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Scott’s blog
Musings on a world I am no longer sure about
Late leaving...bah.
Mark just accused me of having a crap website and then went on to moan about work’s one...cor! And I thought he was talking about FreakCity! 
So. Long weekend and I have no plans. Grr. James from Leeds is visiting this weekend, so I may go to XXL and see him on Saturday, if he manages to turn up this time 
Am possibly barbecuing tomorrow if the weather improves some - Gaz and Deev turn up tonight. They’re staying at Owen’s but will want to go for a drink tonight. Gaz phoned me yesterday and then promptly apologised for hitting the wrong speed dial and getting me by mistake. And then he bizarrely *didn’t* apologise for putting me on hold and forcing me to listen to a pan pipes version of “holding back the years”. Cunt. He suggested we go to the Bleak Hearse tonight. Oh Jesus! Is Deev prepared for such excitement!?
Downloaded some cheap DVD ripper thing and with a bit of tweaking I’d got it working OK and got a half decent 700ishMb copy of “Tank Girl” done Left it doing the Matrix Revolutions...need a DVD autochanger now
Didn’t get around to doing anything with the DAP at all...so am hoping the batteries last ok...if not, I guess I still have the Palm as backup...it only works when wiggled though 
Watched “Angel” last night. Another exceptionally well written Ben Edlund episode...and only 3 more to go...Also got Enterprise - unsurprisingly not as well written - few odd plot holes and an unplanned addiction...tsk.
Whatever happened to American TVs ability to write cliffhangers? I think back to Buffy Season 5 and “Tough Love” onwards, or the final 5 of B5 and there’s nothing that comes even close....
I’d forgotten how crap the District Line is. Bah. Next time I shall just leave earlier and shun it.
My DAP seems fond of Kate Bush...
9am at Earls Court. Dull dull dull. Work is unlikely to be very stimulating either. Ho hum. More bugfixing and shit. Lovely.
I am fed up with being alone, but I can’t have the one I want and I don’t know what to do. I cried myself to sleep again last night, first time this week. It’s all such a mess. Sometimes I wonder what the point is to it all. I want to settle down, share my life with someone, grow as people, but together, instead of apart. I want to feel secure instead of old and tired and jaded. It’s just not fair. But then again, what in life ever is?
• 18:45: Another long day to add to the collection...
It’s rather surreal, but I appear to be writing like Graffiti. How fucking sad is that?
Long day fixing P2-3 bugs. Netscape 7.0 is my new worst enemy, the evil pile of poo. I’d forgotten how non compliant Gecko 1.0 series was. Ugh.
Since cycling lots on Tues, my appetite has been really odd and I have no idea why.
Note to self: Remember to erase Madonna from DAP.
Checked on my DVD rip at lunch. Oops! 2.5Gig. Tweaked a little more. Turned quality down some. Will check when I get back...
Considering going to see Van Helsing as it looks a giggle. Intrigued by the idea of the spin off series - David “They Got The Mustard Out” Fury has been brought on board...should be interesting...
Tube is crowded for 7pm on a Friday evening. No clue why...Maybe the world popped out for a beer after work or something...
So I got this DAP thing with around 3000 songs currently on it...so why am I getting repeats on random play? Weird fucked up thing! Still, it’s playing Zero 7 at me now so can’t complain too much
I wonder if Leeds James actually made it here this time...Texted but as yet no reply - he says he’ll come see me soon too, but we’ll see...
I need to acquire more money. Wonder if I could sell my arse. By the kilo should get me a big profit 
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Another long day...another week of madness left.
Not really done anything other than eat, sleep and work. Oh and attempt to rip some of my DVDs to DivX. Which so far has failed - transcode has merry errors...may raid John’s server and see if there’s owt worth nicking...
Have thought up a way to get his email thing automated Will try it on mine and see if it works right.
The speaker socket on my palm is fucked, which is a tad annoying. Grr. Oh well...it’s only 4 months old and so should still be under warranty... So I’ve dug out my DAP and am busy thinking of ways to charge it faster 
Rick sounds down at the moment - not sure what I can do to cheer him up though. Cept offer (virtual) hugs, which I have been doing...
Going to reinstall the DAP on a PC later and fill some more of it up. Need more music as I spent the day humming the Dave song from Kids in the Hall. Now listening to Skunk Anansie...been ages since I’ve done this. 10gig of songs is better than 512m
Work going slow. Worked late every single night this week so far. There’s so much to do...and it’s all got to be done by next Friday. Urgh. Though we’ve got almost no P1 (show stopper) bugs, which is good - if somewhat surprising!
A big black man almost fell on me then! Note to self, must buy pointy hat for tube journeys...
*dances to a track from Rank - the Rubber Ring/What She Said hybrid track*
Wonder if there are any cool updates for the DAP? Nah. It’s a Creative product...
Was thinking earlier...it must be possible to make a sleeve that contains a small HD and a decent battery and plugs into the SD card slot...then add that to pTunes and you could have an xgig MP3 player for less than the price of a standalone...
The Evening Standard is leading with a story about having discovered the cure for ageing...curious...couldn’t they have found it a few years ago, when I was still young and gorgeous..? Bah.
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Am I hallucinating, or have I been using a version of Netscape that’s not been released yet for the last two months?
I swear I’ve been using Netscape 7.2 for a while now. But apparently I’ve not been as it’s not been released. How strange is that?
