Its all coming up Nick

Its nice when stuff goes your way, even if it takes a little time and effort. I am presently reaping the rewards of putting a little time and effort into a number of things over the course of the last few weeks and months and feeling rather pleased with myself as a consequence.

1. My internet connection is now working at home. No more sneaky blog posting needs to be done over lunch at work and at least I can access what I want with a degree of speed, unlike the limited and clunky connection from work where they don’t let you look at the really good porn. Also I might now be able to get some bit-torrents running so I can catch the new episodes of Battlestar Gallactica that I missed what with not having sky any more. And I can get some music running from Pandora as my stereo and cds are still mothballed at my parents. And just generally being reconnected is nice. Oh, and I got a new free wireless router out of it for bt’s general incompetence (and worked out why my RSS feed wasn't working but is now).

2. Work is improving. I am settling in much better now and feeling a little more content about the place. The new people who have started since me seem nice and we get along fairly well I think. I also got my first full months pay packet recently which reminded why I took the job in the first place. I don’t know if I have said this before but it’s not all about the money however having good financial security and being able to make relatively indulgent purchases without bothering too much about the cost is comforting.

3. My new flat is pretty great, although with some flaws, I have few complaints. The shower is pretty powerful and kicks out loads of hot water which I like. Being up on the second floor is also brilliant, I really like being elevated above the surrounding world and had actually forgotten quite how much having been marooned on the ground floor at my old place for several years. My new balcony means I can totally take advantage of my elevated position, summer should be great here. Aside from the occasional roar of an intercity 125 the place is also pleasantly free of outside sound.

4. I like Maidenhead. I have lived in cities, towns and villages but never anywhere like Maidenhead which is small enough not to be overly congested and too noisy and busy but large enough to have a decent amount of amenities and facilities which I think strikes a pretty good balance. Being way close to the town centre is also a plus.

I put above average amounts of effort into sorting all these things out and now that it is all working out (almost) like it was supposed to I am feeling quite pleased about things in general.

The great milk crisis

The coffee shop I purchase my morning coffee from in the morning has recently put up a sign that reads as follows:

Due to the increase in the price of milk for the fifth time in a row we are sorry to announce that as of Monday 27th March the price of our milky drinks will be going up.

The already extortionate price of a large coffee (which isn’t exactly that large) is £1.50 and has increased to £1.75.

Now I don’t mind the occasional price rise but what is this ‘fifth increase’ in the price of milk? The milk I have been buying has risen by perhaps 3 pence per pint in the last four years. Beyond that I don’t even recall. So I have come to the conclusion that they have just made this up in order to hike up the price of a coffee.

These five pseudo milk price increases must be pretty massive in order to justify tacking on the price of almost an entire pint of milk on top the existing price. I am certainly not receiving an extra pint of milk in my coffee.

I am pretty unimpressed with these fake increases in the price of milk that is being loaded onto my already extortionate coffee price. So on that basis I am taking my business elsewhere. Hello Starbucks.

Leisure time II

Ok, so I am having new ideas about leisure time. What would be great is to have something like the new I-pod but with a bigger screen and BBC breakfast (or something else like that) to start doing podcasts that I could download and then watch on the train. Reading is ok and I am certainly steaming through my current book but it is a little too involved for the morning. Something more passive like breakfast tv would suit perfectly.

Unfortunately, I think I am a little ahead of the times at the moment with Apple’s I-pod being the only video supporting portable media player with a reasonably large hard disk and the screen still being a little on the small side, BBC breakfast not doing podcasts and all the other ones that update on a daily basis predominantly being audio only, and, of course, my home internet connection actually working.

Still, I think it’s a nice idea and its not like I am relying on technology that isn’t already on the market or doesn’t exist yet. And I am hardly coming up with anything that other people haven’t thought of already. It’s just a question of waiting for everyone else to sort it out.

