The nursery is complete

Tomorrow Nicky will be 36 weeks, so after a small panic now our nursery is complete, photos at flicker. This is both exciting, and extremely scary. There are piles of tiny nappies in the wardrobe. Yep, that room used to be mine! How times are changing!

Thats about the only DIY I have ever enjoyed :-)

33 today, baby just a couple of weeks away

Life is changing rapidly. Nicky is doing just fine with the pregnancy, and we are now only 5 - 9 weeks away from the big day. We have been busy heading out to Ikea to buy cots and matresses, chests of drawers, little outfits. We have a car seat, a pram, piles of nappies. Life is definitely changing.

We had a reality check this week too when our friends Carl and Lorraine had their little baby, five weeks early, all are ok, but it made us realise we may not have as long as we think!

We are both handling things quite well, relaxed and happy, I hope everything turns out well, and the sleepless nights do not go on for as long as people say :-)

I am an uncle at 32 (almost 33)

So I became an uncle on 23rd March. First time for me. Went to meet my nephew Ethan. He is a cute little baby. Good as an angel during the day, and according to my little sister Heidi, a nightmare at night at the moment. Hopefully things will settle down for them all over the coming weeks.

This makes reality hit home, now that Nicky and I are getting closer to the big day, (14th June apparently)!

I am getting old :-)

Lucky number nine

Its been a long time since I blogged, part of that is because I have moved jobs and been involved in a very intensive first project, part of it is just laziness, oh and a fair bit of gaming on my PS3 also. Its time I shared some news, it turns out 9 is our lucky number. On the 9th October Nicky and I tested positive with a pregnancy test, then on 9th December we had a very good 13 week scan.

We are overjoyed, particularly as we went through an ectopic pregnancy in the Summer which was devastating. Now the reality of our situation is starting to sink in, and we can enjoy the whole thing. Life will be changing soon.

I have some scan pictures over on Flickr in case you are interested., showing progress over the different scans. I will post updates on this, so I can look back over it as much as anything.

Busy Weekends

We had a run of busy weekends, felt like we did not have a life of our own almost, at least six weekends in a row visiting or with visitors. Now however, we have a couple of weekends at home.. what a relief. The weather is getting better too, I am looking forward to getting the BBQ out :-)

For my birthday two weeks ago we went to the village of Lacock in Wiltshire, and I highly recommend it to anyone, it is so amazingly preserved.

I also ordered a surround sound system finally, to go with my TV I got last year. Should be here in the next week or so. I went with a German brand Teufel, which looks cool and has had some very good reviews. My AV receiver is one of the new Onkyo 507's supporting Dolby True HD.

Gaming news, Street Fighter was cool, although I am pretty bad at it, but I was hugely disappointed with the demo of Resident Evil, and never bought it.

On the plus side, Prototype is out next month and I can't wait for that :-)

Fallout 3 completed

Just finished Fallout 3 on the PS3, what a game. I am sure Nicky got completely sick of it. It is huge in scope, never had so much fun levelling up. I enjoyed Oblivion too, but somehow, taking the whole RPG thing into the future seemed to make it even more fun.

Now I just need to play more GTA 4, before Street Fighter is out next month, and Resident Evil 5 the month after!

I admit it, I let work take over

Its been a long time since I last blogged!!! I have been very busy, working all hours, not very healthy really. But then I notice Lorraines blog is also untouched. Perhaps its just that time of year, oh well... not long (5 days) until the Christmas break starts for me, cool!

Our social lives have pretty much disappeared, we have hardly seen our friends in Newbury, they all seem to be equally busy, and I suppose the fact that the credit crunch is still biting means we are less likely to hit the pubs in town these days.

What to do to sort out the work / life balance then ? Well it seems that whether you are rewarded for your efforts or not, you are probably never rewarded enough, so its probably not worth sacrificing so much of your own time, when a minimum of 37.5 hours a week are spent in the office anyway. Also you need to ensure if you are putting in so much effort that the values of your workplace align with your own.

In particular I strive for technical excellence, probably to a somewhat autistic degree, and I am finding an unhealthy amount of focus on 'shiny' things at all levels above me, whether or not what is under the hood is rotting. I am not sure this is going to change despite any of my efforts. This is not a criticism, there are many things that require focus in the workplace, and an academic approach to everything would never make any money, it is merely an observation.

So we will see how things go, perhaps there is change in the air, I will keep you posted.

Egypt August 2008

We had the holiday of a lifetime just a few weeks ago. We decided that despite the cost, and the credit crunch in general we wanted to go to Egypt.

We both had a great time, pics are up... flickr.

The first part of our holiday was a three day stay in Cairo. Our hotel was the closest one in Cairo to the pyramids, probably only about 150 metres away. We could see the pyrmids from our window.

I was the first to succumb to the obligatory bout of 'Pharoah's Revenge' just 48 hours into the holiday, but it did not spoil any sight-seeing trips.

From Cairo we flew to Luxor, and then spent 7 days on a Nile cruise. We did just about every temple and site of note that was within stirking range, (even a flight to Abu Simbel to see Ramses II's amazing temple).

As it was the hottest part of the ear over there we saw temperatures of up to 50 degrees Celcius, some days it was over 40 degress by 9 am. We made the most of the sun, not expecting to get any back in the UK.

I highly recommend Egypt, we always felt safe, and the tour guides are very professional.

Ben and Charis came to see us

We had a great time with Ben and Charis, we went out to play in Newbury, and then took them to our favourite restaurant the 'Pot Kiln' in Frilsham, where the food and wine were excellent as always. The usual problem though, Ben and I get carried away choosing fine wines and then reap the consequences when the bill follows!

It rained all weekend, really, so Ben and I played loads of Grand Theft Auto 4, which can be a really fun game. We tend to have more fun when not playing it properly though. It seems that you can walk like a monkey, and jump on people's cars in amusing ways. The way the game world is so open, like Assassins Creed is what I love, and the graphics are not bad at all!

Wow, love the TV!

It arrived on Tuesday, and I have already got it mostly set up and configured. I have watched a DVD or two upscaled on the PS3, plenty of SD material (the quality is certainly good enough even on that), and played Assassins Creed and GTA4 on the PS3.

Finally I have the home cinema experience. I have not seen Blue Ray yet, or cranked the sound up much. We seem to have lost our arial, so I can not tinker with the integrated freeview functionality, or do the software updates yet, I will have to buy another arial.

