two down, ten to go

So the second week on my contracting job has finished.

It was a bit better this week in some ways.  I got a better idea of what I'm meant to be doing, but it's not really my cup of tea.  I mean, it's interesting, but not really the sort of work I'd have brought me in for.

Part of the problem is I'm meant to be doing two projects, but one of them has basically evaporated.  In a way that's good as I don't know that what I've been given to do would really fit into the time unless I was able to work on it full time.

The commute is going to be a bit of a drag.  It's turning out to be just under an hour, but only if I do two things: set off before seven and push it on the A3.

This clearly has two issues - it means I have to get up at 6AM and it's costing me in fuel economy.  The first isn't too bad, as I'm a bit of an early riser, although I have to say 6AM is probably my breaking point.  6:30AM I've been doing for years, but 6AM has a bit too much of an impact on when I have to go to bed (I have to get 8 hours every night or I feel cranky all day).

Since it's only 3 months, I can probably cope with the time, but the fuel economy is more of a bugger.  See, the real issue is that the cost of petrol is so high and my company's fuel allowance is pretty crap.  That means I'm not really making much over and above what I'm spending.  Now, that's okay in the sense that at least I'm not out of pocket, except of course that the increased mileage means increased wear on tyres, more frequent services, etc, etc.  And those things are pretty expensive.

Again, 3 months will be okay, but I really wouldn't want to do this long term.

Well, I say that, as there are other options.

Firstly, I could not push it and just arrive when I arrive.  That means the journey will take a long time if I still set off early, because I'll start to hit traffic relating to kids going to school.

The other option is to go in later.  They work flexi where I'm contracting, and at the moment I'm going to work early so I can come home early.  I could alternatively try to go in later and come back later.

I'm not really sure about this, as I am a 'lark', rather than an 'owl' and my body clock is really locked in to doing early, rather than later.

Also, there are going to be days when I have early meetings, etc, anyway.

Part of me is still hopeful that I'll have a bit of a gain of time in the evenings, though.  Because I can do flexi, I can take short lunches and stuff, so once I'm properly used to it I will hopefully have a few extra hours in the evenings across the week.

My weight basically didn't change this week.  To some extent that was because I found work less stressful, I think, but also I had a poor week diet wise anyway, and then my landlord came back from holiday and gave me a gift of chocolates to say thanks for house-sitting... and I ate the lot in a few days :/

I think if I can avoid slipping up too badly with normal diet stuff then I should get back to weight loss next week.  The idea of going for a walk after work is an okay one.  It doesn't work quite as well as my former walking regime and I think it might be a case of picking days to do it on.  For example, some evenings I can get petrol or shopping or whatever and the other I can come back and go for a walk.

first week

So, my first weekend blog post.

My original plan was I would actually post on both Saturday and Sunday, but to be honest I pretty much forgot to do one yesterday.

Anyway, what have I been up to?

Well, obviously I started my new contracting job this week.  That doesn’t mean I lost my job or anything, but it does mean I’ve been working at a different location.  The best way to think about it is the (much maligned) consultants.  I mean, I’m not a consultant, but it’s the thing people know that’s similar.

The job was... okay.

When I did the interview there was lots of talk of the type of work that I enjoy.  I won’t really talk about the detail, but it was to be quite technical and number-crunchy - that sort of thing.

However, it’s become apparent that this part of the work has kinda ‘cooled’ a bit.  I’ve not had specific confirmation that it’s no longer needed, but there’s been some strong hints that the looming deadlines aren’t really that looming any more.

Now the last time this happened to me it was with the same group and what happened on that occasion was that I ended up playing about with something that didn’t really need doing.  In essence they had to make up something for me to do, and it was very apparent.

While I sort of enjoyed doing what I was doing it wasn’t really productive, so I felt a bit rubbish about it.  When I’m doing contracting I like to be working on something properly so that it feels like I’m giving value for money.

This time there’s not the same problem.  There were actually two projects that needed input and the second one hasn’t dried up.  It therefore doesn’t feel like I’m thumb-twiddling, so that’s good.

What’s not so good is that the work I’m doing really doesn’t play to my strengths at all.  In essences I’m having to do lots of phoning around and trying to get things from people.  This is the sort of thing I really don’t like.

What makes it worse is that I’m not really 100% sure what it is I’m asking for.  Again, I won’t give specifics, but there are two basic issues.  Firstly, I don’t really know much about what this group does and so I’ve been given a very steep learning curve.  Secondly, I’ve not had the clearest instruction and have basically been dropped in the deep end - I’m coming in after some work has been done, but not much, and I’ve also not yet gotten access to the background.

As such, I’m kinda calling people up going “Any chance I can have some x?” and they’re going “maybe - what sort of x do you need?  how much and what, specifically about?” and unfortunately my reply has tended to be “er... I’m not sure.”

Hopefully I should get better access to the background next week and find my feet more.

What also hasn’t helped is that I’ve had to do loads of “training” and induction stuff.  It’s good that it was all set up and ready to go (last time I worked there it was days before I even got a computer) but it  means it’s all been a massive info dump.  I’m also having to hot desk, which is rubbish.

