Eight Random Things .. ..

So it appears to be my turn for the “Eight Random Things” after being tagged by Danacea

The question is what to choose from my “dark & distant” past …. Well here I go ….

1) I’ve been working for Blockbuster since October ‘93.
It was a fill-in job whilst I tried to decided what to do with my life. After doing every job in the field other than district manager, I now find myself in the IT dept. filling the role of Retail Systems (or Support depending on who you talk too) Engineer.
I still haven’t decided what to do with my life ….

2) I’m legendary amongst my clubbing friends for my ability to dance all night without the aid of “chemical stimulants” and still have the energy left the following morning to get everyone home safely by car.

3) I spent New Year’s eve 1999/2000 at the Don Valley Stadium in Sheffield attending the Gatecrasher bash that was held there …. along with 24,999 people.
The Chemical Brothers were awesome and dropped Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band in the middle of their set … The entire crowd responded by singing along to it which was amazing. Much lunacy was had that evening and I believe I’ve still got the pictures to aid the memory of my more “spangled” friends …
And yes I drove up from London and back home again straight after !!

4) On July 13th 2002 my best mate and I headed down to Brighton for Fatboy Slim’s 2nd free event on Brighton Beach … Along with 250,000 like minded people … It has since become the stuff of legend …. Good times

5) I have a copy of “Iron Man” issue 4 from August 1968 .. Nuff said

6) I’ve spent the vast portion of my life being referred to as a certain Sesame Street character
The nickname has followed me in various ‘guises for the best part of 20 years to the extent that the “Higher ups” at work all refer to me as “Cookie” and that’s what I get introduced as … I have a couple of cuddly versions of the blue furry one at home too …

7) I proposed to my Girlfriend with a ring hidden inside a Kinder Surprise Egg
With patience and a steady hand I unwrapped the egg. Separated the 2 halves, removed the toy from it’s little yellow capsule and replaced it with the engagement ring. Resealed the egg and re-wrapped it. Total time for the operation was 30 minutes. The look on her face on Easter Sunday last year when she realised exactly what I’d done … priceless

I’ve had a snowball fight with a squad of Russian soldiers.
Quite a few years ago now I went to Russia on a school trip. During a wander through Gorky Park admiring the ice sculptures, which have to be seen to be believed, my friends and I started a little bit of snow war amongst ourselves. The main reason for this was that it was pancake week at the time, yes they have a whole week for it, and during this it’s customary to have a snowball fight. So as the saying goes “when in Rome …..”
The minor skirmish took on what we thought was going to be a very serious turn of events when a stray shot hit the arm of a soldier stood next to his truck, a truck packed with the rest of his squad (about 10 of them in total) … There we were wondering what on earth was going to happen next, thoughts of arrest and imprisonment under some archaic rule rushing through our brains. What actually ended up rushing was a volley of snowballs hurled in our direction by said group of soldiers who’d left their rifles in the truck and gone for less fatal ammunition.
They caught us off guard by this sudden salvo but we regained our composure and returned fire.
This continued for about 10/15 minutes before they went back to their soldier-ly duties.
Of all the sights we saw and things we experienced .. that one instance of friendly competition, with none of us speaking the others language, was possibly the high point of the trip.

So that’s my eight random things …. A little glimpse into my past which triggered a couple of “misty eye” moments for me …

Not just a great "Faithless" song :(

Insomnia …… It’s a pain in the backside ….

Mind you I’m not sure if what I have is actually insomnia.
I’ve never been a morning person .. evah !! Dedicated night owl me, happiest when it’s dark outside.
Since the days of my GCSE’s I’ve always needed very little sleep, about 3 hours a night was the norm.
As I’ve gotten a bit older it’s stretched to 4 hours with the odd “system crash” every few weeks where I’ll get a good 7 hours maybe even 8 !!

However sometimes I seem to have an “excess of awakeness” .. like last night, which ends up with me staring at the walls wondering when, or indeed if, I’m going to get any sleep at all !!

I finally ended up forcing myself to bed at around 05:00 this morning, not good when the alarm is going off at 06:00 to get me up for work …

And through all of this the G/f sleeps soundly … and as she was feeling excessively tired last night she went to bed at 21:00 and didn’t stir until the alarm went off …

Now I find myself sat at work with flagging energy reserves. So the “Big Gun” are being broken out to try and pep me up a bit … Toxic waste coffee FTW !!!

