Author: Sleepypete

Nope. Not advertising chocolate biscuit bars today ! Just spotted a meme on the Facebooks and you me and memes … Yep. Can’t resist.

But first … We had the birthday weekend again this weekend ! Which means seeing the family and the Ben-pup.

Yep. Everyone’s still going strong. Ageing perhaps … but still fighting on. And having our own fun too. Mine involved acquiring bags of bonbons. And then devouring those bags of bonbons. I may have a problem when it comes to bonbons.

My sister liked her birthday present. She got the Lego Star Wars Advent Calendar. This means I may have to buy one too !!! I got jumpers and a leather jacket to replace some that are getting on a bit and a tad frayed. I’m not good at getting the new clothes.

Travel was ok, I think I got all the travel in before the mayhem that has hit today. There are pictures of parts of Bristol where the water is so high, it is above the window level on parked cars. Wow ! I live in a somewhat higher up part of Bristol and there’s good drainage through dykes, so it should be safe from flooding here. I was going to say that the gps on the phone was telling me that I live 70m above sea level. But now it is reporting between 0 and 1m above sea level. Oh well. Time to break out the canoe and snorkel.

(This just tells me that you shouldn’t wholly trust gadgets !)

Meme ? Here goes :
1. Are you named after someone?
Don’t believe so.
2. What colour is your car?
Grey. It is the Grey Ghost because it’s vewy, vewy, qwiet.
3. Do you like your handwriting?
Nah. Too random and I keep missing out random letters. I can barely read it sometimes !
4. What is your favourite lunch meat?
I usually have the turkey in the sandwiches but any fairly low fanciness meats will do me.
5. Do you have kids?
Nah. No kids. But I do borrow the Ben-pup when I visit the parents.
6. Do you use sarcasm?
Definitely ! Sometimes you have to talk other people’s language and sarcasm can be the only one they understand.
7. Do you still have your tonsils?
Gargle – yep.
8. Would you bungee jump?
Not likely. Although … it might help straighten that back out.
9. What is your favourite kind of cereal?
Haven’t had cereal in years …
10. Do you untie your shoes when you take them off?
Yep. Cos I can’t take them off when the laces are done up. Although I do have a pair of older trainers that I can just slip on and off and they don’t fall off.
11. Do you think you’re strong?
Emotionally, somewhat. That’s the tendency to bounce back when I see someone smiling. Physically, not any more because I haven’t been exercising that much as my body repairs.
12. What is your favourite ice cream. 
Gotta be the Mint Choc Chip.
13. What is the first thing you notice about people?
Whether they’re smiling, which is when my Big Grin comes out too.
14.Football or Baseball?
Cricket.
15. What is the least favourite thing you like about yourself?
Inertia, or the quality of knowing there is stuff that needs to be done and just not doing it.
16. What colour pants are you wearing now?
UK definition of pants involves underwear … which I’m not telling. I might not be wearing any 😉 (I am). I’m wearing light coloured greyish running around in trousers that are pretty thick. Good stuff for a colder house :-).
17. What was the last thing you ate?
Box of Maltesers. Surprise chocolate when traffic means heading to the shops for a resupply is a bad idea.
18. What are you listening to right now?
KT Tunstall’s album Drastic Fantastic with songs like White Bird.
19. If you were a crayon, what colour would you be?
Huh ?
20. Favourite smell?
Fresh tea cakes.
21. Who was the last person you spoke to on the phone?
The mum ! Making the arrangements for when I’d appear at their place.
22. Favourite sport to watch?
Cricket ! Have even been to games and I pay attention. Most of the time.
23. Hair color?
At the moment ? Mucky blonde. You know, that blonde that isn’t white and isn’t darker. Something in the middle.
24. Eye colour?
Dunno actually … I sometimes look but never remember ! I think it changes.
25.Favourite food to eat?
Pizza. But it has a certain effect on me now so I have to ration it. Apart from that, I’m becoming a fan of Wagamamas. And steak. And pasta. Wonder if you can combine all that ?
26. Scary films or happy endings?
Happy endings. I can get caught up in the scaries but unless you don’t know where it’s going to take its story, I lose interest.
27. Last film you watched?
Star Trek IV The Voyage Home. Still a decent movie but a bit too much on the Earth. I’m looking forward to seeing Rogue One, Passengers and I’m pondering going to see Arrival on Friday. It is Black Friday though, so I may avoid the centre of Bristol on Friday … it might be mayhem.
28. What colour shirt are you wearing?
I have a green custom t-shirt on. It has a timeline of spacecraft, starting at 0 with the Tardis, going through the space shuttle, an Eagle, Galactica, Enterprise, Serenity before finishing off at infinity with the Tardis again.

Meme done ! But I feel this post will not be complete without …

More Ben ! A minute before this, he was fast asleep impersonating a sawmill. But then someone ventured near the source of treats …

Bless ‘im. His paw still bugs him but he gets around with a curiously wobbling gait. He must be getting pain from it but it’s managed with pills from the vet. He’s quite perky for an old dog, although he rations out his effort. He’ll bounce, he’ll scare off uninvited door stop sales people, then he’ll crash.

He’s a happy muttley.

Birthday today !

I’m having a chilled out one today. I now have the music on (nice bit of Abba with a Suzanne Vega album next up) while a youtube game video is going on in the background. The gaming video is about the new Civilisation VI game that has just come out. I may get that … but not yet. I’m not prepared to pay the £50 for it. I can wait for discounts.

