Saturday comes around

So its saturday, my new year decision to watch all the startrek next gen episodes is almost complete, to go along with this, first contacts about to be on tv, with insurection tomorrow!! yay

Startrek ftw!

I apologise for being quiet recently, havent had a lot to say I guess, Karate is going well, my friend Kellie is hoping to come for her first less on Monday, she was originally going to come this week but shes put a rib out coughing, and so the rest was probably a good idea.

I would have gone to thursdays but I was working.. Well more acurately watching a progress bar for most of 2 hours - exceiting huh.

Well, I apologise deeply for lack of posting - but then, I also wonder just how many people have even noticed my absense, its a little like that if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make a noise.. thought..

Cute!

A zoo has placed a number of webcams online for us all to share, other places have done similar.

See lots of animals here

Meet 3 people who made me who I am!

To give you some idea I was an only child, and had few friends. The day I met these 3 people.. changed my life!

See here

Happy new year!

Well 2007 is here, the sun is shining, the sky is blue! In fact, its not a bad day at all.

I dont really do new years resolutions, but, if I have one, its not to waste so much of my time. For example, Ive been off the last 2 weeks and I cant help but look back and other than watching a ton of startrek, posting a large number of posts on forums and newsgroups about delphi, I cant help but think Ive actually done little with my time, and cant help but regret that this is a waste.

So, my only resolution stands : I will try harder not to waste my personal time doing things I wont remember when I look back. So, less gaming, less faffing around, and more reading, more coding, more crochet, more exercise, more pointful things.

Of course, its bound to fail, Im a lazy cow, but, today, Id like to think rather than "just watching startrek" I will do other things, code or crochet comes to mind.. I had projects in mind for this christmas period coding wise, and I did none of them. My crochet has grown but not half as much as it could have given the time.

Derren Brown

Now, Derren Brown is a rather impressive guy to watch. Those of you who have yet to see him for want of a short phrase, hes a mind reader, but he isnt. Its purswasion, illusion, and suggestion and a lot of flare!

They showed him "live" at some theatre, and yes, some of its hard to believe such as things like he is supposed to have stopped his heart beating and then walked over some glass and had some big guy stand on him.. which Im sorry if your heart stopped that long you'd fall over, or be actually dead..

However, a lot of it is just so entertaining to watch. The last one he did he got a cabby who knows London like nothing else and he got him to give out random directions.. Now as a prelude to this the audience had met at some train station been put on a bus with no windows, blindfolded walked into the theatre so they didnt know where they were.. the directions were how to get to the theatre they were at from the tubestation... but not the same route they went on the bus.. Stuff like that is impressive.

Today he did this strange things with buttons, hard to imagine anything that strange with buttons

He said that as a kid he used to get picked on and to distract himself from the pain of the kicking he would count things, and he got very good at it.. anyway, basically he got a woman to grab a few handfuls of buttons onto a tray, cover the tray, cover the original bowl so he cant see and guess. Then slap him to death and pull cover off the tray, and in less than a second he proclaimed the number of buttons on the tray.. she counted them under a camera.. and he was right..

Now, thats freaky, but it gets more freaky

Next he made her shake the tray around so the buttons were moving.... and do the same..
He got that right too!!

He did some other weird stuff in other programs like a room of like 60 or was it 100 objects and got a person to creep around and select an object.. yeah despite being blindfold and there being no noise... he knew which object it was.. strange stuff

but its really facinating to watch.

So if you've never seen him and it comes up on your tv schedule..

WATCH IT for a laugh! You'll find yourself wondering how he did it.

Oh, only ones not to try were the rusian rulette one, and anything else that could cause death.

more on Glandular fever/mono

So..

Christmas eve it started, hinting away with a mouth ulsa, now, its the gland in my neck as well, I dont feel ill but the gland stuff is always tiring, the mouth ulsa is painful and annoying.

So, Im tired. But this week I had a trip to the inlaws today, and my Dad on thursday! So, no lounging in bed for me for a few days to give me a better chance of being well, no no, following the trip to my Dad, I only have friday and monday off and its back to work as if nothing happened..

I wonder.. naa work would never let me book 2 weeks off starting the wednesday (or thursday for that matter), mind you, even if they had, the 2 weeks would fly and it would be just the same if nothing else had changed, except Id be down 2 weeks holiday though.

Happy Christmas!!

Yep, its christmas day, and as always you can find me where Im at my best.. Behind my keyboard!

You know, its disapointing to see how many of my geek friends arent doing the same.. oh well, time to watch more festive tv.. wait.. there isnt any.. Oh well, more reruns of sad pathetic old shows Ive seen more times than Ive thought of.

Whats the point of tescos?

So, its saturday, ok the saturday before christmas, but to be honest, for our tesco, what Im about to say applies to every saturday and sunday going.

Why open if you dont have any food!!

A funny!

Now, if you are the easily offeneded kind, or find the following personally offensive in anyway, Im sorry. But this is funny.

SouthPark does

On this kinda note - not sure if I mentioned it before, probably but hey, I dont remember so you can get it again.

