Science, Technology

Is high octane fuel worth the extra cost?

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Question came up when talking to my Dad, who uses premium petrol in his cars.

For the varietals available in KL (and in the UK), almost certainly no. Most of the guidance I found in various forums online indicate that you should use the grade recommended for your car (Quora, Yahoo Answers and beyond).

For my Dad’s car, a 4 year old Merc, the manual recommends “high” octane fuel – i.e. 91 grade or above. The ‘low’ octane fuel available here is 95, the high 97 (at a 25% additional cost premium), so the 95 should be fine for him. I think its a similar situation in the UK.

As I understand it the octane number indicates the fuel’s combustibility, with higher octane fuels being less ‘explosive.’ Net issue, if you use a lower octane number in an engine tuned for high octane fuel, you can throw the timing off as presumably the combustion takes place faster than it should. The reverse doesn’t sound like its as much of an issue, so it doesn’t hurt to use the high octane fuel – but it isn’t necessarily worth the money.

In short, use what’s recommended for your car!

Dadblogging, Observational, Shopping

Observations on baby clothing

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Inspired by my good lady wife, this post.

1. Buttons are fiddly. Push-fasteners would be better.

2. Fasteners should be on the front or side of clothes. Things on the back are annoying.

3. Anything that requires pulling over a baby’s head is almost automatically less good than anything that doesn’t.

4. Anything that requires actual tying is optimistic at best, except with shoelaces and even that’s a bit much.

5. There’s this thing – velcro – which is awesome. Apply liberally.

6. Thick clothes need more wiggle room – baby’s arms don’t bend like spaghetti into tight spaces.

7. Emily’s really enjoying the extra freedom she has from being a bit, erm, nakeder, in the warm weather here in Malaysia.

…I’m sure that there are fashion designers out there would would read this with disdain, saying “fasteners are so last year, dah-ling,” but as a Dad I’d pick practicality and comfort over style every time. This isn’t an argument I’ll win every time but it’s nice to voice the thought.

Running, Training

Malaysian running training #2

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A disappointing training day. With the broken treadmill my highly motivating wife suggested we go to a gym, and we found one in Celebrity Fitness, a chain of gyms with an outlet in Mid Valley Megamall, a 10 minute drive from the house and a building full of distractions for Amanda, Emily and Emily’s Grandpa, who volunteered as chauffeur and local guide.

First, we looked for a replacement treadmill. Limited progress was made with the actual dealer we wanted to visit, despite claiming to have an outlet in Mid Valley on their website, actually not so much existing. So it may be some time before we sort that out.

Let’s start with the things that were good about the Celebrity Fitness experience.

1. They had good working treadmills
2. They had reasonable showers

And the bad:

1. Appalling customer service. I was shuttled back between the front desk and the customer service desk, not told where the changing rooms or equipment was, asked for my mobile number three times (“I don’t have a local mobile”), and made to wait for 10 minutes whilst they registered my limited information for a day guest pass. I’d made reasonably clear that I wasn’t going to join and just wanted a transactional relationship with them – give me a pass, damnit! Eventually got in, having eaten into a short window of time I had for the workout.
2. Damnit it was hot. It must have been 30 degrees in there WITH the airconditioning going. The whole point for me in going to a gym was to avoid the blistering outdoor heat!
3. It cost RM60 – about £12. An absolute rip-off for the experience.
4. There were no locks on the lockers (another fact they didn’t apprise me of – should I have just known? I told them I was from the UK, they could have given me a heads up…). You’re meant to bring your own, apparently, so kit stayed with me – including during my shower. Fortunately I found a broom closet to stash my stuff in whilst I had the world’s quickest shower.
5. Crap water coolers, despite the heat.

So… not going back there. Will find another way to work out here. My mediocre run total for the day came to approx 5k in 33 minutes. Not a great time on a treadmill.

0n the plus side, whilst I continued to fail to find a foam roller, I did remember that Sudhir told me I could do the ITB workout with a tennis ball – so will dig around the house for one of them instead!

Technology

Family technical support

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I’ve had a few tasks since being here, including:

1. Rebuilding an old PC (I love the speed of a fresh XP install in the morning)
2. Retrieving data off a failed hard drive
3. Sorting out the wireless networking on the new FiOS net connection they have here
4. Sorting out a networking solution for my Dad’s Skype enabled Panasonic Viera TV
5. Setting up the new Logitech HD camera and Vid we got my Dad for his birthday (they’re a client but I paid full – well, Amazon – price for a matched pair) so they can talk to their grandchild in HD when we’re back in the UK. I’d use Skype but their HD certification is not very well entrenched with the manufacturers yet.
6. Setting up for remote access etc., so I can help them when things go wrong when I’m not here
7. Patching the hell out of all their software (thank you FileHippo)

It’s all gone fairly smoothly. Two points to note – first, PC Expos absolutely SUCK in Malaysia. Rammed full of people, the one way system forces you to plough your way through a massive crowd for limited satisfaction. Incredibly badly designed thoroughfare that I’m sure violated every fire and health and safety regulation there is – if such things were enforced in Malaysia.

Second, Powerlink networking really is the absolute simplest way of getting a big house online! I actually bought the kit to connect the Viera TV, which didn’t come with built in wireless and requires a Netgear wireless adapter that no-one here stocks, but it could just as easily have been used as a range extender on a Wifi network (with a second AP) etc. Impressively simple stuff from the nice people at TP-Link, who I’d not heard of a few weeks ago but now seem well entrenched, both in the UK and here, as the budget networking solution of choice. With Linksys going Cisco-upmarket and 3Com doing the HP thing, I guess a few people had to take advantage at this end of the market.