I have been chilling out with a game today though. XCom2 came out a good few months ago but I never actually got round to playing it. I’m really enjoying having a good run in it now although the aliens are giving my soldiers a good run for their money. Oh and there’s also been a decent last day’s play in the cricket today and one of the more eventful Grand Prix that there has been for a while.

In terms of birthday festivities, I had a chance to have lunch with someone lovely yesterday as we raided the Christmas Market here in Bristol. The management of it has changed hands this year but it still has the German Sausage stalls (they smelled very inviting yesterday) and the Happy Cookie Place is back too. PikaPeacanut Stall wasn’t in evidence, need more checking. And the salmon on a fire stall isn’t there either. I always regret not checking that one out.

But on to the game ! One of the features of games like XCom2 is the customisation of the soldiers you have with you. Take your friends into battle ! Try not to get them killed !

The XCom games are pretty tough. It doesn’t take much of an error to put one of your people in danger. I have actually only lost one soldier so far !

The first two don’t count, they die as part of scripted events in the first opening tutorial mission. The one I did lose got ambushed while saving civilians from alien retaliation.

Yep. This one is all about kicking the alien butt again. It’s the second game in the remade XCom series, picking up 20 years after Earth lost to the aliens rather badly. The aliens now control our planet and resistance is all but stamped out. It’s up to us to kick ass and chew strawberry bonbons. And because the aliens banned the bonbon, you know who’s ass we’re gonna be kicking. But who’s doing the ass kicking ?

That’s the roster after completing one of the early story missions. Oh and the mission after … because. These games can get a bit of a hold on you with the “Just one more mission, then I stop for a bit” factor. They’re doing pretty well. The crew comes from a mix of youtuber name lists (spot the Cinnamon and the TB in there) plus we have recruited in a number of characters from the Mass Effect universe. The name lists give pre customised characters which add a bit of colour into the precedings.

Shall we meet some of them ? Just the friends that is. Showing them all will take forever !

That’s Hotshot, who is the lead sniper at the moment keeping an eye on our squad from high above. Many aliens have died by her hand already.

With a young protege joining in after that particularly hard retaliation mission. She’ll be back in the fight soon enough.

And there’s the last one of the ones I have named so far. His nickname could have gone two ways, either Cyberkitten (spot that weapon detail !) or Truthseeker. It’ll be Truthseeker this time because I’ll be wanting his hacking skills. I think the aliens have already got to him with that growth above his mouth though that tends to appear randomly.

Will they all survive ? How many of them will make it to the final mission ? Will I get chance to play the game more any time soon !

Or maybe some heavy metal grindy music back up in the form of the Final Liberation soundtrack that’s going at the moment.

I’ve come out of game now though. Chill out time for me. But …

Or the cookies. The cookies need me too. Nite !

Oh there is so much feeling on the internet right now. It’s echoing what we saw after the Brexit vote got announced but amplified by there being far more people over the pond and perhaps because it is not in the place with that (in?)famous British reserve ?

The meme I’ve been seeing at the moment is a long list of “If you’re …” Here it is, although I have changed one or two bits because I didn’t quite agree with the original. I think this is an improvement. Here goes !

If you wear a hijab, I’ll sit with you on the train.
Sure ! If there aren’t empty seats elsewhere cos … sitting beside someone when you can sit on your own is seen as a bit weird here. But the point’s valid. There was a case not too long ago in Bristol where a passenger demanded that another passenger leave the bus because they thought they looked like a terrorist (Asian archetype, had beard) and they were scared. I’d have asked the bullied person to sit beside me and asked the bully to leave the bus. Yes.

If you’re trans, I’ll go to the same bathroom as you.
Because we’ve all seen each other’s bits right ? It doesn’t matter what people pee out of does it. And that’s what we go to the bathroom for right ? The people who want to dictate where trans people pee don’t do other things in bathrooms right ?

If you’re a person of colour, I’ll stand up to the cops for you.
Every time. Teachers too. We had a racist teacher at my secondary school who was picking on the only black kid in the school. I helped the guy out, we were good friends while I was at that school although his chances were somewhat crippled by this racist teacher. It does depend though. If the person of colour has just robbed someone, I’ll help those cops if it’s not too risky.

(Avoid generalisations ! Why are the cops after them ? Genuine or bullying ?)

If you’re a person with disabilities, I’ll hand you my megaphone.
I should try not to but I really do bristle when I see non-disabled people steal the disabled parking spots. There should be some kind of fitting punishment for that. I suspect the disabled people don’t want to make too much of a fuss though, they’re busy fighting their own battles. They shouldn’t fight other battles too !

If you’re an immigrant, I’ll help find you resources.
Hmm … that’s what the state is for really. But I see the point again.

If you’re a survivor, I’ll believe you. I’ll listen.
The listen part is the most important there. If someone has been through something intense, it is important that you listen and give them the benefit of your belief. Some of the people around us have been through some Really Crazy Stuff. To help them cope with that, to process that, they need to express it to others. The least we can do for them is to listen and believe.

If you’re a refugee, I’ll make sure you’re welcome.
My Grins are for everyone. Whether they be English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, European, Asian, American, whether they be from everywhere. Except chavs. They can do one.

If you’re a veteran, I’ll take up your fight.
I know a few veterans. They have a quiet strength and dignity that we can all learn from.

