Category: Uncategorized

This evening, I went to the cinema to see “I Heart Huckabees”. I have to say, it was probably one of the most original films I’ve seen in a long time. It’s really very refreshing to see a film which actually looks at ‘existential’ issues, looks at the meaning of life, and doesn’t draw any conclusions but makes you think about them! I certainly don’t think the film would be to everyone’s taste, but if you’re interested in ‘philosophy’ then I think it’d be worth seeing. Probably a film that will become a cult hit. Some of the themes in it reminded me a little bit of ‘Fight Club’, another one of my favourite films… although of course, it was totally different! Just a matter of asking the question, “Who are you?”

Anyway. That’s enough from me now. Later…

Wooohoo! I got paid today! Yeah baby!!!1111one

On a totally unrelated note (totally), I got a new mobile number today 🙂 This means that if you haven’t already heard from me (sorry!) and want to stay in touch with me, you’ll need my new number. Please drop me a line and I’ll give you the new number!

I can’t believe it’s nearly the end of another week. These last couple of weeks have gone pretty quickly… still, it’s not all bad! It shows that I’m enjoying it 🙂 Anyway, I’ve gotta go, life is going by too quickly for me to post here any longer…

… but it’s worth posting again. I’m just reading The 2004 list of words that must be destroyed. I found this one good, and still relevant…

“weapons of mass destruction”

Right now the most active and threatening weapon of mass destruction in the entire world is the United States of America, so knock it off with the political jargon pigeonholing the hysteria inducing WMDs as something only enemies have. Call them what they are: bombs, chemicals, and missiles. You don’t call a gun a weapon of personal destruction, do you? Is a tank a weapon of better than average destruction? Is the Death Star a weapon of total destruction? I got into a fight the other day, and had to deploy my weapons of slightly less than moderate inconvenience at him.

By the way, Simon’s set up a new site. It’s called “LabourOut.co.uk”, I haven’t linked to it because the DNS hasn’t updated yet. Or something. Anyway, by the time you read this it might have done. So, um, yeah.

To be honest, I don’t really have much to say! I’ll just update about the rest of the weekend though. On Saturday, I went back to Colchester with Philippa. In the evening we went to the murder mystery evening, being put on by the Anglican Chaplaincy. It was very good! I played the part of “Arthur ‘Fiddler’ Farquhar”, and I had to use my (dreadful) Scottish accent all evening. A bit tough on the ol’ voice, although I struggled through! If any photos get put up on the ‘net I’ll post up here.

Anyway. Sunday I didn’t do much… went to Claremont Road to watch “Mystery Men” in the evening! And, um, yeah. And work today. Ah, the pace of life these days…

My good friend Joe has made a very interesting post entitled “Band Aids – The Celebrity Solution to World Poverty”. Why don’t you have a read!

Last night, I went to see an opera at Snape Maltings: ‘La Boheme’ by Puccini. It was very good! The first opera that I’ve seen, and very enjoyable. Although I’d better not broadcast that too loudly, otherwise people might think I’ve got some of this ‘culture’ thing (I thought the only culture I had previously was bacteria).

Anyway… I think that’s about it for now. More updates whenever I can be bothered…

I would just like to give you the news that, there is no news. Now that I’ve started work, I don’t have much time to do anything particularly interesting! Getting used to working 9-5:30 is an interesting one… it’s certainly different to university life! Whilst in some ways I really miss the student lifestyle (for a number of reasons), I don’t think I could have coped with being a student for all my life… some people say they want to be a student forever. But I think it’s good just to have it for a few years, and then work… I think work is a lot more fulfilling! You feel as if you’re actually doing something, rather than scrounging off the government.

But yes. Yesterday I was in Colchester for the evening to see Philippa. I have to say, the traffic around Colchester in rush hour is terrible! I think next time I go up to Colchester after work, I’ll stay at work a bit longer.

Anyway. One more day left, and I’ve finished my first week at work… I’m quite looking forward to the weekend, actually. It’ll be good to get a rest, and there’s a murder mystery evening in the chaplaincy which I’m going to 🙂 I hope I’m not the murderer…

Well, I’ve officially started work 🙂 I went into work this morning. My official job title is “Junior Developer”, by the way, in case you were wondering. The job was… well, pretty boring today! It was very much a first day thing — finding out about the company, reading up about their software and learning about it. Hopefully soon I’ll actually get to do some work! I did say that I’d reveal the name of the company, but I don’t think that would be a good idea… I don’t know, sometimes people can be a bit funny about it!

Anyway. Um, I didn’t do much over the weekend. On Sunday afternoon I went to Colchester, to Claremont Road. I spent some time playing on the N64 with Alex, and then Philippa and Paul came round and we got a takeaway from the Bengal Spice (which was very nice) and watched “The Emperor’s New Groove”, which was very good!

And… I think that’s just about all I have to say for the moment. Ciao for now… 🙂

Well, I’ve completed the ‘open source’ page on my new-look website. Have a look and tell me what you think!

The site is taking shape pretty quickly… the difficult bit is going to be integrating the blog. Ah well, let’s get the rest done and do that later…

It’s official. I don’t like Microsoft (well, I think they’ve done wonders for the computing industry in that you don’t have to have a PhD to be able to use a computer these days, and Windows is still much easier to use than Linux, but I think there are some things that are pretty bad, such as)…

I find it really ironic that my new design will display perfectly fine in Firefox, but in Internet Explorer it barely displays at all. The reason I find this ironic, is that it’s actually valid HTML, according to the W3C Validator! Microsoft just don’t make browsers that conform to standards… I don’t think I’m going to bother making my page work in IE. Anyone who uses it can just get themselves a decent browser! 😉

Speaking of open source software, I got a copy of Mozilla Thunderbird today. I have to say, all my fears about being compatible with Outlook were groundless — it seemed to import all my address book and emails without any problems. And works pretty well, although I haven’t been using it for long. I’ll let you know how it goes…

Well, it seems I’m doing pretty well on my open source quest. I think that there are only about three or four programs that I’m using which are proprietary software. If anyone has any suggestions for open source (a) FTP Programs, (b) music production programs, (c) DVD players then I’d welcome them! I know that the best freeware music production software is probably Buzz, but still.

Incidentally, there’s another piece of software which you might be interested in. If you want to create PDF files (for free), then check out CutePDF Writer. Although it is proprietary it is free, and relises on GNU (open-source) software. So check it out 🙂

I think that’s just about it from me. I might actually start up a page about this open-source crusade, perhaps something for the new site!

Ages ago, I mentioned that I was creating a new design for this site (I’ve had this one for long enough, I still like it but it’s time for something new).

Anyway, you can have a look at what I’ve done so far on this page — none of the links work as yet, and it’s pretty obviously not finished! But the basics are there.

Like it? Loathe it? Let me know 🙂