Year: 2008

This one’s from Cyberkitten’s blog, check out his answers here … I can rarely resist a decent meme (plus I’m listening to new iTunes tracks 🙂 so here’s mine :

Where you named after anyone ?

Not that I know of, although my proper name was originally going to be what my second name is (Robert). SleepyRob doesn’t quite have the same ring to it though.

When was the last time you cried ?

Hayfever tears probably don’t count – but the last time I had serious issues there was Tuesday, which triggered the post about drugs. Films get me sometimes but I have too much Yorkshire in me to acknowledge tears …

Do you like your handwriting ?

Definitely not. If it wasn’t for the empathy I sometimes display, I’d probably be a doctor. The handwriting fits. Oh to be able to write my signature consistently or to be readily understood by handwriting recognition systems.

What is your favourite lunch meat ?

Corned beef, it’s a bit different to the usual ham or chicken. (And the sarnies are cheap !)

Do you have kids ?

Definitely not.

If you were another person would you be friends with yourself ?

I think so yes – I get on well with honest people who have time for others and I’d like to think I fit both of those descriptors.

Do you use sarcasm a lot ?

My humour tends to depend on bouncing off what other people do or say and sarcasm is one of the options there. But I only use it when it can be made humourous, I rarely set out to upset people. However, driving does tend to pull above average sarcasm out of me …

Do you still have your tonsils ?

Yep.

Would you bunjee jump ?

Bunjee jumping might do me good, temporarily at least. One of my various injuries is an unhappy back and bunjee jumping might straighten it out a bit. Otherwise, no due to all those injuries again. It’s an unnecessary risk and could well end up with something else getting broke.

What is your favourite cereal ?

I rarely eat breakfast, I can’t actually remember when I last had a cereal. Buttered toast for me, although I used to have a soft spot for Frosties.

Do you untie your shoes before taking them off ?

Always.

Do you think you are strong ?

I have or used to have well above average power in my legs, to the point where I’d be able to push a small car fast enough to let it gain enough momentum to get it bump-started. That can’t be bad 🙂 My arms are a bit weak though and my shoulder injury is approaching a status that can only really be described as “crippling”.

What is your favourite ice cream ?

Mint – especially Minty Cornettos.

What is the first thing you notice about people ?

Their “aura” as the New Age people would call it. It’s the sense of what a person is like, how they look at other people. I get on well with people who treat others fairly and not well with people who just don’t give a damn about others. But mostly it’s whether they catch the grin and smile back 🙂

Red or Pink ?

Red Wunz Go Fasta.

What is the least favourite thing about yourself ?

My physical fragility becoming only a slight second to be not actually implementing things I need to do.

Who do you miss the most ?

My brother.

What colour shoes are you wearing ?

No shoes at the moment – I’m at home loafin’ 🙂 Outdoors it’s either black (work shoes) or mostly white (trainers & cricket spikes)

What was the last thing you ate ?

Minipancakes as a substitute for a proper lunch/breakfast. Although after I finish this meme, I’ll be putting the oven on for dinner.

What are you listening to right now ?

Last iTunes track was the second part of Oxygene by Jean-Michel Jarre, now it’s Popdorian by Dubstar from their Disgraceful album.

If you were a crayon, what colour would you be ?

Green or blue. There’s got to be a psychological reason for those being what popped into my head.

Favourite smells ?

Butter on the Popcorn, freshly baked pizza.

Who was the last person you talked to on the phone ?

A work mate looking for info.

Favourite sports you watch ?

CRICKET !!!! And sailing because the sailors aren’t just battling each other, they’re trying to get the best out of the conditions too.

Hair colour ?

Blonde going on brown, depending on how much sun I’ve been exposed to.

Eye Colour ?

Gray/Blue.

Do you wear contacts ?

Never have, although it’s an interesting option. I’m a little too used to wearing glasses I think.

Favourite foods ?

Pizza ! And anything with bacon in it.

Scary movies or happy endings ?

