Lavatorial
Posted: Tue 15 February, 2005 Filed under: General 4 Comments »I don’t know what it is about the men in this office building where I now work, but on any given day the toilets are abso-fucking-lutely revolting by mid-day. It’s not a one-off, this is every working day. They stink, and every single toilet (as opposed to urinal) has shite-marks all round the inside. It’s not like the office building doesn’t provide bog-brushes, it’s (I suspect) that the majority of the ‘men’ in here just don’t use them.
The worst bit though is the lack of flushage. (hmmm, good word – must remember that one) I swear some of them must be so proud of what they’ve done, they want to display it to the world. And frankly there’s very little as unappealing as walking into a toilet cubicle to be confronted by a floating log of such proportions that one can only wonder whether the layer of said log had recently been buggered by a whale.
I feel sorry for the cleaners – every morning the toilets are in pristine condition, by mid-day they’re layered in shite yet again. It must be a hugely demoralising task.
Why is it that some men (and, though I have little knowledge, some women too) seem incapable of brushing/flushing/being some kind of decent human being?
Uninspired
Posted: Tue 15 February, 2005 Filed under: General 3 Comments »In spite of things finally taking a turn towards the successful at work today, I’m still highly uninspired on what to write for d4d™ today. All the media seem to be utterly hyped about London’s 2012 Olympics campaign 
which (along with Diamond Geezer – sorry, DG – my mistake, and I’ll learn to read next time, promise.) I frankly don’t give a toss about, particularly what the IOC will think during their inspection . I’m not convinced that London is the best bid, nor that it’ll be best for Britain. Just by location it’s going to put off at least half the country from going – at least the Commonwealth Games in Manchester were accessible to more of the country with ease. Ah well.
In fact, one of the more interesting things today is Jamie Oliver *spit* talking about the challenges in updating school menus to reflect something other than “pizza and chips”.
Finally, some success
Posted: Tue 15 February, 2005 Filed under: Geeky, General Leave a comment »After a large number of hours, finally work is getting somewhere, and things are beginning to look like I might actually know what I’m doing.
Scary – but overall a pretty good feeling.
Comments
Posted: Mon 14 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 2 Comments »Well, following on from problems where once a comment has been posted, the entire page reloads in the comments pop-up, I’ve now stopped using pop-ups for the moment.
Of course, non-pop-up comments have their own pain-in-the-arse foibles, but I’ll see what I can do about those. In the meantime, I think this solution is possibly easier. We’ll see – and let me know what you think, and which method you prefer.
Thanks.
Meet The Fockers
Posted: Mon 14 February, 2005 Filed under: Reviews(ish) Leave a comment »Hmmm, what is there to say about this? The sequel to 2000’s Meet the Parents, and as with many sequels it’s not really as good as the first one.
Still funny in places, but really more of a one-trick pony, with various sidelines really quite sadly underused, or just completely undeveloped. Dustin Hoffmann and Barbara Streisand were on top form as the Fockers, but still very underused.
Overall, while it’s an OK way to spend a couple of hours, I’d probably advise waiting for the DVD release. It’s probably got a load of extras on it, too.
VD – 1
Posted: Mon 14 February, 2005 Filed under: Festering Season, General 1 Comment »Yes, the header image has changed for the day, to reflect it being Valentine’s Day (AKA ‘Another Retail cash-in Day”)
Aptly, the image is taken from a shot of the St Valentines Day Massacre. So there.
200th
Posted: Sun 13 February, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »And a quick congratulations to Pix for leaving the 200th non-spam comment on d4d™ since WP was installed.
Once all that’s been explained, it doesn’t sound overly impressive, does it? Still, other than comment spam the comments seem to have dried up a bit over January – we’ll see how it all progresses from here, I guess.
2,400
Posted: Fri 11 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 3 Comments »To reflect that this is the 2,400th post listed on WordPress for d4d™, I’ve done what I promised,and written the title switcher so it pulls out a random title from a database now.
It was even less difficult than I thought (with the exception of whenI made a mistake that simply proved that sometimes I can’t write code) and seems to work nicely. I’ll see how it goes as I add more items to the database.
“Boring Old Gits”
Posted: Fri 11 February, 2005 Filed under: News, Thoughts Leave a comment »For once I suspect that the Daily Star summed up the feelings of a nation with the headline today “Boring old gits to wed” by their new royal correspondent “Hugh Cares”.
It certainly matched my level of apathy about the ‘news‘ that Charles and Camilla were to get married. I never really gave a tin toss for Diana, and can’t bring myself to do even that much for Camilla.
All in all, I think my entire response was “So what?” – and that’s the way it’s likely to stay.
Title Switcher – Revisited
Posted: Fri 11 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 2 Comments »Well, I liked the title-switcher working and changing each day – that was kind of fun. However, I’ve decided I’m going to go one stage further and go for a random title line each time the page is reloaded. Yes, I’m bored – what on earth gave it away?
The changes may not take place today – but then again, it’s equally likely that they will. We’ll see.
Fark
Posted: Fri 11 February, 2005 Filed under: Resolutions 3 Comments »Oooh, flippin’ ‘eck, I’ve gone and booked my driving test. Roll on Tuesday 12th April.
NOW can I be nervous?
ER
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »I’m not going to ruin this for the people who won’t see it ’til Monday/Tuesday when it’s on Channel 4, or who’ve recorded it.
All I will say is this – watch the episode “Time of Death” with Ray Liotta. It’s stunning. Oh, and keep some tissues close by. For the geeky, it’s filmed in “real time” – 45 minutes of programme = 45 minutes of time. Prepare to be stunned. I wasn’t.
That’s all.
Reading Arts
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services 9 Comments »In direct juxtaposition to the tossers at B&Q, I’m utterly impressed with the service from Reading Arts’ ticket booking.
On Tuesday I ordered two tickets to see Derren Brown‘s new show at Reading Hexagon. Their website was a bit shonky and wouldn’t accept Switch Maestro cards, so I called up the box-office instead. No problem, and yes, the website’s a bit old, but we’re working on a new version that should be live in a couple of months – no idea why it won’t accept switch, but the new one will. Fair enough – at least the booking staff know there are some problems, and they’ve got the information to hand to keep the customer happy and informed.
The tickets arrived in the post yesterday. Probably 12-18 hours after I’d ordered them. OK, they’d only got to be sent from Reading to Bracknell, but that’s not overly relevant. It was a nice efficient process, and yes, I’m impressed.
B&Q – still going
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, General 2 Comments »And in direct contrast I also got an email last night from B&Q’s customer services saying “Thanks for your comments, we’ve forwarded them on to someone who’ll talk to you soon”. Impressive – only three days between sending the email and receiving a response.
I despair.
Driving
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: General, Resolutions, Thoughts 3 Comments »Bit of a theme developing, but there we go. I’ll try and break it up with some other posts in between too…
So – no, I don’t have a particular problem with driving, and in fact when I’m doing it I actually quite enjoy it. It just never made the top ten on the priority list. People look at me in a combination of shock and horror when I say I don’t drive – and in some ways I can understand that thought process when they’ve been driving ten years or whatever. But all the same, for the most part it’s just not been something that was necessary. I’ve generally lived in towns and cities where I could get around no worries without driving.
Yes, weekends and the amount of travelling I’ve done would have been easier in a car. But at the same time I was able to sit on a train and read, or do work on the laptop, or even sleep. Sure I’d get there quicker in a car (well, most of the time) but I’d not be able to do any of those other things. Maybe I’m just trying to provide excuses to myself – but whatever the reason, it’s not been a matter of urgency.
Over the last year though, it’s become more important. The travelling between Manchester and Reading/Bracknell would’ve been a lot easier, and the move down here would’ve been easier and quicker too, I can’t deny it. And now, living with Herself, I’d rather be able to share the driving work, and make both our lives a lot easier.
So yes, now it’s more important to get it done, which previously it hasn’t. That doesn’t mean I’m going to suddenly transform into a “drive everywhere” type, because bizarre as it may seem, I actually enjoy walking to work, or (when I get it sorted) cycling to places. Because of the way I’ve been over the last decade or so, I don’t see the car as the way to get everywhere – but it definitely has its uses too. Bracknell’s got less of a transport system than the last few places I’ve lived, and as such driving will be useful. Getting around the area will be easier in a car – and yes, so will things like shopping (although home delivery is still a grand idea, and saves a lot of work!) and visiting friends/family.
It’s going to happen – and I’m sure many people, Herself included, will say “About bloody time too!”
Additional Technical
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 4 Comments »I’m actually wondering at the moment whether I should come up with some fixes on d4d™’s styling within wordpress, and build my own template. Currently the hack I’m using to get round the templating issue is fine, but it’s leading to problems in other areas.
The archives thing is still being a twat, and I’ve no idea why. And Quelle surprise the WordPress support forums are still as helpful as a kick in the conkers. Also on the comments pop-up, I’ve got something wrong where once a comment has been posted, it tries to reload the entire d4d™ page into the comments box. Pain in the ass.
There’s one or two other little bits that annoy too, so I’ll possibly work on splitting down the bits of d4d™ into that templating system that WP foisted on to version 1.5. Goody, that’ll be fun.
Vroom – part 2
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: General, Resolutions 3 Comments »The lesson actually went really well, I’m pleased to say. There’s an 8-week lead-time for the test itself, and I’ve been told to get it booked. Looks promising, anyway.
This time I’m learning in a Ford Focus. Much much much nicer than the Corsa I was in last time. (And yes, Razorhead, I’d agree, avoid BSM like the plague, they’re toss) For the first time ever, I actually had leg-room – being 6’4″ and the width of the proverbial shithouse, a Vauxhall Corsa is NOT the best thing to be driving. I could definitely get to like the Focus though…
Still, all’s good so far. Oh, and Herself has asked me to point out that she’s been encouraging me to sort out the driving, and NOT nagging…
Getting Old
Posted: Thu 10 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »I’ve just plucked out a grey nose hair. God help us all, I’m getting old.
Vroom
Posted: Wed 9 February, 2005 Filed under: Resolutions 4 Comments »Yes, tonight the driving lessons start again. In fact, somewhere right about now.
Driving is one of those weird things that I’ve just never got round to, and never seriously felt the need to do. I don’t know exactly why – although there’s been a number of reasons in the past – but it’s just not something I’m overly bothered about. Yes, in some circumstances it would have made my life easier, but in others it just doesn’t change things all that much.
For example, even if/when I pass the test, I’m still not going to be driving in to work – I’ll be walking or cycling. It’s quicker/easier/cheaper, so why bother using the car? It’ll be useful on longer journeys, so it’ll be good to have it passed, but ’til now it’s just not been on the priority list really.
But Herself has been nagging encouraging me that it’s better to have it passed, so now I’m getting round to it.
B&Q – Finale(ish)
Posted: Wed 9 February, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Weirdness 5 Comments »I’ve just cancelled the order with B&Q. Now we just have to fight to get the wrongly-delivered stuff removed before we can get a refund on it. The tossers.
Never again will I shop using the online B&Q site. It’s crap. The latest chapter in the epic has involved dealing with a person in their customer services team – one who was apparently offended at the word “effing” (I got told not to swear at her – she hasn’t seen this site, obv.) and who tried to say the entire farce was my/our fault for ordering the wrong items.
Speaking slowly, I explained that we’d used the website, where order numbers weren’t entered by the customer. If the twunting fridgelickers couldn’t get the right numbers into their website, how was that our problem? The offer to re-do the order (“I’ll put in the correct code this time for you” – patronising shitehawk) and still not get it delivered ’til mid-March was, shall we say, received unenthusiastically by myself.
So now we’re back to square one, and need to order 2 x 3m worktops. I wonder what Homebase can do to fuck it all up?
Joins, Selects, and VPNage
Posted: Wed 9 February, 2005 Filed under: Geeky 1 Comment »Sometimes I just feel entirely out of my depth, and wonder whether IT is really the field for me. Today (and yesterday, if I’m honest) have been some of those times.
The bane of the last two days have been SQL joins. Not difficult stuff by any means – it’s just that at the moment I don’t understand the concept, or how to tell an inner left join from an outer right one. I know that once it clicks, I’ll look back and think “how the hell did I ever get confused by those?” but for now the logic of them simply isn’t there, and I can’t find a way to get it there, no matter how many of the keffing things I do.
Other than that, setting up Windows XP remotely and sorting out VPNs, server-based antivirus, along with working out why the Windows Firewall kept on restarting have proved to be a day of which I’ve had enough.
Resolving
Posted: Wed 9 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Resolutions 1 Comment »Well, I’m getting round to writing a proper “resolutions” page at last. It needs doing, particularly with WordPress’s archiving bits being tits up and an utter pain in the arse. Oh, and yes, yet again, the support forums were about as much use as a kick in the crotch. Utter cunts, the lot of ’em.
Anyway, the resolutions are slowly being whittled away. With luck the resolutions page will be up later and I’ll have some information on what’s being crossed off, and why. For now though, we’ll leave it like this…
- Making a photo portfolio, and taking it to a couple of agents, seeing how I do – Getting there, the photos have been printed and I’ve gone through them.
- Sorting out the Driving Test *cough* – getting there – the first lesson in the new set is tonight
- Doing a few more bits of proper writing – yes, well, not yet.
- Taking time out, and not running round like quite such a silly bastard – getting there.
- Enjoying life in its new facets – ditto
- Debating whether to close my current company and restart with something new.
- Or Not.
- Lots of other things that I’ll list as I go on
London Thoughts – part 2
Posted: Tue 8 February, 2005 Filed under: General, Thoughts 2 Comments »So – the book launch. It was pretty good fun – the only problem was that the bar it was set in was actually quite small, and so got very warm and crowded very quickly. Other than that though (and a certain lack of cloakroom space) it was a pretty good venue.
It was a busy event, as I’ve said already, but I still got to talk to a few people, including Mik Scarlet, who I’ve known of for years, so it was good to actually meet him.
Unfortunately, the camera threw a wobbly and didn’t like the lighting in the bar at all, so photos were a bit of a no-no. Bummer. I really must start thinking about upgrading to either the Canon 20D or the Fuji S3- although as they’re both over £1000 (and the Fuji’s currently closer to £2K) it’ll be a while yet. It was the first book launch I’d been to, but hopefully won’t be the last – but it was a good event, for sure.
As for the freebies, well, what can I say? Heavy sponsorship by www.sextoys.co.uk and Trojan condoms obviously helped, but there was a whole bundle of stuff that all arrived in its own carrier bag (helpfully emblazoned with “I love www.sextoys.co.uk” – I wonder how many other people shoved it all into another bag? *grin*) it was a pretty good night all round.
co-proxamol 2
Posted: Tue 8 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Hey, scary – after last week’s post about Co-proxamol (or coproxamol if you prefer) I’m currently number 2 in google.co.uk for ‘co-proxamol’. I must still be doing something right after all…
Safer Internet
Posted: Tue 8 February, 2005 Filed under: Geeky, News Leave a comment »According to The Register and Insafe, today is officially Safer Internet Day. Which is likely to mean absolutely keff-all to anyone who’s actually interested, or cares.
The day will see the launch of several new online safety websites – including a new Insafe portal and a site for Finnish kids to air their views about the web – internet literacy programmes fro schools, and a storytelling competition, open to 19 countries. In the UK, there will also be a full day’s conference on young people’s use of mobile technology.
Of course, I’d be more impressed if the new ‘Safe’ portal that’s supposed to launch today had actually done so. But hey, no-one’s perfect…
I’m sure I’ll rant more about this one later.
London Thoughts – part 1
Posted: Tue 8 February, 2005 Filed under: General, Thoughts, Travel, Weirdness 4 Comments »Well, I made it unscathed. It’s a lot easier getting to London from Bracknell than it is from Manchester, that’s for sure. It’s a sod-load cheaper too!
London still strikes me as a strange place though. I suppose that a lot of it is to do with being a city, and having all types/genres of people in a fairly small space. Seeing homeless people outside the ultra-expensive stores like Liberty and Aquascutum always leaves me fairly sad, particularly after the work I did with the homeless charity in Manchester. But it’s more than that – for a city where everyone always seems to be in a rush (while sat at Waterloo it was quite comical seeing all the people running for trains etc.) the pedestrians on Oxford Street and the like seem to have some of the slowest walking speeds known to man.