The commute has also turned out to be a bit longer than expected.  Well, I can do it in the anticipated hour if I set off at seven, but if I set off much later than that, then it takes about an hour and a quarter.  That means I’m getting up at six.

The up side to it is that I should therefore be able to go home at four, but I’ve not really been able to take advantage of that yet.  This also means I struggled to do my idea of going for a short walk after work each day.  Although saying that I lost four pounds this week, but I think that could be due to diet re-adjustment and stress and lack of sleep and stuff, rather than effective diet and exercise activities.

Although to be fair I think part of this is because my landlord has been away, so I’ve been having to fart about sorting the lights out and stuff.

Well, until next week, I guess.

porky time

Well, this is the last blog of the week and I’m also pretty sure it’s going to be the last daily weekday blog for a while.

As mentioned before chrimbo I’m starting on contract and it will be impossible to update the blog at work from now on.  Since I’m probably not going to be keen to then spend time in the evening doing it (I’m pushed to do much more than watch TV) this will therefore become a weekend blog.

Quite how that will work I’m not sure, but I’ll see what I feel like.

The last thing I did want to mention was my dietary progress over the holiday.  Or rather the exact opposite.

Before the holiday I weighed in at 18 stone 10 pounds. When I weighed myself this last weekend I weighed 19 stone 4 pounds.  That’s a gain of 8 pounds, or just a smidge over half a stone.

I did actually gain  little more than that, as I weighed myself during the holiday and weighed 19 stone 6 pounds, but I actually had the same phenomenon that I had last year where I ate a lot and then it took a while for my digestive system to... “catch up” if you will.

Indeed, this year I actually had a few occasions where I had serous gut pain during the night.  It was the same as the pain I’ve had before when I've seriously over eaten.

Part of the problem is that I went a bit nuts before Chrimbo buying stuff “because I was going to treat myself” over the holiday.  But then my dad also loaded me up with loads of food to take back with me that he’d bought.  Quit why he’d bought so much when he knew we were both only going to be there for a little while I don’t know.

And yes, some of it I could have been sensible and left in the freezer or not opened, but then I’d have been faced with weird meals where you’re only having half of what you expect (so bangers and mash without the bangers, because they’ve been put in the freezer :/) and also after the holiday way over, what then?

Would I have to drip feed ‘bad stuff’ in?  Throw it away?  Or what?

So I essentially forced myself in to a situation of having to eat a lot.

I did still keep walking and did some good walks, although it wasn’t really part of the holiday plan to do walking like I do in autumn or whatever.  However, I think those helped me keep things in check a bit.

Anyway, I’ve now pretty much finished it all off, so it’ll be back to bread and water and lettuce next week.

Also, I think I've come up with a bit of a plan for what to do in terms of walking when I’m on contract.  Basically my problem is that it will be an hour commute each way, but I will have the advantage of working flexi time.  As such, my plan is that I will only take a minimal lunch and then I’ll do a single, reasonable length walk when I get back (literally when I arrive home I'll go for a walk).

Before I was doing three short-sharp walks in and around the estate where my offices are (when I got to work (I’m always super early), at lunch and then straight after work, before I got in my car).  I’m hoping these should be equivalent - especially since the walk I have in mind will involve some steep inclines, making it harder work.

the rest of the break

So when I returned from my Dads I obviously wasn't feeling great, as the second cold was still in full swing.

This cold wasn’t quite as intense as the first one, but it seems to have lasted longer - I’m still sniffling now a good couple of weeks later.  What this did mean is that the week between Chrimbo and the New Year wasn't as fun as it could have been.

I’d arranged to see a few chums and while I did do most of those I generally didn’t drink very much and tended to go home early and stuff.  Still, it was nice to see them.

New Years was actually relatively quite.  I still wasn’t fully recovered, and I have to confess I don’t find New Years to be that good of an experience anyway.

The problem is that everyone is out.  So if you go out with the intention of getting drunk it can be quite difficult getting any drinks as all the bars are swamped.  Alternatively you could go to some ticketed event, which can be okay, but can also be expensive.

Also I’ve never been much of one for enforced jollity.  It's part of why I’m not hugely ken on celebrating my birthday - it feels like an obligation, rather than something you’re doing for genuine fun, if you see what I mean.

Anyway, the week after New Years was when I entered that lovely bit where I am basically the only one on holiday.  That’s obviously not true at all, but where the week before most people are off, that first week is more like a proper break.

I like it particularly because it’s time entirely to myself.  It’s holiday I take most years when I can and is a great chance to get caught up on lots of the random stuff I put off or ignore or whatever.

So I gave my flat a really good clean, for example.  I also washed some of the more random clothing items, like my dressing gown and oven gloves.  And I got my suits dry cleaned.  I know - these aren’t glamorous things, but it’s a good time to do them.

Apparently, in Japan, they traditionally give the house and work and stuff a big clean up so that they can enter into the new year with a ‘clean start’.  I kinda try to do the same, I guess.

Of course I’d planned into the time way too much to do.  I’d created a big long list of stuff and I’d have needed to take six months off to do it all!  As such I pruned it down to the bear essentials and focused on a couple of things I thought I could achieve in the time.

