Tuesday, January 31, 2006

Bloggies

Last chance today to cast your vote in the 2006 Bloggies. I like Cute Overload (for the layout and razor-sharp opinion of course, not the fluffy bunnies), Post Secret, Girl with a one-track mind (for the quality of the narrative, not because is shamelessly unabashed literary porn), Digg (but not Slashdot), Del.icio.us and (somewhat begrudgingly) the self satisfied ramblings of Jason Kottke.

Monday, January 30, 2006

Repeat offender

So I have picked up another speeding ticket. I get the impression that they are probably not going to send me on some wanky drivers education course this time as clearly the last time they packed me off there it didn’t work on account of my getting booked again. But then again last time I went it only served to give me the impression that I was a better driver than everyone else there because they all really sucked.

I am not so pissed off about this time though because I got caught doing a manly 81mph by a stealth radar van whereas last time I got flashed by an omnipotent static camera that I knew was there whilst travelling a scant 36mph, making it particularly irritating. At least this time it was sporting. And I happened to be late for an appointment this time too so I have an excuse (albeit pretty weak) whereas last time I was just being impatient and inattentive.

And the moral of this post is; when you bust through the speed limit in southern Buckinghamshire don’t do it on the A404 between the M40 and the turn off to Maidenhead or in any of these other locations.

Friday, January 27, 2006

Ship breakers

Some fascinating and quasi-post-apocalyptic looking visuals of Bangladeshi ship-breaking yards (via).

Thursday, January 26, 2006

Planblog

The internet is replete with vocational blogs; ambulance blogs, train driver blogs, police blogs, washed-up child actor blogs (who incidentally decide to redesign the site when I want to do this post, grrr), doctor blogs, politician blogs, the list goes on…

I can’t find any planner blogs though.

Although I know my blog is not all about planning, and indeed has only relatively rarely touched upon it, I wonder if I am slash could be the first planner with a blog? Perhaps I should do more ‘insightful yet witty incursions into the bizarre world of planning.’

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Stats

So these are my stats for the past 12 weeks. I think it shows a moderate rise in visitors until the Christmas to New Year lull but things seem to be picking up more now with an all time record in week two of 161 page loads (ahem, not to be confused with 161 visitors mind). It’s difficult to tell though whether I am getting more hits as none of the indicators of page loads, unique visitors or returning visitors are entirely reliable for various reasons.

It seems that as the amount of content, and particularly outgoing links, on Nick101 increases so do the number of hits I receive. About 8% of recent visits have been from unreciprocated or unknown links. Thus far I have had viewers from the USA, India, Singapore, Kuwait, New Zealand, Belgium (ok that was me on holiday), Portugal and Spain amoungst others as well as my predominantly UK based readership.

Translating this into content; when I started this blog my initial concern was with actually being able to produce stuff to post. However as time went on I became much more relaxed about it as I realised I could come up with quite a lot. Of course now I have hit another worry point as my viewer stats rise; trying to deliver posts of reasonable quality (not sure whether I am doing that at the moment) and hanging on to viewers and chasing the somewhat unexpected goal of getting more hits.

One of the worst aspects is that it can be quite demoralising to put up what I think is a good post and get very few hits that day. I really liked Urban Jungle, featuring PARK(ing) and the cups in wire fence thing which I really thought was fun and interesting, but that day I got virtually no visits at all (seriously it was like the internet had broken that day) and hence Free Music Stuff the following day was a somewhat half hearted affair that ironically got twice the number of visits on the day it was posted.

Of course, this comparison between posts and hits is somewhat academic as I have no doubt that people will read the blog as and when it fits their schedule rather than based on the content of posts which of course you don’t find out until you read the post in the first place. Moreover, just because you visited the blog, doesn’t mean you read it but the stats don’t count that.

Tuesday, January 24, 2006

How to ruin stuff 101

Requires one perfectly good duvet cover with small holes that need patching, one iron on patching kit (available from Woolworths for around £1.79), one perfectly good carpet, a pair of scissors and an iron.

Take duvet cover, remove duvet blanket and place on large flat area; living room carpet is ideal. Iron area which needs patching. Use scissors to cut iron on patches to cover slightly more than area which needs patching.

Place iron on patches over small holes with some spare fabric underneath to absorb any excess adhesive. Iron over patches for approximately 40 seconds ensuring the corners of the patches are well adhered.

