Back to Normality
Posted: Sat 7 October, 2006 Filed under: Geeky, Getting Organised, Travel, Weirdness Leave a comment »One of the geekier things that’s currently good about coming home is the ability to get back to a wireless network. (Obviously there’s a lot of other good things about coming home from the week at work, but I’m on a geeky thought process here)
It’s been very odd over the last couple of weeks, not being available online after work, and not having the connectivity I’m used to. (God, this is sounding more pathetic by the minute, isn’t it?) Admittedly not entirely a bad thing, as it’s given me the opportunity to catch up on some letter writing and so on, but all the same, very odd to not be able to mooch about online the way I’m used to.
Still, that’ll change from here, as I’m getting somewhere very posh in the coming week, and then the B&B I’ll be staying in will be letting me use their network, so all’s going to be cool on that score.
It just means I’ll need to be slightly more disciplined, and still keep up with writing letters etc. (and all the other writing projects I’m thinking about) as well as working on the websites and so on.
Accuracy
Posted: Fri 6 October, 2006 Filed under: Customer Services, Geeky, Thoughts, Weirdness 3 Comments »Do you ever look at an email that’s been “personalised” (i.e. data about your preferences, or the other things you’ve bought from the same company, has been used to modify the content so that it’s more ‘targeted’ towards you) and just think “Man, they’ve got that one so wrong”.
Today’s example came to me from those uber-twunts of the gig-ticket world, TicketMaster. The subject line, to get my attention, was – um –
Lyle, don’t miss Lionel Ritchie
Wow, how wrong can one line get?
Desperation
Posted: Thu 5 October, 2006 Filed under: Thoughts, Travel, Weirdness Leave a comment »Another thing I watched on TV on Tuesday was a documentary on Channel Four about mail-order brides from Russia. It was an interesting thing, but dear God, I hve to say that I felt the blokes were pretty desperate.
And yes, I know, there’s similarities between my feelings about it and the stuff in the previous post. But for me, I just don’t really get the entire “must get married” thing, let alone being so determined to get married – to anyone – that you’ll go to another country in order to find someone/anyone. Mind you, I also simply don’t get how someone could go through that route, trying to find a bride in Russia, and not make any effort to learn anything in Russian at all. That, to me, is just fuckin’ weird, and shows some major levels of selfishness, and – rudeness. If I were to be in that situation (and I truly can’t see that I ever would be) I would at least make some effort to learn. But then, I suppose the difference is that I would want to have conversation with a partner – and conversation, or companionship, didn’t seem to be the primary goal for the men in the documentary.
Just bizarre, really. Well, to my mind anyway.
Negative Influences
Posted: Wed 4 October, 2006 Filed under: Thoughts, Weirdness Leave a comment »I was watching a drama on BBC1 last night, “The Amazing Mrs Pritchard“, and something struck me while I watched it. Of late, there seems to have become a trend in these dramas for there to be strong female roles, and the women’s partners seem to always have a very diminished role, and be a negative influence on the women, providing a downside of everything, blocking the development, and wanting the women to stop their plans for [whatever]
I realise that drama needs conflict, needs that portrayal of issues, and that the protagonist being supported all the way through by her partner would (in theory, at least) not be dramatic or whatever, but I do find that these cliches are really becoming quite wearing.
After all, if a drama were to portray things the other way round, with the female character holding back the development or dreams of the male character, it would be portrayed as sexist, biased, and many other things. But when the “norm” of negative portrayals of men happens, that’s fine.
I don’t mind as such, and I’m not concerned about it on sexist levels. I do however, think it’d be better if both portrayals were allowed to happen, and for there to be balance, rather than bias.
Yellow
Posted: Mon 2 October, 2006 Filed under: Travel, Weirdness Leave a comment »Oh yeah, I was going to write a bit about my holdall, wasn’t I? (Well, I said I would, although that doesn’t necessarily mean it was going to happen)
The holdall I use is probably one of the best buys I ever made. It’s made by Caterpillar (whose boots I swear by), and is bright yellow ripstop nylon. Nothing fancy, not even a solid base or anything. But it’s tough as old boots, and has now seen me through eleven years of use. It’s fantastic. It’s been used along the way for laundry, general luggage, up to two weeks away from home, as well as being a general carrier of crap, clothing, CDs, DVDs, shopping, and anything else that can get stuffed through its zip.
But the best use for it at the moment is – to be blunt – scaring the shit out of people in London. Particularly on escalators. So many people flinch when they see this big yellow bag coming into their eyeline as I belt down the left-hand side of the escalator, it’s really funny. Mind you, I’d probably flinch at the same sight, if I didn’t know it was my bag…
Frustrating
Posted: Sun 1 October, 2006 Filed under: Getting Organised, Weirdness 1 Comment »The USB TV Tuner thingy arrived fine, and has been installed on the laptop. However, I can’t test it ’til Monday, as for some bizarre reason, Bracknell doesn’t get the necessary Freeview signal at all. So I’ll have to wait until tomorrow evening before I can check it all out properly.
Most bizarre. Bracknell gets Sky and Cable TV with no problem, but not Freeview. Strange.
Gideon
Posted: Thu 28 September, 2006 Filed under: Thoughts, Travel, Weirdness 1 Comment »What on earth makes the Gideon people believe that people in hotels or B&Bs will want a bible to look through?
It’s something that’s always befuddled me, and the point is just getting reinforced yet again this week. I’ve never wanted to read a bible while in a hotel. OK, come to that, I’ve never really wanted to read a bible.
But if someone’s enough of a believer to want to read a bible in a hotel room, surely they’re more likely to have brought their own one with them?
Or am I missing something?