Posts tagged "Personal"
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Blogging again
Wow I can't believe I haven't blogged since 2019. I'm going to make an effort to blog a bit more, trying to crank out at least one thing per month, hopefully something thought provoking. I'll probably…
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My daughter, the reader
It's been amazing watching the youngest slowly get better at reading, then suddenly become hooked. The last week she's had her nose in books at every opportunity. It feels wrong telling her to put the…
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Halloween in Marrickville
Big night in Marrickville. Our area keeps getting bigger and bigger every year. We had a bunch of mates around for the festivities, quick barbecue then out onto the streets to scrounge sweets. Lots of…
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Nerd Dad does an experiment
On Saturday my nearly 5 year old asked me why the heat was going out of the room by him leaving the bathroom door open. He's not really ready for the Second Law of Thermodynamics just yet, so I though…
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Underbelly Arts
We went out to Cockatoo Island on Sunday to the Underbelly Arts Festival. It was a stunning sunny day and the kids had a fantastic time. Kids seem to immediately understand that "art" just means "play…
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Awesome weekend camping
We had a fantastic 4-day weekend camping with our kids down in Bundeena. Bit of a risk this late in the season but we got extremely lucky. 26 degrees every day! Our kids were a bit unwell at times, wi…
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Camping on a soggy weekend
I took Louis camping this weekend in Bundeena. Train, ferry then a short hike to the campsite on the edge of the Royal National Park. The weather outlook before we left was pretty shaky, and it lived…
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Home alone Dad, forced to fend for himself
Holly's out to see The Hobbit so I'm home along with the kids. Improvised Ploughmans of: Home made bread I baked earlier Leftover Xmas ham (almost finished) Selection of cheeses we didn't eat over Xma…
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Early start
Ruby has me out of bed at 0530 this morning so everything moved along earlier than usual. Got to daycare and realised we had 35 minutes to kill so we stopped for smiley babycinos.
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Brilliant Tumblr: Bargain Bin Blasphemy
via bargainbinblasphemy.tumblr.com via @robbie_shepherd
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Happy first birthday Ruby
Ruby turns one today. Amazing how quickly it's gone. She's a beautiful little girl with a huge personality. She'll be walking and talking soon!
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First Sydney FC home game of the season
Saturday night was the first Sydney FC home game for the season. A lovely warm afternoon and 35,000 people packing the stadium. Given the last home game last season had around 7,000, it was a very dif…
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Happy Birthday Louis
Louis is 3 today. It's gone so fast and he's grown into such a delightful boy. Beautiful day of presents then beach.
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Sad face
Yep, smashed my SGS3.
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Can Limited News at least be consistent please?
From the news organization that regularly rails against occupational safety rules as "red tape killing our small businesses".
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Communiction
Learning outcome 6: using spell check.
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Macquarie Lighthouse
We just did the tour at Macquarie Lighthouse in Vaucluse. Brilliant view and gorgeous day for it.
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Nice work Google
For the record, those devices are: Acer Iconia A500 Android tablet Samsung Galaxy SII HTC Desire Logitech Revue (Google TV) You'd think they could make it work on at last one of them if they're gonna…
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Great holiday
We just arrived home from a fantastic holiday in Culburra just North of Jervis Bay. We had Aaron great time, in spite of the weather. Tomorrow I start my new job at Vodafone. Quite looking forward to…
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Easter? Seriously?
It's 4th January.
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Ruby Rumble: photos
Ruby Rumble was born at 15:14 yesterday on 2nd November 2011. At arrival she weighed 2625g and was 45cm long. She arrived all in a rush in the end, popping out so fast the midwife had to quite literal…
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All set for the new addition
Time for a bit of an update I suppose. Our second child, a girl, is officially due towards the end of Nov ember. Holly's been in and out of hospital the last few weeks with high blood pressure, much l…
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Playground
Playing at Victoria Park.
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Bang the garbage
Louis teaches our garbage bin a lesson, then cackles at his own actions a few minutes later.
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Busy day
Busy day yesterday. Swimming, haircuts, lunch at Emma and Stu's, and finally watching a Newtown Jets match so Louis could have some time outdoors during a break in the weather. Nice, but exhausting.
