Today was hell after two weeks of pain trying to get loads of differng people happy about a range of documents, with work being overwritten people misunderstood and a lot of pressure this morning I sat in work at 7am putting all that live it took most of the day and is probably the biggest thing I hve done so far. I guess I should think of it as an achievement. It has taught me a lot about the calculations that go on aprs, ppp, interest and fees. Guys always ask for the TAR (total amount repayable) then deduct the origonal borrowing that tells you how much its acutally costing you to borrow the money its a fairly frightning figure!
Since sunday I have been putting something off dreading talking to Liz I dont believe its would work out but I find it hard to make the break but sometimes when you like something the best thing to is to let it go. Though its not always an easy thing to do. For a while now I have been seeing Liz, I say seeing but in fact I only saw her a few times I always seem to be too busy or tired, I know it ws getting to her and on Sunday she basically had a go at me about it. I guess bubbling away is the thought that I dont like me very much so how can anyone else, there must be something wrong with them to like me. It strange I know, but I guess she isnt the one for me or I would care more deeply, she sounded pretty hurt which was bad. She is a nice person adn dosnt deserve that, unfortunatly I'm not really a nice guy I appear to be I care about something and feel guilty but that dosnt always make me do the right things.
To make myself feel better I went out to see Collin he was looking well its probably a year since we last saw each other he left BLEL before me and I left well over a year ago now. There was something about that place, in between the skiving and the dubious work there were some great people (some awful people too) but it was all just a bit larger than life.
Wednesday, October 05, 2005
Monday, October 03, 2005
Jabez Clegg
Seems like this is a long weekend of music for me Sandbox on Friday night and Paul Tonight, they were both playing as part of the "In the city" fesitval of music in Manchester.
I went down with phil and met up with all the usual suspects Danny, Woller, Sandbox turned up. I arrived in time to catch "The Great Blind Degree" a kind of razorlight esc indie rockers they were talented but Im not sure there music said very much to me. The PA was a bit more powerful than the room the sound uttlerly deafning.
Next on was Vijay Kishore, a singer songwriter like paul, he had an incredibly powerful and captivating voice he put so much sorry and energy into his songs I think a lot of people/ women have screwed him over.
Finally Paul, I though he gave a good performance not the best I have ever seen but he seems to have developed some of hi songs adding a few little touches that were nice.
Unfortuantly as I was working early had to shoot after the gig, Paul seemed somewhat subdued and upset with his performance, which is a shame but I guess artists are a highly strung bunch. I managed to get a few decents photos before the battery on Phils camera died I think I would like to get an SLR and take more photos but I am not sure how I would feel about walking round with such an expensive toy, and I still want a new pc as well :-S All these desires and Im only bearly out of debt going to have to keep a handle on my desires.
I went down with phil and met up with all the usual suspects Danny, Woller, Sandbox turned up. I arrived in time to catch "The Great Blind Degree" a kind of razorlight esc indie rockers they were talented but Im not sure there music said very much to me. The PA was a bit more powerful than the room the sound uttlerly deafning.
Next on was Vijay Kishore, a singer songwriter like paul, he had an incredibly powerful and captivating voice he put so much sorry and energy into his songs I think a lot of people/ women have screwed him over.
Finally Paul, I though he gave a good performance not the best I have ever seen but he seems to have developed some of hi songs adding a few little touches that were nice.
Unfortuantly as I was working early had to shoot after the gig, Paul seemed somewhat subdued and upset with his performance, which is a shame but I guess artists are a highly strung bunch. I managed to get a few decents photos before the battery on Phils camera died I think I would like to get an SLR and take more photos but I am not sure how I would feel about walking round with such an expensive toy, and I still want a new pc as well :-S All these desires and Im only bearly out of debt going to have to keep a handle on my desires.
Sunday, October 02, 2005
Cafe Club
I am totally worn out after a long and highly stressful week. For the last two weeks I have been working on some new lender documents which need calculations for early settlement of the loans, its actully quiet a task to calculate the future settlement of a loan you have to calculate the effects of compounding over the period and if the loan rate is varible (which most are) the figures will be inaccurate.
Also all the documents need new merge field creating this ranging from the simple (inserting data direct from the database) to the more tricky processing data using called programs then inserting into the printing gateway. Ive done about a dozen of these fields for the new docs, at this point I guess you are wondering why I am blithering on about this well here we go, on Friday afternoon about 2pm I had finally finished about 90% of the work, by 4pm I was back to the start again why you ask well thanks to Mike overwriting my entire workload thats why cheers mate good work there :-(
I thought Friday was going to be a total washout I got home from work late having to stay late and try and redo as much work as possible, that meant I had to rush to get changed as I planned to catch the 8pm bus into Manchester where I would go see Sandbox's latest gig. In typical Manchester form it was pouring down I waited for the bus from 7.50 till 8.15 and it was no show I was about to cry when I got a text from Bruce he was driving down yay! The gig was excellent Andy Lenny and Righni totally on form, I guess touring has really helped them out they even gave away a live cd nice one chaps.
Saturday my head felt bad I shouldnt have drunk at the gig I knew I had to get up in the morning, oh well. Today Bruce Phil and Myself were to set up an internet cafe in the Birmingham International Conference Centre, I was helping Phil brother Jim out. Jims company ATOV were doing a conference setup with a 40metre projection and had been asked to set up an internet cafe as well Jim knows nothing about PC's so he asked us guys to do it, it was quiet a laugh really and the end product was pretty suburb 24 laptops and a smoothwall firewall and proxy 12 laptop on each sode of the confreence hall. The only thing count really believe was the price of everthing £900 for three days internet connection! That pales into insignifcance though when compard to the £1200 for power!!!! Phil did a good job getting the laptops made secure and setting up the smoothwall box, Bruce and I were mainly just manual labour really except for some faults (a switch failed as did some cables). I think Jim was happy with the setup it certainly looke the part one ot the sparkies tested it for us checking the football results.
Wires!!
Got back from Birmingham about 7 just enough time for Chinese and a few beers in the farmers :-)
Also all the documents need new merge field creating this ranging from the simple (inserting data direct from the database) to the more tricky processing data using called programs then inserting into the printing gateway. Ive done about a dozen of these fields for the new docs, at this point I guess you are wondering why I am blithering on about this well here we go, on Friday afternoon about 2pm I had finally finished about 90% of the work, by 4pm I was back to the start again why you ask well thanks to Mike overwriting my entire workload thats why cheers mate good work there :-(
I thought Friday was going to be a total washout I got home from work late having to stay late and try and redo as much work as possible, that meant I had to rush to get changed as I planned to catch the 8pm bus into Manchester where I would go see Sandbox's latest gig. In typical Manchester form it was pouring down I waited for the bus from 7.50 till 8.15 and it was no show I was about to cry when I got a text from Bruce he was driving down yay! The gig was excellent Andy Lenny and Righni totally on form, I guess touring has really helped them out they even gave away a live cd nice one chaps.
Saturday my head felt bad I shouldnt have drunk at the gig I knew I had to get up in the morning, oh well. Today Bruce Phil and Myself were to set up an internet cafe in the Birmingham International Conference Centre, I was helping Phil brother Jim out. Jims company ATOV were doing a conference setup with a 40metre projection and had been asked to set up an internet cafe as well Jim knows nothing about PC's so he asked us guys to do it, it was quiet a laugh really and the end product was pretty suburb 24 laptops and a smoothwall firewall and proxy 12 laptop on each sode of the confreence hall. The only thing count really believe was the price of everthing £900 for three days internet connection! That pales into insignifcance though when compard to the £1200 for power!!!! Phil did a good job getting the laptops made secure and setting up the smoothwall box, Bruce and I were mainly just manual labour really except for some faults (a switch failed as did some cables). I think Jim was happy with the setup it certainly looke the part one ot the sparkies tested it for us checking the football results.
Wires!!
Got back from Birmingham about 7 just enough time for Chinese and a few beers in the farmers :-)
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Forever Delayed
OK Its been a long time since my last post, Ive been so busy yet nothing has really been interesting enough to talk about. In fact I am not even sure where the time has gone to seems like I have constantly been busy work has been especially touch the lender documes have all had to change, each one choosing slightly diferent ways to apply the same figures. Also I have been working on some new XML export programs for Trigold which has been a chore, thanks to poor documentation and little support from the user base.
Lulus email prompted me to write new post, it made me sad reading how easily her collegue was sacked as the world becomes more and more controlled by corporations who are out fo profit above all other concerns I feel increasingly isolated. Hoe you are well Lulu dont be too sad.
Last night I backed up and repared to reinstall windows on Jos laptop, Bruce came round to pick up his Amiga 1200 and to work on the proxy for the job in Birmingham on Saturday. The router did not go well I am not sure why either
The router can ping either side and ip forwrding is on but I can et traffic from the router tothe internet or indeed from to mars. From both sideI can ping the far side network interfaces but not the beyond. Hopefully I can sort it ou tongith.
I went to the gym for the first time ages on Monday I have been training but mostly jogging or cycling because myshoulder was painful. I have definatly lost som strength but hopefully I can quickly gai it back Ill be taking it easier until I am sure abo my shoulder though.
Got a phone cal from Collin a fellow ex BLinker sounds like he is doing really well for himself, heopfully eet him for a drink next week.
Other bits Martin has bought himself an pod nano its so small and nice how cares about the scratches or battery I want on!
Nick is looking to buy the place of on Jenny lane, I told Phil he played it cool but I am pretty surehe wants it for himself. I guess Ill wait and see what happens.
Lulus email prompted me to write new post, it made me sad reading how easily her collegue was sacked as the world becomes more and more controlled by corporations who are out fo profit above all other concerns I feel increasingly isolated. Hoe you are well Lulu dont be too sad.
Last night I backed up and repared to reinstall windows on Jos laptop, Bruce came round to pick up his Amiga 1200 and to work on the proxy for the job in Birmingham on Saturday. The router did not go well I am not sure why either
192.168.1.6 < - - - > 192.168.1.3-192.168.0.3 < - - - > 192.168.0.2 ---- Internet
Laptop router mars
gateway(router) gateway(mars) static route 192.168.0.3 is A gateway for 192.168.1.0/24
The router can ping either side and ip forwrding is on but I can et traffic from the router tothe internet or indeed from to mars. From both sideI can ping the far side network interfaces but not the beyond. Hopefully I can sort it ou tongith.
I went to the gym for the first time ages on Monday I have been training but mostly jogging or cycling because myshoulder was painful. I have definatly lost som strength but hopefully I can quickly gai it back Ill be taking it easier until I am sure abo my shoulder though.
Got a phone cal from Collin a fellow ex BLinker sounds like he is doing really well for himself, heopfully eet him for a drink next week.
Other bits Martin has bought himself an pod nano its so small and nice how cares about the scratches or battery I want on!
Nick is looking to buy the place of on Jenny lane, I told Phil he played it cool but I am pretty surehe wants it for himself. I guess Ill wait and see what happens.
Tuesday, September 27, 2005
where are u??
where are u cookie?? i don't want to lose our contact... time difference just makes me feel our distance :(((
i know you feel bad recently, which i might not be able to help. to leave some words here is the only i can do. i do believe you can handle with any difficulties.
i know you feel bad recently, which i might not be able to help. to leave some words here is the only i can do. i do believe you can handle with any difficulties.
Sunday, September 18, 2005
Tight Shoes
Today has been an nothing day really after the excitedment of yesterday and the effort gone into the last week I felt totally shattered.
I did manage to go for a jog which proved a pain, quite literally I think my feet must swell when I am running as my trainers which feel comfortable when Im walkign around feel tight and blister my feet when I go running. Mind you after eating pizza yesterday I needed the exercise.
Spoke to Lulu today she reminded me of our first sms conversation a year ago, there is mid autum celebration in China I didn't really understand what it is about so I did a search on google and found this I guess Lulu will explain when she has time. I think the Chinease are a lot more diserning in the celbrations looking at family rather than the Eurpean harvest type celebrations basically saying hey guys we have managed to make it through another year.
I worked on the Access email system today basically I cheated a little and found this smtp linker which I am using the create a form. The only think I need is another form to build the email address lists based on any criteria chosen.
I actually got a phone call from Jo the fix I made to Hollys laptop didnt work, I think its great people ring me but it would be nice to be asked to the pub rather than rung up for technical support.
I did manage to go for a jog which proved a pain, quite literally I think my feet must swell when I am running as my trainers which feel comfortable when Im walkign around feel tight and blister my feet when I go running. Mind you after eating pizza yesterday I needed the exercise.
Spoke to Lulu today she reminded me of our first sms conversation a year ago, there is mid autum celebration in China I didn't really understand what it is about so I did a search on google and found this I guess Lulu will explain when she has time. I think the Chinease are a lot more diserning in the celbrations looking at family rather than the Eurpean harvest type celebrations basically saying hey guys we have managed to make it through another year.
I worked on the Access email system today basically I cheated a little and found this smtp linker which I am using the create a form. The only think I need is another form to build the email address lists based on any criteria chosen.
I actually got a phone call from Jo the fix I made to Hollys laptop didnt work, I think its great people ring me but it would be nice to be asked to the pub rather than rung up for technical support.