If you’re LGBTQ, I won’t tell anyone tell you that they think you’re broken.
Whatever your preference, whoever you are attracted to, love is love. Me ? I like intelligent pretty ladies. Other guys are different, other ladies get repulsed by blokes. We should respect who and what people are, we should not try to change them. People are at their best when they can be natural and comfortable with themselves.

If you’re a woman, I’ll make sure you get home ok.
Always. If I have to go out of my way to make sure the Pretty Lady gets home ok, I’ll consider that an honour that she wants to spend that extra time with me. Why wouldn’t you escort her home ? It’s a chance to spend more time with someone lovely ? It’s up to the lady though. She might think she should be escorting you home !!!

If you’re tired, me too.
It’s been a long year. Lots has happened, earthshattering events both in politics and in reality.

If you need me, I’ll be with you. All I ask is that you be with me too.
Our greatest gift is our time. When people ask for a little help, make time for them. If someone lonely reaches out, listen to their voice. We’re better together than apart. We can help each other much better if we give that gift of time.

If you need a hug, I have an infinite supply.
Always. Hugs are awesome.

The behaviours start with us. We can make this world a better place. We just have to drop the preconceptions, the prejudices and just treat people as people remembering that our differences are what make us strong, they’re what make us interesting.

Listen to the stories of other people, they will expand your life.

Oooo – randomness.

I had a bunch of thoughts bubbling through this pot mess of a head earlier. Today actually started pretty bad. My mental state is dominated by two things at the moment :

The condition of my outsides;
How much sleep I get.

And I didn’t get much sleep last night. (A combination of me having a shower a bit too late and my hair being too long at the moment to dry quick plus staying on the interwebs a bit too long).

And because my outsides are still being frustrating too.

The bad patches are gradually receding ! Hurrah ! But when I woke this morning, the two spots I don’t talk about (ok, they’re my nipples … and you know what those do in the cold ? Well, the stretching that causes makes new damage … and we shall never talk of that again !) had worsened. It’s a really bad spot. You can excuse marks on arms or marks on legs but there ? Very awkward.

So my mood was being devastated by that plus lack of sleep through the morning. I addressed that mid morning and that’s worked … for now. But it does put off the problem and doesn’t actually fix it. I have more ideas there but it will need more time and looking after. One problem is a constant conflict between needing to keep stuff clean and the act of cleaning causing a certain amount of disruption.

But my mood did steadily improve through the day.

It helps to talk to people. It really does. And I have a few people I can natter at who cheer me up. Oh and a couple of them also work in the canteen which leads to bigger sandwiches at lunchtime (actually it doesn’t except on Friday when I go late and they give me stuff they would otherwise throw out).

I do feel a lot better now, mentally at least, compared to this morning. My left foot is the most torn up but it is good when I take the socks off in the evening to find that it is actually intact. Pretty damaged but … intact. That’s progress !! I also have excellent progress on my arms and especially my elbows too.

Progress is good.

Other random stuff ?

I’ve been in the Internet Spaceship game again. I abandoned the trip around the galaxy for now (will do it at some point) because a major update dropped last week and it has made the game prettier. Definitely, the space stations are shinier now and I’m saying that without even going to the most affluent. They are supposed to be the shiniest.

I suspect my current Pilot Plan may not last long. I have taken my Explorer ship, think it was called “I’m off to find the cookies” and turned it back into a cargo ship. I’ll be smuggling rare goods around the galaxy for a bit. Trouble is, the smuggling part doesn’t work so well now because the police in the game have gone nuts. They’re far too good at finding the illegal stuff. I suspect shenanigans in the code. But it does get you around a very wide variety of space stations.

They’re pretty.

As is the gold Asp. I’ll upgrade that to a Python soon. (pic from the newest version of the game)

(Pic from how the game was last year I think)
I know. Not a particularly pretty ship but very functional. Great with the cargo running plus I had one that was very nastily armed too. The Cookie Cutter should get similarly nasty but needs more investment. So I’ll stick to the smaller ship for a while so I can burn down pirates instead of running from them.

Ok. Pretty Ship picture required :

No Internet Spaceship tonight though. Was tired after work so it’s just videos in the background and an earlier night than last night.

I do feel much better than this morning though.

Other random thoughts :

Vendee globe started yesterday ! This is a round the world race featuring sailors who will do this single handed, non stop in 60 foot long IMOCA 60 yachts. I have so much respect for the people who do this race. They’re legends. They’re just off the coast of Portugal at the moment. You can follow the race at the website (link!). Just the one Brit in the race this year and sadly no ladies but it was great listening to Dee Caffari’s commentary on the livestream coverage yesterday. She cut through lack of knowledge and presented what was happening like the pro that she is. There’s a lot involved in sailing and having someone knowledgeable and who can pass on that knowledge as basics is invaluable.

(I am having trouble with words today I think – I always think you demonstrate true knowledge of a subject only by being able to explain it in the simplest terms. Jargon is bad).

I want to have a look around one of them to see how it’s put together. Both in terms of construction and how the insides are laid out. There isn’t much space inside and it has to serve the sailor. I still have that dream of moving on to a canal boat, although I suspect the True Dream of a potentially sea going Dutch Barge would need a lottery win.

Is she not a pretty little ship ? I would like a pretty little ship.

But I will have to stay to the Internet Spaceships for now. And my dreams. Some of which feed into that potential future novel. Need a good set up for that though.

Should I close on something about politics ? Maybe not. They’re being too scary at the moment. Democracy is great … until it is subverted by those who try to tell us what to think (all of our media) and by those who renege on their promises as soon as they have your vote. We need accountability in our politics and that’s totally lacking at the moment. Everyone is accountable, except the politicians.