Customer service

Me: So my broadband isn’t working, still, and your engineers haven’t called me like they said they would.
Operator: I am sorry to hear that, let me just access your records.
Me: Ok.
Operator: I am just going to transfer you to another department.
Me: Why?
Operator: You need to speak to this other department. Do you mind holding while I put you through?
Me: Fine.
*hold*
Next operator: Let me just put you on hold while I speak to the engineers on your behalf.
Me: Sigh, ok.
*hold*
Next operator: I am going to transfer you through to the next department, can you hold please?
Me: Yeah, whatever.
*hold*
Next, next operator: Let me just put you on hold while I obtain your details.
Me: Sure.
*hold*
Next, next operator: I have accessed your records, an engineer will call you in the next two days.
Me: That’s what I was told two days ago, why are you telling me the same thing now?
Next, next operator: Well the engineers have to test the line and arrange for somebody to call you to come out and assess what the problem is and somebody will call you to arrange an appointment in the next two days.
Me: Yes, yes, next two days, that’s what I was told two days ago. Why are you still telling me the same thing?
Next, next operator: Well the engineers have to test the line and arrange for somebody to call you to come out and assess what the problem is and somebody will call you to arrange an appointment in the next two days.
Me: You just repeated the same thing you said before, you haven’t answered my question. Why was I told the same thing two days ago?
Next, next operator: Well the engineers have to test the line and arrange…
*hangs up*
Total call time: 25 minutes.

Technological wasteland

My old flat was technology-tastic. I had broadband, a big tv, sky, sound system, etc. All a boy needs to keep his boy pad, well, boy padish. My new place is not quite so well blessed (aside from the hardware I brought with me, some of which is still mothballed at my parents). My internet troubles have already been documented and suffice it to say that my faith that bt had begun to shed its former status as a massive leviathan of incompetence has been thoroughly trashed. I must have rung them up at least 20 times now to fix this broadband nonsense and got a different answer every time. Wankers.

Meanwhile I am still trying to sort out my tv reception. Like I said, I had sky at my old place and, with the exception of one or two pretty massive thunderstorms, it delivered consistently good quality tv (sound and picture wise, not necessarily program content) into my living room which after three years there, I accepted as the norm.

I don’t have sky at my new place and I am uncertain at the moment whether I can, or indeed will, get it for various reasons. Nevertheless I am finding that projecting grainy, 4:3 aspect ratio analogue onto my 16:9 widescreen tv is far too distressing. However Elia has kindly lent me her terrestrial digital tuner which picks up most of the free to air digital channels, with the exception of the ITVs (no real loss there) and E4, but I still, bizarrely, get E4+1 and this at least allows me to deliver most tv into my living room with reasonable picture quality.

Of course this is except when it rains when it all goes down the pan and I get nothing. I am not going to ascribe this to Elia’s digi tuner because it picks up some channels absolutely fine (the eminently redundant shopping channels work rain or shine). So I conclude it must be the signal strength that I receive as to where the issue lies. So in an attempt to improve the situation I ventured out to purchase a decent tv aerial this weekend as, thus far, I have taken my signal through my 12 year old portable tv’s wire loop aerial (a glorified coat hanger) so wasn’t expecting miracles from that.

On the highly dubious recommendation of the sleazy salesman in Comet, Slough (Maidenhead is too classy to have anything as trashy as a retail park), I bought the most expensive aerial available. A jazzy looking silver thing with loop and sticky out aerials and light emitting diodes all over it and all manner of self promoting techno-jargon.


Got it home, unpacked it and installed it, to be greeted by reception worse than that delivered by the aerial from my 12 year old portable tv. Yes, worse. To say I was fairly indignant is an understatement. Anyway, the shiny, silver, pile of shit aerial is going back to Comet, Slough, at some point this week.

I am very irritated by being stuck in this technological wasteland. It makes life very inconvenient as my internet dependency is limited to the slightly clunky paraphernalia at work and the terminals available with the nice folks at Apollo video, Maidenhead. Who incidentally are also kindly furnishing me with the DVD collection of 24 (presently on Season 1 at 14:00), which at least my DVD player delivers with consistent high quality.

Cold

My new lifestyle of doing my new job in Ealing and living in Maidenhead is making me cold. There are various reasons for this.