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Getting older isn't all bad
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Changing jobs
I'm leaving Telstra Media this Friday for an exciting new job. I'm going to be Head of Data at Datalicious, a company doing cool stuff at the intersection of web analytics, big data and marketing. I'm…
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Red wellies!
Splashing around in the rain tonight in his bright red wellies.
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Ultrasound
As promised, here's the ultrasound of baby #2. As of last Friday the baby was about six centimetres long. More pics on my Smugmug.
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We're having another baby!
I'm very pleased to announce that Holly is about 12 weeks pregnant and we're due to have another baby in late November. Everything's going well so far and I'll have some ultrasounds to post shortly. W…
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Easter eggs!
First Easter egg. Yummy!
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Chicken dance with Grandma and DadDad
My parents are travelling around the country in their caravan so I got them set up with wireless broadband (Telstra, since then it'll actually work, even outside the cities) so they can stay in touch…
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On quacks and bogus "food intolerance" tests
Our doctor's surgery has been good to us, with a thorough GP who seems competent. I'd always been wary of the practice owner though, as she prescribes so-called Traditional Chinese Medicine (which is…
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Taronga Zoo
We took Louis to the zoo for his first visit on the weekend with his grandparents and cousin Abigail. We all had a fantastic time, and Louis now has a few more animals he can recognise and whose noise…
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Round and round
Louis has discovered spinning.
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Busy weekend
We had a very busy weekend. Saturday Linn, Sean, Cam and I put up plasterboard in the shoffice (shed/office). Lots of hard graft all day and much much appreciation for my helpers who slogged long and…
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Nice day at the water park
We spent today catching up with Julie and Finn who are in town from San Fran, along with Rachel, Matt, Maz and Jameson. Loads of fun.
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Lovely beach afternoon
Afternoon catching up with Nick, Linda & Lucas near Coogee.
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Peats Ridge update before New Year
Festival is great, if insanely hot. Tomorrow is forecast to hit 37 so we're likely to be packed and on our way pretty early. Disaster struck this morning: broken thong. Being a bloody hippy festival,…
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Lovely hat Louis
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Xmas photo
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Fantastic weekend
We've had a fantastic weekend. Gorgeous weather, good times. Yesterday we kind of hung around a bit, played, cooked and the like. I cooked up some patience-required pulled pork (more on which later).…
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Temperance Lane
What a great little bar!
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Louis has a water and sand toy
Louis loves his new toy, a water and sand table he got for his birthday.
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Child bike seats are problematic
Louis is in daycare and Holly starts back at work two days a week on Monday, so our attention has gone to a seat on our bikes for the boy to help with the daily commute. It's a bit problematic. To sta…
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Classy
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Welcome back to work
A good start...
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Fun in Greytown
We've had an odd day. Up very early, kids slightly ill and missed out on seeing any wineries. But it's been nice anyway.
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Louis gets another stamp in his passport
Flying into NZ.
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Louis has worked out steps
And he's pretty damn fast crawling these days too.
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Shed in the pipeline
We had the council's tree officer around yesterday to look at the tree we want to remove from our garden. It's a camphor laurel, an invasive non-native species. In much of NSW it's listed as a noxious…
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Fruitloop shop
Rachel and I took Louis out to Flemington for our fruit and veg co-op shop this morning. Holly got a sleep in. Louis loved all the sights, smells and colours. As usual the ethnic grandmothers loved Lo…
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Demon baby!
And then a cute one.
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World Cup 2010 for Louis
Gripping.
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Louis and Holly meet Tim Cahill
This time it was the Adidas store and both Holly and Louis got to meet Tim. Apparently tonight's Channel 7 news will have Louis!
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Tim Cahill: Follow your dreams
Just got to meet Tim Cahill and he signed Louis' ball.
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Wired baby monitor?
Baby monitors suck. Despite claiming to be "digital" and using the 2.4GHz frequency range, they don't actually seem to use spread spectrum radio technology. As a result you get terrible interference i…
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Ellinor's first birthday party
Birthday party in Dulwich Hill.
