Showing posts with label Catchup. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Catchup. Show all posts

11 January 2008

Happy new blog spot 2008!

Yes, it's been a long time coming, but here's a fresh new post on me blog! Crowds rejoice!
It is a little bizarre that the gap has been such a huge 'un as it's not like there hasn't been things to post about.
Probably the biggest change, which I alluded to in some posts ago was the fact that I have a job! horray! I've finally gone and joined the rat race, and have been slowing waking up to the realisation that I should no longer see myself as a student anymore.
Obviously this is more of a "hey Internets! I'm not dead yet!" type message (of course, I hear you all cry), so content is actually a bit on the sparse side. I'm not sure if I can be bothered to catch up on some of the major events of the last 3 months or so, that's not to say there haven't been that many.
Along with the jobness, I've managed to get my own place and all the fun that has been getting that all sorted, and settling in. Also of course, there have been some pretty huge releases which I have purchased in the fields of music and games, possibly the most immediately significant of those being the latest Coheed album and Halo 3, but more of those later.

...And to wrap up the post, it might be worth jotting down some new year blogging resolutions which I will attempt to keep. I think the first one would be of course to blog more, and leading on from that, I've never been much of an online blogger, I usually have to force myself to blog and then upload it later which usually leads to mammoth posts which trail on for too long, kinda like how this one is turning out. So yeah, more online blogging, prefer the better, short but sweet, a quick judgement on some news article I've read, we'll see how it goes...

Till then, take it easy and watch this space, there is a lot more to come...

6 August 2007

Week 1 (actually it's week 3 now :S)

Very overdue but it seems any free time I've got so far has spent in front of the TV like a zombie, or down the pub with a pint, err... like a zombie.

I did try and write this at the end of week 1, and then again at the end of week 2, and now I'm here on the Monday of week 3 and still nothing, oh dear. I think it's now best to make a number of small(er) entries rather than try and do a catchup of everything that's happened so far.

So, here we are, might as well make this a kind of overviewy exercise. I've started on a course which should train me up with the powers of performing desktop and/or network support in a professional capacity. Along with the lecture and the study towards certification, there's also the help with making my CV better and making a better interviewee of myself as well. That's been one of my probs, so along with the skills, we should hopefully get there.

Along with the course, they've given me a place to live for the couple of weeks. I am currently living in Earlsdon Ave South, quite literally a stone's throw away from where the Red Faction house was when I was back at Uni. Living with 5 others, and they're a pretty good bunch and surprisingly of all different ages.

There's this guy called Dave from South Wales. His surname is actually Hughes which is again a surprise, but then again it's a pretty common name in the land of Wales, so it's time to get over that. He is 32 and has recently graduated from a Music Technology degree and is a bit of a classic rock/metal fan - in particular Guns 'N' Roses. Then there's Aman, a recent graduate of a Computer Science degree and is 24. His twin brother has luckily got himself a job quite recently so Aman's hoping to sort something out pretty sharpish. There's Julian, 29, who currently works at Amazon in Milton Keynes as a problem solver. He's originally from South Africa but is very cool, if a little hard to understand at times (I'm sorry). We then Peter, although that's not the correct spelling - he is fact a Pole national and it's spelt (and pronounced) a little differently, but that's the English equivalent. And finally there's Dal (full name Dalber - remember Dal and "beer" - easy!) who as Julian described him perfectly and concisely as a "party animal" - he is 25, also a computer science graduate, and is often out all night, or gaining points on his licence, usually not at the same time.

So that's the guys, and it's not that surprising that there are no girls living in the house, although there is a single girl in her course - Aeyeisha (sp) who seems nice enough, not really spoken to her much, and unsurprisingly, Dal has made it a bit of a mission to lay her - to his credit he did invite her back to the house late one night, not sure what came of that, she wasn't in our house in the morning, and now Dal has moved out because of Asthma problems into her house, she better watch out lol.

