Inside The Blue Talent Triangle

I've moved!

2006-04-26T10:20:00.000+01:00

If you are reading this, then you must have subscribed to my Blogspot site via RSS or email or divine audience or something.. I have now left Blogger for Wordpress and you can find my new blog at http://taoskiblog.wordpress.com. You can also get the new RSS feed at http://taoskiblog.wordpress.com/feed See you there!

Anti Lurker Week

2006-04-24T11:30:00.000+01:00

I know there are lots of "lurkers" who read my blog but never leave comments or feedback. Of course you are more than welcome to come, read and go - but the idea behind blogging is about sharing, discussion and feedback. So...

Say hello or ask me a question.
Tell me you hate it or that you love it.
What would you like more of?
Should I buy www.taoskiblog.com and move there and dump Blogger all together?

Open For business

2006-04-21T16:02:00.000+01:00

Some of you may have seen that picture on here recently. Sorry for the confusion. This blog is NOT closed and will continue to operate normally under my usual mis-management. And no, Robert... it's not a Butterfly! It's a hacked image I did on Illustrator, of an XBox360 controller. Tsk.

Easter Weekend

2006-04-17T19:23:00.000+01:00

Had a great Easter weekend over the last four days. Friday: Went to the Cotswold Wildlife Park with the wife and kids. We went with Mr and Mrs Swimpig and their daughter too. A very nice day out all in all and ended off with some late night card playing and Jack Daniels drinking fun. As usual, Mr Swimpig won. Saturday: It was the mother-in-laws birthday, so we were over at her house for dinner. The kids got to play easter egg hunting in the garden, so we have again got a cupboard full of chocolate eggs, chocolate bars and assorted chocolate bunny shaped sweets. And all that after we just threw away the eggs that never got eaten from over two years ago! Sunday: Had a lazy day around the house and then went for a dog walk with friends through the local fields. Very nice. Monday: Went to my first ever football match to watch the MK Dons beat Hartlepool 2-1 at the Milton Keynes National Hockey Stadium. My eldest son took part in a Football In The Community scheme where the MK Dons came to his school to teach them football skills. As part of a fund raising Penalty Shoot-out competition, we got a free pass for one adult and one child. I then bought two more tickets so that the wife and my other son could come too. It was quite exciting being in the crowd and we only just won after trickling a shot off the post about 4 minutes before the final whistle. As you may know, I am a seasoned FIFA player on my XBox, so it was nice to see the real thing for a change. There was only a few times when I got confused and thought I would watch the replay of the goal again... only to find I was pressing the head of the bloke sitting in front of me instead of the start button... Hartlepool were certainly the best side and at times The Dons were quite comical, falling over the ball and passing straight to the other team. Some decisions did not go their way though after Hartlepool scored by barging the goalie down after he had grabbed the ball and vollying the shot in. I did enjoy it though and might go to the next, and last, home game later this month. Anyone else up for that? Report: BBC SPORT | Football | League One | MK Dons 2-1 Hartlepool Tuesday: Back to work on the push bike. Microsoft Patch issues ahoy! Great... Technorati Tags: mk dons, easter, football, hartlepool, walk, eggs, chocolate, jack daniels, cards, dog

Google Calendar

2006-04-13T10:34:00.000+01:00

As per a wish in my recent gripes about Whats Missing From Gmail, the Google Calendar has now been released! Shame it still does not appear to be bolted into Gmail though...

April 06 A-List

2006-04-12T16:16:00.000+01:00

Its about time of the year that I did another A-List. A detail of my favorite software that I am installing/using these days. It's probably not going to be much different from the previous list, but here goes... OS: Windows XP Media Center editon with Office 2003. Installed this version of Windows so I could stream video to my Xbox 360. Virus/Spyware: I have ditched the Symantec AntiVirus 10 and the Giant Anti Spyware (now known as Microsoft Defender) and am using ZoneAlarm Security Suite. Since having this installed I have had nothing unusual turn up on the PC, only cookies. Even with Symantec and Giant installed before, if I ran a scan it always found something, but ZoneAlarm seems excellent! Plus with the ZoneAlarm firewall built in you can't go wrong. Browser: Firefox, firefox, firefox!!! Get it! This is a no-brainer really. Since using this my spyware infections have literally dropped off the planet. I have also installed the FasterFox extension which makes it even faster! I also have the Web Developer Toolbar installed into Firefox which makes checking and testing CSS changes in my blog all the easier. It also makes me into a god when helping people over at the Blogger Help Group. Torrent Sites:

I still use torrents frequently and they are the three sites that I use most often. I have started using uTorrent to download torrent files as I found that the webs most popular torrent client, Azureus was big, bloated, built from Java and made my router hang all the time (despite its numerous awards) . uTorrent is small, runs from a folder with no installation needed and is fast! I have also found that on my 2mb ADSL line, if I limit my upload to 18kbps on each torrent, the download speed goes up like a rocket (seeds pending out course). I am thinking of doing a basic "uTorrent users guide" soon - so watch this space. P2P Apps: None. Yep - thats right - none! I have given up on using these. The last time I was bothering, Warez was still my favorite but now that the torrents have really picked up and downloading stuff does not seem so important any more, I have stopped using it. Bookmarks: Some new bookmarks that I go to each day are the Del.icio.us popular links, my Bloglines subscriptions and the Digg.com homepage. There is always something new and amazing on there to look at over lunch. I have started using Del.icio.us more to store my bookmarks now. With Firefox's Live Bookmarks feature, they are available immediately regardless of if I am at home or work. Recap: Away Goal: ZoneAlarm, uTorrent, Del.icio.us, Digg, Torrents Own Goal: Symantec, Giant Antispyware, P2P apps, Azureus Technorati Tags: a-list, symantec, zonelabs, zonealarm, spyware, virus, microsoft, defender, bittorrent, utorrent, azureus, firefox, media center, fasterfox, delicious, bloglines, digg
Add to: | Technorati | Digg | del.icio.us |

iSwitch

2006-04-12T16:11:00.000+01:00

I was just reading my RSS feeds at Bloglines and noticed this one via Gizmodo. Help me become a switcher! Basically, a bloke in the US wants people to donate money to him to get an iMac worth over $2000! Now thats a cool idea. Shame my version of the same thing, that I started back in Janurary 2005 did'nt get any attention from anyone! The US may be the most powerful country in the world, but it's also graced with the loudest and laziest people. A message to my fellow "would be switcher"...

GET A FUCKING JOB YOU LAZY GIT! Flipping burgers for minimum wage makes more sense!

Maybe I should revive my idea and start a rival blog to see who wins first? Nah.. too lazy. Technorati Tags: apple, mac, imac, switcher, paypal, donate, blog
Add to: | Technorati | Digg | del.icio.us |

Nildram

2006-04-10T13:26:00.000+01:00

Does anyone have any experioence with Nildram as an ISP? I am still with AOL who I went with after moving house and having to cancel my BT Internet account. Instead of just moving the service from one house to another, they insist that you cancel your account and then re-apply at the new house! Even though the previous owner of my new property was also with BT Internet! Also, at the time, AOL were (pretty much) the only provider with no download limits, which BT were just bringing into force. My "downloading" action is no way near as bad as it used to be though. Nildram offer up-to 8mb broadband with a 50gb per month download limit. I think it should be enough for what I need I suppose. Although, my mate has a ratio on torrent site where his upload is over 1 Terrabyte! His download amount is something pretty scary too! Might see what ISP he is with. Can't remember off hand although I set it up for him. So. Any experience with Nildram , let me know. Or can you recommend a good ISP that won't release the dogs on me if I decide to download more that 1mb a month? Technorati Tags: AOL, internet, ISP, nildram, broadband, BT, BT Internet Add to: Technorati Digg del.icio.us

In the bank!

2006-04-09T13:49:00.000+01:00

It was another of the annual horse killing events yesterday, otherwise known as the Grand National. We did a family sweepstake and all put a pound in and got 4 horse each, drawn at random from a hat. We also all put in real bets at the local betting office. Just a few pounds here and there. Luckily, after my horse Numbersixvalverde won, I netted the £20 family sweepstake and my wife won £24 from her £2 bet at 11/1 odds. Sweet. Now, what shall I spend my £20 on? Any ideas? Technorati Tags: grand national, horse racing, horses, numbersixvalverde, betting EDIT: Just went and got FIFA06 for my 360 from the Birmingham branch of CEX. Only £28 second hand!

Xtrememac Airplay

2006-04-07T15:29:00.000+01:00

When I was in New York, I purchased a XtremeMac Airplay FM transmitter for my iPod and have been using it in my car to and from work each day. The thing is tiny and the quality is pretty good - although I have doubts as to wether the signal is in stereoscopic sound or not. When I shuffle to some Beatles tracks, that should tell me. There is also some background hum and hiss from interferance which gets worse when its raining. The signal is better when plugged into my nipple. Well... what I mean is - when it's in my shirt pocket and my metal endo-skeleton is acting as a signal conductor. It also makes me look quite "star trek" when changing tracks - but makes me look all "cheap porn nipple caressing" when increasing the volume! Generally the product is very good and I am impressed with it. I was even more suprised to find that ipod ubersite, iLounge gave it an A marking and said that it was even better that the iTrip, which was the device I had been planning to get. I decided to get the Airplay as I was also purchasing an XBox360 Play-n-charge kit from the same shop and it seemed to be the best option at the time. The Airplay's frequency can be manually changed in .2 increments between 88 and 109FM so you can quite easily override everyone who is listening to Radio1 on the way to work with some techno from the likes of the Plump DJs. I was even able to broadcast "Dare" by Gorillaz from downstairs in my home, over the top of my sons radio whilst he was listening to Classic FM (100.3FM) at bedtime. Having Shaun Ryder in your dreams is not good for a six year old's mind. My advice: get it! Oh.. hold on.. it's illegal in the UK. Sorry Officer... And yes, DriverChris, you can have that "POS" Belkin back next time I see you. Technorati Tags: ipod, airplay, fm, apple, nipple, star trek

Keyword Searching

2006-04-07T14:26:00.000+01:00

Just stumbled upon this site after I was assisting a customer with their word document that had inherited "selective" spellchecking on some parts of the file - but not others. The site contains a series of "5 minute productivity tips". I expected it to be full of "teamworking, networking and corporate bitch making" skills but I found the Searching with Firefox Keywords tip and was plesantly suprised! I thought I used most of the nice Firefox stuff like Live Bookmarks and the "Open In Tabs" stuff - but this is cool. When searching at a site (such as Google) you can right-click the box you put the search text into and then click "Add a keyword for this search". You will then be prompted to put in a bookmark for the page and a keyword too. Put in the keyword "g" for Google for example. Once it has been saved, you can then type "g taoski" into the Firefox address bar and it will immediately search Google for Taoski. You can also add keywords to any bookmark you have stored so you could just type g and press Enter to take you direct to Google too! So now, I can quickly search through that HomeMadePornTorrents site I have access to. Technorati Tags: firefox, bookmark, google, taoski, word, spellcheck, tabs

Boot Camp

2006-04-05T16:04:00.000+01:00

Now this is pretty serious stuff. Everyone knows (well - you should by now) that Apple recently made the switch to Intel chips in their hardware. There have been plenty of people out there that have searched for and managed to get Windows XP running on the "MacTel" boxes - although quite a bit of messing was needed to get it working. Today, Apple have released the beta of Boot Camp which allows you to install XP for it to co-exist with your OS-X installation!

Boot Camp lets you install Windows XP without moving your Mac data, though you will need to bring your own copy to the table, as Apple Computer does not sell or support Microsoft Windows.⁽¹⁾ Boot Camp will burn a CD of all the required drivers for Windows so you don't have to scrounge around the Internet looking for them. Windows running on a Mac is like Windows running on a PC. That means it'll be subject to the same attacks that plague the Windows world. So be sure to keep it updated with the latest Microsoft Windows security fixes.

W00t! This is going to cause quite a few ripples in the computing world! I don't expect it would take too long for someone to get a mac just to run XP (or Vista) but then switch to OS-X because "it works!". Smart move Mr Jobs. I salute you! There's probably not much that I could do on XP that I could'nt do on OS-X too. Awww.. I wanna new PC.

WTF?

2006-04-05T14:03:00.000+01:00

Why is it, that I work on an iT Helpline - but get jobs passed to me to fix that are raised by other members of the iT Helpline regarding silly issues with their PCs? I'm sure that if I qualified as a car mechanic I would take my car to the local repair shop each time it needed a bulb changing or petrol putting in. I dispair.....

Purves Welcome

2006-04-04T16:44:00.000+01:00

The Grass armchair is self assembled, each pack contains 14 corrugated cardboard frames and 100g pack of grass seeds. You will need about 240 litres of soil, to fill in the frame. First find the right spot, because once the armchair has grown you won't be able to move it!! You can put up to 20cm of gravel with in the frame then the soil. Spread the seeds evenly using only 4/5 of the bag of seeds. Press them in and water slightly so that the soil is humid. Water the armchair everyday. If it rains cover the armchair until grass has grown, to avoid the chair becoming waterlogged. After 10 days the grass starts to grow. If the grass has not grown evenly use the rest of the seeds to even it out. Once the grass has reached 10cm, cut it to 3cm, and keep it to this height. Now you can sit back and relax!

Purves and Purves Just saw this mentioned over at Gizmodo and thought it was cool! And how much for some bits of oddly shaped cardboard and a packet of grass seeds? £65 - thats how much. I'm off to the skip at the back of the local supermarket to get mine started.

