Month: July 2010

Muahaha – I take it you've just become aware of that moronic survey as well.

Spotted those in HMV today going for 2 for £10 … was very tempted 🙂

Strangely enough, my inbox was hit harder this week than last …

Work is "fun" here too, we have people who say they do stuff but need very careful checking to point out where they haven't.

Firefly and Jericho both ended before their time. Serenity was a decent continuation but it kinda tore up that universe. Same with Defying Gravity and B5 Crusade, excellent concepts killed off by idiot moguls.

LoL @ the parking spaces reference! Too right!

You need Killers, Iron Maiden, Number of the Beast and Piece of Mind. IMHO the early albums are by far the best.

Sounds like a good break to me, though atm I would rather be practiclaly anywhere but at work. It's really stressful 🙁

I was quite pleased that they made a decent stab at closing out Dollhouse properly though was diappointed it got rushed so much -just when the storyline was potentially devleoping and getting interesting. There were a few non-siquiters especially involving Alpha but consiering the time they had left, not bad at all. Don't even get me started on why they had to drop another good series (RIP Firefly and Jericho as just two others)…

Back to work tomorrow, so it’ll be back to the old routine of oversleeping and then rushing out to get to work before they run out of teacakes.

Or more appropriately, to get out of the house at that certain time that gets me through the traffic easier. It works out to me clocking in between 9.05 and 9.15 most days, safely within teacake supply timings.

I’m always curious the evening before returning to work after a break. What’s happened ? What’s the gossip ? Has the Big Stick ™ come out ? (When the IT Girl speaks, we obey – well, I do at least). Have the wheels come off ? How has everyone been ? IS THE CANTEEN STILL SELLING TEACAKES ?

The wheels do that you know, they can’t survive at work without me. Honest. (Yeah right! I iz small kog in Big weel)

Anyway, it’ll be good to go back. There’s only so much hometime downtime I can take before I start clawing the walls in boredom. That hasn’t actually happened yet this time, I bet because I’ve been picking music up again. This time, it’s a double Dubstar album (Goodbye) joining their Make It Better album. I first heard Dubstar by catching their track Anywhere on early Saturday morning telly, the same as how I picked up on Alisha’s Attic. I was impressed with the Disgraceful album but initially hadn’t thought much of Make It Better.

Opinions change though, with time – my music tastes have got a lot more varied lately 🙂 (I blame the Sister)

Doh – missed one of my traditions. Can’t talk music without a video link, here’s Stars.

I’ve had a couple of objectives this week, fairly simple ones because they involved not doing much. Objective 1 – chill out. Think I’ve managed that. I have the borderline insomnia that I get when I’m not tired when bedtime comes around.

Objective 2 – injury healing. Dunno there. My shoulder isn’t in pain but we’ll see how it is when I stretch for something. Ankle is bad news, I reckon I’ll have to take it to the doc’s because when dancing out the door of the pizza shop (it made sense at the time), it wanted to go Crunch again. Won’t keep me out of cricket but it’s a bit of a pain (sic) not being able to put power through it on hard ground.

Objective 3 – clear the box of recorded stuff. Check 🙂 It was at 27 hours recorded on there before Sherlock started recording. It started at about 16 hours free … Plenty of X Files and Deadliest Catch watching going on and I was very impressed with how they closed out the Dollhouse.

Objective 4 – listen to lots of music. Oh yes. Definitely. iTunes tells me I’ve listened to 669 different songs lasting 1.7 days over the past 7. Not bad 🙂 Oh – joining Dubstar on iTunes was Plastic Beach from Gorillaz and an old All About Eve live album.

Plastic Beach is definitely the better of the three, although I have a feeling I haven’t gotten to the standout tracks from Goodbye yet. I think it’s the variation I like in Plastic Beach, plus the better ones start slow and then build. It’s good stuff. It might be next weekend though before I get to listen to it as an album, cos I like to listen to individual tracks first before running them through as an album.

People who know me really well will be wondering about me & gaming … There’s no objective 5 : Game As Much As Possible in there :-). I guess I must be getting fairly reformed there. I’ve been in the games occasionally, with a few runs through Settlers IV and a bit of Borderlands tonight. Not much Eve though … apart from a little bit of redeploying ships. Strange. Possibly more confirmation that my games addiction has been replaced by a music addiction.
(I’ll be covering thoughts on that in a blog post about personality change …)

Ok. There was an Objective 5 : “Get through the Turtledove book”. Which I succeeded in 🙂 Funny – a 500 page book needed months of hard slog to get through. The next book was a 320 pager by Jack Campbell which took just under 48 hours to go cover to cover. I still want to get that Turtledove series read … even it takes me the next decade. 4 down, 4 to go – home straight. Current book is Storm From The Shadows from David Weber, I’m 300 pages through that out of 1000.

I’m sure I’ll have plenty more reading to do when I get back in tomorrow … Wonder if my inbox has survived the assault it’ll have been getting this last week ?