There’s possibly a new copy of Netscape being released soon - looks like AOL have decided to do something with the brand - suspect it’s a tad late, but never mind
Have been told that we’re meant to be supporting (the horrible) Netscape 7.0 
Am going through the flow and tidying. Well, I was, until they turned the server off...
Decided after the fun of yesterday’s commute (see previous journal) I would get the tube in. Sat on the floor this morning and it hurt
rickster turned up yesterday...seems he was mugged in London
Poor thing!
Told him to come visit for hugs and linux lessons some time...he seems to like that idea too
Cooked mince when I got in. Was expensive lean steak mince and by god was it tasty. I’m going to defrost the other portion and make burgers out of it for the barbecue that may or may not happen on account of the weather being shite. Bah
Spent the morning going through bugs - lots of surreal ones that make no sense to me - still, nothing major that I can see from my end, apart from Netscape 7.0 issues
I’ll live tho.
James told me last night that he’s feeling ill again having visited me. Hm. Either he’s got a cold or he’s developed allergies to East London. Not sure which
Fiddled with my DAP this morning to see if I could get it to work right without its power supply. Gave up. When it’s turned on, and plugged into my laptop’s PSU it claims it’s charging - when it’s turned off it claims it’s not. Freak thing.
Am considering taking it apart to see the ickle shiny hard drive. Or maybe just selling it...
Daily Mail World has been removed from b3ta’s website by request of some lawyers - Hmph. It was awfully funny
In other news, Jo’s being mailed by Gomeche, he seems to be upset about one of the photos on her site and ccd some bloke at a .mil email address. She seems rather uninterested in his *nudge nudge* *wink wink* style of email. Can’t really blame her
Looks like he’s taken to CCing everyone he’s ever emailed with his rants. Considered setting up a yahoogroup for him, but figured that’d be more trouble than it’s worth...
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Holy crap I’m wet!
Decided as it was gorgeous weather I’d cycle in. Rah! Left at about 07:45 so I’d have enough time to get lost...and promptly got lost
It all started out so well, too...
Decided to avoid Tower as it’s always too busy and involves hills, went via Aldgate, St Pauls, Fleet St, Strand, Traf Sq, Picadilly, got to Hyde Park Corner and thought “No. There’s no way on Earth I’m going down there” as the cars and lorries all zoomed past into darkness under the roundabout...so went around...ish...
Ended up taking the wrong road and doodling about for about half an hour, found Sloane Square, assumed (wrongly) this must be the right direction as that’s on the district line...ended up at Chelsea Bridge, but didn’t really fancy going over the river and back again so went back to Sloane Square and took a different random road, King St...checked with my “A-Z” (the T3 and some maps in it) and discovered I only had to go up a road to end up in the right place. Ended up being about 5 mins later than I wanted to be at work...result!
Gorgeous weather, so popped out on the bike @ lunch to buy some bits for it. Couldn’t find anywhere that sold facemasks so settled for a U lock. Bought the same make as last time - figured it took so fucking long to get off it’s not gonna be a half bad one
Went to Safeway to buy food for the evening - bought a little too much, but figured sod it, I’ll be ok cycling with it...
Carried on doing javascript bits throughout the afternoon - noticed that the sky was getting slowly darker and darker too. Bastard thing.
I’d only got my jacket, no waterproof trousers, my comfortable boots, complete with holes, as opposed to my nice ones...etc...
Left at 6 after it had just started raining. It then got steadily worse. 6pm and cars needed their headlights on. Ick. I should have left the bike at work and tubed home...
...took me an hour of getting absolutely pissed on to get to Hyde Park. By this time it had got so bad that I couldn’t cycle on the road as it’d be dangerous - visibility was fuck all, and it was dark as dusk. Tried to find some shelter in Hyde Park somewhere and failed...the trees in Hyde Park are way too wimpy to hide under in thunderstorms...
Took refuge in KFC - locked my bike outside, dripped to the counter, squelched my bag onto it, peeled it open, slid parts of my chequebook out and flopped the pages over until I found a dry cheque, and ordered food.
Took food upstairs, soaked a chair, noted that my plan of texting James to find out if I could use tubes with a bike was foiled by my phone dripping and not responding when I tried to turn it on. Ate food, dribbled next door to Marble Arch tube to ask ’em, was told that the closest station I could take a bike into for the tube was Edgeware Road. Comically I found the Bakerloo bit of Edgeware Road after a bit - rain had decided to all but stop as soon as I found it - and I couldn’t find the Circle/District line bit at all and so was going over and over the traffic lights getting more and more annoyed...
Eventually found it hiding behind M&S. Bastards. Got the bike to the platform and had to wait 30 minutes for the feckin train to turn up as the tubes were buggered/flooded/shut. Eventually got home, about 2.5 hours after I set off...had a nice hot shower, washed all my clothes...chatted a bit to James and went to bed.
Rain sucks.
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Escalators DEAD
• 8:41: Escalators DEAD
Think I’ve overspent this month, and I’ve not even been paid yet! Arse!
Was a good boi on Friday and didn’t go out drinking with the rest of work and went home. Tumble dryer still broke. Bah. Shall call them later today...No firemen though...Text from Danny about Retro and “Justin” being there...whoever “Justin” was.
“he knows you...”
...but then again so do all the Justins I know...
And now I’m thinking of the “Daves” song from “Kids in the Hall”...