Also, people seem to be so security unconscious. Travelling on the tube,I could easily see who was listening to an iPod – and if I were of that mindset, I’d probably aim for iPod users as those who’d be likely to have other gadgets and high-cost small-size items on their person. Disposable income, and all that jazz. But there’s the other things too – seeing people with laptop bags slung over one shoulder, dead easy for someone to run past and snatch it without even stopping. And an amazing number of people with bags slung over shoulders and pocket flaps open etc. – just open targets for pickpockets, particularly in busy and crowded environments like Waterloo. People are strange.
Cultcha
Posted: Mon 7 February, 2005 Filed under: General, News 4 Comments »I’m off to London tonight – one of my Linkees, Emily is having her first book published , so I’m going along to the launch party tonight. It’s just off Regent Street, and promises to be quite an interesting event *cough*, so I hope the camera gets some use tonight too…
B&Q – the Complaint Letter
Posted: Mon 7 February, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, D4D™ 4 Comments »Following on from the B&Q saga, this email has just been sent to their customer services…
Dear Sir/Madam,
I am emailing you because I am utterly furious about the incompetent way our order has been handled by B&Q. At the end of December we placed an order via your website for 2x3000mm Stardust black worktops and 2x worktop edges. Personally, I wouldn’t have thought that this was a complicated order, but when it comes to B&Q, I’m obviously grossly overestimating their capabilities.
We first received the order at the start of January. This managed to consist of 1x3000mm Worktop – in Blue – and 1x1000mm wall unit carcase, 1x800mm wall unit carcase, and 4x 500mm cherry wood finish doors. In short, epically, spectacularly wrong.
We organised a re-delivery, and for the delivery company to remove the incorrect items. This time they turned up with two worktops. Great. Except they’re Red Marble finish. And we got a metal hanging rack as well.
For a third time we organised a re-delivery, and an uplift of the incorrect stuff. My partner checked it before it came off the lorry, and this time we had 2x 3000mm worktops. In Grey. We didn’t even take the worktops off the delivery truck. As for the items that were delivered incorrectly last time? Your wonderful delivery service hadn’t managed to detail that there was anything to come back, so they didn’t take anything.
To date we’ve now had three deliveries, none of which have been correct. We’re still waiting for the correct worktops, and the worktop edging. We’ve still got two Red Marble worktops we don’t want, and haven’t ordered, as well as a wall carcase we don’t want and didn’t order, and a metal hanging rack we don’t want and didn’t order.
Is it too much to ask that B&Q manage to sort out this delivery immediately? I can’t believe that this is how B&Q normally operate – otherwise you must be losing hundred of thousands of pounds per year delivering unordered items to people.
I would also like to point out that I’ve just risked serious damage to myself by looking at your website and nearly busting a gut laughing at your statement “Supporting our employees, delighting our customers“. “Committed to great service” is also – in our case – an outright lie.
I would like to be given a call today (Monday 7th February) on 07xxx xxxxxx to tell me what B&Q intend to do to rectify this utter farce. So far it has cost my partner and I 8 hours off work to be present for deliveries, and god only knows how much time in phone calls, emails, and trying to fight our way through the most obstructive AVR phone system known to man.
At this precise moment, I intend to never shop with B&Q again, and would heartily advise anyone else thinking of doing so to go to Dodgy Bob’s DIY Warehowse instead of using B&Q’s “services”.
I hope we can bring this matter to a swift and satisfactory conclusion, and I look forward to receiving your call.
Sincerely
Lyle.
Death Wish
Posted: Mon 7 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Here in Bracknell, it’s what’s known to meterologists as “bloody foggy” this morning. While you can see your hand in front of your face, you can’t see much past about ten yards. Fortunately it’s not freezing fog, but it’s still not particularly pleasant either.
What amazed me while I walked into work was the number of idiot cyclists* riding along in dark clothing with no lights on. Do they have a death wish?
* = not all cyclists are idiots. These ones, however, are.
Socks
Posted: Mon 7 February, 2005 Filed under: General 3 Comments »Over at Little Red Boat, Anna’s been talking about Anarchist socks – believe me, they exist. And I was thinking that socks have actually got really boring since Sock Shop went bust.
When Sock Shop existed, I had a tendency to wear very very silly socks – cartoon characters and the like. Generally kept under cover, due to my preference for Cat boots instead of shoes, but they were there all the same. Since then, well, the variety has been far slimmer, and I’ve ended up resorting to boring socks.
Of course, I realise that this has sod-all relevance to anything at all, it’s just something I was thinking about. I’m sad like that.
Outage
Posted: Mon 7 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »Just an advanced warning, d4d™ may be away for about an hour later – the hosts are norking about with servers.
UPDATED : I was gone for a while, but now I’m back…
Still to be done
Posted: Sun 6 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ 1 Comment »I’ve still got some stuff to work on on this redesign. Not just the rest of the pages (photo pages and the like still need to be redone in the new style, for instance) but also fun stuff like sorting out the archives, which in WP seem quite happy to only display the last week of each month. Pain in the arse, and I haven’t yet figured out where to look to fix it.
Also, I’ve just noticed (having used it in the post below) that the old question-mark icon really needs redoing with a transparency so it works across the colour schemes. At the moment it’s got a nasty little yellow border on it. As does the donor-card image on the right-hand bar.
I’m sure there’s other stuff too, I just can’t remember what it is at the moment. I will though…
Gymmage
Posted: Sun 6 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Yes, again today I’m off to the gym. It’s the second part of the induction, this time on fun stuff like the weight machines. We kind of ran out of time last time, so I’m back again. I’m sure Sunday’s are supposed to be “a day of rest”. *cough*
Anyway, once I’ve had my induction on those, I’ll be seeing what I can get up to on that score as well. I’ve not used them ’til now at this gym, as I wouldn’t have been covered on their insurance, which is fair enough. I know what I’m doing on them, but all the same, always best to be covered just in case I drop a weight on my foot, or a cable goes boing! snap! when I’m using it…
Settling In
Posted: Sun 6 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Should I be worried about the fact we’ve just spent around £100 at Suttons Seeds for stuff to arrive in the next couple of weeks and get planted?
Mind you, most of those are mini-plants (i.e. they’re not just seeds, these are ones we can pretty much just transplant into the earth) so that’s not as bad as it could be. And in there have also been things like purple carrots (I can’t resist something that sounds that strange/different/interesting) and some potato buckets. All very self-sustaining and green. 2005’s going to have a lot of interesting stuff going on, I’m certain 🙂
Blockage
Posted: Sat 5 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »I’m sure I could find interesting stuff to write – but for some reason today my mind is an utter blank.
I’ll probably have more later – but don’t hold your breath.
B&Q – Tossers
Posted: Fri 4 February, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Weirdness 3 Comments »This time, the stuff didn’t even come off the lorry. The worktops were light grey with black flecks, instead of the expected black with grey flecks. You have to wonder at the epic degrees of twuntdom necessary to fuck up an order to this level, don’t you?
The worktops from the last ballsed-up delivery are still in the house too – the arsewipe bureaucrat tossnerds hadn’t even managed to tell the delivery company that they were supposed to be collecting anything.
Snotty letters will be getting written this weekend, I suspect. Copies will be placed on d4d™ as and when they’re written, which pay provide some level of amusement out of the entire farce process.
Decisions
Posted: Fri 4 February, 2005 Filed under: General 2 Comments »I’ve just had a message left on my phone regarding a job that I was interested in back before Christmas. God knows what they’ve been playing at, but it’s only now coming to a phone-interview stage.
Now, bearing in mind I’m already in a new job, but that this one sounded really interesting, do I bother arranging the phone interview?
Decisions, Decisions.
B&Q – The Tale Continues
Posted: Fri 4 February, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Weirdness 2 Comments »Over the last month, we’ve had endless hassles with B&Q. The initial order was remarkably simple. Two black(ish) three-meter-length worktops, and two laminate worktop ends. You wouldn’t think it was rocket-science, would you?
In the first order, they sent one blue worktop, two kitchen wall-units (1x1000mm and 1x800mm) and four 500mm cherrywood kitchen doors. You’ll note, the doors weren’t even going to match up with the wall units that we received but hadn’t ordered.
In the second one, they managed to deliver two worktops (and take away most of the problem delivery, except for one of the wall units) but also put in a metal vegetable rack, and something that now escapes me. And the worktops were a very nasty reddy-marble finish. Nowhere even in the vicinity of “black”. They were supposed to deliver “in the afternoon“, which translated to 11.30am.
Today is the third attempt. They’re supposed to be delivering in the afternoon, and give Herself 30 minutes notice so that she can get home from work to check the delivery.
So why have they called at 9.45am to say “we’re at the house – where are you?” ? Something makes me think there’s no fucking chance the delivery’s going to be right this time either. I just hope the blood’s been wiped off the street by the time I get home this evening…
Papal Health
Posted: Thu 3 February, 2005 Filed under: Health, News 3 Comments »Is it just me that’s ever so slightly cynical regarding the true health status of the Pope? (well, I know Herself is saying the same kind of thing, so I know it’s not just me) All the information is coming through the Vatican, the hospital he’s staying in is keeping very quiet, and it all sounds very dodgy indeed.
I wouldn’t be surprised if there’s not a nasty “relapse” over the weekend, or early next week once the potential new Pontiffs have all been notified, and made their way to Rome from wherever they currently are.
But maybe I’m just a cynic…
Title Switcher
Posted: Thu 3 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Since writing the little piece of code the other day for it, I’m pleased to see that the title switcher seems to be working fine. I know, it wasn’t complicated to do, and really it was only about ten or fifteen minutes to write it, test it, and make sure all was well. It’s nowt fancy, it’s not going off a database of title tags at random, or anything particularly funky like that (although hmmm, maybe for version 2…) but still, I always like seeing a bit of code that works properly first time…
Bulbs
Posted: Thu 3 February, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »At risk of going off down a slightly trippy-hippy path today, I’ve been thinking a fair amount about plant bulbs of late. We’ve got a whole bundle of hyacinths in the house, all of which are currently growing like buggery. And seeing the way they’re doing this – and the speed they’re doing it at – fills me with wonder.
Bulbs are an amazing energy store. The plant lies dormant through the winter (or what passes for it in the UK at the moment) and when spring comes, bang, they go into overdrive. All of a sudden you see leaves sprouting through, and in the case of amaryllis and hyacinths in particularly, you can virtually watch the things growing. Then the flower-heads start to come out, and finally bloom, and the entire process is – to me, anyway – nothing short of miraculous. Yet plants do it every year.
Sometimes it really doesn’t take much to discover wonder in things. And Spring is the best time of all to see it. It’s bloody everywhere!
Day
Posted: Wed 2 February, 2005 Filed under: Geeky, General Leave a comment »It’s definitely been one of those days today. Half the team at work are off sick, and someone in the other department managed to destroy knacker their laptop hard-drive to the extent that the heads have impacted with the disc platters. Now, this is something I’ve never seen happen without the application of a fair amount of force (i.e. thumping) or gravity (i.e. dropping) – it takes an impact of some sort to do this.l
However, on this occasion we’re dealing with the miraculous. The disk heads have somehow magically impacted with the platters without any application of force whatsoever. In fact, the laptop has never even left the person’s desk. That’s quite impressive.
The other downside (having already bought a new laptop drive) is that it’s a Compaq laptop (hey, don’t blame me, I only work here) and as such the drive cage is – shall we say – a cunt. Two of the four screws are fine and standard, the other two have a weird head on them, which is going to require the application of force and brutality a star-head screwdriver. Thanks Compaq for making life SO much more simple…
Gym thoughts
Posted: Wed 2 February, 2005 Filed under: Health, Resolutions Leave a comment »Last night was the first visit proper to the gym, following on from the induction session last week. And my general conclusion is : “Holy shit, I’m out of shape”. 45 minutes of work-out (including a bit of warm-up and cool-down) including 10 minutes on the rowing machine, 10 minutes exercise bike, and 10 minutes on the cross-trainer.
I’m OK on the exercise bike – six miles in ten minutes is OK. The cross-trainer, well, it’ll increase those “steps per day” for sure, and it’s agreed that I’m comfortable for a walking speed of about 120 paces per minute. The rowing machine I currently feel was probably designed by someone with a degree in medieval torture implements. I still feel utterly unco-ordinated on the bloody thing, and really don’t get how it’s supposed to work. Still, practice makes perfect, I figure.
Title-Bars
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »In a fit of boredom, and in a similar vein to the changing of the top image on d4d™ according to certain important days, I’ve now also bunged in a little bit of code to change the D4D title (at the top of the window) every day.
It’s nothing overly special, and just changes it once a day, but what the hell, it was a couple of minutes work. PHP makes things like that really really easy.
Makes mental note of needing to get out more.
RIP Ivan Noble
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Following on from last week’s post about his last Tumour Diary entry, the BBC today carries the news that Ivan Noble has died.
RIP.
Council Tax Twuntdom – The Response
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »Well, colour me (slightly) impressed. I’ve had a response from the council already. I quote it in it’s entirety… (and without changing the way it was written)
GOOD MORNING
TO CLARIFY THE SITUATION.
YOUR COUNCIL TAX ACCOUNT IS IN CREDIT OF £38.23, I HAVE TODAY REQUESTED THAT A REFUND CHEQUE IS ISSUED TO YOU, THIS YOU WILL RECEIVE IN THE NEXT 10 DAYS
THANK YOU
xxx (Name removed by me – fair’s fair)
So there we go – sorted. Well, questions remain unanswered about why they do the form in such a twunty way in the first place, but at least it’s an answer.
Time Flies
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Bloody Hell, February already.
Where’d January go?
Council Tax Twuntdom
Posted: Tue 1 February, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »One of the joys of moving is getting to deal with whole new levels of bureaucracy when it comes to Council Tax. (for non-UK readers, ignore this post, and simply read it as “Fuckwit cunts, can’t organise a piss-up in a brewery, rant rant, can’t find their own arses with both hands and a flashlight, seethe, seethe, sweary sweary, tossers” and be done with it) Not only do you have to register with a new council, and see what things they can screw up (council tax seems to be a great initiation and benchmark test into just how shite and disorganised a council truly is) but you have to talk to the old council in the place you’ve moved away from, and try to a) convince them you’ve actually left, b) state repeatedly that you are NOT staying within that council’s borders, and c) try to sort out whether you’ve over or under paid the council tax account, and thus try (in my case) to get a refund out of the tightfisted fucktwunt’s coffers. This is nowhere near as easy as it sounds.
Currently I’m now on my fourth letter to Tameside, and about the eighth e-mail. They’ve refused to believe I’m moving, they’ve then charged me for next year’s council tax, denied they’ve ever received the letter to which I’ve just read the reply, and finally said “Oh yes, you have moved. Silly Us. Why didn’t you register it on the website?” “I did. You lost it.” “Oh.”
Eventually, today, the final bill arrived. It’s a wonder of council workings and weirdness.
Amount due 01-Apr-04 to 28-Jan-05 £621.88 Less Disabled Relief 0.00 Less discount at 25&percent; 01-Apr-04 to 30-Dec-04 -£140.59 Less Transitional Reduction* £0.00 Less Council Tax Benefit £0.00 Less exemption relief** 31-Dec-04 to 28-Jan-05 -£59.52 Total Amount Payable £421.77 Payments made -£460.00 CREDIT -£38.23 * I have no idea what this is **I have no idea about this one either
Now, according to that, I’m owed £38.23 by the council because I’ve overpaid by that much. But they’ve listed it as a credit of negative money – which, in English, translates into “You owe us”. I’ve emailed them to ask which it is, and why the language they use is so convoluted and – frankly – fucking wrong.
I can’t wait for the answer on this one. Can you?
Feeling Putrid
Posted: Mon 31 January, 2005 Filed under: Health Leave a comment »Today’s currently not all that good a day. I ended up getting in to work slightly late, mainly due to feeling like shite, but it was my day for the early shift (only by an hour, so it’s no great trauma – and I do get to leave at 4.30 instead of 5.30) so I came in thinking “get this bit out the way, then aim to head home so I can collapse and die for a bit”. Bad, bad, bad idea.
Out of the team of six, three others are already off sick today. So I can’t really head home, short of literally collapsing and dying. Arse.
Ah well, I’m sure I’ll get through it – I’ve managed far, far worse, after all.
Possibility of Downtime
Posted: Mon 31 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 1 Comment »Just a quick notice – d4d™ may be inaccessible between 9 and 10am today, as 34sp are doing some behind-the-scenes server-type work.