The biggest irk is that my new flat doesn’t have gas central heating (like my old place and everywhere else I have ever lived) but has night storage heaters. These things are fine for bringing the flat up to temperature in the morning but have to be set on a relatively high output in order to bring the place up to any kind of tolerable morning temperature. I like my flat to be hot in the morning and at the moment it is only adequately warm for my tropical tastes. The problem here is that by using all the ‘stored’ heat up in the morning there is nothing left for the evening so I am presently alternating between being cold and burning cash by switching on the standard electric heater function on the heaters.

Then there is getting to work and being at work. I walk to the station and wait on a windy platform, board a generally pleasantly temperate train before walking at the other end to work and vice versa in the evening. At work I have cause to be out of the office more and this is predominantly on foot. When it comes to shopping I am doing this too on foot either on the way home from work or by walking into Maidenhead town centre at the weekend. As a consequence of all this I am spending a lot more time in the harsh outside. I do have layers so my main body, feet and neck are always pretty warm but I don’t have gloves (do guys even wear gloves these days?) and my work trousers are not particularly thick meaning I have cold hands, knees and nose for large chunks of the day.

I don’t like being cold and I now seem to have a permanently runny nose and variably pink slash purple, cracked hands. None of this makes me particularly happy especially coming home in the evening to a cold flat. I am going to address the flat thing this weekend by buying a timeable free standing oil radiator which should overcome my biggest complaint about the flat being cold (subject to making sure that kind of behavious isn’t a fire hazard).

Meanwhile all I can do is wait for spring and summer to bring some milder weather and try not think about next winter for the time being.

There is no I in team see you later loosers

I thought my old place of work had a high staff turnover but compared to my new employer this affliction was mild. I have been with my new employer for nearly a month now and, as of Monday, I will be the second longest person in the team of people I work in with, on average, one person leaving at the end of each week. To put this in perspective, my period of notice appears to be longer than the normal period of time folks work at the place (so clearly my employer is on to a winner hiring me already).

On the one hand this high turnover is a bad thing, as it is difficult to form any kind of meaningful relationship with anyone who is quite so transitory, not that I have really been there long enough do so with anyone anyway. Clearly getting along with the people you work with is a good thing and the rapid turnover of people to date has precluded this.

However on the other hand, the high people turnover means that folks I don’t like also go fairly quickly and I don’t have to deal with arbitrary pleasantries with them in any kind of supposed spirit of cooperation. Two people I can’t say I warmed to (but didn’t really know sufficiently well to actually be able to say I didn’t like them) left recently and the one other person who I can say I don’t think I really get along with is departing imminently which is all good for me.

Meanwhile, although I am pretty new still, for the even newer newcomers I am already part of the furniture (and knowing pretty much everything about the minor-scale piss-easy wank-planning I am dealing with at the moment) already think I am pretty rapidly becoming the oracle of everything and can soon begin to ply the minions to my mighty will of planingness.

Oh, and if this post didn’t tip you off, nobody I work with knows about the blog (which wasn’t intentional its just worked out that way). But that is the subject of one of a number of, what I think should be good posts, that I have up my sleeve for whenever I manage to get internety at home again.

Witch tit cold

I don't know if folks ever follow any of the links I have stuck up at the side but I thought this post from Overheard in New York was kinda funny. Recon I am going to drop 'witch tit cold' into some conversations and see what folks say.

Nose dive

Well my stats on the blog have taken a massive nose dive recently. I guess that is due to the infrequency and eratic nature of my recent posting but until I get my home internet sorted out (which is taking a while) the blog is going to (clearly) suffer.

I just hope I can get my stats back up again once all this moving home stuff settles down.

All points north

This is probably going to sound a little ridiculous but I only realised this weekend that my flat faces north. I mean I looked round it before moving in, looked at it on a map, looked at it using aerial photography and lived in it for a week and it never occurred to me during all this to consider which direction it faced.

The only, but fairly major, implication of this is the amount of direct sunlight the place gets. As in, not a huge amount. My living room balcony windows face north, my kitchen window faces north and my (otherwise pretty pimp) balcony faces north. But none of them ever get any direct sunlight. Thankfully the place has three outside walls with windows so the secondary living room window (east), bedroom (east) and bathroom (west) all get morning slash evening sunshine.