So far I am totally impressed with both SD and higher, love the colours, and black levels, and just the look of the TV. Tosh ZF is definitely the way to go if you want LCD.

Finally completed Assassins Creed this morning too, what a great game.

Whoops, there is no excuse

I have not blogged for a long, long time. We are only as busy as we ever are, no busier. I suppose it is partially because I got me a nice PS3 round about my birthday time, end of April, and am still definitely addicted to Assassins Creed.

The house is all finished, just some tidying (boarding) to go up in garage, and we are going to have the garden done, landscaped etc. Everything inside the house is peachy though, got our sofa, and dining table.

A couple of weeks ago I finally used my BBQ (incarnation two, the first was ruined in the flood). Great fun, and I love how easy gas BBQ's make it.

We just got back last Saturday from our family holiday in Tuscany (a delayed 60th for my dad). We stayed in the most amazing villa, isolated up in the hills, with incredible views, and a nice pool. I had to buy some excellent wine, this time Nicky knows how much I spent on my special bottle! Pictures of Tuscany are up on Flickr thanks to Nicky.

Friday night we caught up with our Newbury/Thatcham friends, and had a good night out at the pub. Then yesterday Nicky and I had a delayed celebrate our anniversary day out. We went to Cliveden in Maidenhead, amazing house, walked round the grounds. Then I forced her to allow me to buy my new TV in Reading. Ended up getting the Toshiba ZF 40 inch from John Lewis. Got to wait a week now for it to be delivered... booooooo!

Will post impressions once I get hold of it. Meantime, loving the PS3, not sure if Nicky is so keen about the amount of time I spend on it though :-)

Visiting Ben and Charis in Kent

Last weekend we popped down to see Ben and Charis in Canterbury. I can't believe it had been well over a year since we visited them. As per usual we had a great time, thanks guys. Some fabulous food and wine, and what a lovely house to stay in.

We only gibbered a couple of times though, must be growing up a bit! Never did go for that run though Ben, we will have to do it next time. Next time you will have to come up here, we will have sofa's and a dining table by then. We introduced them to Achmed the Dead Terrorist which is always fun.

Urm I bought an iPhone

I got in trouble with Nicky, but it is great I love it. Now I just need the case to arrive so I can stop carrying round the box. As per usual Apple really know how to make their technology. Everything just seems to work. The interface is incredible, and as camera's and 3G are not important to me it is a great fit.

Of course the tie in for 18 months hurts, as does the monthly bill, but having a phone I don't want to dropkick down the stairs is nice for a change.

Wow, dishwasher, wow

Hurray, the dishwasher turned up today, wow, been waiting for that for years, the only thing more exciting would be a new computer or a new TV!!

Wonder if Nicky will let me use it first this time? The house is really starting to take shape, we got our washing machine during the week, and ordered a new table today. It can't be more than a couple of weeks until the sofa turns up.

One thing I can't figure out is we have a bigger house now, but still nowhere to put so many things, I don't recall buying more... how does it work?

Roll on getting this place sorted enough so we can have guests round in comfort.

Gadgets on the horizon

Hmmmm, its been long time since I bought a gadget, and I feel a powerful urge to get some :-) There are so many temptations, top of the list are; a new TV, TFT, probably about 40 inch, sounds system, updated computer, iphone.

I even have a license to purchase (small scale) from Nicky, just got to wait a couple of months to see what the finances are like.

Got to get researching.

Woohoo, we are home

We officially got the keys to our house on Friday, and with help from my parents moved in yesterday! It has been a long wait, and we are so excited to be back. The carpet is in, the new fridge freezer has been delivered and is sat in our brand new kitchen.

The dishwasher did not turn up though, so we have to wait until next Saturday, muppets. The washing machine is arriving tomorrow. We have loads of sorting out to do, as per every move, but already this place feels like home. It is redecorated brand new all downstairs, and we are very pleased with it.

Just got to finish sorting stuff a bit more this week, and then hopefully we can have some friends round to celebrate getting back in!

Oh, don't order a dining table from Homebase, we thought we had a good one, but had to take two back, and then when we tested the display model, it was broken too!!! We wasted such a large amount of time when we were supposed to be moving house.

A New Year, hopefully a better one, lets get blogging..

Hi, its a New Year, I should know by the hangover I had last Tuesday, wow, we drank a massive amount of Red Wine at the Castle Pub Newbury. See New Year Photos and others.

It was great to spend some time with the Newbury lot getting drunk on my favourite drink, although consuming that much of it is not a good idea.

Meanwhile, Bertie and Kim moved back into the area just before Christmas, so its great to have them back, with the new addition to their family Baby Alex.

Nicky and I did the usual, travelling the country, first back to Essex to spend a couple of days with her lot, then to Bournemouth for Christmas Eve to spend Christmas with my lot this year. I spent plenty of time with the two dogs, Bella and the puppy Bonny.

Today we were at Zoe and Dave's for Isaac's Christening, and while the service was a little lengthy it was a good day out, nice to see how Isaac and parents are doing. Now we intend to settle down here in Newbury for the next few coming weeks in the lead up to moving back into our little house, see some progress pics taken before Christmas. Apparently we should be back in by around the 24th January, whoopee. I popped in today and there is no kitchen, but the lounge has its first coat of paint, and the laminate floor is down in the hall, kitchen and downstairs toilet.

I'll be back soon with more good news hopefully.

Catch up blog, house, dogs, work

Life has been busy, we are all over the place at weekends visiting, and basically it makes life difficult when you work fullltime during the week and evenings. To get some quality of life back I think we are going to have to be ruthless, and spend some time in our rented house (although we don't much like it) at weekends.

Which brings me on to progress with our actual house. Well since the builders ripped its guts out and declared it dry approximately September 14th ish, they have done, exactly, wait for it......... NOTHING!!!!! Which means we will not be back in until late January at the earliest. Needless to say, we are both a bit down about this. Apparently they are starting the plastering this week, woohoo.

So on to more positive things, I really enjoyed visiting home the other weekend, to see how my parents new black labrador pup Bonny is growing and changing, she is massive now, but so cute, and everything she does is slow motion. She uses her size advantage against Bella their two year old Jack Russel. See some puppy photos here.

On another positive note, I am through my probation period in my new job, and although it is hard work, I enjoy the nature of the work, and feel I am getting the sort of respect I have been working for.