The XP install on “lazarus”, my newly fixed laptop was so fucked that it would crash windows installer when it was run from the CD. Not impressed Booted into Slackware, fdisk /dev/hda1, d,1,w soon fixed that.
Installed fresh windows, broke it within about 15 minutes of trying to get SMC’s wifi card working...a new personal best...
How someone can take the perfectly fine Prism drivers and break them that impressively bemuses me
Trundled to bed quite early, got up at 7am...texted rickster and got no reply. Hope he’s ok and just doing stuff with his ex, and that nothing happened to him on the way here...
Toodled to Halfords and forgot entirely to buy a new lock...but got two new tyres, an inner tube and some "slime"for the back wheel.
Went nextdoor to PC World and bought a silent PC kit, case and optical mouse for “manny” in the livingroom, as it was much too loud and rattly in the old case. Gorgeous weather! Got a cab home as I had far too much crap to carry...
Got a text from Adam (space_chicken) saying he was gonna pop over. Built PC, built Owen’s old PC.
Went out to find a hairdresser. My usual place was far too queued so went to somewhere else and had my hair cut on autopilot by some ginger woman speaking Spanish with a Russian accent at great length to the blond thing sat next to me. Plus side, not having to make conversation is fun. Minus side, took longer than usual. Went to Iceland and picked up a few pointless little things - then I saw the size of the queue. Oops.
15 mins later and I head back home for more PC poking...
Stuffed all the left over bits into the old case and stored it - tidied lots, cleaned things, still no Adam. Bastard stood me up.
So..stood up twice in one day, and I’m not feeling too good and then lots of things happened that left me in a bit of a state...ended up having a long chat to James about things. I was in a bit of a depressed state to say the least, and I’m not very good at thinking objectively when depressed - I had decided that I wanted my key back from James and to give him back everything in my flat that was his - and then to just not see him again for the foreseeable future - this seemed like a good way of stopping things hurting as much as they were...tho in hindsight I’m not so sure. So I chatted lots, had a bit of a cry, felt a little better...
Bored, I was asked if I wanted to accompany Chris (kingdingaling) to XXL as he was going...he roped me into it and so I headed off at about 22:30 to meet Chris...who managed to be late. Tsk
Arrived, explained my wallet had been nicked but I was a member, I guess they remembered me so it was ok and I got in for the members rate...
They’ve fitted a sling in their “special” room...it’s quite scary
Chris introduced me to the scary blokes he wanted to meet...they were all hanging around like very old women...I think they needed knitting or something. Mostly they scared me a lot, so I left them to it.
Bumped into cute sauna chef, gave him a hug, his English hasn’t improved enough for conversation yet though, which is a shame.
No sign of my Hot Italian Boy...and no sign of Drew either, which was a shame.
Bumped into Rich in the garden. He was in disguise (big cap reading “Fitness First” somewhat ironically) - we giggled about the concept of big fat hairy scary bouncers in a club where most of the participants are far bigger, meaner, hairyer and scaryer...
He was sooo sweet, like a kid in a<
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Arg.
Chris dragged me to XXL. I am now knackered. And skint. Bah
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Bah!
Broke Lazarus (the laptop) within minutes of having it back. Manny (the livingroom desktop) won’t let me log in, somewhat surrealy - it works fine as text, but breaks when I use KDM...what’s up with that? Dropline Gnome have exceeded their bandwidth allocation. So I can’t install it on Lazarus. Grr. And it’s only 7:30. Pfft!
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Cut my wrist on a bad thought....
Database down. Bored. Cut my wrist on the bus door by accident. Look like a failed suicide. My hair is too big. I broke the build by being stressed and pissed off yesterday and am still cleaning up the mess.
Bah. Life sucks.
Still...I now have a shiny optical mouse
Shiny things are goood
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6 comments.
Woo.
Finished. KHRP all up to date. Must go to bed now for a week or so... Laptop boots linux A-OK. Sadly Windows appears to be dead. So I am going to delete the partition, recreate it and see what happens...
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Crappy day.
