About Me

This Site

This site is written in xhtml, with php being my preferred scripting language..

For many years I had the site hosted on my ISP's free webspace which did not give me access to an SQL database. I am working on importing those articles.
My current authoring system is Adobe Dreamweaver CS4 and I use Photoshop CS4 for Images and graphics.

My first site was written in notepad and to a degree I still prefer to start a site in code before moving into a wysiwyg environment.

One of the functions of this site is to allow me to test various scripts and applications for future use in client sites or just to expand my web development skills. As this is a personal site as well as a developmental one I am able to take some liberties that I may not use in a corporate site. As such it is recommended that you have a screen resolution of at least 1024 x 768 pixels and javascript enabled.

To view the rest of the "about me" content, please click on the tabs below.

Personal Details

My name is Stuart Shearing, I live in Perth, Western Australia and this... is my life

  • I was born in London, England in October 1969 and moved to Australia in May 1981.
  • With a few exceptions, I have lived mostly in Perth's northern suburbs, particularly around the Morley area.
  • My humour is a little twisted, slightly sarcastic and overweighted with irony.
  • I am a cat person, and dogs really don't do anything for me. I don't know why that is.
  • I am working full time while building up my own business. 2008 has been a turning point for me and I am planning on reducing my employment hours to part time as my business booms.
  • While I do enjoy movies, time restrictions mean I don't get to very often. I tend to watch at home.
  • I listen to all kinds of music and I sing along. I sing at work, I sing at home, I sing in the car.. I didn't say that I was any good, but that doesn't stop me!
  • I'm a homebody and enjoy finding little projects to do around the house. I particularly enjoy gardening and have taken to growing vegetables.
  • I recycle.. I compost.. I would really like to convert to solar power .. I don't know when it was that I turned into a greenie!
  • I have a passion for photography which can be found in the gallery section of this site
  • I have two beautiful children who I love more than anything else in this world.
  • My wife Lia has two children as well, this makes us a "blended family" or what most people refer to as a "Brady Bunch" family.
  • I'm hopelessly addicted to Teh botol, an Indonesian tea drink which has far too much sugar in to be healthy but it's great for washing down spicy Indonesian food.
  • Aku belajar bahasa Indonesia sudah tiga tahun sekarang.
    Seharusnya aku sudah tau banyak! hihihi
 Family 2006
Likes and Dislikes
The Things I Like
  • Music - It really is my biggest passion
  • Computers - Welcome to the Geek family (you'd understand this if you saw my home office)
  • Cooking - I particularly enjoy cooking for family and friends
  • Eating - It follows on from "cooking" (above)
  • Photography - The advent of the digital camera has profoundly effected this site.
  • Gardening - Increasingly larger efforts and projects.
The Things That Shit Me
  • Racism - I just don't get this one, we're all fundamentally the same
  • Homophobia - If you're really REALLY worried about it, maybe it's time to take a good long look at yourself.
  • Feeling Unproductive - I always find things to keep myself busy - if I'm not busy, then I'd rather be sleeping (which I don't seem to do enough of anyway).
  • VoiceMail - I just don't like speaking to machines... Which brings me to
  • Voice driven computers on telephone with Telstra being the chief protagonist.
  • ASL - The "Age/Sex/Location question is NOT a greeting . There is nothing wrong with asking this question, but it really should not be used in the first couple of lines. Say hello, ask how someone is. you can probably break asl down into a number of questions anyway and it will make for much more fulfilling chat.
    It probably should be noted that the main reason this annoys me is that just about every conversation that starts with ASL doesn't go any further than my reply.
  • Picking up on IRC - Most hardcore chatters have their own communities, and are not interested in randoms coming onto their channels attempting to "score a root"[?]
  • People who park in Disabled bays - Ignorance IS NOT a disability.
  • Cheesy American comedy. Don't get me wrong, there is some really good American comedy, but then there's also a lot of shit. (See Irony, above)
Family 2006
Favourites
  • Music
    • Pink Floyd - My mother playing "The Wall" at high volume influenced my taste in music. My favourite album is "Animals"
    • Iron Maiden - Got me through High School
    • Rammstein - Hard core German Industrial rock.
    • System of A Down - The "Gilbert and Sullivan" of metal