Co-proxamol
Posted: Mon 31 January, 2005 Filed under: Health 868 Comments »Interesting to see today that the painkiller co-proxamol is to be scrapped. Apparently it’s been linked with up to 400 deaths per year and a study found it was the second biggest method of drug-related suicide in the UK, accounting for almost one in five deaths.
I’ve used co-proxamol before, and I can see why it’s easy to overdose on, either intentionally or accidentally. It’s a seriously heavy gun in the world of painkillers, and while it’s sad to see something so effective be withdrawn from the market, I can understand the reasons why it’s necessary to do so.
Work Update
Posted: Sun 30 January, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »It’s hard to believe I’ve been down in Bracknell a month already. Things are still going well, the job’s OK and making me do lots of thinking, and I’m pretty settled. Most unnatural.
There are still things to unpack in the house, although we’ve broken the back of the work, and really it’s now stuff like books that need unpacking, but that’s going to be a gradual process.
But yes, so far 2005 is looking like a good year…
Assembling the Proof
Posted: Sun 30 January, 2005 Filed under: Photography, Resolutions 1 Comment »I’ve spent a large part of today sorting through some of my photo collection (a rather worrying 3,750 images, or 4.5GB) to build up a selection that I can build up a bit of a portfolio from. Thankfully, today’s work has involved just one section, the flowers and macro shots I’ve taken. Mind you, even that worked out initially at just over 100 photos, although I’ve since whittled it down to a mere 69.
I’m getting them printed by my normal place, so I’ll have them here for Tuesday, or at latest Wednesday. Once that’s done, I’m going to look at how best I can crop some of them, get them reprinted, and then start work on assembling them into some kind of comprehensive grouping.
There’s a reason for all this. Not only was it part of my resolutions to myself this year, but I want to test the water and see what the reactions are. I’ve got a couple of companies lined up that I’d like to see printing up these photos, but well, we’ll have to see how it all goes, and what they say.
Optical
Posted: Sat 29 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Health Leave a comment »Having signed up with the gym and so on earlier in the week, today was also the day for the sight check-up, as I’ve been hugely slack and not had them tested (Have your eyes ever been checked before? No, they’ve always been brown) in nearly four years.
I’m pleased to say that the prescription has hardly changed. Of course, I’m still what’s technically known as “Blind as a Badger” without them, but with them my sight is OK, and hasn’t changed. So that’s saved me somewhere around £300 straight off this month. Yay!
Twunting About
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Well, I’ve fixed a couple of problems that had been pointed out to me – most of which I knew about anyway, although the problem with the green stylesheet was a new one on me. Still, that’s fixed, as is the problem in the comments boxes where the comment text box overflowed loads.
The problem with the archives is a right fucker. I’ll figure it out, I know, but for now, well, I can’t be arsed. It’s a job for sometime over the weekend. Or next week at work, when I get sick of figuring out helpful error messages like “Exception occurred”. Light relief, and all that guff.
For now though, I’m off to watch some of the shite TV that TiVo (or Herself) have decided I should watch.
Commenting
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ 9 Comments »Have all my old commenters disappeared and/or died? Since moving over to WP there seems to have been a bit of a dearth of commenting around here.
Are there problems with it? If so, either leave a comment, or email me at lyle2 at dummies for destruction.co.uk and I’ll see what I can do to fix it.
If not and I’m just writing uninteresting shite, say that too… *grin*
Header Graphics
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 2 Comments »Well, I’ve finally got the date switcher working on the header graphic, as yesterday showed. It’s actually a dead easy bit of code, I’d just never got round to it.
So anyway – what other dates should I change the header graphic? Obviously d4d™’s birthday is on the list (or will be when I make the actual graphic, but hey, I’ve got ’til August) as is World AIDS Day (ditto).
But what others should be on the list?
WP Upgrade
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »One thing I will say about the upgrade I did earlier this week to WP1.5 is that the log-in screens now work properly. That’s something I’ve had a problem with ever since installing WP on d4d™, and so far this year any posts I’ve done during the day had been created by directly editing the database.
I’ve just tried an old log-on I’d created, and lo and behold, it’s all working the way it should. And now I’ve sorted out that crap with the themes, it’s starting to work the way I wanted it to from the start.
Now I just need to figure out a certain amount of weirdness with the archives only displaying the same number of days as the blog front page does. Then I’ll be more-or-less sorted.
Catching Up
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: Photography, Resolutions Leave a comment »Over the last few weeks – really since before Christmas – one thing I haven’t done much of has been photography. What with one thing and another, it’s just taken a bit of a back seat. Partly because there’s been a slight lack of inspiration, partly I’ve just been hugely busy with other stuff.
Still, on that score it’s not been an inspiring start to the year. I’m hoping to get back on track with it over the next couple of weeks though – and I also intend to go and see what Bracknell Camera Club is like next week (particularly as they’re doing something about flower photos, which are a subject I’m quite into)
I’m also going to go through the process of putting together some of my photos, then braving the vagaries of Amateur Photographer’s critics. Oh, and also submitting a few others to a couple of greetings card manufacturers who specialise in the type of shots that I enjoy, and seem to be pretty good with. So we’ll see how it all works out…
Gymtastic 2
Posted: Fri 28 January, 2005 Filed under: Health, Resolutions Leave a comment »Actually, the gym was nowhere near as bad as I thought. A blood pressure of 128/88, lung something of 530. Just need to lose weight (No? Really?) and keep going regularly.
Cross-trainers are still some form of medieval torture device, but I think I can get used to them. Exercise bikes are no worries, and the rest? Well, I’m just going to take it all as it comes. But it should all be OK.
Gymtastic
Posted: Thu 27 January, 2005 Filed under: Health, Resolutions Leave a comment »Expect a post saying “Ouch” at some point later (or in the morning, if I can’t be arsed tonight) for tonight is the night of the induction session at the gym.
I haven’t been to a gym in about a year now. I should’ve done, I know, but I haven’t. So this session is going to be interesting. I know the kind of things I’m interested in doing, but we’ll see what they have to say – should be fun, if nowt else.
Holocaust Memorial Day
Posted: Thu 27 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, News Leave a comment »Observant readers will note that I’ve changed the title-bar image for today. The logo comes from the UK Government’s Holocaust Memorial site and the picture of the Auschwitz wires etc. comes from the same source – the full high-res version can be seen here.
If all goes according to plan, I’ll probably come up with several more titlebars for other particular days, and do a simple PHP date-match so that they work without me needing to nork about the way I have today.
Finalé
Posted: Thu 27 January, 2005 Filed under: News Leave a comment »via Gordon, the BBC has posted Ivan Nobles final entry in his tumour diary.
I have written it ahead of time because I knew there would be a point when I was not well enough to continue.
…
That time has now come.
Heroic in its own small way, and the comments from others at the end mark the way the tale has touched so many other lives.
Two-faced
Posted: Thu 27 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News Leave a comment »And of course, even on the anniversary of the liberation of Aushwitz, there’s still the stories of false imprisonment. The four UK people who’ve been incarcerated at Guantanamo Bay for three years without charge or court hearing have come back to the UK, and been released by UK police with no charge.
So how do Blair and Bush manage to go to Auschwitz at all? No, their crime isn’t genocide, but it is still imprisonment of foreign nationals for no reason other than rumour.
The difference is scale.
Anniversary of Liberation
Posted: Thu 27 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News 4 Comments »Sixty years ago today, Aushwitz was finally liberated by Soviet troops. At least 1.1 million people died in this one camp. Today, world leaders are going to be there to mark the occasion.
The BBC has some pictures of existence in Auschwitz and also a fairly good history page regarding Genocide under the Nazis. Also, the camp is now a museum, to show people what the place was like.
This type of thing should never be forgotten – this was more than six million people dying because of a racist policy. Holocaust Memorial Day is supposed to remind us that it shouldn’t ever happen again – but of course it does.
Fixed
Posted: Wed 26 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Well, turns out the fix was simple. So why wasn’t it documented in the update process? *shrug*
Anyway, if you’re in the same position of suddenly being thrown into the shit by WordPress Templates, what you need to do is this :
In your index.php file (i.e. the file your blog runs from) right at the top where it says
require(‘./weblog/wp-blog-header.php’);
add in
$wp_template_redirect = false;
so that it looks like this :
$wp_template_redirect = false;
require(‘./weblog/wp-blog-header.php’);
That’ll fix it for the moment. Well, until WP decides that’s shonky, and well, why would anyone NOT want a WP template?
B&Q – Again!
Posted: Wed 26 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Letters Leave a comment »The delivery from B&Q yesterday, as it turned out, wasn’t OK. In the least.
Three items delivered – two 3m length worktops, and a metal storage rack of some sort. Only the worktops were some kind of reddy “marble” finish that’s fucking vile, and is nowhere near the black ones we ordered. And the storage rack is something we hadn’t ordered at all.
They did manage to take away the stuff they’d delivered wrong last time though. Well, they took away three of the four bits. Maybe next time they’ll get it right. But currently I’m not overly optimistic that they could find their arses with both hands and a flashlight, let alone manage to deliver an order correctly.
Thematic
Posted: Wed 26 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 3 Comments »OK, having done a fair bit of research, I think I’ve found a few ways to get the theme sorted and/or restore d4d to its former glory.
Because of the way the style switcher works/worked, I think it’s more likely to need a retrograde step instead of a progressive one. But it’s still a pain in the arse that it needs doing at all.
As Gordon points out in the comments to the post below, yes, WP’s Development Blog kind of mentions themes. Back in December. And that’s fair enough. However, what’s not fair enough is that the upgrade instructions don’t mention them at all, nor how much they’re likely to really fuck up the blog’s appearance ’til you figure it out or think “Oh fuck it, I’ll stick with that theme for now“, which is what I did.
Now, without blowing my own trumpet too much, I know what I’m doing when it comes to websites, PHP, databases, and the like. But if Joe Public were to try upgrading WP the way I did, he/she’d be right up shit creek, with no hints or pointers towards a clue at all.
And that’s not the way to do business, or to keep users.
Tossers
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 4 Comments »I really can’t explain how furious I am with WordPress right now. The upgrade instructions simply say
Upgrading
Before you upgrade anything, make sure you have backup copies of any files you may have modified such asindex.php.
Upgrading from any previous WordPress to 1.5:
- Upload the new files, and be careful not to overwrite anything important
- Point your browser to /wp-admin/upgrade.php
- You wanted more, perhaps? That’s it!
And that’s fucking untrue. Because of the way they now do it, the “themes” seem to have been split off into a seperate section, you have to split up the old index.php file into all these new pieces, and then figure out how the stupid bastards have put it all together. Sounds easy? Trust me, it isn’t.
Not only do you have to do that, you have to figure out just how they’ve coded the themes, and then work out how to register your own. Right now I want to find a WP developer, and rip their bastard throat out.
To coin a phrase, thanks a fucking bundle, WordPress, you utter utter cunts.
Cuntbrained Motherfuckers
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »Yes, currently d4d™ looks very different. Like a wanker I went and installed one of the most recent WP versions (1.5) and due to the cocksucking way it “works” the upgrade has gone and bollocksed all the stylesheet, index page, and generally made a right bastard out of the entire thing.
I now need to go and re-engineer the entire thing to sort it out. This may take a couple of days, due to other commitments and the like.
Thanks a fucking bundle wordpress, you cunts.
10,000
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, General, Health, Resolutions 1 Comment »Today, Gordon’s talking about pedometers, and how many steps people walk in a day. As it’s something that’s good to do as part of the healthy thing, I thought I’d have a quick count-up of the main part of my walking each day.
Thanks to the B&Q delivery (still cocked up, but less cocked-up than it was) I was able to count my walk to and from work. just for this post (He lies, in a fit of “look what I do for you people” pique) It works out as roughly 2,100 steps, although I’ll be verifying that tonight. So assuming I walk both to and from work (I do most of the time, but occasionally get a lift from Herself) just the walk nets me approximately 4,000ish paces. Not bad considering that the average is only 3,000 per day, and that doesn’t take into account the walking I do around the house and office, at lunchtime, or when we take Hundus for a walk. So I reckon that on a normal day I probably average about 5,500-6,000steps – possibly more, but I doubt I break the 7,000 on average.
What interested me more was my walking speed – those 2,100 paces took me approximately 20 minutes. That’s 105 steps per minute, or 1.75 per second. Fairly fast, I’d say.
B&Q – Revisited
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services Leave a comment »Well, it’ll come as no shocker whatsoever to know that B&Q have the strangest concept of time known anywhere outside BT.
The delivery (and removal of items wrongly delivered last time) was scheduled for an “afternoon” slot. OK, no worries. But why are they now delivering it at 11.30am? Since when did that become “Afternoon”?
Firefox
Posted: Tue 25 January, 2005 Filed under: Geeky 2 Comments »It’s impressive to see that Firefox has now been downloaded over 20,000,000 times in only 76 days.
As browsers go, Firefox is definitely my one of choice (although I still do a fair amount of stuff with Opera too) and it’s the first one I install on any new computer, which is normally a pretty good indicator.
And if you haven’t tried it yet, why not?
</nag>
CLI
Posted: Mon 24 January, 2005 Filed under: General 2 Comments »While I’m at work, I try to have a bit of a policy when it comes to my mobile phone. Thanks to CLI, it displays who’s calling. Well, except when the call is coming from an office, or from behind a switchboard, in which case it displays “Private Number” or somesuch guff.
If I can see who’s calling, I’ll normally answer the phone. Seems pretty simple. If I don’t know, I don’t answer it – the phone redirects to the answering service after four rings anyway, so it’s no problem.
However, CLI appears to have passed a lot of people by – particularly those who call from offices or from behind switchboards. So the moronic twunts just ring off when they hear the answerphone message, and thus I’ve keck-all chance of calling them back.
What is it that is so bloody difficult and mentally challenging about recording a message?
Thoughts on Weight
Posted: Mon 24 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Health 2 Comments »I’ve never been small – I’m 6’4″, and tend to average around 20-21stone. (Gordon wrote some thoughts about this earlier this month) I don’t (normally) see myself as “fat” – I’ve got a 50″ chest, which isn’t fat, it’s bone structure. I know, we’ve all heard the “I’m not fat, I’m big-boned” excuse a thousand times, but at some point it does have some veracity.
I know I need to lose some weight – and, as detailed below, it’s beginning to happen. But when I look at what Weightwatchers recommend as my target weight, I can’t really do anything but laugh.
Start Weight : 20st 10.0lb
10% Goal : 18st 9.0lb
Weight Goal : 11st 9.9lb
11st 10lb?!? Now that’s going to be impressive – losing half my body weight. Meanwhile, back in reality…
Quite honestly, I simply don’t think it’s possible for me to lose that much weight. I’ll be happy with 16 or 17 stone – even that I think only borders on feasible. We’ll see. But eleven stone on a 6’4″ frame with a 50″ chest? It’s not going to happen.
Upgrading Health
Posted: Mon 24 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Health, Resolutions 2 Comments »Since the start of this year, I’ve been working a bit on general health and fitness. The first part of that was to start losing some weight. As of yesterday, I’ve lost nearly a stone in weight in three weeks, which I reckon is pretty good. I’m working on losing it sensibly, rather than any crash-dieting or whatever.
The next part of it starts this week. Over the weekend we joined up with a local gym, and the initiation initial consultation is going to be on Thursday. We may go in the meantime just for a tryout, but having visited it before Christmas I pretty much know what to expect.
There’s still a long way to go – including a visit to the GP, and a thyroid test. (It runs in the family, so it’s best to see how I’m doing on that score) There’s also a plan to buy a bike, which should be interesting as I haven’t ridden one regularly in about eight years.
Still, it’s all working so far, and it’ll be interesting to see how things go.
Anti Spam – the Saga Continues
Posted: Sun 23 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »I’ve now installed a different anti-spam plug-in. We’ll see how this one goes. If anyone feels that their comments have gone astray, or that there’s a problem with how it’s working, let me know by email, sending it to lyle2 at the domain name. ( i.e. @dummies-for-destruction.co.uk ). Cheers.
Anti-Spam fuckup
Posted: Sun 23 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 2 Comments »Well, Spam-Karma was an interesting experiment, but ultimately flawed. Possibly because I’m still “only” on WP1.2 instead of the nightly 1.5 and so on, I’ve discovered that once SK had decided a comment was Spam, there appears to be no way to get it back. And frankly, that’s shite.
