The Spanish airline Iberia seems to be missing something on their world map.

For those that haven’t experienced the wonders of the NSW licensing system, there are four levels of license – learners, red provisional, green provisional, and full. Obtaining a full license takes roughly the same period of time as an undergraduate university degree, but in my opinion still fails to train good drivers. Having driven for more than the required period of time for a full license I didn’t want to drive with unnecessary restrictions.

During my initial enquiry I was told that as I had previously held a NSW driving license, my time driving in Sweden did not count. Thus I would be returned to the red provisional license I held prior to moving to Sweden.

In other words, if I had never got my NSW drivers licence, I would be issued a full license. But as I held a red provisional red before leaving Australia, I would have to return to this level.

I obviously wasn’t happy, and questioned the reasoning. The officer at the RTA told me that I was obviously not able to understand, and asked if I need her supervisor to explain the rules to me. Hoping for a more reasoned discussion, I said yes.

For the next 10 minutes I waited while they reviewed all the paperwork. Mercedes, the supervisor, came and saw me and said the guidelines were unclear what should happen in this situation, but to leave the matter with her and she would call me. In the mean time I should get a translation of my license, which has to come from NSW Government’s Community Relations Commission.

European driving licenses have been designed so that they do not need to be translated. There is a set of standard numbers across the European Union to identify the various bits of data (eg. 1 is surname, 2 is given names). However, for 75 AUD the NSW government takes 14 business days to translate a European license to English. I know someone is being ripped off here …

After two weeks Mercedes called me back. She said she had some luck with the policy review board, and to bring everything in and she would tell me more. After waiting the final couple of days for the NSW Community Relations Commission to do their thing, I put everything together and headed back to the RTA.

Mercedes told me that the policy review board wanted me to go back to my red provisional license, but she was able to successfully argue my case. After paying an additional 157 AUD for a five year license, I was on my way – full license in hand.

This morning, the hourly service to Karlskrona mosied on through Kristianstad C 45 minutes behind schedule.

Øresundståg managed to top themselves this afternoon with a complete shutdown of the rail system in southern Sweden, stopping my train in Kristianstad. Luckily this time Oziel and I put in a two day buffer to get to the airport.

Given the size of the outage there are no buses. But I was able to make usage of the expert knowledge Oziel acquired from years of working in Lund. After deciding my fate with the trains was hopeless, I tightly grabbed all my bags and ran across Kristianstad to just catch the SkåneExpress 1 bus to Malmö. Despite the theoretical longer travel time, we have always found this the most reliable service.

Now … to decide how to get to the airport. We don’t want a repeat of the Christmas episode.

I read Qantas’ excess luggage pricing, and was sure there had been some misunderstanding. So I called Qantas to confirm the price of sending on additional bag of 23 kg. I was told in a calm, matter-of-fact tone that the price would be 850 AUD. At this price, an extra 23 kg bag doubles the cost of one ticket [96% extra for those that don't like exaggeration].

I was completely beside myself. I can’t understand how they can justify that price. At that price, I want an extra seat and extra carry-on luggage allowance too.

The comparison rate for an additional 23 kg bag from British Airways is 50 AUD, only 6% of the price charged by Qantas. Now I am considering leaving bags here, and picking them up on my next flight to Europe—which will not be with Qantas.

Seeing this policing suggests to me that Alan Joyce, Qantas’ CEO, should have thought twice about rejecting his job offer from RyanAir.

The website has a clean design and the process is simple. Once you register you need to wait 24 hours before you can vote. Online votes must be cast before 6:00pm EDST on 25 March 2011. Unfortunately the online process is not open to most people who can vote on election day.

However, I am unhappy with this “improvement.” These changes weren’t propagated through the whole system. So while the train I catch to work in the morning will leave 10 minutes earlier, it will still arrive at the same time. The train will stop in the middle of the journey for 10 minutes at Karlshamn station for no apparent reason. This makes me very grumpy.

As much as I hate all of the delays the trains have faced the last two winters and summers, I am not convinced making every trains late is the answer. I would prefer to go on angry rants once or twice a week than suffer every day.

But I wanted to be more secure – and the fact is I have forgotten a number of passwords that I rarely use, which has cost me money and wasted my time. After some research I chose LastPass as a password management solution. It comes recommended from LifeHacker, Gina Tripani and Leo LaPorte.

For Mac users I found out that Sophos now has a free anti-virus solution. While I have only been using it for some hours, it does not seem to suck like the other solutions I have been trying. That said it hasn’t found anything – but I am taking to be a good sign.

For all other security tidbits I will point to the blog of Bruce Schneier. This will save me various airline security rants.