The coffee consists of the following :-

Half to 2/3’s of a cup of hot water
2 heaped spoonfuls of Rocket Fuel
6 spoonfuls of sugar
and then top of the rest of the cup with Red Bull

Remember to pour the Red Bull in slowly otherwise the foam it generates will go everywhere …. but you should end up with this

I take no responsibility for any after effects you may experience if you decide to try this recipe out … You’re on your own there ….

Incoming Tangos !!!

Rainbow Six: Vegas was a staple for the lads from work and I on Xbox Live for a long time.

Then Halo 3 hit followed by Call Of Duty 4 and the group splintered amongst the two titles.
Follow this up with the glut of releases that hit in the last couple of months last year and you can kiss our Wednesday night gaming sessions goodbye …

However this week sees the release of Rainbow Six: Vegas 2 ….

I managed to snag an early copy of the game and spent a little time with it last night.
As the reviews have stated the core game hasn’t changed that much at all.
The controls are identical to the first. The graphics have had a bit of a polish but there wasn’t much wrong with them in the first place.

The change that people will notice is in your character …..

In the first game you were able to scan your face using the Xbox Vision camera and put your own face on your avatar for the multiplayer portion of the game, like this.
That feature is back, with the twist that you can use it on your avatar in the single player game as well, and as they’ve added jump-in/out co-op play to the mix it’s a very nice touch indeed.

The XP system that featured in the multiplayer portion of the first game has also been overhauled. Where before you got XP for winning matches online (with a very meager amount awarded if you were on the losing side) now you get to level up your character by playing through the single player “offline” campaign, which means you won’t get stuck heading into an online match with a pea-shooter when everyone else is packing nukes !!!
The other addition to the XP system is the “A.C.E.S.” rewards.
Split across 3 categories “Marksman”,”C.Q.B.” and “Assault” you have a selection of tasks for example “Headshots at a long distance” or “Take out an enemy when blind firing”.
The more of these that you complete the more you level up in that particular category and open up extras available only to that category. So for example if you level up in “Marksman” you start unlocking new and improved sniper rifles and other such goodies unique to that category.
Maxing out one category won’t open up every weapon to do that you’ll need to complete all of them, which sort of gives the game an “RPG-esque” quality with your character evolving to your style of play.

Well this is only a brief “first impressions” as I only got to spend about half an hour with it.
I’m looking forwards to getting my teeth into it properly over the next week so we’ll see what happens …..

And remember …. what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas

Tango Down !!!

Indissolubilis Carnivorous Sero

Many moons ago I was given on my 30th birthday a plant by the mother unit.

It was carnivorous in nature as I have a fascination for these slightly weird, yet striking plants.
I actually wrote a thesis on them for my A-level Biology course concerning their feeding habits.

The plant was one of the “pitcher” variety and duly christened “Carni” .. original I know

He was watered regularly and tended to with much care, which resulted in him flourishing and producing some good sized trumpets which caught a fair few flies (useful as he has pride of place on the kitchen window ledge)

I trimmed away the dying leaves and trumpets as he went into his first hibernation period (yes they actually hibernate during the cold winter months). When spring returned he sprouted fresh pitchers and flowers and off he went again ….

Last year was a slightly different story though … Due to the weird weather he never really went into hibernation, which resulted in no flowers but still managed to get some trumpets for the summer. The hibernation period that he’s currently in has gone totally wacko though !!!

At the moment he should be all trimmed back and waiting for spring however at the weekend I noticed a small shoot erupting from the soil in his pot. “Interesting” thinks I and that was about it.
Fast forward to this morning when I glance up from the sink whilst rinsing out the coffee mug and notice that he’s now got 3 new sproutings and the initial one is about 5 inches in height !!
This is made all the more fascinating by the fact that I haven’t watered the poor fella for the last 4 weeks because I thought he’d actually died !!!

Close attention will now be paid to Carni … For I’m convinced he is a Super Plant
And as a present, I think I’ll get him a new pot.

MMU Complete …..

Well .. Almost … If you’re curious

The nice new TV is in place and looking very swish indeed … Lots of hi-res visuals all over the place.
HDMI ports on the rear have been occupied by a PS3 and Xbox 360 Elite and the component cable for the Wii has added a little bit of sparkle to the little one’s output.

The only thing remaining now is a DVD recorder with internal hard drive and HDMI …
Haven’t quite decided on which one to get yet but that will be the final piece of the puzzle.