So...I wake up and discover the washer drier has decided not to dry stuff. At 5:30am. I put it back on again and go back to bed. Wake at 7 - washing finishes at 7:30, it’s still soaking wet. Grr. Yesterday I left the flat without my coat by accident. And it shat it down. James didn’t hear anything about his job interviews, I assume, so I firstly asked him if he wanted to do anything tonight, and he said no...I ask him if he’s ok - I know what it’s like waiting for agencies to get back to you, they never do when they say they’re gonna and it’s frustrating, and he replies with “why shouldn’t I be ok, just because I don’t want to do something with you” or words to that effect. It makes me angry how many assumptions he’s making about me and my life at the moment, when he really doesn’t have a clue what’s going on in it. It makes me angry that I can’t ask someone who I love how they are without them reading more into it and jumping to conclusions that aren’t true. And I’m worried about him as well as being angry...and there’s nothing I can really do except leave it and leave him to it. So already in a bad mood I leave work and get soaked. Arriving back home I do lots of work and go to bed. So I’m up at 7:30 with soaking wet work clothes and I need to leave for work at 8. Find some jeans, make sandwiches, find an old crappy tshirt and I’m out the door... Walk to the station, hop on the DLR and it promptly breaks down. Driver reboots it then drives us to Bank very very slowly...at around 7 miles an hour I’d guess...which is annoying. Get to work and I’m already thinking too much. Thinking about how upset I am about stuff. Thinking about what was wrong and ways it could be put right. Trying to stay angry because if I don’t then I’m going to go to peices. Yesterday I almost had a panic attack in the office. It was a very strange feeling - almost floaty, like my consciousness wouldn’t stay in my head...I’ve had them before, but managed to stay detatched from it and kinda observe it, but this one was much stronger and it freaked me a lot...I had to go out for a walk round the block. I’m not sure how much more stress I can manage at the moment, and I have no-one I can talk to about it - which is part of the reason for me writing this all down...it’s like therapy but cheaper... James has been absent from MSN all day...so I worry, again, probably for no reason because he does this sometimes...I just know how bad he was after he was rejected by an agency, how bad he might be if he’s rejected by two potential employers is anyone’s guess. I send him an email telling him we need to talk - still no reply. Frustrating day at work - I have a really strong pain in my left forearm and it hurts to type, the lead on the project was in meetings most of the day so I was left twiddling my thumbs with struts issues for huge chunks of time and it all went much slower than I wanted it to. Finished at about 6ish and came home to discover the people from the shop downstairs suspect my flat is leaking into their shop and have called the fire brigade and there are five firemen trying to break into my flat. I assure them that it’s *not* my flat, and they tell me that the people downstairs had told them it’d happened before because I left a tap on. The clothes in the washing machine are soaked through and there’s still (for some unknown reason) lots of water in the drum, some of which was still on the floor from where I’d taken the trousers out that morning, so the firemen drag the washing machine out and look behind it, and they can’t see any leaks there either...so I send ’em packing. I have lots of work to do but I am angry and I can’t concentrate. I don’t know what to do. I am amazed I got through the day without breaking down and now I just feel dead inside. It took me ten years to get over Mark...how the fuck am I going to cope if I have to do that all over again? I am going to do the only thing I can do I think.<
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PC Spread
Rubble! Uneventful day at work yesterday. I am however going to be doing some funky Javascript for the hotels compare function...which could be fun
Had a chat to rickster just before heading home - seems he’s coming to London on Saturday...offered my skills as a tour guide, should be nice to meet him!
Also had a flurry of conversation with a bloke I shagged about a year and a bit ago (in mine and James’ "gap") - last saw him at a barbecue ages ago where everyone turned to look at him and go “ooh” (well, he *is* a model) and I got to smugly tell Owen that I’d had him...but I digress, and am starting to sound like photographer so I’ll continue 
Turns out his bloke is away on business or something and he had his flat all to himself and wanted to invite me over for “coffee”...I declined as I had Owen’s PC to deal with. Bless.
Left earlyish to get back in time for Nav to turn up so we could deliver the bugger.
Someone completely demolished the lockup sheds between
to a rather ill Owen. Told him to give up smoking...he told me about him and Nick (www.gaydar.co.uk/nick18cute I think it was) on Saturday. Think he got the better deal. Apparently Nick quite likes Owen, and Nick and his boyf popped over on Monday night and Owen had previously had his boyf too!
Installed some bits. Borrowed about 5 DVDs from Owen to transcode. Suspect Owen’s CD rewriter isn’t really ill, merely full of thick black dust. Forgot my phone. Nav sold me a pendrive - I have no idea what to do with it but it’s pretty
Nav had to scoot off for dinner with his sister - he thinks I’ve lost weight too
Headed home at about 10:30 after showing Owen the pretty new people on FreakCity. Forgotten how much “fun” Ilford trains are at night There were two blokes with a garden chair who got on at Manor Park - the garden chair, it appeared, was because neither could stand up too well. One of them staggered off the train at Maryland so he could walk up the platform and wave at the pretty girls who were on the seat in front of him. His friend only noticed as the doors were closing and he looked a little worried but couldn’t get up in time...
Cute northern chicken sat diagonally opposite me. Gobby shite. Bless.
Got to the DLR platform at Stratford, just in time to see a train leave. Stood in the cold for 10 minutes, pretending like I cared or something. A dark and shadowy figure approached - a homosexual. I was scared. He asked if I had a gaydar profile - I said yes, he said “Scottlet” and then that he’d seen my DudesNude profile too...He told me his name but I didn’t remember it. He apologised, and mentioned he didn’t usually do this kinda thing but was drunk. I nodded and smiled. Stalkertastic! Got on DLR train and his in a corner (insomuch as one can hide in an open plan carriage)...
Got home and had another strange conversation with another online person - went something like this:
Him: You used to live in Ilford, right?
Me: Yes
Him: I think I saw you on the tube yesterday.
Me: yes
He then went into detail about what I was doing and asked if it freaked me out that he knew what I was doing and had no idea who he was. I said no. I went to bed
Got up bright an early and put “manny”, one of my livingroom PCs back together after it had been cannibalised by Owen’s PC. Got it all working in 15 mins, which I was kinda chuffed by
Have connected it to my KDE install and am about to try and RDP to it and see if I can get KDE to transcode stuff remotely via RDP <> VNC...
I’m such a geek
Will attempt to clean fluff outta Owen’s CD/RW tonight. Have nicked his old intellimouse which seems to work well enough for my purposes. Will try and dismantle that too, and work out where the loose wire is that cuts it off from time to time...
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The Mail Is For Stupid People
Mumsie! 069.jpg So I woke up at 6:30 on Sunday and poked Sal to see if he was still alive, which he was, and so I got up and prepared to tidy the flat somewhat. Why do gays make so much mess?
