Some genuine weirdness

Look at this BBC News article.

It's a dog-eat-dog (or in this case bird-eat-bird) world in London!

And, when you read the article, do you understand why everyone just watched and nobody helped the poor pigeon?

Technorati tags: London, birds

"It'll take three weeks, Captain"

Our little Micra was scraped by some rude person in the Chiswick Sainsbury's car park (see post). This was despite the car being in a Parent and Child space (so having extra room on either side) and the car being within the designated space.

May have been blind as well as rude, then.

Anyway, as is often the case in London, it was a hit and run. The offender didn't even have the honesty to put a note on our windscreen to say sorry. It makes me mad. Another one of those things we have to put up with in this dirty, uncaring city.

(Slightly off topic: this guy falls over on the bus yesterday as I was coming home, as he was trying to get into a seat when the driver accelerated away. He apologised for falling over because he knocked two of us already sat down. I asked him if he was OK; the other person didn't even look up from her book. They guy just looked blankly at me as if he didn't know what to say back. Or maybe it was the laryngitis and he didn't hear me properly...but you get my drift. Kindness is not expected in London.)

Anyway, I phoned the insurance company and they arranged for their garage to pick up the car and to repair the damage. You've probably seen from the photos that whilst unfortunate, the damage is hardly major.

Can you believe that they estimate a completion date of 15th November? I was shocked to say the least. I hope that these dates are subject to revision!

Maybe it's just usual for some mechanics / engineers to wildly overestimate the time so that you'll be impressed when they finish early. Think of Scotty from Star Trek!

Fingers crossed that we'll have the Micra back before then, otherwise I'm going to have to get used to driving the big Mazda estate. Jase usually drives it as I don't really like big cars, but I guess it's about time I got used to it!

Technorati tags: Car, repairs, garage

Breasts....

I would consider myself an expert on this subject with at least 20 years of experience in observing the workings of this natural phenomenon, and I even have about 5 years of experience in cultivating my own!

OK here are two Links:
HD Version and Normal Version.

Please don't watch the video all the way through... about 2 seconds will be enough to understand the rest of this post!

Now my experience tells me that the motion of the breasts in this video is NOT NATURAL. Some Japanese programmers need to seriously stop writing / playing games and get out there and observe more real people.

As my hero Absath puts it:


Taking all that into mind I give you today's comic!


Thanks to CAD.

Top 10 Stupidest Domain Names

1. A site called 'Who Represents' where you can find the name of the agent that represents a celebrity. Their domain name is
http://www.whorepresents.com/

2. Experts Exchange, a knowledge base where programmers can exchange advice and views at
http://www.expertsexchange.com/

3. Looking for a pen? Look no further than Pen Island at
http://www.penisland.net/

4. Need a therapist? Try Therapist Finder at
http://www.therapistfinder.com/

5. Then of course, there's the Italian-Power Generator company
http://www.powergenitalia.com/

6. And now, we have the Mole Station Native Nursery, based in New South
Wales:
http://www.molestationnursery.com/

7. If you're looking for computer software, there's always
http://www.ipanywhere.com/

8. Welcome to the First Cumming Methodist Church. Their website is
http://www.cummingfirst.com/

9. Then, of course, there's these brainless art designers, and their whacky website:
http://www.speedofart.com/

10. Want to holiday in Lake Tahoe? Try their brochure website at
http://www.gotahoe.com/

Broadband Pains

First rant of the week!

We currently get our 8 Meg broadband from UKOnline, part of the EasyNet group. Our exchange has their hardware so we are classified by BT as an LLU ADSL* user.
Sky bought EasyNet and are now offering Sky Broadband on the same hardware as UKOnline.
We pay £25 per month for our 8 Meg service.... Sky Broadband is £10 for 16 Meg - both are unlimited downloads.
So I phoned up UKOnline to get a MAC code to transfer the service (works the same as Mobile Phones) and they said it can't be done as both companies use the same hardware and BT gets confused!!!!
So I phoned Sky Broadband and they also blamed BT saying this wasn't an issue related just to EasyNet hardware, but anyone using LLU ADSL (as opposed to BT based ADSL).

So instead of taking 2 hours to transfer my Broadband using a MAC code, I have to fully cancel my UKOnline contract and wait 5 days for the line to be cleared down by BT, before then ordering Sky Broadband.

All in all I am guaranteed to be without broadband for 2 weeks minimum and maybe upwards of a month!!!!!

Looking at how we use the internet, we can't do it! Serena needs the internet for the next month for her exams and I use it for work every Friday. So that means it would be Christmas/New Year before we can even think about switching.

Since the Sky package is 12 months minimum and we plan move to Oz around October/November next year, I don't think I can be bothered switching providers given the extra hassle of cancelling early at the end.

I have never even seen anyone state that migrating from LLU ADSL is impossible without cancelling completely. So who is to blaim? Sky/UKOnline would seem to point the finger at BT.

I think I may have to find a high horse and go off crusading on this one as I am thoroughly dissatisfied and can't seem to find anyone to take the flack. Time to email a few computer mags "Help" pages to see if I can get some journalists in my corner!!!!

* LLU = Local Loop Unbundling - shows that you are not using BT ADSL Hardware.

For Gareth and Gillian to Fight Over....

On Gareth's blog there has been a bit of bitching going on...

Since I can't post the following in the comments properly it is posted here for Gillian and Gareth!

So I guess I shouldn't buy you this calendar as your Christmas prezzie?
GK - Would you prefer I got him this one or this one?
Or am I fighting a losing battle with this one?

Time for a Complete Ramble

So what shall we talk about today?

First up lets talk about Brains! Or more specifically the Brain Warehouse, that I spotted in Shepherd's Bush about a month ago. It appeared and vanished within a couple of days so I never got any photos. It turns out that it was a film set for the Government's new series of Cannabis adverts. I wish I could have gotten a couple of photos though as it was a brilliant setup.

Hmmm, next... Da Vinci Code.
Well Serena's delayed birthday prezzie of a couple of DVDs turned up on Saturday, so we watched the Da Vinci Code yesterday afternoon. I have read the book twice and was a bit scepticle about the film. I have to say it is a very good yarn if you take it in its own right, but the book tells the story much better as there is more time to build the plot (the book is a slow burner, as opposed the hectic film). They also Hollywoodised the ending slightly, which was a shame. Definitely worth a watch whether you have read the book or not.

How about Sore Bums?
The plan for lunchtime today is to go to the Tate Modern and play on the new art exhibition - a set of huge slides. Apparently the pieces are a bit roughly welded together and give you a bit of bounce on the way down, so I may be sitting carefully later! Still I am fairly well padded in that region so I should be OK!

Robin Hood...
The new BBC version is actually quite entertaining. Maybe I was hoping for something more like the 1980's ITV version, with a nice mystical undertone, but nevermind. I think the BBC were expecting too much for it to be on a par with Dr Who, as the writing is not as strong, but there is potential in there if they choose to develop the characters a bit more. Generally it is Robin seeking glory and the Sheriff seeking the Ham of the Year award. Could do better, but worth a watch.