I almost managed to get them finished and I reckon I’ll use this next weekend to knock them on the head.  They’re also things that should save me a little bit of money when I’m done, so that’s always nice.

white noise 2 - the light

I watched a few rental DVDs over the Christmas period, the first of which was white noise 2.

I seem to recall I quite liked the first white noise, mainly because the ending was somewhat unexpected.  It led up to something that, while I don't think I would really classify it as a twist, was quite an interesting ending.

The second film is less successful.

Mainly, I have to confess, because it seems to go in a direction that isn't really a proper follow-on to the first film.  In the first film the idea is that the souls of the dead are essentially captured in radio and television static - hence the white noise.

While it's bunkum in terms of spirits, this is a known phenomenon, where, if you record static occasionally bits of it - interference in particular - will sound a bit like someone speaking.  The human brain is particularly attuned to pattern finding, and these noises, with a bit of imagination, can seem to sound like words being spoken.

So the first film used this idea as if it really was spirits communicating, with the main character being recently bereaved.

In the second film it kinda tries to tie it in to the static idea, but takes it in a direction that is really similar to the Final Destination series.

In those films someone gets a premonition of their death as part of some big, tragic disaster and then manages to take themselves and some other people out of the line of fire.  However, death then 'pursues' them, essentially trying to bump them off in the order they should have died.

In this second white noise film, the main character acquires a similar sort of power - the static now seems to point out to him people who are about to die, giving him the opportunity to save their lives.

Now there is more of a traditional twist to this story (which I saw coming a mile off so that probably suggest it isn't a very good twist) but the problem is, because it feels like it's a cobbling together of the two films and doesn't really follow on from the effect used in the first, it feels a lot less original.

Also, where the first film was built on a known effect that anyone can encounter, this second film endows the main character with special powers.  And they're special powers that seem to give him a view of things that nobody else does.

I mean, it'd be okay if they worked it so that everyone sees the effect, but only he interprets it in that way or sees something extra, but no - only he sees it, and it's a definite thing and is never really cast doubt on.

I'm being quite harsh on the film - it's not really bad as such, it's just the first film worked a lot better.

back to work

First day back to work today.

It feels a bit weird, as I’ve had quite a long time off.  Well, actually it’s only just over two weeks, but it feels like it’s been a nice long break.

So I guess I should talk about Christmas and the new year and holiday.

Christmas I went to see my dad and my sister at my dad’s.  We had Turkey for Christmas lunch.  It’s a bit weird having Turkey as my Dad and sister have both said they aren’t hugely keen on it before, so I don’t tend to expect to have it.

However, we’ve had it for the last couple of years, where usually they like to have lamb or beef.  I think part of it is that my Dad has found a good butchers and buys what I think is called a Turkey crown.  Whatever it’s called it’s basically just a huge hunk of breast meat.

I’m assuming it’s from the one bird - that’s how he described it - but it must be a monster of a bird.  He’d basically chopped it up into three huge chunks and frozen two of them, sending me and my sister away with one each.  The third bit was what we cooked and it was a whacking great chunk of meat.

Unfortunately we got the timing a bit wrong.  We tried the thing where you skewer the meat and look for the colour of the juices, which was clear, but then when my Dad started cutting it up it clearly wasn’t quite done.

I mean, it wasn't a long way off, and we could probably have eaten it as is, but it’s always better to be safer rather than sorry with poultry.  As such my dad cut off enough for us to have then and we nuked those bits to finish them off (everything else was on the table, so we couldn’t really wait) and put the rest back in the oven while we ate.

In hindsight we should have cut it open when it came out the oven before resting it, just to make sure t was cooked and then we’d have known.

There’s normally one mistake for the chrimbo lunch, and otherwise it all went smoothly.

Unfortunately the rest of the time at my Dads was a little marred because I caught another cold!

My sister was riddled with cold when I arrived and was coughing and sneezing a lot and I could start to feel it come on within about 36 hours of arriving, so I think I caught it off of her.  Since she lives a fair way away that also would tie in with a different strain.

However, there are a couple of other possibilities.  Firstly it could have been my first cold making a comeback.  This is certainly possible, but y the time I wet away I was almost over it.

The second more likely possibility is that I caught it off someone else at work.  When I went on holiday almost everyone else in the office had a cold.  Now I had obviously assumed this was the cold that I had caught off of our “typhoid mary” (the introducer of the virus) that had then been past on, but apparently someone else’s partner had also got a cold and so there could have been another strain kicking around.

However, as I say, my belief is I caught it off my sister.

I’ll continue later in the week.

merry wishmsases

I hope you have a good Christmas and New Year period :)

I am away on holiday now until the 10th of January, so I thought I'd post my usual Chrimbalo message for over the festive season.

As I mentioned earlier this week I will actually be going on contract next year, so the blog will almost certainly switch to being a weekly one next year.  The contract doesn't actually start until a little after I'm back, so initially I'll be blogging as usual, so see you then.

saw vii

My basic feeling when I reviewed saw 6 was that it had kinda disappeared up its own fundament.

The saw films have always tried to have an approach where there's a twist to them, so when you get to the point of having 6 or 7 films, you've piled on so many twists that you probably don't know whether you're coming or going.  It also probably doesn't help that (as the commentaries indicate) none of it was really planned - they've just kinda gone with the flow.

