Save Me

I have done a lot today, I was in work for 6am to put some programs live. It all seemed to go very well which is about the best we can do.

I also went to the gym for the first time since before my holiday, I did some leg exercise. I have lost some strength but I just about managed a session. I felt a lot better for it afterwards.
This evening I went out with Nick, Bruce and Phil. It was a lot less harsh than last night. Rather than just complain about our love lives, we had fun, chatted about nothing and everything setting the world to rights.

Met Mark Dunnington at the pub, its amazing to me that this guy is married with a job as a policeman, and a house. I remember when he was a reprobate, it just shows how much things can and do change. He reminded us that Ian and Paul are going to Amsterdam with them for Emilie's fiancée stage do, should be fun for them!

I picked up my new glasses today (pictures below). My eyesight has changed a great deal since I last was tested so much one of my eyes basically wasn't working, crazy huh! They have pretty much bankrupted me as they were a rather unexpected expense. I got a card through the post and decided to follow it up. I last had a check in 2003! I shouldn't have left it so long my eyes have really changed, and work should really pay for the test as I work behind a screen.

I got some texted off Olya today she met and argued with her ex and was feeling not the best. It was great to hear from her but I was a little stuck on what to say, I just want her here with me now but it is impossible, so no point on dwelling on it.

Power out

I went for a drink with Nick tonight, he was in a strange mood really. I think his break from Becs is having more of an effect than he would care to admit. Whats frustrating is they dont talk to each other about it. I think if they just sat down together and had a frank chat some, maybe enough could be sorted out. Mind you what do I know about it I am not exactly doing great when it come to relationships. I hope they sort things out.

I am missing Olya greatly. I sat at work today looking out of the window at the rain and the cloud wondering what the heck am I doing here? Post holiday blues perhaps, I should be happy I have a pretty ok job, a little money I am just mad at myself for taking the easy route, living with my parents, not taking risks its no wonder I cant find anyone who loves me.

I have to work tomorrow, early, its not helping my mood so I better get some sleep hopefully I'll feel better or at least be able to find more perspective.

Feeling frustrated

Going back to work was difficult, there is so much going on.

Ian's wireless link has been suffering recently so I had bought a new access point, well second hand from ebay access point. It has been sat in my room for weeks, only when I took it out to set it up it didn't work. Its broken! What a pain I was so annoyed I smashed it to pieces with Nick's sledgehammer.

I went round for some beers and a chat setting the world to rights. He seemed a little sad but trying to make the best of it.

How to rotate videos

Whilst I was away a took a number of videos on my camera side on, resulting in side on footage. I didn't realise it but with quick time pro you can actually flip the video really easily.

On an Apple Mac open the film in quick time (this only works in quicktime pro), then choose window, then show film properties (shortcut apple + j). Select the video track then visual settings. There you will find the options for rotating, resizing or flipping the film.

Also I found this really useful page on how to make screenshots in Apple OSX.

Compromising

I haven't finished all my Turkey posts yet but I am getting there, I have spent most of today just going through my photos rearranging things and writing blog posts.

I did watch the film American Splendour which I thought was pretty cool. About the man behind he comic book of the same name it was shot in a challenging but pretty interesting way. One of the better biography's I have seen, they usually tend to be over-long and obsessive but this seemed to manage to encompass the majority of the import bit without detailing too much minutiae.

Went to Japanese class and totally fucked up in front of the German girl, I just got completely confused. It was the last lesson of this year, so a break until September I already can hardly remember 20% of the words I have learned I cant even imaging how bad I will be in September.

Becky came round to pick up her hard disk, I showed her the pictures from my holiday and we had a chat. It seem things are not exactly rosy between her and Nick. I wont detail it but neither of them are very happy at the moment. I can see it from both sides and I count them both as my friends so it was a very difficult conversation. I really hope they manage to patch things up, I think relationships have there ups and down so you have to be prepared to compromise at some point if you want to carry things on.

Final Day

I am sat in the airport in Dalaman, I arrived at 2.30 and my flight isn’t until 4.55. I had to wait until after 3 for the check in desk to open. It has been a heck of a trip, I have managed to do many activities and see many things. Emotionally its been a bit of a rollercoaster. Today things were much better and as Olya waved goodbye I felt very sad to leave.