And finally U certificate movies...
I am always amazed how certification standards have changed down the years. Take a classic film like The Guns of Naverone which was on Channel 4 on Saturday - Certificate U. There is a lot of "Stealth Violence" in the film - cuttings of throats and blackjacking etc and the dialogue, whilst free of modern swear words is quite "strong" and "adult" in places. I reckon that it would get at least a PG certificate, if not a 12 if it was reclassified now. I am certain there are other films like this out there - The Black Hole (Scary) is the only one that leaps to mind right now, and maybe Clash of the Titans (very violent).

Fortnightly Quiz

The last CCOnline quiz was crap.

This week's is much more interesting:

 

The Pope has one but he doesn't use it
Your father has it and your mother uses it.
Nuns don't need them.
Arnold Schwarzenegger has a big one,
Michael J. Fox's is quite small.
What is it?

Browsing Choices

Unlike Gareth and Rena, I am not a Firefox all the way type of guy...  there are bits about it that I love, but there there is something about it, that I can't quite put my finger on, that doesn't quite work in my eyes.

Well Microsoft finally release Internet Explorer 7 yesterday and I installed it last night.  It still looks like a Microsoft product, but it has the bits of Firefox that I like thrown in (tabbed browsing etc), and even does them better.

Firefox 2 is due out of beta in a month or so and I have no doubt that it will appear on this PC as well, but for now I am back using IE over Firefox.

Birthdays

Well yesterday passed fairly quietly.
A Pie and a Pint at lunchtime (London Beer is just too bad! I resorted to Guinness.)
Four cards in total (and numerous emails / text messages / blog comments).
1 Cheque.
A couple of "No Show" DVDs (much to Serena's embarrassment).
Pork Chops for dinner and finally taking the piss out of the idiot girls on Ladette to Lady (recorded from last week).

Clearly my 34th isn't a major milestone, but I still think my 30th was my best of recent years. Having been used to rain, wind and foggy weather on my birthday all my life, spending the day on the beach in Queensland soaking up the UV radiation and dodging jelly fish in the crystal blue waters was a definite plus! Follow that up with an outrageous shirt, cocktails and fine food and the day was complete!

Gadgets

I have added a link on the right to Jason Bradbury's blog. He is one of the presenters on Five TV's Gadget Show and I love reading his stuff.

So Slow....

Hmmm, something is not right in the world of Blogger.
I posted lunchtime yesterday and my post vanished into the ether for 12 hours, only to reappear when I logged in this morning!

Gareth's blog seems to have vanished. I guess he forgot to put 50p in the meter again!
James seems to be training people how to scramble eggs! I see this as a step forward from his perpetual studentship (Kidding mate!), although I didn't realise he knew how to cook!

ASIDE:
How to make an egg survive a 2 story drop using just Newspaper, Card, a Carrier Bag full of String and Sticky Tape? I love these types of challenge.
How many of James' students will think outside the box and use the Carrier Bag as a parachute? People often overlook the "container" when presented with a load of items to use in this type of challenge.
We had a competition at school called the "Great Egg Race" (name nicked from a TV Show of the same theme). The idea being you had a bunch of rubbish and a challenge to complete within 2 hours. I always enjoyed it! Hell my team won when I captained it - thanks to James for a History Lesson!!!! (And he was working for a different team.)

Anyway, back to the plot (so to speak).

Another day on the helpdesk for me. I am writing up procedure as I go, which makes the work twice as dull.

When I get a spare 15 mins at home I have been playing the Battlefield 2142 demo. It is good fun (Like BF2), but you must, must, must find a server where people are prepared to play in teams otherwise it turns into a free-for-all nightmare.

Three cards made it on time (although I left before the postman this morning). Maybe being 34 isn't too bad.

Lunch at Smiths today I think!

What to Blog?

For give me Father for I have sinned... It is 5 days since my last blog!

Serena pretty much covered off our weekend in her blog as well as plans for our Return to Oz.

So what can I ramble on about this week?

Well work is busy. Very busy in fact! Then I suspect that comes from 3 days off sick and the accompanying back-log that people expect you to catch-up on.

Jasie says...
This week I am mainly supporting broadband.

So how do you explain to a technophobe that they need to upgrade a USB ADSL modem to am ADSL Modem/Router without using long words???? Most of the time I fob them off and tell them to ring their ISP for all the details of what they need to do. Back in the old days, ISPs refused to support routers, but nowadays you find they will help with almost anything technical. I did send one guy into PC World and he phoned me from the store to say they had laughed at him! I told him to stick two fingers up at them and go to Comet (which was next door). Sometimes I dispair at the level of customer service in this country.

Jason Ayers - Crime Fighter!

OK - I'm sick! No really! The last three days have not been pleasant for Lauren or me. Some nasty tummy bug has left Lauren throwing up and me running to the loo every 15 minutes.
Anyway, Lauren looked a lot better yesterday, whilst I continued to whimper on the sofa like the strapping bloke that I am, so I dragged myself out of my sick bed to take her to nursery this morning.

On the way home I stopped at Sainsbury's to pick up some essentials (milk, paracetamol, extra-soft toilet paper...)

When I cam back out to Serena's car (it has the better of our two car seats in it so I use it for school runs when possible) some bastard had pranged it:



I complained to the store manager and he sent a security guard to review the CCTV footage and then I headed off to the police station.

After much form filling, and a trip home to pick up my insurance details etc, the Police advised me to lean on Sainsbury's over the CCTV footage as they have a history of being "slow to produce" evidence! So back to the store manager I trotted and "leaned" on him.

The annoying bloke refused to let me review the CCTV footage myself and said he would contact me if his security staff had anything to report! I really wanted to witness this act if wanton destruction! I could feel my pants wanting to leap to the outside of my trousers and a cloak flapping in the wind!

Anyway, for a good 45 minutes I completely forgot how ill I am!

I am back home now and am going back to bed!

Useless Technology (aka Monday Morning Rant)

Like Gareth I like my technology, however I am starting to despair at some of the items I have bought over the last five years.

Minidisk... Waste of money! It was handy for about 6 months and then it was just too much hassle to use it. I suppose it could be used as a Dictophone as it has a microphone socket, but generally made obsolete by MP3.

DVD Recorder. We suffered VCR problems just before Christmas and our Sky+ was out of commission so I bought a DVD Recorder from ASDA. Now I didn't pay a huge amount of money for it and you generally get what you pay for, but ours is just crap! The menus are unfriendly. It is unreliable. It has a habit of corrupting disks that were working fine when you tried them last week and I can't get it to work with anything but rewritable disks (as it corrupts every DVD-R + or - that I have used in it). I can't even be bothered to EBay it! It's one redeeming feature is that it is small and multiregion, so I reckon it will end up in either the bedroom or kitchen as a DVD player.

PDAs. In theory my Dell Axim should be in use every day... But instead it sits on its charger at home and pings at me when someone's birthday gets close. It is too bulky to be used for the purpose I need it for... (address book / diary / plus other bits a bobs). I could even use it as a mobile media player (MP3 and MPG) but the in build audio device is shockingly bad that it just isn't worth it, and the battery life means that 30 minutes of video is your limit! I think I may invest in a decent smart phone, once whatever new job takes off, as it makes sense to me to have diary and address book linked to your phone. I'll let Gareth bamboozle me with smart phone science as that is one of his pet topics!!!! I'll also leave the mobile media player to a decent Laptop and MP3 player as they do the job so well!