Slightly upset to hear this … a mere 2 weeks after upgrading my 360 core to an Elite.
The same thing happened when I got my iPod though .. a month after that they went to colour screens …. but them’s the breaks I suppose …

Not sure on the positioning of the Xbox and the PS3 at the moment though … The PS3 is sat on the top shelf which means that the top of the unit over hangs the loading slot slightly making for some nifty finger work when swapping disks.
Haven’t quite finished tidying up the cabling behind as a result of this possible move round.
Also trying to work out where to locate the imminent NAS device that’s going to serve as a media server for the consoles and the G/f’s laptop meaning that my trusty behemoth of a desktop will no longer need to be switched on unless it’s gaming time.
I’m thinking they’re going to be located down where the PS2 is currently sitting which would put them out of the way enough to not annoy the G/f but not so far out of the way that I can’t get to them easily if they misbehave ..

Well that’s the state of play so far …

Caution MMU in progress !!!

Well we finally got the bonus announcements through from the big cheeses … and for once they were highly AWESOME !!!!

So now comes the assignment of portions of said bonus to things …
First off a sizeable chunk is heading to the “wedding fund” which made the G/f very happy.
Then there’s the usual sensible things .. Car tax & insurance (booooooo)

And then …. there’s the fun stuff … The MMU … or Major Media Upgrade

The first step … Getting shot of the trusty old 28″ CRT telly that’s provided many years of movie watching & gaming goodness and replacing it with an spanking new up to date HD capable LCD one.
I was aiming for a 37″ however after a few minutes with the measuring tape I’ve had to settle for a 32″ .. in fact I’ve settled for this. I know it doesn’t do 1080p but at that size I’m not going to notice that much of a difference, it does however have 3 HDMI ports which is important for the following phases of the MMU and for my uses it has “Game Mode” which I’ve seen running on my brother’s Samsung and it looks fantastic.
I’ve literally just placed the order for it so now I’ve got that horrible wait for the delivery man to look forwards too ….

The next phase of the MMU involves my Xbox 360 .. or rather trading it in and upgrading to an Xbox 360 Elite. After a bit of arithmetic it works out at me parting with about 50 quid to get the job done .. which I can live with to get an HDMI port and the larger hard drive. The added bonus is that it should have the quieter drive and run cooler too. So that’s 1 out of the 3 HDMI ports on the new TV catered for.

Phase 3 of the MMU involves the addition of the final part of my console collection … a PS3
Given the recent demise of HD-DVD and the fact that I’ve actually got the money to do it, I thought it was time to add this to the hardware that surrounds my media unit. Not 100% too sure on the games I’m going to get with it but it’s looking like “Ratchet & Clank” and “Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune”, and that takes care of the 2nd HDMI port on the TV.

The final phase has yet to be decided … I was going to opt for a DVD player with an HDMI port for upscaling purposes but I’m thinking I might go for a DVD recorder with a hard drive. The only limiting factor to that is I need it to be multi-region, so the search is still on for that one.

So that’s it …. the complete MMU …. Needless to say that along with all this shifting in hardware there’ll be an opportunity for me to re-cable and tidy up what was once a work of art behind the media unit ….

Can’t wait to see it all put together …. The first HD production I’m going to purchase ?

Planet Earth … Essential documentary from David Attenborough, if you haven’t watched it then go out and find a copy now. You won’t be disappointed

How did I get myself into this ?

Okay .. I’ll admit it this update has been a long time coming but to be honest, work was mental in the run up to christmas and getting things back to normal post festive period took awhile …

So what is my first post of the new year going to contain ….

Well .. I’m getting married in September of this year and earlier on this week I got to talking with some of the guys at work about stag do type events over lunch, so I could give my best man some ideas.
This started off well and numerous ideas concerning boozing were put forth … and then things started getting a little silly.
Somehow … I think it might actually be my fault although I was only joking when I suggested it, but somehow I’ve been roped into a rally or race of sorts that’s sort of in honor of my impending nuptials.

The plan is this …
To drive from the office in sunny Uxbridge to Nice in France.

“That’s not that bad” I hear you say … Then comes the good bit ..
Each team must purchase a car for no more than £200 (Must be taxed & MOT’d) to make the journey.

The cars however aren’t making the return trip as we’re going to sell them/scrap them when we get there and fly back …

We start at 6pm on Friday 9th May and we have to be in Nice by Sunday …

How I got myself into this I don’t know .. but I’ve booked the ferry and the flights home …
I’ve roped my brother in as a suitable team mate so it’s all systems go !!!