My apologies to Anni and Gordon (and at least one other contributor) whose comments were nicked by SK and shoved into some weird ether database. If I can recover the comments then I will, but for now, ’til I figure out what the fuck it’s doing, SK has been killed off.
It’s a pain, because it was doing a nice job on the other stuff…
Not Taking The Piss At All
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services Leave a comment »On the other hand, I ordered a couple of spare parts from Fujifilm yesterday for my camera. They arrived today. Now that is what customer service is all about. And “under-promise, over-deliver” – I wonder why more companies can’t follow up on a policy like that?
Taking The Piss – Part 2
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »Currently my mobile phone is on the O2 network. I’ve been with them for nearly a year, so it’s coming up to the time to upgrade the handset, and all that gubbins. Joy.
I’m looking for an upgrade to the one that I’ve got now, and quite like the Nokia 6600, which according to O2 is free (plus a free bluetooth headset) with a new account. So I call them up to see if I can upgrade my current phone to this one.
Well, I can, but only if I pay £100. Frankly, fuck that. If I move my number over to Vodafone I can get the newer model (the 6630) for £30 and simply port my number over to them. And save myself a nice little £70 into the bargain. I can get the 6600 for absolutely keff-all.
When I explain to the O2 muppet this situation, that I’ll actually just move my contract to another provider, the attitude is “Fine, you’ll have the same problems with upgrading the phone with Vodafone in twelve months time”. Hardly conducive to making me want to stay with O2, is it?
I have to wonder what kind of company seemingly is so happy to lose customers. Their attitude of “We’ll charge you to stay with us” seems utterly bizarre. Maybe I’m just naïve though. *shrug*
Taking the Piss
Posted: Sat 22 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »As I said earlier this week, Nine Inch Nails are doing two concerts in London in March. Allegedly. Tickets went on sale today at 9am. Allegedly.
The website that’s supposed to be selling the tickets has no mention of them. Ticketmaster have no idea what the fuck I’m talking about, when I eventually get through. The Carling Live website (the London Astoria is now owned by Carling, apparently – Jesus God Fucking Christ help us all) doesn’t even list the gig.
In short, buying tickets for this event is currently an absolute no-no, and no-one seems to know what the fuck is going on. I despair.
Heavy Lifting
Posted: Fri 21 January, 2005 Filed under: News Leave a comment »Wow. 180 tons of granite being lifted by a crane that arrives on 30 lorries and takes a week to assemble.
The resultant sculpture may actually make me want to visit the Eden Project. Sometime in 2006 when it’s been completed.
Time Flies
Posted: Fri 21 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Travel Leave a comment »Isn’t it hard to believe that we’re already three weeks into 2005. Where’s it all gone?
I find that if I look back and actually take stock of what I’ve done in that time, I’ve got through one hell of a lot of stuff. But at the same time it only feels like yesterday that we were seeing in the New Year.
This weekend is going to be the first in ’05 where we’re not travelling up to Manchester in order to sort out house etc. There’s still a lot to do, but for the first time this year it doesn’t involve travelling all over the place. This is a Very Good Thing, if slightly novel.
I finally feel like I’m kind of settled again – and able to sit down a bit and take a deep breath and some down time. Of course, I bet it won’t happen quite like that, but it’s a nice concept.
More Comments Gubbins
Posted: Thu 20 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »While sorting out comment spam and the like, I’ve also altered the comments so that they now appear in a pop-up instead of in-line with the post.
I’ve had a couple of queries about doing it this way – and of course I still need to alter the CSS again for comments, but that’s the way of the world, I guess.
I haven’t got time just now to do the editing of the CSS, so I’m afraid that for today it’ll look a bit messy, but I’ll sort it when I get the chance.
UPDATED : Well, I found some time to play with the comments pop-up page, so it’s now all fixed and done.
Ooh, Ooh, Ooh
Posted: Thu 20 January, 2005 Filed under: Music, News Leave a comment »Excellent news – Nine Inch Nails, one of my long-term favourite bands, will be playing the London Astoria on Wednesday March 30th and Thursday 31st. Tickets go on sale at 9am on Saturday.
No idea as to price just yet, but well, it’s NIN.
Comment Spam
Posted: Thu 20 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Following on from attacks over the last couple of weeks, I’ve got round to installing Spam Karma to see how we do. Frankly, if it even halves the amount of shit littering d4d™’s comments, I’ll be happy.
Supposedly, WP1.4 or 1.5 will have a lot more anti-spammer stuff in it out of the box, but well, we’ll see.
Frustration
Posted: Wed 19 January, 2005 Filed under: Geeky, General Leave a comment »Part of the problem with going between MySQL and SQL Server is that certain datatypes and so on are very different.
I’m now re-doing the database for the third time, because also SQL Server doesn’t let you alter datatypes once they’ve been entered.
Grrrrr. Microsoft. Grrr.
Alternate Convenience
Posted: Wed 19 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Weirdness 5 Comments »My new employer currently rents office space – although that’s going to change this year. Where we are though there’s a very strange layout.
Toilets are in the main entrance lobby for each floor – that’s fine. It can’t be a nice sight on occasion for visitors, their first glimpse of the company being someone going to/from the bog, but that’s another matter. The odd thing is that each floor has either mens or womens toilets – they alternate per floor. So if you’re female and work on level 3, you’ve got to go up or down one floor to get to a toilet. If you’re male on level 3 all’s cushy, but if you’re on level 4 you’ve got to do some stair-climbing.
I assume there’s a logic to this concept, but gawd only knows what it is. The really funny bit is when the toilets are being cleaned, and people have to (potentially) go up or down by two floors in order to use the facilities.
All very strange.
Headchuffed
Posted: Tue 18 January, 2005 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »Today I’ve discovered (yet again) that actually one of my biggest problems when it comes to running my own site-design business as well as working for a living is when the two sections bounce off each other.
The place I’m now working for is very much an ASP house, it’s all Microsoft, OLEDB, ODBC, SQL Server and the like. The stuff I do for myself is far more “Open Source” – PHP, MySQL, that kind of thing.
The conflict comes when you try writing ASP commands in a PHP page, and vice versa. And yes, I’ve done both today. Utterly tubular, but the joys of keeping at least two programming languages current in the brain at the same time, particularly when they do pretty much the same things.
Anyone got any paracetamol?
Reliant No More
Posted: Tue 18 January, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Following on from yesterday’s post regarding waiting for other people to do stuff, I’m now sorted and working on my own projects again.
Much, much happier now I can simply sit down and get writing these pages so that the work can start being done.
I can’t deny, in some ways the current project is hugely daunting, doing the documentation, site maps, procedures etc. for twelve systems I’d never even seen at the start of the year, but it’s also the kind of thing that I enjoy, being dropped in at the deep end and having to figure it all out from scratch.
Of course, I may end up swearing lots (hey, that’d be a shock) and Visual Source Safe is a nightmare for writing/editing code in, but that’s the way it’s going to be for now, so I can live with it no worries.
Spam Comments
Posted: Tue 18 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, News, Sweary 4 Comments »Since 8am today I’ve been getting attacked (again) by some weasel-prick fudgenugget tossbadger comment spammers. Yet again, it’s fucking bloody Texas Hold’em Poker and its many variants, and at last count it was something like 600 comments.
First of all, can anyone recommend a decent anti-comment-spam script to run in WordPress? All answers and ideas gratefully received.
Also, according to the BBC Gambling sites are getting hit by DDOS attacks from hackers and the like, and are complaining it’s not fair. Well, so far as I’m concerned while their brethren insist on spamming the shit out of blogs, sites, and email, then they deserve every fucking DDOS attack they get. Reap what you sow, you shitworm cockknockers.
Reliant
Posted: Mon 17 January, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »Anyone who knows me will be aware that I’m really not all that good at relying on other people, nor am I exactly great at being tolerant when those other people don’t come through with what I’ve asked for and need done.
Today is one of those days – I need log-on details for certain sections of the stuff at work, and I’ve asked several people how to get it sorted. “Oh, I’ll do that in a couple of minutes” is the answer- and it’s not happening. I actually want to get on and get working on these projects and ideas, yet I can’t ’til I get the log-on and passwords sorted out. Yet I’m still waiting.
In another section, I’m waiting for feedback from a couple of people in what needs doing and altering in a couple of places, and that’s not happening either.
I’m pretty much in limbo, and that’s a place I don’t want to be. It’s frustrating, and I’m really not handling it all that well.
Ouch
Posted: Mon 17 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News Leave a comment »Sometimes I must admit that I find it incredible just what the human body can tolerate, and apparently not even notice.
Today’s story in the BBC of a man who didn’t know a nailgun had backfired and sent a nail through the roof of his mouth is one of those instances. A mixture of “ick” and “how?” thoughts went through my head while reading it…
485,000
Posted: Sun 16 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »It’s been a fair time since I did a report on the number of page views/hits on d4d™ so I took the opportunity today to let one run.
I must admit, I’m not convinced any more that it’s completely accurate – it’s saying that d4d™ has had just under 500,000 page views since it started. That’s nothing short of bloody amazing – but the figures do have a huge spike on the 26/27/28 December, so I wonder if a lot of that is down to the WP virus attack that was going on at the time. I don’t know.
What I may have to do is invest in a proper hit-logging system and work from there.
Memetastic
Posted: Sun 16 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, General 4 Comments »via Karen at Uborka, a musical Meme.
1. What is the total amount of music files on your computer?
A disturbingly paltry 24.8Gb. Although there’s another 8Gb on the laptop…
2. The cd you last bought is:
The last one I bought was Wake by Dead Can Dance. Very strange Australian band who play very traditional music. Not what you’d expect me to be into at all. Last album someone bought me is “Who Killed The Zutons” at Christmas. Bloody excellent.
3. What is the song you last listened to before reading this message?
Um – something on the radio last night, I think. No idea what though, we’d just done four and a bit hours on the motorway…
4. Write down 5 songs you often listen to or that mean a lot to you:
- Nine Inch Nails – Something I Can Never Have. Always reminds me of some odds and sods that were going on a long time ago.
- Alabama 3 – Peace in the Valley. A kind of closure for the things that I’m reminded of by Something I Can Never Have.
- Cowboy Junkies – Trinity Sessions album. Bit of a cheat, but the entire album is filled with memories and thoughts.
- Tom Waits – Bone Machine album.
- Faithless – Reverence album. Their first album, and they still haven’t managed to beat it, so far as I’m concerned.
5. Who are you going to pass this stick to? (3 persons) and why?
No idea – whoever reads it and thinks “Oooh, that’s cool”.
Knackered
Posted: Sun 16 January, 2005 Filed under: Sweary, Travel Leave a comment »200+ miles on Friday – not too bad a journey, certainly better than last weekend’s gale-strewn nightmare.
200+ miles back on Saturday – under five hours in a fully laden High-side Sprinter van, including a break. Not far short of fucking amazing travel-time, really.
Sunday – moving stuff between garage, house, garage, tip, back from tip that has a 6′ height limit for some reason known only to local fuckwit cunty bastard councillors.
Currently collapsed and dead before moving some more stuff around the house in order to settle stuff into proper places. This domesticity thing is bloody chaos to set up – but the results will be worth it.
Travelling – Again
Posted: Fri 14 January, 2005 Filed under: Travel Leave a comment »I’m away now, travelling up to Manchester (again) for the final bit of moving.
An update will be made tomorrow – late tomorrow. But at least then it’ll be over and done with.
Bah February Humbug
Posted: Fri 14 January, 2005 Filed under: Festering Season 3 Comments »I just looked at the calendar – in a months time, it’ll be Valentine’s Day.
Doesn’t time fly?
B&Q revisited
Posted: Fri 14 January, 2005 Filed under: B&Q, Customer Services, Sweary 7 Comments »About two weeks ago, we ordered some items from B&Q’s website – nothing particularly special, two lengths of kitchen worktop and some doors to replace the current ones on the units. Not bank-breaking, about £250 all told.
Because I’m a twunt, it ended up being two orders – one for the doors, one for the worktops. Fair enough, that’s my fault, and I don’t have a problem with them for that part of it.
When all the stuff arrived at B&Q’s branch – all on the same day, I should point out – they decided in their infinite wisdom that the two deliveries should go out via two different carriers. Why, fuck only knows. But that’s how they decided to do it. Ah good – insanity from the start.
The deliveries arrived yesterday and today. The unit doors delivery was done by Parcelforce, and one of the most spectacularly unhelpful and braindead semi-primates known to science. He couldn’t bring both packages to the door, so I had to carry one. The one he carried (bearing in mind it’s wooden doors) was dumped right on the door jamb, and the packaging for the one I was carrying was split. “Not my problem, mate, I just deliver them. If you want to complain you’ll have to call someone. I just deliver ’em.” I think this was a pre-programmed speech, operated by use of the expression “where do I say on your little computer ‘packaging damaged, goods uninspected’?”. But I digress.
The second delivery – supposedly two 3m lengths of worktop, and an end-cap for the worktop – arrived today. Only – well – it’s one worktop. In the wrong colour. It’s also two 1000mm wall units in “cherry”, four cherry-wood doors, and a 400mm door. None of which match. None of which we ordered.
We now have to organise to get all the stuff taken away, and then re-order what we wanted. In short, the entire thing has been about as organised as elephants working in a jelly factory. Fucking farcical. I wonder if Richard Branson is the B in B&Q?
Right Proper Charlie
Posted: Fri 14 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News 1 Comment »OK, he’s been the centre of various controversies over the last couple of years, but really, is Prince Harry wearing a Nazi uniform to a fancy dress party that shocking?
It seems to me that the headlines should read (or would,if the media could get away with it) “Harry is a tit. Again.”. Not a shocker, not a revelation.
In fact, as with many other “controversies” it seems to be proving to be a great excuse for red-tops like the Sun to print pictures of swastikas – immediately causing more offence – and to a far wider audience – than the original transgression did. The entire thing has a kind of bitter hypocrisy to it, along with a “you should be shocked by this” undertone that I find deeply unpleasant.
I’ve never been a great fan of the media telling me what I should be thinking/doing – and let’s face it, that’s seems to be the raison d’etre for most of the tabloids. This appears to be another example – yes, Harry was a twat, but that appears to be a bit of a family trait anyway. Other than that, the people that should be had up for offending public decency or whatever are the editors of the papers that seem to delight so in showing that photo as many times as they can get away with.
Corners
Posted: Thu 13 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »A couple of days ago I was whittling on about rounded corners when you view this site in Firefox, and as Caitlin rightly pointed out, there were a whole lot less rounded corners than I thought there were. Ooops.
Anyway, I’ve found the problem, and will be fixing that too over the next few days. The blue colourscheme already has them, if you’re interested.
Moving Over
Posted: Thu 13 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Not content with moving house (and yes, that’s still being finalised this weekend. Can’t wait) I’m also slowly moving over pages to their new stylesheet and .php extension. It’s a slow process – mainly because I forgot I’d done some already and that they were on the laptop.
Those pages got moved over yesterday, and the navigation got changed to send you to the .php page instead of the .html. All the base pages linked to in the navigation are now using the new style – and all use the stylesheet as selected here in d4d™
I’ll move over the other pages as and when I get round to it. But it’ll be sooner rather than later, I’m sure.
UPDATED : Well, the stylesheet holds on all browsers except IE. No idea why, but I’ll look into it tonight.
UPDATED AGAIN : Ah, it now works on IE too. What I’d done was fuck up how the cookie that holds the colour selection works. Buggery. Anyway, you may now have to re-select your preferred colour-scheme on this page, and it’ll then be sorted on the new pages too. Sorry about that.
Mayfly
Posted: Thu 13 January, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Over at Meish, Meg has resurrected The Mayfly Project – now in its fifth year.
The basic premise is to sum up your year in twenty words or less. That’s it. It makes for fun reading, and it’s quite a challenge to get a year into twenty words.
Ending World Poverty
Posted: Wed 12 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky, News Leave a comment »The observant among you will have noticed the little diagonal white banner on d4d™ about making poverty history. I nicked the scriptlet for it from Chris who’s now not sure where he got it from.
Anyway, if you want to add it in yourself, simply add this line to your current index page.
<script type="text/javascript" src="http://www.makepovertyhistory.org/whiteband_small_right.js"></script>
just under the <body> tag. Lo and behold, the banner appeareth. It’s very neatly done. Huge respect is due.