We've all noticed now how everyone has some kinda medical issues now-a-days, wether its exma, asthma, allergies, through to more serious things like MS and so on..

But if we had all lived 100 years back, next to none of this would have existed.

The problem is that when some new one gets a name and in the press, everyone has it, its like the being fat excuse of "its my glands" .. yes, legitmiately for some people this is true, but for all those who blame them, very few actually medically have backing of this. Now, speaking as a person who is larger than the doctors deam "Normal".. Id love to have this excuse, but, I know where my additional weight came from, chemo, followed by being so tired and run down I couldnt do much and stuffing my face to gain energy but not, just pileing on the pounds.

So, onto the subject, and again, if you find this offensive, Im sorry, but, its just my thoughts.

A.D.D, I dont disbelieve in it, so let me make that clear, but so many people online claim ADD.. In fact, play online game, find someone under 15 or so, their age will show in something if you group/raid and hey presto "be nice to me I have ADD" seems to be the default reply.. Is ADD really that prevelant or, is it just the case of because disipline is lacking now in todays society, after all kids now cant even fail exams, or be told things are wrong.. they seem to have little respect for anyone.. so, is that really ADD or just little oik ??

Hmm, vanguard download

So, I waited all day, watching the timer count down to like 5 minutes..

Then it shot up to 11 hours!!!

now despite even restarting it, in case it was a little confused.... it still thinks theres 7 hours to go

if this sucks when I get there, I'll be very bored.

Vanguard!?

Now, I know Im getting older, and I know one day my memory will fail and not long after that incontinancy will follow Im sure.. but, hopefully those days arent here yet.. but I am thinking that they maybe sooner than I'd like, why?

I got an invite to the vanguard beta, this is MMORG game long awaited by main game players out there, only to find.. its run by Sony! Im sure, Im so so sure, that so much of the hype about why vanguard was going to be great was because it wasnt done by the makers of EQ. Well ,it was, but it was being done by those who had left EQ and moved on to do vanguard.. Now, it seems Sony has that too?

Karate lesson #6

The final less for 2006, was an odd less, it was very much geared around christmas and children, and paying 5 pound 50 to kinda watch kids play games isnt necessarily my idea of good value. However.. it was the second half of our grading..

Technically I am now a white belt with little yellow tips, Im 8th Kyu or something. :) whee!

Chillis may save the world! (Diabetes cure found!)

Now, those of us who love chillis (personally, I love finely chopped chillis on toast, yes, you read that right, take a chilli, remove the seeds, finely chop stick on toast with a bit of butter.) This article just tells us maybe all we ever needed to know about chillis.

Diabetes cure?

Now, for those of you with diabetes, I bet that any results of this finding wont come quick enough, but, at least this is the most positive thing to come for diabetics everywhere in a long time. After all, this is potentially a cure, not a treatment!

However, I was interested to read that back in 1999 it said they found it was like pain, and that some guy on a whim decides to try injecting chilli stuff, and hey presto.. It comes back to 1 thing though.. All these break throughs, is it me, or is sometimes something natural and simple often the best answer? Pills and potions always seem to have more side effects.

Karate lesson #5

Today we did the first half of our gradings for yellow belt. So, of course, despite the fact last week I remember it all nicely, this week, I messed up.

However, other than we are being scruitinised for our grading, this week was much like last week. I wanted to talk to the trainer after the lesson, but he was busy, next week is our last week before christmas.

I fear I will fail, I got the impression from before the lesson that its almost impossible to fail.. but, somehow, I guess the inner doubts I have make me feel I will.. And its for those reasons Im going, I need to improve myself confidence.. that and it would be nice to think if some guy came at me I could at least put up some resistance.

Nigela Lawson.. A rant by me

For those who may not know, Nigela Lawson is supposedly a chef. She is currently on my tv talking about cooking. However, there is so much wrong with this woman its hard to know where to start.

This is the kind of woman who would say things like "I would only use wine that has been hand crushed by vestal virgins from mount Olympus and you only need 3 bottles" ...

She really seems to insist on the most expensive things, and while we know often they probably do taste better, lets grab some realism, I dont mind spending time preparing a meal, I dont mind spending *some* money on making it nice.. but Im not spending a months wages on a snack, and Im not going to have go to on 87 holidays just to get the pieces she blathers on about.

The series called Naked Chef by Jamie Oliver, was based on good simple premise, buy reasonable food, cook it, eat it. Minimal greif, for nice food. Great respect for that. Nigela has never had anything practical about her cooking.

She all but finely chops herbs and then places each piece on the food.. where as anyone else just throws.. She has a voice to drive you to drink too, and originally I admired the fact she was a cook (I cant bring myself to say shes a chef, as to why, I shall explain later), and was thin.. sadly was is so much the word. Now, Im never gonna win thinnest person UK, but she makes me look thin.

So.. why the "cook" ?? well she was on radio saying how she hated cooking and that it was too much effort to warm food from the fridge/freezer..