I'm setting aside the fact that the twist in the first film isn't really a twist as such and was kinda irrelevant.  What's more important is that in the early films you could genuinely see that there was a reasonable chance most of the people would have a chance of doing what was required of them and surviving.

Yes, it would be brutal and nasty and the thing they'd have to do was traumatising and painful, but you felt there was a good chance of them making it.  In the later films - 7 especially - that seems to have gone away.

Indeed, in most traps they came to rely on other people having to do something and / or there was a death guaranteed.  In other words, one or more people had to make a decision that affected somebody else and often times that decision resulted in one person dying, rather than another.

This was kinda explained by what happened in the story that flowed through the narrative, but it also started to feel a lot like pandering to the audience.  An audience that was, by now, almost entirely consisting of gore hounds and more hardcore fans.

This of course was not helped by all the complicated back story - you couldn't watch most of the later films unless you'd seen the earlier ones.  There was no way you could 'dip in'.

In 7 you get more of the same.  Indeed, you get so much more of the same this feeling of pandering to the core audience becomes pretty overt.  I mean, they've set it up as the last one (both commentary tracks hint that actually maybe they'd do more in the future - you never could keep a good horror movie killer down) so they kinda had to do that, but still, there's so many deaths and so much gore that it just becomes a bit silly.

Especially at the end - the people who die have nothing to do with traps or what was meant to be the point of the film in the first place.  I mean, at the start, Jigsaw was very clear about how he never killed anybody - he just tested them to see if they could break through and survive.

At the end of 7 you've got exactly the opposite - all the traps are virtually un-winnable or some people are guaranteed to die and a lot of the deaths are just nasty killings, not even traps.

In other words, it kinda has become torture porn - that label the critics slapped on it but probably wasn't deserved at the start is really what the films now definitely are.

One last thing - the screaming in this film is ridiculous.  I mean, people always used to scream a bit, obviously, but mainly when they really had something to scream about.  Or you'd get bits where they tried to hold back the screaming or they couldn't scream.  Now the screaming becomes like an iron bar to beat you into submission with.  It's all just a bit too much, much like the film itself.

If they ever do re-start it, I hope they go for something a little less complicated, or go back to when it was Jigsaw proper and it was about proper (and significant) moral lessons and winnable traps.

ringing in the changes

Right then, a bit of an announcement.

The intention of this blog was always that I would post every weekday about things happening in my life or giving my opinions on things that were happening and to post up reviews of stuff.  Fairly mundane stuff, but at the least it kept me writing and it makes it more like a diary, which was kinda the idea.

Anyway, this was all pretty much based on my work situation, where I was based at the main offices of my company and would only be out of the office due to the occasional meeting or through holiday or illness.

Well that situation will be changing at the start of next year.

I don't tend to talk too much about what my company actually does, but one of the things we do is provide contractors.  Another, more precise name for this is "Manpower Substitution" and as this suggest we provide people to fill roles.

And that's what I'm going to be doing from next year.

It's initially a three month contract, running until the end of the financial year, but there's the possibility of an extension.  Financial year is obviously when budgets get re-worked out so they will see if there's money for me to continue.

Also it's obviously dependent on whether it goes well.  They may hate me or I may prove to be incompetent or the work may dry up - anything could happen - but what is certain is I will be there until March.

Now the weird thing is that actually while on contract I will be doing less hours than I do at my normal work.  The reason is that the contract is paid per hour and they effectively by a set number of hours a week, but at my work, although we have a working day, I actually work loads of (unpaid!) overtime in the sense that I get to work at least an hour early and often go home half an hour later.

However, the place I will be working at will be an extra hours drive on my commute (which may actually act as a bit more of an incentive for me to move) there and back, so although I'll be doing less working hours it'll still be about the same length of day.

Of course I get to claim expenses on the extra miles, so that'll be a nice little cash bonus (except of course the increased wear and tear on the vehicle does add up), but it does mean that I won't be able to post blogs on weekdays.

The reason is that where I'll be working I won't have any internet access, and I'm very unlikely to be bothered to do anything like write a blog post every evening when I get back.

I will keep the blog though, with the intention that it will become a weekend blog.  Whether that means I post on both Saturday and Sunday, I don't yet know, but it'll be some sort of weekend thing.

The reason I'm going on contract is that it's not been the best year for the company - expenditure has increased while revenue has decreased, so we need as much cash coming in as we can get.

it's actually back this time

Total Wipeout appears to be properly back this time.

It also appears to have started in a "Winter Wipeout" format.  Whether this is a temporary Christmas thing or the whole series will be Winter Wipeout I'm not sure.

It was again very quiet in the Laundrette.  Not sure why it was quiet, but I did therefore take the opportunity of not being worried about my machine ending without me there (not from a people may knick my stuff point of view, but due to politeness - not wanting to keep a machine occupied when it's not doing anything) to go and explore the Co-op.

I'm pretty sure I mentioned this before, but a new Co-op mini-supermarket / convenience store type of thing has opened up at the end of the road.  It's taken over an old electrical goods store that's been closed for years and is of a reasonable size.