Talked to mum at 9ish, they left at 8:30 and were going via Bury and Andy’s Dad’s to pick up some bolt cutters to try and free my bike. Mentioned this would add half hour or so to their journey. Great weather for ducks. Not so great for photography though. I remarked that $deity must hate fit people as the marathon would be very wet.
Had some more pokage of Owen’s PC, made a list of stuff to buy for it. Accidentally blew up 512M RAM, that kinda thing. Mopped floor. Checked toilet was fit for Mother, that kinda thing. Had a brief break at tennish to be told that they were about to arrive. That was quick. Bounced in and out of shower and put kettle on. Andy attempted to Free My Bike with the bolt cutters and failed. I showed Mother LivingRoom v2 and she was suitably impressed. Decided to go to Halfords to see what they could suggest to Free My Bike. Was amused in a post ironic way that the shifty looking young bloke behind the bike counter knew straight away how to do it. So we purchased a punch set and a rattly hammer and then went next door to PC World to buy some components. Bought Owen a new case some new RAM to replace the stuff I fried and a new HD. Also bought him a 60 quid Quiet PC kit with PSU, heatsink and fan. And a big leather chair for me. Went next door to discover that Currys, The Electrical Superstore, doesn’t sell lightbulbs.
Trundled all that lot home, Andy attempted to hammer the fuck out of my Ulock and failed. We settled on a drill and a metal bit...this eventually worked and now my bike is FREE!
Went for a walk up to the Wings Buffet place...thought I’d take them there as it’s much nicer than that Basildon one that they seem to go to lots
Raining, so all wrapped up in waterproofs, we saunter off at a leisurely pace, watching all the knackered and slightly damp people walking past us, including a couple of knights in armour.
novak.ethosuk.org.uk/~scott/random/20040418/images/20040418%20032.jpg
Class! Took some pics of stuff, got a bit wet, admired the narrowboats, that kinda thing....
Mum and Andy loved the food at Wings...and we all ate far too much for our own good. So we walked off to Canary Wharf in the rain
Popped into the shops bit of East India Quay on the way, as it’s dry indoors and not dry outdoors. Got told off for taking pictures by a cute man in uniform. Ooopsie.
Wandered underground to the Canary Wharf shopping bit and got some bits in Stared incredulously at the Mail on Sunday and it’s headline of “Lord Filth”. Apparently it’s disgusting that one of Tony Blair’s advisers is now chairman of PayPal as the service is for “perverts” to buy “porn”.
Another fantastically well researched story by the Mail on Sunday. I wonder how they do it?
I am waiting with baited breath for the stories about how credit cards enable perverts to buy filth online...
Headed back to flat on DLR, Mum forgot her Halfords perfume things so my flat smells like a fragrant car at the moment.
Spent a while trying to get Owen’s PC to work right again. Gave up again. Went to bed.
Went to work yesterday, not very exciting. Felt bit guilty for leaving before 6, but as everything appeared to be a tad broken it’s not like I could do anything.
James got an interview! Dead happy for him, hope he gets at least a shortlist, tho can’t help feeling crappy about it as if this had happened a year ago then maybe things’d have been different and we might have still been together. I dunno. I just wish we could sort stuff out, but he seems to want to move on and get on with his life and I can’t really blame him for it I guess...The interview’s in Surrey and he’s thinking of moving there if he gets it, so I’d see hi
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Today
...I have mostly been feeling knackered. Still...the day is nearly done and I have a whole flat full of computer parts to go home to. Aren’t I lucky!
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Barbie
Having already written all this and deleted it by accident, I’m not very impressed. Oops!
Anyways. Popped out after work with work people for a drink on Friday...Had one too many and had some cigarettes, which was naughty of me. Stood about on the banks of the river...pretty sunset Staggered home. Well, I only had about 4 pints...so not really staggered, but should have eaten really...Anyway...got home at about 10 I think, drank loads of water and went to bed. Up bright and early and hangover free...Much too early actually...and started washing up as I’d neglected it a bit, what with work being busy and having the Annual Report for KHRP to do...Popped online for a bit. Found Rich on there, he’d apparently been online all night and was trying not to fall asleep, bless ’im. Invited him over to fall asleep on me but suspected he was having far too much fun...and I was knackered by then too and decided to go back to bed.
Orlando Bloom’s “The Calcium Kid” poster is very distracting...
Er...where was I?
Got up a couple of hours later, just as a rather knackered looking Rich arrived. Chatted for a bit and then stuck him in bed.
Wandered to Sainsburys and bought loads of meat for the barbecue. Got a text from Owen saying that Nav was on his way and should be getting to him for 4. I had bought all the bits last weekend to upgrade Owen’s puter somewhat...so I figured an hour, tops, to install new mobo and chip...Smee and MrsSmee due at 6:30, Nikki at 7ish...figured plenty of time...
So, got back home by cab with £50 worth of foody bits...managed to get the door caught in the wind so it slammed and shook the whole flat, waking Rich up. I swear it’s lead lined uPVC.
He escaped before anyone else arrived, and I went off to wash up more.
Chatting briefly online I bumped into Lee, who’s in London in an Easy Everything and bored - not seen him in about 3 years and so invite him to the barbecue...along with Footle and Danny...
So Smee + MrsSmee turned up an hour early. At 5:30. Still with no sign of Owen. So I stuff them in the livingroom and tidy more, gradually more people arrive and then eventually Owen turns up at about 7ish...and his PC is made by Compaq, who should be shot.