What else... Hmmm... How about the switch over to Digital TV?
I think this is both needed and being handled disastrously.
The key points that no-one in power seems to have picked up are as follows:

1/ The majority of people in the UK will need an new aerial to get Digital TV, unless they seriously boost the signal. I am in a really good reception area and I still can't get freeview through our roof aerial. Your average granny is going to get ripped off if they don't get proper assistance!

2/ Going back to your average person on the street who never bothered with Sky/Cable TV (and I am thinking of my Mum here)... The concept of keeping your TV on one channel whilst you change channels on the Digibox will be new (even though they could have been doing that on their VCRs for years - but they just didn't). The fact that they won't be able to easily watch one programme and record another is also a factor and will be complicated even further if they need to either (a) leave the digibox on the correct channel whilst they are out or (b) remember to program the digibox to change channel! Don't even go there about trying to record Eastenders and Coronation street whilst they are away for 2 weeks! (With most digibox guides only being 7 days and not having a "series link" option.)

I really want to get my parents onto Digital TV, but I am lost at the best way of implementing this! (Don't even mention the old TV in the study that doesn't even have Scart sockets!) If I could get them on Sky I would but they aren't allow a dish on their house! Maybe in the loft?

Sigh... Rant over!

New Favourite

I took loads of photos of Lauren today... this is my new favourite.

A Bit of Ego Massage

I can't remember if Serena blogged about this or not, but a few weeks back we both applied for the "Australia Needs Skill Expo" to be held in London at the end of next week.

Anyway Serena got an invite almost straight away and I shrugged my shoulders and was all manly with my "I didn't really expect to get an invite anyway"!

Well my invite came this morning and my Ego is feeling a lot better about itself!

It does throw up one small problem... The invite clearly states "No Hangers On" and "No Bags". I have had to email the High Commission to get permission for us to bring Lauren, her pushchair and her bag of goodies (Nappies, Milk etc). Once I hear back from them (they have a 24 Hour response SLA) then I will book my timeslot, either to coincide with Serena or to go before her (so she can look after Lauren and then we swap).

It also means I need to sort out my CV slightly sooner than I was intending, but Hey, my Ego is well pleased!

Reformatting....

I'm not happy with my blog template at the moment.
I am experimenting with new ones and have created a temporary blog for the experimation.
Link on the right!

Interesting Wine....

How about this for a description of a bottle of wine!

Male Restroom Etiquette

If you have a spare 10 minutes, this is really well written.

Drool

If allowed (by Serena) then I want one of these.

Bragging Rights

I guess I am not too busy today!

"Boss!"

Just when you thought you'd seen everything!

The "Boss Button".

The London Effect

London... it gets inside you! I am not saying that is a good thing either.

Take for example this weekend's trip to Asda.

The place is like a bombsite at the moment as they are changing the layout and Sunday mornings seem to be a popular time for families to hit our local Asda superstore. I was popping over to buy some milk, bananas and nappies (the essentials)! The first incident was in the nappy aisle. Pampers were on a 2 packs for £16 offer and the area was a bit of a jumble. Seeing the offer I picked up the last 4 packs of Size 4's and dumped them in my trolley. Moments later a family started rooting through the size 3's and 5's looking for more size 4's (I was looking at juice bottles for Lauren) and the women came out with a colourful expression that meant "Oh dear they haven't got any #4's left!" The father then looked in my trolley at my 4 packs of #4's and I swear for a second I thought he was going to take them. He was a rather large bloke and if he had tried, there would have been little I could have done to stop him beyond shout and duck! I am sure he wouldn't, but I've been in London too long and the paranoia is starting to seep in.

Incident number two was at the checkout. The queues were long and I was standing in line with everyone else. Behind me I heard a manager tell and assistant to "Open Aisle 13", so I followed her down there. As I had a trolley to navigate with she got there well ahead of me and just as I joined the queue of one person, a lady from Aisle 14 rammed into the side of my trolley saying "You weren't thinking of pushing in front of me were you?". I bit my tongue! In the end I said "You seemed to be in the other queue, but I am a gentleman so feel free to go first." I added a nice edge of sarcasm which was lost on this lady (I forgot to say she was American)! She just replied "Why thank you!", which was as blatant an admission of guilt that I have ever heard (and she wasn't being sarcastic)!

The final London incident happened this morning at the bus stop. I am a bit knackered as Lauren has a nasty cough that kept us all awake, so I was pretty much on autopilot. A 266 pulled in (not my bus) so I stood back and watched a few people get off. The first person off deliberately kicked a loose can of Coke onto the road from the bus. After the hurly-burly cleared I notice the can was full and sealed and lodged under the bus's wheel. I took three steps back and watched with morbid fascination as the bus pulled away, the can exploded and soaked a poor woman's pink skirt in Coke. I don't know why I said nothing in warning... that isn't like me. I normally warn people about wet seats on the tube etc... Maybe I am just tired, or maybe it is the London "look after number one" attitude sinking into my bones.

All of the above is reinforcing Serena's and my opinion that we NEED to get out of this city. I can't see us staying here for more than a couple of years. If things don't work out for Serena we may head north of far south much, much sooner.

Hmmm... Maybe I am depressed? A cup of tea is needed!

Click

I was gutted that I was too busy to pop over and see my idol the other lunchtime.

Anyway here is a bit of magic for all his fans!



PS I hear the film is crap!

I don't like you any more???

Link at your own risk!

Quizoo

I would like to thank Gareth for Quizoo! I accept the challenge!

Just a taster - I rule (as long as it ain't music)!

Pub Quiz Help!

Nope - not a request... Here is a link to Pub Quiz Help the website!

That should keep my Dad and James happy for a while!

End of Hi-Def War?

BBC NEWS | Technology | Double disc might end hi-def war

This one is for Jase and Gareth!

Note to Jase: Further drooling over technology is suspended until suitable job(s) are secured!

Talk Like a Pirate...

Further to Gareth's post about "Talk Like a Pirate Day", I was tickled by this from the Pirate Guys:



Not to worry, only 362 days until the next Talk Like a Pirate Day (September 19th).

Someone get me a parrot!

Meat!

Lauren was in full octopus mode last night, so she didn't settle until about 10:15 pm. I had managed to set Sky+ to record the programmes I was interested in, and whilst Serena was blogging the story below, I crashed out in front of the telly and began to flick.

Nothing on the "entertainment" channels grabbed me, and I only lingered for a few minutes on the movie channels before coming bored.

We don't subscribe to Sky Sports any more (cost saving - the only person who watched it was Serena's Dad!) so the next channels I hit was the music ones.

I am not like Gareth in that I can't normally sit and watch MTV or VH1 (channels picked arbitrarily rather than based on knowledge of Gareth's viewing habits) so I was speed flicking and had to back up about six channels when something caught my eye....

Total Meatloaf.