Depends whether or not the ending is telegraphed. If I can guess what’s going to happen, I get bored. Babylon AD was a good one for keeping people guessing. I’d prefer Action movies to the two types above, as I can sit back and enjoy the ride in those.

Last movie you watched ?

Star Wars – Return of the Jedi. I like to watch old classics every once in a while. I’m currently making my mind up as to what will be the Next Movie, as I’ll be chilling out to a dvd while my dinner’s in the oven.

What colour shirt are you wearing ?

T-shirt of the day is a bright red one with a large Skull And Crossbones motif on the back, along with the words “Surrender the Booty”. It nearly got adopted as the motto of an Eve corporation I used to be involved with.

Summer or Winter ?

Cricket is played in Summer.

Hugs or kisses ?

I like hugs.

Favourite dessert ?

Anything with brownies in it. Or chocolate log 🙂

What book are you reading right now ?

Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne. Seen a couple of series based on that book, never read the actual book. Time to remedy that 🙂

What is on your mouse pad ?

I don’t use mice pads at home, I find they get in the way. I use the trackpad on this laptop and the optical sensor on my desktop’s mouse gets on pretty well with the texture of the veneer on my desk.

What did you last watch on TV ?

The climax of the English cricket season. Notts got beat by Hampshire, while Durham beat Kent to go on to win the title.

Favourite sound ?

The beeper on the microwave, although that could be because I’m getting rather hungry right now and the beeper will mean my dinner’s ready. (At least half an hour before then though !)

Rolling Stones or Beatles ?

Beatles – will have to root out Eleanor Rigby for adding to the iTunes Party Shuffle.

What is the farthest you have even been from home ?

Orlando, Florida. Or the various pocket universes that are the domain of my Moo2 empires.

Do you have a special talent ?

I grin at people and they can’t help themselves but to grin back.

Where were you born ?

Birmingham, England.

Somehow, I can rarely resist … I like to know if the characters survive 🙂 (some of the books I read can have a very high body count!)

I don’t think I’ll have too much of a problem with The Next Book – I kinda already know how Around The World In Eighty Days will go, although this is my first reading of the Jules Verne original.

I like to be surprised. It’s like reading a book: the temptation to read/look ahead is always there, but I fight it like the dickens!

Or is it …

The sort of PC games I’m most into take a long time to play through. They’ve usually got an epic storyline as their foundation, with the player being rewarded for progression by seeing a little more of the storyline. Trouble is though, it can be incredibly tedious playing through some of the missions or stages in these games. Which is where walkthroughs and Frequently Asked Questions come in. If you’re stuck on a stage, then the FAQ or Walkthrough should have the answer.

However … Once you have the walkthrough, it’s far, far too tempting to peek ahead to see what’s going to happen. Which can spoil the rest of the game somewhat. I’ve had a good long look at the walkthrough for Baldur’s Gate 2 and had a peek at the walkthrough for a little known one called Star Trek Away Team the other night. Now I’ve had a peek at that latest one, suddenly I’m not too bothered about playing the game any more !

This is where the question of whether it’s a good thing or a bad thing to have a peek at what’s coming ahead. Having a look at the last couple of pages in the book is another example. You know what’s going to happen (kinda!) without having the slog through 500 pages to get there. It’s similar with a game, on the story games progress can suddenly hit a brick wall as you start banging your head against the literally impossible situation the developers have put you in.

Sooo … I know what happens in Baldur’s Gate 2 and Star Trek Away Team, without having the huge long slog through the game with lots of use of the Immortality Clause* to reload from before you started the banging on brick wall thing. A book is a different case, they may be long but you know exactly how long they’re going to be.

One of the selling points of games is the quality of Replayability. In a role play type game, there’s often many different ways to play through to the end point. It’s a rare game though that has true variation in how you get to that end. Warcraft has this now, as you can skip half the content as your character matures. But there is that long slog to get there.