I think there's quite a lot of the store been used for storage and back-room area, though, because I was actually a little surprised by the actual shop-floor space.  It's quite 'rammed in' to compensate.  Most of the aisles are very narrow - it would be a struggle to get past someone if they were down the row and you certainly couldn't get two trolleys past each other.

IT was obviously quite early so it wasn't exactly busy, but I could imagine it would seem quite full even if there were only 5 or 6 people in there as you'd all be getting in each others way.

Having said that, part of the reason for it being so full is that they've tried to get as much in as possible.  The range of stock is really quite good and you could easily do a reasonable shop in the one place.  I mean, it doesn't have as much as a big supermarket, obviously, but there's a good range of products.

The opening hours are also very long - it's open 7AM to 11PM according to the sign, and I've been past it quite early on my walks and going to the laundrette and it did genuinely appear to be open.

I didn't exactly buy a lot - just some mini-baguette things - but then it was more of a reconnaissance exercise than anything.

And speaking of my wanders, on this weekend's saunters I got to see some of the damage the reason storms caused.

It was obviously not as bad as they had up north, but there were a couple of trees down and where there were roads with lots of trees there was a lot of detritus of broken off bits of branches in the road.  It was obviously a lot windier than I'd appreciated at the time.

a week to go

Wow, it's only a week until I go on holiday and then a couple of extra days and it's Christmas.

As I mentioned before I'm quite looking forward to it this year and the news there's less than a week to go is very pleasing.

I've pretty much done all my Christmas shopping now.  A few things are still to arrive, but all should be here by the time I go away.  If not, it's not a disaster, as I can just post those bits that don't arrive in time.

I'm hoping we don't see a repeat of the snow we had over the last few years.  Fundamentally I like snow, but it's best when it happens when you yourself don't have to get anywhere or do anything.

Or, even better, when it snows you in from work.  Although that always has the difficulty of knowing when it's safe to go back.  It's best when it knackers you mid-week, but then goes away over the weekend.

I sort of sympathise with those who moan about how the country grinds to a halt when it snows, but I can fully understand why.  I mean, yes we've had a few years in a row of bad snow, but then we could easily have five or ten years of really mild winters, so spending loads of money on gritters and ploughs and stuff would then be seen as wasteful.

The best compromise idea seems to me to be the suggestion that farmers be provided with ploughing equipment that they can easily store and then they're brought in when it does snow to clear the roads.  Not sure how much that would cost, though.

Anyway, plans for the weekend are to try to clear the decks of some domestic stuff ahead of the break, so that when I'm on holiday I can spend more time relaxing, rather than fiddling about with that sort of stuff.

I'm also planning to do a bit of cleaning and washing - this'll be two weeks in a row and I think I might need to make it weekly over winter, as the colder weather means I wear more clothes (jumpers and vests and stuff).

noises of the night

I mentioned before that when I got back I'd had a radiator installed and that necessitated a move of my bed across to the other side of the room.  Now that actually sounds a lot more spectacular than it was - it was actually a move of about 1.5 metres.

However, it did mean I was now closer to a different window compared to where I was before and so it took me a while to get used to sleeping in this position.  They reckon it can take up to three days to get used to sleeping in a different bed, but I don't know if the same applies to moving your bed.

Anyway, point is that I felt a bit disjointed for a while and I'm still not operating at 100% smoothness after the change.

And that's when the noise started.

Initially I thought it was a reflection of the aforementioned change - I was now closer to a different window, so there was perhaps a change in noises.  In particular the noise was a bit like the dull roar you get from traffic noise even through double glazing.

However, it was too constant in tone and volume to be traffic noise.

I then tried simply opening my window - it sounded a bit like the noise my air conditioner makes so I thought maybe someone had a heater going outside.  No, I don't understand my thinking either - I think I was perhaps wondering if it was maybe a set of temporary traffic lights that were run from a  generator, something like that maybe?

But when I opened my windows there was a really weird effect where it was almost drowned out by the general background noise.  In other words, it was louder inside with the windows closed than outside.

I therefore then investigated the actual radiator itself - was it perhaps making a noise?

Not as far as I could tell.

So I left it - the noise was there, but it wasn't too loud and I often wear ear plugs to bed anyway, so I could resurrect that practice.

And then I discovered the cause when I went for my walk, and it's a weird one.

Basically, the Farnham Rugby club has a built a new ground and associated with it is a big building.  One of these fitness places is on the same site, so I assume the big building is mainly a gym, but with a few bars and stuff for the rugby club.

Well, as I was walking along with my ear buds in early Sunday morning I could here the same noise I hear at night.  I took my ear buds out and there it was - horrendously loud and coming from the direction of this big building.  However, it was really foggy, so I couldn't really see where it was, so I wandered down to investigate.

There's a dirt path that goes behind the facility along the edge of the fence and I walked along there until I got right behind it and discovered this horrendously loud fan-like noise.  Given the correlation with my air conditioner, my guess is that's what it is, though why they need to run a huge air conditioner all night in the middle of November I haven't a clue.

What I think is actually happening is that the noise is being carried up to where I live (which is about half a mile away) and, because of the particular frequency of the noise, it is getting through my double glazing and then bouncing off the side of the inset part for the window and being reflected back to where I sleep.

In other words it's rather a conflagration of circumstances.