Leave to cool for about a minute. Attempt to remove duvet cover from carpet. Realise that iron on patches have adhered themselves to the top side of the duvet cover which has in turn adhered itself well to the under side of the duvet cover which again has adhered itself to the carpet. Scratch head and re-read instructions on iron on patching kit.

Use brute force to remove duvet cover from carpet leaving large mass of firmly affixed glue on carpet and chunks of carpet reciprocally attached to the duvet cover. Separate the top side of the duvet cover from under side of duvet cover.

Stand back and appreciate formerly perfectly good carpet with two very large masses of glue embedded in it (pictured above) and iron on patches just barely affixed to duvet cover with flappy edges.

Update:

The iron on patches came off the duvet cover in the wash. Ironically, the remenants of carpet stuck to the underside did not. Think I am buying a new duvet cover this weekend.

Monday, January 23, 2006

Seven more

Rejects:

Maidenhead one bed – Nicely decorated flat in period property next to the river, plenty of height to it, not so much floorpsace though, which is where it counts.
Maidenhead one bed – Ok sized but just off the A4 and noisy, has parking but half way across town. Comes (badly) furnished.
Maidenhead one bed – Slightly strangely laid out flat with wood floors. Ok, so there wasn’t anything really wrong with it, it just didn’t feel quite right. Can’t put my finger on it, just not right.

Candidates:

Maidenhead one bed – Good size, right next to the river. Comes part furnished with questionable taste but nothing really wrong with it, a little pricey; paying for river proximity.
Maidenhead one bed – Majorly close to the train station, a little small and a little dated. I was initially put off because the current tenants were, well, filthy but I have no doubt the place would get a decent clean and then it would probably be ok. It’s hard to look past the major ming problem though.
Maidenhead one bed – In the same block as the place I lost out on and a bit smaller (also cheaper) and there really was nothing wrong with it at all apart from the living room was a bit purple.
Maidenhead two bed – A little on the pricey side but a clear winner, comfortable walk to the station, immaculately presented, comes well, but sparsely, furnished which is ideal as I could probably just fit most of my stuff in it too, and the rest can go in the garage that comes with it.

(I think my judgement on the latter three might have been a bit skewed though because the pretty girl who showed me round was unreasonably flirty).

Friday, January 20, 2006

28 (20 working) days later

Caution, this post contains wanky, and no doubt dull, introspective nonsense. However, I have added some arguably unnecessary links to jazz it up a little.

As of Monday I have only four weeks left at my present job. I have been feeling increasingly weird about this as time has gone on although I don’t think its just leaving my present job; fairly big changes are afoot in general with other associated stuff going on at the same time.

I have been dying to get away from my current job for a little while now and, when going to work for the past six months or so, have been thinking ‘why am I doing this and where the hell is it getting me?’ (Answer: don’t know and nowhere, respectively). But now I am going to work in the morning and counting down the days (I have even numbered the days to count down in my outlook calendar) and as they get fewer and fewer the inevitability of some major changes gets greater and greater.

A number of people have commented that I have been bouncing around work with an uncharacteristic level of energy and enthusiasm. In honesty I didn’t notice this until it was pointed out to me however I think I can guess what is prompting it. Even so, my impending departure still leaves me with a degree of nervousness at what is coming next.

I have been with my present employer for three and a half years now. This is, by a wide margin, the longest time I have been in any single job (although I suppose its two jobs, technically speaking) and it is a long time. This is compounded by my moving flat at the same time which I have been in for nearly as long as I have been at my present work. I haven’t lived in the same place for this long since I left London (by which I mean the watered down suburbs of Middlesex) in 1996. And this is where it gets a bit circular as I am going to work soon in a place just a few miles up the road from where I left nearly ten years ago now.

The circular weirdness aside, at the same time I am going to miss doing what I do at the moment because it is familiar and seeing the people I am used to seeing especially as I like quite a lot of them.

Anyway, I’m not too sure what the point of this post is, aside from possibly illustrating a mixture of apprehensive excitement and abject terror about what is to come combined with a sense of relief and nostalgia about leaving.

Would be nice if I knew I had a nice flat to move to mind (seeing five seven more this weekend).

Thursday, January 19, 2006

Yooire not frum roound ere

So I had some fun looking up my family name on the surname profiler (via).