I like the story games 🙂 But it’s often just as much fun to read a book and not nearly so frustrating. Time for a bit more of that. Choice – Grab a copy of the Star Wars Empire at War game, or watch The Empire Strikes Back off dvd. Easy ! I’ll take the option that will avoid getting popcorn butter over my mouse 🙂

*The Immortality Clause – most games have a save feature, which lets you preserve your progress. I call the ability to save & reload back to a point the immortality clause – if something inconvenient happens, like your favourite character developing extra holes, then you can invoke the Immortality Clause, take the game back a bit and get the character back 🙂

One of my various conditions that tends to slow me down and put a brake on the headlong rush that is usually me is hayfever …

It doesn’t hit me in the breathing too much nowadays but what it does do is make my eyes water. Endlessly. It starts at the rubbing of the sleep out of the eyes in the morning and escalates as I poke ’em. Most days, I can handle it and get it under control again using a cloth to dab ’em. Some days though, I have to resort to drugs because the constant watering turns my mindset towards one usually associated with causing watering eyes …

I’m not one for taking drugs to sort a problem, most of the drugs out there seem to be some sort of mask to cover up the real issue. Like painkillers to get people moving again, even though moving would cause more damage to the injured limb. Anti-biotics for something that will cure naturally in time – that’s one of the vectors for MRSA getting a foothold. Stimulants for getting a little more kick out of a too tired body.

I’ll go the stimulant route, even to joking about the Pepsi Max and Crunchie combo that’s almost guaranteed to give me a short term energy boost. That’s no endorsement of those two by the way, as the boost from Crunchies will come from nasty E number yellow colouring and I bet the Pepsi Max effect is just placebo. Every drug has a side effect though, which is why I tend to try and avoid taking them. Like the combo above that gives a short term energy boost which is balanced by a longer term crash.

I’m in the throes of hayfever drug side effects at the moment. The brand name one is what I’ve had stored in a cupboard at work for a while, it’s in date but I’ve made the link between that and the side effects … Which are :

Depression. Tiredness. Joint pain (well – aches, shoulder hasn’t stuck it’s hand up yet). Lack of appetite. Feeling of worthlessness. Lack of motivation (depression?). Clouded thinking. Inability to focus. Tingling limbs (could be the way I’m sitting right now !)

But I haven’t had to wipe my eyes since I took that pill this lunchtime. So a result in one way – but sometimes I’d just rather have the symptom instead of the side effect.

It’s funny in a way, because I used to jokingly refer to the hayfever drugs as performance enhancing for the cricket. I’d take one at about 4pm, so it would take full effect before cricket starting at 6pm. I could breathe all right – but when I went to run, I’d wonder why there was absolutely nothing in the tank. I’d pull the trigger on the sprinting muscles but there would be absolutely nothing there to fuel the engine.

Ok – that’s been a fair bit of outpouring about a problem I’d rather not acknowledge too much – lesson time : If you take a drug, whether it be prescription, off the supermarket shelf, from the bar or acquired any other way, make sure you can know the full effect it may be having. So that’s :

Not running like a loony now that leg pain has been dampened by the painkiller.
Is that hayfever tablet having side effects ?
Don’t drink & drive …
Will that narcotic fry your brain.
Is that coffee masking a body that needs a good feeding ?

We take drugs of all forms for a multitude of reasons and pretty much all of those reasons are good ones. (Can’t understand narcotics users there) But what we should be doing is keeping a level headed monitor on all of the effects of that drug. Not to be a hypochondriac but to try and catch the bad effects before they become crippling.

I probably could walk into the Doctor’s surgery tomorrow (well – tomorrow being on an arranged appointment time) and walk out with a prescription for painkillers for my various joint issues but I know that the painkillers would only be masking the real damage. Plus any drug has a side effect. I think I kinda prefer the occasional mopping up of the eyes to the lack of energy and associated depression that comes out of that particular hay fever tablet ! And besides, I like the occasional milkshake for more reasons than it getting calcium in to shore up my shins.