Hopefully they've just been running it over night for a particular reason, though what that could be and why so many nights I don't know.

I also noted on my wander round they'd put some trees in, but they were tiny little starter trees and will likely take years to mature to the state of providing any kind of sound baffling.

fast and furious

I made a bit of a cock-up here.

See, I thought that fast and furious was the first film in this series, but it turns out that the fast and the furious is the first in the series, and fast and furious is the fourth.

I'm not sure when the trend of not simply giving sequels a number started, but Fast and Furious seems to be a chronic case.  The second film is 2 fast 2 furious, so that has numbers, but not in a normal way.  The third film appears to be The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift, the there's Fast and Furious and then it goes Fast 5 and Fast 6.

Clearly the furiousness of the cast lessened as the cash rolled in over the series.  Also, I think Tokyo Drift is more like a spin-off than a film in the series proper, so it's all a bit confusing and hence my error, I guess.

I don't think it matters too much, though.  The plot for the film I watched was so simple as to be comparable with a child's crayon scrawled oeuvre.  I mean there's character baggage, sure, but it's so generic and easily understood, it barely needs explaining.

Obviously you can tell I thought the plot was bobbins, but then to be honest a good plot of a film like this is way down the list of what you should be expecting.  A film like this is all about the car action - chases, crashes, stunts, that sort of stuff.

In a way they're like giant cartoons, but only in so far as they're like poor cartoons.  Good cartoons have plots and good characters too.  No, what I mean is that they ignore stuff like physics and are a bit daft in a cartoony way.

And this film delivers to some degree on that.

If I'm honest there was a bit too much farting about with plot and character stuff and it could have done with a lot more of the action element.

Also a lot of the action was a bit too cartoony for me.  I could have done with less in the way of stupid stuff.

However, the thing I'd really complain about was the sound.  It was really difficult to hear the characters talking as they mostly seemed to mumble (or growl menacingly I think was meant to be the idea).  It could have been something wrong with the disc I guess, but the car bits where plenty load.

And that was the problem - I kept turning the sound up to hear what they were saying (or mumbling in a menacing / manly way if you insist) and then suddenly there's squealing tyres and the bending of fenders and blood is leaking out of my ears.

Also, the sound-track seemed pretty poor.  Half the thing of films like this is for the soundtrack to really compliment the action and I barely remember any of it.

So yeah, I don't think I'd really recommend it.  I am planning on watching the other films to see how they compare, though - who knows, perhaps coming in after 4 films does hamper the enjoyment, but I kinda doubt it.

turned out well

Well that was a good weekend.

And I don’t mean that with any sort of sarcasm - the weekend went well.

The work chrimbo lunch was okay.  We went to the same place as we did last year and I have to say the food itself wasn’t as good as last year.  It was okay, but it was better last year.

However, it was slightly marred by the fact I ended up sat next to someone who, well, they were nice and all, but they never stopped talking.  I mean, I’m obviously not the most talkative of people, but I know that, in order to have a conversation, you need to stop talking for a bit for others to say stuff.

Indeed, conversation is almost be definition about not talking in certain bits - if you do all the talking it’s a speech.  But this person didn’t seem to know that, and it became a bit boring a bit quickly.

Saturday I decided I would do a wash out of sequence, taking advantage of the lack of Grand Prix.  It should hopefully pay dividends next weekend where it’ll reduce the normal clothes amount so I can wash a couple of bits I’d like to before the Chrimbo holiday.

It was weirdly quiet in the laundrette.  I always go just as it’s opening and usually there’s a short bit where few others are in there, but then when I go there’s loads in there.  But this time there were a couple of us to start with and when I left I left one guy in there.

And that's not with machines going and people having left them - we were the only ones using machines at all.

The rest of the weekend went okay.  I was obviously still a bit coldly, so I wanted to take it easy in order to try to recover.  This went pretty well and by the end of Sunday I was staring to feel fairly normal.

Today I still seem to have a bit of snotty nose for some reason, but I’m not really suffering with the cold anymore.

And then yesterday of course I took the day off, with the intention of doing chrimbo shopping.

In reality I decided to buy most of it online.  I did look in shops but it was all more expensive (though surprisingly close in some places).  However, I did buy almost all the other bits I needed to - cards and wrapping paper for example.

Unfortunately it then turned out that one of the things I wanted to get wasn’t actually available for quick delivery online.  I’m crossing my fingers, but my guess is that I wont have it by Chrimbo.  It’s not too bad as I’ll have other stuff, so I can just give it to them afterwards, but it was a bit ironic as I’d seen it in one of the shops.

So yeah, a good weekend.  I even lost two pounds, despite the huge Chrimbo lunch!

chrimbalo lunchings

It's the work Christmas lunch today.

Some companies have a full-on bash, and we used to do that when I first joined, but a few years back it turned into more of a long lunch at a pub thing.  It's usually okay, marred only by the fact that we have to go back to work afterwards.

I went for traditional Turkey and Christmas Pud of course.  I know some people don't really like turkey - the breast can get quite dry - or can get sick of it, but my viewpoint is that it's Christmas, so you should have a Christmas meal.  Also I think Turkey is okay and I don't really have it any other time of the year, so what the hell.