I was a relaxed day with out anything to do. We both slept in late, feeling tired after the diving, karaoke and drinking yesterday. Missed breakfast we went out to lunch, at the Baran bar. They do pretty tasty food and have air conditioning that is just the job for lunchtime heat.

The Turkish seem to be a nation of traders, everyone wants to be your friend, at whilst there is a chance they can separate you from your money. Good never have an actual fixed price you just have to haggle your way down and often this can mean right down. They do work hard though most of the bar staff seem to work all the time; it was the same people in Baran at lunchtime as the night before.

After lunch we went swimming then I sorted out my taxi, tour guide Ben managed to get it for 40 Lira cheaper than I arrived so that was a bonus.
Olya and I had dinner together than I packed and we went for a final drink on the strip before the taxi would pick me up and 1am. It was a weird evening felt close again (I am a glutton for punishment arn't I) she even wanted to sit on the beach together, it was pretty nice, I was sad to have to leave.

I had a last minute panic as I couldn’t find my driver straight away but fortunately we hooked up and I was soon whizzing down the country roads to Dalaman airport. Arriving way before my flight was due giving me a chance to sit here and start documenting my thoughts.

I caught something on the tv behind me it was a bit of a parallel life experience. I haven't really seen the news all week so it was weird to see a piece about the UK terror alerts on TV especially hearing prime minister Gordon Brown.

Diving

Though no longer together Olya and I seem to have patched things up enough that she still wants to spend time with me, especially as Luba had already headed off home.
Regardless I wanted to try doing some diving and Olya was keen to give it a try so we booked onto a day trip with Marmaris dive centre. I opted to stick with the beginners group as she was pretty nervous about the whole experience.

They were pretty good with Olya, giving a Russian-speaking instructor despite the fact she was the only Russian on the trip. He ran her through the basics, 1 breath, 2 equalise your ears, 3 clearing your mask. The rest would be taken care of by the instructors. The dive would be to 5 meters only and the instructor would tow round Olya.

Thanks to my PADI cert I was allowed to join in but not be babysat. We got into the water and though she tried hard Olya couldn't breath through her mouth so I was impossible for her to dive.

I sat on the bottom waiting having my photo taken, then went on a short dive. When I surfaced she told me about it. I was sad she couldn't join in. It did mean on the next dive I was allowed to go out with the experienced divers so at least I go a proper dive in. It wasn't the most impressive diving though. After the Coral Sea and the barrier reef in Australia seeing a few ancient amphora just didn't impress me much.

This evening Olya and I went to Baran bar, a sort of karoke cocktail bar, I got quiet drunk on Efes larger. So drunk Olya managed to talk me into doing Karoke, I have never tried it before, always finding some reason not to. I tried to inject some humour into it and choose The Beatles — Back in the USSR. I even switched Moscow Girls to Ukhta as its Olya home town. She didn't even notice!

Jeep Safari

Today we went on the pre booked Jeep Safari tour, Olya was friendly but withdrawn, despite renewed attempts to be more decisive and manly the damage is done, the gate is open and the horse has bolted.

The jeep safari was a fun trip, piling into 4x4 Jeeps, 6 people per jeep, each jeep was armed with a load of water pistols and bottles of water, which we threw over each other at any given opportunity. It helped to keep cool in the hot air.

First stop was a track overlooking Marmaris, the view was superb. After a short drive on the motorway we tool the jeeps off-road thundering round dirt tracks whilst trying to soak each other as much as possible was quite amusing indeed!

The only problem was we were a bunch of cheap people in our jeep, we couldn’t afford to buy extra water pistols like the people in the other jeeps had done. So we tended to be on the brunt of the soakings.

We stopped the madness for lunch, and then continued on to what I would consider the highlight of the trip. Stopping off at a river and waterfall. It was very pretty all trees and water. We jumped from the rocks into the waterfall pool. The water was cold but refreshing.

After 45 minutes wondering round the waterfall the next stop was a village in the mountains where they made honey. The guided showed us the Turkish Viagra honey, and a wishing tree, you had to walk around the tree three times touch it then make a wish.