Phone Theft
Posted: Wed 12 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News 2 Comments »According to this story on the BBC, from today you can register your phone’s details online so that if the phone is stolen, you have a better chance of getting it back.
It’s pretty easy to do – although you need the phone’s IMEI number. On O2 you can get this by dialling *#06# (according to their website – it didn’t work on mine,but there we go, that’s O2 for you) or it should be on the phone’s label, just under where the battery goes.
I’ve no idea how good the system will be, but anything that makes phone theft more traceable – and in fact more difficult to get away with – gets my support.
UPDATED : Apparently it’s not a new site or programme, but well, I’m still going to keep the post, as it’s a good thing for people to know about.
Reaping What They Sowed
Posted: Wed 12 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Travel 5 Comments »Sometimes life offers up an opportunity that’s just too sweet to miss. Many readers will know how much I hate Virgin Trains and their utterly shite levels of service/ punctuality/ common sense/ etc.
At Virgin Trains, we’re making moves towards a service that delivers
100% customer satisfaction. And with more new trains and faster, more
frequent journeys, we’re getting there.What we really need now is your feedback, to help us get there faster.
In return, we’ll enter you into a draw to win First Class leisure travel
for two on Virgin Trains for a whole year!
I got this email today telling me that they want feedback from customers about the service that Virgin offer. I can’t deny it, I couldn’t resist. So I’ve let them know what I think, and what could be improved.
Hacks
Posted: Wed 12 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »I have actually found a way to write posts for d4d™ while at work. The log-in problems with WordPress still exist, which is an utter cunt and no-one seems to be able to explain why it’s happening at all. Oh, and yes, the support forums are utterly abysmal.
Anyway, I realised that I can actually add in posts by the simple move of writing them directly into the database. I know my way round what WordPress does, and how it holds the data, so why not? And that’s exactly what I’ve done.
It’s not an elegant way of doing things – given the choice I’d much rather be doing it through WP’s front-end, just in case things go horribly wrong – but for now it’ll do as an alternative. Maybe that’ll change when WP releases a fix. But ’til then well, what the hell, if there’s stuff I want to write about during the day then I’ll do it this way.
Geeky, but true.
Validation
Posted: Tue 11 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 4 Comments »At long flaming last, the XHTML code for d4d™ now validates. It’s taken effing ages to get round to sorting, but it’s now done.
I could do the CSS too – but there’s a couple of things I like in it (such as the rounded corners on borders when viewed in Mozilla/ Firefox) that don’t validate. So bollocks. I could get ultra-picky, but frankly I can’t be arsed. Life’s too short.
Final Stages
Posted: Tue 11 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News Leave a comment »Well, the Transit van (technically it’s a Sprinter, but who’s counting?) is now booked for Friday, so we’re just about ready for the final part of the move.
It’s been a fair while coming, to be honest – but I’ll be glad when it’s all out of the way at last.
Adding on Work
Posted: Tue 11 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »You know, sometimes I wonder about my own sanity. The documentation project I wrote about yesterday has – well, it’s changed. Originally I was going to be building up a site-map for each site the company does, documenting how it all worked, and making it understandable for all.
I’m still going to be doing that.
However, I’m now doing the entire thing in its own database, looking at how to map stuff back out of the database, and generally making it into a far more useable tool, but increasing my initial workload by about 500%.
Smart move or what?
2,300
Posted: Tue 11 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »Amazingly (and even more amazing that I didn’t notice at the time) I’ve now written just over 2,300 posts on d4d™ That’s quite something. I’ve no idea what the word count is (although I’m sure I could figure out a way if I wanted to) but even so, 2,300 posts is pretty good. I’m going to do a log-report tonight as well, and see how the viewing figures are going. I think they’ve taken a bit of a downturn since going over to WordPress, but I don’t know for certain just yet.
A lot has happened over those 2,300 posts, and I’m sure there’s plenty more still to happen.
Wiki
Posted: Mon 10 January, 2005 Filed under: Geeky 1 Comment »Oh yes, that’s the other thing I’ve got to start looking at. The work Intranet needs (apparently) a Wiki to be started from scratch as an in-house glossary thing so that everyone realises that they DO all talk about the same thing, just that different companies refer to the same things in different ways.
Which is, of course, dead helpful, and makes everything SO much easier…
Work related
Posted: Mon 10 January, 2005 Filed under: Geeky 2 Comments »Work is still carrying on apace, and actually looks like it’ll be interesting. As it turns out, I’m not just going to be developing new stuff, I’m going to be doing a lot of background stuff, writing documentation, creating site maps, database diagrams, data-flow explanations, the lot. It’s all linked to quality management (I just know that Karen has now put her head in her hands, thinking “Oh God, he’s going to be asking me questions on it”) and a whole bundle of technical documentation etc. (And now Gordon has done the same)
I’ve not done a lot of this side of IT work before – as a techie, documentation etc. has always been someone else’s problem. But now it’s mine, and I’m actually looking forward to doing some new stuff, figuring out the inherent challenges, and generally swearing lots while I do so. Oh, and in the meantime it’ll also provide me with a good way of learning all the systems and how they work. Not bad at all.
Broadband’s Back
Posted: Sun 9 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 1 Comment »In other news, now that the main PC has moved homes to be back with me, we’re now sorted for broadband etc. Well, technically speaking it’s semi-broadband, a 300Kbps service, but for what we need, that’ll do fine.
I find that I’m less and less interested in downloading music and films etc. – the 300Kbps will be purely for data, email, web-browsing and the like, and quite honestly the “slower” speed will do just fine for that kind of thing.
Now I’m off to sort out new email accounts, new mail server names and the like. You can tell I’m not a pure techie by the fact I’m not actually running my own mail server.
Oh, and next step is to put it all back to going through the router/firewall box. That’ll be fun, but it’s a job for the morning. In the meantime, it’s all getting turned off again. Can’t think why…
Movement
Posted: Sun 9 January, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Another bloody good journey – I could get used to this, if only I didn’t know it’ll never last. Four hours door-to-door, including a break at Some Services Close To The Edge Of Christendom™. They’re only known by such a long title because I can’t remember exactly where they were, or who ran them. Travelling is not good for the memory, nor for the IQ.
Two Three (my mistake) runs to the dump – and my (now ex) council should be shot for how bad their website is. Look under “dump” or “refuse site” and fuck all comes back. Look under “environmental center” and the story is the same. Look under “civic amenity site” and there we go, the tip I’d wanted to find. Now, why didn’t I think of it as a “civic amenity”? Because that’s not what they should be listed under, according to the e-government and APLaws projects! Twunts.
So now the move is half-complete. Most (if not all) of the high-value gubbins is now moved, thanks to Herself’s idea of hiring a mini combo van for the weekend, which made a lot of sense when it came to shifting stuff about. Far better than a Fiesta…
Next weekend it’s the joys of a high-side Transit or similar, for the big stuff. That’ll be fun then.
Birthday
Posted: Sat 8 January, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »Oh yes, and Happy Birthday Lori. Hope it’s been a good one, and sorry we didn’t make it to the party. We’ll make up for it at Sevitz’s bash…
Manic
Posted: Sat 8 January, 2005 Filed under: General Leave a comment »After yesterday’s mad journey up to Manchester, we’ve been packing stuff up for the last twelve hours. Utterly knackered – one load of ex-furniture to the local tip (it was so knackered it wasn’t worth moving it, or trying to find another buyer for the stuff) and a whole bundle of stuff sorted.
Along the way, we’ve decided that I’ve got WAY too many DVDs, books and CDs, which makes life interesting – still, there’s lots of new shelves in Bracknell to fill with that kind of junk. Although I doubt there’ll be anywhere near as much once all this lot has been unloaded and sorted.
The first week of ’05 has been nothing short of insane, what with New Year, new job, new house, and still moving stuff from the old one. Next weekend is going to be the final push on that score – hiring a Transit van to get it all in, and working from there. And after that, with luck, some time to sit down and stop.
It’s a nice thought, but whether it’ll happen or not is another matter entirely…
Travelling
Posted: Fri 7 January, 2005 Filed under: Travel Leave a comment »Most unnatural. The M40, M42, M6, and really the entire route up to Manchester were – well – easy. Four hours. That’s it.
Not too bad at all – but fucking hell it’s windy!
Harveys
Posted: Wed 5 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services 13 Comments »There’s an advert currently on TV for Harveys furniture stores‘ January Sale, and frankly it annoys the tits off me.
The sales pitch is that they’ve “taken half the price off, then an extra ten percent”. Now, I’m no rocket scientist, but from the price examples they give, that’s just a bag of shite. They have one piece of furniture that was £899. It’s now £299. OK, So 899/2 is £450. Less 10% ( £45) we get £405. Not £299.
Not one example actually adds up to what they say. Quite how they’ve got the ad through OFCOM is beyond me. But there we go.
Changes
Posted: Wed 5 January, 2005 Filed under: Health, Resolutions Leave a comment »The new job is still going well. I think I’ve done more brain-work in the last 48 hours than I did in 18 months in the previous job. The learning curve is somewhere just short of effing vertical, but that suits me just fine. I like being challenged mentally (as opposed to being mentally challenged *Grin*)
Along the way I’m also working on weight loss – we’ve both joined Weightwatchers’ online programme (and I have to say that for a system that’s entire web-based, their website is utterly fucking shite) and that’ll continue to be worked on. It was one of my targets for 2005 anyway, to lose some of my ample bulk, and it’s going to be interesting to see how it works. There’s also a gym membership in the offing, which’ll help too. There’ll be fairly regular updates on that score – not that anyone really cares, but well, what the chuff, it’s going to be interesting to me.
Now I just need to get the move and so on sorted – there’s a lot of stuff around that still to be organised, but with luck I’ll be able to get a lot of that dealt with while I’m up there again this weekend.
But in general, 2005 has started well, and I just hope it’s going to keep on in the same vein…
Observative
Posted: Tue 4 January, 2005 Filed under: General, Travel 2 Comments »Today on the TV news, they talked about charity shops, and did a report on one in particular that specialised in selling second-hand books and music. Since the Tsunami disaster in Asia, they’ve been snowed under with donations and so on. Which is all well and good, obviously – every little helps.
However, when they were doing the report, they showed a man taking a book off the shelves. In a fit of epic bad taste (although I’m pretty sure they didn’t even realise what it was) the book was The Beach by Alex Garland. If you know the book or the film should be cringing right about now.
New Job
Posted: Tue 4 January, 2005 Filed under: General 1 Comment »The new job is fine, by the way. Induction days are always dire, but this one’s not been too bad at all. In general I feel pretty optimistic about the entire thing, and we’ll just have to see how it all goes.
A New Paradigm
Posted: Tue 4 January, 2005 Filed under: D4D™ 1 Comment »I’m afraid that some things are going to have to change on d4d™ due to the new job and so on. Because of the ongoing problems with logging in to WordPress from anywhere other than my PC and laptop (only one of which is even within 150 miles of me ’til the weekend) I can’t write stuff for d4d while anywhere other than work. That’s a pain in the arse, so updates will be done either early in the morning, or in the evening.
Also, over Christmas d4d™ got hit badly with comment spam (and by badly, I mean in excess of 1,800!) for fucking online poker sites. As such, I’m banning the word “poker” from all comments. Again, it’s a pain in the arse, but it’s better than making all comments moderated, considering the problems listed above.
Observation
Posted: Sun 2 January, 2005 Filed under: General 3 Comments »You can tell Christmas is over. The shelves are full of Cadbury’s Creme Eggs.
Ikea
Posted: Sun 2 January, 2005 Filed under: Customer Services, Sweary 3 Comments »What is it about Ikea? I’ve been three times now, and each time I reckon that the average IQ for the entire building is about 8. I’m including my own IQ in this average – but it’s not that much of a factor, considering the sheer number of people in the place.
Personally, I think a lot of Ikea’s stuff is bloody good. It’s just that buying it and getting through the store without aid of machetes and landmines is an utter cunt. If their website were any good – fuck it, even if their website were utter shite (Oh look, it is) but included some form of e-commerce (remember that terminology?) then I’d use the bloody thing. Instead it’s a sack of crap, and doesn’t actually even include some of the products they do. Guess what? The stuff we wanted was part of that section. Fuck it, we’re off to Ikea. Oh goody.
The problem with the place is that while the concept is great, the infrastructure is nothing short of fucking shit. The staff are International, to be charitable. Perhaps if you know Esperanto then you’ve a chance of getting sorted without resorting to sign-language and pop-eyes as a communication method. As it is, it’s like a Tower of Babel – multiple languages, and some impressive linguistic abilities. If you speak Swahili, or some obscure dialect from Papua New Guinea then you’re in with a shot of being served at Ikea. Effnic minorities are well served in this.
Unfortunately, Ikea’s concept seems to stick WAY too much in the hands of the general public, and they seem to be more comfortable with being spoon-fed stuff. Even the simple concepts like “getting your items in the car” seems to be beyond most of the motherfuckers. Rather than spreading themselves along the area, and standing back near the wall so people can make their way past, they all cram to the front where the cars are, as if they can book a space like that. No, instead it just blocks the entire fucking place for everyone else.
How more murders don’t happen every day in Ikea, I just don’t know – if I had to visit regularly, or God Forbid, work there, the place would be like a charnel house within minutes.
Busy going on Manic
Posted: Sun 2 January, 2005 Filed under: General, News Leave a comment »Well, what a happy new year it is so far. I’ve got a cold, and we’ve been to Ikea today (More ranty about that in a bit, I suspect) although seeing the parents yesterday was kind of cool. I’m looking forward to relaxing a bit tomorrow now before starting off the new job on Tuesday. Nervous? No, not really – I’m actually quite enthusiastic about it, which is a pretty bizarre concept, all things considered…
Lots of shopping has been done, Life insurance has been bought, Ikea has been visited, I’m even starting to work on weight-loss through doing a weightwatchers-style plan. Now there is a scary concept!
2005
Posted: Sat 1 January, 2005 Filed under: Resolutions 4 Comments »Hmmm, New Year, New Lifestyle. There’s going to be a lot of changes throughout 2005, and while I’m normally averse to resolution lists and so on, the following are some of the things I’m planning on doing during the year.
- Making a photo portfolio, and taking it to a couple of agents, seeing how I do
- Sorting out the Driving Test *cough*
- Doing a few more bits of “proper” writing
- Taking time out, and not running round like quite such a silly bastard
- Enjoying life in its new facets
- Debating whether to close my current company and restart with something new.
- Or Not.
- Lots of other things that I’ll list as I go on
What I’m likely to do with this post (or some form of “resolutions” page, anyway) is to have a link off the sidebar over there >>> and keep it updated as new stuff occurs to me, and/or when stuff gets done.
And in the meantime, Happy New Year to all D4D™ readers. Have a good one!
Sod.
Posted: Fri 31 December, 2004 Filed under: General 1 Comment »Oh yes, and in the end it looks like the bits we want are going to be from Ikea®. Oh goody – another journey to Brent Cross.
*Sob*
Shopping
Posted: Fri 31 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season, General Leave a comment »Grrr, shopping between Christmas and New Year is a fucking nightmare. So far in the last couple of days we’ve looked at umpteen furniture stores (including a journey to the Pit of the Earth – AKA Ikea) as well as some other places for clothes and general domestic stuff. The furniture places (excluding Ikea) were fairly OK, but the general stores were only classifiable as Hell On Earth™.
Still, all over for the moment, and it’s a New Years’ Eve in Reading with friends. Have a good one, one and all.
Under Attack
Posted: Wed 29 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 1 Comment »WordPress has recently been under attack by a worm. For more information about it, look here. In the meantime, if you are running WordPress, add the following code at the top of your index.php page, just after the < ?php line.
if (strpos($REQUEST_URI, 'visualcoders.net') > 0) {
exit;
};
if (strpos($HTTP_USER_AGENT, 'wp-trivial') > 0) {
exit;
};
if (strpos($HTTP_REFERER, 'myhost.gb.com') > 0) {
exit;
};
if (strpos($HTTP_REFERER, 'mall.uk.net') > 0) {h
exit;
};
Apparently, it stops the attacks dead. Sounds good to me.
Getting Sorted
Posted: Wed 29 December, 2004 Filed under: Customer Services Leave a comment »Getting there – sorted out a multitude of address changes and account closures, either for now or for the end of January when I finally give up the house in Manchester.