Terminal Tournaments IV
Another Lan bash, another day of Quake, Counter Strike and Unreal (with some flat out for good measure). After spending most of yesterday tweaking the server in order to be ready for today, all last minute as usual I was already pretty tired and my day did not start well Berger rang me before 9am wanting a lift (cheers mates! A little warning next time perhaps?). Berger's car was in the garage for repair and of course Berger uses the garage near Woodford so he thought I was the best bet for a lift,
I had been trying to sort out some of the niggles that we had suffered with at the previous lan namely the maps not rotating on Quake, and games starting before everyone is ready. Also trying to add mani statistics recording to Counter Strike. Apart from quake maps I unfortunately failed on all counts. I did however add a nice implementation of Samba and introduce a web site with some crafty batch files. Overall with the addition of some extra memory the games server was running pretty well I thought. Many thanks to David Bourne for his efforts with mani next time I hope things will be running somewhat sweeter for you.
The actual lan was a success in many ways but I felt a bit of a failure overall, whilst we have improved massively since the first shambling event we have not increased the popularity (in fact less people attended than TT3) and some of the original niggles still remain and will do until the server is perfect. Hopefully we have got something to build on we can actually get some things done rather than continually talking without taking action.
Apart from that the games were excellent I do well at Quake and Flatout only to be given a hiding on Counter Strike and Onslaught.
Tidying up went well we were out in about 45minutes including tidying everything up and hoovering up, pity Martin O missed it really. I was really upset with Bruce getting double booked given how far in advance the event had been booked for. , I also worry that we are reliant on his equipment. Eventually I would like to use some of the profit to procure some TT own equipment which is used only for the lan's I guess thats just dreaming at the moment but I think its the way forward, at least that and building up the numbers with some better marketing.
I had been trying to sort out some of the niggles that we had suffered with at the previous lan namely the maps not rotating on Quake, and games starting before everyone is ready. Also trying to add mani statistics recording to Counter Strike. Apart from quake maps I unfortunately failed on all counts. I did however add a nice implementation of Samba and introduce a web site with some crafty batch files. Overall with the addition of some extra memory the games server was running pretty well I thought. Many thanks to David Bourne for his efforts with mani next time I hope things will be running somewhat sweeter for you.
The actual lan was a success in many ways but I felt a bit of a failure overall, whilst we have improved massively since the first shambling event we have not increased the popularity (in fact less people attended than TT3) and some of the original niggles still remain and will do until the server is perfect. Hopefully we have got something to build on we can actually get some things done rather than continually talking without taking action.
Apart from that the games were excellent I do well at Quake and Flatout only to be given a hiding on Counter Strike and Onslaught.
Tidying up went well we were out in about 45minutes including tidying everything up and hoovering up, pity Martin O missed it really. I was really upset with Bruce getting double booked given how far in advance the event had been booked for. , I also worry that we are reliant on his equipment. Eventually I would like to use some of the profit to procure some TT own equipment which is used only for the lan's I guess thats just dreaming at the moment but I think its the way forward, at least that and building up the numbers with some better marketing.
Thursday, September 15, 2005
Routing
Well made it to the gym again for a cadrio only sesion my shoulder is still sore I must admit its really starting to annoy me now I just want to start training again.
My blinds are now up so my room is finally finshed yay! So last night I got to sleep in my own bed again its so much more comfortable. Its strange really compared to some of e hostels I stayed in when I was travelling round OZ the spare room is excellent yet somehow knowing I have a lovely warm comfy bed in thesame house made it less habitable. Well that and being surrunded my my dads horded crap wasnt any fun.
Phil came round lt night to draw on m linux knowledge, it made me realise that since working for Tbred I have done a lot less basic neworking it took me half an hour out work out the correct routing commands. Using a Suse Linux 9.3 computer as a router with two network cards and routed running on one side was a windows client on the other my apple mac. Each seperate side had its own gateway, so the metric had to work that traffic travelling between the neworks was least cost but for each side its own gateway had a lower cost than routing across the network.
It was a bit confsing but we managed in the end SuSE is even a pretty good Linux when you turn KDE off and Phil bough me some beers for m trouble :-D
My blinds are now up so my room is finally finshed yay! So last night I got to sleep in my own bed again its so much more comfortable. Its strange really compared to some of e hostels I stayed in when I was travelling round OZ the spare room is excellent yet somehow knowing I have a lovely warm comfy bed in thesame house made it less habitable. Well that and being surrunded my my dads horded crap wasnt any fun.
Phil came round lt night to draw on m linux knowledge, it made me realise that since working for Tbred I have done a lot less basic neworking it took me half an hour out work out the correct routing commands. Using a Suse Linux 9.3 computer as a router with two network cards and routed running on one side was a windows client on the other my apple mac. Each seperate side had its own gateway, so the metric had to work that traffic travelling between the neworks was least cost but for each side its own gateway had a lower cost than routing across the network.
It was a bit confsing but we managed in the end SuSE is even a pretty good Linux when you turn KDE off and Phil bough me some beers for m trouble :-D
Tuesday, September 13, 2005
Where is my life
Some days I wonder where the time goes, I look back on my uni days where I had so much free time, it waseasy to have a lie in easy to reorgnise. Whereas these day by the time Ive been to work and the gym I feel almost too tired to think.
I often wake up with my body sreaming for me to stay in bed on a weekday but on the weekend I feel like I have to getup early so as not to waste that precious time.
I guess I am just feeling down at the minute given that thing with Nikkie turned so sour so quickly, and then Liz. Nikkie even had the gall to say I as a boring sad geek which is pretty funny/ironic from a girl so badly in debt she cant afford to go out and yet she continues buying games for her xbox. Critising me for going to bit lite,well I was out drinking beer and having fun listening to music and meeting new people whilst you were sat at home on our own, so who exactly is a loser? Oh well plenty more women out there I am sure one day Ill meet someone who is intellgent and will love me for who I am. I am not going to conform, I am not going to be one of the lads am going to be me.
I often wake up with my body sreaming for me to stay in bed on a weekday but on the weekend I feel like I have to getup early so as not to waste that precious time.
I guess I am just feeling down at the minute given that thing with Nikkie turned so sour so quickly, and then Liz. Nikkie even had the gall to say I as a boring sad geek which is pretty funny/ironic from a girl so badly in debt she cant afford to go out and yet she continues buying games for her xbox. Critising me for going to bit lite,
Sunday, September 11, 2005
Stock Dove
Its been another long day full of different but fun things, the second day of c64remix / retrovision was fun though it ended at 3 and left me a lot of the day left to play with. Saw this ace wizzball animation
In the evening I managed to catch up with Paul, I dont get to see him very much these days but I always find it interesting talking to him. I guess he is a connection to a more colourful creative world he is actually a musitian so it was good to be able to chat to him about the remix music I had listened to I know it wasnt really his think but Im pretty sure he could appriciate it on some levels. Unfortunatly he has been havng some problem between himself and Lisa I wont go into the details but we had a long chat I tried to listen and not advise but help him come to his own conlusions I always find its better for people to make up there own minds rather than try and lead them.
It is always a good experience for me talking for Paul I think he can be so positive and brings out the best in people generally a top bloke to have around its a same our lives have seperated over the years him followinf his dreams of becoming a musian and me going into the corporate world. One day I hope both our career paths will reward us though both in different field we are looking for direction, I think we both want to find something to focus on.
In the evening I managed to catch up with Paul, I dont get to see him very much these days but I always find it interesting talking to him. I guess he is a connection to a more colourful creative world he is actually a musitian so it was good to be able to chat to him about the remix music I had listened to I know it wasnt really his think but Im pretty sure he could appriciate it on some levels. Unfortunatly he has been havng some problem between himself and Lisa I wont go into the details but we had a long chat I tried to listen and not advise but help him come to his own conlusions I always find its better for people to make up there own minds rather than try and lead them.
It is always a good experience for me talking for Paul I think he can be so positive and brings out the best in people generally a top bloke to have around its a same our lives have seperated over the years him followinf his dreams of becoming a musian and me going into the corporate world. One day I hope both our career paths will reward us though both in different field we are looking for direction, I think we both want to find something to focus on.
Geekend
Oh where to start what a day, last night after a shit day at work I found myself in Failsworth talking to some fiendish people about computer games from the past.
I think the highlight was listening to Phil trying to give tips about cannon fodder to the fucking guy that programmied it!!! Phil hadnt got a clue there was a guy playing Cannon Fodder emulated on a PSP, he turned out to be Senible Softwares programmer.
Today was a whole day playing games on retro consoles including bomber man (which bruce kicked arse on, any fighting game which I pretty much rocked on). Then in the evening it was a show including Ron Hubbard whoo who rocked a bands who came up with the brillient "16K where does it get you today" and Sid Back to 80s who were excellent.
I cant really explain other than if you owned a Commador 64 or Spectrum but once upon a time you loaded games from tape waite half an hour and sometimes the loading sequence was better than the game. Today modile phones are more powerful!
I bought Makkes album and some Galways stuff to listen too which is Ace. Martin might take his pinbal table down tommorrw,
I think we should deinfatly try and get into expanding the lan by putting on some of these demos and music as sie events see if anyone else is interested. Quite apart from anything else I think the range of talents from Martin with his av to my organisational skills I think we could be a big help and together build something good.
Other funny things included Bruce spiloling kebab all over himself so he sat there for the rest of the evening with his t-shirt on inside out to hide the orange kebab sauce stains.
I think the highlight was listening to Phil trying to give tips about cannon fodder to the fucking guy that programmied it!!! Phil hadnt got a clue there was a guy playing Cannon Fodder emulated on a PSP, he turned out to be Senible Softwares programmer.
Today was a whole day playing games on retro consoles including bomber man (which bruce kicked arse on, any fighting game which I pretty much rocked on). Then in the evening it was a show including Ron Hubbard whoo who rocked a bands who came up with the brillient "16K where does it get you today" and Sid Back to 80s who were excellent.
I cant really explain other than if you owned a Commador 64 or Spectrum but once upon a time you loaded games from tape waite half an hour and sometimes the loading sequence was better than the game. Today modile phones are more powerful!
I bought Makkes album and some Galways stuff to listen too which is Ace. Martin might take his pinbal table down tommorrw,
I think we should deinfatly try and get into expanding the lan by putting on some of these demos and music as sie events see if anyone else is interested. Quite apart from anything else I think the range of talents from Martin with his av to my organisational skills I think we could be a big help and together build something good.
Other funny things included Bruce spiloling kebab all over himself so he sat there for the rest of the evening with his t-shirt on inside out to hide the orange kebab sauce stains.
Friday, September 09, 2005
DWD
I thought I would write a bit of a different blog today and bore you all with my finances. Its basically how I DWD (dealt/dealing with debt), for the last year or so I have been doing my best to try and get out of debt, I would like to now write a bit of a statement of affairs.
Looking back to this time last year, I owed close to £2700 on my Credit card, about £1000 in an overdraft and I had just purchased an Apple Powerbook using a line of credit from the Apple store. Add to this my about 12,000 of student loan (though that's handled differently so Ill discount that for the moment).
Ouch how did I get here?
Whilst at uni I was bad with money despite getting some money off my parents and having a part time job at the council and doing a years paid work for Wilmslow High School I graduated with an overdraft and a big student loan. Then I decided to go to Australia for three months it was the trip of lifetime (see some of the pictures here) I had savings of £4000 up to that point on the trip I basically spent all of this and then some whoops.
To make matters worse I found it difficult to get a job on returning spending nearly 4 months on jobseekers allowance and still using my credit card double oops.
What was worse once I started earning a wage rather than pay off my debts I borrowed more.
So what is the big deal?
"the borrower becomes the lender's slave."
-Solomon in Proverbs 22:7
Well in a way the wasn't one, I could have taken a loan consolidated my debts and worried about it tomorrow. The only thing is I started to think how much money the banks were making out of me, it might only be costing a few pounds a week but it all starts to add up and I started to think maybe I should keep some of this money for myself. I also read a number of books thanks to Nicks badgering "The Richest Man in Babylon" and "Rich Dad Poor Dad" and they really showed me that I didn't want to be a slave to debt.
So where am I today?
Credit Cards
Well thanks to using a series of 0% interest credit cards my current credit card balance is £257 and over the last few months I have switched to a cashback card use my credit card to earn cashback and pay the balance each month earning me money in two ways firstly I get to leave my money in the bank for longer earning interest and secondly for each purchase I earn 0.5% cashback.
Student Loan
A funny debt really its the usual government mess of means testing and brocracy. I currently pay about £50 a month (used to be 80-100 before the government change the threshled). I could start to make overpayments be what would be the point? Interest on student loans is pegged to inflation, so I would make more money be saving any overpayments in a deposit account. Also payments out of my wage are taken before tax any extra payment would be made after tax.
Overdraft
My overdraft level is down to £450 well inside my £500 graduate account' interest free allowance.
Savings
Well pretty much for the first time in my life I have a reasonable amount of savings building up. I set up a number of direct debits to make regular payments into my savings accounts the day after payday, I found after a couple of months I hardly missed the money. I have two savings account one is a long term emergency fund (eventually Ill save the equivalent of 6 months wages as a kind of self insurance against the unexpected.) the other newer account is meant to be way of saving up to pay the big bills like my car insurance and gym membership. Although I don't put much in about £50 I don't see the point of saving whilst in debt this time next year I expect it to be an important money pot. I save into an Abbey Postal ISA 5.5% tax free emergency fund and use ING Direct 4.8% taxable for my day to day pot.
Investments
I actually started putting money into investments some time ago. My first investment was a disaster putting £1200 into a technology ISA about a month before the DOT com bubble burst in 2000 was a pretty stupid way to spend my student loan. Anyway after doing some research I found that over long periods 80% of funds failed to beat the market averages, so rather than try to find a fund in the 20% decided hey why not invest in the market February 2004 I started investing £90 a month into Legal and Generals low cost UK all share index(costs are important as they seriously affect the performance of your money over the long term). So far thanks to a recovery in equities I am already well ahead of cash savings and I expect that this will be the case over an extended period 5 - 10 years. When I paid off my Apple loan I increased my monthly savings to £200 per month.