Busy busy busy!

2006-04-04T16:19:00.000+01:00

Phew! Had a real busy day here at work today. I cycled to work again through the icy cold wind this morning and even managed to make it out at lunchtime for a quick ride too. Well... a ride up to Subway for a foot-long Veggie Max sub! W00t! I have noticed after just two days of cycling, that when I get to work, although I feel all sweaty and my lungs are insanely burning in a sea of my own mucus, I feel so much more awake and ready to do stuff! It's cool. The wife's out at her Salsa class tonight, so I get to spend a little more quality time with my Xbox, PC and 360 - before I sell them all!! HA ha ha ha.... (evil laugh). Swimpig promises to make an appearance too at some point. Maybe he wants his arab strap back?

Three Six oh?

2006-04-03T21:36:00.000+01:00

I am quite close to making somewhat of a decision. Now that I have been paid and the overdraft is slightly smaller after maxing it in New York, it's time to think about subscribing for a years worth of XBOX Live and getting a new game for my 360. However - what game to get is one question... But - "do I want to" is the most important one! Now don't get me wrong. I love my 360 (like a bruvver! burp) but hardly ever play on it. At present my "gaming time" is spent either fitting in a quick game of Fifa 2006 on my old Xbox after the wife has gone to bed or snatching a few games of the same title on my Gameboy Advance SP (while I crap). The 360 sits redundant beneath my TV. The most I have used it for recently is to stream our New York photos to from my Media Centre PC.

Maybe it was a rash decision to buy it?
Maybe I should have got a PSP like I was thinking?
Maybe I'm just having a "downer" on it at the moment?

Who knows. I certainly don't. But a PSP from eBay with a few games and a memory stick would not set me back too much. And I'm sure someone would have my 360 off me to counter act the spend. Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox 360, sony, sony psp, psp, fifa, fifa 2006, gba, gameboy, new york

TRON? TR-OFF!

2006-04-02T15:35:00.000+01:00

I managed to get a copy of TRON from... er... somewhere and it's a great copy in widescreen too! I attempted to convert it to DVD using DVD Santa and got an "Unsupported video stream" error. Roxio 8 also decides to give me a cryptic "unspecified error" plus a load of hex to go with it! Fecking computers! So, it appears that the format of the file is one of those odd DivX ones that refuses to convert without a lot of hassle. I also downloaded DivXtoDVD too (after reading a few good things about it) and after converting and burning which took about 2 hours, the quality of the DVD is jumpy and the audio is about 3 seconds ahead of the video! Good job i've still got my old, modded XBox to watch it on over the network. On a side note, I have decided to post at least once per day this month in an attempt to kick start my blogging again. I failed yesterday though already! I was discussing a possible "april fools day" post with Swimpig over breakfast yesterday but nothing came of it. Technorati Tags: divx, dvdsanta, divxtodvd, tron, dvd, convert, blog, roxio, xbox,

TRON

2006-03-31T10:30:00.000+01:00

This is the story of two worlds and the beings who inhabit them. One of these is our world, the one we can see and feel. The world of the 'Users'. It lies on our side of the video screen. The other, an electronic micro-civilization, lives and breathes just beyond our grasp. This is the world of the 'Programs'. Because we, the Users, have created this new world, part of us lives there, too... ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE SCREEN I'm off to find this film this weekend!

Questions, Questions...

2006-03-22T23:09:00.000+01:00

I see I have 2 questions in the comments of my previous post from fellow Blogger users regarding template design. So, rather than respond in the comments, here are the answers: Question from GVM:

You seem to be a blogger expert, even a very friendly one, would it be a problem to ask you the following ? - how do you adjust the size of the letters in the side bar, esp. the text in the About Me profile ? - where can one find the "search this site" button ?

To change this, you need to find the following line in your CSS code at the top of your template: #profile-container { } And change it to the following to make the font the same size as the main post body text: #profile-container {font-size:90%;} Make sure you do a full blog republish and if you don't see the changes immediately, press CTRL+F5 to force a full refresh of your page. The "search this site" button is actually built into the Blogger NavBar you see at the top of the blog. It just called "Search this blog" instead. The only problem with this is that it does not always pick up searches for new posts immediately. I had some posts that were over 3 weeks old that did'nt appear when I searched, but eventually they were indexed and it worked ok. You can always try Google Sitesearch too. Question from Tarun:

Different background for different posts intersting.tell me how to do it.

Well. That sounded more of a curt instruction really Tarun! But here's the answer. To do this, you will need to use some Javascript code which sequentially adds 1 to a variable or takes it away for each post and then assigns a CSS property to the post depending on the value. First, you need to add the following lines to the CSS style area of your template. This is usually at the top of the template code, and will be enclosed between the </style> and </style> tags. div.post-even { background-color : #F5F5F5; padding: 5px 15px; } div.post-odd { padding: 5px 15px; } Then, on the line just before the <Blogger> tag, I inserted some Javascript to zero the variable we would use. <script type="text/javascript">var evenodd = 0</script> And on the line just after the <Blogger> tag, I inserted some more Javascript that determines if the variable "evenodd" is 0 or 1 and applies the relevant CSS DIV to the post. <script type="text/javascript">if(evenodd == 0) {document.write('<div class="post-even">');var evenodd = 1;} else if(evenodd == 1) {document.write('<div class="post-odd">');var evenodd = 0;}</script> And that's it! I actually made mine a little more complex by adding a gradient image to the bottom of the post in the CSS bit: div.post-even {background-color : #F5F5F5; padding: 5px 15px; background: #F5F5F5 url(http://static.flickr.com/39/81719143_e19cdc7865_o.jpg) bottom left no-repeat;} Hope this has been some help to you both. I am in the first stages of a new "project" that will encompass many similar requests - so watch this space.

Airwalk: RIP

2006-03-21T14:06:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, I finally laid to rest my pair of Airwalk trainers. We have been together for over 10 years! During that time, my Airwalk and I have been through many changes, challenges and events:

Worn on many skateboarding days.
Learned to drive in them.
Cycled to work in them.
Ran three miles in them, three times a week.
Worn on my Honeymoon.
Worn at the birth of both of my children.
Worn when I taught my Newphews to Skateboard.
Worn on holiday in St Lucia, Dublin, France, USA.
Worn to the top of the Empire State Building.
Worn into the deepest, darkest caves in Cheddar Gorge.

I will miss them as all I have to wear now are my bright white NIKE running shoes. Farewell my friends... we were good together.

Neiw Yoirk Repoirt - Part 2

2006-03-20T22:29:00.000+01:00

"Hey! I'm walkin' here!" As promised in my earlier New York report, here is the details of where we went, what we saw and what we thought. Empire State Building This was totally excellent! If you walked left out of our Hotel to the corner of the block, you could see the Empire off to your right. It was really close! Right next to a Starbucks too! We went first thing in the morning on Tuesday after a bacon/egg/cheese/bagel/coffee combo deli breakfast. As it was so early, we pretty much went straight in and straight to the top for a clear view as far as the eye can see! I have some great pictures and will post them to my Flickr when I get a chance to re-install Photoshop to my PC and "tart them up". It's an amazing building too - art deco to the max! Grand Central Terminal This was also a cool place to "hang out" and "people watch". It was only about 15 minutes walk from out Hotel too. The main terminal was totally breathtaking and almost like a cathedral. We took photos of "the clock" for our kids after they saw Melman the Giraffe smash his head into it on the cartoon, Madagascar. We had lunch in the food court downstairs on the same day and went back for breakfast there too the next day for another sesame seed bagel/cheese/bacon coffee combo thing. Totally delicious! Nice to see people going about their normal day to day business too. Saw some snooty business men getting their shoes shined as they totally ignored the person doing the work! Financial District/Wall Street We took the Metro from Grand Central to Wall Street to check out the Stock Exchange which we thought we might be able to get into to see the action from the public viewing gallery. Of course, it was closed after 911 - but our guide book we had borrowed was over 6 years old!! We got to see some "financial types" getting filmed outside the stock exchange and then photographed by the press, guarded by some butch SWAT types with automatic machine guns! One of the them was a kid called "Zack", or so his gold plated name badge told me. He was obviously with his parents and had a look of "made for life" all over his smug little weasel face. We asked a security guard who they were, but he just gave us indifference. "Jus' some more rich people". Liberty Island From Wall Street we walked through Battery Park to the ferry to take us to Liberty Island to see the Statue Of Liberty. The security to get onto the ferry was more invasive that it was for us to get onto the aircraft and into the country in the first place! I had to remove my belt and shoes to get through the scanners and x-ray machines. The statue is pretty cool close up and it was a real nice day too. From then on, the week got hotter. We had got tickets to go inside the statue, but after queuing for ages behind another 30 people, we then found that the people a few feet in front of us were told that they would be waiting an hour to get in. As my legs and lower back were killing me from walking so far, we decided to head for the "Tat shop" and head back to the mainland. We got some nice photos there of the brown smog hanging over the city too. Ground Zero We walked from Battery Park up to Ground Zero to see "the hole". It was quite odd really. To think that there were 2 massively tall buildings in such a small area is amazing. And to think that they had been destroyed without causing much (or any) damage to nearby buildings was also amazing (read "conspiracy"). The whole area seemed very quiet too. There were lots of billboards up showing designs for what was to replace the buildings. Not sure which one is going up though. At the moment, the hole is just full of what appears to be air conditioning ducts! Soho/Greenwich Village We walked uptown from Ground Zero to Soho and Greenwich Village, bits of which reminded us of Camden Market and Covent Garden. We took a much needed respite in a coffee shop with a giant slab of carrot cake and a seat in the window so we could see what was going on. The wife shopped, I yawned and ached and we made our way back up towards our Hotel. We rested for an hour and watch crap US TV and then headed out to a buzzing steakhouse where the smallest steak was 6 inches diameter and 8 inches deep! I had a massive burger and fries which was my first real big American portion. Great food and a great atmosphere! Macys/Saks/Bloomingdales The first day (night in UK time) we got there, we dumped our suitcases, looked for something to complain to the hotel staff about in the room (found nothing though!) and headed out for a walk and some food. We stumbled upon Macys a few blocks away and the wife settled into what would become the main theme of the week. Shopping. Macys was ok, but not quite what I expected. I was lead to believe that it would be like Harrods (to which I have never been) but it only sold clothes! Bloomingdales was the same, but Saks (of 5th Ave) was a real classy joint! The decor in there was really nice and on one floor, we turned the corner to see Roberta Flack doing a PA for the store. So we got to see her tho! And she was very good. Tiffanys Breakfast not included! We went to Tiffanys twice. Once to look. Once to buy. I was under the impression that it was going to be very posh and when I saw the security guard on the door, I expected to be turned away as I had holes in my shoes (more on that in my next posting). The shop was cool and the staff were pleasant too. Obviously used to tourists cruising in to take a look at their wares. We went back on Thursday and I bought my wife a bracelet for her birthday we had been looking at for a while (at the cheap fakes on eBay). Central Park We walked from our hotel, all the way down Broadway, looking for a toyshop that was mentioned in the guide book we had, which don't forget, was 6 years out of date. Needless to say, by the time we hit 97th street, we decided it was not there any more. We got to see a hotel we nearly booked into and were glad we did not! We cut through east across into Central Park and rested a while. Well... I rested a while with my sore legs and back. We then proceeded to circumnavigate the Jackie Kennedy Onasis resovoir, against the wishes of the signposts and sour looks from the joggers who were nearly bumping into us. We tried to get into the Guggenheim but it was closed on Thursdays. Damn guide book again! We carried on down and ate pasta for lunch in the basement of the Metropolitan Museum. We tried to blag our way into the main exhibits for free, but got caught. We then stopped at the Woolman Ice Rink and Central Park Zoo, for more Madagascar related photos, on the way back "downtown". New York Central Library This place was cool. Very very nice inside and full of people with their Apple Notebooks studying. I wanted to be one of them! The main reading room was amazing and was very nice. We went back again on Friday for a free piss and a sit down to kill time before our flight (as we had run out of cash too!). We got to watch some breakdancing street performers outside. I'd give anything to be able to windmill.... Times Square Flashy. Very flashy. Avoid if you have photo-sensitive epilepsy! My mate Ghone, said before I went that Piccadilly Circus was much better. What a twit! It was very impressive. We also got to wave at the kids back in the UK via the Times Square Earthcam Webcam! Toys-R-Us was disappointing as were most of the shops there. We ate in the Hard Rock Cafe there as we couldn't be bothered to walk anywhere. We were seated in the Madonna and Velvet Revolver area, close to James Brown's suit and some of Elton John's too. Well... there's my quick recap. I have missed so much, but you probably never read it all anyway! It makes me want to go back there again! Buy me an Apple Powerbook, a large Mocha, sit me in a New York Deli and I will be a happy man!

Apol-ogies

2006-03-20T15:09:00.000+01:00

Just a quick post to appologise for not posting recently. There have been some great things to blog about recently but I have not felt up to it - at all! I guess I am just slogging through a period of "Blogger Apathy" or "Blog-d-pression". Other stuff has been happening at home too such as ill children keeping me up half the night and the wife's 40th birthday (say happy birthday to her everyone!). I have also found the love of Hexic on the 360. Puzzling fun! Mainly I have been hanging out at the Blogger Help Group and have posted over 1000 messages in the last month, assisting people with chaging their Blogger template and other general help. The people who frequent there usually need help doing basic HTML stuff like adding images to their header or sidebar etc - so I have something planned (in my head) to help them. The Blogger staff do not go there as far as we know - so maybe i'll get a "Blogger MVP" soon or something.... Anyway... I will do New York "Part 2" soon. I promise...