Kerrang were dedicating a 30 minute slot to the "Meat", and so I kicked back and entertained Serena with my karaoke versions of various Bat out of Hell (1 and 2) tracks!

White City

Exciting happenings in our local area in the news! A huge amount of money is being pumped by Ken Livingston to regenerate West London and part of this involves this project at White City. Apparently, a huge shopping centre is being built there, due to open in 2008.

This is a good thing, as the photo shows how it currently appears. Leaves a lot to be desired! The BBC TV centre is close by. As an aside, we've been meaning to go down there to catch a show or be part of an audience...maybe some day when we have babysitters!

According to the Beeb, it will be really big and have a lot of the major retailers, as well as restaurants and cinema. And importantly, it will have car parking!

People were on the news to say that it will be a disaster for Oxford Street because it is so close and will pull shoppers away. Well, I for one won't be sorry. Oxford Street is a nightmare, especially on Saturday. You have to walk for miles to get between the shops you want, you're exposed to the elements, it's so crowded that you can't move (you're pushed along by the swell of people, rather than going in the direction you want) and at the end of the day you have to struggle on and off public transport with all your shopping, as there's no parking.

Imagine doing that with a one year old! In fact, no need to imagine, as I've not been able to go with Lauren in tow. The one time I've been to Oxford Street this past year, I had to leave Lauren at home with Jase, otherwise I could not have gone.

So I can't wait for the new shopping centre! Somewhere to shop without feeling hassled, we'll have a cinema and the general area will undoubtedly improve with this coming to the area (which means our house value will go up - yay!).

Roll on 2008!

Now that's Entertainment!

The last couple of months of Saturday nights have had one highlight for Serena, Lauren and I.... How do you solve a problem like Maria.

Whether it is how we were brought up, or whether it was just well crafted I couldn't tell you, but we have really enjoyed this programme and were getting to the stage where we were shouting at the telly! (Especially when Siobhan beat Aoife in the semi-final.)

Justice was done in the end with Connie and Helena making the perfect last two and with Connie getting our vote for the Win! (Which she did!)

I found it strange that ITV were so threatened by this show... Football and other commitments meant that the BBC move it round the schedules nearly every week, and ITV dutifully moved the X-Factor audition show around to match minute for minute. I just don't see why they felt they needed to do that as X-Factor isn't even at a voting stage.

So what else has tickled my fancy recently?

As previously commented A Town Called Eureka on Sky has been good fun, and I am delighted that Spooks has returned for a new series. I am even more delighted as the Hallmark channel on Sky have just kicked off a rerun of Spooks Season 1, which I missed!

For all you U2 fans! (look away now)

Chop

OK, it's not exactly a suprise, but yesterday's announcement confirmed what we suspected.... No jobs for the London Project Team.

So I have the choice between Voluntary Severance or Redeployment.

The latter means you get stuck on a list of people with no jobs and get matched to a vacancy. You get very little say in what vacancy you get matched against, so I am not inclined to pick that option.

The former means I get a pay-off of approx half a year's salary (not certain on the tax implications) and need to find a new job.

Looks like I will out of work come November!

A couple for Gareth

Thought this might interest you.
Also this is worth a look!

A message to Sally!

Welcome to the wonderful world of Blogging!

I had to laugh reading you blog in more detail last night.
I love the piccie of James asleep. That is a view I have woken up to far too many times in my 33 years. I must dig out some of the older pics for you to laugh (I mean look) at.
I have also been watching A Town Called Eureka. It is great.
I am having a bad relationship with my PDA... I have decided that it doesn't love me anymore, so it sits on it charger looking forlorn whilst I leave it at home. I think I need an upgrade, but budgets do not permit.
Road signs being "girl friendly"... Hmm interesting. We talking about making them pink and furry? (Just Kidding).
Serena and getting lost used to be a regular occurrence when we moved to London (poor dear). For her birthday a few years back I was planning to buy her TomTom GPS System and whilst it was on back order she got horrendously lost and returned home in floods of tears. She demanded that this would not happen again and she didn't care how much it cost, she was buying SatNav. I was harsh and told her she couldn't buy it and proceeded to get a serious earful. In the end I brought my proposed surprise to an end and told her I had already bought one for her and was just waiting for it to be delivered. Again that triggered floods of tears (fortunately the good kind).

For those of you wanting to know more about James' Beau (or should that be Belle?) then I have added a permanent link to her Blog on the right.

Deal or No Deal - US Style

So how do the Americans take the Noel Edmonds fronted quiz show and convert it into a format that works for the US?

New Spam Trick

Admittedly Norton catches and deletes most of my spam nowadays, but I have noticed that the B@stards are trying a new trick.

I was checking my webmail, which has more stored on it than usual, as I haven't reinstalled Outlook yet following my disk death of last week. It uses Squirrel Mail which displays 15 mails per page and I am well onto 3 pages needing downloading.

I processed the new stuff, being my own spam filter - i.e. deleting all the Nationwide emails telling me to update my account details and those offering me improved sexual performance (how do they kn0w?). Once I was done filtering and reading the message I wanted to keep, I noticed I still had "1 New Message". A bit odd, so I refreshed and nothing appeared.

OK, I jumped to page two... nothing. I jumped to page 3 and BAM. A new piece of spam dated 2002!

I guarantee it hasn't been sat their for 4 years, and I find it unlikely that even Blueyonder's mail servers are that slow.

So what are the implications for the "semi-savvy" user.

They download their mail and delete the ones they don't recognise (being "savvy"). Outlook Express etc still tells them they have one new message, but they can't see it. (Thier inbox contains hundreds of read messages sorted by date - they don't tidy into folders / archive). Confused they decide to let Outlet Express show them the new message by clicking the "Next New" button. BAM... the spam messgage is opened by Outlook Express from the very bottom of their Inbox, where they never thought to look. Now that opening triggers all sorts of nasty things.

I haven't seen this before but it can't be that new an idea can it?

Edit:

This gets weirder:

Sword of Damocles

I've just been invited to two meetings....

Thursday 4pm... "Important Annoucement - WM Operations Restructure"
Friday morning... My boss wants us to have a 1 on 1 to discuss the implications of the previous day's meeting.

Move over Damocles!

Word of the day

Sorry, today's Word of the Day cracked me up....

Courtesy of Red Dwarf it is one of Serena's favourites!

Regrets?

Well there has been little to blog in the last few days, since I have been too busy to have much of a life.

I was just catching up on some celebrity gossip over a Decaf Cappucino when I read the following interview with Kirsten Dunst, discussing her break up from Jake Gyllenhaal.

How much is she going to regret being quite so candid?

Jake and I couldn't last. He's a stay-at-home boy and I'm an out-on-the-town girl. We tried to spice things up - we had sex in cars, in the bathroom and even by the sea. The only place we didn't have the guts to try was in a walkway in a hotel because we thought we might get kicked out if we were caught.

At least Alex may be in with a shot!

Sorted

Well we had a fun weekend...
What with Lauren walking, fixing the computer (pretty good success) and Serena studying it wasn't too much of a drag!

I'll write more later.