That’s a really bad way to finish a post though.

Really liking the phone. May talk about that more at some point but it’s a substantial upgrade over the iPhone.

Start with the sad, end with a chuckle. I hope that pic makes you laugh as much as it made me laugh.

It’s NaNoWriMo month !

At some point, I will indulge in the NaNoWriMo initiative. What is it ?

The picture is from Two Brooklyn Cats on Twitter (link!) and they don’t have nearly enough followers yet. Hint-hint.

NaNoWriMo is a yearly thing. I’m pretty sure I’ve written about it before, the aim is to write a 50,000 word novel in the month of November. I’d like to think I could write the stories that would make up a novel. I can rabbit on quite happily when the mood takes me and I’ll run through conversations in my mind before they happen. Probably a bad habit because I assume that the conversation goes the way I want and I always tend to miss something which takes the actual conversation in a completely different direction.

I’ve written before about what I would write too. There are a few nucleic ideas :

Post Apocalyptic and recovery phase where my central group of characters scavenge and scout to help rebuild.
SPACE ! Firefly was an awesome series and didn’t last long enough.
Fantasy with magic environments.
Scifi.

I think you get the picture there. But some of the stories I’ve enjoyed most have involved a central group of characters who bantered with each other. This was a main theme of David Eddings’ successful series. Different characters who banter, bicker, argue, love.

I’m not going to do NaNoWriMo this year though. After a few spurts of thought earlier this year, I haven’t actually turned those into something I could write something around that would make sense. All writing needs a plan. A pre-book if you will. A setting for the world you write the story in. The best stories have a certain consistency and you need that view of the world early to acquire that consistency so details aren’t rehashed later because they didn’t fit in with later elements of the story.

I have a plan for most blog posts I write, although it tends to just be themes I want to cover. For this one, it’s NaNoWriMo morphing into writing about what I’m watching now. (In a minute). Nah. I want to be properly healed up as well so I can direct all my mental energies towards this. I’m still feeling a certain amount of wornoutness that partly comes from the feelings about my outsides.

I am healing … steadily. My skin felt great last week, getting super smooth mostly. My arms are nearly all better. My ankles and a couple of other areas may need more help though. Or to be left alone some more. They’re trying to heal but it’s so ridiculously easy to aggravate the damage again. Even clearing some of the flakey to clean it up can be too much for the current strength and integrity of the skin.

But it is getting there. What am I watching though ?

Ok. Not that movie. But a close one to it. I’m watching Star Trek The Motion Picture, the first big screen effort from the Star Trek franchise. I’m a quiet fan of this movie, it hit the spot in many, many ways. It’s actually a really good scifi movie and it has that core set of characters all giving it their all.

It is described heavily as an extended episode of the series. Don’t all movies fit that description ? Perhaps.

It does show its age in the melding of computer imagery, artist imagery and the real acting. You can see the joins. We’re far better now at stitching it all together but for a 1979 movie, they do a great job. It’s a movie that I’ll consistently enjoy as I am now.

My plan is to watch all of the Star Trek movies over the next month or so. I’ll be watching on non-stream nights, that should work pretty well and it just might get me to where Star Trek Beyond won’t be full price. See ? I have a Cunning Plan.

It’s just getting to the climax of the movie though so I’ll leave it off there. But how about this for an intrepid bunch of character to build a crew around …

The one who points the direction to go. The centre point. The brain of the crew.
The sailor who is rescued from a dead ship and joins the crew for adventure, a warm meal and a hot shower. The pro.
The worker bee who throws herself into everything she can, who is the heart of the crew.
The pair who would be brothers in another life. Who played the games together before whatever calamity hit. Who can finish each others sentences. One is a writer, a philosopher, a student of the mental sciences. The other, a student of the physical sciences.
And finally, the mom who could not be a mom, who looks after us as her family. She’s a mean shot with that sniper rifle …

And there would be the dogs who scout for us and guard for us. Dogs are smart.

I think I’d have fun writing a book with that crew, although you need to throw them at drama to make the story interesting.

Oh and you’d have to figure a happy ending too. All the best stories have those.

Have you ever listened to a song and thought … This is their best, it cannot be beaten.

I have … and here are a few of them. They’re some of my favourites from a multitude of artists but beware, most of the songs in here are in the list because they provoke an emotional response. Some may require hankys !

Oh and there are a few artists I listen to a lot who aren’t here … If you have some amazing music to suggest for me, please leave the track name and artist in the comments. I’m always on the look out for more to listen to. A lot of what I do listen to is due to suggestions from other people.

Bring ’em on ! Oh and this post was mostly inspired last night by me going “I’ll just listen to Ting Tings The Wrong Club and go to bed.” That track is possibly the best they’ll come up with, it’s got the words, the message, the music and an excellent video too. It’s a track I’ll keep going back to.

Labelling something as “the best and they will make nothing better” is a little sad though. It’s better when the group constantly surprises you with more and more excellence. Bat For Lashes is a perfect example here. You hear songs like What’s a Girl To Do ? (Dat video) and you think it’s amazing. Then she beats it with the beauty of Moon and Moon from her second album. And beats it again with the powerful Laura.

But it’s best when the groups constantly change their style. Madonna does this with every album, Goldfrapp do to a certain extent. I don’t think Goldfrapp have beaten the Metropolis inspired Utopia. I’ll keep going back to Alison Goldfrapp’s incredible voice that’s shown off in Utopia and the weird and wonderful Voicething. And then there’s the chill out of Road To Somewhere.