Hopefully the next time I blog more positive news on the house.

Options options options, or lack of

For quite some time now I have been plotting my home entertainment system. Now, if I am honest with myself I cannot afford a new TV right now, but I am planning ahead to perhaps April when I may be able to. Our DVD player broke down, (sound is broken) several months back and I am telling Nicky we will hold off buying a new player because its a waste of time when we can use my Mac Mini... but this raises several questions.

- I do not have Front Row on the mini, so no remote, the machine was just prior to those particular features, does this render the idea impractical?

- will the sound be good enough off a Mac Mini, really we need a proper sound system right ?

So, looks like I need to research more right?

I do like the idea of having iTunes, music, photos and internet etc off the Mini.

Our little house has been declared dry, woohoo!

Nicky and I got the news on Friday.. our house is now dry. That means that the surveyor can draw up a schedule for the rebuilding works, and we have been given a provisional in before Christmas date for getting back home.

The rented accommodation is ok, but we are excited about finally getting to live in the house we worked so hard for.

We are already planning what we are going to do with the place.

Now if I could just get some kind of a lifestyle back and get this insanely demanding project at work finished!!!!

In our new house

So, we moved in just over a week ago to our temporary rented accomodation, and had some help from our friends to speed things up. The place is ok, especially as its only for a while, (hopefully no more than four months). We are near our Newbury friends, all within a road or two, so should be good for film nights and pub nights.

We got the internet connected yesterday, so hopefully I will get time to keep things updated.

I have dropped off the radar for a while as I am working on a big project and the deadline is rapidly approaching, I have been putting in some serious hours on that recently, so lets hope it gets me somewhere.

We popped round to our little ohuse to see how things were looking and to keep the garden ticking over. The plasterboard is mostly off, and everything is stripped back... its amazing what just two inches of flood water can do :-(

Anyhow, will post again soon when there is more news.

Great Weekend at my sisters housewarming

This weekend Nicky and I went down to Bournemouth for my sisters housewarming party. Heidi and Ben have almost finished doing up their new house. Ben has a full size pool table in his back garden!

All my family were there pretty much including mum and dad with Bella. I drank my first cider in about 15 years, and it was ok, not been sick on it for a long time so its drinkable again :-) Thanks Heidi and Ben for a good time.

Aurelia also introduced me to Midlake The Trials of Occupanther, which I am enjoying at the moment.

Bad News and Good News

Well, our surveyor is decent, seems like he's good at his job. The good news is he says they will probably not need to dig our block and beam concrete floor up, which means it cold be as little as three months until we get all sorted. The bad news is we definitely need to get out until that time :-(

We are still enjoying having our own little castle, with a decent sized garden for a new house, and intend to come back while in our rented accomodation to keep things ticking over in the garden.

At least this house move is a smaller scale one, as e can leave loads of stuff upstairs, which will be sealed of while it becomes a building site.

Oh, why is nothing ever simple in life?

Bad News

So, as you are aware, we decided to move house, and worked very hard to find and afford something, well, unfortunately a week after we moved into our brand new house, we were flooded. We are now looking for rental accomodation for the 6 months it will take builders etc to fix everything, how depressing!!!

On top of that, no internet at home :-( Will blog whenever I find time.

Oh woe is me!

We are probably moving on Friday

I say probably because although we have exchanged contracts, I am convinced after the crazy ride we have had that something could still go wrong... lets hope not. Details will be following in either email or letter form soon. We are only moving up the road, to a slightly bigger house with its own little garden.

The biggest problems we saw were I believe some incompetence in the way of forms being lost in the post on more than one occasion, misinformation, lack of communication, and Newbury council being short staffed (apparently). These things and some buyers who were desperate to get in here, and somewhat naive. Oh I almost forgot BT, unbelievable, I have not even got the energy to explain quite how incompetent they seem to be on so many levels. Call centres in India really do not help things along very much either.

Anyhow, we will be without internet for a week or so after moving, but I can check my emails daytimes at work, and we are reachable on our mobiles. Hope we'll be settled in for a housewarming party sometime in the summer.

Great Sci Fi books, Hyperion / Endymion

I never did blog about it at the time of reading, but Hyperion by Dan Simmons is a great book! Featuring one of the best Scifi Fi creations of all time, 'the Shrike', read to find out if you have not already.

Well a year or two later I am now reading Endymion, and although my memory might not serve me, I think I am enjoying it even more. I can't seem to put it down, especially when my favourite character the Shrike is featuring. Great secrets seem to unfold with every chapter. Its a brilliant book, wish I had written it.

Oh the disappointment of Bond

Nicky and I finally watched the new Bond last week. After all the hype from everyone else on this one I expected it to be excellent. As it was, I was glad I didn't go to the cinema to see it. Disappointing...

I was right in my opinion before watching it, Daniel Craig is just not Bond material. He is not sophisticated enough, and he just does not look right.

So the list stands as all time best = Connery, second best = Brosnan.

They made the wrong choice in Craig, and the film was not action packed enough.

There, I've said it.

Finally, I saw Spiderman 3

About a month after all the Newbury Lot went to see Spiderman 3, I finally got to go and see it with Nicky.

An expensive trip, but well worth it. The special effects were amazing, especially the Sand Man. However the film was flawed! They tried to fit too much in, and they included some really poor acting from the female news reported that should never have been in there.

In my opinion it should have been Sandman and the Goblin in this one, and maybe Rhino and Venom in a fourth film.

Still, I was so impressed by those effects, they looked real. Not long now we will not be able to tell the difference.

Its a little delayed, but I thought I'd say thanks

Thanks to Nicky for organising my surprise 30th birthday weekend, and thanks to everyone for travelling to spend the day with us. The most amazing thing was that Nicky kept it all secret, although I am not the most observant person... sneaky women :-)

It really meant a great deal to me to see everyone, especially as I had been complaining for weeks how I never saw my friends anymore, now we are all grown up with busy lives.

Cheers Everyone!

Wedding Anniversary Number Three

As hard to believe as it seems to me, three years have now gone by (well on Friday) since Nicky and I got married. We repeated last years events we enjoyed them so much. We headed up to Stratford Upon Avon again, for fine food, rowing and Shakespeare.

This time we saw Ian McKellan in King Lear, it was excellent, everything I expected. We have really been very lucky two years running, last year it was Patrick Stewart in Anthony and Cleopatra. To have seen two of the greats in Shakespeares home town in quality productions is great.