Looks like I have lots of namesakes knocking round in Cornwall, Devon and whatever that purple slash redish blob up north is (like Manchester and Derbyshire and stuff?).

Wednesday, January 18, 2006

I just want a nice flat

Without wanting to turn this blog into a diary of how I can’t seem to find a nice flat to move to I am going to rant about the two places I saw yesterday which were, well, the worst yet by a wide margin.

First I saw round a very spacious crumbling relic of the 1970s. The carpets were encrusted with ming, the kitchen looked like the set from a horror movie in a mental institution, the living room had damp crawling up the walls and the bedrooms looked like prison cells. And it was located above a bunch of take-aways and car repair garage, accessed from some dubious back alley probably best suited for junkies to sleep in and use as their toilet.

The second place was marginally better insofar as it was only a throwback to the 1980s but also felt like an asian sub-continent squat complete with curry house music and a bizarre aroma of incense. The kitchen was also so small that if you wanted to make a cup of tea and a slice of toast at the same time you would probably run out of space.

At both places the agent was very keen to point out that they really would get a thorough cleaning and 'a decent airing to get rid of strange smells' before I moved in. I think they needed a bit more than that though.

This is the 21st century, why are folks trying to peddle me slums?

Tuesday, January 17, 2006

Six movies

A list of six movies that everyone else seems to think are rather good that I thought were really boring:

Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels
Get Shorty
The Usual Suspects
The first Lord of the Rings movie
The second Lord of the Rings movie
The third Lord of the Rings movie



A list of six movies that I thought were rather good but rarely admit to because nobody else seems to agree with me:

So I Married an Axe Murderer
Pitch Black
Star Wars Episode I – The Phantom Menace
The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3
2010
13 going on 30 (ok, not really but I couldn't come up with a sixth and this happended to be on tv when I was trying to come up with something)

A list of six movies that should be watched at least once a year (ideally with either lots of tea or lots of beer):

Ferris Bueller's Day Off
The Breakfast Club
Die Hard
Any one of the three original Star Wars movies
Alien
The Terminator

Monday, January 16, 2006

Limbo

Ok, so the current tenants of the flat I supposedly had agreed on do not appear to want to leave just yet but I can’t seem to extract whether they are still going eventually and if so when. This leaves me rather cross about being led up the garden path and stuck in limbo land in terms of finding a new pad.

I have resumed flat hunting but can’t find anywhere as nice for an even remotely comparable rent which is both reassuring in that the more I see the more the place I picked appears pretty amazing but it's also intensely irritating as it means I can’t move flats before I change job and it’s unclear whether I get this flat at all. Ultimately it’s all a bit depressing because if I don’t get this one then, unless something else special comes along, everything else is going to be second choice (by quite a wide margin based on experience to date).

So at the moment I am trying to work out whether it’s best to wait for the number one choice or give up and find somewhere else. Because of timescales on starting job and giving notice on my current place I have to decide one way or the other now and can’t do both because if I wait I want it to be somewhere worth waiting for but if I ditch it I also have to find somewhere else immediately otherwise there is no point not waiting. But then again there’s no point waiting for something that I’m not going to get (if that makes sense – it does in my head).

Thus far the other places I have seen have either been nowhere near as nice (for various reasons) but similar in terms of rental payments or comparable in niceness and way more expensive.

Here’s the shortlist of alternatives that I’ve seen:

One bed in Ruislip – right next to tube station and high street but noisy and with no parking.
Two bed in Ruislip – a fair walk from the tube station with the kitchen from Trainspotting and a dubiously giant porno mirror covering one entire wall of the main bedroom.
One bed in Maidenhead – really nice flat with fantastically massive balcony out back but over half an hour walk to the train station which is too far.
Two bed in Maidenhead – student dive looking flat outside a fish and chip shop (which is better than a kebab shop I guess) with a cat infestation, oh, and it majorly smelled of feet.
Two bed in Maidenhead – immaculately presented, great location, unfortunately squeezed into the size of Ford Transit (and not even one of those ones with the extra roofy bit on top).
Two bed in Maidenhead – Kate’s old flat (which makes it a bit weird actually) which is nice but way more expensive. I really can’t afford or justify paying extra for the classier area.
One bed in Amersham – stay where I am and wait and see if I get evicted.