We refilled out water bottles tried some honey and after the stop tore off down the back towards home. We had one last water fight before heading back to Marmaris.

Tonight I am sat only in my room, I have hardly spent any time here before now, I guess I will do so much more during the remainder of my trip. I suppose the difficult thing of it all is that she was right in many ways. I am not the most independent person, and I live my life in a kind of bubble, certain activities taking up most of my time. I am not very manly either; I have always been quiet and a little shy. I never really noticed how indecisive I could be.

Kervan Saray, and how it all went wrong

I had to work up to this post, the memory and the pain are still very fresh, and what is worse I could have just kept my mouth shut for two more days and it wouldn't have been so bad. I had to go buy a pack of cigarettes a drink before I could start.

The day had been a fun if tiring one, after the aqua park we were tired but Olya wanted to go to the Turkish nights show at Karvan Saray. Ben the tour operator we have used all week picked us up at 7.30 and took us to the show.

The shows consisted of a traditional folk group who did Turkish dances, a belly dancer, and a male belly dancer, and fire breather. To finish the night off
We were seated with a group of Russians none of whom spoke English. I was also he only man, which meant they expected me to fetch and pour drinks, apparently it is a Russian custom.

Olya in the dance competition

 After we returned from the show Olya was on a high, from the Vodka and the dancing. We went for a night swim in the sea and said goodbye to Luba Olya's friend who was returning home that evening.

We went back to Olya's room, and I felt she was being really frosty with me, and because of the drinks I had consumed, and the fate of being ignored while everyone spoke in Russian I basically decided completely stupidly to rock the boat. I guess subconsciously I knew there was a problem; I just underestimated the effect the question would have.

Olya not only confirmed that she was unhappy but went on to tell me, "I like you as a person, but as a man I don't like you at all." She didn't stop there though, "you are like a child", in that I am not independent enough, I should be making all the decisions and not asking questions. Finally to add insult to injury my performance in bed was "more or less". She didn’t believe I had any passion, I did not help her and I didn't hold her. Ouch! I felt my stomach knot I couldn't continue I just lay in the dark listening to the air conditioning. She was next to me in body but she might as well be back in Russia.

Turkish Market / Aqua Park

The Turkish like to haggle, never take the first price offered there is always a better bargain to be had. Olya and I had been waiting for the Market to buy presents for the folks back home. The market was a largest building with many stalls selling everything from foodstuffs to t-shirts. They catered to the English market with many of the stalls offering cheaper than ASDA prices.
Olya bought presents for her family, I got some Turkish delight of Bruce and Phil and a few little bits which would fit in my bag.

The aqua park was a little disappointing. It was quiet expensive so we expected a multitude of slides and water based entertainment. There weren’t many slides, and to of the slides there were painful to use. It was also incredibly hot and we got tired out running up the stairs to the top slides. After a few hours we headed back and booked onto an evening of Turkish dancing at Kervan Saray.

Bar Street

Bar street pretty much does what it says on the tin it’s a street full of bars and clubs, with a few snack shops thrown in for good measure. The music ranges from dance to hardcore rock, but its always cranked loud.

Bar street is packed with Russians and English people out for a good time, to meet people of just to get hammered. As usual Turk sit out the front trying to entice us in. We walked the length but couldn't find anywhere playing music we liked very much so we stopped into Crazy Daisy. It has a huge projected sign, dominating the sky at above bar street. They promise exciting nights, we were not entirely impressed and moved onto another place. This had slightly better music, but also had the interesting feature of having free popcorn and nuts. Very novel. The much was loud the air-conditioning just about cooling the room enough to dance a little. It was actually a nightmare going outside to the back bar and toilets because the night air was about 30C.

We had a few drinks, Olya met up with some girls she spoke to in the airport. Niether Olya or Luba enjoyed the music so much but we had a good time dancing and jumping around. Watching the go dancers, including one shaven headed girl and a rather camp looking guy.

On the way back to the hotel Olya stumbled across a shop with bad Russian and was given a flag, which set her and Luba off singing in Russian.

