commafruit.co.uk. welcome.

Schmap^w have seen fit to include a photo I took in the summer of St. Charles station in their latest online travel guide. Neat! No compensation, but credit is given, and a link back to the original on Flickr. Check out the guide, or see the original.

Comments(0)

Audio from George Galloway’s speech this afternoon at Luther King House in Manchester.
Some elements are taken from from his confrontation with the US senate in 2005 (video is well worth watching, despite it’s length - Galloway is unshaken and resolute throughout).

MP3 audio (40kbps, 11.1MB download) / Ogg Vorbis (32kbps, 5.5MB download)
Note that quality is similar in both files, go with Ogg Vorbis if you can to save on bandwidth.

Apologies for the poor audio quality, the recording was made on my mobile phone, which saves to the AMR format. I cleaned it up (or tried to) using Audacity.

Comments(1)

Just got back from this - not a bad turn-out, maybe 100 people. Police were actually pretty pleasant from what I could tell, got a little aggressive about use being on public property at the start but nothing remarkable.
We basically stood and chanted for about an hour, then left, nothing eventful since she’d apparently been in the hotel the whole day.

The only thing that riled me was that there were nearly as many people from the Manchester SU (who I went with) as there were from Liverpool! I realise the populations are different, but if Manchester can transport that many, where were the Liverpudlians?

Once the police had pushed us off the Liner Hotel’s property.

Placards and horses.

The placards were supplied by the SWP. The one on the right reads “get your rosaries off my ovaries” - great slogan.

Sorry the pictures are so blurry - not much light and being in the middle of a crowd makes it hard to frame a shot properly.

Comments(0)

So I’ve been back in Manchester about a month, it feels great to be back in a proper city. While Peterborough had it’s charms, I find I prefer to be in a city with a larger feel to it - just walking through Manchester there is a buzz which I knew I’d been missing, but without quite knowing what it was.

Studying rather than “working” is a larger change though. Even though I have a fraction of the hours allocated for study/classes as I was working last year, it feels like I’m now working with greater intensity. I sense I’m also likely to miss the satisfaction of working for a client and having a product to produce - even if I did no work this year, few would even notice, let alone worry. It’s not that I need constant reassurance, but there is something to be said for a client who is vocal about their opinion on the results they’re seeing for a project.

Comments(0)

Just back from two and a half weeks touring Europe by train, I’ll put up some notes soon, but for now, try this flickr photo set.

Comments(0)

Got my confirmation of attendance for the Future of Web Apps conference/expo. Not something I’m really used to, though I did go to the Google Developer Day last May.

The speakers list looks amazing, most interested in seeing: Heather Champ (flickr), Matt Mullenweg (Wordpress - you’re looking at it), Derek Powazek (if only to see who’s behind JPG Magazine), John Resig (of Mozilla, jQuery fame) and Kevin Rose (who will also be doing a live Diggnation filming).

Comments(0)

Haven’t been blogging much lately, though I keep meaning to. Just so tired all the time - I keep wanting to, as well as wanting to concentrate on a few webdev projects I have in mind, but when you’ve spent all day at work doing it (as well, lately, as overtime, and other *ahem* projects), it’s hard to get motivated.

I think, lately, I might’ve had mild SAD - but that’s no excuse for getting on with things (though maybe having my motorbike stolen is). There will be more.

Comments(0)

Bit of a self indulgent post, but worth mentioning - the last week or so I’ve been preoccupied with taking my CBT motorbike test, and buying a new motorcycle: the famous Honda CG125. Check out the pics below, and see more on my Flickr page.

Comments(1)

Last week I was privileged to go to the ECM Awards, held at the Grosvenor House Hotel, London. It was comfortably the biggest, poshest party I’ve ever attended (Rob Brydon^w acted as compere). I also met loads of people I’d previously spoken to only on the phone. Had been going to post photos… but I really don’t have any decent ones.

Comments(0)

Today at the office, I unexpectedly received a bottle of Mumm^w in the post! This turned out to be from one of the London offices, given as thanks for the work on a (relatively minor!) project* I did a couple of weeks ago. Suppose it pays to try to provide good service on all things, as you never know what benefits there’ll be!

* I built (that is to say, I installed and configured the excellent Snitz) the forum component of the new Yours.co.uk website.

Comments(0)

Since I moved to Peterborough, I’ve been playing cards with people who have a preference for playing with Russian playing cards*. These cards are unusual not only in their design and markings (”D” (though the character much more resembles an “A”) is Queen, “B” is Jack, “T” is Ace…), but also in that the cards 2-5 are missing, meaning the deck consists of only 36 cards.