I have another viewing today in Maidenhead and two viewings in Ruislip tomorrow; we’ll see how those go. Heaven forbid I am going to have to start considering looking at places such as Langley or South Harrow (but never Slough).

Friday, January 13, 2006

Free music stuff

I’ve been using Pandora for the past few months for free music. Basically you tell it what music you like and it plays more like it. It also tells you what you like too and now appears to know more about what I like than I do, which apparently is a subtle use of female vocal, disco influences, mild rhythmic syncopation, melodic phrasing, extensive vamping and heavy use of choral patterning. Which is nice, not too sure what that means exactly.

Thursday, January 12, 2006

Urban jungle

Car parking spaces are generally so sought after in towns and cities these days that nobody ever seems to stop to consider what else they could be used for. The concept of being able to rent a piece of space in integers as little as fifteen minutes is quite cool when you think about it. Other than parking spaces I can’t think of anything that you can rent for so little for such a variable amount of time with so little commitment. Anyway I really liked PARK(ing) as it was an inventive way of looking at urban space in a new way and putting it to a slightly more beneficial use than just sticking a car in it.

I guess stuff like PARK(ing) counts as modern art, but is refreshing insofar as it doesn’t tout itself as such. I like the interactivity of it too, much like this
display of paper cups in a chain link fence.

Wednesday, January 11, 2006

Maidenhead baby

So I made a rental offer for a nice two bed flat in Maidenhead yesterday morning. I got a ring from the agent in the late afternoon after a painfully long wait all day who said that the landlord had accepted the offer and we could start talking about references and moving in dates and stuff so that is really rather exciting. (Yippee) (photos of the outside are in How much?! and the inside of a similar flat, two floors up, in Phone dump).

In honesty I didn’t have much hope of getting very far with this place because the flat seems to me to be under priced compared to others I have seen to start with, my offer was really insulting (I thought) and having spoken to the current tenants, who are still there so its not like the landlord is desperate for a new tenant, my offer was also like well below what they are paying.

Anyway, so I am pretty pleased with how that worked out as I now hopefully have secured a jazzy new flat with two bedrooms, living room, small dinning room (yeah, check that out, a dining room!) and good sized kitchen. Drawbacks are that it is a little further walk from the train station than I would have liked, no dishwasher and it has electric heating. However these minor points are like really small compared to the amazing amount of space I recon I have got, a nice little garden area, near to shops, a spare room (!) and all for an acceptable rent.

All I have to do now is make sure the landlord gets shot of those current tenants pretty damn quick so I can move in before I have to start the new job.

Of course I didn’t hear from the agent about all this until pretty much the end of the day, five minutes before I was due at two viewings with another agent in Ruislip. So I felt I had to kinda pretend that I hadn’t found anywhere and look round these two shitty flats with this other agent guy because I thought it was a bit late to cancel. Actually it wasn’t that bad because its always fun to have a bit of a nose around and like I say, these other two places I saw were pretty dire (think flowery wallpaper, kitchen off the set of Trainspotting and even worse - no off street parking). I suppose it was worth it really as it re-affirmed my belief that I had picked the right one already.

I am really pleased how this has worked out as thinking back a month or two ago I was sure I was going to end up in some dive studio flat with views of the A40 or Heathrow Airport or a sewage works, or even worse, in Slough.

Tuesday, January 10, 2006

Burning dependency

Amid the recent turning of part of Hemel Hempstead into blazing inferno of hydrocarbons and the slightly satanic black cloud that lingered over my neck of the woods for the following few days, this article is hardly reassuring. This report of peaking oil production coupled with some alleged convenient lies on behalf of OPEC and chums is not going to make you feel any more comfortable. And just on the off chance that you doesn’t worry you enough, how about this uncomfortable but arguably not implausible forecast.

Friday, January 06, 2006

Firefoxy

So I’ve been using Internet Explorer for years (like since me and the internet met) and despite having tried other browsers in the past (typically various versions of Netscape) have always come back to it.

So, despite having had Firefox recommended to me by virtually everyone and loads of websites that seem to know what they’re talking about I was still pretty reluctant to attempt the switch (you can take a horse to water etc…). Anyway, I gave it a whirl at the beginning of this week and had a play about with it. And to cut a long story short, I am a convert. IE sucks. Use Firefox. And I don’t think I have even scratched the surface insofar as all the stuff you can do with it.