    • Metallica - before the black album when they used to be good and before they started to sue their fans!
    • Australian HipHop - Particularly "The Herd"
    • Vivaldi - The Four Seasons.
    • Holst - "Mars" from The Planets Suite
    • Tchaikovsky - 1812 Overture - Roll out the cannons!
    • The Beatles - Particularly their later stuff, The White Album, Sergeant Peppers
    • Neil Diamond, Kate Bush, Simon and Garfunkel, Abba and a whole line of other bands that my peers just won't like!
    • Midnight Oil - Political Australian rock band
    • There is literally a heap of other stuff I listen to, not necessarily of a particular band, just tracks or songs or music that grabs me at the time.
  • Movies
    • The Sound of music - The hills are alive... Ok I don't care, I still love this movie.
    • Pink Floyd, The Wall - This is a love it or hate it movie and due to the strong influence of the album being played really loud when I was growing up it's not hard to work out why I fall into the first category.
    • Star Trek 4 - The one with the whales (Yes, I know my Geek is showing)
    • The Rocky Horror Picture Show - Its just a jump to the left
    • Matrix - I've not seen the sequels and I have no intention to have the first one spoilt by them.. I don't know if this makes me old school or just stubborn, probably the latter
    • The Harry Potter movies.
    • The Lion King, Aladdin, Lilo and Stitch, Beauty and the Beast, Finding Nemo, The Incredibles and a whole heap of other movies my kids watch over and over again!
    • 2001 - A space oddessy
    • For the record I particularly HATED - Forrest Gump (propaganda and patriotism at it's worse), Dumb and Dumber (the name says it all), The Blair Witch Project (over hyped and under entertaining).
      I'd previously included all Adam Sandler movies in this category but his more recent work is a definite improvement on the lowest common denominator style humour so I'm retracting!
  • Cars
    • My favourite car was a 1997 Subaru Impreza wagon. The car was so well balanced and the constant four wheel drive gave it incredible traction on the road. I brought it new and had it around 3 and a half years.
    • Sentimental favourite would be my 1974 Ford Escort. It was a complete rust bucket, it constantly broke down, and it was my first car. Everyone is allowed to have irrational feelings over their first car :)
    • Worst car - A 1999 Mitsubishi 8 seater wagon that lacked power and personality and is very prone to breaking down.
    • Current car - 2006 Hyundai Santa Fe, replacing the 2003 version.
  • Television
    • Doctor Who - My favourite show of all time, I used to watch it religiously and now it is back on the ABC I am watching (and recording) it again. I collected the books from the series. when I was younger and now I'm working on the DVD's as they become available. Yes, I'm in the "obsessed fan" category.
    • I don't really watch much else, although I do enjoy NCIS, probably because of all the computer detective work bringing out my inner geek again!
  • Websites
    • A sporadically updated list of Websites I have enjoyed at one time or another can be found on this site in the Links section.
  • Theology
    • I was born into a Protestant Christian family now I am Buddhist with Theravada leanings.
Occupation

After many years of doing contract work I was invited to move back to full time employment working in the hospitality management, My future, however is my web design business and I have spent 2008 building it up to a point where I can now consider it to be a viable business 

Other Bits

I am an IRC addict, although these days I am finding myself way too busy to actually chat. Once upon a time I used to leave my machine permanently connected but am now on a power saving drive and turning computers off when not in use.

If you want to chat to me this way, my nick is usually stu or juslooken and you can find me on the DALnet network. I operate the #perth channel and can be found there. Yes, I know about Austnet.. Thanks, but no thanks!

I am a home body, I prefer to entertain at home rather than go out to a pub, in fact these days I hardly drink alcohol. Also I would rather watch a movie when it comes out on DVD rather than see it at the cinema. I do like to go out to restaurants for a meal though!

I'm musically eclectic. I like music that stirs passion, however I find increasingly the music played on commercial radio is bland and lacks any passion at all. Its all standard doof doof, or sappy love songs produced purely for its marketability and not for pleasure.
My musical tastes range from classical and opera, to hiphop, metal, I love music from the 50s through to the 80's. I particularly enjoy something with strong guitar work, or heavy bass as well as vocals that have strong messages, stories or political content.