Right – tablet got taken at 12noon today, it’s a 24 hour tablet, so that means about 14 hours to go before it starts getting out of my system. All I want to do right now is sleep but I have the inner sense in me warring at that to try and keep me sparky. I did have about half an hour sleepytime when I got home though, before rousing to check out the commotion of the shop people who park in front of the house leaving to go home. I doubt whether I’ll be interested in opening a game up tonight but I should be able to make more of a dent in Arthur C Clarke’s 3001.

PS Not giving the name of the hayfever tablet I’m having trouble with cos everyone’s different. As one drug affects me, other’s will be fine with it.

Just finished reading a book set in the Warhammer 40k universe called Rogue Star, written by Andy Hoare.

Curious book this one, it’s set in the Warhammer 40k universe, so it has a decent amount of backstory and structure to call upon. It feels a lot like an introduction, in terms of how it shows the 3 main characters experiencing their universe. There’s space battles here, plus a look at the culture on a world of the Imperium of the 40th millenium.

Trouble is, it definitely is an introduction – at the end of its 250 pages, you feel as if the story is just beginning after a couple of skirmishes. That’s a little disappointing, I guess I’m used to the Timothy Zahn’s, the Iain M. Banks, the David Webers, where each book has its own definite story even though it’s fitting into an epic sequence. Well, maybe Iain M. Banks’ Culture novels don’t slide into each other the way a Zahn trilogy would or Weber’s Honor Harrington books do.

I think I’m in great danger of writing more about other books in this short review than I am about the one the review is about, which could probably be taken as a bad sign. It’s a very readable book this one but I’m a little wary now about spending more cash on Warhammer books. It’s a full price £5.99 for a 250 introduction. When that’s compared to the same or a pound or two more for a Weber epic or a Banks masterpiece, I think I’ll keep collecting the other novels.

Still, I managed to read it pretty quick, which probably shows how much attention the games are getting at the moment 🙂 I read Iain M. Banks’s Excession novel before this one too, another book set in the universe of the Culture. That was a far more interesting book and introduced the dialogue that the Minds have too. The Culture is a society run by machines called Minds, with the Minds looking out for the people who live inside it. It’s an interesting view on Utopia/Distopia, well worth a look if you’ve not been introduced to it.

Essential Iain M. Banks books – Consider Phlebas and The Algebraist. The second of those isn’t Culture but is another Banks masterpiece.

Right – dinner’s about to come out the oven, Ryder Cup is on the telly and I’m going to hide behind another book while it’s on. This time it’s the turn of 3001 by Arthur C. Clarke, which is a beneficiary of the A To Z book challenge 🙂

I had a look at Nationstates a few years ago – interesting idea but I did get bored of it after a while due to it going through a few cycles for its questions. I was spotting the repetition coming in.

I’d guess the book would be better 🙂 Computer stuff tends to fall down because the game can only do as it’s programmed, whereas a book’s plot is completely up to the author and can therefore go in unexpected directions.

Will have to have a peek 🙂

I am weird. I have read some of the books for the challenge…but I have this bizarre anxiety of writing the reviews. I want to do my reviews justice.

One book that I read “Jennifer Government” will have to get a review soon….while I can still consult it for accuracy. It’s a library book. 🙂

Jennifer Government is funny. I loved reading it….just as much as I enjoy playing NationStates and NationStates2 (both based on the book, if you didn’t know).

Well….talking about it here, I have at least some idea what I will talk about when I review Jennifer Government. 🙂

Am with you here – it is a sad, sad day amd a great loss to music.

Alas as great as Dark side is, it 40 million sales only makes it the equal 5th greatest selling album of all time with Saturday Night Fever.
The title of greatest selling album of all time goes, by very large margin, to THriller with 108 million copies sold

My “Wizard” did both your suggestions, plus a whole host of other stuff…And….NADA!

It is so bloody frustrating…And NOW, Blogger is really screwed up, too! I have no idea what to do about that!

The Gas Pipe is starting to look really nice to me….(lol)