Before the play we had fine food and wine, then after the show pudding back at the hotel.

Marvellous.

A very tame Reading Beer Festival this year

Wow, we must be getting old, it was the tamest Beer Festival we have been to yet. We drank plenty, all day long, but just did not seem to get drunk. Was great to have the usual crowd there, although we were missing a few due to weddings etc.

On the plus side Rosspo, Darth Limpet, Chudplug, Bert and I did all wear tweed, and Chudplug and I bought pipes for the occasion. As per usual the pictures are up on flickr-rossputin, and flickr-theplugs.

Roll on Newbury Beer Festival now, when we will have to try to get back into the drinking games :-)

A little update on our busy lives

A few months ago, I blogged about getting a new job. I am still loving it, nice little company, great location, interesting work, cups of tea made for me all day, marvellous.

Well, after a long difficult search Nicky has a new job now also, she is finally leaving Francis Bailey Primary School after eight years teaching there. Nicky will be starting a new job at John Rankin in September, so now hopefully her life will be easier knowing what the future holds.

On the house front, we accepted an offer on ours, and then found a nice new place just up the road. We made an offer on that and had it accepted, so fingers crossed, it could all go smoothly.

Updates to follow soon.

My rapidly approaching 30th birthday

Oh dear, I am almost 30, scary! On the plus side I am milking it for all it is worth, I have already been to Center Parcs, am off to the Reading Beer Festival in a couple of weeks, and this weekend went home to Bournemouth to spend some time with my family. I got a fantastic golf set, my first one. I can't wait to get out there and swing my new clubs.

Thanks everyone :-)

Centre Parcs

Alas, the long awaited Centre Parcs visit is over. The Newbury lot, Rosspo, Darth Lipmet Chudplug and partners plus myself and Nicky paid for the Exclusive Accomodation this time, with hottub, steam room and sauna facilities. It was marvellous, we had wine and Champagne in the tub. The rapids were excellent as per usual. I won an archery competition, wow, first time I have won anything for ages.

Thanks to everyone for my birthday pressies, so much Belgian Beer it will take me ages to drink it all, and I even got an authentic Pauwel Kwack testtube glass thingy!

We videotaped a cake-off between Joey and Rosspo, both cakes tasted very good. Photos are here!

Amiga Emulation, marvellous

Yep, I could be considered late jumping onto the bandwagon, I just never got round to it, well, finally I set up WinUAE, and started playing some of my favourite old Amiga games. I need to get hold of a load more, but for now I have 'Menace' and 'Arkanoid' working, and they are as playable as ever. Its relatively painless getting WinUAE up and running, but if you want a really simple solution, simply look up 'Amiga Forever' on your search engine of choice.

My little sister is going to love playing Menace again after all these years.

We got tickets to see the police.. wow!

Excellent news, Nicky and I are going to see The Police at twickenham with Mr and Mrs Plug.. (The Chudlings). As its my 30th this year, as mentioned in my previous post.. it seems fitting that we struck it lucky and not only did they reform, but we got tickets to see them.

Added to this, I am doing the Reading Beer Festival is rapidly approaching, 6th of May I think.. so much to look forward to right now.

Centre Parcs is just around the corner

Hurray, only a couple of weeks to go now, I can't wait, we have booked Centre Parcs over the Easter weekend, with swanky accomodation including a hottub. Darth Limpet and I are going to be celebrating our 30th birthday there.

We are just about to book our activities, lets hope there is more Greco Roman wrestling 'strictly torso dude'.. and drinking!

A little update

So I mentioned before that I was job hunting, well.. no more, finally some 6 weeks after I started the search I got me a new job. What's more its away from London, so no more ridiculous commute, hurray!

Its with a small company in Hungerford, and everything about it just felt right, I like the technologies, the location and the people, I hope it works out.

I will be sad to leave VNU behind, but the time is right to move on to the next stage of my career. I just have to get through the remaining 6 weeks of my notice period.. half way now!

So now Nicky and I just have to find a new house! Hope thats gonna be easy.

So now, its time to watch a cheesy horror film.. 'Last Cannibal World' and crack open a bottle of wine.

Well, back from Dubai.. boo, there's no sun here

Nicky and I just got back from our holiday in Dubai, see pictures at Flickr. We had a great time staying with our friends Tina and Kent. If the rent were a little cheaper, and there were more footpaths I would be out there to live in a flash, (12 months of sunshine).

So now its back to the UK, and getting the house ready to put on the market and on going career change trauma.. oh why is life never easy?

On the up side, I bought myself a Nintendo DS and it is great fun, looking to get more than just the one game though, only have Brain Age or whatever its called.

On the other up side Supreme Commander should be joining my collection of PC games tomorrow if all goes according to plan :-)

Fantastic Christmas break

So, despite a massive amount of free time from 11th December until 3rd January, an almost total silence in blog land... sorry, I was pretty much playing golf, or Oblivion, and after Christmas Medieval Total War 2. I had a brilliant holiday, as I had been saving up my holiday at work due to many busy project launches.

Hair update.. sadly the locks of the hairy Rossputin are no longer with us, as they were at the recieving end of too much abuse :-) I got called Lego Man, Playmobile man, The Hulk, Superman, and probably far worse things I can not remember! I am now more like Tintin again.

So a new year.. my resolutions, how am I doing?

- give blood (not yet)
- get fit (trying in between fighting off colds and travelling all over as per usual)
- address my work life balance (yep, doing pretty well on this one)
- couple of hobbies with Nicky (French, Squash) (we are still keen on these)

Its all up in the air right now, we are tidying the house up to put it on the market, and I am considering my career options, basically everything may change, watch this space

Second post so soon?

For a good reason, while we are on the subject of New Years Resolutions, lets add another 'getting organised'... its time I did just that, thanks to my continually disorganised state, see (Nicky is my Oracle/calendar/contact book), I have just let a close friend of mine down.. I was supposed to go to Breakpoint in Germany in April with him (sorry Emanuel), but have already booked and paid for a joint birthday celebration. Muppet!

So what organiser software to use? My phone I suppose, and SyncML... more details to follow.

First post of the New Year... 2007...

What will it hold? Probably going to move house, try to keep my resolutions :

- Give Blood
- Get Fit
- Don't take any bullshit

.. thats probably it for now.