Pension
OK pensions are boring and if your like my dad pensions are heart breaking (his was with Equitable Life) however I guess its better to do something than nothing. Unfortunately my company doesn't have a pension scheme they have though arranged a salary sacrifice scheme whereby some of my wages is chopped off and paid, the bonus of this its done on gross wage (before tax or national insurance) so it works out a pretty tax efficient £250 a month (about 12% of my gross wage) will apparently buy me about £8000 (in today's money) when I retire its not great buy hopefully along with my other investments it will be enough to get by.
Overall
Well discounting my student loan I am now a net saver rather than debtor which is great news. My main goals now have shifted from paying off my debts to building up a sizeable asset column and saving a deposit for a house. I am hoping next year to fully use my ISA allowance investment £4000 in stocks and £3000 in cash. Plus saving and paying off my bills in a more sensible manner so that I don't feel squeezed form month to month.
If you want to stay out of debt and be finacially secure there are only two things you need to do,
1. Spend less then you earn, this miht seem like a no brainer because it is however on average people in the UK spend £11 for each £10 they earn. Youll always be in debt if you live this way.
2. Pay Yourself, for each paycheck keep a portion of the money for yourself this money is your to have an hold dont spend it keep it and let it earn more money. If you spend everything you earn and dont pay yourself will always be on the edge of financial meltdown hat happens if something goes wrong?
Looking back to this time last year, I owed close to £2700 on my Credit card, about £1000 in an overdraft and I had just purchased an Apple Powerbook using a line of credit from the Apple store. Add to this my about 12,000 of student loan (though that's handled differently so Ill discount that for the moment).
Ouch how did I get here?
Whilst at uni I was bad with money despite getting some money off my parents and having a part time job at the council and doing a years paid work for Wilmslow High School I graduated with an overdraft and a big student loan. Then I decided to go to Australia for three months it was the trip of lifetime (see some of the pictures here) I had savings of £4000 up to that point on the trip I basically spent all of this and then some whoops.
To make matters worse I found it difficult to get a job on returning spending nearly 4 months on jobseekers allowance and still using my credit card double oops.
What was worse once I started earning a wage rather than pay off my debts I borrowed more.
So what is the big deal?
"the borrower becomes the lender's slave."
-Solomon in Proverbs 22:7
Well in a way the wasn't one, I could have taken a loan consolidated my debts and worried about it tomorrow. The only thing is I started to think how much money the banks were making out of me, it might only be costing a few pounds a week but it all starts to add up and I started to think maybe I should keep some of this money for myself. I also read a number of books thanks to Nicks badgering "The Richest Man in Babylon" and "Rich Dad Poor Dad" and they really showed me that I didn't want to be a slave to debt.
So where am I today?
Credit Cards
Well thanks to using a series of 0% interest credit cards my current credit card balance is £257 and over the last few months I have switched to a cashback card use my credit card to earn cashback and pay the balance each month earning me money in two ways firstly I get to leave my money in the bank for longer earning interest and secondly for each purchase I earn 0.5% cashback.
Student Loan
A funny debt really its the usual government mess of means testing and brocracy. I currently pay about £50 a month (used to be 80-100 before the government change the threshled). I could start to make overpayments be what would be the point? Interest on student loans is pegged to inflation, so I would make more money be saving any overpayments in a deposit account. Also payments out of my wage are taken before tax any extra payment would be made after tax.
Overdraft
My overdraft level is down to £450 well inside my £500 graduate account' interest free allowance.
Savings
Well pretty much for the first time in my life I have a reasonable amount of savings building up. I set up a number of direct debits to make regular payments into my savings accounts the day after payday, I found after a couple of months I hardly missed the money. I have two savings account one is a long term emergency fund (eventually Ill save the equivalent of 6 months wages as a kind of self insurance against the unexpected.) the other newer account is meant to be way of saving up to pay the big bills like my car insurance and gym membership. Although I don't put much in about £50 I don't see the point of saving whilst in debt this time next year I expect it to be an important money pot. I save into an Abbey Postal ISA 5.5% tax free emergency fund and use ING Direct 4.8% taxable for my day to day pot.
Investments
I actually started putting money into investments some time ago. My first investment was a disaster putting £1200 into a technology ISA about a month before the DOT com bubble burst in 2000 was a pretty stupid way to spend my student loan. Anyway after doing some research I found that over long periods 80% of funds failed to beat the market averages, so rather than try to find a fund in the 20% decided hey why not invest in the market February 2004 I started investing £90 a month into Legal and Generals low cost UK all share index(costs are important as they seriously affect the performance of your money over the long term). So far thanks to a recovery in equities I am already well ahead of cash savings and I expect that this will be the case over an extended period 5 - 10 years. When I paid off my Apple loan I increased my monthly savings to £200 per month.
Pension
OK pensions are boring and if your like my dad pensions are heart breaking (his was with Equitable Life) however I guess its better to do something than nothing. Unfortunately my company doesn't have a pension scheme they have though arranged a salary sacrifice scheme whereby some of my wages is chopped off and paid, the bonus of this its done on gross wage (before tax or national insurance) so it works out a pretty tax efficient £250 a month (about 12% of my gross wage) will apparently buy me about £8000 (in today's money) when I retire its not great buy hopefully along with my other investments it will be enough to get by.
Overall
Well discounting my student loan I am now a net saver rather than debtor which is great news. My main goals now have shifted from paying off my debts to building up a sizeable asset column and saving a deposit for a house. I am hoping next year to fully use my ISA allowance investment £4000 in stocks and £3000 in cash. Plus saving and paying off my bills in a more sensible manner so that I don't feel squeezed form month to month.
If you want to stay out of debt and be finacially secure there are only two things you need to do,
1. Spend less then you earn, this miht seem like a no brainer because it is however on average people in the UK spend £11 for each £10 they earn. Youll always be in debt if you live this way.
2. Pay Yourself, for each paycheck keep a portion of the money for yourself this money is your to have an hold dont spend it keep it and let it earn more money. If you spend everything you earn and dont pay yourself will always be on the edge of financial meltdown hat happens if something goes wrong?
Wednesday, September 07, 2005
One Story
Well after talking last night Liz clearly went to bed and got up pissed with me from the sound of the text messages I got today, I must say she caught me at pretty much the worst time possible so my reply was none too friendly. I cant believe how badly things have gone falling out with two girls in two days is a record even for me.
Work was foul lots of spaghetti to dig through too many questions as to why on earth things have been done the way they have, but hey none listens to me anyway im just the trainee. My main gripe today is the way the database is structured nothing is normalized the tables are huge and for some very bizarre reason we have three separate tables for each of the three types of loan rather than have a flag to say which type of loan it is. So it means you have to programatically decide which type of loan it is which is not always an easy feat for various reasons like it the loan has been transferred from one to the other it will have a record in multiple files witht he same key, just so poor.
This evening Martin and I went to see his ex workmate Aaron at the Night and Day Cafe in Manchester, the guy didn't endear himself to me asking if I was gay :-S his music was ok a bit like Damien Rice only without the passion. One Story were pretty good though they had a lot of intensity and a couple of stand out songs though the lead could do with getting a better mike couldn't hear some the vocals through the hiss.
Saturday is bit light which is something good to look forward too
Work was foul lots of spaghetti to dig through too many questions as to why on earth things have been done the way they have, but hey none listens to me anyway im just the trainee. My main gripe today is the way the database is structured nothing is normalized the tables are huge and for some very bizarre reason we have three separate tables for each of the three types of loan rather than have a flag to say which type of loan it is. So it means you have to programatically decide which type of loan it is which is not always an easy feat for various reasons like it the loan has been transferred from one to the other it will have a record in multiple files witht he same key, just so poor.
This evening Martin and I went to see his ex workmate Aaron at the Night and Day Cafe in Manchester, the guy didn't endear himself to me asking if I was gay :-S his music was ok a bit like Damien Rice only without the passion. One Story were pretty good though they had a lot of intensity and a couple of stand out songs though the lead could do with getting a better mike couldn't hear some the vocals through the hiss.
Saturday is bit light which is something good to look forward too
Lies damn lies and blogs
I must admit at times I am a terrible liar, I lie at work so I can be lazy, I lie to people about where Ive been or am going to, usually its just a case of me protecting my private life (I guess pretty much an odd thing for someone who runs a blog but hey I never claimed t be a simple person). I guess the person I lie most often to is myself, I have pretty strong belifes that sometimes just to get through the day I need to justify things to myself. Once upon a time I was convinced I could do something with my life be positive but somewhere on the way after many compromises I sit here and well I havent and the sa fact is I probably nver will.
You might at this point dear reader be slightly confused about this post why should I be talking about lies, well the reason is one of my lies became undone because of this very blog!
Over the last few weeks I have been seeing in a casual sense two women Liz and Nikkie, neither was serious in fact Nikkie very much didnt want anything serious, I did however quiet like Nikkie enough to want to see what happened well if you read the last post you know what that was. I digress however in a nutshell I had lied to Liz about what I was doing this weekend in order to have a free schedual I justified this that hey we werent serious it wont matter (see what I mean about lieing to myself, ifs not a character trait I like). Anyway the long and short of it is she read my blog and cofronted me and well I had no excuses.
I should have been honest but I wasnt in fact today I wa completing a survey about morality it asked what I would do if I saw people committing an illegal act whether I would respond, I longed to say would but in my heart I knew that I am a coward and although I like to talk about doing great deeds I would probably walk on by.
The only positives things from day were actully being honest with Liz and going for a cycle, my shouldr hurt during the night though so maybe I even overdid that.
You might at this point dear reader be slightly confused about this post why should I be talking about lies, well the reason is one of my lies became undone because of this very blog!
Over the last few weeks I have been seeing in a casual sense two women Liz and Nikkie, neither was serious in fact Nikkie very much didnt want anything serious, I did however quiet like Nikkie enough to want to see what happened well if you read the last post you know what that was. I digress however in a nutshell I had lied to Liz about what I was doing this weekend in order to have a free schedual I justified this that hey we werent serious it wont matter (see what I mean about lieing to myself, ifs not a character trait I like). Anyway the long and short of it is she read my blog and cofronted me and well I had no excuses.
I should have been honest but I wasnt in fact today I wa completing a survey about morality it asked what I would do if I saw people committing an illegal act whether I would respond, I longed to say would but in my heart I knew that I am a coward and although I like to talk about doing great deeds I would probably walk on by.
The only positives things from day were actully being honest with Liz and going for a cycle, my shouldr hurt during the night though so maybe I even overdid that.
Monday, September 05, 2005
Another Monday
Well I felt completly terrible going into work today that will teach me to drink on a chool night. It was good though so that cheered me up.
Unfortunaly I was soon grounded back to earthby Nikkie she didnt seem to understand my annoyance with what happened and finished with me. Not that we were actually together in a meaningful way this was afterall the girl who kept telling me she had her own life and didnt want monogamy. Anyway the usually recriminations via text, I was less than pleasent with reason I feel, but thats it over. Realistically she could have simply been nice but as usual it was all accusations straight away, i guess it would never work with her in Blackburn anyway oh well, another on to experience.
Work was as painful as usual more bugs more bad planning sometimes I dispair at the lack of direction and planning.
At least mr happness was at another site so I didnt have the entire will to live stripped away. I got a crazy and random job offer to be a senior novell person, did the agent even look at my cv? Quiet funny especially as its based in Paris France I dont speak French. Oh well managed a meet Bruce for a pint at the unicorn and had a chat to Cassy which lifted my spirets a bit.
Unfortunaly I was soon grounded back to earthby Nikkie she didnt seem to understand my annoyance with what happened and finished with me. Not that we were actually together in a meaningful way this was afterall the girl who kept telling me she had her own life and didnt want monogamy. Anyway the usually recriminations via text, I was less than pleasent with reason I feel, but thats it over. Realistically she could have simply been nice but as usual it was all accusations straight away, i guess it would never work with her in Blackburn anyway oh well, another on to experience.
Work was as painful as usual more bugs more bad planning sometimes I dispair at the lack of direction and planning.
At least mr happness was at another site so I didnt have the entire will to live stripped away. I got a crazy and random job offer to be a senior novell person, did the agent even look at my cv? Quiet funny especially as its based in Paris France I dont speak French. Oh well managed a meet Bruce for a pint at the unicorn and had a chat to Cassy which lifted my spirets a bit.
Sunday Bloody Sunday
Today was meant to be a good day I was ging to Nikkies for her sisters wedding it would be a chance for us to spend some time together and to eat bbq etc. The first let down had been ork cancelling my holiday so I couldnt stay over (though as it panned out this might not have been such a bad thing).
The first bad sign was getting lost, maybe this was the universe trying to put me off, maybe just me being inept.
Anyway finally arrived and to start with things were cool satting chatting playing criket then all of a sudden im alone I try and mingle but everyone seems very cliquey after serveral hours of bascially hanging alone I made my excuses and left. I dont think I have every felt more like a spare part, its like the sort of parties i went to as a kid trying to fit in I promised myself I would never be exploited like that again and yet there I was bored as hell watchig Nikkie mingling with people I didnt know. I was glad to get away and to brighten my day I met up with Ian Bruce Faye and Ian for drinks at the Davenport Arms. It was great fun chatting and laughing about lost and life. Eventually ended up back at Ians smoking some weed and chatting about the old days it wa like being 17 again chasing after Laura Fairhurst. In fact there was a conisidence as Nikkies house is on Fairhurst lane, almost some sort of sick karma. I came back from Ians totally trashed I am surpirsed I have been able to type this, Night
The first bad sign was getting lost, maybe this was the universe trying to put me off, maybe just me being inept.