It’s a little sad when groups seem to burn out early or they do one song out of character that has total beauty. Here are a few :

T’Pau’s – China In Your Hand
A-Ha – Take On Me (still more brilliance to come but nothing got close to this)
Cranberries with Linger, Shakespeares Sister with Stay
Stairway to Heaven ! (I hope they didn’t copy)
Dirty Vegas – Days Gone By (perhaps it’s the acoustic style)
Alisha’s Attic – The Incidentals – I was hoping for much more from these ladies, 3 albums were not enough.
Massive Attack – Teardrop
Morcheeba – The Sea
Snow Patrol and the Martha Wainwright combination for Set The Fire To The Third Bar
U2 with Beautiful Day ? I don’t listen to much U2. Too disconnected from reality.
Evanescence with My Immortal

And an advert just gave me a teaser of Kate Bush’s forthcoming live album. I’ll pick that up at some point but she’s a good case of an artist who was incredible for a long time but then seemed to lose the touch. For me, her albums after The Sensual World just aren’t nearly as good as what came before. The advert was for a track from Hounds Of Love but I present here, This Woman’s Work.

Other groups who have gone away from an earlier style or perhaps ran out of inspiration are people like :

Pink Floyd’s style changes with the decades but they were most inspired in the 70s with tracks like Wish You Were Here.
Arctic Monkeys had a brilliant first few albums but have gone off a bit. But then you listen to songs like A Certain Romance again and remember their magic.
Similar with Seal, the voice is still there though but has he ever bettered songs like Future Love Paradise ?
Dire Straits seemed to run out of ideas after Brothers In Arms. Indeed, they split after the following album. Mark Knopfler still makes amazing music and excellent soundtracks.
Air’s magical All I Need.

I’d include Portishead here with songs like Roads. You see the intensity in live performances like that and you wonder how they can pull it off so well without collapsing into a mess afterwards.

There are also artists taken from us before we heard all they have to give. I still like Eleanor Rigby best from the Beatles but there was more to come after the Beatles with songs like John Lennon’s Imagine and George Harrison’s My Sweet Lord. And then there is Thriller by Michael Jackson, he definitely had more gifts to give.

You know. Songs that make you sit up and listen. The Veronicas did that to me with their song Untouched. Very powerful, very dramatic. And the ears always perk up with Little Boots comes on too. I don’t think she’s bettered Remedy. Paramore’s wonderful The Only Exception is always a sit up and listen highlight.

That’s a lot of music though. Lots for people to listen to ! (I have been pondering investigating Spotify playlists … would it be worth it ?)

There have been a few bands who keep coming out with new and even better music than we’ve heard before. Nina Persson still has it, after starting in the Cardigans, moving through a very dark phase with the Cardigans, transitioning to A Camp with songs that speak to me like Song For The Leftovers and now going solo with tracks like Animal Heart.

I’ve always kept an eye on Tori Amos too, she just continues to give us new albums with more brilliant music. And there’s usually a surprise in there too. Just when you think she couldn’t beat Silent All These Years or Space Dog, out comes an I Can’t See New York or a The Beekeeper.

All About Eve too, kicking off with tracks like Martha’s Harbour, indeed all of their first album was amazing. Then there’s Scarlet and Are You Lonely to finish off their third album. And then she comes back with the Mice album ! Love the Doctor Who inspired Blue Sonic Boy.

That’s an awful lot to listen to though. (And I’ll be catching up the links too !)

One last song. The way an album starts and finishes is very important. Arctic Monkeys did this with A Certain Romance but the one I’m really thinking of is Sleeper. They seemed to be interfered with somewhat by labels wanting to split the singer from the band and never really bettered their first album which finished with the song I’ll close on : Click … Off … Gone.

Anyone got any more song ideas for me ?

Whew !

I only started watching the Great British Bake Off a few years ago but I’ve really enjoyed it while it lasted. I think some of that stems from watching stuff Mel and Sue have been involved with since I went to uni. They’re a naughty pair those two but they remember they’re there to entertain first and foremost.

That’s something really important, the viewer is the person who is absolutely key. The entertainer has to bring the viewer (or reader for here !) with them and include them in what’s going on. And that shows in the viewing figures this show gets. You can guarantee it’ll be the highest watched show in GB this week.

Mel and Sue have always been like that. They’ll bring in the naughtiness to add some fun but in the end, programmes like Bake Off are all about the contestants and the tasty creations they cook up. And it was the same 20 years ago with their Late Lunch and Light Lunch chat show programmes. The inclusiveness is why I watch people like HeyChrissa and why I’ve gone away from watching a few other people on the internets.

This is the last year of Bake Off as we know it though. It has gone away from BBC and 3 of the 4 presenters have walked away. I don’t think I’ll be watching the Channel 4 version, they’re a much more trash tv kind of channel, although BBC can be pretty trashy too. Bake Off is about the only thing I watch(ed) on BBC lately. Oh, Doctor Who and Sherlock as well.

Oh and after that mention of the HeyChrissa earlier … I have her stream on in the window behind this one. She is playing Playstation VR at the moment (looks fairly decent and promising although – Job Sim – nah) and is edging closer and closer to the window … chat thinks something may occur …

Oh – job thing. I’m on holiday this week to regain some energy back and get some healing in. I did think about heading out at some point but … I don’t think I will be to be honest. (I’ll get to that in a mo – nothing bad).