It's probs best to save anything else for another post, but it's worth adding that some of the material in the course has been covered in my previous academic pursuits of computing, whether that be at A-level level (err..) or at degree level, so that's a bonus, although I think the most useful stuff will be the practical stuff plus proprietary hardware/software like Cisco and Windows Server 2003 etc. Also it's worth noting that a couple of the lecturers (Andy and Alex) are also party animals, pissheads at the least, and they are often out on the lash. I actually managed to make it out once so far with them, but that's another post right there.

I will finish up by saying that I've signed up for random free photo hosting accounts (photobucket and flickr actually) and mean to get snapping with my mobile phone with pictures of the room, this Strongbow glass I managed to swipe (another post), random shots of Cov and if you're lucky, me in my formal robes (read: shirt and tie).

Here's spending another night decomposing in front of the TV.

25 April 2007

Belated Hello! [dated 13/04/2007]

Hello and welcome back. Before I decided to start blogging again, I took a little look at the last post I made. It was actually the first post in a new blog I had created and unintentionally it mentioned a renewed effort to get into the habit of regular blogging. I think that post was made last September, Lol.

Anyways, here we are now, and this time I promise it will be better, and that doesn't sound like a cliched empty promise if ever I heard one.

Let's kick things off with some music commentary and go from there. As it turns out, I'm back off to my union to see Biffy play there, should be awesome, looking very much to that. My original and hopeful plan was to meet up with my old mate Adam and spend the hours before the gig catching up and general hanging out, but a phonecall earlier today means that now Adam is going in a minibus from and to Northampton. Gz to him I said, and although I knew that I would be making the train journeys there and back on my lonesome, but I won't get to hang out which saddens me greatly. Anyways, I'm not gonna moan too much, the gig will be cool, and I'll get to see my uni mates so it should be win win.

In more general music news, I can't get enough of At the Drive In's supreme Relationship of Command, and also Motion City Soundtrack's Commit This To Memory. Considering At the Drive In first, the album is the result of a group steadily getting better and better until they break through with this hit. Although I have downloaded the back catalogue of them, I'm nowhere near as impressed at those efforts, which obviously suffer from lower and lesser production, then RoC which is as polished as well, a very polished stone lol. I remember when first hearing it, and my initial thoughts were that apart from One Armed Scissor, it was all incontrolled noise. A couple more listens and a couple of years later and that opinion has pretty much reversed. That happening is probably thanks to finally being able to appreciate the Mars Volta, whose debut was a masterpiece, to exaggerate ever so slightly, but later efforts have me less convinced, but that's another story.
The great thing I Find about listening to RoC is how chaotic it all seems, it feels like getting chucked about on a rollecoaster, although that is still quite comfortable, maybe a plane crash is closer. Listening along, I feel almost breathless from the onslaught of sound they throw down my ears. When it stops I feel relief at the restbite, btu at the same time, really enjoyed the song, and wish it had never ended. Anyone that has not heard it, I recommend it fully and if you have patience to listen to it a couple of times, as initally it's probs not to everyone's tastes, you will love it... or your money back.


Another album I can't get enough of is MCS's 2nd album, commit this to memory. I remember when it came out, how excited i was, after finally been converted to them thanks to my mate's love of I am the Movie, I came to the slow realisation, that it was genius. I was excited at release, downloaded it promptly (i'm a pirate, get over it), but then felt disappointed - it had seemed that the magic formula created on I am the Movie had been lost in the time after. I don't know how much time passed before I decided to give the album another proper listen. I think it was during revision time, when I put it on to revise to, and unfortunately for my revision, I paid too much attention to the record, and I was thinking, actually oMG! this is fantastic, a masterclass!. I was happy once again with MCS. Somehow some months later, probably after reviewing both albums in quick succession, I had decided that Commit This To Memory was not worthy as being I am the Movie's successor and had cast it down once again.
Only thanks to a couple of songs, namely Hangman and Attractive Today appearing in my huge random playlist of all tracks, I had retracted my opinion again and actually it was awesome once again.
The writing is awesome, and their grasp of melody is superb. There are only a couple of songs off the new album, mainly the slower ones, which don't have you singing along and/or tapping your toes even after the first listen.
So good was the album, it's been on my wanted list for quite some time, and eventually I stopped resisting and parted cash for the shiny cd and artwork.