Anyway finally arrived and to start with things were cool satting chatting playing criket then all of a sudden im alone I try and mingle but everyone seems very cliquey after serveral hours of bascially hanging alone I made my excuses and left. I dont think I have every felt more like a spare part, its like the sort of parties i went to as a kid trying to fit in I promised myself I would never be exploited like that again and yet there I was bored as hell watchig Nikkie mingling with people I didnt know. I was glad to get away and to brighten my day I met up with Ian Bruce Faye and Ian for drinks at the Davenport Arms. It was great fun chatting and laughing about lost and life. Eventually ended up back at Ians smoking some weed and chatting about the old days it wa like being 17 again chasing after Laura Fairhurst. In fact there was a conisidence as Nikkies house is on Fairhurst lane, almost some sort of sick karma. I came back from Ians totally trashed I am surpirsed I have been able to type this, Night
Saturday, September 03, 2005
CD Storage
After spending Friday night watching the last 6 episodes of Lost whilst enjoying a bottle of vodka. It ends on a cliffhanger I just can't wait for the next series to start. They really know how to build the interest just relieving enough or taking you away on a tangent in every episode.
Thanks to the vodka and late night I was feeling pretty tired on this morning. In spite of this I decided to try and get some things done, my arms still sore from over-lifting at the gym so instead I cleaned my car even did a bit inside. Then I finally went out and sorted my CD storage problems. Since getting rid of the unit my old fish tank sat on I have had all the stuff that was held in it scattered in piles all over my room. It was mostly CD's and DVD's so I decided it might be a good idea to get a storage rack. I had tried whilst I was at Ikea a few week's ago but the only suitable one proved to be 3cm too tall. Living in a converted garage mean having a low ceiling. John Lewis had what I wanted but it was too expensive.
I finally found what I needed at Argos. They sell a media rack which can hold upto 780 CD's or a combination of CD's and DVDs. Its was a little pricey at £70 for a chipboard unit however its looks pretty nice stocked full of my music CD's (well not full yet have to buy some more CD's :-) Phil and I must have looked pretty funny lugging a 2 metre long box up Hillgate.
In the evening myself Ian and Phil went for a few drinks at the farmer's arms in Poynton. Ian is another Lost addict and was really interested to hear I had the whole series. I might even let him watch it if he asks nicely...
With my parents away my cat has being keeping my up all night. Meowing for food, or to come in or go out, I don't know how they put up with it.
Thanks to the vodka and late night I was feeling pretty tired on this morning. In spite of this I decided to try and get some things done, my arms still sore from over-lifting at the gym so instead I cleaned my car even did a bit inside. Then I finally went out and sorted my CD storage problems. Since getting rid of the unit my old fish tank sat on I have had all the stuff that was held in it scattered in piles all over my room. It was mostly CD's and DVD's so I decided it might be a good idea to get a storage rack. I had tried whilst I was at Ikea a few week's ago but the only suitable one proved to be 3cm too tall. Living in a converted garage mean having a low ceiling. John Lewis had what I wanted but it was too expensive.
I finally found what I needed at Argos. They sell a media rack which can hold upto 780 CD's or a combination of CD's and DVDs. Its was a little pricey at £70 for a chipboard unit however its looks pretty nice stocked full of my music CD's (well not full yet have to buy some more CD's :-) Phil and I must have looked pretty funny lugging a 2 metre long box up Hillgate.
In the evening myself Ian and Phil went for a few drinks at the farmer's arms in Poynton. Ian is another Lost addict and was really interested to hear I had the whole series. I might even let him watch it if he asks nicely...
With my parents away my cat has being keeping my up all night. Meowing for food, or to come in or go out, I don't know how they put up with it.
Wednesday, August 31, 2005
:-S
Yesterday was pretty damn annoying for me, bascially our new member of staff is one of the most negative and downright antisocial I have ever met, I have been finding it increasingly difficult to get on with him. Added to this he seems unwilling to help me learn anything which given I am meant to be a trainee makes my life very difficult coupled with the fact that my other collegue is increasingly busy so unable to help I have begun to feel more and more a useless.
To add insult to injury I asked for next monday off through the normal channels which was give an ok. Then about an hour later after I informed my client I received another email this time from the head of the company asking me not to take the day off and worse questioning why I would request time off when the company are planning a software rollout at another site, well the reason would be that NOBODY BOTHERED TO TELL ME given I am not a mind reader and wsnt CC'ed into any of the emails or told by Tony it was pretty difficult for me to know. Apparently Kevin didnt know either as he didnt bother to mention it in the reply he sent to me.
I was so pissed off by the close of business I went straight to the gym and did a two hour workout in order to get rid of some stress. This was a slight mistake as in my anger I tried to lift too much and nearly torn a musle in my shoulder. Oh well at least 45minutes on the cross trainer should have burned a few calories.
Later I went for a drink with Phil we have decided to go diving in Sharm El Shek for my birthday by which time hopefully I will have saved enough money for a holiday. Though I think I will need a diving refresher course beforehand.
To add insult to injury I asked for next monday off through the normal channels which was give an ok. Then about an hour later after I informed my client I received another email this time from the head of the company asking me not to take the day off and worse questioning why I would request time off when the company are planning a software rollout at another site, well the reason would be that NOBODY BOTHERED TO TELL ME given I am not a mind reader and wsnt CC'ed into any of the emails or told by Tony it was pretty difficult for me to know. Apparently Kevin didnt know either as he didnt bother to mention it in the reply he sent to me.
I was so pissed off by the close of business I went straight to the gym and did a two hour workout in order to get rid of some stress. This was a slight mistake as in my anger I tried to lift too much and nearly torn a musle in my shoulder. Oh well at least 45minutes on the cross trainer should have burned a few calories.
Later I went for a drink with Phil we have decided to go diving in Sharm El Shek for my birthday by which time hopefully I will have saved enough money for a holiday. Though I think I will need a diving refresher course beforehand.
Friday, August 26, 2005
Ian
Recently I have not seen so many people for one reason or another so it was good to meet upwith Ian last night, he has been away in Spain for the last couple of weeks, hwe was well Zanshin Mobile Bars seems to be growing which is a bonus for him. Apparently Dannys carpet shop is opening on Tuesday so I might go down and chck it out.
It was really nice to have a chat and catch up hopefully wont be so long until I see him next.
He was impressed by the increase in performance of my Saab now that Ive got the mass airflow sensor replaced, to be honest I am still enjoying the massivly improved acceleration :-D
It was really nice to have a chat and catch up hopefully wont be so long until I see him next.
He was impressed by the increase in performance of my Saab now that Ive got the mass airflow sensor replaced, to be honest I am still enjoying the massivly improved acceleration :-D
Thursday, August 25, 2005
TV Output
Last night Bruce and I stayed in to watch the latest episodes of lost on channel 4 and E4 but being as Bruce had managed to aquire som hidef stuff we also tried out outputting video content from my laptop to my TV. After much messing about and annoyance we finally managed it, all I am going to say is intel graphics drivers leave a LOT to be desired.
Ive tried twice this wek to concentrate on doing the stats recording for the LAN but have so far failed in my efforts I must concentrate this weekend and not be sidetracked by other issues.
I spoke to Nikkie on Tuesday we were suppose to go out this week but to be honest with her moving and her lack of desire to see me I have pretty much given up now. Given as we were only seeing each other in the loosest sense I guess its no real loss.
I was looking at houses today to be honest I must finally admit defeat there is no way I can afford anything halfway decent on my own and its going to take years to save up a big enough deposit to make any sort of difference so have to hold off and try and save more. On which note I have increased my monthly payments into my saving account by 40% and so long as I am careful this month will pay off my credit cards in full. My overall debt level is still dropping and I am very much now a net saver rather than debitor which is great but Id like to keep to my new years resolution of being debt free (although than my studend loan but thats an entirly diferent matter).
Ive tried twice this wek to concentrate on doing the stats recording for the LAN but have so far failed in my efforts I must concentrate this weekend and not be sidetracked by other issues.
I spoke to Nikkie on Tuesday we were suppose to go out this week but to be honest with her moving and her lack of desire to see me I have pretty much given up now. Given as we were only seeing each other in the loosest sense I guess its no real loss.
I was looking at houses today to be honest I must finally admit defeat there is no way I can afford anything halfway decent on my own and its going to take years to save up a big enough deposit to make any sort of difference so have to hold off and try and save more. On which note I have increased my monthly payments into my saving account by 40% and so long as I am careful this month will pay off my credit cards in full. My overall debt level is still dropping and I am very much now a net saver rather than debitor which is great but Id like to keep to my new years resolution of being debt free (although than my studend loan but thats an entirly diferent matter).
Sunday, August 21, 2005
Meat + Death
This weekend was fairly good as it goes after having a relaxing night on Friday Saturday Martin myself and Bruce went to meet up with a fellow Slayradio listener Driller.
We had a few drink;s at various bars in Manchester and got the last bus home. I must better getting old or something I felt so tired by 10 I needed my bed. At least Bruce and Martin were in the same boat I blame being busy at work.
It was the first time I had caught a bus in ages; I must say although it was a bit slow taking a really long route £1.80 return is excellent value on the 157 Bullocks bus from Woodford to Manchester.
Sunday I went to the gym completing a rather hard session (for me anyway) 50 minutes on the treadmill I managed to cover about 6.5km. Eventually I want to try and build up to 10-15KM but that's going to take sometime. I also completed a full weights workout using the men's health trainer.
In order to undo all that good work at the gym I then went round to Martins with Bruce and Phil (Simon joined us later) for a BBQ so much meat was consumed it was a lovely sunny afternoon and all enjoyed ourselves.
Afterwards we had a mini lan bash killing each other for a couple of hours on Unreal 2004 and Quake 3, couldn't get Flatout to run :-( The idea of the evening had been to try and organise things for the next lan bash (terminal tournaments IV) but that somehow dropped by the wayside after a beer and food oh well hopefully we will sort it out before the next tournament.
We had a few drink;s at various bars in Manchester and got the last bus home. I must better getting old or something I felt so tired by 10 I needed my bed. At least Bruce and Martin were in the same boat I blame being busy at work.
It was the first time I had caught a bus in ages; I must say although it was a bit slow taking a really long route £1.80 return is excellent value on the 157 Bullocks bus from Woodford to Manchester.
Sunday I went to the gym completing a rather hard session (for me anyway) 50 minutes on the treadmill I managed to cover about 6.5km. Eventually I want to try and build up to 10-15KM but that's going to take sometime. I also completed a full weights workout using the men's health trainer.
In order to undo all that good work at the gym I then went round to Martins with Bruce and Phil (Simon joined us later) for a BBQ so much meat was consumed it was a lovely sunny afternoon and all enjoyed ourselves.
Afterwards we had a mini lan bash killing each other for a couple of hours on Unreal 2004 and Quake 3, couldn't get Flatout to run :-( The idea of the evening had been to try and organise things for the next lan bash (terminal tournaments IV) but that somehow dropped by the wayside after a beer and food oh well hopefully we will sort it out before the next tournament.
Saturday, August 20, 2005
Lazy
Lulu told me im lazy so I guess its time to write another post. To be honext not much has happened in the last week thats worth mentioning. I have been more tired than usual this week thanks to a hectic work schedual and me starting my own training plan thanks to the mens health online personal trainer. The trainer is pretty slick you put in details of when you ant to train and some information about yourself including weight height and it draws up a training program. You take the program to the gym work out record what you actually do then enter it on the pc and it adjusts your next workout accordingly pretty cool eh! Thanks the the program I went Monday, Wednesday and for a jog on Thursday. Ill be honest being ill and having time off has had a significant impact on my fitness im not as strong or fit as before. Hopefully I can quickly regain some strength.
I watched another episode of lost with Bruce on Wednesday and we did some more work on the server trying to get an xoops gallery progra working as usual it proved more difficult thanks to a lack of manuals and the almost sadistic method of getting things working.
I got work to buy my a copy of oxygen xml which is by the far the best xml editor ive ever used even if I didnt understand how the debugger worked without RTFMing.
Bought a couple of games this week which we might use for the lan Doom 3 and Warcraft 3 they were are both good might make good additions.
Today I need to go and find some blinds for my room my parents are going to help hopfully it wont end in arguments.
I watched another episode of lost with Bruce on Wednesday and we did some more work on the server trying to get an xoops gallery progra working as usual it proved more difficult thanks to a lack of manuals and the almost sadistic method of getting things working.
I got work to buy my a copy of oxygen xml which is by the far the best xml editor ive ever used even if I didnt understand how the debugger worked without RTFMing.
Bought a couple of games this week which we might use for the lan Doom 3 and Warcraft 3 they were are both good might make good additions.
Today I need to go and find some blinds for my room my parents are going to help hopfully it wont end in arguments.
Thursday, August 11, 2005
Lost
I am in work early (7am) so whilst waiting for some programs to transfer though I would update my blog. I finally finished painting the walls and ceiling only got to paint the woodwith gloss and get myself a new wardrobe then I have finished with my room wahoo.
Went on slayradio last night was nice to chat albiet breifly with the guys.