Next CCL Competition

This fortnight's CCL compo is a piece of piss!

This fortnight's puzzle prize is a fantastic Cyber Acoustics A303 iPod Docking Speaker System that sound great in the home or on the road! They are ultra stylish and will impress and amaze your friends with pure audio quality! To win them all you have to do is solve our puzzle…

You’re driving a bus. At the first stop 9 people get on. At the second stop, 2 people get off and 12 get on. At the third stop, 6 get off and 8 people get on. At the fourth stop, 4 people get on (I think this is a typo and should read off) and 3 people get on. At the fifth top, 12 people get off and none get on. How many people are left on the bus?

As usual, answers on an email to answers@cclonline.com. Best of luck everyone!

Please don't disappoint me...

PS No one I knew won the hat compo, but B was the correct answer!

Flakey

CRAP!

Our main PC has been a bit flakey recently and crashed a few times whilst gaming and did the odd "funny boot".

To resolve the issue I decided to reinstall Norton System Works, which was always pretty good at tidying up after crashes.

Midway through the install the System Died and it isn't wanting to wake up.

I need to recover the Shared Docs folder, but beyond that the C drive can be wiped and started again....

Basically this is a bummer.

Khaki Day

I think this should become a global tribute.
If I read the BBC article sooner I would have dressed differently this morning.

Oh and it looks like Serena has been busy... a huge polystyrene box labelled "Martin's Seafresh Fish" just turned up on the doorstep!

Weird stuff

Firstly according to Google Weather it is rather cold here at the moment:



And secondly there is a new shop in Shepherd's Bush near my bus stop called "The Brain Warehouse". I'll try and grab a photo tomorrow.

Format Wars...

Anyone who has talked technology with me in the last month, will not have been shocked by the delay of the Euro launch of the PS3 as I have been predicting it.
Just reading a couple of news sites made it perfectly clear that Sony was way behind in building the PS3 and wouldn't have enough (more than 5 million units needed) for a glocal release. Even more scary is that they may only manage 1 million units for November, which would mean the US would only get 500,000 or so (demand there was predicted to be 10 times that number).

However, does the delay mean that HD-DVD will get a head start over Blu-ray?
I had been predicting that Blu-ray would win the format war, solely on the back of the PS3.

Most consumers are smart enough to wait for the format war to settle down before buying new kit and I reckoned the Christmas rush for the PS3 and its built in Blu-ray player would result in a big enough market share to kill HD-DVD pretty quickly.

Even more weird is the concept that Blu-ray will win in Japan and the US, but Europe and Oz will pick HD-DVD. Not a problem for film distributors, as their content is localised anyway, but hardware manufacturers won't like it. In the end I expect that Blu-ray would be forced upon us by the Japan/US technology market.

Anyway, Sony has fumbled the ball and it remains to see if this could be their undoing.

Found It!

James was trying to remember this:

Free Competition....

CCL Online are running a free-to-enter competition.

The prize for this puzzle is a 1GB MP3-DJ Vivid. A stylish number from the guys at Genius. It integrates a MP3 digital audio decoder, FM tuner, flash memory, built-in microphone, and OLED display all in one. This really is a cracking prize for one lucky winner. Check it out here!

The competition is as follows:


You email your answers to: answers@cclonline.com

I have submitted my "correct" answer! :P

Something a bit more manly!

Can't let my wife steal the limelight too much!

After 15 months it is time for a change!

One step too far?

Personally I think this is taking things too far!

Donkey

This one is for Gareth!

I am sure he knows why!

Frazzled Working Mum: All singing, all dancing!!

Frazzled Working Mum: All singing, all dancing!!

Check out the new appearance of the family website. Not bad for someone who knows no programming stuff at all; hope you like the changes!

Let me know what you think!

Early Adopter

Hmmm, for the first time I find myself with a technological dilemma!

Blu-ray or HD-DVD?

OK, neither technology is really up and running yet here in the UK, but then again I am not ready to buy.

Come next spring I will be ready to buy and both formats should be up and shouting.

I don't remember the Betamax v VHS war as my parent's aren't early adopters where technology is concerned (they only just got a PC - one of our hand me downs), and the DVDR format war never really surfaced as dual-format players / recorders came out within months.

We bought an HD-TV back in February, as we needed a new telly, so future proofing seemed sensible. Having sold our Hi-Fi / Surround Sound system (too bulky), we are back to watching DVDs via a Scart lead with dodgy stereo sound. I reckon that the reduced quality and a lack of contiguous time (Lauren) has killed our passion for watching films.

My spring purchases were going to be along the following lines...

• HD Disk player.
• HDMI Switching Amp + 5.1 / 7.1 Speaker setup.
• SFF PC (to act as Media Centre).

Early reports on the Warner Bros HD releases (WB is the only studio atm who is releasing on both formats) is clearly pointing to HD-DVD being the better format.

I am not convinced that HD-DVD will win in the long run though. I think Sony will steal the market with the PS3 / Blu-ray combo.
PS3 will be the must have Christmas present this year, and I can see parents justifying the spend as the console will also act as a HD compatible film player.

Obviously Dual-format players will emerge eventually, but can I wait?

Actually do I care? Now that I have typed most of this article I am starting to think again.
Getting the Amp and the Media Centre PC is a sound investment. It will be cheaper to upgrade the PC with an HD player and I can by-pass the need for HDMI switching in the Amp, as I can hook the PC up via DVI and Optical (which is good enough for HD). That will leave the HDMI on the TV free for the Sky+ HD box (when they drop in price).

Serena and I also talked about adding a Wireless Network File server (which we can hide in a cupboard). It can be ugly and hidden and we can stick big Raid HDDs in it to free up space on the Media Centre / Laptops. Streaming of Video over a 54g Wireless LAN works perfectly well (I have proven that already between my desktop and laptop PCs). I reckon that building the file server will be a piece of piss, as all I need to do it recycle our current desktop machine "as is", but stick bigger hard disks in it. Once the system is built I can use windows networking tools to remotely administer it from a laptop, so we can get away without it needing a keyboard / mouse / monitor most of the time.

Anyway, I seem to be rambling again! But then this is my blog!

NB I don't see us buying a PS3 (before someone suggests it).

Hoff-ally sorry!

I completely forgot to thank Gareth for sending me Junk Mail. Scan of post card attached!

What's the point?

Work sporadically update the firwall ruleset to block a few more "unsuitable" web sites.

Today's update blocked all BBC News pages apart from the front page! However, BBC News is split into three versions... UK Edition, International Edition and Low Graphics Edition.

They blocked the first one and not the others. Why? Internation Edition is still high graphics and is hardly ever different from the UK version.

Oh yeah... they also neglected to block the Sports section (but that could be deliberate!).

An Important Distinction

Its a very fine line and I try desperately not to step over it....

When I can!

I am back playing Oblivion and X3 as a change... I got a bit WoW'd out. I find that since I broke my addiction to MMORPGs, I get tired of playing them after a couple of months and need to take a break.

Anyway I decided to restart X3 and Oblivion now that I had done a clean install on the new XP build. I have been enjoying both a lot more than I did last time. No fear on WoW though, I'll be back.