A final mention, music wise, is with purchasing MCS's album, I also splashed out on Guitar Hero 2 for the 360. Although it's probs the least stunning looking game I own for the 360, that's not a really important feature for the game. Being bundled with an Xplorer controller, I get to play along with some classic rock tracks. It's crazy addictic and fun as well. it wasn't long before I was nodding along while I was playing. In terms of achievements, I want to 100% complete the game, although it may be really hard. I am working through on medium now, and it's starting to get tough, and the next difficulty they start using the 5th fret button :S



Moving on to other events, One of particular note, happened at work yesterday. This Irish woman, and I assume it was her daughter were purchasing a garden set from TJs. Me and this guy Aaron weren't allowed to take it their car, they had to find their way to our loading bay on their own. they then confessed that they couldn't read or write, adding that they were Irish - like it was something, a trait you expect of them. It's a stereotype I've never heard of, if they were drunk, then they would be living up to what I consider stereotypes of the Irish. Anyways moving on, and I couldn't help noticing her daughter - to be fair she was half naked so good for her. She wasn't freckly as such, more blotchy over the top half of her body. I was curious to what the rest of her boobies looked like, as well most of them were hanging out of her small red top. It's no suprise I hadn't failed to notice them. Anyways, they went off to bring the car round - wtf they can't read or write, but they can drive! *shakes head* As I later learnt they were gypsies from the fair that was in town. It might be a bad and shameful thought, but I couldn't help but think - "mmm, if you're not worried about catching diseases, then to score some gypsy ass would be pretty cool"

They eventually arrived at the loading bay, later that day, and Martin was loading a TV into his car at the same time. We helped the garden set into the car, all the time Martin was smirking like a chesire cat, and I almost lost it and burst out laughing. When they left, Martin came over, said a few things, he said to us, us being Rachel, Janet and myself, that those 2 must have been a sight from the loading bay (there is a significant drop to the car park btw), and we were all laughing, but I was acutally thinking, it wasn't all that bad, thanks to the daughter, I'd say that was the best cleavage I'd seen all day, hell probs all week, unless something crops up later today lol.
The question is, am I a bad person to think like this I'm not too sure.

Right, time is against me so I must go, One thing I must do is remember to upload this, I have a few blog entries on this laptop which have never seen the light of internet. There's a few more things I wanna add to this, I think it will get done in some kind of P.S. form, seeyas laters. Take it Easy.


P.S. I resume several days later, and also more importantly did not get this uploaded, ah well, I'm trying to force myself into a regular blogging schedule, but still hopefully avoid boring and trivial posts like maddox moaning about how many pieces of toast one blogger had one day, mmm. I also want to make this blog more public. I am becoming a bit hermity in my existence at the mo, so maybe having this connection in written form, well keep ppl connected, and if someone asks what have I been upto, I will then barrage them with the URL of my blog, although that probs won't satisfy all of them - "What?!?! You haven't been keeping up with my blog!?!? ZOMFG!"

Anyways, time for fresh post, concerning the weekend that has just passed, bb

Backlog

Hey peeps, just a quick mention that I have successfully breathed life into this blog before it even started - think of it as being born prematurely and has now been nursed to good health using some kind of blog incubator.

Yeah, so check out all the clutter in the "sidebar". I wanted to put up my last.fm charts, and discovered these cool "quilt" things as last.fm calls them. They look pretty smart, so I said, "hell yeah! let's have some of those!"

Anyways, enough with ridiculous medical metaphor, here are some posts I made over the last week or so, there's a few more to follow but still wrestling in my head if it's worth it.

Anyways again, here they are enjoy...

Take it easy
J-Man