It’s all happening, slowly but surely. Most unnatural – I’m sure these things are supposed to be more chaotic than this!
Bank Holidays
Posted: Tue 28 December, 2004 Filed under: Customer Services Leave a comment »Of course, the problem at the moment with changing all my address details is that if they can’t be done online, there’s pretty much fuck-all chance of doing them ’til tomorrow when Customer Services departments the country over finally open up again…
Over and Done With
Posted: Tue 28 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season 2 Comments »Hallelujah, that’s the Festering Season™ over and done with for 2004. Yippee!
Actually, if I’m honest, it’s not been too bad. Norfolk was lovely, bright sky, and not too many hassles. Back in the land of dial-up for a while, although I’m going to be sorting out broadband as soon as possible.
Over the next few days, I’m going to be sorting out loads of address changes. You never really realise how many places have your address details ’til it comes to a time like this, where you need to change them all. Bills, Mobile Phone, Domain Names and accounts, loads of stuff. Joy.
But at least we’re over and done with Christmas. Just a New Years’ Eve to get through now, and then it’s full steam ahead for 2005…
Festering Season
Posted: Sat 25 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season 1 Comment »Much as it’s unlike me, and the rest of the stuff on d4d™, I just want to say that I hope everyone’s Festering Season runs smoothly.
And remember, a stun-gun is for life, not just while Christmas Shopping in Asda/Tesco/Wherever.
Travelling
Posted: Thu 23 December, 2004 Filed under: General 4 Comments »Norfolk, Here I come.
Don’t expect much here ’til after Christmas now. The wilds of Norfolk are not known for their internet connectivity…
Manic
Posted: Thu 23 December, 2004 Filed under: Travel Leave a comment »Aaargh – Manic moments. Why is it that no matter how well planned everything is, there’s always stuff that needs to be done in the last 30 seconds?
Happy Happy Day
Posted: Wed 22 December, 2004 Filed under: General 1 Comment »And that’s it, I’m no longer working in Oldham. Eighteen months, gone not with a bang but a whimper.
Upgrading
Posted: Wed 22 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »In general, I must say I’ve been pretty impressed with how WordPress works. The log-in thing is a pain in the arse, and still no-one seems to have figured out what’s going wrong with it. Still, once I’m sorted today, I’ll simply sort out new admin passwords for the two home PCs, and then leave any other hassles with it ’til the new year.
Over the festering season™ I’m probably going to do some work on getting some more of the d4d™ sections into the new stylesheet. Now, should I have the colour-switcher section on every page? Or should I just leave the others to get the information out of the cookie from the blog page? That little lot likely won’t be uploaded until either sometime between Christmas and New Year, or alternatively in early January. We’ll see.
I’ve been pleased with the way the colour-switcher works too – it was one of those things I knew I wanted to do, and I figured it all out myself. In fact I think the only time I needed the reference books at all was in how to write the cookie to the browser, which was something I’d never done in PHP anyway. But I do love the things that challenge me, and getting the idea and writing the solution was definitely a high-point.
In fact, WordPress is kind of cool on that score – I like the fact that if something annoys me, I can write/edit one of the files, and get it to do things how I want them done. But sometimes it’s a complete pain in the arse, and things that should be obvious somehow aren’t.
One example is the sweary/non-sweary filter. I know how it should work, but it’s not quite there yet, because of the way WP handles things. Again, I’m probably going to spend some time geeking around when I get the chance, and see what I can figure out. And yes, that does mean I’ll have a PHP book with me over Christmas. Pathetic, isn’t it?
In general though I’ve been pretty pleased with the way it’s all worked out so far. We’ll see how I feel about it after a few more weeks.
Incommunicado
Posted: Wed 22 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season, News 1 Comment »Once today’s over, I’m not likely to be updating d4d™ that much ’til after Christmas. Tomorrow involves a journey down to the wilds of Norfolk, and I think I’m being volunteered to help with the Christmas Shop at Tesco. Oh goody, oh lucky me…
Once the Festering Season itself is done with, I’ll be down in Berks, at which point some normal updates should resume (assuming I get the WP login problem sorted at some point).
Yes, it’s all go chez D4D™
Funky functionality
Posted: Wed 22 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season, General 3 Comments »Well, this is – at long last – my final day in Oldham. I can’t wait to finish – this town has proved to be a truly demoralising and depressing experience, and I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.
I’ve just done a bit of a test with delayed posting, so even though I’m likely to be out of touch for most of the duration of the Festering Season™, there’ll still be some updated on d4d™. How cool is that?
I’ll be writing more today, but in general it’s definitely time for a bit of a celebration…
Moved Linkage
Posted: Tue 21 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™ Leave a comment »For anyone who has linked to d4d™, while the old link will still get to this page, it might be worth changing your links to
https://www.dummies-for-destruction.co.uk/random/
Thanks
Letter Spacing
Posted: Tue 21 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky 1 Comment »OK, that’s one of the problems sorted out. I was having issues with how WordPress was spacing the letters in d4d™, and couldn’t find the correct CSS Selector for it.
Should anyone else be having similar problems, it turns out it’s as easy as
#content p {letter-spacing:0px;}
*sigh*
Resolutions 2
Posted: Tue 21 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season, Resolutions 3 Comments »The second part of the resolutions (or as close to them as I get) were as follows (and can be seen in their original format here)
- New Tattoo
- Pass the fucking Driving Test
- Redo D4D in
Movable TypeWordPress- Lose weight
- Spend the Festering Season™ away from the UK
So – how did things go this year?
- Nope
- Halfway – at least I got the Theory test sorted out
- Done – still tweaking, but done, and you’re looking at it
- Ish
- See below, but no, not seeing it out abroad
However, during the year I’ve also :
- Printed up my own photos, and had other people want them
- Been paid for commercial photography work, now published in an Annual Report
- Been to Iceland
- Finished at my current workplace (well, that’s tomorrow technically, but hey ho)
- Developed new sites and systems for a bunch of people
- Started to believe in myself a fair bit
- seen D4D™ get another 150,000+ page views
- various other things
- and made a lot of plans for the start of ’05, including new location, new job, new domestic situation, and new lifestyle
So overall I reckon I’ve done a lot more than a simple list of resolutions indicates – but there’s likely going to be a new list for ’05 too.
Resolutions
Posted: Tue 21 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season, Resolutions Leave a comment »So, last January I wrote about some of what I planned to do in 2004. One of those was what I intended to do for Christmas.
- Go somewhere sunny – and possibly non-christian.
Now this one appeals, knowing my need for sun, and my desire to avoid as much of Christmas and it’s traditions as possible.- Go somewhere snowy
Prague still really appeals, and the entire thing of going somewhere that’s capable of a “proper� christmas- Stay home, and work a soup kitchen or similar
Done it before, and I’m pretty sure I’ll end up doing it again. Maybe not in ‘04, but definitely before long. We’ll see though.
And what’s happening for Christmas? None of ’em. Instead I’ll be down in Norfolk, with the family of Herself.
However, I did manage to do some work with soup kitchens over the last couple of months, so that’s that one kind of fulfilled.
WordPress Problems
Posted: Tue 21 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 2 Comments »There’s one thing where I’m currently getting really pissed off with WordPress. The login section seems to be – frankly – utterly fucked.
Currently, ’til I get something figured out and/or fixed, I’m having to reinstall it every day, so that it gets a new admin log-on. That means that I’m needing to backup the database, delete it, and start from scratch before installing the DB again. The WP forums have been – frankly – fuck all use, despite posting the problem, and keeping on following up with new stuff I’m figuring out.
I’m almost at a point where I’m considering going back to Blogger ’til WP is more sorted.
Does anyone else have this problem with WordPress?
Still To Do – WordPress Migration
Posted: Mon 20 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 6 Comments »- move other sections to new CSS styling and PHP
figure out some of the font issues(Firefox, for example, seems to have some issues)- sort out sweary/non-sweary styling
- put some of the other stuff back into the right-hand side-bar
redesign that “navigation image” – it’s shit, but it’ll do for nowsort out a script for putting in the titles on posts that don’t have ’emupgrade to 1.2.2 from 1.2.1– please god it’s painless (it was!)
Still Chuffed
Posted: Mon 20 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky 3 Comments »Bloody IE.
I thought I’d got the column problem sorted out, with the menu and links not over-writing the other stuff. And I had, in everything except I-fucking-E.
Rethink is needed. In the meantime, I think I’m going to turn off the side-bar. It’s more hassle than it’s worth.
UPDATED : Hmm, interesting. I think I’ve now fixed all the spacing problems cross-browser (including fucking IE). How did I do it? By letting the browser work out more stuff instead of using defined widths for a couple of the columns.
Now I just need to sort out this letter-spacing issue. (and probably loads of other things too, I know)
House.co.uk
Posted: Mon 20 December, 2004 Filed under: General 6 Comments »As most readers of d4d™ know, I’m going to be moving house between Christmas and New Year (although a lot of it will be going on through January, but that’s just the way it’s worked out this time) so as part of that I need to close off my account with British Gas (who also supply my electricity). So I thought I’d make my life easier and do it all online at the site British Gas created for this kind of thing www.house.co.uk. Dear Christ, I wish I hadn’t.
The site is bloody awful. Not content with making it so it only truly works with Internet Explorer, the style sheets are so fucked it means that using Opera or Firefox with it is nigh-on impossible – text is superimposed over other text, and it’s basically just a sack of shit. To rub salt in the wounds, they bang on about how accessible the site is.
So I sent a complaint email to them, asking why it couldn’t be used in anything except IE. And the reply I got was – shall we say – complacent.
Thank you for your enquiry regarding the problems you have encountered on our web site when attempting to register impending house move. Please accept my apologies for not being able to give an earlier response to your enquiry.
Unfortunately the web site is only tested for Internet Explorer and at present you would not be able to use Firebox or Opera. When you have moved out of your property if you could take a reading from the meter and contact our Home movers section on 0845 6091133 and they will take the reading from you.
I hope this answers your enquiry
Perhaps rather more incensed by this than I should be, I enquired about how they could justify banging on about accessibility when they blatantly didn’t give a shit about anyone using any other browser than IE.
No, this doesn’t really answer the query. Your site blathers on about being accessible and so on – so why is it only tested on IE? And (from the look of it) designed with only IE in mind?
As someone who works with accessibility issues all the time, I’m interested to know how British Gas justifies their claims against the simple fact that the site isn’t accessible to those who prefer to use a browser with as many known security issues as IE.
Today I got a response from the scrofulous twadgeknockers.
Thank you for your email to house.co.uk, my apologies for any inconvenience caused regarding this matter.
Website designers will build their sites around the Internet browsers they expect their websites customers will be using. However, their expectations can be incorrect.
Microsoft Internet Explorer version 4.1 and above is the only browser that is fully supported by the House website. This is detailed in the website terms and conditions section under the heading Using the website. Whilst you can access the site using other browsers, the availability of some parts of the site may be limited.
We are constantly updating and upgrading the site to ensure that people using other currently unsupported Internet browsers can access all areas of the site. This is backed up by our commitment that all new areas added to the site should be fully compatible with a wide range of Internet browsers and once this has been achieved, then the compatibility will also be made fully retrospective.
Once again, please accept my apologies that you have experienced regarding this matter
I know there’s going to be another reply (perhaps something about “Well check your CSS layouts then, fuckface”) but maybe that’s slightly aggressive.
Finalé
Posted: Mon 20 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Yesterday was my final weekend of big train journeys to and from Berkshire. I can’t even begin to describe my feelings about that – I’ve still got some train journeys to do, don’t get me wrong – but the one that’s become a regular fixture over the last six months is no more. That’s quite something – if nothing else it means that I’m not going to be paying Gitboy Branson £200ish per month!
I spent a fair amount of the final journey looking out the windows, watching familiar landmarks go past, wondering when I’ll see them again – and in some cases I wonder if I ever will. One of the things for 2005 will be to pass that bloody driving test, and then the train travel is likely to be a much rarer thing. I’m sure I’ll still do it on occasion, but it’ll be far less common.
I won’t miss the journey that much – there’s going to be a lot of good things happening anyway, and another advantage is that I’ll be getting seven or eight hours per week back simply from not doing this all the time. So far 2005 is looking deeply positive, with many life-changing things going on. I’m currently working on a post about that, and about the changes I’d planned for ’04 and what’s happened with them. That might take some time to write though, so don’t hold your breath.
But in the meantime, life is changing hugely – has already changed hugely. Between now and 04/01/05, I’ve got to do Christmas, move basic stuff between Manchester and Berkshire, sort out things like computers and email, tell loads of people/companies I’ve moved, and start work with a new company. There are bits about Manchester I will miss, and people, but I’ll see them on occasion, and stay in touch. And I’ll be close enough to London that I’ll be able to do most of the stuff that I’ll miss doing in Manchester.
But I won’t miss the bloody train travel.
Faithless
Posted: Mon 20 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Last weekend I was due to be seeing Faithless in concert at the Manchester Apollo, but because of the interviews that I had down in London and Bracknell (and particularly once I’d discovered I was having a second interview on the Monday) I ended up missing the gig. Absolute bummer, because I’ve seen them several times before, and love their gigs, even when the albums haven’t been superb.
So now I’ve just booked tickets to see them at London’s Alexandra Palace on Saturday 30th April. 8.00pm ’til 2.00 am. It’s going to be blinding.
The Move
Posted: Fri 17 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Well, on some things I have to say that WordPress is an utter, utter bastard. I’ll get there, I’m sure – and in general it’s a nice bit of kit, but it does have certain aspects that are utterly bastardish.
- only using index.php – I’ve blethered about this already, but it’s still a pain in the arse.
- Templating – I’m going to have some problems with the sweary/non-sweary idea because of the way it does some things. Thought is needed.
- Log-in problems – I’ve now had to rebuild four times because the changing of log-in passwords is – shall we say – volatile. I’m hoping that the upgrade to 1.2.2 will iron out some of that.
- This may be just me, but it seems to be a lot slower than the Blogger-driven system. Although, in fairness, the “upload” takes a shedload less time
I’m sure there will be other things as well, but for now, that’ll do.
Blade:Trinity
Posted: Fri 17 December, 2004 Filed under: Reviews(ish) 2 Comments »OK, first things first, it’s confession time. I like Blade. Sad, but true. I even think Blade 2 was OK(ish). So seeing Blade:Trinity was a bit of a foregone conclusion despite some less-than-positive reviews.
But what is it with Hollywood and trilogies? Matrix was superb, Matrix:Revolutions was *cough* less so and Matrix:Reloaded was fucking horrendous. It’s much the same with Blade. Dear Christ I hope they’re not planning on making a fourth one.
It’s hard to define where it all goes wrong. I suppose “the start” would be a good definition. And it doesn’t get any better. There’s just too much that’s wrong – and even worse, it all feels horrendously disjointed. It’s a revenant, a zombie lurching from place to place with no real connection to any of it.
Avoid, avoid at all costs. It pains me to say this, but Blade:Trinity is nothing but undiluted shit.
Title Tags
Posted: Fri 17 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »Hmmm, there’s one problem I need to work on more than most now. Titles.
Because of the way I’d worked with Blogger, all the titles were wrapped as <p class=”hx“>title</p> – now I need to migrate that into the Title section on wordpress. I *think* I know how to do it using a PHP script, but does anyone know of a way to do it in SQL?
Imported
Posted: Fri 17 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »Yes, I’ve managed to pull in all 2,600ish posts no worries, and it’s actually gone fairly smoothly. Of course, there are some problems, but they’re more in how I wrote the stuff in Blogger, rather than due to the import process.
I now need to do some work with the problems, but I think that this will officially be the first post under WordPress.
Moving Along Nicely
Posted: Thu 16 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky 3 Comments »As well as everything else that’s happened today, I’ve been working on the template for the upgraded site, once WordPress is fully working.
Let me know what you think of the layout, and whether there are any problems with the colour switcher etc.
Oh, and yes, the colours ARE foul. And I need to work a bit on making sure that the content text continues to stand out – in a couple of combinations it turns nasty at the moment. And the navigation bits are meant to be blank ’til the mouse hovers over them.
Celebration
Posted: Thu 16 December, 2004 Filed under: News 1 Comment »Yes. Just had the call, and got the job based in Bracknell. It’s less money than the one in London – but it’s also meaning I won’t be doing 4+ hours of commuting per day.