The entire trip/decent into chaos & madness is due to be documented via the medium of pictures, film and depending on what sort of connections I can blag, blogposts and my ever trusty Twitter feed …

I’ve no idea what’s going to happen … I do know that we’re going to have a lot of fun doing it though …

So stay tuned for further updates …

Oh .. one more thing .. if anyone has a line on a car that’s reliable and going for under £200 let me know …

The day where it took forever to get to work !!!

Well that’s a bit of an overstatement I suppose …. but this morning did not go according to plan.

I awoke bright and early and got my morning hating self breakfasted, showered and out the door at 08:15. Bang on time …. “Superb” thinks I but somewhere someone was having other ideas.

I travel a very busy stretch of motorway (The M40) every morning, and I have done for the last 13 years, so I’m used to random variations in traffic speed and density but this morning was a jam of quite gobsmackingly awesome proportions !!!!

I passed 2 gantries with information displays before hitting the traffic neither of which had any info concerning the automotive nightmare that lay in wait for me (Thanks for that Highways Agency)
And so … a scant 20 minutes into my journey I came to a grinding halt and then over the course of the next couple of hours crept the remaining 20 odd miles to the office … Yes that’s right it took me about 2 hours to cover 20 miles !!!!

Fortunately I had my laptop with me, albeit, in the boot of the car. Not to worry though after remaining stationary for 10 minutes with the engine off (not normally something you can do in the outside lane of the M40 that’s for sure !!) I go out and retrieved my trusty work unit and had a quick chat with a couple of the other stranded motorists and, much to our annoyance, a passing motorcyclist …..
Given the company I work for it’s not unheard of for movies to be lurking in my bag and today was thankfully no exception so I sat down to watch Die Hard 4.0 (although I’m still mystified as to what that was doing in my bag).
Viewing however was cut short when the traffic started slooooooooowly moving again … Just as the film was getting good too.

Much creeping and wondering what carnage lay ahead to cause this massive delay I got to the cause …… A pile up consisting of at least 9 vehicles which didn’t look to healthy at all.
A fairly broad spectrum of motorised conveyances went into making up this twisted snake of metal … There were several cars, a few white vans and more worryingly a couple of lorries too.
All of which were looking very buckled and bent. Most worrying though was the poor car that had been sandwiched between the two lorries !!!!! I’m hoping the driver made it out in one piece but the car itself was destroyed and to add insult to injury I think it was an Aston Martin !! (I say think as it really was that bent out of shape) …

Anyway with the chaos passed and all 4 lanes of the motorway now open I was free to finish my journey to work eventually walking through the office door at 11:15 … Yup that’s a journey time of 3 hours, when it normally takes me 45 minutes at the most.

Generally not a good way to start the day …. but when I think about it, it could have been worse.

I could have been driving the Aston ……..

Impending Wealth Diminishment

So we reach the month of November ..
Que the local “yoof massive” purchasing fireworks that they shouldn’t be getting their grubby little mits on and setting them off on the green outside the flat.
Now the majority of the time I’ll turn a blind eye and let them mess about with explosives as they’re not my kids, however when they’re doing it at midnight it’s not exactly inspiring goodwill towards them … but as yet my wishes to hear a scream resulting from a skin graft enducing burn haven’t been fullfilled
(does this make me a bad person ?)

The other thing about November …. The pre-holiday season gaming flood !!
It seems that the gaming industry is conspiring to make me a very very poor person indeed …
After PGR4 and The Orange Box arriving at the end of October they’re now forcing me to purchase Call Of Duty 4 this week (no honestly they are .. there’s a gun to my head and everything).
Next week I get a week off but the week after that there’s Scene It? Lights, Camera, Action on the 360 and Super Mario Galaxy on the Wii
The week November 23rd sees the release of Guitar Hero 3 and Mass Effect. The words essential purchase spring to mind for these two. To say that I’m excited about Mass Effect would be an understatement and Guitar Hero 3 ….. Well it’s Guitar Hero .. Nuff Said

So in the space of about 6 or 7 weeks I’m spending approx. £300 on games .. OUCH !!!

I know Christmas is just around the corner and all that ,but to be honest, given the track record of certain parties (who shall remain nameless) not getting the most obvious of hints it looks like the only way I’m going to get hold of all these goodies is if I buy them myself.
Then the only problem is finding the time to play them all !!!! I know I don’t sleep much but this may stretch even my capabilities …..

Hopefully I’ll be able to get my mits on Call Of Duty 4 this evening …. Sometimes I love working for this company
So stay tuned for some first impressions

Monday morning "joy"

Just the start you need first thing on a monday morning. Stationary traffic, so stationary in fact that I’m sat here with the engine off … This does not bode well for the rest of the day