Caught the first three episodes of the new big us tv hit lost its being show on channel four and E4 I must say for once it seems the hype is justified I really enjoyed it the characters actually have development and the story interesting. The only worring thing is the jurassic park subplot going on.
Bruce watched he show with me and we did (a little) work on his website
I feel tired this morning well actually I have been feeilng tired even since I started decorating my room and was ill a couple of weeks ago.
Nikkie sent me a funny star wars thingy
Went on slayradio last night was nice to chat albiet breifly with the guys.
Caught the first three episodes of the new big us tv hit lost its being show on channel four and E4 I must say for once it seems the hype is justified I really enjoyed it the characters actually have development and the story interesting. The only worring thing is the jurassic park subplot going on.
Bruce watched he show with me and we did (a little) work on his website
I feel tired this morning well actually I have been feeilng tired even since I started decorating my room and was ill a couple of weeks ago.
Nikkie sent me a funny star wars thingy
Monday, August 08, 2005
Investments
Arghhhhhhh why cant anything ever be simple, there is too much misunderstanding and problems. My car is still not fixed I had to stay late at work missed out on lunch and had an argument about it all with my parents.
At least I managed to go for a run (well jog, I am pretty unfit after not training for several weeks thanks to illness and decorating). Otherwise I am totally knackered and generally pissed off.
I also received saving statements for my ISA my legal and general index tracker is doing well should be a decent long term investment. Whereas my New Star technology fund lost money again even the glossy brochure didn't cheer me up if it was worth selling I would.
Had an early night.
At least I managed to go for a run (well jog, I am pretty unfit after not training for several weeks thanks to illness and decorating). Otherwise I am totally knackered and generally pissed off.
I also received saving statements for my ISA my legal and general index tracker is doing well should be a decent long term investment. Whereas my New Star technology fund lost money again even the glossy brochure didn't cheer me up if it was worth selling I would.
Had an early night.
Sunday, August 07, 2005
Fish
Finally today was the day to mve the Oscars into their new home, I moved the catfish first to give them a chance to get used to the tank first no it was time to move the oscars two. They struggled a lot drowning the stack of books next to the tank. After their intial shock at being moved they started exploring the new tank, swimming p and down and round the catfish seems fairly pleasedto see them Mike was swimming around the Ocars. Tiger is mostly quiet hiding out in the plants.
Did somemore paintning its starting to get me down there no matter how much I do there always seems to be loads left to do ho hum its looking fairly white now.
Went to the Unicorn with Nick and Becky tonight which was really good, except for Nick being on the defensive about money all the time. Becky isjust as lovely a ever I just wish one day I could meet somne that nice oh well.
Liz has been messaging me a lot she see seems very keen maybe a little too keen. Im still not sure how I feel about Nikie shes good to be with but also can be quite a handful and she is moving off to the Blackburn.
Did somemore paintning its starting to get me down there no matter how much I do there always seems to be loads left to do ho hum its looking fairly white now.
Went to the Unicorn with Nick and Becky tonight which was really good, except for Nick being on the defensive about money all the time. Becky isjust as lovely a ever I just wish one day I could meet somne that nice oh well.
Liz has been messaging me a lot she see seems very keen maybe a little too keen. Im still not sure how I feel about Nikie shes good to be with but also can be quite a handful and she is moving off to the Blackburn.
Terminal Tournaments III
After last night I was abit tired so found it dificult loading up the car to go to the lan.
Setup went well apart form one minor hitch with the gigabit card.
We played quake counte stike unal flatout ate pizza and had a few beers all without any major hitches which is a real achievement. I think we can tabl in another one possibly two games next time. From speaking to David (aka Cool Hand Luke) he enjoyed himself as did Bruces Friend Steven. I think its a rea triumph there ill be pictures going up on the website soon.
Setup went well apart form one minor hitch with the gigabit card.
We played quake counte stike unal flatout ate pizza and had a few beers all without any major hitches which is a real achievement. I think we can tabl in another one possibly two games next time. From speaking to David (aka Cool Hand Luke) he enjoyed himself as did Bruces Friend Steven. I think its a rea triumph there ill be pictures going up on the website soon.
Saturday, August 06, 2005
Sandbox Live
I had the day off today but as there is no rest for the wicked was up early painting my room. Managed to get a coat on the ceiling, its looking a lot nicer now, on balance blue was a bad choice/
I bought a few more plants to brighten the tank up and a net from Wilmslow Garden centre (they have a really nice aquatics centre). I decided the new tank has bedded in now so I decided to move the catfish across. They seem to be quiet disturbed but soon started exploring their new home.
The afternoon was taken up with Bruce and myself doing some changes to the server in Manchester. It was a complete pain a lot of time sat around waiting for things to finish.
The evening though proved to be good fun, Martin, Phil and I met up with Paul, Ian Lisa, Faye and Danny to watch Sandbox at academy 3. It was a really good night sandbox were excellent and it was great to see Paul, Lisa, Ian and Faye. Danny was in a bad mood thanks to his relationship breakdown with Lyn. Whilst I feel for him I really think he needs to move on its far too up and down, does he really want to take on someone else child?
I bought a few more plants to brighten the tank up and a net from Wilmslow Garden centre (they have a really nice aquatics centre). I decided the new tank has bedded in now so I decided to move the catfish across. They seem to be quiet disturbed but soon started exploring their new home.
The afternoon was taken up with Bruce and myself doing some changes to the server in Manchester. It was a complete pain a lot of time sat around waiting for things to finish.
The evening though proved to be good fun, Martin, Phil and I met up with Paul, Ian Lisa, Faye and Danny to watch Sandbox at academy 3. It was a really good night sandbox were excellent and it was great to see Paul, Lisa, Ian and Faye. Danny was in a bad mood thanks to his relationship breakdown with Lyn. Whilst I feel for him I really think he needs to move on its far too up and down, does he really want to take on someone else child?
Thursday, August 04, 2005
Amiga demos
Another fun day at work still working on early redemption figures how can everyone use the same equation and yet apply it in sightly different ways eh :-S
Oh well did a spot more painting only the area behind the fish tank and the ceiling to do now. Also had a bit of a tidy up cleaned my mums car it was filthy.
Getting close to being able to move the fish now I hope they survive the move. They should be a lot happier in the new tank at east I hope so given the effort I have gone to. I ordereda load of new filters from aquacare they seem pretty cheap Icould have save £20 buying my tank from them. Oh well stillsavedd over £200 from what my local store would have charged.
Went round to Martin ostensiblyly to chat about the lan wendeded up playing the old amiga demos for Martin O. I forgot just how funny fraxion wasand the old acid house demos scene.
Oh well did a spot more painting only the area behind the fish tank and the ceiling to do now. Also had a bit of a tidy up cleaned my mums car it was filthy.
Getting close to being able to move the fish now I hope they survive the move. They should be a lot happier in the new tank at east I hope so given the effort I have gone to. I ordereda load of new filters from aquacare they seem pretty cheap Icould have save £20 buying my tank from them. Oh well stillsavedd over £200 from what my local store would have charged.
Went round to Martin ostensiblyly to chat about the lan wendeded up playing the old amiga demos for Martin O. I forgot just how funny fraxion wasand the old acid house demos scene.
Tuesday, August 02, 2005
Car Woes and nights in
Some people think that cars are a symbol of our freedoms personally I think they are a milestone around our necks. THey cost a fortune to buy run insure and maintain. There is constant pressure to get a newer greater model.
Since buying mny car over a year ago second hand I have had to get the brakes replaced have services and now a problem with the turbo sytem meant a £119 charge for a diagnostic and a replacement rubber hose (the hose itself is a £10 item) I also need to get a sensor (mass airflow sensor cost £240 :'( ) replaced before the cars performance returns to normal. Its so expensive not like I do the sort of mileage I used to either, I could ride my bike to work except I have to wear a suit and tie and there are no changing facilities or shower here.
In order to save some money to afford my car repairs and the money Ive spent on decorating I am going to have to spend a lot of nights in over the next two months. Tonight I rented a flim called hide and seek. Its a twisty turning psycholical thriller with a twist similar to the sixth sense. It was quiet enjoyable though had the usual crap Hollywood ending and I found it pretty predictable.
My parents are away are the Taunten Flower Show my dad took over my Wildflower software and sold it to them I dont think it works that well I always wanted to rewrite it ut never quiet foud the time. My dad just gives it away for free he isnt very good with money and seems to let people take advantage of him I dont want to end up like that.
Since buying mny car over a year ago second hand I have had to get the brakes replaced have services and now a problem with the turbo sytem meant a £119 charge for a diagnostic and a replacement rubber hose (the hose itself is a £10 item) I also need to get a sensor (mass airflow sensor cost £240 :'( ) replaced before the cars performance returns to normal. Its so expensive not like I do the sort of mileage I used to either, I could ride my bike to work except I have to wear a suit and tie and there are no changing facilities or shower here.
In order to save some money to afford my car repairs and the money Ive spent on decorating I am going to have to spend a lot of nights in over the next two months. Tonight I rented a flim called hide and seek. Its a twisty turning psycholical thriller with a twist similar to the sixth sense. It was quiet enjoyable though had the usual crap Hollywood ending and I found it pretty predictable.
My parents are away are the Taunten Flower Show my dad took over my Wildflower software and sold it to them I dont think it works that well I always wanted to rewrite it ut never quiet foud the time. My dad just gives it away for free he isnt very good with money and seems to let people take advantage of him I dont want to end up like that.
Monday, August 01, 2005
Bad Day
Some days just don't seem to pan out no matter how hard one tries, unfortunately today was one of them.
On the face of it today should have been a fun and exciting one, the plan was to go to Huddersfield and visit Cybernet gaming to see if we could pick up any tips for the lan bash. So I set off picked up Martin and headed to Bergers, the problems started almost straight away; I recently upgraded to TomTom 5 from version 3 if you care contemplating this DON'T! Version 5 has crashed twice in the first time I used it and each time it crashed I had to reset my Palm T5 and each time I reset I had to re-authenticate the maps :-S this meant phoning my dad ad having to talk him through the website registration. This is just appalling anti piracy that punishes users it not acceptable to be honest I an emailing to complain its just awful.
Anyway I digress, we headed to Huddersfield and found the place easily which was thankful as I had no TomTom. Berger, Martin and Myself then had a half hour of Counter Strike Source before we were told that we had to get off the internet because they were playing a tournament. Cheers for that guys we had paid our money and you didn't bother to warn us. The whole setup was fairly amateurish ad we didn't really learn a lot except how not to do things.
Next we went for a Chinese then headed home, it was then when things started really getting bad on the way back my car played up it had reduced power and the warning light kept coming on so Ill have to get it checked out with will no doubt be expensive.
When I got home I realized my phone was missing gah I rung it no answer Cybernet hadn't got it neither :-S Must have dropped out of my pocket :'(
I managed to clean fuel and fix my passenge door (bolt needed tightening) before heading out to meet Liz at Ra!n Bar. It was an enjoyable enough evening though I felt tired and upset at my stupidity for losing my phone.
I dropped her off and had a nosy at her house it verynice not far at all from Bergers pad then got home just in time for m stomach to rebel from the Chinese food think its still a bit fragile from last week.
All in all I was happy to finally curl up in bed and for a terrible day to be over.
On the face of it today should have been a fun and exciting one, the plan was to go to Huddersfield and visit Cybernet gaming to see if we could pick up any tips for the lan bash. So I set off picked up Martin and headed to Bergers, the problems started almost straight away; I recently upgraded to TomTom 5 from version 3 if you care contemplating this DON'T! Version 5 has crashed twice in the first time I used it and each time it crashed I had to reset my Palm T5 and each time I reset I had to re-authenticate the maps :-S this meant phoning my dad ad having to talk him through the website registration. This is just appalling anti piracy that punishes users it not acceptable to be honest I an emailing to complain its just awful.
Anyway I digress, we headed to Huddersfield and found the place easily which was thankful as I had no TomTom. Berger, Martin and Myself then had a half hour of Counter Strike Source before we were told that we had to get off the internet because they were playing a tournament. Cheers for that guys we had paid our money and you didn't bother to warn us. The whole setup was fairly amateurish ad we didn't really learn a lot except how not to do things.
Next we went for a Chinese then headed home, it was then when things started really getting bad on the way back my car played up it had reduced power and the warning light kept coming on so Ill have to get it checked out with will no doubt be expensive.
When I got home I realized my phone was missing gah I rung it no answer Cybernet hadn't got it neither :-S Must have dropped out of my pocket :'(
I managed to clean fuel and fix my passenge door (bolt needed tightening) before heading out to meet Liz at Ra!n Bar. It was an enjoyable enough evening though I felt tired and upset at my stupidity for losing my phone.
I dropped her off and had a nosy at her house it verynice not far at all from Bergers pad then got home just in time for m stomach to rebel from the Chinese food think its still a bit fragile from last week.
All in all I was happy to finally curl up in bed and for a terrible day to be over.
Saturday, July 30, 2005
Big tank
Well after a rather long day working, then painting, filling gravel (30kg of it which had to be washed and scalded) my new fish tank is finally set up. I feel very tired but it's good to see it all set up. Its a lot quieter than my small one which is a bonus. At the moment it look a bit forlorn with no fish or plants, I need to leave it running for a week to get rid of the chlorine and allow the filtration to activate before I can move the fish over. There is a photo gallery on my photo site check it out here.
The tanks filtration system is really complex using lots of different filters which is great but it means I need to replace them regularly which is a pain and will significantly increase the running costs which is a bit unforeseen. I guess I will need to stay in one night a month to pay for it!