Swings and Roundabouts, but for now I’m just happy to have the job, and something concrete to go to once I’ve moved.
Yay!
Waving
Posted: Thu 16 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »So there goes Blunkett, riding off into the sunset. I wonder how many journalists were wanting to use the phrase “Blunkett was shown the door”? I’d love to say I was sorry to see him go, but at the end of the day Blunkett scared me for the simple reason that he actually managed to make Jack Straw look reasonable. An impressive task, but not strictly a positive one.
I wonder what this’ll do to the “need” for identity cards?
Normal Service?
Posted: Thu 16 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »Well, it looks like ‘normal’ service has been resumed chez Blogger. A “misconfigured router” that chuffed things for the greater part of yesterday. We’ll see how things go today, anyway.
As for WordPress and the problems I was having with it, they came down to a number of things. Not least among them is that fact that (unless I’ve missed it somewhere along the line) wordpress only seems to work when it’s index.php. The problem on d4d™ is that – well – this part isn’t the only section on the site. It’s on a page of its own, and WP really doesn’t seem to like it. So I’m going to have to work to create a new directory where this lot can go as index.php and work from there – oh, and write some rules to redirect people from /random.html to /random/index.php. Bit of a pain in the arse, but still doable. The other problem, which led to three re-installs is that WP really didn’t appear to like Opera – I reset the admin password and everything died, wouldn’t let me in at all, and so it was another reinstall. I ended up doing all that guff in Firefox instead.
So now I just need to figure out the templating stuff, and then I can have the real joys of exporting/importing from Blogger to WP. Oh what joy…
Kept Hanging On
Posted: Wed 15 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »No news. Still. Grrr. I hate this stuff, waiting for other people to get their acts together in order to tell me what the shit is going on.
Still Buggered
Posted: Wed 15 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky, General Leave a comment »Ok, I’m now getting really fucked off with this. I’ve been working to get WordPress installed after all, which has been – well, interesting would be a tactful phrase. But we’re getting there, having had one or two hassles. I haven’t started work on the template yet, that’s next on the list. The CSS is kind-of there and ready, although that may need some tweaking too. And then I’ll work on the rest.
In the meantime, Blogger has reported
A misconfigured router is causing the current mail2blogger, ftp and sftp publishing problems. Our Ops folks are working on it and it will be fixed soon.
Fan-fucking-tastic. It’s only taken them half a day to realise. I know, they’re in the US, blah blah, but all the same, is it too much to ask to have some kind of 24hour support now they’re owned by Google? Obviously so.
Utterly Fucked
Posted: Wed 15 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »High-Rise
Posted: Wed 15 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Anyway, while I’m waiting for news, I’m also thinking about next year , where to go, what to see, all that kind of gubbins. And one thing that’s certainly looking like it’ll be on the list is the world’s tallest bridge which was opened this week in France. The highest section is taller than the Eiffel tower. I wonder if it’s got stopping places so you can take photos from it?
Hanging on the Telephone
Posted: Wed 15 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Today’s a bit of a crunch day. I’m supposed to hear back from both agencies about the jobs I interviewed for on Friday. I can’t deny, I’m nervous and just want to know whether I’ve got something to start work with on 4th January, or if I’m going to continue running round like a mad thing to get work sorted.
In some ways it’s been a frustrating process – loads of applications and CVs without much feedback. I did have a phone interview on Monday as well (just before the 2nd interview for the 2nd job) which may prove interesting. But right now I just want to know about the two I interviewed with.
Obviously news will be published here as and when I get any.
Response
Posted: Tue 14 December, 2004 Filed under: Letters Leave a comment »Someone at Thorntons has a sense of humour, God love ’em. In response to yesterday’s email, I got this…
Dear Lyle,
Thank you for your e-mail.
We always appreciate feedback from our customers and I have passed your comments on to our Marketing Department.
Kind regards,
[name supplied]
Customer Services
Thorntons Direct
Festering Fir
Posted: Tue 14 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »Further to the post about buying a christmas tree, I should point out that while I helped carry the bloody thing, it’s not in my house, but rather is down in Berkshire.
So yes, I’ve actually helped with a tree, although I’d be forced to say that decorating it was down to Herself rather than me.
(In)Competence
Posted: Mon 13 December, 2004 Filed under: Letters Leave a comment »As the run-up to the Festering Season continues,back on Thursday I’d decided to buy a couple of “wine and chocolate” box sets from Thorntons to be delivered. Hardly rocket science, you’d have thought. But no, all the wine box items (only available through on-line or telephone purchasing ) were out of stock, and no information was given on when/whether they’d be back.
Oooh, look, there’s an email address for customer services, regarding stock items and out-of-stocks etc. I think I’ll mail them…
To whom it may concern,
I have tried today to order some of your “wine and chocolate” hampers, primarily product codes 51116 and 50565, in time for Christmas.
Unfortunately, both these items are listed as out of stock. I find it incredible that a company such as Thorntons would make such a monumental cock-up when it comes to the Festive season and gifts that have been heavily promoted in your catalogue etc.
Will these items be back in stock before Christmas? Or is Thorntons determined to lose as much business as possible to companies such as Hotel Chocolat?
Sincerely
Lyle.
Ex-Thorntons customer.
On Friday came the response from Thorntons (Although I only read it on Saturday, due to a certain level of manic behaviour around interviews on Friday)
Dear Lyle
Thank you for your e-mail.
50565 the Classic Combinations wine hamper should be back in stock at the beginning of next week, week commencing December 13th.
Unfortunately 51116 the Twin Red Wine hamper is now sold out and we will not be receiving further stock of this item. 51117 the Twin White Wine Hamper is still available to order as an alternative.
Please accept my sincere apologies, on behalf of Thorntons Direct, for any inconvenience caused by these items being out of stock.
Kind regards,
[name included], Customer Services, Thorntons Direct
OK, now I’m sorry, but that deserves a response. So here we go!
Many thanks for the response.
As a general pointer regarding usability on the website (as only website and phone ordering were available for the wine hampers) would it not be an idea to perhaps mention when an item is due back in stock?
As it is, Thorntons has lost the sale of at least three of these hampers by myself – and I can’t begin to imagine I’m the only person who was planning on buying one of these items!
Having advertised the hampers in your catalogue, I simply can’t believe that you’ve managed to sell out of the Twin red hamper completely – did your ordering department underestimate demand?
I’ve now completed my Christmas shopping with one of your competitors ( Hotel Chocolat, if it’s of any use to know) whose ordering system has been superb, and with no stock problems at all that I have found.
Congratulations on losing customers in this way.
Sincerely
Lyle
I haven’t yet had a response – that’ll probably be some subject matter for Tuesday’s posts!
The Incredibles
Posted: Mon 13 December, 2004 Filed under: Reviews(ish) Leave a comment »I confess, I’ve always been a fan of Pixar‘s films (although I draw the line at “Finding Nemo”, which I still think is a hunk of crap, but that’s my perspective on it, rather down to the film itself) so going to see the Incredibles was always a case of “when” rather than “if”. And last night turned out to be the “when”.
I lost count of how many “superhero” movies the Incredibles features. The speeding bus from “Speed”, the slow character build-up of “Spiderman” and “Hulk”, The ‘group of heroes’ thing from X-Men etc., and many other far subtler ones. Interestingly, the film has a much maturer aspect than their other works, this one really isn’t that much of a kids film, in the way the Nemo and Monsters Inc. were. It’s not “adult” humour, but it demands a more adult outlook- understanding the frustrations of Mr and Mrs Incredible, forced into being “everyday” people, using their secret identities as their only identities, and put in everyday jobs.
The entire film is beautifully done – as with Monsters Inc, it will stand up to repeated viewings – even in scenes you get familiar with, it’s all too easy to simply look at the detail the animators put into everything. For example, the water in Incredibles is simply stunning, as are the fabrics, and the way they move and flow just like the real thing.
Technically superb, Pixar’s films always seem to be firmly based in the storyline – these films aren’t a series of setpieces about “look how great we are at animating”, instead they follow the full story curve, and their work has always been more of a film than a cartoon.
Incredibles is a step up for Pixar, and well worth seeing (
and probably buying the DVD) several times. Now, when’s their next one “Cars” due out – that looks fantastic too!
Miraculous – pt. 2
Posted: Sun 12 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »Ye Gods, this domesticity thing takes some compromise sometimes. Today has actually involved – and sit down while you’re reading this – the purchase and decoration of a Christmas tree. Two shocks in one weekend : I’m just not prepared for this kind of thing. I feel like Scotty in Star Trek “It’s no good, captain, the propulsion system cannae take the strain…”
Still, it’s up now – I’m just waiting for the dog to destroy it while we’re out…
Art for All
Posted: Sun 12 December, 2004 Filed under: Depression, General Leave a comment »I love the story today about Mad for Arts, which according to the BBC story is designed to enable people with experience of mental illness to express themselves through art.
It’s always been said that those with mental illnesses can sometimes be more in touch with their own creative side, and if it helps to express those feelings and thoughts in a ceative and non-destructive way then I think the initiative deserves all the coverage and publicity it can get.
Mirabile Dictu
Posted: Sat 11 December, 2004 Filed under: General, Travel Leave a comment »The train journey down to Reading on Thursday evening was nothing short of miraculous. In fact, I think it was actually a first. Uncrowded – busy, but not rigid.
But the miraculous part? The part that made me think Virgin didn’t know I was on this train? The thing wasn’t just on-time, but it actually came in to Reading FIVE minutes early! My flabber has never been quite so gasted.
Interviewage
Posted: Sat 11 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Well, both interviews went well – even the travel to London was OK, which was a bit of a shocker. The first one had some techie guff I honestly didn’t know, but I think I made up for it by understanding where I’d gone wrong and so on. Always helps, really.
The second one was interesting too – and I’ve got a second interview with them on Monday! Eek. Talk about time moving in really quickly. Still, I guess that I should be optimistic on that score, and fingers crossed for Monday…
Retrospective
Posted: Thu 9 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season, Reviews(ish) Leave a comment »Pixeldiva wrote about the way her life has changed this year. I’m really pleased that things are working out for her, and congratulations again on the new job!
In many ways, my year has been very similar. Ups, downs, highs, lows, and a curve that looks like a moonshot.
Looking back in the archives to the start of this year, I was at a low ebb then. The previous year had worn me down, and I was hoping that 2004 would be a lot calmer. Come to that, I was also planning on spending the next Festering Season™ somewhere other than the UK. So, got both of those wrong then!
In the last year there’s been whole worlds of change. In February I was surprised by one person (who I never really wrote about, except in some very roundabout ways) and let down by another. (another thing I never really wrote all that much about) Over the summer I ended up being even more surprised by another person, and things changed immensely.
The person who let me down had continued to do so, and it ended up with us going seperate ways. It’s not easy walking away from a decade-long friendship, but on this occasion it had to be done – and I still don’t regret it. Sometimes it’s odd, thinking “Oh, I must tell them that”, but no, there’s no regret and no doubt. Everything took time, because I didn’t want to end with a “what if?” moment – and that’s worked, there’s not been a “what if?” thought at all. Does he read d4d™? I have no idea. I don’t honestly care that much – but I suspect he doesn’t, it’d be far too much like showing interest.
And now we’re at the end of the year. I’m moving back down to the South, and new job, new house, new(ish) relationship, and spending Christmas in Norfolk. In all honesty it couldn’t be much further away from any situation I’d envisioned for where I’d be at the end of the year. Huge leaps (one might even say quantum leaps) have been made, and I’ve changed immeasurably over the last twelve months. 2005 is going to involve more of the same, but a lot of it will be developing things that’ve started up this year.
This time last year I hadn’t even printed a photo – now my stuff is on walls in a few houses. I’ve done photo work I’ve been paid for, and also submitted (and been rejected) stuff for an exhibition. I’m going to keep on with it, and see how I do once I’ve moved, though.
Tomorrow I interview for new jobs, and all I can do at the moment on that score is “wait and see”. I’m trying to find a balance between optimism and pessimism. And failing.
I’ve no idea what 2005 will bring – if this year has taught me one thing, it’s that sometimes everything is out of our hands, and we just have to ride the waves it throws our way.
Counting the Days
Posted: Thu 9 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »In 12 hours I’ll be down in Berkshire.
In 24 hours I’ll be in the first interview of the day – the big job I’m really interested in.
In 2 weeks I’ll be without a job.
In 2 weeks 1 day it’ll be Christmas Eve.
In 3 weeks I’ll probably be sorting out stuff for moving – well, at least some of it, clothing and the like.
In 3 weeks 1 day I’ll have handed in my month’s notice on the house I’ve been living in for the last 18 months.
In 8 weeks time I’ll be completely moved.
Time’s flying on. Scary.
Semi-Organised
Posted: Wed 8 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »
Two weeks today will be my final day in this job. I can’t bloody wait.
Unfortunately it also occurred to me that this also means that in very slightly more than two weeks (17 Days, to be precise), it’s going to be bloody Christmas. “Oh bugger”, thoughteth I.
So last night and today, I’ve actually written out and sent all my cards for the festering season. In fairness, there’s not all that many – not much of a shocking revelation really, for anyone who actually knows me. But at least it’s all done now.
Amazingly, I’m even pretty much done on the shopping list now – I think there’s two or three things I need to still sort out, but I’m pretty much sorted out for the most part.
But for this year, I have to say, the main reasons I’m looking forward to Christmas (and even more to the time when it’s finished) are that I’ll have left this job, and be moving.
Debugging code
Posted: Tue 7 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »For ages it wouldn’t work. It wasn’t redirecting to the “change password” page when all the variables were saying it should be doing. I’ve been through every stage, getting the script to print out the variable values in an effort to find out what was going wrong, and why it wasn’t working. Twenty minutes of debug effort later, I’ve realised what it was.
PHP uses a simple command called Header to redirect to another page. The version I had read
Header(Location : http://www.website.org.uk/adminarea/change_password.php);
when it should have read
Header(Location: http://www.website.org.uk/adminarea/change_password.php);
Can you spot the difference?
I’m a fuckwit and on occasion can’t read code, and miss the fucking obvious.
Stumped
Posted: Tue 7 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky Leave a comment »For some reason I really can’t think of much to write here today. Head’s full of PHP, Soap, Pear, and a whole bunch of other acronyms.
Reading Up
Posted: Tue 7 December, 2004 Filed under: Geeky, General Leave a comment »Well, the first interview on Friday is a biggie, as I said below. I’m spending a considerable amount of time over the next few days reading up on a couple of the technologies they use, just to make sure I know what I’m whittling on about.
Stress!
Oooooh Shit
Posted: Mon 6 December, 2004 Filed under: News Leave a comment »Well, after Friday’s news that I’d got one interview next Friday. It was good news, because I can’t deny, I’d been beginning to think “eeek” about moving with no potential interviews or promising work advances.
Well, it never rains, and all that toss. I’ve been told today that I now have two interviews on Friday. One at 9am in London, which is a real biggie for me, and I’m already slightly orbital about it. I’ll be fine closer to the time, but the run-up to it is going to have my brain in a mode similar to that caused by feeding a two-year-old loads of sugar and dodgy food colourings. The second interview is at 1pm in Bracknell. The timing is going to be close, but I’m padding it all a bit so I should be OK. Infamous last words.
It’s the first one that is the one that’ll be most interesting. It’s at least one grade higher than I was looking at or expecting, and the pay is commensurately higher, although the concept of weekly progress reports to the Senior Managers is a bit of a nerve-wracker initially.
Having looked at it, some of the requirements are going to require a learning curve so steep it might as well be called effing vertical, but it’s more that they use commercial packages for stuff that I’ve already done or designed by hand. So I should be able to get through it. I’m just going to go off and gibber in the corner for a while now….
Satanic
Posted: Mon 6 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »I only have one question about this story. Why are the boy’s eyes glowing red as though he’d been satanically possessed in a cheap straight-to-video horror flick?
Scary or what…
New rules
Posted: Mon 6 December, 2004 Filed under: Depression, News Leave a comment »At long last, I’m pleased to see that GPs are to be given new guidelines about the prescription of anti-depressants such as Seroxat and Prozac. Way back in March 2001 I wrote about the side-effects of the SSRI group of anti-depressants, which were supposedly side-effect free.
Of course, the manufacturers still say “there are less side-effects with these than with previous anti-depressants”, but that’s not quite the same as “no side effects at all”, is it?