Christmas was great, and the New Year at Darth Limpet's place, we dressed up as James Bond, and did some horse racing. Drank some great wine, and got lots of nice pressies. Including the main reason why 90% of my time has been spent in front of my PC... Medieval Total War 2, the best game since Rome Total War. Wow!!!

Got to finish Total War in time for Supreme Commander, which is coming soon :-)

My New Phone

I got a new phone a couple of months ago, the Sony Ericsson P990i. Its great I love it, but there are some small problems. The user interface is not consistent in the messaging section, sometimes I cannot delete multiple messages, this is annoying. More serious than this though, the keyboard has stopped working down the far right hand side.. and ironically the web browser crashes every time I go to the Sony Ericsson homepage.

On the flip side as already stated, the phone is cool, and I have done some cool stuff with it, like synching up with a centralised contacts database, and hooking up my encrypted wifi network at home :-)

My last Sony Ericsson phone the V800 was replaced twice with new handsets before it finally just worked.... the theme goes on.

The Guiness Surger

So Rosspo bought me a Guniness surger for my birthday back in April... finally, months later, in between my wine experimentation, I got to try it out on Sunday night...

See the evidence The Surge Experiment.

The pint did actually look exactly as though poured in a pub in Dublin, tasted great, and most importantly, the ultrasonics were geekily impressive :-).

On holiday at the moment, loving it.

I decided to use some of my holiday up and keep Nicky company while she is on her half term. We are not going anywhere, just spending some time together, and getting all the things in order that I am usually too busy to do, paperwork, keeping CV up to date, sorting out a new dedicated server for rossputin.org, so expect updates there over the coming weeks! It just goes to show.. when we are working, we just don't have time even to do every day things.. it kind of takes over our lives! Booo, lets push work down the stairs!!!!

Company of Heroes

Just completed Company of Heroes... and as its rare that I complete a game.. it must have been good! An RTS set in the Second World War, you can lay mines, build sandbag emplacements and shoot the Kraut! Marvellous. I highly recommend it.

Wow, did Oktoberfest on Saturday!

It was amazing... a completely different experience to UK beer festivals.. not better, just different!
The traditions were amazing, great costumes, ceremony. The atmosphere was astonishing before even the first beer was poured. One thing only was lacking, proper beer :-) The Whitebeers were tremendous, just too much goddamn lager! Yuck.

The downside was me chucking my guts up on foul lager, I am a lager girl!!!!

Glad I did it though, thanks to my most esteemed German Compatriot Emanuel, for organising everything, and making sure I got back to my hotel on the publisc transport.

The Beer Festival Run

Well I thought it was about time I picked this subject up again. The beer festival run.. I am aiming for 6 festivals this year, with 2 already attended, Reading and Talin... I hope to squeeze in The Pubecks Banks Arms festival immediately after getting back from holiday.

But yesterday I realised Nicky is out to destroy my plans.. by removing the possibility of me attending my annual visit to the Newbury festival!!! I am horrified!! What to do?

Sniff snif, sad Putin.

Second Thoughts on Keane's new album

OK, maybe I was hasty... just been listening to the album again, and this time, very unexpectedly, another song just started grabbing me, 'Nothing in my Way'. Marvellous, from nowhere, it grabs you, with close to the brilliance of some of the songs on the first album!

My first go at cricket in about 3 years

I went out and chucked a few balls at Rosspo in the nets today, it was great fun, and it seemed my accuracy was not as bad as I feared it might be!

Wonder how the shoulder it going to feel tomorrow.

So, I got Keane's new album yesterday

Just had a chance to listen to it today, and I have to say, despite a couple of good songs on it, it is nowhere near as good as their last one... hope we haven't had the best from them already, they have so much potential!!!

Wow, what a weekend we had!

It was our second anniversary last week, so this weekend, we finally went on a celebration weekend, that we had been planning for a long time. We headed up to Stratford Upon Avon, went in a rowing boat, had tea in some tea rooms, saw the birthplace of Shakespeare, stayed in a posh hotel... and to top it all off, we saw Anthony and Cleopatra at the Swan Theatre, starring Patrick Stewart!!!

It was the funniest, best acted Shakespeare I have ever seen, and while they are doing all the plays, I highly recommend going to see one! I ate rabbit for starters at the hotel, then a fine piece of Scottish ribeye steak.

Today, we followed on with excellent plans, and went to Warwick Castle on the way home. They had a working Trebuchet there!!!

Some pics of the whole weekend...

Our anniversary weekend pics

Mission Impossible 3

We saw Mission Impossible 3 last night, and both thought it was excellent. In my opinion better than the second film, and maybe almost as good as the first for suspense. Could have done with a little more chop-sokky, like Jon Wo's action scenes in the second, to make it almost perfect.

Thought the explosive devices in heads were great!!!

Roman Silchester, just a few miles down the road

Wow, its amazing what you don't know about major historical sites just down the road from you... http://www.flickr.com/photos/rossputin/sets/72157594147710066/... but this place has the best preserved Roman walls in Britain, and an amphitheatre.

The surroundings were beautiful, and there are plenty of great country pubs en-route.

We had a great day out here, and highly recommend it.

My family's new dog is a budding computer scientist

When I was at home a couple of weeks ago, I settled down to do some work on my laptop out in the conservatory.. and a little puppy jumped up on to the couch with me. She immediately became fixated on what I was doing.. following the movement of the cursor and windows around on the screen, and displaying an interest in all my interactions with the computer. This went on for an hour and a half.. and it turns out she is still doing the same thing with my dad, and sister when they are on the computer.

She is such an intelligent little dog, watching everything always curious.

oh the jetlag!

Had an amazing time in New York, walked everywhere, and saw all the sights that we always see in the films. Walked the Brooklyn Bridge, did the Empire State Building, even went to the Opera, which was uncomfortable in the pleb seats.

We just need to invent teleportation now, so I can escape the massive lack of sleep that such a trip means for me!

My Beautiful New Machine, mmmm

OK, its fast, its beautiful, and after my recent experience in working life, its the only thing keeping me sane and happy at the moment!

Enough said, here are some photos!

Well it ws a busy weekend, but fun!

Back down to Bournemouth for the weekend, to celebrate my Grans 80th, and my aunty's birthday... saw my cousings James and Sohpie, and the irrepressible Bella, who is growing up fast.