Regardless of this I am still pretty happy with the place… I am just outside of five minutes walk from the train station, ten minutes from the town centre, fantastically elevated above the rest of the world on the second floor and (other than the occasional drone of an intercity 125 and the particularly irritating doo-daa horn thingy that sometimes gets blasted) in a fairly peaceful position. And also not in Slough.

Regular service will resume shortly

I know posting has been patchy this last week, due to a certain telecommunications company not wanting to get me on-line in any particular hurry and internet access at work, aside from being a little erm... patchy, being, well, at work.

So this post comes to you from the jazzy confines of the Apollo video store, Maidenhead.

Leisure time

Thanks to my new commuting arrangement I know have 64 minutes (31 there, 33 back) of time spent just sitting available to me every day, by which I mean time I spend sitting on the train waiting for it to deliver me to my destination.

At the moment I am spending this looking out of the window and thoroughly appreciating that I don’t live in all the places I pass through without exception but most specifically Hayes and Slough which quite frankly look like hell on earth. However, smugly staring out of the window and being condescending about other people’s neighbourhoods is not going to keep me entertained for long.

Now I don’t want to think of this 64 minutes as ‘dead time’ where I have to sit and wait for the train to do its thing, nor do I really want to get into the mindset of ‘this is my commute, deal with it.’ I would rather consider this 64 minutes as additional ‘leisure time’ that I have been blessed with. So what should I do with my new leisure time?

The easiest option is obviously reading. Many of my fellow partakers of leisure time on the train engage in this activity, either in the form of books or the day’s newspaper. I can’t say I am so much up for the newspaper thing as I somewhat resent having to pay for the days news when it is quite freely available and much more personally customisable on the internet. I am open to the option of reading a book though and no doubt will be taking my current choice of literature, Life of Pi by Yann Martell, with me in the foreseeable future.

In a worldly kind of way I have considered perhaps investing in some self-improvement tools. Using the time to learn another language maybe or study up on history or professional development however, lets face it, I am not going to be in the mood for this kind of thing in the early morning or immediately after work so no matter how good my intentions, its probably not going to happen.

What I really want is to pursue the high tech route. I would like a PSP and an I-pod or other similar music playing device both of which I think are pretty self explanatory. However the Holy Grail probably has to be a laptop computer; something nice and small and light and functional (and would supersede the desire for a PSP or I-pod device).

For example, I have done, but generally don’t, spend around an hour constructing blog posts. With a laptop I could, mood permitting, use my new leisure time to construct posts for the blog which I think would be a fantastic use of the time. It is something I enjoy doing anyway and slotting it into leisure time seems to be a perfect match. The laptop also has the added bonus of being usable for other things such as regular work, planning aid work, computer games or offending fellow passengers by viewing porn (ok not really) etc. The laptop does of course require a rather large and self indulgent chunk of cash though. One I can’t really justify at the moment, particularly given my current rash spending on lunch and breakfast (now generally a large coffee and a chocolate croissant or bagel) as well as other essential house moving items.

So for the time being I think I am going to be restricted to the book option which is fine… for now.

Disconnected

Having no internet access or phone line for the time being at (new) home (and a consequent inability to make blog posts as I would like), living in a new and relatively unfamiliar town, work email being about as reliable as a circa 1980 communist Russian Trabant, work internet blocking access to my personal email account and my mobile phone being misplaced slash stolen I am feeling a little lost and disassociated at the moment.

Over the past few weeks my entire life has been turned on its head like it has only three times before. Namely, moving out of London and changing schools in 1996, moving to Sheffield and starting University in 1998 and moving to Amersham and starting work with my former employer in 2002.

Moving out of London and starting at my old job I did with and slash or in the presence of my family which at least afforded a degree of consistency. However starting University and moving to Maidenhead I have done slash did almost completely by myself (although of course everyone who helped me physically move flats last weekend is way appreciated).