X3 and Oblivion are also much more "Lauren friendly", as they have Pause buttons! I have also cracked Lock-picking in Oblivion. I can take a Master lock with my pitiful 5 skill points!

I also reinstalled Half-Life 2, and don't seem to have backed up my Game Saves... So I am back in City 17 shooting zombies. At least I get to do the cool dune buggy level again!

On Standby

Jase is not blogging as much at the present time (see this related post) but do not fear, he will be back.

I've noticed that after playing WoW a fair bit, he's now back playing Oblivion and X3 again in his spare time. This is not a great deal of time as presently we are both very busy at work and I am getting ever closer to my exam (so to aid studying Jase is on baby sitting duties at home).

Sorry for the disruption to normal services but all will be better after November is out of the way.

Oh, and I've decided to blog in a different colour to avoid confusion!

Do they think I am stupid?

Over the last few days our doorbell has been ringing randomly. I never caught any kids doing it, so I reckoned that someone else had a wireless bell like ours which was interfering and changed the transmission channel.

I am working from home today.
The doorbell goes.
As I am expecting to the postman I head straight to the door and just see a folded umbrella disappearing round the corner into my neighbour's front door... the kids are using it to press my bell and retreat quickly.
So I move to the sofa and peer out the side window straight at their door.
A couple of minutes later they decide the coast it clear and repeat the trick... I bang on the window and they look very sheepish before disappearing.

Clearly my neighbour's kids (or rather the youngest son and his friends) are stupid, but what punishment do I bestow? I don't want to start a feud, but I don't want them doing it again and disturbing Lauren.

Mainly for Balint

A long, long time ago, when we couldn't afford to go out on a Friday night, we used to have film nights, where Serena would cook and Balint and I would take turns providing films or wine.

Balint introduced me to two French films: Les Visiteurs (great comedy just ignore the Hollywood remake) and La Fille de d'Artagnan (young Sophie Marceau).

I have remained a fan of the French swashbuckling movie and enjoyed Le Pacte des Loups when it hit the cinema in Australia (despite it getting a very poor edit to R2 DVD).

I recently came across another film of the genre that I really enjoyed and thought I would post it here for those of you who may be interested.

It is called Le Bossu and features a very average plot and pretty nifty swordplay.

Now all we need is a remake of Scaramouche and we are complete!

Battlestar Galactica Season 3

After two seasons of rapidly increasing popularity it looks like the US networks have thrown a big budget at BSG and are seeking awards!
A special "Story Thus Far" film is being made as a prequal to Season 3 and it is going to be made freely available on the web.
They are also making this season in HD.... hmmm that upgrade is looking tempting!
Not long to wait now though!

Happy Birthday your Majesty!

No not Madonna! Its Lauren's 1st Birthday today!

Lauren shares her birthday with a much higher class of celebrity than I do! She gets Madonna, Ulrika Jonsson and Shimon Peres. I get Jean-Claude Van Damme, Lee Harvey Oswald and Martina Navratilova!

Looking at others...

Serena gets Teddy Sheringham, Dermott Reeve and Linford Christie!
James gets Romeo Beckham, Melissa George and Barry Gibb! (And a suprising number of Porn Stars!)
Gareth gets Ice Cube, Courteney Cox and Noddy Holder. (Plus the star of Britney Speared!)

Otherworld

A while back I posted on a TV forum (I even forget which one) to see if anyone could refresh my memory and name a random program I remembered from my youth.

No one could from my weak description (which turned out to be pretty accurate).

Anyway, I was reading today about a weird programme called She-Wolf in London (don't ask...) and someone linked a site called RareTV that sells rip-off videos of TV shows that networks can't be bothered to repeat or release on DVD.

Thinking back to my failure I decided to trawl the alphabetical listing of shows released in the 1980's and finally found my missing show... Otherworld.

Now the big question is does anyone else remember it?

My memories are really spurious! I remember really enjoying it and being annoyed that I had to watch it on Tyne Tees TV as Yorkshire TV didn't show it. We had lowsy TTTV reception in York. Reading some of the forum posts about Otherworld really triggered off some memories!

What other blasts from the past are lurking out there???

Absolutely nothing to say!

Well I haven't blogged on my own ramblings for a week now. Beyond doing the family thing and working I haven't done or come across anything worth blogging!

Someone give me a new movie theme and I'll maybe get inspired!

The distance between insanity and genius is measured only by success.

I see that George Lucas must be running short of cash again!
We have a new set of the original three Star Wars movies coming out on DVD.
Double disk sets with the remastered special edition on Disk 1 and the grainy "Stereo" 1970s version on Disk 2!
Does he think we are complete mugs?
Let me know if they are any good Gareth! ;P

PS Here is a new "Demotivator" just for Jules.

So, this is where they keep the old relics, then, eh?

Ahhh, the Maestro is back!

I knew it was too early to promote you.

Ahhh we are back on the third floor after a month on level 1...
The remodelling of our old area has squeezed in double the number of desks and is now laid out "call centre" style rather than as little friendly islands.

I also owe a belated Happy Birthday to my mexican bandit friend Giuseppe! (See below.)
Also, I doubt that Lawrence reads this blog any more, but Happy Birthday stranger (if you do)!

The 1970s week is finished and I have arbitrarily decided to dedicate this week to James Bond films!

I reckon this one will be very challenging!

The only thing you can do with virgins like that is pounce!

Spurious links as always!

I ordered the new camera on Wednesday evening. It just arrived (friday afternoon).

That's rather fast... considering I bought it in Hong Kong!

Her Majesty did sting me for £30 of duty, but still a bargain!

I know what you're thinking. "Did he fire six shots or only five?"

Slghtly dodgy connection with the quote, but hey - its my blog!

Serena and I have just shelled out on a new digital camera. Our old Nikon has lasted us nearly 5 years, which is an age as far as technology goes (the only thing older that we still use regularly is our Sony DVD player, which was state of the art when we bought it and still cuts the mustard now. That is waiting for the HD-DVD/Blu-ray market to stabilise! ).

Our new camera is the Canon Digital IXUS 800 IS (known as the PowerShot SD700 IS in the US). Its pretty new on the market and has been winning lots of awards and getting really good reviews.

We coupled this with a high speed 2 GB SD card and a spare battery (alway a must with these things), totalling a spend of nearly £300. Hopefully it will last us another 5 years!

I want you to round up every vicious criminal and gun slinger in the west. Take this down...

...I want rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass-kickers, shit-kickers and Methodists.

Giuseppe - for God's sake get a haircut and shoot the caterpiller!

What are you? Some kind of half-assed astronaut?

I am thinking of sticking a few photos into this compo....
Gareth - Your "Yellow" photo from last year (or was it the year before) could do well in the "Rock and Roll" section.

PS I couldn't think of a relevant quote, so I picked another '70s Classic!

I told you, we're an anarco-sydicalist commune.

I can't think of anything worth blogging this morning, so I'll see how much a of a roll Gareth is on by using this quote!

This is one you will either get straight away or will need to google!

I guess you've noticed something a little strange with Dad. It's okay, though. I'm still Dad!