No valid explanation was ever offered for this, but perhaps the most amusing is that when sailors brought the cards to Russia from the west, some of the cards got lost, and the Russians who found them just went along with what they had, telling the printers who were to recreate them “oh yeah, that’s how things are in the west… missing out the first five numbers then appearing to tack the number one on the end…”

* the guy I’m taking over from in this new job - his fiance is from Russia.

Comments(0)

Found this shopping list, I must have written it after I moved into my new flat (oh yeah, I moved into a new flat a couple of weeks ago - more on that and Peterborough^w (the city I moved to) later).

It shows:

• That I am a geek, equating buying bread and a new router…
• …with the handwritting of a small child.

Translated:

• Bread
• Small milk [one pint bottle]
• All fruit [that I like, and would want in the near future]
• Treats [biscuits etc.]
• Router [I guess the cable people were coming that day!?]

Comments(0)

Maybe I’m a couple of years late, but I’d still like to add my voice to those hordes asking: why was Firefly^w cancelled?
One of the best sci-fi TV shows in years, with a rich background universe, an exciting and understandable continuing plot (rebels undermine the evil and all-controlling alliance), and characters who inject a dose of humanity into everything. Then it gets scrapped after one series, what a disgrace.

Comments(0)

Second year exams (for me) started today, so there’s a good excuse to not post for a couple of weeks. Maybe once these exams are finished I can start writing some proper content again rather than falling into the trap of “so I read this book…”

I like this blog/resource for self improvement a lot, and would like to share this article about getting up when your alarm goes off. This morning, I slept through two alarms at ten-minute intervals, including one of which being on “snooze” mode so it would’ve gone off about three times before I got out of bed. It’s no big deal (I don’t think - you may disagree), but what struck me was that I had been coherent enough to walk across the room and reset my phone alarm, then use the snooze function on my clock three times, and yet I didn’t remember any of it 20 minutes later. Steve Pavlina describes a similar situation, and suggests methods for conditioning oneself to be able to wake when the alarm goes off. I think it’s worth looking into.

Comments(0)

So, just over two weeks ago, I had my parents send up some papers, to my house in Manchester: having arrived today, they took over two weeks to get here, dispite having all the correct stamps etc. An Amazon parcel took from the 23^rd of April to today. What happened Royal Mail?

I probably wouldn’t have posted if it weren’t for the quality of Amazon customer service. I emailed them on Wednesday to say that my stuff hadn’t arrived, and they emailed back (I don’t know if this was auto-generated) to ask whether I’d like a refund, or to use the same address, or a different address etc. Then the replacement arrived today as well. Amazon FTW!

P.S. Yeah I’m gonna email and tell them, I only opened one of the packages ‘cos I know they’ll be the same…

Comments(0)

Seems like everyone on the planet has read Dan Brown’s The Da Vinci Code^w, except me. This is on purpose; having got the gist of the plot, and had six hundred and twelve* people inform me that the book is teh best evar [sic], I became resolved not to read it.

Now that there’s a film coming out featuring Audrey Tautou, I may have to think again however. The trouble, I’ve realised, is that it’s part two of a three part series, and while I could follow the masses and just read it straight off, I’d rather read the books in order. As if I don’t have enough to read… (Though admittedly some of those have already been taken off the list.)

* estimated.

Comments(0)

Went to Bordeaux with my parents and sister last week. It’s such a nice city, made me wish I’d made more effort to learn French at school when I had the chance. I did try to learn by myself (partly using the excellent BBC Learning site), but it’s hard to maintain interest with other things going on and no real incentive.
Anyway, Bordeaux is a beautiful place, and unexplainably French; it made me realise that in the past I’d been to Paris, and had been willing to think that this meant I’d been to France.

A lot of the landmarks are currently surrounded in fencing, presumably because they’re currently being cleaned, which makes me suspect that the city is preparing itself for an increase of tourism this summer. I hope this does not detract from the atmosphere of the place, I think it would be easy to damage the (apparently) slow pace of life, or the distinctly French nature. Maybe in a few years (when I can afford it, and, maybe, can speak some more of the language) I’ll go back and find out.
Took some photos, not great given how pretty the scenery was, but then the weather wasn’t that great…

Comments(0)

Last week I went with a few friends to stay in Powys, Wales in a friends grandparents cottage (free of charge!), then climbed Cader Idris, second highest mountain in Wales. In many ways, the driving was one of the most exciting parts of the trip (some of these Welsh roads are amazing, just not the most safe ever…) Took a few photos on the way around though, see below.

Comments(0)

I got the industrial placement at Emap for next year! Get in. Not sure it’s not bad form to go writing about it on the ‘net, so I’ll just say that it’s based in Peterborough, I ought to learn ASP.Net before I start, and I’m really excited about the whole thing!

Comments(0)