I was working out my student loan repayments today. Based on the governments revised threshold the monthly payment has reduced. Whilst I like having extra money a month its drastically increased the repayment time to about 17 years!!! Oh well I could make over-payments but it dosn't make sense given that a=they will be out of my net wage and that the interest charged is only 3.2% so it would make more sense for me to put any overpayment money into savings account on which I can earn 5% tax free if I add to my ISA.
Today I spent trying to understand one of my colleagues programs. It is quiet a challenge as he has taken a totally different approach to Business Basic XML integration. I think its a bit of a hash however hopefully I will be able to make the required changes next week.
Got a text from Liz she seems really nice I hope we can be friends regardless of how things go on our meeting on Sunday.
I think its pretty much fizzled out with Nikkie she will be moving soon which is a shame I enjoyed the time we spent together it just I don't think it was right for either of us.
The tanks filtration system is really complex using lots of different filters which is great but it means I need to replace them regularly which is a pain and will significantly increase the running costs which is a bit unforeseen. I guess I will need to stay in one night a month to pay for it!
I was working out my student loan repayments today. Based on the governments revised threshold the monthly payment has reduced. Whilst I like having extra money a month its drastically increased the repayment time to about 17 years!!! Oh well I could make over-payments but it dosn't make sense given that a=they will be out of my net wage and that the interest charged is only 3.2% so it would make more sense for me to put any overpayment money into savings account on which I can earn 5% tax free if I add to my ISA.
Today I spent trying to understand one of my colleagues programs. It is quiet a challenge as he has taken a totally different approach to Business Basic XML integration. I think its a bit of a hash however hopefully I will be able to make the required changes next week.
Got a text from Liz she seems really nice I hope we can be friends regardless of how things go on our meeting on Sunday.
I think its pretty much fizzled out with Nikkie she will be moving soon which is a shame I enjoyed the time we spent together it just I don't think it was right for either of us.
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Paint
My fish tank arrived today hurrah, it really does look quiet big sat in its box on a pallet. Unfortunately my mother has pointed out that once the fish tank goes in I will be difficult to paint behind and oh wouldn't it be lovely to get rid o the awful blue paint. After what three years of living with it I must confess the blue is a little dark. So after a long trip looking around B&Q (my god how many shades of neutral colours are there) I choose a crown Monaco paint.
So rather than setting up my new fish tank I spent the evening painting my room. Its gong to take at least two coats to cover the blue as well so there is going to be a delay getting the tank running.
When it is set up I will have to run it for about a week before I move the fish into it this will allow the chlorine to evaporate out and for some bacterial to start to grow. Here's a handy hint for those of you who don't like the taste of tap water; Chlorine is almost certainly the bad thing you can taste to get rid of it simple pour some water into a jug and leave in the fridge for 2 or so hours, volia nice tasting tap water.
Congratulations to Nikkie on getting her new job!
Got an email from Alison today it was really good to hear she wasn't hurt in the Sharm bombings. She is went working as a dive instructor after leaving Australia.
So rather than setting up my new fish tank I spent the evening painting my room. Its gong to take at least two coats to cover the blue as well so there is going to be a delay getting the tank running.
When it is set up I will have to run it for about a week before I move the fish into it this will allow the chlorine to evaporate out and for some bacterial to start to grow. Here's a handy hint for those of you who don't like the taste of tap water; Chlorine is almost certainly the bad thing you can taste to get rid of it simple pour some water into a jug and leave in the fridge for 2 or so hours, volia nice tasting tap water.
Congratulations to Nikkie on getting her new job!
Got an email from Alison today it was really good to hear she wasn't hurt in the Sharm bombings. She is went working as a dive instructor after leaving Australia.
Tuesday, July 26, 2005
Back at work
Going back to work after a absence is always a pain but its a lot worse when your still not feeling well. That said fortunately yesterday wasn't too bad and I managed to get through the day just about.
I spend last night working with Phil organising all our diving photos for uploading onto the website, even with the duplicates removed there 700mb, however it should look excellent once all the photos are on there.
I was also chatting to Cassy last night it seems like such a long time since we lived in Moseley road interesting how peoples lives diverge. She introduced me (on-line) to her doctor friend Liz a junior doctor no less, personally I think it would end up like Bex she proved far to nice for the likes of me however Ill meet up with them when I am feeling better.
I hope everyone likes the new photo album . In time I intend to move all the pictures onto there.
Oh well I best get back to work I am having a meeting to catch up with the PSD at 10.30 .
I spend last night working with Phil organising all our diving photos for uploading onto the website, even with the duplicates removed there 700mb, however it should look excellent once all the photos are on there.
I was also chatting to Cassy last night it seems like such a long time since we lived in Moseley road interesting how peoples lives diverge. She introduced me (on-line) to her doctor friend Liz a junior doctor no less, personally I think it would end up like Bex she proved far to nice for the likes of me however Ill meet up with them when I am feeling better.
I hope everyone likes the new photo album . In time I intend to move all the pictures onto there.
Oh well I best get back to work I am having a meeting to catch up with the PSD at 10.30 .
Sunday, July 24, 2005
Rainy Sunday
I haven't written a post for a few days so I am going to have to try and cram a lot into this I will try and keep it chronological but if things get screwy its because I'm still taking codeine for my stomach pain.
I was still really quite ill on Friday so in an attempt to cheer myself up I've ordered myself a new fish tank. The Oscars have totally outgrown my current tank, I feel cruel restricting their space. I have been meaning to get one for ages so today I finally bit the bullet and bought a Jewel 300 litre tank. It comes with a rather snazzy beach cabinet/stand and should look really nice. Its going to be a squeeze getting it into my room. I think it will require some major reorganization but it should be worth it in the long run. Only slight downside is Mum wants me to repaint my room and apparently this is a good opportunity :-/
It all makes m wish I could afford a place of my own but there's nowhere within my budget and I am still stuck into a debt cycle in which stupid purchases of fish tanks and holidays to Sweden rather drain my resources. Though I wonder if deep down I am just scared to committee to buying somewhere and being tied down it is easy living at home perhaps I am get myself into a position where I cant get away so it gives me an excuse not to?
The debt situation is getting much better I'm clearing my credit card each month and I haven't dipped into my overdraft for months. Also my savings accounts are starting to look a bit more healthy I think I well on my way to hitting my new years resolution of clearing my personal debts. I just need to learn a bit more self control and not go so mad buying things.
Saturday I spent most of the day trying to fix up the games server in time for the next Lan bash on the 6th. Steam still proved a complete pain I finally managed after much effort to get it running. I was also working on my Sweden holiday gallery I think I will have to give up on XML/XSL Picasa outputs tiny rubbish thumbnails and xsl doesn't always render correctly in Firefox I think I will look for an alternate product rather than try and reinvent the wheel myself.
Saturday night was Jo Berger's house-warming, his place is really nice especially now he and Holly have tidied it up and given it some more homely touches. I went down with Martin and Bruce and Phil met up with use, no Ian or Danny though. Haven't seen Ian for a long time.
Spent some of the evening watching the happy tree friends such a funny violent cartoons they crack me up completely. The juxtaposition between the cute cuddly animals and the ultra violence (the level of which would make Alex DeLarge smile) is excellently handled. Although I pretty much hate flash on the web some of the cartoons are excellent.
Spoke to Paul this morning it was really good to hear from him again, hopefully I can go down and visit him and Lisa soon.
Its raining outside and my stomach is still unsettled I'm pretty worried about going back to work tomorrow sometimes after missing so much I have a lot to catch up with. I hope I can make it through the day aright.
I was still really quite ill on Friday so in an attempt to cheer myself up I've ordered myself a new fish tank. The Oscars have totally outgrown my current tank, I feel cruel restricting their space. I have been meaning to get one for ages so today I finally bit the bullet and bought a Jewel 300 litre tank. It comes with a rather snazzy beach cabinet/stand and should look really nice. Its going to be a squeeze getting it into my room. I think it will require some major reorganization but it should be worth it in the long run. Only slight downside is Mum wants me to repaint my room and apparently this is a good opportunity :-/
It all makes m wish I could afford a place of my own but there's nowhere within my budget and I am still stuck into a debt cycle in which stupid purchases of fish tanks and holidays to Sweden rather drain my resources. Though I wonder if deep down I am just scared to committee to buying somewhere and being tied down it is easy living at home perhaps I am get myself into a position where I cant get away so it gives me an excuse not to?
The debt situation is getting much better I'm clearing my credit card each month and I haven't dipped into my overdraft for months. Also my savings accounts are starting to look a bit more healthy I think I well on my way to hitting my new years resolution of clearing my personal debts. I just need to learn a bit more self control and not go so mad buying things.
Saturday I spent most of the day trying to fix up the games server in time for the next Lan bash on the 6th. Steam still proved a complete pain I finally managed after much effort to get it running. I was also working on my Sweden holiday gallery I think I will have to give up on XML/XSL Picasa outputs tiny rubbish thumbnails and xsl doesn't always render correctly in Firefox I think I will look for an alternate product rather than try and reinvent the wheel myself.
Saturday night was Jo Berger's house-warming, his place is really nice especially now he and Holly have tidied it up and given it some more homely touches. I went down with Martin and Bruce and Phil met up with use, no Ian or Danny though. Haven't seen Ian for a long time.
Spent some of the evening watching the happy tree friends such a funny violent cartoons they crack me up completely. The juxtaposition between the cute cuddly animals and the ultra violence (the level of which would make Alex DeLarge smile) is excellently handled. Although I pretty much hate flash on the web some of the cartoons are excellent.
Spoke to Paul this morning it was really good to hear from him again, hopefully I can go down and visit him and Lisa soon.
Its raining outside and my stomach is still unsettled I'm pretty worried about going back to work tomorrow sometimes after missing so much I have a lot to catch up with. I hope I can make it through the day aright.
Thursday, July 21, 2005
Still Ill :-(
Well days have past and yet Im not getting much better, so today I decided to fight my fears and head to the doctors. One examination later and I find I have either got a dose of food poisoning or a gastric bug either way he gave me some pills to help with the pain and other effects.
Work were pretty understanding about me having time off which was really good of them.
Though I have been at home I have been in no fit state to work on anything even as a casual project its really not much fun at all :-(
I hope to improve in time for Bergers house-warming on Saturday else I really will be upset.
I have managed to spend a few minute getting some of my personal tools for the next lan , namely a headset so I wont have to borrow one from Phil (Cheers for last time matey) I've gone for a pretty top of the line one though I bought it from eBay rather than a shop. I also treated myself to a new gaming mouse. Its called razor dimondback from razor (see razors website). There's a rather nice review of them here. I have been really impressed so far its been much more precise than my logitec mouseman dual hopfully it will net me a few more frags ;-)
The only thing I need now is a new PC to go with them then Phil can give his old one to Berger and we will all be happy. It wont be in time for the next Lan though I still need to pay off my Swedish trip and save up for a new fish tank they are the top priorities at the moment.
I've pretty much given up with buying a house for the time being its going to take years to save up a worthwhile deposit I am certainly no Nick when it comes to money.
Work were pretty understanding about me having time off which was really good of them.
Though I have been at home I have been in no fit state to work on anything even as a casual project its really not much fun at all :-(
I hope to improve in time for Bergers house-warming on Saturday else I really will be upset.
I have managed to spend a few minute getting some of my personal tools for the next lan , namely a headset so I wont have to borrow one from Phil (Cheers for last time matey) I've gone for a pretty top of the line one though I bought it from eBay rather than a shop. I also treated myself to a new gaming mouse. Its called razor dimondback from razor (see razors website). There's a rather nice review of them here. I have been really impressed so far its been much more precise than my logitec mouseman dual hopfully it will net me a few more frags ;-)
The only thing I need now is a new PC to go with them then Phil can give his old one to Berger and we will all be happy. It wont be in time for the next Lan though I still need to pay off my Swedish trip and save up for a new fish tank they are the top priorities at the moment.
I've pretty much given up with buying a house for the time being its going to take years to save up a worthwhile deposit I am certainly no Nick when it comes to money.
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
Ill
I didn't make it into work today was up all night with terrible stomach pains. It wasn't as bad as food poisoning I got in France but still I don't feel groovy.
One good thing about having a day off was I got to finish Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, it was a good book though not on a par with Goblet of Fire or the Order of Phonenix.
I watched Jamies school dinners repeats this evening, strange to see such passion for his work and another example of corporations exchanging the externalities which is our kids existence health for profits. Scary really is it possible that we have all become such a part of the machine that no one really noticed the corporations taking over replacing knowledge for advertising, health and the environment for profit? I worry but what can I do drop out join a commune that's hardly me is it? I just wish I could find Jamies passion and use it to change the world myself. Is that just arrogance on my part or is my apathy part of the problem even as I sit here the TV is on spewing yet my advertisements trying to create a desire for things I don't even need.
One good thing about having a day off was I got to finish Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince, it was a good book though not on a par with Goblet of Fire or the Order of Phonenix.
I watched Jamies school dinners repeats this evening, strange to see such passion for his work and another example of corporations exchanging the externalities which is our kids existence health for profits. Scary really is it possible that we have all become such a part of the machine that no one really noticed the corporations taking over replacing knowledge for advertising, health and the environment for profit? I worry but what can I do drop out join a commune that's hardly me is it? I just wish I could find Jamies passion and use it to change the world myself. Is that just arrogance on my part or is my apathy part of the problem even as I sit here the TV is on spewing yet my advertisements trying to create a desire for things I don't even need.