Neiw Yoirk Repoit Part 1

2006-03-13T14:06:00.000+01:00

Well... i have to say that our time in New York was excellent! The hotel was in a great location (East 30th Street) for walking to most of the stuff we wanted to see. My legs and lower back were killing me by the end of the week as we had walked so far! I am only usually used to walking from my house to the car and from the car to the office desk. Not really - but not far off the truth! New York is a really amazing place! Although the residents are a total ethnic/social mix, the roads are filled with cheeky honking yellow taxi's and the density of the buildings, businesses and shops is so intense, it all just "works"! It's quite funny to see people skateboarding to work or rollerblading down the street backwards during the rush hour. Not funny as in "har har, look at that twat" but funny as in that it's just accepted and seems normal! Even to me, who had only been there a few days. I read before I went that New York has a "can do" attitude and you realise what that means when you see the people just going about their business, but in their own unique way, with no hassle or prejudice from anyone! New York is definitely the iPod capital of the world. I counted more "white phones" per block than anywhere I have been before. People also seem ok about getting out their "technology" in public, be it iPods, CellPhones, Laptops or PDAs. I always feel quite reserved and nervous about using my laptop on a train for example but I lost count of the number of people using their Apple Powerbooks in coffee shops whist listening to their iPods or sitting outside in public parks using the free Google wifi to MSN video chat. I even saw what I thought was a tramp who was checking the bins for rubbish only then to pull out his Hipster phone/pda and sit down to do some typing! Weird! The whole atmosphere was great and we felt safe and welcomed where ever we went. I was going to do a big write up here on each day we were there, but it would take too long. In the next part of my report I will highlight the highlights and dish the dirt on the tourist attractions.

How do we reboot this thing?

2006-03-05T22:21:00.000+01:00

I'm off to New York early in the morning! Hopefully not to get this bird's eye view! Then again... anything for some more brownie points at work! If I get a chance to post whilst wolfing down a giant pretzel, skinny mocha latte and eggs over easy, I will. See ya in a week!

iPod Hi-fi

2006-03-01T17:17:00.000+01:00

Well.. It was'nt quite as I predicted the Apple iPod "Boombox" would be like. But it's not too bad. Quite minimalistic and low tech, but for £249, I would want it to make my cups of tea for me too! "iPod Hi-Fi Teasmade" anyone? EDIT: Someone's already got their hands on one and has posted shots of it being "un-boxed" on their Flickr page. It looks really big! Technorati Tags: ipod, apple, hi-fi, boombox, steve jobs

Escape!

2006-02-28T15:20:00.000+01:00

Just time to tell you that I got my new passport and managed to escape "Inbred Mutant City" (Peterborough) without any injury or mental illness. When you have four hours to kill in a shopping center, you get to see what the "real" inhabitants of the locallity are like. Overbiting slobs who got pregnant at 15 to the local "future mental care order" kid with the wet grin, no school exam passes and slight bum fluff moustache. I was only glad that my iPod and tin foil hat was there to shield my brain from the "mongoloid transmitter" cunningly hidden in the area of Floor 4 of the multi-story car park. Then again, it could have been my lack of sleep, anxiety and the sudden influx of "Grande Mocha's" that skewed my view of things there.

Typical me!

2006-02-25T11:24:00.000+01:00

I was just preparing things for our New York trip in a weeks time and, as usual, somethings wrong. My 10 year passport expired in October last year! FUCK! I called the helpline I have an appointment for the £96.50 "1 day fast-track service" at Peterborough Passport office next week. I have to be there at 0830 and then kill 4 hours waiting for them to make the passport for me. And the local Post Office's passport photo machine is "out of order" too, so I have got to go to the main shopping center later to get them done! Last time I used the passport, to go to St Lucia, 10 years ago, I had to do the same then too! What a twat!

MC Hammer Blog

2006-02-24T12:21:00.000+01:00

MC Hammer Blog No, no, no! This was not why blogging was invented! Gah! ps. Turn your sound off... crap MIDI file alert!

Hello...?

2006-02-14T15:24:00.000+01:00

Next time you ring me.... you might get something you don't expect! Darth Vader Soundboard Monty Python and the Holy Grail Soundboard Borat Soundboard Bender Soundboard All via DevilDucky

NYC Tba!

2006-02-13T16:40:00.000+01:00

So, in just under one months time, I will have returned from a weeks holiday in New York! Does anyone have any advice for me before I travel?

Places to see?
Places to eat?
Muggers to avoid?
Presents to buy my kids?

Technorati Tags: new york, NYC, america, holiday, vacation, presents

Postal

2006-02-09T16:07:00.000+01:00

Fuck this shit... I'm goin' killing!

Joke of the day

2006-02-07T16:37:00.000+01:00

Bruce walks into his bedroom with a sheep under his arm and says... "Darling, this is the pig I have sex with when you have a headache."

His girlfriend who is lying in bed replies: "I think you'll find that's a sheep, you idiot."

Bruce says: "I think you'll find I wasn't talking to you.

Thanks to the esteemed Captain Beefheart for this! The first laugh i've had all day!

MCE on XP on 360

2006-02-07T15:47:00.000+01:00

After recently getting my Xbox360, I decided to re-format my desktop PC and install a copy of Windows XP Media Centre Edition so that I could start streaming movies to the new console. After all, my old Xbox (which is still sitting quite comfortably next to my 360 under the TV) was mainly used as a Media Centre, so I did'nt want to give up that functionality when I upgraded. I attempted to get this working the other day but failed miserably. The 360 would not see the XPMCE machine on the network at all! I did some further reading yesterday over at the XboxScene forums and ran through all the updates from the M$ WindowsUpdate site last night. I thought I had the latest version installed already - but apparently not. An interesting side note is that once you have gone to the M$ WindowsUpdate site and it's Validation Check thing reports that your copy of XP is dodgy, you can go to Tools > Internet Options > Programs > Manage Add-ons and set the Windows Genuine Advantage Validation Tool to "disabled" and it works after that! How fucked up is that? Well... fucked up in a good way. I did'nt get a chance to test it further until this morning after the kids and wife had left for school - and after a little tinkering with the ZoneAlarm firewall (ie disabling the fecker) the PC reported that a new Xbox360 was detected and I was prompted to download another extra bit of software and enter a validation key that the 360 had given me. AND THEN IT WORKED!!!!! I nearly pissed my pants with joy! So many people have had issues with getting the two connected. I don't believe in god - but he was on my side today! I had already converted a DivX video to the WMV format that the 360 likes using the Videora Xbox360 Converter and it worked a treat! The only problem is that the file literally doubled in size to just over 1.6gb! There is a way of converting movies from DivX to WMV on the fly, detailled over here but it looks a little complicated really. Update: Just found out about this application too which was written by the original Xbox Media Centre programmers. And he's from Milton Keynes too! Technorati Tags: XP, XP media centre edition, mce, xbox, xbox 360, videora, stream, zonealarm, genuine advantage, WMV, DIVX

What's missing from gMail?

2006-02-03T15:17:00.000+01:00

Google's GMail webmail interface has now become my mail application of choice. I have had several (over 10) email addresses over the years with various ISPs and a gaggle of WebMail sites but have now settled for GMail as my primary mail address and mail application. All the others are either full of spam, have closed down or I no longer remember the password. I have been using GMail for nearly a year and a half now and am still very impressed with it. But what's missing from GMail? 1. The ability to use a GMail calendar would be excellent. As my wife will attest, my memory for personal stuff is total crap! I can remember an IP Address of an old obscure decomissioned NT3.51 server at work, but I am not sure when my Mother and Father's birthdays are! Or even how old they are! If I could create a Calendar in GMail and (have my Wife) update it, share it with others, tag or categorise the entries then that would be cool. There are rumors that a Google Calendar is somewhere on their (immense) roadmap - but for now I will have to rely on someone else to organise my life for me. I have recently found out about the 30Boxes calendar which looks nice. Would be great if it was in my GMail account though. It is still in Beta and does not get properly "born" until the 3rd of Feb. 2. Online storage. I already use my GMail account to store useful information that I need access to on a fairly regular basis. I compose a message, enter the information and then save the message as a draft. The information is then easily searchable and available to be copied or forwarded on to others if need be. I use drafts to keep a copy of:

Phone numbers
Addresses
Passwords
Interesting sites i've found (that are "NSFW") ;-p
Blog HTML code that go AWOL when posting to Blogger
My Blogger template HTML code

It might be nice to be able to handle this information in a better way. Maybe an "Online Documents" or "Notepad" section would be useful. I came across Writely, the excellent Web2.0 based Word Processor which would be a good addition to GMail. You can even make posts to your blog from there too! I also use the Draft facility to move documents from one PC to another. For example, it's quicker for me to upload a file to a draft to take from home to work (to print on the expensive color laser) than to get my USB2 Hard Disk out of my bag each time. 3. Color tagged messages. Gmail allows you to create "labels" for messages, which can also be usefull for tagging messages you need to find easily. This can be done by clicking the label on the sidebar which automatically shows the messages tagged as such. You can also "star" messages to make them stand out too. A little "gay" though methinks! What I want is to be able to tag messages with colors. It's not really for anything amazing - it would just be nice to be able to do so. 4. Incorprate Google Reader. I currently use Bloglines to manage and read my RSS subscriptions, but I am sure Google Reader would get more interest from me if I could view the RSS feeds properly within my GMail. I know that GMail has recently added that little "Web Clips" thing along the top - but for the RSS hungry types like me, it's totally useless and just gets in the way. All Google need to do is improve the interface of the Google Reader and allow it to be displayed inside the GMail window somehow and all will be well. At the moment, the nice scrolling interface on the Google Reader just takes up too much space and I can't easily see the feeds I want to get to. Bloglines have got it right in my opinion. Quick and simple. 5. Online Favorites. I have just started using Del.icio.us to store my online favorites and findings but if i could drop those into GMail too that would be cool. Import my Firefox bookmarks or IE favorites and off I would go! I could then subscribe to them in firefox as a "live bookmark" and have them all updated and available where ever I went. I realise that Using Del.icio.us you can do all this (and more) and it looks very powerful. The Import function is offline at the moment though so I will have to test that later. 6. Interface. The GMail interface is good, fast and responsive on all the machines that I use it on. This is where services like Hotmail have gone down in my opinion - too much clutter and fancy crap on the screen just makes it too slow to use. Keeping it simple keeps me sweet! To incorporate all the extra features I have mentioned above, Google could add some sort of tabbed interface along the top or bottom of the GMail screen. Not too much to ask though is it? I'm sure all this is pontificating is falling on deaf ears though... Hello? Is there anybody in there? Technorati Tags: gmail, googlemail, google, webmail, 30boxes, calendar, bloglines, del.icio.us, writely, hotmail, firefox, live bookmarks

Torrent Sites

2006-02-03T15:01:00.000+01:00

Back in the day, this blog used to be all about Torrents and warez and stuff like that - so in honour of my old ways, here's a link to the mostest biggerest list of torrent sites I have ever seen! All mixed down into categories too! Thankyou Web of Knowledge

I'm suing Apple!

2006-02-03T14:56:00.000+01:00

As reported in a few places including The Register, a Louisiana man is suing Apple for making the iPod too loud and damaging his hearing. John Kiel Patterson was unavailable to comment. Presumably because all he could hear when we rang to talk to him was the "Brain Morse Code Bleep-Trance Remix" brought on by his adverse Tinitus. I have decided to sue Apple too. For somehow smuggling "SugarBabes" and "Beyonce" into my iTunes and therefore into my iPod and therefore into my brain where they go round and round and round until I can't sleep, I can't work and I can't stand NO MORE! Gits!

Pile Up City

2006-02-03T10:36:00.000+01:00

I managed to get in some racing last night on Project Gotham 3. I'm still total crap - but am getting better. I actually finished 2 races rather than getting timed out and my powerslides are getting more... er... "powerier" too. I am slowly working out how to use the handbrake button at last. I'm sure most players don't use the break at all in favour of the handbrake, as I hardly ever see any red lights as they approach a corner. Playing on XBox Live is quite funny though, listening to the jovial banter in the lobby area which then turns to "you mutha-fucka! Piss off and practice you twat!" in a variety of languages as the cars pile up at the first corner. People seem to forget it's a game and get very, very intense about it. I also played a few "Team Slayer" and "Rumble Armory" games on Halo2. I started off good on the RA games I played, coming 2nd or 3rd but on the TS games I was always on the losing team. Or rather, the losing team always had me on their side. The people playing on Halo2 seem to be alot friendlier and I got invited to a Party Game by someone too. Great fun . But a shame it does'nt update my GamerCard to say i've been playing Halo2 though... never mind. Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox live, xbox 360, halo2, halo, PGR3, Project Gotham Racing, powerslide

Tagged

2006-02-02T00:00:00.000+01:00

Been tagged by mmChronic over at NewLinks with this meme. Not sure I should be doing these anymore really... are'nt these things for silly girl bloggers who bitch about their friends or Newbie Bloggers? Anyway - here goes... Four Jobs I've had:

Washing up/dirt removal operative
Shelf stacker/Supermarket technician
Archaeology Site Technician/mud scraper
iT-mumbo-jumbo-fix-er-upper/tea drinker

Four Movies I Could Watch Over and Over:

The Empire Strikes Back
Carry On Doctor
Revenge Of The Sith
Madagascar (not through choice! The kids love it)

Four Places I have Lived:

London - E17
Milton Keynes - MFK
Does "The Internet" count?
The list endeth here...