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Can sneezing really help treat depression? | Crikey
Can sneezing really help treat depression? by Amber Jamieson MP Andrew Robb writes in Crikey today about his own personal battle with depression. One quote in particular caught our eye: I employed var…
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Louis is growing
It's about time I gave an update on our son Louis. He's doing great, putting on 200 grams a week for the last two weeks and growing 3cm since his birth. All that growth requires a lot of food, which m…
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Welcome Louis Anthony Rumble
After a long and quite painful birth, Holly delivered our son Louis Anthony Rumble on Thursday 30th September 2009 at 22:53. He was 2.7kg (5lb 15oz), 48cm and all the bits in the right places. And abs…
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Rollercoaster ride: birth imminent
Holly and I have had a bit of a rollercoaster ride the last six days. On Friday she woke up with a headache in the early hours that stayed with her until it was time to get up for work. On her visit t…
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My new blog: Informed consumer
I've regularly thought about the imbalance between consumers and companies providing services. Having worked in telecommunications, it's really obvious. We have whole teams of people sitting around wo…
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Latest ultrasound
Here's the latest scan from this afternoon. 28 weeks and 2 days. Diagnosis: Normal growth and wellbeing. And here's Holly brandishing her disco biscuits.
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Tashman: an excellent driving instructor
I've been learning to drive in Sydney for the last few months with an excellent instructor who's been patient, thorough and reassuring. Tashman driving school has seen me through a bunch of lessons at…
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Eulogy for Anthony Rumble: 1972-2009
Below is the eulogy I gave for Anthony at his funeral yesterday. It outlines his life, and his achievments. I have had many comments from my family that they didn't know he had achieved so much, and t…
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Anthony Rumble: 1972-2009
My beloved brother Anthony died unexpectedly last Friday in his flat in Belmore, Sydney. He will be remembered as a devoted father to his eight year old daughter, as a loving brother and son, and as a…
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Important announcement
Holly's pregnant. We're having a baby. Didn't wanna beat around the bush on exciting news. Holly's 15 weeks up the duff, and we'll be parents in October. Very exciting, very life changing, very bloody…
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Hedge down and Myth in lounge room
Over the weekend we made a few changes around the house. The hedge out the front came down, which means the front looks quite strange since we're accustomed to the hedge. I'm thinking of growing a lem…
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Designing my lair
I'm planning an office/shed in the garden of our house, to provide an office for me and storage for the household. I've been mulling over the design for quite a while and now need to finalise it and g…
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Beer's Estate Marrickville
I managed to find a poster for the original sale of the land our house sits on from 1891 in the National Library of Australia's catalogue. $35 later and I'm the happy owner of a CD with a ridiculously…
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Happy New Year
I realise I'm about a week late, but hey I've been on holidays, for the first extended break in far too long, so I've been neglecting my readers. Too bad, I needed the holiday! So, it's a new year and…
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Giant CRX City Pro: not happy!
Letter I just sent to Giant Bicycles, who make excellent bikes, apart from this one. Anyone wanna buy a bike that could easily be converted into an excellent single-speed or fixie? In April 2007 I bou…
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Scott's bucks night
Geo: -43.105311,147.72546 On the weekend I flew down to Hobart for Scott's bucks night. It was held in a beautiful spot down on the Tasman Peninsula. About 20 of us camped out, drank a lot of beer and…
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Ten years!
Ten years ago I snogged a lovely young woman at The Globe nightclub in Newtown (now a backpackers hostel and pizza joint). Ten years on and we've travelled the world, cycled thousands of kilometres to…
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How to be popular
Break SHMBO's hair dryer while shrinking tubing for your new LED bike light system. Fortunately she has another, travel, one. Not as good, but it shrunk the tubing eventually.
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Liam Colm Askins
On Friday afternoon, Liam Colm Askins came into the world a bit early. The birth was straightforward and both mother and baby are doing well. Being a bit early, Liam will have to spend a few weeks in…
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Loads of photos
The trouble with the cheap, mega capacity memory cards you get these days is that I have less incentive to process them all. I've got a gig in my little pocket camera, and 2 gigs in the big one. This…
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Giant CRX City Pro: a year on
About a year ago, I blogged about my shiny new bike, a Giant CRX City Pro. I was very excited about the hub gears on it. A Mark Jones found my post and asked me about it, so I figure I should share my…
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Socceroos calendar
Since the FFA seems too clueless to provide this, I've created a Google Calendar with all upcoming Socceroos matches. I watch the football news about our team pretty closely, so I should be able to ke…
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Doctor reviews?