Sunday, July 17, 2005
Lazy Sunday
After working with Martin yesterday I dont have my usual Sunday refreshed feeling, so think its time to have a lazy day. It was strange to do moonlighting putting up projectors screens in a big ops centre. It was alsmot surreal all these people sat around behind screens like me on a weekday.
Its midday and I am still sat in my dressing gown chatting to Lulu on the internet whilst trying to work out a nice way to present my Swedish photos, after the amount of effort Makke Boz and the others put in I dont want to just shove them up with webalbum generator.
Oh just got a message from Martin he wants to go to the gym later, oh well I can rest until then. My parents are away this weekend I think my cat is missing them he keeps moping about and meowing for no reason.
Its midday and I am still sat in my dressing gown chatting to Lulu on the internet whilst trying to work out a nice way to present my Swedish photos, after the amount of effort Makke Boz and the others put in I dont want to just shove them up with webalbum generator.
Oh just got a message from Martin he wants to go to the gym later, oh well I can rest until then. My parents are away this weekend I think my cat is missing them he keeps moping about and meowing for no reason.
Friday, July 15, 2005
End of the Week
This week has felt like a long one, not sure if I am still tired from Sweden or what but I certainly feel like a couple of days off.
However tomorrow I agreed to help Martin with a small job oh well the cash will come in handy towards the credit card bill.
Watched the film Constantine tonight, a epic based on the helplessly series it was quiet religious with the usual themes of redemption dogma and of course good versus evil. I have been thinking about religion a lot recently especially with the bombings in London I am so unsure about the existence of god, like most people I would love to believe there is something more than this world. Yet so many bad things seem to be perpetrated in the name of god.
Sometimes this sort of thinking nearly drive me insane laid alone late into the night, is religion just heroin for the masses or is there really some big plan. If there is a god are we simply a pet project gathering dust while working on the next thing?
The new Harry potter is released at one minute past midnight unfortunately the internet has already tainted it slightly for me, I was reading /. when I saw a link that like a car crash I didn't want to read but couldn't turn away. I wont ruin it for anyone that knows but I know which character is going to die :-S
However tomorrow I agreed to help Martin with a small job oh well the cash will come in handy towards the credit card bill.
Watched the film Constantine tonight, a epic based on the helplessly series it was quiet religious with the usual themes of redemption dogma and of course good versus evil. I have been thinking about religion a lot recently especially with the bombings in London I am so unsure about the existence of god, like most people I would love to believe there is something more than this world. Yet so many bad things seem to be perpetrated in the name of god.
Sometimes this sort of thinking nearly drive me insane laid alone late into the night, is religion just heroin for the masses or is there really some big plan. If there is a god are we simply a pet project gathering dust while working on the next thing?
The new Harry potter is released at one minute past midnight unfortunately the internet has already tainted it slightly for me, I was reading /. when I saw a link that like a car crash I didn't want to read but couldn't turn away. I wont ruin it for anyone that knows but I know which character is going to die :-S
Sunday, July 10, 2005
FP!
Well thought I would give this blogging lark a try, it's a lovely sunny summers days here and I have just had a bbq so I am pretty full. My Chinese friend Lulu has been pestering me to start writing so here it is. Ive actually self published some earlier work on my website and also some of the Slashdot journal. I may migrate some of the content depending on how well I like blogger.
Last night I went out to Wilmslow, Paul was out as was Lisa freshly arrived from Sydney. She was in great form as was Paul, in fact it was a great evening sat outside the rectory chatting and drinking in the awrm evening air. Wish I had taken out my camera and got some shots. Talking of cameras Woller has a really lovely new camera phone 2mp! Think its time I upgraded there is a 7mp Ixus now.
It has been a long week, this time last week I was in Sweden watching the Flugtag and at Coldplay on Tuesday they were amazing much better than when I saw them at the men arena.
Yesterday I saw a film that chilled me to the bone. Called the corporation and is about the rise and domination of the corporation I hadn't fully realised how much control they have it was scary and now the question is what do I do as a shareholder and a member of a capitalist society I couldn't go through life and avoid all corporate but I really think the system has to change.
Last night I went out to Wilmslow, Paul was out as was Lisa freshly arrived from Sydney. She was in great form as was Paul, in fact it was a great evening sat outside the rectory chatting and drinking in the awrm evening air. Wish I had taken out my camera and got some shots. Talking of cameras Woller has a really lovely new camera phone 2mp! Think its time I upgraded there is a 7mp Ixus now.
It has been a long week, this time last week I was in Sweden watching the Flugtag and at Coldplay on Tuesday they were amazing much better than when I saw them at the men arena.
Yesterday I saw a film that chilled me to the bone. Called the corporation and is about the rise and domination of the corporation I hadn't fully realised how much control they have it was scary and now the question is what do I do as a shareholder and a member of a capitalist society I couldn't go through life and avoid all corporate but I really think the system has to change.
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Printer Rant
First Published on Slashdot Journal
Gah I am fed up with printers, some days it seems all users problem are in some way printing related. Printers are dirty and noisy, I always end up covered in toner, and its even worse on the colour printer I am left in cyan yellow magentry mess :-(
And Inkjets arghh dont even get me startered the cost the crapness of the drivers and the rubbish build quality argh who cares if it does photo quality if after the cost of the special ink and paper it ends up being greater than the cost of going down to a developer and getting top quality prints :'(
Gah I am fed up with printers, some days it seems all users problem are in some way printing related. Printers are dirty and noisy, I always end up covered in toner, and its even worse on the colour printer I am left in cyan yellow magentry mess :-(
And Inkjets arghh dont even get me startered the cost the crapness of the drivers and the rubbish build quality argh who cares if it does photo quality if after the cost of the special ink and paper it ends up being greater than the cost of going down to a developer and getting top quality prints :'(
Saturday, July 19, 2003
About Phils house mates
Steve he is a real Queenslander after a few days I had enough, here some examples, I fixed a pc for him and he woke me up at 6 in the morning to chat about it git! In fairness to the guy he did give Phil his money which helped put gas in the car.
Sam cool guy. Just did not need Phil around because he could not save money.
Sam (Another Sam) and Amy were also New Zealanders they are nice people although Amy did wake me up every morning at 4am and Sam again at 6am
Sam cool guy. Just did not need Phil around because he could not save money.
Sam (Another Sam) and Amy were also New Zealanders they are nice people although Amy did wake me up every morning at 4am and Sam again at 6am
Sunday, July 06, 2003
Airlie Beach
The next day we booked into a hostel near the lagona. The hostel itself is a little less personal and not very social but I think that the whole of Airlie hostels is that way. Most of the socialising is ethier done in the tacky bars or on the many sailing trip that there are.
So like the Romans we indulged in a night out. Not very sucessful. That day we had only eaten a few things and were still shatter from the day and night driving the day before.
We went to an Irish bar and the was no bar people. The ironic thing though was it looked like everybody had a drink in there. Advancing on to another bar called magnums we drank a couple more chilled beers. The Aussies drink cold beer, the pumps are cooled bottles are packed in ice and just to make sure it stays cold bottled beers are often served in polystyrene jackets to keep them cool. Beer and stupid contests were the order of the day I was still pissed off about my exams and no matter how much phil attempted to cheer me up my mood darkened so we decided to call it a night.
Awaking we tried to figure out how to kill another day in Airlie theres really not much here. Sitting on the beech we wrote out some postcards to send home. Surfed the internet for an hour or s and posted some of the photos for everyone to enjoy. We drove up to the rainforest and some of the views were spectacular.
In the evening we went out again, I decided to try and not let everything spoil my holiday so I was in a much better mood. We met up with a dive instructor called Andy, he was in Airlie looking at a boat (it apparently wasn't too hot in the end). Andy was a pretty sound bloke and he told us many dive stories. We will be looking up Calipso dive his company when we head north. More drinks followed then Andy pulled some pretty girl Phil and I went to bed drunk. Phil fell asleep in his clothes and I had to take his shoes off.
Friday, July 04, 2003
Airlie Beach Mission
Due to its size when you say you're going on a short drive in Australia you can mean upto 200km. So when I say we took a long trip from Hervey bay to Airlie beach I mean we did a LOT of driving. Departing from Hervey bay (9:30) after munching the free toast breaky, we set off on the highway for Airlie beach. I drove all morning reaching Rockhampton around (2:30). We ate lunch I bought a watch (the sales assistant gave us a discount I think she took a shine to Phil). Next we pulled into super cheap auto (4:30) to replace the faulty inverter, and now here is the thing about Australia the sales assistant took us on our word and replaced it without a receipt that would never happen in England.
It is Paul's birthday tomorrow so I bought him a card and then did something rather dumb, I walked into Australia post with the envelope and asked what do I need to send this to Sydney, with a rye smile the postmistress looked at me and said you need a stamp dear. Doh! Pretty obvious ask a silly question get a silly answer. Back on the road and by 5pm we were driving through some beautiful countryside the sun was setting over the mountains as we travelled through the scene was amazing, from sunset the watching the stars appear, certainly it made the KM's much more bearable.
Unfortunately for me this is also the day I found out I only got a 2:2 so it was very bittersweet. By the time we made it to Airlie beech I was feeling cru shed and tired Phil just tired, we couldn't find a hostel open which had vacancies and ended up paying $50 each to stay in a hotel. Needless to say we now have plenty of towels, and we defiantly know to book ahead in future.
Thursday, July 03, 2003
Fraser Island (day 3)
Ouch is it morning already! And Phil feeling chirpy not so good for all the hungover people. Back to the all you can eat breakfast we both ate well. (Well we did pay for it). Trying and tell someone with a hangover not to eat a fry is like telling smoker not to smoke. Our guide for the day would be different, owing to a mix-up a bloke called Kerry would be doing the honours. He was very factual and after a bad joke he put a tape on. We saw different vegetation and how some of it worked on the island mainly though fire and how the new seeds grow in the ashes of the burned tree.
We then went to the one of the oldest sand dunes on the island. From this lookout you could see The Dune Formation, Lake Wobbie, lots of vegetation and the Ocean. Nearly as nice as the picture of Phil and the Two Swiss girls at lake Mackensie. From the lookout we continued down to Lake Wobbie, this is a small lake separating the dues from vegetation, not clear like Mackensie or Basin lake and with a steep side not so many people decided to swim. Even Phil decided not to come in for a dip. I have to admit it was pretty cold but seeing as Paula, Bart and Sharon joined me we had some fun. Kerry had warned us not to dive in as although deep away from the banks several people had seriously injured themselves diving in. Another group found a quick way to get in though rolling down the sand bank onto the water.
Lake Wobbie wasn't much to see (A part from a kite hovering abover the water to catch it lunch) really so we decided to walk to the beach. Its about 2km across the sand to get there. As we walked by Paula and she was putting on sunscreen. Phil saw Jesse emerging from the bushes, She said she was answering a call of nature quite apt in such a large sandbox. The beach was a much better prospect the sun was stronger and we all lay down for some sun worship, next to the thunder of vehicles passing. Fraser Island is quite strange in that the beach is classed as a highway. It is 56 miles long (according to Dave) and cars thunder up and down, its also used as an airstrip and the people who went up from the plane took off from here.
One last look at the Mahino and we departed back to the centre to leave. Just as we were driving along the beech we finally caught a glimpse of whales. About 800 metres out to sea there were a couple moving slowly and playfully they surface for air, quit a sight and a good way to round off the trip. An hour later and we were waiting for the boat home swapping email addresses.
It was a great trip and it was with a heavy heart we all said goodbye the couch taking us all to our hostels from the seaport. We really enjoyed Fraser saw a lot and had a great deal of fun, but all good things come to an end. Most of us set off towards Airlie beech gateway to the Whitsunday Islands for the next leg of our tour.
For us though another night in the Woolshed backpackers beckoned. We got back late and needed to do some washing which turn into a mission as we didn't have the right change. One large Pizza and much watching of the tumble dryer later we headed back to the hostel. Bed was calling and while Phil had been clever enough to grab his doona I froze even my hoody did not protect me. In the end I pulled all of the clean towels over me to stay warm.
Wednesday, July 02, 2003
Fraser Island (day 2)
We woke feeling the shots from the night before. It was also raining, during the night most of us (not Phil though he can sleep through anything) had been woken up by a thunderstorm, a big one at that. Who expect rain in the tropical rainforest :-S Phil woke up none the wiser and after drinking nearly a litre of water was ready to face the day. A cup of char later and sitting down to the all you can eat breakfast. Which everybody did we had to make up our lunch only one sandwich no good at all.
The first stop of the day was the coloured sands, caused by metal elements leeching through the rock they are an impressive sight. To Aboriginal women this was a sacred site.
Advancing next to the onto champagne pools but not with out seeing a dingo on the beach. (This beach is amazing it has a100kms speed limit, runway for many light aircraft and a kids play ground all in one). The champagne pools did not look as inviting as some of the other thing we had seen just because it was cloudy. But we both went in and it was lovely. We had small fish swimming around us and the waves making bubbles as they splashed over the rocks. The champagne pools are the only safe place to swim in the sea, strong currents sea snakes, stingers and sharks making the sea around Fraser a dangerous place.