I have been on and off enjoying the games and generally chilling out over here. I’m in much better condition than I have been, although it’s still silly easy to set that condition back again. The aim is to be a little bit better than the day before. Continuous improvement of how my outsides are. No backward steps.

My ankles are almost right but not quite there yet. And even then, there will be more healing time needed before they’re tough ankles again. (There’s more damage than just my ankles but the ankles are safe? to talk about). Switching to mostly using moisturizer (Aveeno for the win!) and only very sparingly using that HC45 healing gunk seems to have helped a lot.

So no heading out this week. I’ll be ensconced in front of the cricket again from Friday. Protect those ankles some more. After so long with this condition, I have extreme wariness about doing daft things and setting back the healing. It’s kinda inhibiting.

That said, if an offer came up to drag me out of the house then I’d jump at it. Real Life people are far better than games. And getting used to new mobile phones …

I’ve been on an assortment of the games this week :

Darkest Dungeon turned brutal. It switches between the town and dungeon adventures. Every game week sees another 4 venturing into the dungeon. It was ok up to 20 weeks, fairly easy apparently even. And then it developed a taste for Adventurer Blood. Perhaps my own fault for putting a torch in something that said “Put torch here to taste oblivion”.

It’s a very simple looking game. That’s from a different encounter which my heroes survived … barely.

And then there’s the Stellaris and Hearts of Iron strategy games. I haven’t actually taken one of those to their full conclusion yet. I’m avoiding getting the new Civilisation game, from watching a few gameplay videos it seems to need a patch or two. Problems like overactive barbarians and weak opponent AI.

I tried a new one today, a free to play (with many non intrusive microtransactions) game called Path of Exile. It will be very familiar to anyone who’s played a Diablo game. Plays well too, although I think I would get bored of it quickly. It’s not really the type of game I get hooked into.

Apart from that, I’ve been steadily adding apps to the phone … It has a decent selection on there now although I am skipping the First bus mTickets app. It’s always useful to look at reviews for apps, especially when they warn of it taking your money and not giving you tickets. Poor show First Bus, which is exactly in line with their level of service in Bristol lately. They’re not helped by our traffic planners but … apps should work and the buses should run on time.

I think I’ll be admitting defeat for now with the Android iTunes sync. The Doubletwist app depends on a file transfer method that has been out of Android for a good few versions now (surely they should update their program ?) and I’m not paying the £7 for the wifi sync verson. Nope. I’ll keep the old iPhone around for now. It’ll be happy bluetoothing the music across to the car and I can run it without a sim card.

Back soon. Still more healing to do, still energy to catch up on. And sleep too !

I’ve done the deed …

The sim card is now out of the old phone and into the new, for good or ill. But first !

Yep. That sums up a few of my intentions for this coming week. I have the week off work for a repair and recharge. Definitely need it, I’ve had that confusion over what day of the week it is lately, which is usually the most prominent sign that I need to chill out and hibernate for a while.

So far, I’ve had the cricket on for most of the day plus there has been a Grand Prix on in the evening. It was a reasonable GP but to be honest, I barely watched it after seeing a couple of very compulsive viewing days of cricket. There could still be either result tomorrow, England win or Bangladesh win. We’ve had all sorts in this game, batsmen have never been comfortable, bowlers have still had to work (really hard in the heat over there!) hard for their wickets.

I started yesterday morning fast forwarding through in an attempt to catch up with the live play but quickly abandoned that because there was just too much going on in the game. I’ll be looking forward to watching the finish of the game tomorrow, hopefully it’ll be a win for England.

I haven’t been getting up for the actual play, hell no. They’re a good few hours ahead of us here so I’ve been watching it time delayed … and attempting to avoid the inevitable spoilers that will pop up on Twitbook.

I’ve also been in a couple of games :

Darkest Dungeon on the Friday – this is a grim dungeon crawl game, very simple to play, that I find quite compelling. The mechanics, outside of the usual dungeon crawl stuff, include sanity and stress. If things go badly for our adventurers, they get stressed. Past a certain point, they’ll have a mental break and react in random ways. Sometimes it is to fight harder, other times they become abusive, masochistic, fearful or other stuff that’s bad … and somewhat comical too.

Yep. I’ve been enjoying Darkest Dungeon. I’d recommend checking it out if you have something suitable to play it on. It has that magic combination of being easy to play, being unexpected, not becoming boring …

Stellaris has been the game over the weekend. They’ve just patched it and made an expansion available. I have a curious relationship with this game. I do like its space strategy theme and the mechanics work pretty well with that. My empire has been building gradually and is now at the point where I could execute a grand campaign where I race across the galaxy like an avenging horde, conquering all, burning what refuses to be conquered … you get the idea. The empire has the supremacy and no one local is strong enough to challenge it.

But …

This is also the point where the game gets boring. I’ve never actually taken a game of Stellaris to its end game where it shakes things up with invaders from another dimension, AI rebellions etc. I haven’t taken it to a galaxy purifying conclusion either. It has improved with the patch but there are also new annoyances, new bugs.

I think I’ll set the Stellaris game aside for a bit. I do enjoy the early game but games of this type can outstay their welcomes and become boring. There are other games.

And lots of videos to watch and books to read. I must get reading again.

Wait …

I said something about doing the deed didn’t I ?