Also, on a more fundamental level, Christmas meal is basically just a roast with a few more trimmings than usual, so since I love roasts I actually quite like it.

It's been a particularly horrible week, having been suffering with this cold.  Things have been getting better in the last couple of days, but were I not so busy I'd have taken a couple of days off at the start of the week for sure.

Hopefully, the weekend should prove relatively quiet.  We're now out of the Grand Prix season, so I kind of get my weekends back for a bit, if you see what I mean.  I've also got a days leave booked for Monday.

The plan is to do some Chrimbo shopping, as previously mentioned, though it may well be a case of looking at things in shops and then buying them on line.  I mean I will definitely be buying a few bits in the high street (plus things like wrapping and cards) but you can just get more bang for your buck online is the simple fact of the matter.

So yeah, I won't be back blogging until Tuesday.

work broadband

We now hove a vaguely decent connection speed at work.

It's a weird package we're on, in that it's like a managed service.  This idea is that it has very little downtime, but you pay a premium for that and it really is expensive compared to most packages.

Quite how they guarantee that up time, given the reliance on the bits of the service being provided by BT, I'm not sure.  But what's also weird is that it didn't seem to be a low contention line.

Contention is basically when you have multiple people using the same line at the same time.  You get broadband because of bandwidth, which you get because they make use of multiple frequencies down the telephone line instead of just the one "blip and bloop" like you used to get with old fashioned modems.

Anyway, the idea is that the higher the contention, the mode the line is divided up and so the lower the speed everyone gets.  By having a service that guarantees low contention, you therefore ensure a good minimum speed.

For businesses this can often be more important that potential lofty maximum speeds.  If you're a business you're likely to be using your broadband during the day when lots of other people and business will be using there's, so guarantees over minimum speeds can be more useful.

However, this isn't a low contention line, but it is more expensive with guarantees about up-time - weird, as I say.

What they've done is basically given us access to the full capability of the line.  Previously it was fixed as a 512mb line and they've only just offered this as a free upgrade.

My guess is that actually, BT probably won't allow them to get a line restricted to 512mb any more, so they've had to offer it as a free upgrade.

The connection is a bit quicker.  I wouldn't say it gets anywhere near the claimed 8mb maximum, but then it never used to get anywhere near the 512mb it used to be.  We actually used to get something like 200mb, which is better than ISDN, but not greatly.

If I was to guess (I haven't done a speed check) I'd guess it's running at about 750mb, somewhere around there.  It's certainly a lot easier to use with much reduced waits for pages to load, but it's still not really able to cope with streaming video properly unless you allow it to buffer.

Obviously you've always had to do that, but before it would have to buffer the whole thing, but now you can set it going if it buffers half of it.

It is remarkable how much more pleasant the experience becomes though even with such a relatively modest jump.

men in black 2

Well this was disappointing.

A big part of the charm of the original film was the relationship between Will Smith's and Tommy Lee Jones's characters.

The basic set up was that Smith was a world-wise cop who wasn't phased by anything, but then he got pushed into the MIB world where there are aliens everywhere and suddenly he was a wide-eyed noob making errors everywhere.

Meanwhile Jones was an utterly dead-pan seen-it-all before MIB agent. In other words, almost the same as Smith's character.

The comedic interplay between these two characters was made the film good.

However, at the end of the first film, Jones retires, has his memory wiped and goes to live a life with his old love.  As such, at the start of the second film there's something of a role reversal.

Except not.  Smith is now supposed to be the super-wise MiB agent, but Jones's shift into the equivalent role to Smith's in the first film doesn't really work.  When we eventually catch up to him he's supposedly working in the post office and running a tight ship.

But it's also revealed his wife has left him - it just all doesn't work as well.

But what really annoyed me was that when Jones gets back to normal, suddenly Smith's character reverts back to being the noob.  I mean, why would this happen?  It makes no sense and is just odd - why would he suddenly become dumb?

Unless maybe we're supposed to believe he's pretending?  Or maybe he was pretending before?  I dunno - I just didn't get it.

And the trouble is the film is very reliant on that chemistry.  I mean the plot is almost identical to the first film, but it has to be said in a good way.  It just doesn't feel like any effort has gone into it.

Also the bad guy (or gal or alien or whatever) is pretty lacklustre and she has a sidekick who I think was meant to provide some comic relief, but actually didn't do anything funny.

Even the characters that recurred from the first film didn't really add anything (well, the worm guys worked quite well).  And as for the love interest for Smith - that was just so half arsed it was almost painful.

I think I'm probably giving the impression I hated the film, but I would say that was too extreme - I just found it all very meh.

broken cupboard

There's a cupboard at work with a combination lock that I occasionally had reason to get into.

We actually have several such cupboards, but this one used to have some bits in that I would regularly need to get to.  I say "used to", because I have transferred the bits I need access to over to another cupboard.

The reason I've done that is because the lock is fucked on the other cupboard.

I don't know if you've ever done a combination lock, but the idea is that you twiddle the dial clockwise and anticlockwise, stopping at the numbers that are the combination.  Well on this lock, the mechanism is so loose and sloppy you can't actually use the numbers, you have to go past the numbers.