So having discovered I can’t a) fit the new Mobo in the case b) reuse the heatsink coz it’s shite (ok, I kinda guessed that’d be the case anyways) c) use the PSU as it’s 145watt (!!), d) go to PC world as it shut so couldn’t buy anything, I end up taking apart one of my PCs and giving Owen the case/PSU/Heatsink from that.
Oh, and AGP card, as Owen’s graphics card is too old to fit in the motherboard
Only it won’t boot. It gives me smiley faces.
Nav starts barbecuing things as I’m up to my nipples in PC parts and filth (I suspect Owen runs his PC in a chimney. A real live working chimney with real live soot). We try and get the Compaq floppy drive to talk to the motherboard. It decides that it will eat any floppy disk put into it - so I cannot update the bios in case that’s the issue...
Lee decides to phone Salvador (vervain) and arranges to meet Sal and his friends in the Swan. I warn them against the delights of Chav City. They seem determined, so I nick Lee’s phone and point out to Sal that there’s such thing as an entry charge to the Swan on a Saturday, so he decides to come over here instead.
I’m still battling with PC when they arrive...Owen’s drive doesn’t boot, but one of my drives is fine in it, so I know it’s not the mobo...and I am stumped. I even phoned James to see if he has any ideas but he’s stumped too. Bah.
Lee reminisces about things with Salvador for the 10 minutes that Sal manages to stay awake before passing out in my bed. Sal’s friend Nick (who apparently came from a sauna, I find out later) is abandoned in my livingroom, not knowing anyone, pissed as a fart and feeling<
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Becks has a strange willy
Not been up to much cept work, really. Am considering dropping the .Net image bits from Freakcity in favour of ASPJpeg as the .Net classes seem a bit wank really. I mean - Image classes with no “crop” method is just silly. I love Microsoft. Still not finished HTMLifying the KHRP Annual Report. It’s been done on a Mac, it has ligatures, when the text is copied + pasted from Acrobat it simply replaces “fi” and “fl” with “?” which is more than a tad annoying as I’m having to proofread all 70 pages carefully as I go...which, as you can probably imagine is a pain in the arse. In other news, Rebecca Loos claims she knows something about an “intimate part of the star’s body” - and can prove it. William is a “Scotch and a splash” man, reports the Metro, mere pages from the “Binge drinking brain damage warning” headline...tho apparently this is to do with him being picked for a Scottish water polo match. Cue scary gay excitement at seeing him in trunks. Or have they all started fancying Harry now that Wills is so old? I lose track... And in an amazing marketing coup for Proctor and Gamble the universe has been declared a “giant Pringle” by German scientists at the university of Ulm... I wonder what flavour we are? I just had to run for a bus. How unfair is that? C2I got mentioned on the news last night. Sam being pied. And how they were succeeding where the US was not. Read Jo’s last report (have added a link to it) and was almost in tears. It’s disgusting what is being done in our names. And it’s equally disgusting that all we hear about it is the official lie...about how these are “Ba’athist” and foreign “insurgents” who don’t want “democracy” - and the figure of 600 dead insurgents isn’t being questioned by the popular press...even though the majority of victims turning up at the hospitals are women and children. And when I say “hospitals” I mean those that managed to get to Baghdad, as the US appear to have bombed the hospital in Fallujah and shot at and destroyed most, if not all of the ambulances...bastards... “That same day, Brent Bourgeois, a 20-year-old lance corporal from Kenner, La., said he had seen an American helicopter fire a missile at a man with a slingshot.” - NY Times
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From PoopBitch:
“The way to achieve Inner Peace is to finish all the things you’ve started.”. So I looked around the house to see all things I started and hadn’t finished.... and before going to work this morning I finished off a bottle of red wine, a bottle of white, the Bailey’s, the Tequila and half a lemon, the Prozac, two valium, 20 Bensons and a box of chocolates.
Made me snigger lots
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Long weekend
Mostly chilled out over the long weekend. Slept lots and lots. Tidied a bit more too...
Built a new PC for the lounge, which failed to work. Rich donated me a motherboard which was kind of him, so now it works (mostly)
Stone is working fine as well too - and my new server’s about to come online as well
The pub down the road from work is “Now open until 2pm Fri and Sat” which is nice
Got very little of Freakcity 2 finished. Instigated a logo drawing competition and seemed to acquire some new users tho which is fun
Made bread. Made lasagne. Made more lasagne. MEAT. I should probably start dieting about now.
No fags. Yay me
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Aliens!
Urg. Too much beer+food.
Now I feel fat(ter) and er...all bloaty. Still...got to see winj’s squat down the road. It’s quite nice as free accomodation goes
Long day @ work. Another build day...managed to write some JSP stuff which was nice. Got frustrated by struts (again)...but hey. I’m determined to make the stuff that was done by Ash actually look and work like my design - doing ok. Am going to do something messy using arrays an stuff to make the ordering work right. He’s only interested in the clickthroughs and making the functionality on the rather crap wireframes work, but as it’s my baby I’m gonna take over the results bit
Met up with winj and bex and jrg and dodgysteve and nymph tonight. Some are on the site under different guises, all don’t bother with it any more. Bastards.
Bex had had 4 pints before I arrived...never seen her pissed before, which was fun
We went to a pub near me called the George Tavern. It appears to be run by crusties and looks fab...all candlelit and stuff. Only complaint was that the (very excellent) music was too loud. They played Portishead: Portishead tho...whole album...so I can’t moan *that* much.