Four TV Shows I Would Love to Watch:

LOST
Any computer gaming show on Bravo
Never Mind The Buzzcocks
Black Adder

Four Places I have been on Vacation:

St Lucia
Gran Canaria
France
Dublin

Four Websites You Visit Daily:

BlogLines
BBC News
Gmail
Google

Four of My Favorite Foods:

Peanut Butter
Cheese Twists (the dry biscuit type)
Almond Danish
Egg and Tomato sandwiches

Four Places I would Rather Be:

I concur with my "tagee", mmChronic. Bed - with my wife - would be the best option..
Or playing my 360 comes very close too..

Four Albums I Cannot Live Without:

Early Oasis
Stone Roses, Stone Roses
Wish You Were Here - Pink Floyd
Pungent Effulgent - Ozric Tentacles

Four People to Tag:

Not gonna tag no-one - if you feel like replying... do so.
Its a free country after all..

WIP

2006-01-31T15:54:00.000+01:00

Just been farting around with my template again over at my TaoTest blog. After seeing the cute and excellent site design over at OrderedList I decided to take mine to a "low tech, single post" level. In order to do this effectively I would have to limit the size of the inital view of the latest posting to a few lines and then introduce a "Read More" item at the bottom for people to load the full thing up. I did a search for Blogger Hacks and found this posting by Nerdier than thou! on how to create such a thing. The only issue I can see with this is that you have to insert some CSS code into your post to get it to work correctly - which I don't want to do. I just want to make a posting and have the first portion of it displayed automatically. So... Off to JavaScript land I went and came up with something that actually works! Here's the code bit i stuck in my template: <mainorarchivepage> <script type="text/javascript"> var str_length=400; str = '<$BlogItemBody$>'; last_dot = str.indexOf('.',str_length); document.write(str.substring(0,last_dot + 1)); </script> <br><a href="<$BlogItemPermalinkURL$>">Read more!</a> </mainorarchivepage> <itempage> <$BlogItemBody$> </itempage> The blog post is written into the variable str and then the post is scanned for the next full stop after the number of characters specified in the str_length variable. To show more content, increase the value of str_length. The post is then re-written using the document.write command as far as that full stop character to allow for proper sentences to be displayed rather than being cut off in mid flow. The JavaScript is between the <mainorarchivepage> tags to allow it to be shown on the front page. A normal <$BlogItemBody$> tag is shown between the <itempage> tags to allow it to be displayed in full when you click the "Read More!" link. This is still a Work In Progress - so please don't take it as gospel - but I think it works ok. Not sure how it will work with pictures though. Rather than messing with CSS code, I was thinking of putting some keywords into the text such as !start! and !end! to signify the start and end of the posting you want to be displayed before the "Read More!" link. That should be pretty easy for JavaScript to sense and strip them out, and alot easier than going into the HTML code when posting.

360 Enabled

2006-01-27T15:46:00.000+01:00

I have now got my Xbox360 and "w00t!" - what a belter it is. I unpacked the console when I got home, connected it to the net, signed into XboxLIVE and took out my free 1 month gold trial account. The plan was to show the kids the awesome power of the new console before they went to bed (as they seemed more excited than I was). This "great unveiling" did not take place though as it clashed with the start of Eastenders and I was forced to send them to bed "empty eyed". During the next four hours of TV that my wife watches on a Thursday night (Eastenders, 10 Years Younger, Celebrity Big Brother and ER) I dipped in and out of LIVE during the ad-breaks to download demos of FIFA 2006 RTWC, Fight Night 3, Fully Loaded, NBA Live and Quake 4. Plus a few videos, Live Arcade games and stuff like that. I am really impressed with the content on there that is free. More to come I expect - and hopefully more gamercard pictures too that I don't have to pay for! Come 11pm, the wife went to bed and I settled down with a fresh cuppa, poised to beat hell out of a computer generated assailant on Fight Night 3. And wow! The graphics were amazing! So realistic and crisp and clean. Forget buying a HDTV! The image was perfect! The gameplay is a little sluggish - but seeing the ripples on the guys face when you upper-cut him to the canvas is excellent. Jolly good fisty-cuff fun! I then moved onto play Fully Loaded which is a racing game with guns, missiles and other assorted weapons. The console version of the old Car Wars game I used to play years ago. Again, the graphics impressed but the game play was limited (although this is a demo). Race and fire, jump, crash etc. Very good fun and probably best played on LIVE against some real opponents I would expect. Die muthafunker! Third down was Quake 4 which initially looked very "PC Graphics" during the intro sequence. When the real game started though I was impressed and reminded of Doom4. Looks very very good. I wonder if this was a straight port from the PC version with not much tweaking? I was expecting a first person shooter deathmatch though - maybe that was on one of the other menu options. FIFA 2006 RTWC is just fucking amazing. As you may have read in my previous posts I have recently got really into playing FIFA 2006 on my (old) Xbox and usually play every day. So when I saw how detailled the graphics, character modelling and environment was... well... I just kept on saying "oh my god! - there is grass! They rendered grass!!". This is definitely my next purchase and have already been investigating the prices on eBay in readiness for my Valentines present. I was totally blown away by this title. The demo is only one half though - Brazil vs France. And the annoying thing is that you have to re-load the whole demo to play again! Grrr! Tossers! I then played Project Gotham 3 - buying a white Skyline as my first car and completing a few races and goals. I also played one online game but got my ass well and truly kicked! I am well gonna have to "up my game" on this title. Definitely one to put some time into. As with the other games, the graphics are so smooth and detailled. Very very good. Something that I have been waiting for since I used to play REVS on my BBC Micro back in the 80s. So, to sum up - the console is everything that I was expecting and a whole load more. I am totally blown away by the graphics and do not regret buying one at all now! No anti-climax! WOW! It must be a first for me. Before I used one I was slightly sceptical about the wireless controller and had a feeling that I would play with the cable attached - but now... no way! Its a really nice controller. The only thing missing was the IR Remote which they have now excluded from the Premium pack. Well. I am not too fussed about that really. Unless the DivX streaming from my PC to the 360 can be sorted properly - the old Xbox will be the media player for now. The fan in the console is quite noisy though and when you are playing from a DVD rather than the hard disk - it's even worse! Then again, it was 1am and the house was deathly quiet. Whats next? Dead Or Alive 3, more FIFA, getting XP Media Center Edition onto my PC and getting back into online gaming. I have also got a disk with the Beta of Final Fantasy 8 to load on (better take a USB keyboard home too as I hear the registration stuff is immense) and a copy of the Xbox360 retailler demo disk with playable levels of King Kong and Call Of Duty 2 on. Oh - and I also have my retail copy of Halo2 to play too. Deathmatch fun - here we come. Here's my gamercard.. come say hello! Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox live, xbox 360, taoski, fifa, fight night, pgr, project gotham, revs, carwars, quake 4, w00t!

Think again...

2006-01-25T17:35:00.000+01:00

I had this great idea. I would install Apache and Wordpress locally, following the instructions over here and publish a work intranet blog thing to help us feed out information to the members of our (small) section. I have recently been fiddling with this setup on my machine at home and if you are lucky, you might even find my test Wordpress blog lurking over at http://taoski.blogdns.com - but only if my firewall lets you in, the Apache stuff is running and the kids are not playing Backyardigans games on the web. It works pretty well - especially for testing out Wordpress - which is way, way, way more advanced than Blogger and looks pretty cool. I still intend to migrate to Wordpress and my own domain at some point - but as you can guess from my previous post, cash and my spare time might be a little tight! Anyway. I get the site set up at work and its all working but Apache just keeps on crashing! Crashing when I attempt to upload a file during a post, crashing when I try to post a test comment and crashing when I move the mouse too fast after drinking too much coffee. I'm on the late shift tonight - so I might have time to play with it a little more. Ahhh... the joys of a technical job... Don't you just love it? It used to be all "exciting", "innovative" and "rewarding" but now it's just "boring", "samey" and "mundane". I wish I had used my A-Level art and A-Level Graphics Design for something rather than just creating a pile of quickly deteriorating artwork under my bed or making the odd kiddies party invitation on MS Publisher. A nice design job like DriverChris does would be nice.... 09:50: Turn up to work with expensive "Michael Caine" glasses, expensive sharp suit and expensive coffee in hand. 10:30: Start "design" work after reading The Guardian and sending emails to your "pretend mates" on your Blackberry. 12:00: Off to the Wine Bar for lunch with "Fifi and Charles" from "The agency". 13:30: Back to work to sketch out that idea that came to you as you "piss-chased" some chewing gum round the urinal in the wine bar. 13:40: Get distracted for a while by minimising the windows on your Mac to "the dock" and back again. You forget the idea you had. Time to have a power-nap. 14:30: Play with your Mac a bit more and read some websites about design and Audi cars. 15:00: Team meeting in the office. See who's got the brightest pink shirt and discuss the future of "frameless fixed-width inline CSS templates" for your customer portfolio. 15:50: Return to the desk and fiddle with Illustrator/Photoshop/Quark until the boss goes home. 17:00: Off home on the tube with your iPod, another expensive coffee and copy of Stuff magazine. 18:00: Get home to your lonely flat. Cry in your Findus "sad and lonely microwave meal for one". Go bed early after watching Trinnie and Susannah, getting tipsy on sparking white wine and being all confused over your sexual preferences.... Is the grass greener? Who knows? I won't. I am doomed to be stuck at this desk whilst a telephone headset burns a ridge into my skull, I fix the same faults I resolved 4 years ago and the world passes me by. EDIT: Just found this alternative program for running Apache and MySql locally to run Wordpress: WampServer Technorati Tags: apache, wordpress, xampp, blogger, intranet, work, design, ipod, audi, art

It's not what you know...

2006-01-25T14:49:00.000+01:00

During another severe beating at FIFA2006 this lunchtime I also learnt that my XBox360 would be in my sweaty hands tomorrow. A Premium bundle with Project Gotham Racing too. Looks like my online gaming will be taking off again! But as usual, in total Taoski fashion - "Anti-climax... here we come". I was almost on the verge of telling the bloke to not bother getting me one after all - but it's too late now. I will have to seek out a version of Windows XP Media Centre too then I suppose! Technorati Tags: xbox 360, microsoft, xbox, anti climax, project gotham, halo, windows media centre

Infamy!

2006-01-21T00:05:00.000+01:00

Sometimes, I do know what i'm talking about. Plus, hello to my two new readers, Wendy and Darren who popped round tonight for drinks and nibbles. We did'nt mention the wife swapping stuff yet... break em' in gently! ps.. i'm joking!

Shrinky Links

2006-01-19T22:15:00.000+01:00

Just a collection of random links from my recent surfing... Shrinkydinks? Still going strong! A huge list of albums to download. Some nice wallpapers here e-books (site in russian) PayPal Sucks! - apparently! ZCult FM - a comic scans torrent site!

Nuff said

2006-01-18T23:17:00.000+01:00

Dr Wicket will see you now

2006-01-13T14:33:00.000+01:00

I was booked for what I thought would be an appointment for a heart echo scan at the local hospital yesterday. I turned up and was ushered into a room to see an ewok sitting at a desk, pretending to be a doctor. I had seen him once before when I was admitted the night I discovered I might have a heart condition and at the time, my wife and I both thought "Ewok!". It turns out that I was in fact turning up for a consultation with the doctor to examine the results of the 24 hour tape monitor I wore and the results of the Echo Scan too. But I had not had the scan yet..... ah! Problem. He called the Cardiology section and checked. Yes, they should have booked me an appointment and I should have had the scan by now - but they fucked up and forgot. There is a 5 month waiting list for the scan - so I can expect to go for this sometime in May and a return visit to see my furry Ewok friend in mid-July. Piss. The results of the tape monitor were good and show no cause for concern - at all, so I should be "encouraged" by this and I am safe to start going to the Gym again. He also told me that I need to be having daily, dirty sex as part of my rehabilitation. So wifey, if you are reading this..... Technorati Tags: heart, cardiology, echo scan, doctor, star wars, ewok, gym

Techno Porn

2006-01-11T16:44:00.000+01:00

New Intel iMacs released.... Must resist.... Must be strong.... Hold on.... got no money! Decision made for me! Technorati Tags: apple, imac, intel, steve jobs, got no fucking money

I'm on the move

2006-01-11T12:02:00.000+01:00

After "a good hard think" I have decided to make the switch away from Blogger. Not that Blogger is crap or slow or full of spam blogs and is generally seen to be the AOL of the Blogging world or anything. Blogger has served me well over the years but I want more control over my blog, how it looks, functions and is accessible. I am going to buy a domain name, some webspace and host a WordPress blog there. I will also amalgamate this blog, my Photao Photoblog and Music Club blogs into one giant tri-headed beast. Wordpress will also allow me to create sub-blogs for subjects - so I could have a personal blog, a tech blog and a blog about my pet rock, Mr Stone Knee Boy (joke! - honest). I kind of have a picture in my head of how it will all pan out and work - but we shall see. Webspace and a platform like Wordpress will allow me to customise the site to my needs. The Newlinks boys made the switch away from Blogger quite a while ago and are still going strong on their nice Drupal based platform. Drupal is also possibly "in the running" for providing the front end for my new site. This is even more customisable than Wordpress but may be too much for what I need. I have got a website to design for Flights-Physiques.co.uk and wish I had got him to purchase a business hosting service so I could install Drupal or Wordpress. At least then he could update the news section of the site himself! Taoski.co.uk is available as a domain name and I can use Wordpress to import all my Blogger posts and comments - so watch this space suckers! Related links: Wordpress for beginners, Wordpress Themes, Working with Wordpress. Technorati Tags: blogger, wordpress, blog, drupal, newlinks, pet rock, hosting, site, photao, music club

Radio Scum

2006-01-09T16:06:00.000+01:00

I am not known for my outspoken views - or even for my beliefs. In fact - I have little opinion about very little - and what I do have an opinion about, I usually keep to myself. Last night during my usual 9pm Sunday night shower, I was listening to "The Sunday Surgery" on Radio1. An Agony Aunt style program where listeners can call in with problems and the smug doctor and presenter can advise them on where they went wrong. As part of this format, they have a section where the listeners can call in to give their opinion and advice on someone elses problem. This time, the person who needed the information was a 17 year old girl who was deciding if she should have an abortion or not, as her 21 year old boyfriend said he would "stick by her" and "do good for the baby n' nat". She had not told anyone else about this though... This is wrong on so many levels.