My GP has moved practices and is now based in Drummoyne, which is too difficult travel-wise for my tastes. So after being very happy with her, I'll have to change doctors. I'm sure the only industry w…
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Rainbow lorikeets in the garden
This afternoon we got visited by a flock of rainbow lorikeets, munching on the seeds from the tree in our neighbour's yard. They're such beautiful, colourful birds. Our garden really is a hive of wild…
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NYE 2008 and housewarming
The party at our new place last night was loads of fun. Stretching across twelve hours, a bunch of people tramped through the house, got drunk, danced and shouted at each other. Great fun! I took some…
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Car sharing
Mary laments the limitations of car share companies. Holly is in GoGet, so I thought I'd share our experiences. First up, "car share" is a misnomer. I'd consider that to be when you let people jump in…
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Moved into the house
We moved into our new house last Thursday and spent Friday and Sunday nesting. The move was pretty painless, with the removalists getting it all done in one truck load taking about two hours all up. W…
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Quite a week!
Quite a week. Australia signs Kyoto, we get our first (acting) prime minister, Howard is formally unseated. Oh and we bought a house! Holly and I had a poke around the house this afternoon, met the ne…
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Home owners!
Holly and I are now home owners. Settlement just happened and we are officially (part) owners of the house. We move in tomorrow.
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Some new photos
Finally got around to uploading the backlog of photos I've had. Sydney FC playing Beckham's LA Galaxy. A team so bad they made Sydney look good! Critical Mass crossing the Harbour Bridge in November.…
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That's an expensive stamp
One step closer to being home owners. We just paid our stamp duty. It's one hell of a stamp!
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Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race
Last weekend Holly and I drove down to Canberra for the Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race. It's been described as the Glastonbury of mountain biking, and it's pretty amazing. Hundreds of riders all on…
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Disappointed with the Nexus internal hub gears
I bought my commuter bike specifically to have minimal maintenance. In the last month I've been unlucky enough to cop two punctures in the rear tyre. The problem with this is that removing the wheel a…
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Torch as bike light
I'm doing the Scott 24 Hour mountain bike race this weekend with some mates. To mountain bike at night, you need decent lighting. The proper lighting kit is massively expensive and could easily be mor…
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Suddenly it's Summer
All of a sudden we've gone from bundling up with a blanket in the lounge room to full-blown Summer. 29 degrees over the weekend and 32 forecast for tomorrow! Just in time for a visit from Beth, who ar…
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Bring on the lifetime of crippling debt
Today Holly and I exchanged contracts on a house in Marrickville. Yes, this is the neighbouring house to the one we bid on a couple of weeks back. For those of you in the UK who seem to be able to hav…
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We bought a house! (nearly)
Holly and I last night negotiated the details of our purchase of a lovely house in Marrickville. It's next door to the place we bid on last Saturday. The process here is quite unusual. At the end of t…
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Auction: sheer terror
Holly and I went to a house auction this morning and placed some bids. It has to count as one of the most terrifying experiences of my life. In the end, the house went over our price limit and the two…
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Great weekend in Wamby
Had a great birthday weekend up the coast in Wamberal. Laura, Lillith, Emma and Holly came to stay in the beach house, Jacinta, Mat and Eamonn dropped by, and Ben and Kaz joined us for birthday dinner…
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What happens when you piss people off
While tweaking my site, looking through Google's stats for keywords hitting my resume, I noticed a couple of people searching for "Acumen Envision". It sent me down memory lane a bit. Back in 2001, wh…
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MTB training
Yesterday I went up to Gosford with Majella (Marion's sister) for a mountain bike ride with Ben (Holly's brother) and his mate Warren. We're all in the same team for the Scott 24 Hour Mountain Bike Ch…
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More reason why I don't have comments on my blog
61.238.244.86 - - [30/May/2007:06:55:35 +0100] "POST /blog/index.cgi/me/Comment_less_Blogs.html HTTP/1.1" 200 7516 "-" "-" This is someone randomly trying to post spam to a post I wrote ages ago about…