Talked about lots of stuff. Didn’t moan about macs too much. Gave Bex my old phone, as hers died when she ended up killing her mac as a can of drink in her bag developed a hole. Went to a place down the road (Lahore 2 or something) for some food. Had their special grill thing as a starter. Was worried as the chicken was the same dayglo colour as lifeboats. Ate a bit and realised why...it must be a warning colour. Ow. My bum will hate me in the morning
They were arguing about who was the poshest, and Jeff said Steve was part of the chosen race so we couldn’t include him in the argument as it’d be antisemitic, so I think Bex won.
After food (and Cobra, the less gassy beer) we headed back to winj’s place. Apparently the person that got them the house managed to squeeze through the cellar railings and get into the place like that. Which was scary as we’re talking about a 5" gap.
Headed off to the swan on me own coz it seemed like a good idea at the time...very busy, but dull. Trollette and Springs doing showtunes. Stayed for a couple more than I meant to and then came home. Think I should go to bed soon. Drinking water tho to offset the hangover
Limehouse is apparently the 24th best place in the UK to get abducted by aliens! So I’m holding my breath. I hope some of them are rich...
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Almost Easter vol 1
Fun day. got to write some actual JSP and Java, which was nice. Long day though, full of annoyances and bits of struts not working and stuff, which was annoying.
Now I’m boredly waiting for the #295. And it’s a tad fucking chilly. Bah. I can almost write Graffiti without looking now. Yay.
Why do shockingly ordinary old women persist in wearing orange hair? Is there a flaming beauty in each of them, desperate to once again see the light of day? I blame Hollywood, meself.
Mike has had his bike thieved, so I’ve offered him my old one, as it’s just sat on the balcony at the moment doing arse all...think he may have to do a touch of work on it but hey...
Unsure as yet whether or not I should head to Retro with a large set of earplugs or just do the Swan portion of the evening or merely stay in and be a miserable fucker. Think I may do the latter
I think I need a new keyboard as mine’s very old and getting a bit icky these days...I am considering just washing it and seeing if that helps, but I’m not sure it’ll go back together again...Decisions, decisions. Phoned Compaq about the dead laptop. They suggest that it could be static and nothing serious - so I have to take the thing apart and leave it for 24 hours. If it is still deceased then they’ll get it picked up and fixed. She (she had a gorgeous lilting Irish accent) said that although it sounded like the hard drive, they usually just cause a bios error and don’t tend to stop the whole thing booting. So we shall see...
I am now the proud owner of a server...£30 a month...may put Chillisoft ASP on it and see if it’ll run Freakcity with a postgre DB. Will probably move mail to it as well. May see if I can get some cash outta mates for hosting sites and stuff. I will be moving the main ethos site there, I think. Possibly something small like www.exhibitlondon.com - just to see if I can get Tomcat and a MVC Java app up there and running.
The PoshBecks story just keeps on growing. I smell Max Clifford. Or maybe Millbank:
Our Tone: Things in Iraq are getting shitty! Quick! What can we do?
*makes phonecall*
OT: Mr Beckham. Mrs Beckham. You are England’s golden couple, you symbolise all that is good and right in this country! You have to help me!
Beckhams: You wot?
OT: Our government may be finished if the public find out about the powderkeg we have foolishly ignited under the Shia majority and learn our people are dying in Iraq and that we misled them over the reasons for the war.
B: You wot?
OT: The situation in Iraq is balanced on a knife edge. I need a distraction! Something to keep Murdoch at bay!
B: Eh?
OT: I need you to be in all the papers
B: Oh, why didn’t you say!
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Dull day
...but the weather was fun. Sun, snow, rain, hail, wind...we had it all!
Got founts from Rochelle. Will hopefully be able to get her stuff all sorted tonight now. Invited James over but suspect he’ll decline, so will have spaghetti bolognaise again. Am being good and not Streathaming again tonight as I don’t really have the cash for it at the moment.
Got the map bits written for the hotels search - it zooms and stuff...very pretty, if I do say so myself Only problem is, it doesn’t work with the rest of the page, which is a small problem! Fire alarm excitement in the office. If there’s ever a fire I swear we’ll all die! No-one knew the procedure, or who our fire warden was or anything. We assembled...well...outsideish in clumps and watched the rest of the offices wander out. I pointed out the small green company sign on the fence so four of us managed to assemble correctly out of 200 odd employees. Marvellous!
Tube door alarm stuck. Björk cannot drown it out. Woe is me
So. I have decided. No more untidyness. Routine. No more fags. No more booze. (Well, at least no more getting wankered ) No more hours in front of PC. No more takeouts weekly. More outness. More cooking. Walking up escalators. Putting things away after use. Finding homes for everything.
Day 4 of this and my resolve is holding...
It seems to be giving me some energy back at any rate.
I still hate going back to my empty flat alone though, and although I don’t want to I am going to have to just try and get on with my life and stop kidding myself that somehow me and J will be able to work it out and grow old together...I just hate the situation at the moment but am kinda trapped. I don’t know what he wants, I don’t even know if he knows...it’s all a mess and if it carries on how it is at the moment I am gonna get very hurt. Grr. Love is blindness.
Nikki has been made redundant! She’s thinking about college coz she’s fed up with nursing. Told her to find a rich old man to look after. Don’t think she got it
Tad worried tho as Anglia Rail (which was about the only good one of the lot of ’em) has had its franchise revoked so don’t know if Brian’s job is ok or not...shall find out later on, hopefully.