The fact that Radio1 should entertain a public airing of such a contravertial issue.
The fact that Radio1 chose it to be a "free for all" allowing the public to call in to help.
The fact that the girl actually came on the air and talked about the problem to millions of people - but she could'nt tell her parents.

Poo to Radio1 for allowing this to go ahead. I never heard the ending, or any of the comments that "the public" gave - but I can imagine what they were like. I'm glad i'm a Radio4 man. They have much better programs. Technorati Tags: radio1, abortion, agony aunt, chav, pregnant, doctor, advice

Fantabulosa

2006-01-06T14:43:00.000+01:00

I was watching a program the other night called Balderdash and Piffle, relating to the origin of words and phrases, their meanings and their definitions in the Oxford English Dictionary. The BBC has been attempting to enlist the help of the public to, for example, get the earliest meanings for terms such as "Pear Shaped" and "Pass The Parcel". The program was rather dull and even the minxy feline presenter was not attractive enough to keep my attention. Apart from one section...

"That charpering omi is a dish! Troll over and vada his basket for me!"

Polari is the name used to describe British gay slang from the 50's and 60's when the subject or practice of being homosexual was rather frowned upon. In an effort to keep the movement underground, a secret language was developed and used by the gay community so you could converse in public about the size of "that bloke at the bar's todger" without getting arrested, beaten up or both. Polari, or pallare, is also used to refer to the internal slang languages used by other groups such as sailors, gypsies, circus folk and vagrants. So possibly "can you spare 10p for a cuppa tea guv" could have some other sinister hidden message the public have not yet grasped. Kenneth Williams, a popular gay actor and comedian in the 60's (now deceased) has been partially blamed for destroying the now seldom used language by using it frequently as part of a comedy radio show, Round The Horne. The show was listened to by millions of the British public and such mass exposure to the terms ensured that no-one was safe using them any longer. Also, the eventual acceptance of the homosexual communities ensured that Polari was no longer needed - as that bloke at the bar now knew his enemy and could beat you up even if you weren't talking about his todger anyway! A list of common words, meanings and a brief history of Polari can be found here. And just for the record. I am not an omi-palone, a meese or a riah shusher! I was just intrigued by this stuff I had never heard of before! Technorati Tags: polari, pallare, language, slang, gay, homosexual, kenneth williams, round the horne, OED, BBC

Finally... a good Podcast!

2006-01-05T11:33:00.000+01:00

Yesterday, whilst I was supposed to be helping babysit SwimPigs daughter, I was playing with his PSP and noticed that he had downloaded some MP3 Podcast's to his 1Gb Memory Stick. I have "dabbled" with Podcasts in the past and have a few subscriptions in my iTunes which I usually delete after a few weeks of not listening to some nasal american whining on about how great his Mac is or some half drunk english guys who are supposedly funny. In my opinion, 99.9% of Podcasts are all total crap. It might be the latest "big thing" but I read enough useless WOBBs (Waste Of Bandwith Blogs) - I don't want to hear them talk in my head too! SwimPig had downloaded the previously unheard of to me, Ricky Gervais podcast and when I went to the Podcasts page in iTunes, I found that it had overtaken the Best of Chris Moyles Podcast (which I already had subscribed to and deleted) as the most popular. I have downloaded all 5 episodes to my iPod and have just been pissing myself in the toilet (pun intended) , trying not to laugh out loud. And that is only 9 minutes into the first one! It is very good - and well worth the download. At last! A good and funny Podcast! Until I get mine done of course! Technorati Tags: ipod, podcast, ricky gervais, chris moyles, itunes, toilet, laughing, humour

Dons Gone And Been Dones

2006-01-03T23:11:00.000+01:00

Yet again the MK Dons have been beaten. And its all my fault. But why? When I put FIFA 2006 into my XBox for the first time and selected my local team as my favorite, it offered me the chance to play against the World Classic VII. They totally whipped my ass! Damn you Cantona! At least I got two of them sent off injured. "Thats it... hobble away old man!... fat has-been!" I have played the FIFA series on PS2, PC, GBA and Xbox for years and have really enjoyed getting beaten all the time. I am really crap at it - I admit! If and when I get onto XBox live and play someone - they are gonna kill me. Unless it's some spotty schoolkid who's shins I can hack away until I get the game abandoned through too many red cards against me. The latest version for Xbox, FIFA 2006, is visually amazing, fluid, realistic, fast and fun. So i can get beaten in real graphical class! Definitely a must have game! On a side note, I have actually bought my first real retail game for my Xbox! Halo 2 from Play.com for a tenner!. Hard to pass up really. Especially if I get the 360 and can play it online too! Technorati Tags: xbox, fifa, fifa 2006, football, soccer, xbox live, MK Dons

Xbox 460

2006-01-03T15:56:00.000+01:00

I was in my local Game store this weekend and found, to my surprise, that they had some Premium Xbox 360 bundles in stock! The only problem was that they were only willing to sell them for £460, bundled with 4 (crap) games. What a load of fucking tosh they are! Trying to squeeze even more money out of me so they can sell more games! Thats an extra £190! Since my matey Swimpig has got himself a PSP for xmas and I have put in a good few minutes on it - I am pretty impressed with it. I am now in a quandry over getting a PSP - or getting a 360. Maybe I could get a PSP and then a 360 in the summer but I am not sure. The thought process behind getting a PSP means that I could play FIFA when the missus is watching her soap opera stuff. It might be worth me holding out for a non-retail PSP with some nice old-school firmware so I can load homebrew apps and emulators on it. I can then sell my GBA-SP to part-fund the venture. The problem is - I really want BOTH of these items - but feel that if/when I get one of them I expect I will feel terribly unfulfilled. I'm not sure what it is about me and these kind of things. I obsess about them until I get them and then.... nothing. A real anti-climax. I have been the same with my iPod. I do use it - but not as often as I thought. It's a good job I have'nt got much money - otherwise my house would be (more) full of crap! Technorati Tags: PSP, xbox360, xbox 360, microsoft, sony, playstation, game

Twenty Oh Six

2006-01-01T12:51:00.000+01:00

Please wait....

2005-12-29T02:05:00.000+01:00

Re-publishing your blog for the 200th time... please wait. Ever get the feeling you spend too much time farting with little CSS niceties in your template when you should be sleeping? 2 hours to make the comment background to alternate between grey and dark grey! Wahoo. I get the feeling it was not worth it now. Then again - I did it myself!

Hats, Twats and Throatyaches

2005-12-23T00:40:00.000+01:00

Christmas greetings to all. But not to the retarded customers at the local supermarket who were all wheeled and bussed in and had special "day out visits from the institution" just to piss me off and get in my way as I tried to gather some basic supplies yesterday. I am normally quite deft at avoiding other "obstacles" when I am crusing the aisles but they just wanted to die! 10 points for a crusty, 15 for demented, dirty slob parented children and 30 bonus points for bashing the shins of the employee who decided to drag out a cage of stock right in front of me! He deserved it. I'm sure it was'nt all that bad. It may have had something to do with the fact that I have been off work all week with another throat infection. In my last post about... the last infection... I used a photo of someones tonsils I found off the net - but those ones above...are really mine! Come to papa! I have also spent the time I was not hallucanating from the effects of a 4-a-day dose of 250mg of Penacillin, making cardboard christmas hats for when we go and spend a few nights at the in-laws over the xmas weekend. Apparently it is a family tradition they have (strangely left out of the ten christmas's I have spent with them) to wear ellaborate hats at the christmas dinner table. We (i) appear to have ended up making 11 hats for the people in attendance this year and I present the current state of play, modelled by some annoyed children (click em' to Big Em' Up in Flickr): In order from left to right: 1. Sister In Laws Hat. She has recently got herself a Moto RAZR V2 phone and is generally one of those people whose phone and mouth never stops, so i modelled one for her! My wife and I did the eyes and mouth together. 2. Ethan's Hat (my youngest). He is mad on trains and Thomas The Tank Engine so I modelled him Thomas running on the tracks across his head. Thats him too BTW. 3. Father In Laws Hat. He owns his own video production company and is also the editor/cameraman. I tried to make this look like a camera. There is a fish jumping on the other side as his area of expertise is in filming and making the best and most popular fishing videos in the UK (and world!!). That hot model is me BTW. 4. Corin's Hat (my eldest). This is finished apart from the spray paint, but is supposed to be Darth Vader. Possibly the most difficult hat to make so far. And when he came down in the morning and saw it, he complained that he wanted a Father Christmas hat instead. Thanks mate... love you too... 5. My Wife's Hat. She is renown for stealing all the gravy at the dinner table. This started off as a hat for Corin but began to look too much like a weird blow-up-doll - so we changed it to my wifes instead. 6. Lily's Hat (my niece). Supposed to be a sort of Cleopatra type hat. What you can't see is the glittery hair at the back but the snake was all modelled by me out of cardboard! 7. Joe's Hat (my nephew) This is supposed to be a "chiselled jawed pretty boy" hat as he is an image conscious teenager. It reminds me of a gladiators mask or something though. 8. Mother In Laws Hat. Obsessed with cleaning and cleanliness, this hat features her rubber gloves and cleaning materials. She made it actually - but we finished it off for her. 9. Luke's Hat (my nephew). He is currently at Bath University studying "commerical music" so we thought a hat with Symbals, a bass drum (he is a Grade 8 level drummer) a mic, and a guitar amp would be appropriate. 10. My Hat. What else? An iPod hat! It sits on my head in it's own "dock" and features real (cast off) headphones glued in. Its yet to be sprayed but will end up gold. I will also stick on an iPod screen too so it looks authentic (and even more geeky). I did toy with the idea of being able to remove it from the dock too and carry it around... but that was just silly! Just one more to go... and I think I might have to make a harmonica! Fecking hell! Don't think I will be doing this again next year! Merry Xmas to all. I'm off to bed to watch the drugs do their work on the 70s light show cinema scape that is the inside of my eyelids! Wahoo!

I'm missing out on something

2005-12-15T16:20:00.000+01:00

Advance Wife Warning: When I see a 360... I will buy it! If there are other regular readers of this Blog who have an XBox Live gamertag, let me know and I will add you to my list. Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox360, microsoft, xbox live, live, gamertag, gamer tag

Boom Shake Shake The Room

2005-12-14T15:31:00.000+01:00

Engadget reports on the latest iPod rumour doing the rounds on the usual "I Know What Apple Did Next Summer" type sites. Apparently, a new verison of Apple's flagship iPod product is now headed for that dusty shelf in your living room, bedroom or study in the shape of a wireless enabled hard disk'ed up "Boombox". There is already a raft of other (expensive) speaker systems for the iPod so it seems common sense that Apple would provide their own system too. If it wireless connects and syncs to my iTunes too then that would be cool. A basic iPod docking speaker system would be too "low tech" for Apple to make, so expect it to have lots more bells and whistles. No doubt it will be some kind of iPod docking device that allows you to connect to iTunes, and the iTunes Radio stations too over your wifi connection. Add the ability to sync the tunes on your pod' to the internal hard disk too for when your battery is dead and that will probably be something near to the final product. The device may be announced at the Mac Expo early next year. Technorati Tags: apple, ipod, boombox, wireless, itunes, radio

In the real world

2005-12-14T14:20:00.000+01:00

I just found these links via Slashdot and thought I would share:

I would also like to thank Bill Gates for making this all possible and keeping my salary rolling in. Technorati Tags: windows 95, windows 98, windows 2000, windows xp, microsoft, support, admin, sysadmin, slashdot

Ring a ding ding

2005-12-10T11:17:00.000+01:00

After sorting my Bluetooth VS Windows XP VS Crap Software issues the other day I went searching for some Gorillaz MP3 ringtones and came across this site which allows free downloads and also the ability to upload your own MP3 tones too, so others can share in your trimmed remix of "Crazy Frog Versus The Magic Roundabout" - or even worse... Charlotte Church.