So, she should get stuffed, shes a rich person sapping even more money by making pretentious cooking programs.. and if I never saw her on my tv again.. Id be happy.

PS Oz Clarke is nearly as annoying about wine.. guess which program followed hers?

Karate lesson #4

Today we did that first kata all the way through, which is 20 moves in total I think. So, I feel pleased with myelf. I however sponged a lift off the instructor home - its like 10 minute walk but it was quite windy, and spitting looking like it might immenantly throw it.. so, he was kind enough to let me in the car :P

We did a lot more today, it was hard work, I went very red and blotchy coz I was hot, I was terribly sweaty, so took my 2nd t-shirt off.. came to put it on at the end and it was cold and wet.. EWWWW - half the reason I didnt want to walk home coz I was cold already!!

We saw the second kata today, as 2 new people came, one has a yellow belt the other orange, and the second one (yellow) is the same as the first but with kicks, you punch kick on the single steps and kick punch on the linked steps.. so, it should be fairly easy to remember when my time comes!

The weekend comes and goes

Cant believe its saturday night already, its nearly 11pm, and what did I do today?

Charlie went down the vet, whos still pleased with his progress, to the point we dont have to go next week, we get the week off, a trip to tesco, played a short bit of wow, did some crochet.. I really dont know where it all went..

Sunday, well Dad will ring around 10am tomorrow, as always, I'll wash a few clothes.. then it will be monday!

Id like to recommend two products for you though

MediaMonkey - a media player, written in delphi, its real cool!
Bits Du Jour - a place that sometimes has great software for a stupidly cheap price. This week, for example I bought automise from them for $19.95, normal price? $195!!!

Ever had the feeling...

We've all done something and had that feeling where you think, if I had used just 1 brain cell, just 1, I wouldnt have done that.. but..

Have you ever found yourself wondering if your brain is really wired wrong? Either when you really cant grasp the concept of something you know must be simple, or that you just dont find something funny that everyone else is virtually hospitalised with hysterics over, or something??

Im having a week where I swear there must be something really really differently wrong in my head..

Charlie the pup

So, how is Charlie you ask?

Well last weekend he got done with the trimmers. and I mean done.
So, as you can probably see the photo was taken just as I finished the job, and hadn't as yet tidied up! Hes sitting next to his pile of fur.. the rest being splattered around the landing carpet.

He does look very different when hes done, when his fur is around 2 inches + he looks very bearded collie, which he half is, but when trimmed the springer spaniel side of him shows through strongly.

Hes also happier as usually like now by the time I do him his fur is getting longer and hes feeling quite hot. He doesnt enjoy a fair chunk of the trimming, feet especially, he also has a very short attention span, but with the new trimmer I bought last year it does only take 15-20 minutes including the breaks to do him, where as the first time I did him, he didnt mind me doing it quite so much but I only had nail scissors and it took about 2.5-3 hours!!!

The vets went well this weekend (yes this should really have come before the Karate 3 post), the vet is please hes well and doing fine, although perhaps a little too fine as he must not try and walk on the leg and well Charlie feels he should when only moving a few steps.

Another good point this weekend was that Charlies weight is down, he was 45kg. Hes now around 41.85! thats great weight loss considering its not like hes getting much exercise.

Its still hard not to spoil him rotten, let him play and so on as you can see in him that hes missing the fun and sad, and when anyones sad you want to cheer them up, somehow.

Karate lesson #3

Well, success again this week. No falling over.

We've learnt some punches, some kicks and, some blocks.

Im biologically at a disadvantage for the short stomache punch as you need to put your elbow in to your stomache.. only.. well.. as a female, there are 2 "glands" which get in the way..

We do stomache punches, head punches, back hand head level punches, back hand sideways punches, short stomache punches, rising elbow punches and.. round elbow punches...we then do front kicks, side kicks, round kicks and back kicks. (the kicks not too surprisingly I do very well given Im flexible, but without the balance is when Im most likely on the floor)

we do head blocks, inside hook blocks, outside hook blocks, downward blocks and sweeping blocks.

While that sounds like a lot of stuff, its generally announced "do this" and then we do like 10 of them, and maybe 10 faster, or 10 of something else and then swap back.. this is ok

what is harder is we are now being taught to do them and move. So things like bounce back and forth on your feed and then punch.. believe it or not, its amazing how many ways there are to mess that up!

We are also being taught our first kata, katas are like a routine. This first one has around 20 moves in it, and while all are made from one of the above...remembering which is next, which foot/hand to move..what to do with the rest of you..oh and when trying to turn 270 degrees of course, not fall over.. this is actually surprisingly hard.

We've learnt the first moves they go something like

stand, turn 90 degrees left and block with left hand in a lower block,
step forward and punch
turn 180 and block with right hand in a lower block
step forward and punch
turn 90 degrees left and block lower block with left and
step forward punch
step forward punch
step forward punch and shout
270 degree turn and block with I think right hand.. gets a bit mushy here
and I think stepforward and punch..

Well I found this link .. you tell me how good I remembered!