Boat Trip

Took a trip on one of the many boat sailing out of Marmaris Cruising south it stopped in several places where we could to swim and enjoy the beautiful surroundings. First stop was Paradise Island, a small rocky outcrop surrounded by a superbly beautiful and calm sea. We amused ourselves swimming and diving off the top of the boat. It was such a hot day it was nice be out of the town and to feel the sea breeze. Swimming in the cool clear water, so much cleaner than the sea near Marmaris.
I stupidly tried to climb on the rocks, which I managed but instantly regretted thanks to the millions of splinters and cuts I sustained!
Next the boat moved onto another spot for more swimming, the trip continued like this for the rest of the day moving from one amazingly beautiful place to another. I tried to take some photos but my camera really did not do the scenes justice.
One of the most beautiful places was the lunchtime stop, we moored just outside a beautiful empty and unspoilt beach. We thought it looked like paradise, the beach was sandy the water blue and clean.
After lunch we headed to another beach stop this time docking at a bay with a restaurant and more sun loungers. We wanted to sit in the shade, typical Turks forced us to buy a tea before we could even though there was plenty of space.
Whilst we were sitting a speedboat bulled up in the quay, it was towing several rubber rings. Olya and I decided to go have a go, it was great fun trying to hold on whilst the speedboat thundered road the sea. I went off a couple of times :-)
We only had one more swimming stop after that in another empty clear bay, one of the Turkish deck hands climbed right up the rocks and did a spectacular dive.

Rafting

Olya wanted to try river rafting, I had done it once before in Australia and found it enjoyable. We booked onto a trip to the Dalman river. The Dalman River is about one and a half hours drive from Marmaris. This meant we had to leave at 7.30, which meant missing breakfast so by the time we arrived at the rafting centre we were very hungry. Fortunately breakfast was included in the price of the trip.

After a quick breakfast we climbed into the rafting centre buses and started another hour and a half journey. This time the bus snaked around the mountains climbing higher and higher. The road were mostly little more than dirt tracks with rather sheer looking drops on down to the valley below. The mountains were very beautiful; we sure got a good look at them as we rode over the dirty dust tracks. The sky radiant blue, the sun hot, Olya and I were both excited it was going to be a good trip. One of the river guides told us that the government is building a dam so five years from now rather than a river the valley would be a large reservoir.

By the time we reached the high point of the river I was glad to get out of the bus. The sun was beating down strongly. The heat was such that we had to throw water over the rafts to cool them down enough to sit on.

Our boat contained myself, Olya and a Dutch family, the guide and a trainee guide. I think our guide was a little crazy to be honest but it all made for a more fun trip. We started to move downriver just about knowing when we hit the first major rapid. I do emphasise the word hit too. Our raft smashed into the rock face flipped over pouring us into the water. I ended up under the flipped boat and had to dive down to get out. I drifted away as the others struggled to right the raft. I got picked out by one of the following rafts I was ok apart from a few grazes. My sandals tore to pieces though, oh well.

After a rendezvous I rejoined my raft and we continued downriver, we actually had to get out and walk round a couple of times avoiding some the worst rapids. About halfway down the river we stopped off for a short rest. There was a deep place in the river you could jump from the high rock walls about. I tried it a few times it was very refreshing to hit the cool river.

It was kind of disappointing to see the Roman bridge which marked the end of the trip. There was one bit of fun left, we got out of the raft and floated through the final rapid. Olya and I both had a great time I bought the video of the trip, it's a bit big for the web but I am hoping to cut out the crash scene :)

Turkish Bath

Olya and her friend Luba had booked to go to a Turkish bath. They invited me to join them so I though I might as well.
There is a popular phrase "its as hot as a Turkish bath in here", now I know what they mean. The bath started with a sauna. After which we were ushered into an octagonal room. It was very humid inside the room. In the centre was a slab on which you lay during the bath. First some Turk cleans you with a kind of scouring pad, apparently this removes the dead skin. It was very relaxing; the only pain was waiting for my turn inside this hot and steamy environment. After the bath was a massage, a Turkish masseuse massaged oil into my skin. I was left feeling relaxed and smelling vaguely of fruit!

The afternoon was incredibly hot touching 50C. Just about the only things to cool down was to go for a swim in the sea then relaxed on the sun loungers.