Technorati Tags: mp3, ringtones, ringtone, bluetooth, crazy frog

Fucktard Can't Read

2005-12-08T18:06:00.000+01:00

The Register reports how an innocent eBay'er was duped into buying a picture of an Xbox 360 for £470. As BigFootCookie knows, stating the correct details of the item in the auction is very important - as is reading the auction before you part with your cash! Here is a link to the eBay auction, complete with a full description of the XBox probably copied from the Official Microsoft Site - but with the added quip:

This auction is not for a Xbox 360 game system, but instead a picture of one. I hope you enjoy this high-quality item. The 360 is the hottest thing on the market.

I bet PayPal are working through their lunch break to sort this one out. If they can stop laughing that is.

And what does the purchaser have to say on this matter when leaving feedback?

Lying theif, stay away from this ebay member !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jesus. He can't even spell either!

Hells Blue Teeth

2005-12-08T16:18:00.000+01:00

Since I got hold of my Motorola V600 phone I have been trying to use Bluetooth to upload stuff to it. I bought a Blue-USB Bluetooth adapter from eBay and have paired the phone, using the crappy Bluesoleil software to my PC, but can only download pics from the phone - not upload ringtones or anything else. After reading the tutorial over at Jonsguides for getting any USB Bluetooth Adapter to work with XP using the Widcomm software, I went in search of the required files that had been deleted (as requested by Widcomm) and found them! All done via this search string on the mighty Tyoogle. I have'nt tried this yet, but will tonight. Enjoy! Update: Installed the drivers and patches to my laptop. Followed the complete instructions here as Jon's is missing a bit. Tested, works brilliantly! Now, off to find a copy of Crazy Frog.mp3!

Auto Patcher

2005-12-08T00:43:00.000+01:00

I came across this little program last night after searching for ways to get my USB Bluetooth Dongle working in XP properly. Head - bashing - desk - not - working! Anyway, I digress. For those people who have a "non-pukka" version of XP that fails the usual Windows Update verification thingies... heres a program that contains all of the latest updates and fixes all together. It also contains extras like the new XP Royale Theme that I blogged about earlier and the latest Google Toolbar. There is also a "lite" version that only contains the main fixes though. The full download weighs in at over 100mb - so definitely not for those luddite modem people. Get it over at the Autopatcher site. There is also a hacked DLL doing the rounds that you have to patch your PC with in safe mode that will allow the verification tests to pass - but I have not tested it. Update: Tested the DLL crack - works a treat! Happy Xmas!

Time for a change?

2005-12-07T10:24:00.000+01:00

A new broom sweeps clean: Blue Triangle Blues

Snikitt!

2005-12-06T23:29:00.000+01:00

Lock up my wife, Logan's back. Get the trailer over at Quicktime.com

Lunchtime Kudos

2005-12-06T22:57:00.000+01:00

As promised, my pal Dodgy Trev, took me back to his gaff for an early lunch of cheese on toast and to play PGR3 on his nice new spanky Xbox 360. He plays it on some dodgy "no-name, no-brand" 28 inch widescreen TV, so the game was not running at it's HDTV best (or anywhere near it) but I have to say, I was impressed. Driving games are not really my forte but this game just looks so good! The detail in the cars, buildings and surroundings is so realistic and flows perfectly with no pop-up at all. I get the impression that this is a game where you could easily get lost in the "realism" of it all. As I was racing "downtown" in New York, a portion of the track takes you onto a bridge which just looked real as it whizzed past me! I was really really impressed. Mum.... I know what I want for christmas.... I also tried to break it by pressing the Xbox button on the wireless controller when the game was loading a new track but it quite happily showed me part of the dashboard where I could see what my (Trev's) mates were up to on XBox Live and I could change my music prefs. We tried to get the 360 hooked up to some MP3s on his PC using the Media Connect software but this did not seem to work. The PC could see the 360, but not the other way round. Odd. But I have seen some posts over at XBox-Scene where other people have had this issue too. We then fired up Halo2 which looked crisper and more detailed than ever. The backwards compatibility worked a treat! Come on Halo3, bring it on!

Seen one!

2005-12-05T15:07:00.000+01:00

I saw an Xbox360 "in the flesh" this weekend! Yay! Whilst trying to navigate the immense dimensions of our new local ADSA Walmart store I came across the small Xbox360 demo booth where a spotty faced employee was trying to get rid of an error on screen that said "no signal". I went and looked at the toys with the kids and returned a little later to find the console working and a man playing FIFA2006 who had ditched his wheelchair bound mother to get at the new hardware. She sat with her back to him, cuddling her lap-blanket looking folornly at the nearby counter of cheap DVD Players, whilst her son pitted his skills of England against Germany. As predicted, the game looked freakin amazing! The players facial textures and the detail on the clothing rippling in the wind was really cool. As the camera zoomed out to the usual view of the field during play it did not look quite as impressive. But as the bloke guided Paul Scholes to make a poorly judged tackle from behind (not that he would do that in real life.....) the cut scene was really well rendered! My matey Dodgy Trev has managed to get an Xbox and I am off to play Project Gotham 3 at lunchtime tomorrow - so expect me to give an update after I return - unless I am too busy ringing round trying to find out where I can buy one!

Xbox 360 Round Up

2005-11-30T14:15:00.000+01:00

So, its only 2 more days until us chaps in "little ol' england" get the XBOX360. Well, we would if we had pre-ordered. It appears that Europe as a whole will only get a total of around 300,000 units for sale on launch day this friday. Pants! In preparation for the event, I am summarising the stories since the US launch a few weeks ago so you can all be "well informed" and "make the right choice" before buying. Fact#1: There have been issues with the 360 crashing which appear to be maily due to the external AC power adapter overheating. The fix for this is to put it on top of a cardboard box! "No recalls!" shouted Micro$oft, "Par for the course!" said a M$ support person, "Pants!" we say! Fact#2: You can install the Windows Media Connect application from Micro$oft to stream "multimedia" from your XP machine to the 360. However, this only covers Music and Photos. If you have Windows XP Media Centre Edition installed, you will be able to use the video and PVR functions from the 360 - but at the moment there is (absolutely) no way to stream or play Divx/Xvid files on the 360. This looks interesting though - a little hacking to run XP MCE apps via the 360. Or maybe using VLC to stream any content through a web interface is the way forward. Fact#3: The Free60 project is already up and running to attempt to get Linux running on the Xbox360. They have found out lots of information about the internal hardware and its hacking restrictions that have been imposed. A clever chap called "The Hypervisor" is guarding the (bill) gates and seems to have butt-fucked any chance of a modded 360 (so far). So don't wait for a modded version people! See this article at Engadget for a run down on the internal structure of the 360. Still, nothing is impossible - but I have yet to see a 360 ISO file turn up on "the torrents". Fact#4: The DVD player functionality has already been panned. It plays "backup DVDs" ok but also has quite bad "artifacts" and "smearing" on screen, even from retail DVDs. Stick with the £40 "Happy Shopper Matsui DVD Player" from Tesco methinks. Fact#5: Xbox 360 does allow you to plug in USB devices to access files such as music and photos. It will not allow you to play videos from that device though. You can connect your iPod and play music from it whilst playing a game, but you cannot rip music from the iPod (or any other USB device) to the 360's hard disk. This still has to be done by putting in your CD and ripping the tracks to the XBox hard disk in WMA format. Also, some MP3 devices are having issues being recognised by the 360, but this is mainly due to the fact that they are not *proper* USB Mass Storage Devices and may use their own internal disk format. Taoski's Parting Comment: "Whilst the 360 may appear to be the best thing since sliced bread, for me, the fact that there are *issues* connecting it to a PC to stream movies to it is a big no-no. I currently use my (modded) Xbox primarily as a media player using the excellent XBox Media Center application. Without that functionality in the new device - I will be scuppered." "It does appear that it will be a long time before a modded version of the console comes out but I have been away from online gaming for many years and feel the need to get a *real console* that plays *real games* so I can play against *real people*. Plus I should be teaching my kids the real value of things now they are getting older. Nothing comes for free - and if its worth having, then its worth working for." "I have yet to see a 360 in action pre-release day despite a trawl of my local gaming stores at the weekend. No doubt I will see Project Gotham playing and then obsess about getting one like I do with most other things. But for now I will stick with my current Xbox which does all I want it to and whilst the graphics on games like Burnout Revenge still amaze me - thats enough for me." Taoski says "RELAX" (and wait until next year to get a cheaper bundle). Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox360, microsoft, uk

Read and Destroy

2005-11-29T14:28:00.000+01:00

When I was little, I can remember my parents reading me this book, "The Elephant and the Bad Baby" written by Elfrida Vipont and illustrated by the excellent Raymond Briggs. I bought this book for my kids a few years ago and when I read it to them, certain of the pictures give me a real feeling of euphoria from when I was young. There is one part where the elephant takes a bun from the bakers shop and the image of his trunk reaching through the door is very emotive for me. It's not the story, just the pictures. I have recently obtained a copy of a DVD called "Rollin Through The Decades" which charts the history of skateboarding in the UK. The added bonus is that it is edited by my friend Ben, who I have talked about in the Music Club Blog several times. The main focus of the documentary is around the South Bank in London where skateboarding has been welcomed, revilled, accepted and then outlawed many times over the years. Around the time I used to skate (circa 1987-1993), there was a skateboarding magazine called R.A.D. (Read And Destroy) which I used to buy every month. On Rollin Through The Decades, the magazine's creator, Tim Leighton Boyce talked about the creation of the mag and quite a few skaters pontificated over the content and style. Just seeing the covers of the magazine brought back similar feelings to those I described earlier. I can still remember the pictures and articles too, each one as emotive as the last. Then, over at the Too Old To Skate blog, I found a link to a new online archive of the R.A.D. magazine, setup by none other than the creator himself! I hope he features the issue where they came to Milton Keynes. I was there when the photographer was taking shots - but i never got into any of them (as I was too crap probably) but there were lots of my friends in them. Oh happy days!

iPod Volume Hack

2005-11-25T23:45:00.000+01:00

Someone asked my where to get the ipod with full volume hack. So I thought I would find it and give it a go myself too. Not expecting too much, I installed the app - and it makes a hell of a difference! Not only does it increase the volume, it also expands the aural fidelity audio frequency curve graphology rating too! Ouch, ears... bleeding! Well worth an install! Technorati Tags: ipod, volume hack, apple, ears, bleeding

Retraction

2005-11-24T11:41:00.000+01:00

I would like to retract my earlier statement regarding the casting and special effects used to make Mad Eye Moody in the new Harry Potter and the Goblet Of Fire film. I watched most of it last night in the Taoski's Torrent Sofa Cinema and I was impressed! It certainly is the best HP film to date - and I have'nt even got to the good bit yet at the end of "The Maze"... Mad Eye is done very well actually and does the character justice. So... sorry... I appologise. Technorati Tags: harry potter, goblet of fire, mad eye moody, HP

Hum Drum

2005-11-22T15:26:00.000+01:00

There must be an official industry term for this: Trapped in a high salary, crap boring job that is the same every hour, day, week, year. Too scared to leave, too frightened to speak up in case of the dreaded "sideways career move" to another part of the company. At one point we, "the team", were the best of the best. We were looked upon in great esteem and revered in the highest eschelons of the corporate infrastructure. We were like gods, paving the golden road ahead in the world of remote PC fixes, "the best of the best". Our names were engraved upon the wooden toilet seats of our directors and fanfares were sounded when our names were spoken in meetings. I was their DemiGod. The bringer of light, chief fighter against evil and the writer of the holy and sacred batchfiles. Life was good. Work was a laugh, EVERY DAY! and it was real good fun. "The light at the end of the tunnel just turned out to be the screen of another broken PC......." How did it all turn into this rat-shit?

That's some damn tasty burger!

2005-11-21T16:16:00.000+01:00

If you want some new XP Eye Candy whilst you are waiting to migrate to an iMac, download the Microsoft Royale Theme which has recently been released. It's nice n yummy. Technorati Tags: xp, theme, royale. eye candy

Man Flu

2005-11-17T11:28:00.000+01:00

My body lay wet, cold and broken on the bed. Each twitching movement sending another prickly wave of pain from my back over my shoulders to my kneck. A bright ring of light was held tight around my skull, slowly twisting tighter as my brain inside throbbed harder and harder to escape from any orrifice it could find safe exit. And then I swallowed. Yep. I got the Man Flu again - but this time I also get to have 100% extra free Throat Infection too! Yipee!.. ow! I started to feel all tingly and achy on Friday last week and went downhill fast. Slept for 21 hours on Saturday and then had to endure the dreamlike comical toytown nightmare reality that was taking my wife to work on Sunday and then looking after the kids for six hours. Its amazing how much notice kids take of you when you are shouting soundlessly at them from the dizzy void of another dimension. The highlight of Sunday was taking my kids for a spin on the merry-go-round at the new Christmas display at my local shopping centre. It was just like the ending of 2001 - but with more hurting. It might have all been a dream... I'm just not sure! I got prescribed Penicillin (Phenoxymeythylpenicillin potassium) by my local surgery on Monday and have been on a steady dose since. Much crashing on the sofa was also prescribed and some DVDs had to be watched. I braved a return to work yesterday, against others wishes and better sound judgement, thinking I would be able to function but just found that my computer screen had turned into a milky puddle of rippling colour and that my hands kept on disappearing. When I was trying to talk to Mr Noxious about a remote install of Access 2000 he was attempting to an NT4 workstation with a .147 IP address I had to struggle to keep my sanity as he veered off the subject at random to talk about "tubes" and "hair folicles". Not what I needed at all. Again today I feel like my head is being squashed into the corner of the sofa by a big bean bag full of tiny ringing alarm clocks. My spacial awareness has gone completely off the radar and things look and feel a lot smaller or larger than they could be. Even as I sit and type this on my spongy keyboard, I feel the room spinning around me under my chair (which thankfully is on wheels) and my feet feel like the floor is pitching up and down under them, like they are on the pedal of an old sewing machine. Must be time for some food I think. Nothing too crunchy though. Technorati Tags: cold, flu, infection, penicillin, dream, void, headache

iPoddy

2005-11-08T23:00:00.000+01:00

Here's my iTunes Playlist in dedication to all those disgruntled iPod Nano users who have troubles with their screen! Bring on the multi million dollar lawsuit! Tsk... twats! On a similar and related theme, heres some links for an iTunes hack to Download music videos from the iTunes. This has recently been blocked by Apple (after the announcement of the iPod that does video) so check the links on the Latest URLs page. Right click the link on the Latest URLs page and paste it into the box on the front page. This will give you a .MOV URL which you can copy out to do with, what you desire. Also keep an eye on the UNEASYSilence version (which is currently offline) as it worked better Also from the UNEASYSilence site are the instructions for How to download high res album art from iTunes and How to download movie trailers from iTunes. Technorati Tags: iPod, iPod Nano, Nano, iTunes, Apple, Hack, video, album art, ITMS

Mad eye

2005-11-08T00:34:00.000+01:00

No, no, no, no... NO! This is not what I expected Mad Eye Moody to look like! In my minds eye he was a lot more "grotesque" than this. He was more kind of like Robert Deniro's version of Frankenstein's monster. And what the hell is that? A strap on eye? Get a grip! I might have to go back and check The Goblet Of Fire for the first description of Moody - but this just destroys him for me. Nearly as bad as casting Keanu Reeves as John Constantine for the poor film version of the Hellblazer comics.... Casting directors..... "Stupefy!" Technorati Tags: harry potter, the goblet of fire, mad eye moody, tgof, constantine, keanu reeves, Brendan Gleeson

Holy cow!