So if a number to enter was 1, you'd actually have to go to something like 1.5 or 0.5 (depending on which direction you're coming from) in order for it to work.  So, in other words, you still have to "accurate" but you now have to be accurate with a number that's not a full number.

Well, as you can imagine that opens up all sorts of possible "real" combination values - if you say you have to be "half a degree out" how much is half a degree?  And do you have to be out by that exact amount each time?  Or does it vary for each number?

The annoying thing is that hen I first started using the cupboard I was able to work it out.  I couldn't get it first time, but I'd give it a go and it would pop open.

But then, a couple of weeks back, I suddenly couldn't do it any more.  And, to my shame, I got so annoyed with it, I actually walloped the lock with my fist.

Well, after that I was really worried I'd broken it, as it felt even sloppier.  Thankfully it turned out I hadn't, as a colleague was able to open it.

Frustratingly they were actually able to open it first time with only the vague instruction from me that it had to be "about half a degree out".  I was actually stunned when they opened it, because as I say, I thought I'd damaged it.

Well, after that I tried myself again to see if I'd regained the knack, but I hadn't and so I transferred my stuff to another cupboard.  This other cupboard works beautifully - the lock is crisp and you put in the numbers properly and it opens every time, no matter who's trying it.

I occasionally try to the crap cupboard, but still haven't opened it.

sniffle

Well that was a crappy weekend.

On Sunday I really fell foul of a cold that seemed to be brewing all week and essentially spent the day in bed.  I still feel really crappy and don’t really seem to be over the hump yet.

The cold has come from someone at work, who’s been suffering for more than a week.  I really hope it doesn’t last that long for me - I really don't fancy a week of feeling crap and I’ve loads to do at work.

As I say, she’s had it for more than a week and it seemed to start coming on for me earlier in the week. It’s been really weird, actually, because normally when I get a cold it happens fairly quickly - I generally get a tickly feeling at the back of my mouth in my soft palette area, and then within a day I get the sniffles and that shortly develops into a soar throat.

Well this time the tickly feeling lasted for days.  I wasn’t initially sure if it was cold because of that, but then as I say on Sunday it really kicked in and my nose flowed like a tap.

I’m guessing the cough will follow soon, although given how long it’s taken for the rest of the cold to show up I wouldn’t be surprised if I’m still suffering with a sniffly nose at the end of the week and then the cough happens at the weekend!

In some ways I was lucky that it happened on Sunday as I had loads to do on Saturday, which I was able to complete.  If it had kicked in then I’d probably not have gotten it done, which would have been a pain.

There was also a slight surprise when I weighed in on Sunday morning in that my weight hadn’t really changed.

With the impending cold I’m afraid I really let my diet slip and ate quite a lot of really bad things.  Who knows - perhaps it was the sudden increase in calories that held it at bay?  What I would say is it’s weird I didn't loose weight.

Another possible explanation is that I really had trouble sleeping last week as the cold came on.  That tickly feeling is usually associated with a ramping up in snoring - it swells, so it blocks the airway, cause really bad snoring, which bruises the area, causing it to swell more and hence producing a feedback loop.

The problem really was hat I would drop off okay, but then after a couple of hours I’d wake up with that area feeling really soar and tender.  So I was then basically unable to get back to sleep.

Thursday night in particular I think I only got two or three hours of sleep.  And as I found before, lack of sleep tends to ramp up the need for calories.

It doesn’t make a particularly sensible diet plan, though, as generally I feel terrible the next day.

chrimbo look forward

I'm really looking forward to Christmas this year.

Well, I'm looking forward to the holiday.

This year has been absolutely manic - I've never known a period like it since I joined the company.

I've booked a smidge over two weeks for holiday - my first day off is the 23rd and then I don't come back until the 10th.  I've actually also booked the 12th off so I can do my last few bits of Christmas shopping, so that means from the week of the twelfth I have two four day weeks, followed by two weeks completely off and then a four-day week when I get back.

The only real plan I've got for that period is to go visit my dad over the Christmas weekend.  I'm not planning on staying for very long - just until the Tuesday, when I'll head home.

I have to confess a part of not staying very long is my Dad tends to have a bout of depression at Christmas.  It's fairly obvious this is linked to the fact that Christmas is the time of year my mum passed away.  Although I suspect it also punches a bit of a whole in his traditional "I hate Christmas" thing.

Not that I'm saying I think he secretly likes Christmas, it's more that he liked certain aspects of our Christmas - the family gathering and, in particular, the big meal my mum would cook.  I miss that too, of course, but I think it all just reminds him too much that she's gone.

My sister will also be there, though hers will likely be a flying visit again.  She works in a pub, so she tends to take advantage of the overtime and extra hours, I think.  Well, she could also make it a short break for the same reason as me.

I'm also not staying over in Devon for any extra days or anything, so the rest of the time I'll be able to chill, watch lots of stuff and get some of the jobs done I like to do over Christmas, like give the flat a good clean and do a full back-up.

So yeah, I think I'm actually looking forward to Christmas this year - especially if it stays quite mild like it has been.  we've had way too many super cold winters in recent years and it would be nice to have a mild one for a change.

Plus of course that will help reign in my heating bills even further, which would be a nice Chrimbo present in and of itself.