I remember the feeling of being slightly lost and overwhelmed by everything in the first week at University but this was at least shared by everyone else I was with at the time pretty much being in the same boat and quickly slid away, lubricated with large amounts of alcohol.

This time it is different insofar as it just me to whom everything is new to now. It all feels totally new and slightly alien, and indeed is, ranging from ‘where is the bloody exit to the train station?’ and ‘is it you I talk to about getting additional consultations on this planning application?’ to ‘aha, this new oven will cook slash burn my dinner much faster than my old one’ and ‘how the hell do I get this bastard night storage heating system to work?’ Almost every single action is experimental or prompts a question.

This all makes life more interesting and the challenge is certainly welcome after my seemingly pedestrian former existence which ceased (still less than) a month ago now. However it would be nice to have something I could fall back upon as being reliant and consistent so it is not all change however it appears that, given events, (like I said at the start of this post) I am not going to be afforded this luxury, at least for the time being.

Hello *person type 19*

Well this apparently is my new neighbourhood profile.

Family income: High.
Interest in current affairs: Very high.
Housing - with mortgage: Medium.
Educated - to degree: Very high.
Couples with children: Very low.

If you read the full profile (link) it pretty much describes me, or at least how I like to see me (which are hopefully not too divergent). All I have to do now is start liking sport and I would be pretty much 100% accurately pigeon-holed by my post code. I am unique, just like everybody else.

Deconstruction

Moving day is this Saturday. I have spent the last few weeks gently disassembling my little flat and packing all non-essential items into boxes, some of which are already stored at my parents for the time being. Today was the final pack up and everything I own has been pretty much either deconstructed to its component parts or committed to cardboard boxes (with the exception of my pc, monitor, keyboard and mouse, bed, kettle and a mug with a tea bag in it, oh and some things to make myself clean in the morning).

I pick up keys to my new place tomorrow morning and then have to go sort out meter readings, inspection etc. and check out any other issues that come to light. The previous tenants seemed pretty sanitary and I doubt the place will need much of a serious clean before I move my stuff in but its going to get one anyway. Expunging the former tenant’s existence from the place just seems like a sensible ritual that is necessary before I can take proper possession.

Like I said, moving into the new place on Saturday, then depositing the stuff that I don’t need (as it comes kitted out with white goods etc. which I have already) at my parents on the Sunday and then stripping out and cleaning my old place up followed by handing back keys on the Monday whereafter I will hopefully have some opportunity to sort the new place out before being back in work on Tuesday. At the moment, getting all this done seems like a real uphill challenge, its taken me all day to order my old place and I am still not done yet. I will be glad when it is all over. Actually, getting back to the, at least consistent, mentalism of my new job and working environment (the intended subject of a forthcoming post) should be somewhat of a welcome relief.

Of course the reason for the move is twofold. One, because my old flat was linked to my old job and I couldn’t stay there indefinitely and two, to make my commute a little easier into work as, I can tell you, spending up to and hour and half on the horribly unpredictable A40 and then fighting for on street parking before walking a variable distance to work was starting to do my nut. Although, not so much for the doing it, more for the unsettling uncertainty of how long it was actually going take. So pretty much regardless of reason one, reason two is sufficient grounds to want to move in my opinion. A near door-to-door train ride of thirty minutes seems like a much more civilised prospect despite that other people are apparently going to be getting on this train thing.

I thought I would be a little more (hmm, what’s the word) nostalgic (?) about leaving my old flat but it seems that, as it was with my old job, I am more looking forward to what’s in store in my new place and living somewhere new, rather than reminiscing about the memories from the old place. Maybe that will come later when I have a little more time to actually think about it.

Anyhow, bye bye to Amersham (smell you later), hello to Maidenhead.

Opposite side of the sun

Well it has been six months since I started this blog and lots of stuff has happened including getting a new job, finding a new flat, going to a wedding, getting a speeding ticket, going on holiday, getting up early (more than once), serving a stop notice with a police escort and how could I forget, getting threatened by agents of the North Korean Government.