Week off this week ! Hurrah

Looking to stay off my feet as much as I can get away with and generally take it e-z. Looking for the various niggles to settle down, so I can get back into haring around a cricket field like a mad thing. Also looking to get the brain recharged so I can plan what I do instead of just reacting to the next firefight task.

Went up to see the parents on the weekend, sister was there too. Bit of a whirlwind weekend, definitely with some strangeness cos the sister was the one fixing my dad’s laptop and not me ! It’s another Acer, which has been very sturdy over its mebbe 3.5 year life but has been slowing down lately. It’s another victim of Kaspersky … Which has now been removed. It’s a dog eat dog world in the area of computer software and if one company’s product disappoints, well there’s plenty of other companies out there gagging to sell you stuff.

So Kaspersky has been ditched due to issues with its IS 2010 product (false alarm reports are not good if non-IT people see them) and because it’s another of those products that gets in the way. Avira is on there now and the laptop is a little quicker again. Still 3 and a half years ain’t bad. There’s only one sign of hardware failure and that’s a flickering screen. I’d buy Acer, as shown by me tapping this post out on an Acer laptop. (Which is a turnaround, as Acer Labs hit my Blacklist after disappointments with a previous motherboard)

We went up this weekend cos we were going to see Yorkshire play Notts at Trent Bridge. That’s only about an hour away from where my mum & dad live, not too far at all. The best cricket matches are close run things, where from start to finish you don’t have a clue who will win. This wasn’t one of those, as Yorkshire’s batting got blown away by good bowling quite early.

Our side lost … but that was ok cos – I got to shake the Hand Of Bumble ! Spotted the legend that is ex England batsman and Sky commentator David Lloyd making his way around the ground. Called over “Good afternoon sir, we’ve just been listening to you on the car radio” (which we had !) And the proffered hand was duly shaken.

Made my day 🙂

Right – I fell asleep last night wishing I could spend more time in my current Jack Campbell book (finished Turtledove no 4 – finally…), it’s nigh on time to get back to it accompanied by the first of what’s going to be a LOT of iTunes listening.

12 – if you have to ask … lol 🙂

Teacakes – Monday to Thursday, Bacon bun – Friday 🙂

Curious about the iPad, just not sure I'd find an excuse to use it. I've owned an iPaq for years that is just satnav only now.

Makes you wonder why the religious people waste time sticking around here when they could be going to the Pearly Gates … Get on with it and stop taking up our parking spaces ! 🙂

Need more Iron Maiden, I only have Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, Powerslave and Somewhere In Time.

Some of those definitley resonate with me but I have to ask: Is that bacon with teacakes?

With respect to gadgets – the iPad is everything it promised to be and so much more. I love mine : )

I do find it interesting that religious people cannot conceive of a life worth living without religion (I have had the same discussion myself). Do thye not have friends, family, experinces they love? I was also accused once of having no morality without religion but that's another discussion (one that peron lost).
Iron Maiden rock BTW 🙂

Good list.

Confused by No 12 though…… [grin]

A good friend, Cyberkitten got asked during a theological related debate what makes his atheist life worth living. He answered “Brunettes”. Which is something I whole heartedly agree with. CK then expanded that to include 20 items, which has given me an idea …

Here’s CK’s original post (linky) and here’s mine :

(I’m trying not to steal too much)

1 – Brunettes – definitely. I tend to go ~wibble~ when asked for help by brunettes.
2 – Blondes & redheads – see above.
3 – Cricket – sport of kings and it suits me down to the ground. Man’s sport, not a sport for babies like football.
4 – PIZZA – I think I’m part Ninja Turtle.
5 – Chocolate – Dairy Milk. And I seem to be able to eat Giant Buttons now with no ill effect 🙂
6 – Music – all kinds, see my Thursday 13’s for more there 🙂 (Iron Maiden at the moment)
7 – Games – I’m a very competitive person.
8 – Scifi – gives an escape from this rather humdrum world.
9 – Driving round corners way too fast – guaranteed to give me a Silly Grin.
10 – Making people smile – The Grin ™ is almost guaranteed there.
11 – Being able to help people – cheers me up, makes me feel useful.
12 – Ooh La La 😉
13 – Books – and anything that says “new experience”.
14 – Gadgets – I’m not an Early Adopter but I do like to see things Work. The more Efficient, the better.
15 – Teacakes & bacon – pinching a bun in the canteen (40p for a teacake) is always a great way to start the day.
16 – Flirting – comes with that making people smile thing.
17 – Milkshakes – definitely partial to an occasional strawberry milkshake.
18 – Mischief & misdirection – I love making people think completely the wrong thing.
19 – Good friends – I don’t count myself as having that many close friends but those I have, they are awesome people who are truly treasured.
20 – HUGS – what better thing to look forward to getting ?

That’s 20, so it’s time to indulge at least 2 of those … I have a box of Maltesers in the fridge that ain’t gonna survive the night.