Nicky and I then had a nice restful day today, and attempted to fit our bike rack, as a test run ready for Centre Parcs on Friday. Not fun, it ws cold, and the damn thing just could have been made better.

Oh well, Chile Con Carne fo dinner tonight, and I reckon I will order some nice wine hee hee!

Time in the modern world

So, these days I find myself with less and less time in which I am supposed to do more and more...
I am not sure how I arrived in this situation...
I now work for 7 European countries, and usually at least two of them want stuff from me (at the same time)... I wonder if my wages should be multiplied accordingly.
Now perhaps I do not manage my time well enough... I don't know...
I am supposed to be writing a technical article, organising a stag do, writing a little webapp to ease the previously mentioned task, working on my game, keeping fit, spending time relaxing with Nicky, the mind boggles at the number of things I am meant to do!

Add to this travel abroad, particularly when the public transport infrastructure lets me down as it did on Thursday, when my train broke down for 2 hours 5 miles from home.... and I am getting pretty tired and stressed... and the fact that I do 15 hours travelling a week minimum, I am still looking for the rewards I hope I am due...

Now I have New York coming up, and Stag Do's etc... wouldn't it be nice to win the lottery?

Think I will add one more point to my New Years Resolution... say no to people more often, unless it is in my best interests, make them wait till I AM READY to help!!!

Those boys at 37Signals are about to do it again

Before I say anything else, go to www.37signals.com...

I have hype on about their products/ideas before... and they are about to do it again... watch carefully for the release of 'Campfire' this week.... you are going to love it!!!!

Good Reading

As part of my New Years Resolution List, one of my objectives was to improve my time management and stress levels...

To this end I decided to do some effective reading... and low and behold it does pay off..

The First book I would like to recommend it 'One Minute Manager', recommended to me by my boss. This book is a gem, you absolutely have to read it... enough said.

The second book is 'The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People', habit number one 'Be Proactive' has already helped me out on numerous occasions in the last few weeks!!!!

Hahaha

Sick Nicky is getting better again, hurray, I will be able to go out and pay again, sorry I have been a hermit everyone, very busy at work, and staying in with Nick while she was poorly.

Now its time to relax again!!!

On top of that, my body weight is increasing again, nearly back to 13 stone now my appetite has increased again, HAPPY DAYS!!!!

Body Weight

Boo Hoo,

I have lost half a stone since before Christmas, all I did to do that was eat loads of food, and not go to the gym. Depressing, as I wanted to put a stone on... I am not at the lowest for about 4 years at 12.5 stone...

So a new programme is in order, I am going to cram protein, and exercise more, lots of chicken tuna and pasta coming up!!!!

Rage against the machine part 2

So, Wednesday was a bad day for travel into London... and out of!!!!

Paddington underground was shut because of congestion, again, I'm so bored of this problem that our government and transport agencies can not be bothered to solve that I will nt say anymore on the subject!!!!

Then, worse, on the way home, they let me get all the way into the hellish bowels of the earth on the platform at Oxford Circus, before telling me there was a fire hazard... at which point a cretin working for London Underground could provide me with no further information... So I ran from Oxford Circus to Paddington, in order not to miss my train, giving myself blisers all over my feet... now I am a flabby city boy, and need the exercise... but I don't like running for the failings of my own country...

Ross for Emporer, come on!!!!!! I'll sort things out.

New Years Resolutions

1) relax, no more stress, if you expect to get more than one thing out of me at a time, think again, (but that one thing will be done really, really well of course)!
2) Nicky says point one is because I am a man!
3) get fit again... gym, run
4) eat more healthy, (more fruit)
5) drink more water
6) speak better Italian
7) work on my game
8) blog more regularly
9) dream more normal dreams
10) stick to this list

Before I get on to serious things

Another strange work related dream... A friend of mine from work Emanuel, and I were having an argument in my dream on Thursday night on which is better, Little Britain or The Fast Show... The problem was, Emanuel was getting very, animated, violent even, and he was wearing a very big hat made out of pork!!! Confusing... anyway, he later revealed to me how he likes strange hats.....

Wow, what can I say... this guy can blog (techies will like this)

I found a really good blog on web 2.0 and Ajax, a couple of concepts that I hear being chucked around more and more...

My take on them.. remember when we thought javascript was the most amazing thing... and it should almost steer websites singlehandedly, alond with DHTML.. we soon found it was a cross browser nightmare, insane too many client side screw-ups, demented monkeys in a barrel wearing gas masks and flippers directing the show approach.. and dropped it... why have people not learned from their mistakes? They are doing the same thing all over again???

So read Bile Blog, Web 2.0/Ajax...

Finally saw Pumpkin Head while Nicky was out at the Doves concert

Have to disagree with Carl on this one, the old hag was great in it, throw in a bit of hillbillyism and you almost have the complete thing, but in general the film was a bit lame!

Probably needed a scene like the popcorn love scene from Troll 2 to liven it up!

Whinging in general

Yo Yo, I'm back from Milan, nice place, workde hard, played hard now tired...
so here is how bad luck comes in 3's...
first someone drove into the back of our car when Nicky picked me up on Thursday night from Reading Station... no injuries, just a pain in the arse...
then our car headlight bulb went...
then we got a crack in our windscreen while driving down to Bournemouth...

aagghh!

Fun to see you all for the Christmas gettogether!

I had a great time, was good to see you all, although we were not very successful with the Christmas shopping, at least we got ideas for ourselves hey?

Rosspo, the betrayal!!!! What a black day it was with the toffee, I shall have to remember that for your stag do!

Nice mixture of red red wine, and Guiness.

The Machinist

Wow... Christian Bale is really on form with this... he has been damn good in quite a few films so far...

I thought the transformation/weight loss thing was amazing, you couldn't pay me enough to make me want to do that!

However, the idea (not saying what) that makes up the general gist of the film has been done before.

I still think his performances in Empire of the Sun and American Psycho are his best.

A new addition to our family, Welcome Bella!

So there is a new addition to our family, little Bella, who is about 7 weeks old, and as you can see, is just about the cutest thing on the planet!
She is in effect, the spiritual daughter of Bess our beloved old family dog who died at the excellent age of 15 some months ago.

Bella is apparently quite a little character, quite hyper, and active.

I look forward to seeing you can outplay the other when I see her next!

Well I am back from Tuscany

And it has pretty much rained for a week! Over in Tuscany I was in the outdoor pool, catching the beautiful golden light thta the region is famous for. Drinking marvellous coffee, eating wonderful food, and to finish it all off, some exquisite wine.