Popped out for a hair-cut at lunchtime, since it has been nearly 2 months and I was feeling rather shaggy in all the hot weather.

Lauren is looking at me funny, as if to say... "What happened"?

PS This quote is a little obscure... this film is best known for its "5 notes"!

Listen, I can't get involved. I've got work to do.

Ahhh, the eternal torment...
Lots of things I'd like to do with my weekend and Lauren won't allow me the time!
Still I don't begrudge her any of it.

A bit more of a tricky quote today! Trust me you ALL know it!

Do you spend time with your family? Good. Because a man that doesn't spend time with his family can never be a real man.

Well Serena has to work all weekend, so I get the pleasure of Lauren's company.
Not certain what we'll do but I am pretty certain that Ice Cream will feature in there somewhere.

Today's quote is a easy one as it comes from the most popular film of the 70's.

I'm here under the orders of the President of Earth, I'm looking for Durand-Durand.

My morning radio DJ made an annoying mistake today. They were talking about pop groups who have taken their names from films and he mentioned Duran Duran, and then proceeded to link them to the wrong film.

Can you do any better?

It was a relief I tell you. I was seriously struggling with leading lady quotes!

I am my father's daughter, and I'm not afraid of anything.

I am running out of leading lady quotes fast!!!! This post would normally have gone on Rena's blog, but since it fits in with a good quote I thought I would post it here.

Two days running now we have gone to the park with Lauren after work. As Rena commented she is in full "mountaineering" mode now, climbing up and over anything in an attempt to stand upright.

Ravenscourt Park has plenty of pigeons and dogs to keep Lauren enthralled as well, however when Serena took her to see Jase & Charlotte's kitten (Rafferty) she was really scared. We think it is the way that he moves, as he is motionless and then suddenly jerks into motion, making her scream (which clearly makes him jump). We'll work on this, as I don't want Lauren to be scared of animals.

My Uncle and Cousin train race horses and my Uncle's brother runs a farm all in the same Yorkshire village, so I think we will have to take Lauren up there soon to see all the animals. Definitely next spring though, when the lambs, piglets and puppies are around and Lauren is that little bit bigger!

Our minds are unravelling and every time you bring us back it gets worse!

This Blew my Mind!

The Omegahedron Selena! I want it!

Post was called: "Silliness - Thanks Gareth!!" Admin'd by Jason

Well, I just couldn't resist.

After reading Gareth's post about the dog I spotted this. And I had to post this after James had talked about the subject as well.

Watch this; and you do have to have the music as Gareth said.

I had to giggle!

The quote is only relevant as it come from a very silly movie!

You're going to be bad for business. I can tell.

Hmmm, a toughy to get us started for the remainder of this week.
Let's start with one of my favourite female leads in one of my favourite films.

Feeling Hot Hot Hot!

OK - very spurious quote! Comes from the Gag Reel at the end of a movie! (OK I admit I am a nerd!)

I just had lunch with Alex and walking back across St Paul's Churchyard was a bit warm to say the least!

I am looking for suggestions for a movie quotes theme? e.g. If Gareth picks "Star Wars", and I need to come with relevant quotes for the rest of the week.

Suggestions in the comments!

It's hot as hell in here. Yeah man, but it's a dry heat!

Well London is shaping up to be damn hot this week.
I am glad I invested £250 in an air conditioning unit for our bedroom, as I find it hard to sleep when the temperature goes of 25°C never mind well over 30°C! We have relocated Lauren into our room so she gets the advantage of the cool air too.

However I wanted to post something a bit more serious on my Blog (for once).

I am very concerned about what is going on in Israel and Lebanon. Clearly the terrorist / militant activity in Lebanon is not a good thing, but does anyone else think that Israel is over-reacting slightly?

Also it grieves me that the US always stand firmly behind Israel. I know they have invested a lot into the Israeli state, but you have to take a step back sometimes and go "hang on a minute"! What is next? Nukes launched into Beirut?

I hold up my hands and admit that I don't understand a lot of the politics or history that is going on here, but from your lay-man's perspective it all seems a bit over the top and is not being condemned strongly enough by our leaders.

OK, enough serious stuff for now... I'm going to fill in some answers to the quotes in the comments fields.

I'll tell you something. If you're as good in bed as you are on the dance floor, then you're one lousy fuck!

Sophie Ellis Bexter found dead in a Paris flat.....

It's murder on Zidane's floor!

(Say it out loud... you know you want to!)

Game over man!

OK, so Wimbledon and the World Cup are finished as is the second series of Dr Who.

Wimbledon was mildly entertaining, the latter stages of the World Cup were blooming awful and the final episode of Dr Who was really enjoyable (even if I hoped a painful death for Rose).

So what now? Looks like I am back to the DVD box set of Alias Season 3 and catching up on a few films.

I have been playing a bit of World of Warcraft which I have to admit is mildly entertaining!!!! I even managed to play it for a few hours in France (in French), although I was hampered by being unable to decipher some of the quest text. As I am having to look after Lauren in my free time, I cannot explore the game fully as far as grouping or longer dungeons but that may come in time.

Yes, Pippin, my point is, he's clearly over-reacting. Run!

OK, I need to take a chill pill!
I have added clues to all the old ones back as far as So Long and Thanks for All the Fish!

DISAPPOINTED!!!! (shoots sofa twice)

Clearly no-one is interested in my movie quotes theme (despite Gareth's last comment).
Do you know how hard it is to come up with something relevant all the time?
OK, so most of them are really easy (e.g. the last two) but I reckon someone other than Gareth should be at least having a stab! I don't do this for my own gratification! (OK I do, but you are spoiling that gratification!)

Look at the size of that thing!

Maggie, Peter, Lauren and I went for a cup of coffee and a cake yesterday, whilst Serena was working... The slices served were HUGE. Fortunately there is no evidence as Maggie's camera batteries were flat, however I cannot look at another slice of cake for at least a week!

OK - I just wanted to go back to this earlier comment. I can solemnly swear that I have never been served such a huge portion of cake anywhere in the world... and that includes in the US.

I can also state that I haven't eaten any cake since!

The most efficient piece of aversion therapy I have ever experienced!

How Wude!

OK, this is way, way overdue!

We returned from France on Saturday, in time for an England v Portugal penalty shoot-out in the baggage collection hall (so much for avoiding the score and watching the replay on digital).

I have to admit as to not feeling too great (must have been the sweetbreads!) and started to run a fever, and come Sunday I was feeling blooming awful! My throat had swollen up so much that when Serena had a look at it even she was worried! (I often complain about not getting any sympathy as Serena is a Doctor and is used to seeing people with bits hanging off, but when she actually gets worried then it is really scary!)

A visit to the GP on Monday (he barely glanced down my throat in the 3 minutes I was in his office) resulted in some weak antibiotics (Serena calls them the "pissing in the wind" variety) and I skived off work for two days feeling miserable!

Back to work yesterday and found a building site where my desk used to be... bit of a shock actually! Apparently our department were given two days notice to pack up and move out! (Hence the title.)