In the evening Olya, Luba and myself went on the Moonlight cruise. The cruise takes place on board a large ship called the Orca (it has two bars and a disco). The Orca leaves the jetty and cruises up an down the marina to the sound of disco songs. There was even a belly dancing show. I enjoyed the cruise sitting up on the top deck, taking in the evening relaxing with a cocktail. I found the music a bit tiresome the typical dance rubbish they play here. Olya calls in "dunce dunce dunce" music and I tend to agree. There also weren't many people on board so the dance floor was pretty empty.

Still it was a an enjoyable evening, especially sitting outside with Olya.

Arrival in Turkey

I had a rather surreal start to my trip, I saw Peter Kay, nearly knocked him over in fact coming out of WH Smith at Manchester Airport.

My flight was late boarding they said because the incoming flight was late but I am not sure I believe that. I saw the there 1.5 hours ahead when I entered the terminal. Something else was going on, or maybe I am just paranoid.

Turkish airlines weren't exactly the slickest operation I have ever been on, I don't know why but they just seemed unprepared and stretched even though the flight was only about 2/3 full.

Istanbul airport was very confusing; I had to wait in a visa queue for ages. I had to jostle for position with a load of Russians who insisted on pushing in the queue. Then as I had to transfer I hadn't got a clue where to go I had to ask twice at the transfer desk they weren't the most helpful.

However I remain excited waiting here for my connecting flight to Dalaman. I found out the airport wireless is open to dns-html lookup attack; I will defiantly have to get one of those servers up and running.

The taxi ride to Marmaris took 1.5 hours, it is not only far but the final part of the journey involves tearing down some rather twisty mountain roads. The driver was really quiet scary, tearing around blind and sharp bends at a fair pace. Fortunately we made it into Mararis and after 15 minutes of searching and asking other taxi drivers he finally found my hotel, the Ocaktan.

Whilst I was checking in I met a Russian girl called Olya in reception. she was sat smoking and chatting to the hotel attendants. We got talking and went for a walk along the seafront. She was funny interesting and beautiful. We sat out on the deserted sun lounger watching the sea.

Marmaris reminds me of any resort from like the Costa Del Sol in Spain or even Blackpool. You can eat at the Italian/Indian/Mexican/Chinese restaurant. Loud music permeates from every bar as they via for the attention of passing trade.

The beach is a tiny strip of sand covered in sun lounges laid out by the various hotels and restaurants along the sea front. The sea is closed off from the ocean by the high mountains so there is hardly any tide, it is however very salty

Hiatus

I went out for some drinks with Bruce and Phil tonight. We sat chatting setting the world and the IT industry to rights.

I think my prediction that blueray will out is beginning to come true, blockbuster the biggest video rental chain has decided to throw its weight behind blue ray rather than hd dvd. Given Blockbuster is both a huge retail player and plays an active role in film financier this is a huge boost to blueray. I guess the execs have good reason to believe based on the market the blueray will out. I think the sooner the next gen format war is over the better for the customer, so hopefully we can see consolidation pushing down hardware and disk prices.

I have been feeling a little stale recently, in respect to this blog. There is a lot going on but its mostly work which either I cant write about or I feel its boring ground to go over. I really dont want to turn this into a work only blog its just thats actually my life at the moment. I am heading off on holiday to Turkey on Friday so I have decided to put the blog on Hiatus until I return. Ill be back with stories and pictures from there on the 3rd of July, catch you on the flipside.

Fall, Fall, Fall

Just finished watching Babel, a twisting dark film connecting lives of people from America, Mexico, Japan and Morroco. It was really well shot and a very challenging film exploring the different ways people are isolated and yet connected in this modern connected world. According to the blurb its also a follow on to 21 grams and Amores perros. I have spent today writing software, updating something my dad started years ago, when I was still at school. We talked many times about updating it to something modern. It has taught me many things about writing in .net, and how to connect to the free mysql server. I found this great article on using lists, and collections. Much as I am really happy to get something working with my dad it another day I didn't go to the gym. Its nearly a week now, I am really getting out of the habit. I feel really unfit and fat, I really must try and go at least twice before Turkey. My family were all really happy today, it was father's day so we had a special meal. Add to the good mood my cousin Mark sent round photos of his newborn son Jack Henry Flannery. The pictures are wonderful look like they are really happy, Jack is very healthy; they have a great life in Kansas. Quiet funny though they have this wonderful looking dog George. He is a Rhodesian ridgeback, and apparently he loves to be in on the pictures (he made it onto loads of the new baby ones) and every says "oh nice kid, but wow that is a great dog"! There was some weirdness though apparently there were two Jack Henry Flannery's born in the same hospital that day! Very random but I guess there are many Irish immigrants.