I love the language, and culture... in short I reckon I could live there.

So here I am, working again (time to win the lottery)!

Had a disturbing dream last night, Nicky had twins!

Woke up in a cold sweat!

Hi Everyone

As you are no doubt aware, I have been incredibly busy just recenty with trips to Europe etc, so I just wanted to say thankyou for all making it to Alton Towers for Nicky's birthday, it was great, except for the rain, and my fear of some of the rides!

I am now looking forward to my holiday in just less than a weeks time, hurray!

And finally I wanted to record my latest strange dream. I was sat at my desk at work, and all the code I had written had bugs, each bug was attached to a packet of toffee, in the draw of my boss, who was kind of like Willy Wonka. The packets of toffee were all lined up and filed, and he kept throwing one at me for every bug he found. Whats that all about?

Darth Limpets Cider Homebrew Extravaganza

Great fun, cheers DL, still don't think I can get back on cider though.
Good to see Chudplug, and Mrs Plug on good drinking form.
The IToy was great fun, Kung Fu mayhem, a great keep fit toy!
Was good to see everyone.

It will be good to see those Half Yard of Ale piccies up on the web!

My first scary trip to the dentist

AAAGGGHHH, no pain, but a lot of discomfort, like when they put at least three drilling type implements in your mouth all at the same time.

The three most unpleasant aspects were however, the bits of tooth spraying out of my mouth, the dribbling like a gimp, and the choking and drowning sesation.

No more sweets, drink more milk, whatever else, just keep brushing my teeth!!!!

(And that was only one filling!)

Newbury Beer Festival

The wheel of time turns, and we found ourselves back at the Newbury Beer Festival.
To summarise, the hog roast ws perahps the best I have ever had, the first one I was allowed to help myself to crackling, yumm!!
We didn't play any drinking games this year, or make Bert eat things, which was a shame, but the organisers appreciated our plan to start with the beer at the top left and work our way down.

I know Darth Limpet would have appreciated a greater range of ciders!

Finally, some advice on good hog roast technique:
=> wait for fresh pig
=> don't be first in line
=> have more than one, its great!

Just a further effort to enhance our growing little community

Some time ago now I introduced my most esteemed compatriot Darth Limpet to a number of online tools which I hoped would enrich his life. I had been using these tools myself, and appreciated how they let me express thoughts and opinions.

The first of those tools was obviously www.blogger.com, and the second, Flickr for online photo sharing.

Now it is time for the next life improving tool, certainly for someone as forgetful as me.

Backpack allows you to create reminders, todo lists, and mini web pages, and you can get automatic reminders texted to your phone. It will help you organise your life.

And you can try it for free!

Blogging about a blog, hmm

Outstanding,

Rosspo launched a search on the web today for the 'Newbury Beer Festival', which is looming now.
Now, he used Microsofts web search MSN Search (and usually we would not forgive him for that), but in this case the first result to show was one of my blog postings, (at last, fame on the web), perhaps the first time I have ever appreciated Microsoft!!!!

IQ Tests

I am obviously so stupid that I don't even get IQ tests.

I have had three separate scores of 109, 127 and 136 over the last 6 or 7 years,
with the lowest being admittedly while I really couldn't be bothered to do it watching Anne Robinson, the other 2 occasions were under more controlled situations.

My most recent scored 127 off a web site test IQ Test.

How can you get such different scores, I know (spacial awareness is a low point for me)!

Load of old bollocks!!

Napoleon Dynamite

Saw Napoleon Dynamite last night, even had Nicky watching it. A very funny film, we both thought it had many similarities to Australian Films, some quirky filming, and it reminded us a little of an Australian series for kids form the early 90's called 'Round the Twist'.

Worth watching definately!

Holiday in Cornwall

Hi all, sadly my holiday has come to an end.

I had a great time, saw some amazing sights, and enjoyed my first attempt at surfing (something I hope to do regularly in the future)!

As it turned out, I was over confident and kept falling off the board, but Nicky was a good squatter and beat me!

Was good to see the family at my cousin Sophies wedding too! Congratulations Sophie and Mike.
See Rossputin Flickr Images .

House of Flying Daggers

Have been meaning to blab about this film for a while. I thought it was a lot better than Kung Fu Hustle despite its slant towards being a love story.

The fight choreography was a lot better and the cinematography was breathtaking at times.

I am not quite sure however why the baddies ran around with their swords pointing the wrong way!

My Sponsor Pack came through for Seamus at Monkey World

Excellent, now I have a season ticket for a year to go see chimps and monkeys at Monkey World.

In fact with any luck, I am going to combine a visit to see the chimps with the beer festival on the Purbecks this weekend. You can't get much better than beer and monkeys!

Hmm Smoothie Maker

Excellent, one of my long time aims has been met, I have wanted a smoothie maker for ages, but Nicky never let me get one. My reasoning is that it will help me eat more fruit, because I am lazy, and fussy with my fruit. Oh yeah and smoothies taste great.

Anyway, finally just bought one with a disapproving Nicky looking on, and my first smoothie (apples, banana, grapes and vanilla) was superb!!! Yum!!!

So its bombing day tomorrow again I suppose

Oh well, I suppose I will go in early to try to avoid it. If it weren't so hot I would wear my Die Hard vest and stop those lunatics myself.

Seems my boss has the right idea, he is going to be driving round in lovely Italy, eating home cooked food, drinking beer, and generally avoiding extremist fundamentalists!

Conspiracy Theory

Hmm, strange, now there are satellite images, at least up to a certain zoom level.
Either it is hunting season on bears, so the satellites are getting through the screen of bear shit, or something else exactly as strange happened!

Now I just wrote this morning to Darth Limpet, Rosspo and Chudplug about Microsofts site being screwed since Friday, (lacking a css), and by the time they look that is fixed as well.

Like Darth Limpet says, perhaps I am a known agitator, and am being watched!!!!

Summer BBQ 2005

Its been a couple of years since we did the last one, and lets just say the weather wasn't quite up to it this year!! But we managed it, the bbq found a little house under some shelter and we had brolly boys and girls to help, see www.flick.com/photos/rossputin, or www.flickr.com/photos/limpetboy.

Thanks for coming everyone, was good to see you all there! The homebrew was pretty successful really, and the half yard of ale, (cheers Darth Limpet).