I think it has taken a little while to settle into a blog rhythm and reading back I do cringe at some of my earlier posts which I think were, on occasion, pretty cruddy (and no I don’t want confirmation of that). However I think I have settled into a reasonable pattern now and for the most part can come up with something at most times that at worst passes a few moments of dullness when reading at work and at best is something folks like to keep up with.

I have some objectives for the future, including a few fairly ‘grand posts’ that I am keeping quiet for the time being as I don’t know if they will come to fruition because they involve more effort on my part than I have had to commit to any other post thus far.

Meanwhile I am happy my blog has got this far and that people keep reading. I think if I stopped getting any readership the blog would close down pretty sharpish. I wonder if I will make it to a year...

Hell is other people at breakfast

I came across this article today which struck a chord with me (via). In a roundabout way I think it part explains why I like doing this blog. I get social interaction through it but on my own terms.

I'm an introvert. You are a wonderful person and I like you. But now please shush.

Fix me

So my phone to USB connectivity thingy or something isn’t working. Or to clarify in a sentence constructed using English, I can’t transfer photos from my phone to my computer for the time being until I work out how to fix whatever is wrong or I come up with another solution. This is irritating as not only can pictures from my phone be used to jazz up some posts, they form the focal point of some of them. For the time being this little situation has blown like five posts worth of stuff that I was going to do including ‘phone dump II’ and the long overdue ‘crimes against pd’ as well as a number of other ideas I have. So, erm… here’s a picture of some cute bunnies in cups instead.

And on the subject of things being broken, I know the Nick101 RSS/Atom feed isn’t working at the moment and haven’t managed to work out why as of yet. I will try to sort it as soon as I have the chance. As my somewhat ham-fisted efforts haven't worked so far I suspect a nice email to those folks at blogger may be in order.

Dork

This post makes me a big dork. Why? Because of the link I am going to post at the end.

Not only do I have a blog, have a pretty geeky job, like the new series of Battlestar Gallactica, abjectly fail to grow any meaningful facial hair and spend too much time on the internet; I actually found this link, watched it three five times with a giant grin on my face and then posted it and professed it to be one of the most fun things I had seen in ages.

My only consolation is that I don’t live with my parents and haven’t converted my bedroom into a replica of the Starship Enterprise (and have no intention of doing either of these things).

So what’s this all about then? Watch here.

Rude goldberg machine

I am very tired this evening so here are some links instead.

If you liked the Honda advert where the bits of the car set each other off in a big sequence you’ll probably also appreciate a similar kind of thing done in a Halflife 2 mod.

Or you can read K8's blog.

The microfiche connection

I had a little routine at my old work where I would come in in the morning and make myself a mug of instant black coffee at some point during the first hour using the free hot water machine. Hardly a grand indulgence and it kept me reasonably content for a part of the morning.

My new work doesn’t have quite the same hot drink making facilities. For starters the kitchenette unit is located one flight of stairs up at the opposite end of the building. Once there the facilities leave much to be desired; being a rather dubious looking wall mounted hot water unit which appears to heat the water to somewhere in the region of slightly above room temperature. Additionally the kitchenette appears to have the hygiene standards of a student hall of residence. So suffice to say my previous morning coffee routine has been axed much to my disappointment.

Meanwhile, at old work, if I wanted to view historical records which was a relatively frequent occurrence I would get up from my desk and walk to the filing bays and get whatever I wanted when-so-ever I happened to choose.

At my new work, instead of walking round to the filing bays I have to either request them specially from a dedicated records store five miles up the road for delivery in the afternoon or the following day or leave the building I work in, walk three minutes down the road and into another building to inspect the records along with joe public.

So from here we conclude that I miss my morning coffee and have to go a lot further to fetch historical records. Of course in fetching historical records I have to walk past a rather nice cafe selling a fine array of fresh coffee, croissants, pastries, baguettes and really everything the hungry slash thirsty office worker could ever want.

You can probably see where this is going.

I have already become quite the patron of this rather canny little establishment (spending nearly £7 there yesterday in two visits) and I really don’t want to make a habit of it as it will cost me dearly (with a large, fresh coffee setting me back £1.50). However the promise of a very good cup of fresh coffee after a suckish commute and with no real alternative I am struggling to resist.