2005-11-04T16:59:00.000+01:00

Just stumbled upon an ZDnet blog page detailling the new Swedish train which runs on fuel made up of organic waste from cows.

Not just being environmentally friendly and quiet, the train also runs at a respectable 130kph and according to travellers on the maiden voyage, ran on time.

I'm not sure what Rev Awdry would have to say about this - but i don't expect a DVD version of "Thomas and the shitty smelling train" will be landing on my sons lap at christmas time.

Technorati Tags: thomas the tank engine, biogas, train, cow, environment

Ho Ho Ho, says Bill

2005-11-04T11:21:00.000+01:00

In a shock "billionaire tries to make more money" scandal, it appears that the US launch day stock of the XBOX360 will be limited to meagre amounts per store. As detailled over at the XBOX Forums already, stock for some major retail stores in the US like WalMart will only be able to sell between 10-50 units on a first come first serve basis with only one purchase per person. The dedicated gamer outlets like Electonics Boutique may only receive 16 units per store which will piss off the 60 odd people who have already pre-ordered - over 30 of which were promised a console. Some other stores worldwide have also been told that they must sell out on the launch date and that they must sell at least two games per console. The spin on this is possibly two fold.

Has Microsoft had issues making the consoles in time for the launch date? If so then the low stock estimates could be valid.
However, predicting a sell out on launch date, creating a high demand for the "must have" next gen console could also work in their favour, creating a shopping frenzy. Hell, they are already on eBay for over £300!

What ever the reason, if I don't get one on December the 25th... i will stamp my feet and cry. Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox 360, microsoft, walmart, electronics boutique, christmas, presents

Pretend Poo

2005-11-03T14:35:00.000+01:00

Cripes! Mr Postman delivered my GBA Flash Cart this morning before 9am! Hows that for eBay service! Ordered yesterday afternoon - delivered today! I unboxed my new toy and slapped it into the USB port on my XP box and installed the drivers, briefly read the instructions (ignored most of it) and launched the program from the included CD to upload some **ahem** backups of my games I already own. ERROR: NOT ENOUGH ROOM The Cart stated that it had 256mb free... but only 256MB RAM - not ROM.... Hmm... I tried to format the card using the same program - but it just crashed every time. Thoughts of negative eBay feedback entered my mind as I re-read the instructions. I went off to the manufacturers website and began to download the latest version of the upload client and was a small part way through downloading it over my 2Meg ADSL line at 3.2kb a second when I found a slightly older version on another site. Downloaded that - unRARed it and tested... it worked!!! I was able to pick my ROM images and load them into the application ready for uploading. So why did'nt Mr eBay supply the latest version of the client too? He did supply his own CD with the drivers on, but they were obviously the old version! So I now have ...er... some ROMs on the cart. And for the record.. it works - perfectly! It boots to a loader screen (with wallpaper you can change) and you arrow up and down the list of games and press the A Button to load them. I don't know why I did'nt get one years ago! Now, i'm off for another "pretend poo" to play. And tonight, I will be mostly searching the internet for ROMs and Emulators. Technorati Tags: nintendo, gameboy advance, gameboy, gba, flash, EFA, emulator, ROM, eBay, USB

Spam

2005-11-02T14:46:00.000+01:00

I just logged onto the webmail portion of my "other" main email account with BTInternet that I have had for over 8 years to check the latest on my eBay/PayPal purchase. Only to remember that I had changed the email addresses ages ago. They have an automatic spam killing feature on there that moves the offending messages direct to the Trash folder and then deletes them after a month on a rolling process. At the moment, the count of the last 31 days worth of spam is 1373 emails! Not to mention the ones that slip past the filters to be captured by my Thunderbird spam filters. That's about 44 pieces of crap per day! Or 16,500 per year! Then again, the email address has been used on newsgroups and a various array of other "dodgy" sites over the years - so 44 per day is probably not that bad! The actual amount of proper emails I get to that address is minimal - i might as well delete it really. On a side note... here is my first ever newsgroup posting from over 10 years ago. Thanks Google! Oh - and sorry Terry. I know your boss wasn't pleased... Technorati Tags: spam, email, bt, btinternet, trash, ebay, paypal, newsgroups, usenet, google

Advice taken

2005-11-02T12:50:00.000+01:00

I have taken the advice from the comments on my previous posting and have purchased a 256MB flash ROM cart for my Gameboy Advance SP from eBay. Review coming up soon! Technorati Tags: GBA, nintendo, flash, emulators, roms, ebay

You're Tekken the piss

2005-11-01T12:20:00.000+01:00

A little help please... Years after finding an original Gameboy Advance on the train a few days after they have been released in the shops, my love affair with portable gaming has not ceased. I upgraded the old unit for a nice new spanky Gameboy Advance SP when that came out and we have spent many a happy hour together. The problem is, I only have 3 games!

I have recently won 29 fights on "Survival Mode" on the "Hard" setting of Tekken Advance, so I think I might have done it to death. I have also completed Tony Hawk with nearly all the characters (much to the delight of my fellow train commuters). Advance Wars is a different matter. I have not even completed the basic training games! Why? Because it takes too long! I only like to play games that are not too deep and do not take too long. Ones that I can pick up and play for 5 mins at a time. Something I can play whilst on the toilet without running the risk of getting arse-sores. Has anyone got a suggestion for a new Gameboy Advance game that fits this criteria? Or has anyone got any good experiences to share regarding the GBA Flash Memory Carts? Or does anyone want to do swapsies with my copy of Advance Wars? Technorati Tags: gba, gameboy, gameboy advance, nintendo, tekken, advance wars, tony hawk, console, xbox

iTao

2005-10-30T18:42:00.000+01:00

On friday I had my portable heart monitor fitted for 24 hours. Seven different coloured electrodes were attached to various parts of my chest after a student doctor shaved me and dealt me a few lines of his jokey patter. The main device was in a small black zipped bag slung over my shoulder. Not that different from a camera case. I went straight back to work and hid the device under my shirt. Looking like I was "packing heat" I spent the rest of the day feeling a little odd for having sticky pads all over me - but only had one slight odd heartbeat type symptom at around 12:39 which I noted in the little diary they gave me. I went and stayed at SwimPig's house, had a few beers and a real coffee at 9pm (which will be noted in the diary too). He took some excellent long exposure shots of me, in my monitor gear, in the garden with a torch. You have to keep your eye on his site. One of the shots may appear soon. Also, my sleep was affected as I normally sleep on my side - so the wife was kept awake by me snoring like a cattle grid. I will be taking the monitor back tomorrow and will expect to hear the results (if any) sometime soon i suppose. Technorati Tags: ECG, heart, monitor, ipod, murmur

Smoke and Mirrors

2005-10-27T16:14:00.000+01:00

As a reformed smoker of over 5 years standing I now feel qualified to speak on this matter with some authority. The UK government has started legislation for a partial smoking ban in UK pubs.

I am not PRO a total ban on smoking in public places - as I will not be able to get my "by proxy" fix of the sweet smell of Old Virginia rolling tobacco wafting over my pint of Guinness whilst I chat.

Smoking is nice. I loved it and I probably would still love it now.

Call me selfish... but I don't care!

Technorati Tags : smoking, ban, smoking, uk, patricia, hewitt, guinness, pub

Photoshop Kubrick Header Template

2005-10-26T16:10:00.000+01:00

Hot on the heels of my previous posting about the Kubrickr header image generator - and bang on the money after Mr Noxious slated my new header design in favor of the old logo (in a LOST stylie) comes a copy of my photoshop template for the Kubrick "Blue Blob" header. Made from two layers, you can either customize on top of the "blue blob" or remove it totally for your own "free form" enjoyment. I was starting to think of a new design and made this template to help me. Hope others can benefit from using this too! Grab the template here Get the Kubrick for Blogger template here Technorati Tags: kubrick, template, blogger, kubrickr, photoshop, lost, header

Obituary

2005-10-25T15:18:00.000+01:00

I hereby announce the passing of my sons first Tamagotchi creature, DJ.

They spent 8 wonderful days together, playing games, shopping and pooing.

He spent time in the bath, played with his Ninja Throwing Stars I bought him after we gambled 9p a time on the slot game and he also had a nice day out wearing his hat we purchased from the fat shop keeper.

His favorite treat was Cupcakes (just like Uber!).

We will miss him... but he has already been replaced by TIFF, a new female creature! I'm glad we've got two bathrooms!

Technorati Tags : tamagotchi, egg, creature, cupcakes, ninja

Clockwork Headers

2005-10-24T15:59:00.000+01:00

Just found this neat little web based tool to automatically make "Kubrick style" headers for your blog (the template championed by myself and Nick). Images are pulled from Flickr by entering an appropriate tag and then manually cropped to make the JPG which is then downloaded to your PC.

It will never replace spending hours on a tedious multi layered Photoshop/illustrator image (only to find it looks crap at the proper size) but it could be a good way of finding a starting image though.

Not sure why the site will not pull out my Photao tagged images though. Odd.

I still would (eat my own arm for) like a version of the Tao of Mac kubrick slideshow header which is done in Macromedia Flash and pulls random images from Flickr. It just gushes class! Just need some (reliable) webspace i guess.

Found via the Great Flickr Tools collection.

Technorati Tags: flickr, kubrick, template, header, blogger, photao

Get iTunes Workin'

2005-10-20T15:17:00.000+01:00

Just spotted these two links via my lunchtime Bloglines readings and thought that I would blog them before my phone rang and I forgot my name... How to find and add media to your iTunes library with del.icio.us - using RSS feeds. Works with MP3, PDF etc.. Subscribe to free del.icio.us videos in iTunes - using keywords like "funny" or "boobies". Both via the excellent Lifehacker site. Not tried it yet - but it does look "interesting"! Technorati Tags: itunes, ipod, apple, ITMS, RSS, del.icio.us, lifehacker, video, mp3, media

On Average

2005-10-20T11:40:00.000+01:00

A report yesterday found that on average, the average person spends and average of £21,000 on music in their lifetime. The Uber-Music-Geek however spends, on average £44,000 (mostly due to ordering that rare INXS german remix with the japanese cover notes from eBay). In this modern age, £21,000 equates to aproximately 30,434 purchases from the iTunes Music Store (based on 69p per track). The Audiophile with their £44,000 gets a whopping 63,768 purchases from the same store. With the average size of an MP3 being about 6mb, the iPods for the next generation of tune-heads would need a storage capacity of 200GB (to fit aprox 30,000 songs) and 400GB (to fit aprox 64,000 songs) to enable you to carry your entire lifes music purchases in your pocket. In realistic terms, we are not too far off these possible capacities. Come on Apple, sort it out! There's a market hole waiting to be filled! Just don't make it too heavy! By the time I have purchased (torrented) all my music - i might be a little frail. Technorati Tags: apple, ipod, storage, music, itunes, ITMS

Bye bye Gmail.. hello Google Mail

2005-10-19T11:05:00.000+01:00

For quite some time I have been a champion of the excellent Google GMail service and now use that more regularly than the other (13) email accounts I have. In the UK, Google's use of the GMail name has been the subject of dispute as another company has already claimed its right to use the GMail name. So it appears that (for once) Google have given in and will be changing the addresses for the UK users of its service from @Gmail.com to @googlemail.com sometime soon. Shame really. Its not got the same ring to it. I still have 100 invites left to give out for GMail... sorry... Googlemail. So if you want one, let me know. Technorati Tags: gmail, googlemail, google, email, webmail

Whats my Vector Victor?