Lets hope we can get back to playing in the garden next time.

Why bears definately shit in the woods in Thatcham/Newbury

As I emailed to some of you recently, google maps is good stuff, but I noticed one thing...

Click on hybrid mode over Newbury and Thatcham, and there are no satellite images for either Thatcham or Newbury.

As I suspected, bears in the woods chuck their shit at the satellites as they pass overhead, blocking their view. Thus making Thatcham and Newbury the darkest places in the universe, and probably terrorist hotbeds!

Home made beer diary - day 25

Its calling to me, I don't think I can stop myself.
Its calling to me, I don't think I can hold back.
Its coming, from the gloomy depths of its lair, its resting place.

One beer to rule them all, one beer to find them.
One beer to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.

Kung Fu Hustle, thoughts

Sorry to be contraversial here, but despite the amusing snake style kung fu clip, the rest of the film is disappointing, much of the choreography is poor, with unconvincing martial artists.

The mix of genre's does not work, and reminds me too much of big gay musicals, (obviously deliberate), but these are just not my cup of tea.

A cross between Paint your Wagon, West Side Story and some other sheisser mixed up with mostly lame martial arts!!!

I would rather see Ong Bak elbows any day, or House of Flying Daggers.

Preparations for BBQ and weather

Hmm, school holidays, my BBQ therefore its going to rain on Saturday, so looks like we might not play croquet after all.

Will have to think of some back up plans, (The Swan for a few pints sounds a likely emergency plan!).

Meantime the beer is sat there calling to me, should be ready by now but I promise not to taste it till the inaugural ceremony!

I can't wait to see Dave the Tank (Darth Limpet) christen his half yard of ale!!!

Home made beer diary - day 14

OK, so my beer survived so far, but the last couple of days it is no longer producing any gas.
Did I deflate it too much? Is there a leak, will it taste really bad now? So many unknowns,
I need a homebrew guru, a beer Jedi, anyone got any ideas?

First things First

Before I tackle anything else today, I am going to Rage Against the Machine, Rant Against the System, launch into a tirade against society and in general manners and behaviour.

What sparked this off was the unpleasant end to a good, fun evening, yesterday.

We all enjoyed ourselves at the comedy in Newbury, then went for some takeaway, in this case a burger at Rio's. We all put our orders in, and Nicky asked for a burger for me, and some chips for herself, clearly enunciating every request.

10 minutes later our food turned up, with Nicky's chips mixed in with my meaty dripping burger with bacon.

When she politely asked for chips not soaked with meaty goodness, the miscreant behind the counter poured them into a fresh container. Obviously this is no good to someone who has spent 14 years chastely avoiding meat products. Nicky politely pointed out she was vegatarian, and at this point the increasingly irate individual threw some more chips on to cook. When Nicky pointed out we had to go catch a train, and had no time to wait for chips to cook, the pleb swore at her, and tried to kick us all out of the shop, swearing and cursing, asking us 'do you know how hot it is in here?'.

Out of principal, Nicky asked for her money back, which she got practically thrown at her.

Outrageous, I am not sure what kind of proprietor, lacking in education, common sense and manners thinks he can swear at his patrons, he must own the place or he would never keep his job, anyway, the moral of the story KEEP AWAY FROM RIO's of NEWBURY.

Plebs, or gimps, morons, cretins, imbeciles are not impressive representations of the species.

I had to throw my burger away, as I only eat food cooked by people with an IQ of more than 43.

Anyway, to top it all off I have been frustrated by people with an inability to queue properly this week. Its fucking simple, you stand behind the person who got there before you, how insanely basic is this principle. Yet it seems at least 50% of people can not manage it!!!!!

And finally, people with those little pieces of shit suitcases on wheels, milling round in other peoples way, WALK TO ONE SIDE get out the fucking way, learn how to make up your minds about where you are going, HAVE SOME CONSIDERATION for others in a race to catch a train.

JESUS H CHRIST, I really need to rule this planet, I can solve at least 87% of all problems facing humanity and the planet Earth.

Lots Happening at the Moment

Belated post for the Reading Beer Festival we had great fun trying to make Rosspo look like a tramp, and invented a great new drinking game, see flickr for some evidence I will be posting eventually. (Not done yet).

Its all go go go, this weekend was golf, War of the Worlds, (good film), Nicky's second Race for Life, and a bbq.

This week is comedy Thursday and Saturday, maybe a pub quiz.

Our homebrew was born one week ago, and so far there has been only one casualty, Daves decided to evacuate itself on his carpet.

Hopefully the remaining beers will survive!!!

Only a couple of weeks till we play half yard of ale at our bbq party.

Too long since my last post

But here I am again now, and with Carls wedding to blog about, we all had a great time (the Newbury Thatcham lot), and there are plenty of photo's to prove it.

Wedding was great, thanks for inviting us Carl and Lorraine.

Drank too much, had a nice cigar, had a bundle with the guys, (including the stag) which nobody managed to catch on film somehow...

Anyway, as for the ultimate picture (finally proving the nature of Rosspo and Limpet Childs relationship...

I have uploaded it to my flickr album!!!!

You should have received invites to view...

My Beautiful Mac Mini has arrived

It was late, but well worth the wait...

It is so beautiful, quiet, fast, it just works.

Everything from unpackaging to plugging in, to switching on, to wireless network to bluetooth keyboard took about 30 minutes, and I have never really worked with Mac OSX before.

If you need a new PC, consider it!!!!!

Any one want excellent Creative 5.1 dolby digital sound system?

Few years old, but works fine, free to a good home.

I am switching to the world of Mac, and just don't need such heavy firepower, as I don't have time to game so much.

Come on you gamers out there...

This has to be seen to be believed

In the usual spirit of Microsoft bashing, please follow these simple instructions for a good laugh:

1: go to http://maps.msn.co.uk
2: click on the 'Get Directions' button
3: Select 'Norway' from the combo box labelled 'Address in'
4: Enter 'Haugesund' in the city field of the start address
5: Enter 'Trondheim' in the city field of the end address
6: Click on 'Get Directions' button
7: laugh, laugh again, then laugh some more

Try reversing the search to prove you don't have to go via England

Still alive after the New Years Eve party

Oh well, back to work, it had to happen sometime, at least I have the consolation that I got to dress up like a Nazi and play with inflatable breasts over the Christmas holiday,

marvellous.