Next stop was Indian point. A rocky outcrop. Indian point is so called as Captain Cook sailed past there were many aborigonies on the top, Cook called them Indians. To get to the top of Indian point required us to climb up a few rocks but no worries. The point is a great look out and the views were spectacular, you could see miles out across the Ocean. On a good day they say you can see whales and sharks, unfortunatly for us we didnt get to see any, except for a Ray. Sharon lost her sun glasses off the top of the point. Dave showed us some of the photos of his 10 years on Fraser. One of a brozer whaler shark (a nasty shark) of 3 meters in length near the beach. After seeing that the pics none of the group went in the sea. We had are only sandwich on the lookout and then all piled backon the bus. We both fell asleep on journey to the Mahino wreck. Phil in that time had lost his sunglasses and went really under about it. Little did he know one of the out people had kindly picked them up and did not tell him because they had gone on a plane ride to see Fraser from the air. The wreck was stunning sticking half way into the sand. It was let down by the overcast conditions.
The bus stopped at the shop so we could buy some liquid refreshment to go and watch the sunset. Before we all sat down to watch it there was another surprise a dingo on the beach. Some of us split off to get photos but we need not have done that because it went closer to the ones that did not follow it. The sunset was stunning to see over the mainland, it happened so quickly the sun disappearing over the sea leaving only dusk remaining. Phil being arty (Or trying to be) got a picture of the group facing the sunset. I have to say I have not watched many sunset but we both agreed this was stunning. A small hike back to resort up a very big hill and then to another game of shithead with a few beers. Another way to wait for the showers again.
We all went to dinner and tonight's entertainment was the karaoke. I have always thought that karaoke was invented by evil genious who likes to watch groups of people humiliate themselves. Everybody wanted to do it but we to afraid to put there had up to admit liking it. After a Tubby Japanese Ricky Martin (Who should have won). It was are turn and I have admit a very good rendition of Queens Bohemian Rhapsody. The line up was Bart, Phil, John, Mark and Paula. I do not know who was Freddie but that will be shown when (Or if Mark sends us a Pic of us doing it).
Tuesday, July 01, 2003
Fraser Island (day 1)
Got on the bus it was nearly empty. It was sold to us as a cheap party tour to Fraser Island and all the people getting on were families and couples. One Kid look like bobby out of king of the hill. We got coffee and started to talk to Bart (a Dutch guy that sounded Irish), Paula and Josie (Two cute Swiss girls). In actual fact Phil went straight over to the women like flies round a turd. After a 45 minute boat ride we arrived caffeinated and ready to go.
First stop was Basin Lake a perfectly clear inland lake. Phil, Bart and John all went in for a dip. The sun was shining and the water was so clear, not only that but ranger Dave informed us that as the water was 5.5ph it actually cleaned us while we swam! I think that was a first for Phil in a few days anyway.
After the swim there was a 2km walk to central station and launch. Central station was so called because in the days when logging was allowed a steam train was used to move the timber.
After lunch another short walk took us through Pile Valley. Phil was still trying his luck with Josie; demonstrating to her how to operate a digital camera. After the valley Dave took us to Lake Mackensie another inland lake but much much bigger, than basin lake. Most people got in, even Josie after Bart gave her a helping hand dumping her into the water. It would have been the perfect scene except the weather had slightly worsened clouding over and dampening our fun. After the swim phil pulled out his $2 cards and we all started to bond over a game of shithead. (Teaching most of the crowd at the time). I do think this made the trip a lot better because we played it most nights before and after dinner.
A note to travellers to Lake Mackensie check out the aptly named second beach is quiet and the entrance to the lake is shallower so the water gets heated up more.
Dave took us back to the lodge complex most of the group ened up together in lodge 8. The rooms were nice though a few more toilets and showers might have been useful. A few more games of shithead killed time before dinner (and whilst waiting for the showers). More people were now joining in and learning the game.
Dinner was outstanding, the food was both plentiful and tasty especially the pizzas. The girls tried hard not to dig in but surrounded by such good food they soon tucked in. Entertainment was in the form of a quiz. Phil got the drinks flowing buying two jugs so we were all getting merry. Needless to say we didn't do too well at the quiz but we sank plenty of shots (a few cocksucking cowboys I think and we all liked them). We were up early the next day so we went back to the lodge for more shithead before retiring to bed.
First stop was Basin Lake a perfectly clear inland lake. Phil, Bart and John all went in for a dip. The sun was shining and the water was so clear, not only that but ranger Dave informed us that as the water was 5.5ph it actually cleaned us while we swam! I think that was a first for Phil in a few days anyway.
After the swim there was a 2km walk to central station and launch. Central station was so called because in the days when logging was allowed a steam train was used to move the timber.
After lunch another short walk took us through Pile Valley. Phil was still trying his luck with Josie; demonstrating to her how to operate a digital camera. After the valley Dave took us to Lake Mackensie another inland lake but much much bigger, than basin lake. Most people got in, even Josie after Bart gave her a helping hand dumping her into the water. It would have been the perfect scene except the weather had slightly worsened clouding over and dampening our fun. After the swim phil pulled out his $2 cards and we all started to bond over a game of shithead. (Teaching most of the crowd at the time). I do think this made the trip a lot better because we played it most nights before and after dinner.
A note to travellers to Lake Mackensie check out the aptly named second beach is quiet and the entrance to the lake is shallower so the water gets heated up more.
Dinner was outstanding, the food was both plentiful and tasty especially the pizzas. The girls tried hard not to dig in but surrounded by such good food they soon tucked in. Entertainment was in the form of a quiz. Phil got the drinks flowing buying two jugs so we were all getting merry. Needless to say we didn't do too well at the quiz but we sank plenty of shots (a few cocksucking cowboys I think and we all liked them). We were up early the next day so we went back to the lodge for more shithead before retiring to bed.
Monday, June 30, 2003
Diving
I took me open watercourse with Nam (the shop manager and top instructor). The skills you have to learn included The mask removal, which is not very nice. I hated it. I had to confirm I would to finish the day and make a decision on if I wanted to continue. After two more days of being PADIed with both Phil and Nam teaching. I finished my open water and being with the other open water student Travis.
The Saturday the day before we left. We had a heavy session on the beer we were ment to meet up with some of the dive people but they did not turn up and Phil only sent the message out that day. We met up with Michelle and Dee (Phils old flatmates). A good night of drinking was had. Sam did not meet up with us but we were in the same pub but it was a loud and we were at the bar.
The day we left surfers paradise we were still hung over and having to pack didn't make for a good morning. We headed to Noosa but only for 10 minutes until Steve rang and asked for his keys back doh! After the aborted start and a stop for gas we were on our way to Noosa. We have pictures of the beach at dusk very nice. It too us about an hour to find the hostel and when still recovering not to good.
We stayed at a nice hostel (Noosa backpackers resort), which they gave us a room to are self. I say a very attractive Scouse girl taught me how to play a card game called shithead, she was a grand master.
We travelled to Harvey Bay where we booked a trip to Fraser Island trip. We even managed to negotiate a good discount on. It was the kingfisher trip. We chilled out on the beach and then though lets get a hostel. We looked in the travel bible again (Lonely Planet). We found a place that would give free breakfast and with haveing to get up early to go to Fraser island phil thought it as a good idea. This was a gem of a hostel only 6 people that night staying and the hospitaltiy was great but the room was freezing and they only gave us a thin sheet each. We played shithead with two dutch farmowners and a Swiss guy. He said Fraser was awesome and the weather was great. All in all we were starting to think we were going to have a excellent time on Fraiser Island. Phil even managed to get his 24 fix only one more episode left now.
Sunday, June 22, 2003
Jet Lag Sun and Diving
I spent a week doing jack around Surfer Paradise. Phil's housemates would wake me up about 6 in the morning as they went out to work. I then spent the mornings on the internet trying to get used to the jet lag. The afternoons I spent wondering around Surfer what a barren wasteland nothing but endless seas of hotels and shops, you could be anywhere same. After a week of doing nothing (except fixing Steve's PC) I was really bored. Was this Australia? Get me back to the UK please. Fortunately Phil took the wise decision to leave work one week early. We took a day trip to one of the most beautiful places in Australia, Byron Bay. You can see from the photos what sort of place it is.
After visting Byron Bay and nights spent drinking with Phil, and Sam (Phil's New Zealander flat mate). We went to watch the Lewis fight, it was pretty weird the Aussies didn't want him to win, I enjoyed it even though it didn't go the distance. Walking to the pub we had passed a surf company, and having nothing better to do we decided to go surfing. You can check out more photos here. It was very fun and I would recommend the it. Pity about our knees though my tip don't get off in water too shallow. Sam was already a surfer so he took all the pictures, thanks mate!
Phil took me for my first dive on Monday. It was Phil's last day working at the dive shop. I didn't enjoy it that much because it felt very alien and clumsy in the gear. There was also a group of people that kept on bumping into me.
Phil took me for my first dive on Monday. It was Phil's last day working at the dive shop. I didn't enjoy it that much because it felt very alien and clumsy in the gear. There was also a group of people that kept on bumping into me.
Thursday, June 19, 2003
Goldcoast
I arrived in Coolangatta a bit confused I thought it was called the Goldcoast and the gate was changed perhaps I had boarded the wrong flight. Everything was alright though I was in the right place, and Phil met me at the baggage collection place. Another surreal but welcome experience. Only last week Bruce and myself were discussing how weird it was sitting having a bbq without him and now here I am 12000 miles from home standing next to him.
Wednesday, June 18, 2003
Arrival
The Manics wrote in their song Australia "you fly for so long it hurts" and well it's pretty apt as after flying I really felt like death. Meeting up with Paul was surreal we missed each other at the airport and finally met at central station. Really good to see him again though even though I wasn't unto much after the flight I had a good evening though. It had been ages since I had last seen Paul so I was really suprised and grateful that he met me at the airport. It was great to see him again and to meet Lisa for the first time and I was really sorry that this was going to be such a breif meeting. Sydney was good although I was still a bit zombified, I will have a better look around when I arrive back there at the end of my tour.
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| Paul and Lisa |
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| Paul and I |
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| Paul and Lisa |
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| Paul playing some tunes |
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| Lisa looking lovely |
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| Close up of Lisa |
Sunday, June 15, 2003
Going Tommorrow
It's 12:40 and my flight leaves tomorrow morning I cant sleep. I'm wondering whether I'm doing the right thing. I am going to miss my graduation leaving behind everyone and going on an adventure.
I'm really worried about the flight, 21 hours sounds like hell to me. I'm scared about the first night alone in Sydney 15,000 miles from home. I must be made. Either my next journal will be very happy as I enjoy my adventure goes well or depressed alone in a foreign land.
I'm really worried about the flight, 21 hours sounds like hell to me. I'm scared about the first night alone in Sydney 15,000 miles from home. I must be made. Either my next journal will be very happy as I enjoy my adventure goes well or depressed alone in a foreign land.
Australia here I come!
Friday, May 09, 2003
Going Away
Only 5 more weeks and I've finished uni, that's it, all done! Most of my life has been spent in education and now its coming to an end. I'm happy and a little worried at the same time. To celebrate I am off to Australia for two months I can't wait. Going to visit friends check out Aires Rock and the barrier reef, learn to dive.
All I've got too do is pass my remaining exams, oh why couldn't HCI (Human computer interface) be more interesting!
All I've got too do is pass my remaining exams, oh why couldn't HCI (Human computer interface) be more interesting!
Friday, May 02, 2003
Printer woes
Due to a pressing need to print out many copies of high quality images (for my dissertation) I decided that it would be cheaper and easier to buy my own photo printer. To tell the truth I have wanted one for a while. I own a digital camera and though I don't mind looking at images on the web others keep requesting pictures I've taken as hard copy. Anyway I digress yesterday on finding a massive queue for the colour printer at uni I decided it was time to take the plunge and buy a printer.
On my way home I stopped at Micro Direct and purchased a brand new HP 5500 photo inkjet printer. Got home to find it wouldn't work, spent an hour on the phone to HP Technical support who gave me a reference and suggested I return it to the store. So I got my dad to give me a lift back to Micro Direct where I waited for nearly an hour in a queue. Only for some little tech-monkey to tell me it was a driver related problem. I thought this was a bit odd as the HP tech (who was really helpful) seemed to blame the printer mechanism. After much arguing a more senior bod tested the printer and confirm it was b0rked, half an hour later after filling in various return forms I had a replacement and was on my way home.
Once I unpacked the new printer I noticed that it had much more packaging, than the previous one. Firstly there were lots of bits of tape securing bits of the printer. The other one didn't have any of these taped pieces. It then dawned on me although the box was new the previous printer was not, I wonder how many other people it will be sold to or how many broken items are re-boxed in this manner? I don't know whether it was Micro Direct, or one of there importers but I was not happy to have wasted most of the day buying a printer. At least I managed to get everything printed off in the end, actually its quite a good printer if you get a working one!
On my way home I stopped at Micro Direct and purchased a brand new HP 5500 photo inkjet printer. Got home to find it wouldn't work, spent an hour on the phone to HP Technical support who gave me a reference and suggested I return it to the store. So I got my dad to give me a lift back to Micro Direct where I waited for nearly an hour in a queue. Only for some little tech-monkey to tell me it was a driver related problem. I thought this was a bit odd as the HP tech (who was really helpful) seemed to blame the printer mechanism. After much arguing a more senior bod tested the printer and confirm it was b0rked, half an hour later after filling in various return forms I had a replacement and was on my way home.
Once I unpacked the new printer I noticed that it had much more packaging, than the previous one. Firstly there were lots of bits of tape securing bits of the printer. The other one didn't have any of these taped pieces. It then dawned on me although the box was new the previous printer was not, I wonder how many other people it will be sold to or how many broken items are re-boxed in this manner? I don't know whether it was Micro Direct, or one of there importers but I was not happy to have wasted most of the day buying a printer. At least I managed to get everything printed off in the end, actually its quite a good printer if you get a working one!
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