I used to know this and then I forgot it, and a guy asked me for it today, so I had to look it up again, so now I'm writing a story here so that I can easily find it the next time I'm asked for it. Gosh, that was a crappy sentence! I have an LG TU500 3G phone on Telstra's NextG network. This and it's equivalent, the TU550 and the Canadian CU500 are all really good phones with great reception and there is a hidden service code that unlocks a feature that allows you to view the receive signal strength. Type the following code from the idle screen just as if you were going to dial it as a number; *748#96 . Don't dial the . that's just there to end the sentence (not that there is a dot on the phone anyway). A yellow box will pop up with a bunch of useless information, but next to "RSSI:" you will see the receive level. I can't tell you what is good or bad, but whilst I'm sitting in my office in the centre of Hobart I see about -60. Every time the number raises or drops by 3 that is a doubling or halving in the signal strength.

[UPDATE] OK, this has prompted some discussion so here is a bit more info. The best thing to look at is apparently on the third page. After you have entered the code press the down button on the phone three times and you should see a page that says RF State. Ignore that and look below it where it says RSCP. That is the number that you want to watch. The lower the number the stronger the signal, so you want to see low numbers here. It stands for Receive Signal Code Power (boring isn't it!). Below this is something called ECIO. That apparently means Energy per Chip over noise. I'm assuming this is a noise margin, so the larger the number the better. If the number gets to zero then thesignal is the same level as the background noise and you will have no service. Using this information you can tell that the antenna is at the top of the mainbody of the phone somewhere near the camera. If you put your hand over the camera you will see the RSCP go higher indicating that you are blocking some of the signal, so don't hold your phone there if you are out in the sticks! Oh yeah, to get out of it just hit the red hang up button.

Sorry, this is not a photo of Lara Bingle (of "So where the bloody hell are you" fame), it's a photo of the back end of my car. I park down by the water at the Hobart Regatta Grounds (my car has a better view than my office!) and some mongrel cut a corner and swiped the back bumper then took off without leaving a note. All I know is that their vehicle was white. Because they didn't leave a note I now have to pay the excess (fair enough) but I also loose my no claims bonus (this stinks). They reckon I'm at fault because I can't supply the name of the other party. I was about one kilometer away at the time, so how can it be my bloody fault?!?! I'll have to go and get a quote to see if it's worth claiming on. It doesn't seem to be too badly damaged other than the slice out of the plastic and they might be able to plastic weld that up. I had no idea the bumper was full of foam. I wonder if the car would float?

I couldn't believe my eyes the other day when I saw a wild rabbit munching on the weeds in my back yard. If I lived near the bush I could understand it, but I'm only a 10 minute walk from the beach. I guess there is some bush about a 10 minute walk in the other direction, but it's still a long way through suburban streets for a little bunny to hop. I told Emma and Brad but I don't think they believed me until they saw him for themselves. Then the next day there were two! They both stayed around for about a week so I was under strict orders not to cut the grass weeds as it was the flowers that they were eating. Unfortunately I haven't seen them for a few days now, so I cut the grass on the weekend. They are probably in someones tummy now!