Anyway I found my stuff including half a Kensington lock security cable - apparently it only took 5 minutes and a pair of pliers to cut through it to free my docking station from the desk - and got my desk up and running again. It still needs a good juggle to get everything where I think it should be, but that takes energy and I am seriously lacking that at the moment.

I had 250 emails to plough through and one urgent situation that had arisen... I may get round to another updated sometime this month!

I don't think we are in Kansas anymore!

Wow! Finding internet access here is St Malo has proved to be a chore!
Serena is still trying to work on her paper and needs to lookup some more references so I pulled out all the stops and found the ONLY internet cafe in St Malo for her! (I looked at 3 others but they had shut down.)

I am touch typing this as I am using a french keyboard and the letters are all over the place. I managed to convince "Le Windoes" that I am American, which gets most of the keys where I think they should be, so I just need to not look down and type on instinct!

The weather is OK. Not particularly warm, but at least it isn't raining. The food is great. Fresh shellfish and lots of crepes & gateaux! Maggie, Peter, Lauren and I went for a cup of coffee and a cake yesterday, whilst Serena was working... The slices served were HUGE. Fortunately there is no evidence as Maggie's camera batteries were flat, however I cannot look at another slice of cake for at least a week!

Go "Trig Boy", it's your birthday!

Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday dear Gareth!
Happy Birthday to you!

I like the French language. I have sampled every language, French is my favorite. Fantastic language. Especially to curse with...

OK the quote is too good to be truncated: I love French wine, I like the French language. I have sampled every language, French is my favorite. Fantastic language. Especially to curse with. Nom de dieu de putain de bordel de merde de saloperie de connard d'enculé de ta mère. It's like wiping your arse with silk. I love it.

How bloomin' hard is it sort out internet access in France for Serena? Paris is OK, but it looks like Saint Malo is the back end of beyond as far as technology is concerned! The only advertised Internet Hotspot I can find is in the Ferry Port. I hope we have more luck in the centre as I can find out no useful information on the internet.

Orange are no help either. Despite owning Wanadoo in France (now called Orange.Fr) they won't give me HSCSD access whilst we are there (that is old style 28.8k modem access via a mobile) as they "don't provide that service in France". My French may be rusty but the www.orange.fr website seems to offer this service to local subscribers!

I am sure things will be much more obvious and simple when we are there, but it is really frustrating when trying to plan ahead.

Lions, Tigers and Bears... Oh My!

This one is for Rena:



So is this:



And this one is for Gareth:

Yes well, you put your clothes on and I'll buy you an ice cream!

To survive the heat of the weekend I consumed a couple of large ice-creams.
I was feeling rather guilty about it until I saw this picture of my old mate Balint!

Quote from another old favourite (1981 was a vintage year for movies).

To call you stupid would be an insult to stupid people. I've known sheep who could outwit you. I've worn dresses with higher IQs!

I am kicking myself! You can call me Mr Thicky!

Since we moved into our newly extended house we have had our ancient portable TV running in the kitchen. It is one of those ones that predates SCART and from when teletext was a dirty word! You have a normal RF input and that is your lot!

Suffice to say that we don't have a roof aerial socket in the kitchen, Serena won't let me run a Magic Eye cable along the length of the house from our living room Sky+ box and all the wireless AV senders I have found only support SCART TVs (SCART to RF signal converters are suprisingly expensive).

I resigned myself to squinting at a lousy picture on the loop aerial (indoor booster aerials are both ugly and expensive for what you get imho). We intend to put an LCD in the kitchen later in the year anyway, so I can be patient and wait.

Well DUH!!!!!!! What piece of kit has been sat in the loft for 12 months and has 2 SCART sockets and a built in SCART to RF signal converter? My old VCR! All I need to do is hook the AV sender up to the Sky box in our bedroom, the receiver up to the VCR in the kitchen and the TV up to the VCR. Bingo - Sky in the kitchen! Why I didn't think of that months ago I cannot say!

Today's movie quote is from one of my favourite British films and is in honour of its star who has announced his retirement.

So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish

Well the hot weather pinned me indoors this weekend, as it was too hot for Lauren and Rena was working. Lauren also has a sore throat at the moment so she was having difficulty sleeping during the day, which meant that it would have been nigh on impossible to play some KOTOR2.

Instead I watched films as part of a catchup session. In order they were:

Assault on Precinct 13 (Remake): Should be retitled assault on the eardrums! Sky listed it as a 15 certificate. I think there must be some mistake! 18 all the way in my books - or am I becoming a fuddy duddy? Anyway it was pants apart from the proper treatment of Psycologists!

Stepford Wives (Remake): Whilst this story leans itself well to a comedy make-over and the cast was pretty good, it was still a lousy attempt with a predictable twist. Stick to the original.

Logan's Run (Classic): Shown on TCM and edited to have the bouncy bits taken out so it can be shown as PG before the watershed. Still a Classic but I missed the bouncy bits that made this a teenage classic! I can't believe they are planning a remake!

Bull Durham: An old favourite. I am weird as far as Brit's go... I like baseball movies (such as Major League and The Natural)! Anyway it was still great and Crash's list of beliefs only didn't make it as my quote title as it is too long!

Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy: Better than I expected. Best for all the in-jokes linking back to the BBC TV version! Not brilliant though.

Æon Flux: This was completely panned so I didn't hold out much in the way of expectations. I don't think the panning was deserved! Not too bad but there have been better films of this style (Equilibrium comes to mind). Charlize Theron is very watchable and the amount of Toupée tape that she must have gone through makes the mind boggle!

I also watched the football, but would have probably gotten more entertainment from watching Anchorman! (OK, maybe not!)

He's not the Messiah, he's a very naughty boy!

OK, so my last post was a bit weird, but I just wanted to get into the spirit of things.
Jerry Goldsmith's soundtrack to The Omen still sends shivers down my spine!

I had to laugh when I read that the boy who played Damien in the original has been given a bit part as a reporter in the remake! Clearly the Antichrist has gone down in the world!

I have to say that I was a bit miffed yesterday. I have sorted out my DivX woes (cheers G) and even managed to fix the audio problem (missing AC3 codec) on one film, and so could finally get round to watching Angel Season 1 (downloaded as Sky have been skipping episodes!).

Turns out I had downloaded "Galaxy Angel" (in Spanish) which is some sort of Manga cartoon. I was a bit miffed. Anyway Episodes 1-4 were at 96% when I left this morning and the rest of Season 1 was sitting at 10%, so we are getting there!

Ave Satani

Ave Satani
Sanguis Bibimus
Corpus Edimus
Tolle Corpus Satani

Sanguis Bibimus
Corpus Edimus
Tolle Corpus Satani

Sanguis Bibimus
Corpus Edimus
Tolle Corpus Satani

Ave Versus Cristus
Ave Versus Cristus
Ave Versus Cristus

Ave Satani
Sanguis Bibimus
Corpus Edimus
Tolle Corpus Satani
Satani
Satani
Satani
Satani

Where's Gareth? Torturing Americans. How thoughtful of him!

My blog has four regular readers (I am tracking you!)...

So here is my first dedicated post to celebrate my biggest fan! :P

Bloody hard to come up with a movie quote though!

Cheers G.