I have upgraded the phone … No longer am I an Apple Fanboi. I have the droid I was looking for. It’s a Samsung Galaxy S7. Not the Note aka Bombphone which was on display at one of the Three network shops (oops), although I can believe the Bombphone stories now. The S7 gets warmer than I’d like. Perhaps that’s a symptom of thinner shells and that I haven’t bought it a case yet.

Impressions :

A case will be essential. The outsides are super smooth and likely to cause breakage incidents from the phone slipping through my fingers.
UI – Apple’s iOS 6 was genuinely better. There are a couple of features I will miss like “Tap the top of the screen to go to the top of the page.” Is there an Android equivalent ? The back button is on the bottom right of the case, it’s usually on the top left of the screen on iOS. This makes it far easier to press back when you didn’t want to.
Google’s interface to its services – is GARBAGE ! It took me ages to get to my blogger page.
Vue’s app is still broken.
Battery life is surprising. I gave the phone a full charge on Friday and it is still at 49%. This is really good, although I haven’t actually used it that much outside of starting to load it up with apps. Why use the phone if you have better devices to look at the internet with ? I’ll be curious as to how the battery holds up to a normal day though.
Transferring settings – was far easier than expected. They provide a wire and an interface that copies everything over, text messages, contacts, all sorts of stuff. I did have to set up my mail app again though and because I’m not using the Safari web browser, I’ll have to rebuild my internet bookmarks too.

The great music hope – Doubletwist – hasn’t worked yet. This is to get the phone connecting up to my iTunes. I haven’t bought the paid side of the app yet but I should be able to connect up with a wire, this isn’t working. The paid side lets you connect up via wifi but if that fails, I can still use the iPhone without a sim and have that as an intelligent iPod.

But I’ll wait until I do that.

Early days impressions are pretty good and it’ll be good to be freed from the curse of broken backwards compatibility that Apple force on their indentured customers. Apple used to be extremely good but I think they’ve reached that point where you can be happy with Apple stuff if you have it but don’t buy anything else from them … And be very wary if you update it !!!

This week will mostly be a rest, repair and recover week. I am healing much better now but there are still a few hold out bits. My ankles are actually much better now !!! The moisturiser is helping, especially as I haven’t used any of the Magic HC45 gunk on them lately. Other bits aren’t responding quite so well, they’ll need a bit more TLC. But I do have my hopes.

We’ll see how it goes ! I think I’ll need to consult a doc at some point this week. Perhaps something will arrive from Amazon too as an early birthday present to ME at some point ? A little early but … if I’m in anyway :-).

To be honest, I’m just looking forward to a really quiet week regaining my strength before the run in to Xmas.

And there’s that too !

So I realised yesterday evening that I’d been a bit behind in making sure my Tivo telly box doesn’t record all the wrong things.

The way I’ve been controlling that Tivo box, for setting up programmes to record at least, is through the app on my iPad. The actual remote is very clunky and takes ages to navigate. The iPad app is far easier to use. But … apparently … also broken.

What I think has happened is that a power cut incident last Friday has damaged some of my network gear. The way it is supposed to work is :

iPad talks to router. Works ok.
Router talks to Powerline widget 1. Works ok.
Powerline widget 1 talks to Powerline widget 2. Wasn’t working so well.
(The Powerline kit means wires run around the room instead of across the floor).
Powerline widget 2 talks to Tivo. Nada.

So the chain was breaking at around Powerline widget 2. That one is also supposed to bring wifi as well, which I used before I got my latest router. (Complicated explanation cut short – needed it so my printer would work, got another solution now)

Before any fixes, one tool told me that the two Powerline bits of kit were talking to each other at 11Mbps. This is Very Slow. One reset to defaults later and it was talking at 337Mbps. That’s more like it !!! But still no wifi signal. And the Tivo isn’t talking yet.

And then I look at the diagnostic tool again and apparently it’s showing traffic going one way but not the other. Can’t really explain that, it could be that there was no traffic to go the other way. I could turn the lights on it on and off remotely though, so something must have been working.

After some headscratching (and frustration that the configuration tool is on a cd that is lost under much clutter !), I try another solution …

I have more widgets …

I use an Apple Airport Express (aka LittleWhiteBox) to transfer my music from laptop to hifi. It talks to the router via wifi, so that’s another wire that I don’t need stretching across the room. It’s really good with transferring that music too. (Almost cd quality bandwidth and keeps the signal digital when sending it to the amp).

It can also (allegedly) act as a router on its own, or as a network bridge to extend a wifi network. As in, you tell it to talk to your main wifi and can also plug a network cable in to hook up something without wifi (like the Tivo).

This actually worked last night. But not tonight. Grr. Apple are steadily destroying their reputation with me for competence in the software market, which is very silly because they control the hardware as well as the software. It should do what it is supposed to do.

The daft thing is that the LittleWhiteBox worked as a network bridge last night but tonight ? Audio stream broke. Fixed now by taking it back to the settings before I started playing but … I’d like to use all of its facilities, not just those that decide to work on the day.

Actually there are more daft things but I’ll get to those in a bit. For now :

I can’t control the Tivo via my iPad any more. But I can control it via the web on the desktop. So that counts as a victory.
My audio streaming works again ! My ears are saved.
Powerline kit will be plugged out soon or at least until I can find the configuration cd.

Daft stuff :
Virgin Media really need to sort their stuff out. Dunno why the iPad app can’t talk to the Tivo any more. Perhaps they’ve updated the software again and broken it ? Highly likely.
Virgin Media really need to sort their stuff out. Yep, again. When I got the Tivo, it worked pretty well. The menus were quick and … all important … it could record while on standby. A recent update broke the recording on standby … so I leave it on.
Virgin Media … you guessed it … A 2016 network enabled device should really have wifi on it if it is designed to talk over a network.
Apple device working one moment, breaking the next.
TP-Link’s Powerline configuration utility staying on the cd instead of installing itself to the machine.