Anyway, hopefully I’m done with fixing things (just need to figure out how to configure Viera-Skype), and can continue to focus on baby, family, my lovely wife and get started with the writing. And the fitness training. Crikey, I’m trying to fit a lot in!

Personal

Baby training academy

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Emily is *so* close to rolling over. Amanda and I have taken to giving her a bit of extra training – more tummy time and some assisted rolls. It’s a matter of days, we think!

One of the many highlights of recent days has been seeing her start to be even more responsive and interactive during activities like this. She smiles during tummy time, gazing around the room to see the smiling relatives looking on adoringly. She even lifts her head up so she can get a good chomp on Sophie the Teething Giraffe (a favourite toy).

The other recent fantastic experience is seeing her react to her buggy – in the UK she wasn’t quite big enough to sit in the buggy chassis for her Silver Cross Surf pram, but the relatively cheap and cheerful Hauck three wheeler we’ve acquired over here (something like this) is better suited to her current size – and she sits in it literally trembling with excitement as she zooms around shopping malls, leaning forward (she’s in a permanent state of crunch) to grab the bar and lift herself up for an even better view. She giggles joyously when we play with her in it.

Huge fun. Being a dad is *awesome*.

Injuries, Training

A roller, a roller, my kingdom for a roller

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61 dFeEhrnL._SL500_AA300_I’ve been desperately hunting around Malaysian sports shops looking for a foam roller, which you may remember was a big part of my miracle cure for ITBS.

Admittedly my current plans for heavy running training have been somewhat curtailed by  breaking the treadmill but we’re hunting for a gym I can use (only madmen would run outdoors in the 34 degree heat, torrential tropical thunderstorms and / or mosquito haven). Also, without incurring cost-prohibitive data roaming charges, I don’t have Runkeeper here to track distance/pace, and so my motivation for outdoor running falls to zero…

Unfortunately, either Malaysian runners don’t suffer from ITBS (despite previous assurances from doctors in the UK that it was the most common running injury), or… people here don’t really run, and running/sports shops are for trendiness only.Given there is a KL marathon the latter doesn’t seem too likely, but garrrrrrrrrrr all the same.

I may have to resort to tying together several yoga mats into a tight roll and seeing whether that will help. Any Malaysian runners out there can help me find one of these???

Personal

Giggles with Emily

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gigglesMy daughter’s adorable. She’s not easy to make laugh, though, and therefore it was with a real sense of achievement that I not only managed to eke out a full 2 minutes of giggles out of her with the help of Ambrose the Hippo (now renamed Peeka), playing peekaboo off the edge of her buggy – but also captured it on video!

If you’re a Facebook friend you can view the vid on my wall. If you’re not, you get this pic. She’s even more beautiful when she laughs!

Miscellany

Advice on haircuts…

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…that I need to take myself.

1) Don’t allow anyone with ridiculous hair to cut your own

2) Don’t reference actors who you really haven’t seen on TV in 8 years (David Boreanaz / Angel was my reference point today)

3) Be wary of hairdressers that think you’re after good value in a haircut. I’m happy to come back in 3 weeks rather than have a “trim” take me down to my roots.

Thanks, “A Cut Above” and curse jetlag for having me half-asleep during the hour long ordeal. It was still cheaper than my local barber in Victoria, though… the wonders of developing nation labour costs.

Film

Bafta for the Eagleman Stag

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My friend Ben Please (of Urusen fame) and his brother Michael recently won a BAFTA – which is pretty awesome. I haven’t been able to find the full short animated film online (presumably it’s still doing the circuits at festivals etc) but the trailer follows below. Michael talks about it here.

I think Michael is the mastermind of this rather than Ben, and whilst I’ve not met Michael I’d previously encountered via his work on the Urusen music video, Nosediving – also below. A lovely song.

 

Diet, Training

Oops, I broke the treadmill

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Seeing as I’m in Malaysia for the next few weeks all my running training is happening on a treadmill. Which I broke today after my first run – a 5ker which I finished in 27.45. Theoretically this is a good time for me but in practice – the treadmill makes things so much easier I should be able to get closer to a 20 minute 5k. See if I can manage that this trip, once the treadmill repair people see if they can replace the part… Not that its a cheap treadmill (it’s not) or I’m a heavy lump (less obviously untrue) but suspect some of the plastic goes brittle in the hot humid conditions…

The speed wasn’t inspired by this, but in an interestind sidebar: My Dad’s friend popped over the other night and recommended PACE training for fatburning (which I need, the fatburning not necessarily the PACE training). I’d not heard of it before and am slightly suspicious of it despite the logic, which is (in part) – you want to get into the fat burning zone and stay there long enough for your body to switch substrates, but not convince your body to switch to creating fat to support the ‘habit’ – a consequence of which is you should chuck your long distance running/ aerobics routine.

I’m vastly suspicious of anything that tries to make weight loss sound ‘easy’ and Dr Sears’ method sounds a bit too good to be true (12 minute workouts etc)…

I need to understand more about human metabolism. I wish Ben Goldacre would write a book about this stuff as between this and the nutrionist stuff he writes about in Bad Science I’m sure there’s a bunch of debunking (or at least: rational explaining) of this, Sears, Atkins, and every other populist weight-loss plan we get confronted with at parties so that I could provide a semi-definitive – “it sounds great but like too much work for me” or “the science makes no sense.”

Anyway, I mostly run for fun rather than weightloss (although that’s a necessary objective for me if I’m to break a 2hr time for the half this year).

Armand David's personal weblog: dadhood, technology, running, media, food, stuff and nonsense.