Only one complaint thus far, that being I can’t copy and paste blog posts into Firefox which is a little irritating (not too sure if it is me doing something wrong), so for the time being IE has not been completely shelved.

If you haven’t got it already, download here.

Think I might make that my new year’s resolution actually. Use Firefox as web browser… Check, done.

Thursday, January 05, 2006

What the estate agents really mean

What the estate agents said: A well presented, modern, one bedroom apartment.
What they really meant: A tiny flat with wood floors.

What the estate agents said: Internal inspection is highly recommended.
What they really meant: The outside is pig ugly.

What the estate agents said: Excellent access to the train station.
What they really meant: The mainline from London to Bristol pretty much runs through the living room.

What the estate agents said: Ample parking with close proximity to local shops and services.
What they really meant: Located in a bland 1980s housing estate dominated by car parking, miles from the town centre with a small corner shop about half a mile away.

What the estate agents said: Well proportioned apartment.
What they really meant: This flat has a bizarre layout.

What the estate agents said: Sought after location.
What they really meant: Sought after location for chavs and car thieves.

What the estate agents said: Convenient town centre location.
What they really meant: It’s above an all night kebab shop and nightclub and there sure as hell ain’t no parking available.

What the estate agents said: Under offer.
What they really meant: This place is such a shit hole that the landlord has given up hope and decided to flog it instead.

Wednesday, January 04, 2006

Resolution

So last year my new years resolution was to drink Guinness. Hardly the most challenging task but I never really have been one for the whole new years resolution thing.

Anyway, I managed it and tried Guinness, although it took until about March, so it was hardly a resounding success but I now drink Guinness occasionally and do quite like it.

In fairness last years resolution wasn’t really much of a resolution or even that much of a challenge (which was the point). I hadn’t planned on having one this year but after giving unnecessary grief to the poor waiter dude in the pub on new years day realised that perhaps one particular new year’s resolution would be in order. Namely to try to be nice to the waitress/waiter types in restaurants as I am building up a fairly good track record of being mean to them. This is generally exclusively in situations involving me being hungry and having a hangover and wanting my food immediately and to a standard and with a level of service well in excess of what I was willing to pay for. And, yes, I do feel a little guilty (once fed to my exacting standards) for being mean to these poor people who do shitty jobs for minimum wage on a Sunday morning, no doubt with a hangover and rumbling stomach comparable to my own at the time.

However, lets get real here. When I have a hangover and am hungry I am likely (but not exclusively) to be at my least reasonable and little inclined to sympathise with the catering staff's position when my mayonnaise is not forthcoming with my bacon cheeseburger, my orange and lemonade not having lemonade in it or my side salad not arriving (regardless of whether I wanted side salad or not).

So, really, a new years resolution along the lines of ‘be nicer to the waitress/waiter type people in restaurants and pubs’ is unlikely to have much chance of success. Therefore this years new years resolution is to ‘think about being nice to the waitress/waiter type people in restaurants and pubs (but with no firm or quantifiable commitments).’ I might upgrade it to something a little more challenging in 2007.

Tuesday, January 03, 2006

Phone dump

A very mildly reminiscent first post to 2006. Here are a few photos captured on my phone camera thingy in the past month together with a bit of commentary where necessary.

Work Christmas do. Somewhere in London. I forget where exactly.

A barn in the middle of a field. Nothing much going here, which was exactly the point of my taking this photo in the first place.


Sometimes I struggle a little to try to explain to people exactly what it is I do all day (besides playing on the internet). Trying to explain why I was taking a photo of absolutely nothing of any consequence or interest is possibly one of the harder things to account for I think.

My brother and dog, next to fire at parents house on Christmas Eve. Yes, very home Counties, blah, blah.


Inside one of the flats I liked in Maidenhead. This is the living/dining room. Not too sure about those light fittings though.


Me and Elenor, News Years Eve, or early hours of morning on New Years Day. A fairly academic distinction really I think.


Not posted: Photos from work Christmas do where everyone looks a little more plastered. The sneaky photo of me that Gem took when we were in Pizza Express that I didn’t find until a week later. Me taking a photo of Elenor taking a photo of me. More photos of that barn in the middle of a field.