2005-10-19T10:47:00.000+01:00

After spending all day slaving over my PC at work I then spent several hours bashing away last night at a new logo for my blog. It was all for research purposes though.

I have decided to get to grips with Adobe Illustrator CS2 as I do like the look of vector art. I think it will take some getting used to though. Compared to Photoshop I struggled to get it to do what i wanted and had to export back as a JPG to finish it off. The final image’s detail was totally lost when i converted it across… it looked excellent in Illustrator but crappy and pixelated in Photoshop. More practice needed i think – if anyone has any tips on this then let me know.

The new Illustrator CS2 version has a great “Live Trace” feature where you can pull in line drawings you have scanned and it converts them to editable paths. The great thing is that this also works with photos. The eye on the left (which is mine) and the skateboarder (which is not me – as I am much better!) were both processed using this method – and i think it looks pretty cool!

I kind of had a thought the other night that I would start trying some illustrations. I would set myself a goal of learning the Adobe Illustrator application, doing some illustrations and selling them – or having them used/published somewhere within one year. Possibly a tall order seeing as I work on PCs all day and the thought of having to chain myself to the PC all the time when I am at home makes me cringe. At least Illustrator makes it easy to work with imported graphics – so I could also spend time drawing and making art to scan in to use. Is this a silly idea?

If anyone has some good sites with Illustrator tutorials on then let me know please!

Technorati Tags: adobe, illustrator, adobe illustrator, vector, illustration, logo, live trace, tutorials

iPorn

2005-10-16T23:34:00.000+01:00

For those who really know what technology means to a man.... iPod Erotica via Surtin.com Technorati Tags: ipod, erotica, iporn, apple

They did it.....

2005-10-13T09:24:00.000+01:00

Contrary to Uber-mole insider type sites, Apple managed to Black Propaganda and outsmart everyone again with the announcement of their new iPod. And yes... it does do video! The new iPod which appears to have replaced the standard large capacity colour screen iPod device sports a 2.5 inch (320*240 pixel) screen capable of 30 fps video playback using Apples Quicktime format. Apple has obviously learnt from the success of the iPod Nano and have made the device thinner - and also available in what I like to call "gravestone black". In a 30GB and 60GB capacity the device can playback 2 or 4 hours of video respectively before the battery goes "all Betamax" on you. Also launched at the same time (apart from the new thinner technophiles physical porno iMac) was the new version of iTunes (version 6) which now adds video purchase, sync and playback capability. At present there are only music videos available to download as well as the classic Pixar short animations. Each of these is set at £1.89 each - which ain't too pricey. I dragged one of my WMV files to the application but it refused to do anything with it. It did take one of "my friends" MPG files though and added it to the Video section - but be careful when you ask for playback with MSN Messenger's set to show the currently playing song information against your name! Steve Jobs also announced that in the future there will be episodes of Lost available to purchase and download and (to appease the Wife who haunts all of our tech purchases) Desparate Housewives. And as the new iPod comes with a video out capability you can then plug the device into your TV so the whole family can enjoy your new iPorn Podcasts. So Apple now have a device that plays music, shows photos, stores data, stores organiser information, plays audiobooks and now plays videos! What's next? I am increasingly impressed with the Apple iTunes Music Store and the range of stuff available. If I was'nt such an "Internet Pirate" then I would definitely buy from there. I, for one, welcome the Apple overlords and their new products. Now... where can I get the money to get one? Technorati Tags: ipod video, ipod, itunes, apple, imac, lost, desparate housewives, pixar, ITMS, Quicktime

The Back Quack

2005-10-11T15:51:00.000+01:00

I have found that the best way to relax after being told you may have a heart condition is to watch adrenaline sports on the TV and play intense car racing games on your XBox. It beats that Tai Chi and Yoga bollocks any day! I am feeling better and a lot more rational about my "condition" now and the panicky feelings have totally gone away. I am still left with a feeling of pressure on my chest - like I cannot take a full lung full of air even though I can - and the odd griping pain here and there - but generally alot better. I was beginning to think that the pain I am now feeling is more skeletal or muscular so I made an appointment with the local Chiropractor and went to see him this morning. He immediately spotted that I was "all tense" and set about attacking me with his pressure hammer adjustment tool and also gave me a good back massage (my first that didn't end in a blow job and an emptying of the wallet!). I will be going back to him again next week for more of the same. As a practicing Chiropractor and sports injury clinic, I thought he would have seen it all - but he was quite impressed with the poor knotted state of the muscles down the right hand side of my spine.

They're totally seized up mate!

So more shoulder muscles excersises and relaxing on the cards for the rest of the week for me. More playing train tracks with my son, chilling to "Party Mix" on iTunes, hammering the torrents and watching crap TV. It's tough being ill.

I heart me

2005-10-09T12:36:00.000+01:00

When I was younger I used to watch a Sitcom called "Only When I Laugh" which was set in a hospital ward where three mismatched patients would cause havoc each week and make fun of the Asian doctor called "Gupta". This program and the Carry On Doctor films has always lead me to think that a stay in hospital would be quite nice. Well. I got my chance this weekend! Lets rewind a little. Thursday was just another crappy slow day at work, but I began to have feelings of pressure on my chest also accompanied by the odd irregular heartbeat - which I have had before in the past (usually due to too much Coffee). This abated though and in the evening I felt fine. Friday morning was again no issue. At around 10 am at work I started to feel unwell again with increased pressure across my chest and I was a little short of breath. I did not feel very unwell and it did not stop me from doing my work as usual. I didn't feel faint or anything - just felt like I had a child lying on my chest preventing me from breathing correctly. By the end of the day it still had not gone and I was getting a little concerned and decided to see the local emergency doctor after work who checked me over. He thought that it could be stress related but he also thought he could hear a heart murmur through his stethoscope and tried to hook me up to their ECG machine (the machine that goes "ping") for a scan - which didn't work - at all. So he ordered me to go directly to the Clinical Decisions Unit (CDU) at the local hospital to be checked over. I had to call my wife from home as I was not even allowed to walk back to get her to drive me. I still felt ok too at this point - my heart rate was elevated but I felt ok - probably just scared. My poor wifey went into panic mode and had to call my parents over to feed the kids as she was in mid evening meal cook. We went to the CDU and booked in at about 1830. I was checked over by a nurse an hour later with the ECG machine and blood tests but all appeared normal. I was still feeling ok too. Hours later the other doctors checked me over and agreed that they could hear a Apex Heart Murmur which could be a blood flow murmur but they were not sure. I was then checked again by another more senior doctor who checked me for other stuff (Marfanoid Features??) but agreed that my heart was exhibiting these murmur symptoms. My blood test was fine though and there were no other obvious signs (sweaty, swollen ankles, double vision). So I was admitted overnight and was left by the wife at around midnight who had already been home to get my clothes. Meanwhile, one of the nurses was taking lots of blood for some cultures to check for infections which would take about 3 days to grow. I managed to get to sleep after 1am and was woken at 7am for breakfast and more nursy TLC. I was seen by a senior doctor a little after 9am who listened to my chest again and thought that it was a only a flow murmur and I was told I would most likely have to attend as an outpatient for a Echo scan on my heart. I went for a chest X-Ray at about 1030am which showed nothing obvious either and was left to sit on my bed, watching elderly patients nearby slowly dying and waiting for a decision to be made by the Cardiologist who I was told would be round to see me today. I had my delicious hospital lunch (cardboard sandwiches) and dinner (soggy pasta and salty mash potatoes followed by over sweetened apple pie and magma crust custard). Nothing happened until about 10pm when the senior doctors and the Cardiologist did their rounds and they took 5 mins to discharge me. I have been told to avoid caffeine and spicy food until they know what it is exactly. I phoned my Dad and after I pretended I had to stay in for a month he came to get me at about 11pm. However, when I got home and went to bed I started to have real bad pressure on my chest again and began to hyperventilate and feel very faint. My heart rate felt normal (to me) though so I rode it out with some yoga breathing moves provided by my wife and some "head between the legs and deep breathing" action. After a bit of water and chocolate (just in case it was due to low blood sugar) I managed to get back in bed and after 30 mins or so I slept until morning.

Was this a possible panic/anxiety attack?

I feel ok now but I do still have a feeling of pressure/discomfort on my chest and feel slightly out of breath at times. Maybe when the blood cultures are grown they will discover some sort of infection - who knows. I will have to go back to the docs some time next week to hand in my letter of discharge but also to inform him of the "Panic Attack" situation last night. I will also be making an appointment with a local osteopath for a skeletal check up as the pain I am feeling in my chest does feel as if its actually on my breastbone and surrounding area. The osteopath in question has done wonders for my whole family in the past - so I am expecting great things. Maybe being hunched over a keyboard for 8 hours a day has finally done something to me! Needless to say I shall be "self certing" myself off work for as long as possible. Enough time to chill as much as I can and time to see the doctors and the osteopath. It could be related to stress I suppose although I don't feel I have anything to be stressed about. Work is easy and my home life is very good. I will be going back to see the Cardiologist in around 10 weeks for the Echo Scan so until then - and when the results come in a few weeks after - I will not know for sure if there is something wrong with my heart. But at the moment it all points to nothing serious.

The Boy Who Heard Music

2005-10-06T13:44:00.000+01:00

Hot on the heels of us creative wordy types over at Handshandy, Pete Townshend of The Who fame has began to tread our path by posting two chapters of his novella over at his Blogspot blog. I have’nt read the whole thing (yet) so if you can be bothered, let me know what its all about.

Sure makes better reading than Pamela Anderson's blog though!

Oh. And Pete uses a Mac by the way. Why does’nt that surprise me?

Technorati Tags: the who, pete townshend, blogger, novella, novel, pamela anderson, handshandy, celebrity

viPod?

2005-10-05T12:52:00.000+01:00

So next week Apple are doing another of their Invite only announcements and the rumors circulating the Internet is that they are going to announce a Video iPod. I reckon it’s going to be called a ViPod.

Although Uber iGod Steve Jobs recently said that they were not planning a video version of the popular iPod range as "no-one had got it quite right yet" - this does not mean that they will not do so. As with any Apple product, the security has been kept tight as ever but with other product enhancements, like a new range of the popular iMac Mini and possibly a new range of "Professional Mac Workstations" in the offing, the announcement could be not what we are expecting (or predicting).

I for one did not expect them to announce the iPod Nano. That was a total surprise. Read from that event that Apple still have the upper hand on this and could announce something totally new that we have not expected.

People have already found links within the newest versions of the iTunes software that appear to link to some sort of downloadable movie content - the same as they did when they found that iTunes also contained code for exporting to the new ROKR iTunes mobile phone before Apple and Mr Moto (officially) announced the device.

Engadget have already posted a possible sneaky shot of the Video iPod. It kind of looks how I would expect it to look if there was such a device. But Steve Jobs has got to have something clever up his sleeve to make this work.

Seeing how the majority of portable video players out there support various formats, including the BitTorrent's friend, "DivX", would I pay £xxx for a device that only allowed me to download content to the player via iTunes and in a format decided by Apple? Hell no. I don't do that with the music on iTunes at the moment. It takes what i feed it (and loves it)!

Or will they be releasing a new version of iTunes at the same time that will convert my DivX, Avi and Mpeg files to their copyrighted locked down Quicktime format? Only time will tell. The dudes over at Engadget have already reported that someone has found information in iTunes regarding the Microsoft WMV format - which can also be copy protected.

When, not if, the device is launched, stand by to subscribe to iPorn and iVidcasting too by the way...

Technorati Tags: ipod, apple, video ipod, steve jobs, itunes, music, video

Sweaty Pits Ahoy!

2005-10-04T23:31:00.000+01:00

21 years ago, this 32k game, Revs, on the BBC Micro was "the business". My friends and I enthused over the limited colour graphics and blocky details for many a long weekend (when we were'nt playing D&D).

I remember showing the game to my neighbour who was (is?) a chief marshall at Silverstone racetrack. He was blown away by the realistic graphics and car handling. I can still feel the beads of sweat dripping down from my armpits as i just hung onto first place whilst he stood behind me, egging me on.

I have recently been playing the new Burnout: Revenge game on my XBOX which is amazing too. I can't see how it can get much better than this!

But... I have just watched a new trailer of the new Project Gotham 3 game due out for the XBOX360 at the beginning of December - and i felt those beads of sweat all over again. I'm getting excited now! I was being good and telling myself that I will not get a 360 when it comes out - but I think I have just changed my own mind again!

Technorati Tags: xbox, xbox360, project gotham racing, microsoft, revs, bbc, bbc micro, PGR3, PGR

Sunday pleasures

2005-10-02T23:21:00.000+01:00

This weekend I went to see the parade of fat celebrities over at Collectormania 8 in my home town. Although i missed seeing a fat Batman I did get to see a fat Daisy Duke and a fat Buck Rogers to add to my collection of "The bloaty stars of yesteryear".

It was another of those times when i could have spent lots of money on pointless transforming robot and Star Wars toys. However, my time (and money) could have been better spent over at the World Beard and Moustache Championships in Berlin which were held this Saturday.

I have yet to get the whole results through from the Beard Team USA Blog, but I am already looking forward to the next event which is to be held in London in 2007! Better get grooming chaps!

Technorati Tags: beard, moustache, collectormania, batman, buck rogers, star wars, milton keynes, daisy duke, dukes of hazzard

Dear wife

2005-09-29T22:08:00.000+01:00

Your cooking is really nice!!! Honest!

Technorati Tags: cooking, head, scales, dead, photoshop