All the gear and no idea

I spend most of my life trying not to be the sort of person who has all the gear to do a job but is unable to do it (All the gear and no idea). Today I went to help Phil set something up and I must say I had a real ATGANI afternoon. His brothers company atov wanted to project a rendered scene across 4 projectors. This would need a huge scene many times the quality of the average dvd. To do the job Phil bought one of the most powerful computers on the market, an Apple Mac Pro. It has got 4 processors 8 GB of Ram and two graphics cards.

The only problem is, it cant do the task, I am not sure anything can apart from very high end specialised kit. Stretching video across that many screens is virtually unheard of so probably untested. I think this sort of bleeding edge kind of things will require custom development and or input from someone heavily involved with this sort of technology.

T%his evening Phil myself and Nick went for some drinks in the Farmers Arms in Poynton. It was a pretty chilled out evening very relaxing after a hard week working and a frustrating time trying to make video play. Bruce even joined us later on.

We had a bit of a debate going on. I don't subscribe to the Britain is a small country and its full idea. Britain has such small cities compared to China, we have so much unused land really, even something like 1% usage of the greenbelt would house many millions of people. We mostly suffer from a lack of development the last new towns were constructed in the 1960/70's. Even Manchester big by UK standards is a minnow in the grand scheme, the leader of the industrial revolution is now something like 78th place the world GDP rankings. Far too many bright people disapear off to London or abroad, its a real brain drain down south, sorting that out attracting more business would require a real change in planning legislation to allow some more development. I don't feel threatened by immigrants I feel more threatened by a collapse in the UK.

Gone on Safari

Apple have released their web browser Safari for Windows download the beta.I am actually using it to type this blog post on. Personally I think its a bit slow and buggy at the moment, but more choice for users is likley to be a good thing.

From out of nowhere

I have been finding it very difficult to blog recently. Apart from feeling extremely tired all the time, there are things I cant talk about on here, and the rest of my life is taken up by the mundane things I have already discussed in detail. Maia hit the nail on the head when she told me she thought the thing I was most afraid of was being boring.

This morning I looked at myself in the mirror all dressed up in my work suit, and I wondered how did I end up here. Lately I have devoted the majority of my energy into work, its really wearing me down. At what point did I start living to work rather than working to live?

The problem is I cant answer the questions, I wonder if other feels like I do. That they have been swept along with the tide rather that master their own destiny. I spoke to one guy tonight, he reminded me of myself at his age, full of hope for the future. Somewhere along the way I replaced that hope for compliance, I think I need to get my edge back.

I also have a huge self confidence / doubt problem that is really an issue. I have a tenancy to be a pretty negative person, always questioning myself and striving for improvement. It's a problem working in a company where its literally impossible to get feedback on the quality of your work.At least that what I would like to believe, I am quiet lazy.

It hasn't help the one of the staffers with people picking holes in my work. C exposed some rather stupid mistakes, too much use of the cut and past caused a weird error. It was quiet embarrassing but at the same time I feel it exposed some poor working practises which we need to address.

I was like a message centre this afternoon, playing communicator between several groups of people. I was just about on top of things, until I received a random call from one of my ex's. The call came through during a busy period, so a made my excuses. Despite efforts later she didn't ring back, leaving my very curious. I think I have tried my best, worked hard and dome some good things, but all C see's is some joker who missed an obvious bug.

This evening I went for a drink with Bruce. It was very much needed, I have been feeling stressed all week, and while I realise Lager is a depressant it tastes so nice. It's has been a horrible evening, last week I was boiling, this week I needed to put the heating on!

Well I have waffled enough about nothing, night night.