Anyway, with luck the new guidelines will see a significant reduction in prescriptions from the current 13 million per year.
Comments and Search Engines – My Response
Posted: Sun 5 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »Dear xxx,
First of all, my apologies for the way you found my site. I would like to make it clear that I've in no way "placed" my website on the NTLWorld search engine, particularly in connection with [that brand of toy store].
Many search engines regularly "crawl" the web, building up content and references that can then be used to produce search results when requested by people. In this case, it looks like Google (which is used by NTL as their search-tool provider) picked up the reference I made to [that brand of toy store]'s atrocious website, and when you searched for [that brand of toy store], d4d came up as part of the results.
NTL's search has a "safe search" filter that is *supposed* to block sites like mine, should it be selected. However, following on from your comment, I checked into the NTL Search and it's Safesearch filter, and I found that even when set on the "High" (where all explicit words and images are supposed to be blocked) it still brings up the d4d text - including the swearwords that are within the context. This is something that is utterly unacceptable, and I fully understand your anger at the way this has happened. Unfortunately, short of altering my entire writing style (a word that some would dispute when linked with d4d *grin*), there is very little I can do when it comes to NTL's filters not working.
I would suggest that you also write to NTL explaining the situation - please feel free to forward this email to them as well, if you feel it will help the case/explanation - and suggest that they look into how this has happened.
D4D is a personal site, and lists my own thoughts, expressions, and ideas. I've never paid for advertising anywhere, and most definitely wouldn't try the utterly shonky tactic of building up my own readership by trying to be linked to a company like [that brand of toy store]. Unfortunately, semantics like this are ignored by the search crawlers, and this can result in problems like this.
I will also be writing to NTL tomorrow morning (Monday) to ask that they sort out their filters, and hopefully this will help to stop it happening again. I had thought about editing the specific post in response to your comment, but on further consideration I realise that this would be a pointless task - with the text the way it is in the search results, at least a supervising parent will be able to avoid that link, rather than clicking on it with no warning when other posts contain equally explicit words. In addition, I am working on a "non-sweary" filter that, when selected, would replace the explicit words with either stars, or less offensive replacements - however, that can't stop the first look at the page before the "non-sweary" option was selected.
Again, my sincerest apologies for the offence caused, and the way you found d4d.
If I can be of any further assistance, or provide any more information regarding NTL's Search filters etc., please don't hesitate to get in touch.
Sincerely [etc.]
Comments and Search Engines
Posted: Sun 5 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Geeky Leave a comment »I got a comment today that raised my eyebrows a bit.
Having read just a small portion of your literature, what the f*** are you doing placing this website with those that advertise childrens toys. I am not at all adverse to bad language, I use it myself, but not in front of my son who has just learnt to read, and was looking on the net to decide what he would like for xmas!!!! Thank god he is supervised. Be a little more responsible and who knows, you might get a larger following???? Amusing you are! Responsible you are not. When you’ve moved your site let me know ‘cos I’d love to visit it, just not when my son is around!!!!!!!!!!!!
The commenter left his email address too, but I’m not going to add that in
Now, OK, I know I’ve been abusive of late about the POS masquerading as Toymaster’s site, but “placing this website with those that advertise children’s toys“? Funny, thought I. A quick check in Nedstat showed that I’d been linked to by NTLWorld’s search engine if you do the search for that brand of toy shops. So no, I hadn’t intentionally associated myself with it.
I did a bit more checking – NTLWorld has a “search filter” you can set to None, Medium (explicit images only will be blocked), or High (explicit words and images will be blocked) – even on “High” the d4d™ result comes up, which is – frankly – a piece of utterly naff coding on the part of NTLWorld.
Now, I could change the way I write – but why should I temper my phrasing simply because NTL can’t write code worth a toss? However, it’s definitely time to start seriously looking at the new template and a couple of the ideas within it. For now though, I’m going to write an email to this commenter explaining why it came up, and that the link wasn’t my choice, along with suggesting a complaint to NTL about why their search filters don’t work (oh, and by the way, why they only work at all in IE, try swapping it in Opera and the thing doesn’t work at all).
I’ll post up the emails, and any responses, as and when they happen.
Yet more work
Posted: Sun 5 December, 2004 Filed under: News Leave a comment »Recently, as well as the normal bundle of stuff I’ve been working on, I’ve been asked to be the Press and Publicity officer for another local charity around the area I’ll be moving to.
It’s a bit of a family thing, as Herself is involved in it as well, but it’s going to be an interesting challenge. During the last week I’ve been working on the first handout leaflet for them, which was being distributed during a charity “fayre” today. It’s been a bit of a struggle to get it all sorted on time, but it’s been a successful day by all accounts, and the charity has raised about £140. Not a bad day’s work.
There’s going to be a lot more work in the next couple of months, and plenty of ideas (and, of course, a website *grin*) but yes, the first steps are certainly looking promising.
Antisocial
Posted: Sun 5 December, 2004 Filed under: Depression Leave a comment »If all were well with the world, this would be a deeply pissed post with letters astray everywhere, and not really much in the way of a thought-train. It’s 2.35am, and I’ve been out drinking (slowly but steadily, although according to the government it’d be seen as a “binge drinking session”) since 2.30pm. To coin a phrase, “oops”.
However, all’s obviously not right with the world. I’m worryingly sober, despite a rather copious amount of alcohol consumed. I wasn’t completely in the mood, and the supposed “send off”, (considering this is my last weekend in Manchester while resident here) while it’s been fun, hasn’t been quite the booze-fuelled chaos it could’ve been.
I don’t know why, but it’s just not clicked yet that I’m moving on. Well, that’s not true – it’s clicked in all the relevant ways, it’s just that I don’t really do “send off”s and the like, same as I don’t really do leaving parties and all that shite.
Yes, there’s a feeling of “Oh, blimey, this is my last official ‘night out’ in the city centre” kind of thing, but I don’t do that all that often anyway. Particularly in the last six months, but more accurately in the last eighteen, I’ve hardly been here of a weekend anyway. “Home” has been four walls within which my stuff resides, and my clothing gets washed and dried. “Home” in my heart has been – well, somewhere else. Where? Pass. But not here.
And now the time to move on is approaching – and doing so at speed. I’m looking forward to it – moving has always been the time when I feel most comfortable, rather than the “putting down roots” phase, although maybe that’s due to happen a bit in ’05.
For now though it’s time for bed, and I’ll write more and think more tomorrow later and see where I go from there. But yes, for now it’s bed, and being worryingly sober about the entire thing…
Novelty
Posted: Sat 4 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season, General Leave a comment »Amazingly, I’m in Manchester this weekend. I was supposed to be here next weekend too, but that plan has now changed, due to an interview down in Bracknell. Yes, the first interview, and about fucking time too.
Ah joy, a week to *cough* look forward to it.
Plague Ward
Posted: Fri 3 December, 2004 Filed under: General, Travel Leave a comment »Rail safety experts are investigating the cold and flu risks faced by commuters packed on trains. With the flu season upon us, we ask experts what does lurk among bus, rail and Tube passengers?
It’s another of those “no shit, sherlock” moments. People who commute to work in public transport are more likely to catch colds etc. Shocker. You only have to be doing it to know how many people at any one time are sniffing and sneezing their way through the journey.
However, I also feel that on occasion it has a beneficial outcome too – because it results in a tougher immune system than the people who commute to work in their own little environmental microcosm. Or “car” if you prefer.
Fuck My Luck
Posted: Fri 3 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »Oh God, it’s going to be one of those days. Friday tends to be a “dress-down”, which in some contexts is fine. However, bear in mind that it’s now Winter, the office is like a sweatbox (the thermometer near me is reading 25°C) and Stinky
Coming in through the office’s front door, I took one breath and knew he was in. It’s that bad. And because it’s “dress-down” he’s also opted to wear a wooly jumper. Fuck knows why – I’ve never claimed to understand the mindset of the odiferous.
Thank chuff for Glade
My lovely hosts
Posted: Fri 3 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season, Geeky Leave a comment »I use 34sp.com for the hosting of d4d™ (and a few others besides), and all things considered I’ve been bloody impressed with them so far. Service has always been quick and non-patronising, even when it’s turned out that I’m an utter twat when it comes to remembering certain passwords or whatever. (Yes, these things happen, even to me!)
Yesterday I got an email from them, and they’ve increased the webspace on every account. Not just mine – everyones. Now, OK, they’re a hosting company, and obviously disk-space isn’t a hugely expensive commodity for them. But a 30Mb account now is 50Mb. The 75Mb I’ve got (and which I’d recently increased from 50Mb) is now 150Mb.
And I can’t deny – even knowing it will have cost them close to fuck-all – that I’m impressed by that gesture. They’re very, very nice people, the ones at 34sp.
Familiarity
Posted: Fri 3 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »It has to be said, someone (and she knows who she is) knows me far too well…
As with yesterday’s, click to biggify. And yes, the curtain behind it is vile – that’s one of the joys of rented property…
Good
Posted: Thu 2 December, 2004 Filed under: General, News Leave a comment »I must admit, I’m pleased to see that David Bieber has been found guilty of murder and attempted murder. I’ve not commented on it ’til now, but the story of what this man did was pretty horrific. I can’t even imagine being on the jury, and hearing the recording of policeman Ian Broadhurst pleading with Bieber for his life before being shot executed at point blank range.
Bieber’s story about the killer having been “a friend” that “he wouldn’t betray” really didn’t appear to hold any water at all, and yes, I’m glad that he’s been found guilty.
Counting Down The Days
Posted: Thu 2 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season, General Leave a comment »Ye Gods, we’re already in December. My last month in Manchester. Time’s flying past. Waiting for agencies to get back to me about jobs is becoming a frustration, and I just want everything to be sorted.
More frustrating is the current work. There’s no particular point in starting any new projects, and it just feels like I’m treading water. I want to move on now, and yet I can’t for another three or four weeks.
But still, I know it’s not long now, and it’s all going to bring 2004 to a good close. And 2005’s definitely going to be an interesting year!
Mystery Object
Posted: Thu 2 December, 2004 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season Leave a comment »OK then – just for amusement value – what is this?
If you click on the image, you get a bigger version. Lucky you.
Goodwill to all men
Posted: Wed 1 December, 2004 Filed under: Festering Season Leave a comment »How can you tell when it’s truly the start of the Festering Season? That month that’s supposed to be about “Goodwill to all men”, “Peace to the World”, and all that shit?
It’s when you see about Church carol services being cancelled after councillors don’t get the best seats or at least ones they feel is commensurate with their supposed position. It’s when you see that Santa has been banned from appearing in two Leicester hospitals. And it’s when a war memorial gets defaced and covered in pro-Nazi graffiti.
Welcome to Advent.
Gullible
Posted: Wed 1 December, 2004 Filed under: News Leave a comment »The emails claim people could be hit with a bill for �260 if they “press 9” and listen to a recorded message offering them a free all-expenses paid holiday. Another apparent scam relates to people phoning a “missed call” number beginning 0709. Anyone calling the number will be charged £50 a minute, warns the hoax email.
However, ICSTIS says this is all utter tosh and has urged anyone who receives one of these emails to bin it and not to pass it on.
Said the regulator: “Please note that these stories are NOT true. £20.00 per minute and £50.00 per minute premium rate tariffs do not exist – the highest premium rate tariff available is £1.50 per minute.
Now all I need is to get the fuckwit cunts at work to stop sending me this.
World AIDS Day
Posted: Wed 1 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »It’s December 1st, which among other things means it’s World AIDS Day. This year in the UK, it’s about reminding us all that HIV is an issue for everyone.
The 2004 Annual Report from the Health Protection Agency shows that there are now 53,000 adults living with HIV/AIDS in the UK, 27% of whom are unaware they have the virus.
There were 6,606 new infections diagnosed in the UK during 2003, 58% (3801) of these were amongst heterosexuals, with gay and bisexual men accounting for 26% (1735). That’s an 8% rise in cases in one year.
The National AIDS Trust is one place you can donate to help, as is the Terrence Higgins Trust.
Tough
Posted: Wed 1 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »In today’s Guardian there’s a story about a survey that’s been done into Britain’s attitude towards those with Hiv/AIDS. It makes for some disturbing reading.
One fifth of those polled said they felt it was people’s own fault if they got HIV/Aids. Almost a quarter said that drug users who contract the infection through shared needles should not get treatment on the NHS. 26% felt people had the right to know who in their community had HIV/Aids and 17% said they would worry if they knew their doctor had treated patients who were HIV positive.
A large proportion – 41% – thought that asylum seekers should not be allowed to stay if they had HIV/Aids. The survey shows ignorance about the virus – only 64% knew that babies can be infected in the womb, 73% knew you could get it from a blood transfusion, while 11% thought you could get it from kissing and 5% from eating with the same cutlery.
The Rubber Tax
Posted: Wed 1 December, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »If you do happen to click on the Terrence Higgins Trust site, you might also notice the link to the “Erase Tax on Rubbers” campaign. The THT has joined up with the National Union of Students to call on the government to stop charging VAT on condoms and contraceptives.
The income the Treasury gets from VAT on condoms is tiny compared to the cost of preventable sexual ill-health in the UK. Sexually transmitted infections cost somewhere around �1 billion to treat annually in the UK, and HIV care costs are around �350 million and rising. Wider condom use would save health and money.
Condoms in the UK are some of the most expensive anywhere in the world. They are almost twice as expensive as they are in the US, and more expensive than anywhere else in Europe. In theory condoms are sometimes available free of charge on the NHS; but clinics ration them and they are often hard to ask for, especially if you are young. Please click on the link to email your MP and ask them to write to John Reid, Secretary of State for Health asking him to support the recommendation of the Independent Advisory Group and remove VAT from condoms.
Band Aid 20
Posted: Tue 30 November, 2004 Filed under: Reviews(ish) Leave a comment »I’ve already voiced my feelings on the piece of shit masquerading as Band Aid 20 – although I still think it’s more Elastoplast than Band-Aid. But hey, what would I know?
Anyway – obviously lots of people will be wanting to buy the single and “help the hungry” or whatever the buzzphrase is at the moment. But of course you don’t want to end up with loads of copies of the same thing, dunging up your CD collection. What’s the answer?
Step forward Band Aid Dilemma.
You want this record to succeed, because you feel for the plight of the refugees in the Dharfur region of Sudan and this project is funding aid projects on their behalf. However, you hate this recording and feel your musical ego looming and refusing to be bruised.
The answer?
- Buy as many copies of Do They Know It’s Christmas by Band Aid 20 as you can afford.
- Destroy them in amusing ways, on camera.
- Send us the pictures.
Charity. Violence. You know it makes sense.
Posted: Tue 30 November, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »
Anti-Spam Screensaver
via Gordon, the BBC is reporting on an anti-spam screensaver made by Lycos, of all people. By upping the bandwidth costs for spammer’s websites, it’s possible that it will make spamming into an expensive proposition. And of course the main thing with spam was that it was cost-effective advertising…
You know, Watson, it might just work.
Posted: Tue 30 November, 2004 Filed under: General Leave a comment »
Train Chaos
Hardly a shocker really (it seems to happen every year) but as always, the UK Rail Christmas timetable still hasn’t been finalised. The various Train Operating Companies (TOCs) can’t organise a piss-up in a brewery for their own “services”, let alone organise anything between them.
Of course, there’s an air of profiteering about it, too. As the story says,
Although open tickets are available beyond Christmas Eve, more affordable rail deals require passengers to specify which train they intend to take – impossible without an agreed timetable.
Anthony Smith, national director of the Rail Passengers’ Council, said: “It’s very, very disappointing. When you’ve got a rail industry which is based on airline-style advance purchases for long-distance travel, this kind of delay undermines the whole system.”
Obviously the last bit is purest bollocks, the rail industry isn’t based on advance bookings, it’s based on fleecing the punters for as much as possible – which is why I’m never surprised that they haven’t agreed the timetables. This means that rather than the ultra-cheap advance tickets, passengers have to get a higher-priced ticket instead. For example (from the story) on First Great Western, an Apex return ticket between London and Bristol ought to cost £20. But without a firm reservation, travellers can only buy a £43.20 Saver.
Since privatisation, the TOCs primary concern has always been the bottom line, the profit margins, and as such getting every punter to spend extra cash is going to have a beneficial effect on that bottom line, and that’s what matters to these money-grabbing cockmunching weasel bastards.