Bout the only other exciting thing to happen today was Rob posting his arse on the forums. Bless. He is *so rude!*
Am considering creating another level of privacy for Journals (and diaries, etc) whereby only linked friends can view them.
Cor. It was just raining on only one side of the DLR train! Funkeh!
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Posh-and-Becks-athon
Didn’t do too much last night. Safeways after work for cheap shopping, then home. Bought some pastrami as it was going cheap and I’d not had it before. Still no real clue what it is...tasted like peppered and cured beef. Maybe it is? I am so uncultured
Was planning on a bit of programming and fun after uploading Rochelle’s bits, but Acrobat wouldn’t behave without the correct font and I didn’t have enough of the correct docs to do the rest. Bah humbug. So I cooked Spaghetti Bolognaise, somewhat hindered by the fact that all but one of my cans of tomatoes were past their best before date.. Fuck it, I used one anyway. Also chucked in the last of the red wine Danny left months ago, Worcester sauce, The last of my tabasco and some frozen veg. I am like soo classy. It tasted gorgeous though. And plenty left for tonight too, which is always good.
The beef was SO fatty tho. I had to drain it before adding the veg...ick...
Daniel was doing something all family like and Jewish and so came over to watch “Shells”, which he realised he’d seen before. And then nodded off until the end credits. Still, he liked livingRoom v2 which is good. Checked messages - one from Craig about how heartbroken he was that Becks might have slept with another woman. Promised to spank him. Went to bed. Slept fairly well too...
So I get up and Posh and Becks are littered across the papers like the cheap chavs that they are...and I’m left wondering...Did they just make it up because “Hello” won’t take their calls any more? Because “The Sun” doesn’t care? I’m starting to think so. We[1] want to see them suffer. We want to see their marriage collapse. And they want to frolic in front of cameras. But no-one wants to photograph them! Aww bless. So they planned a ski trip, concocted an affair story, claimed the trip was so David would be “facing the music” etc...and then got their wish as the world’s press photographed them playing in the snow like ickle bunnies.
Or something.
OK...I need to think less *smirk*
[1] Well, not me, obv...
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1 comment.
Food Poisoning Tastic!
arteh SO, I got home nice and early on Wednesday, right, thought..."I know, I’ll chill out, get takeaway, etc..."
Woke up at 5am on Thurs with stomach cramps, ran to the loo. Was unpleasant. Went back to bed, curled up in a little ball, sweating...dozed...woke again at about 5:15...exploded some more in the toilet...
*repeat*
Called in sick. Went back to bed. Spent the day in bed, dozing, having exceptionally odd hallucinogenic memory thought things, punctuated by regular 15-30min intervals on the loo.
Stomach cramp felt worse, so figured I should try and eat something around lunchtime, knowing full well I’d either feel better or be violently sick.
Promptly violently sick.
My poor toilet!
This carried on for an amusingly long 36 hours or so. Had to call in ill on Friday as well because I’d had no sleep and was still running to the loo every 15-30 mins. Stayed in bed until about 2ish, and actually managed to get a little sleep. The toilet stops were also getting less frequent. By 4pm I had almost managed to feel ok...I managed to make it downstairs to buy milk, figuring alkaline + filling but not too heavy, and sipped gently until I went to bed.
Still runny on Saturday, but feeling less crampy, I got up and decided to do some stuff with the flat that I’ve been meaning to for a while...
Firstly I cleaned the whole kitchen, then I went out, bought a new light from Argos, and a small computer desk.
...then I rearranged the livingroom for some hours
My flat is almost tidy!
Went out to the local coz some poor soul was moaning that it was a Saturday night and he was stuck in. Picked him up in a cab from Stratford and headed down there for about 1am. Scary. Swan full of Essex chavs and short women making up for their stature in breast size and volume. Need border controls I think.
Was really shit. OK, so I wasn’t drinking or smoking, which probably helped me appreciate the delightful atmosphere, but still. Escaped at about 2:30 and went to bed knackered.
Got up, rearranged more flat. Also tried to get my spare computer to work but it appears to be ill...think the AGP card is buggered. James wasn’t sure either, but was in Manc being a dirty stopout so wasn’t able to do much more than text. Suspect something’s up as he was acting a little strangely, will talk to him later...
Finished rearranging flat. Did lots of washing. Cooked duck breasts (but binned the “a l’orange” bit ) - instructions for frying “don’t add oil” - fuck! There’s so much fat in duck! The bottom of the pan was swimming in it after 2 minutes of flash frying. Still, they tasted gorge
Played with the new lights by doing some scary photos of me. I can now get a perfect 80s photography kinda thing going. Yay!
Watched “Kill Bill” in the evening. My first Tarantino. OK, so the others really didn’t appeal, blokes with guns are dull...but this one was fucking excellent. Almost has the quirkiness of Lynch and the action setpieces were stunning. Uma Thurman is a babe and Daryl Hannah was funny
Might go to the cinema and watch vol 2 at the end of the month.
Have promised Owen he can come over and see it some time...
Fishy is back in the UK, so safely away from the violence that has erupted in Basra and Baghdad. “unknown” number of Iraqi dead...nobody is counting...
Paul Bremner is being comical as ever...stating that the religious bloke who started this, Mr Sadr, was trying to “establish his authority in the place of the legitimate authority”. What legitimate authority?
*sigh*
I suspect this may get worse still...