And there’s probably more Daft Stuff too. (Like a 2013 Macbook Air with a half broken wifi – known issue that the 2.4GHz antenna breaks, it’s perfect on the 5GHz).

Yep. There was more frustration tonight and a few factory resets of the LittleWhiteBox to get that working again. Disabling the network bridge thing sorted that out. And I can still control the Tivo from the desktop, even though it isn’t on the home network any more.

I think that counts as a win ?

Other news … I’ve gone to a Plan B … The HC45 Magic Healing Gunk was great but one of its effects can be to thin down the skin. So using it too much can lead to similar problems to what I was trying to fix. As in, I’ve been back in the ankle protector this week because my ankles were worsening.

It’s not all bad news though. Plan B means using a fair bit of the old Aveeno moisturiser again. My ankles and left foot are damaged still but I’m pretty sure they improved over today and yesterday, despite me doing the typical amount of movement around the office. They should appreciate me skiving off the work next week.

Other other news … I had something to say here and I can’t remember !!!! NOOOO !!!!

Ok. What was it.

I know !!! The new phone is likely to be a Samsung Galaxy S7. I still give them the Arched Look Of Suspicion but it seems like they’re the best phone on the market at the moment. The Honor phones are cheaper but … you tend to get what you pay for. Or less. I had my eye on the HTC phone but … it’s too expensive. I.e. it’s more expensive than the Samsung for questionable value.

Yep. Voting with me feet and starting to walk away from Apple … Soon !

PS You can probably tell that I’ll be sticking with my current mobile phone network instead of taking up Virgin Media on one of their offers …

A couple of things on my mind at the moment are …

Phones and Hacks.

I’m thinking heavily about updating my phone soon … I currently have an iPhone 5 and because Apple want to force people to use the software versions they push, I can’t update it. This means apps are gradually becoming unreliable and nonfunctional. The latest is the Vue cinema app, it can’t get data since Vue downgraded their site with a new look which honestly … isn’t very good.

Let’s talk about that …

How come I don’t want to update the software on my Macbook Air ? There are a few reasons actually but the biggest is that I’m rather attached to the iTunes DJ function that was removed after v10.7. Actually, a lot of things were removed after 10.7 most of which were to do with basic usability … v11 and onwards are a mess.

Oh and the newer versions of iOS don’t talk to 10.7 any more, so I can’t update my phone.

Not just that, Apple updates are getting notorious for breaking things. Like changes to firmware making the laptops much slower. I hear the new MacOS Sierra breaks battery life by making the machine work too hard. I can well believe these stories because pretty much every time I updated iTunes on Windows, it would break.

So yeah – the phone is getting less and less usable with the apps, so it’s getting near time to replace it.

Except I don’t know what to get … The elimination part is proving easy :

Not Apple, definitely not Microsoft for the phone.
Not Sony, the Xperia mini phone I had before failed as a phone (calls frequently being just static noise) and couldn’t have its software updated.

Apparently not Samsung either now. I used to have quite a high opinion of Samsung products. They made perfectly functional tellies and monitors that just did what they were required to do and they did that extremely well. But … their quality has been slipping lately. I think my current telly is contributing to the trust issues that my amp and bluray player have. My last monitor was … not as good as it should have been. The AOC one is way superior. And then there is the Galaxy Note 7 debacle to top it all off … I’m not mentioning what I read in an article yesterday but … if industry people don’t treat their people right, the customers suffer as poor quality and deliberate mistakes come in.

I’m currently thinking HTC but would prefer a Google Nexus. I don’t think I can get a Nexus phone on my current mobile network though. The HTC is expensive too compared to the Samsungs. I may be forced to go to an earlier version of the Galaxy …

Hacks ?

I’ve had a couple of warnings over the email today and odd behaviour from the Apple account … They’ve only come from GOG and Apple so far but it’s enough for me to start changing passwords.

GoG – a couple of 2 factor authentication requests. Bit odd as I don’t think it is me initiating that.
Apple – Facetime ID. That could have been the laptop doing something strange.

What’s also odd is that they have different usernames on the log in …

Just what password to choose ! Most password systems are pretty crazy now. You have to beware of simple stuff like dictionary attacks where the cracker system will go through the dictionary trying to break in. Number and special character substitution tends to demanded. I like using recognisable words but to get around the dictionary attack, I use combinations. Like Hack4Evah. Mis-spelled words can be good too.

(I have never used Hack4Evah !)

So yeah – new phone soon and a few new passwords too I think. The important stuff like bank is kept safe behind all sorts of multifactor authentication. Most stuff I have online is protected by two or more factor authentication.

But I did get hacked once … my Eve Online account was hijacked and the only way I could explain that was that the keylogger that captured the credentials got in through the people who run the game. Had to be ! It was the only thing that got hacked.

It’ll be a little time until I switch the phone. I’m evaluating options at the moment.

Me ? I’m ok still. Hanging on in there somewhat until I go on leave in a week but still pretty good. My outsides are gradually reclaiming themselves, when I let them although there are some hold outs. I still have my hopes, although I’ll go see that doc on my week off if I’m not happy with progress. Kinda want this outsides thing done now so I can move on and away from it.