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Matt and Maz wedding photos
We went to Matthew and Marion's wedding last weekend. Loads of fun. After the reception, lots of people ended up at our place for the after party, including the bride and groom. Much fun had by all. P…
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Matt's bucks night
We went out for Matt's bucks night on Saturday night, and a good time had by all. We started in the Australian Youth Hotel in Glebe, then headed to the dogs at Wentworth Park. After the races we had a…
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A lifetime of crippling debt
Holly and I have decided to enter into a lifetime of debt. That's right, we're planning to enter the Sydney housing market. Eek! Scary shit eh? Now we, too, can bore everyone by talking about real est…
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Shiny new bike
Note: one year on, I've blogged about my experiences with this bike. I just picked up my shiny new bike. It's a Giant CRX City Pro which features Shimano Nexus internal eight speed hub, carbon fibre f…
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Happiness is a firm mattress
Holly and I ordered a new mattress for our bed last weekend. We've not been sleeping well for a month or two now, due to the crappy, saggy old mattress. The new one arrived on Saturday and it's amazin…
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Need a new bike
Just got a call from David at Cheeky who's been working on my bike. The spokes on both wheels were very loose, and the wheels were pretty badly out. The first spoke he touched broke off at the nipple,…
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Free as in beer!
My case of free beer just arrived. It's the James Squire Porter, a lovely drop. Only trouble now is getting it home from work. I think it'll have to be one six-pack at a time.
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Free beer!
I'm subscribed to the Malt Shovel Brewery's (of James Squire fame) email newsletter. The latest one had what I thought was a pretty condescending comment for something sent to self-identified beer lov…
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A Winter after two Summers
Last night I actually got a little chilly at the pub. We haven't had a Winter since we left the UK in April last year. Two Summers in a row was pretty luxurious, but we're actually looking forward to…
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How useful!
A job ad from realstate.com.au led me to their site, where you have to register to apply for a job. It helpfully tells you this: I can guarantee you, my password isn't made up of asterisks. Further hu…
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Lovely morning for a ride
Sunny when I left home. Sunny as I wheeled into the office. Pissing down the entire journey. Reminds me that I need to get some mudguards.
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Beach and beer
We had a great weekend up the coast at my parents' holiday house. We drove off on Friday night and watched a film when we arrived. Saturday morning we slept in, had a lazy breakfast reading the paper.…
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Flooding from the storm
There's rivers running down the roads near our place. Crazy stuff. At least some has hit the dams!
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Lordy that's real rain!
Just tried to get to work and was turned back by being soaked, head-to-toe, at about 1/3 of the way to the bus stop. This was with an umbrella. I'd got used to London rain where it's constant but does…
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Great party
We had our housewarming party last night and it was loads of fun. The theme was "Departure Lounge" and we had some fantastic costumes. Lots of boogie board bags with suspicious additions. Trolly dolli…
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Loving the beach!
My family has dinner together most Mondays. Last night we went out to Bronte Beach for a surf and barbecue. This is probably the best thing about being back in Sydney: getting to the beach regularly.…
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Good Invasion Day weekend
For those of you outside Australia, Invasion Day is Australia's national day. Officialy known as "Australia Day", it commemorates the day white people took over Australia. Hardly something to celebrat…
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El Nino winding down: Lake Eyre visit?
It seems that the current El Nino cycle is winding down, which should end the severe drought much of Australia is currently experiencing. It's common to assume that these droughts are somehow worse th…
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Happy season folks
Well it's Xmas here in Sydney and it's pretty warm and humid, raining but it's supposed to clear in the morning for the big day. Xmas is more hectic, as expected, being in the same country as the fami…
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Settling down in the Inner West
On Saturday I did some farting about in the house. Got flyscreens made for the windows, improved the window security a little, toyed around with my new Internode ADSL and Nodephone VOIP stuff. I also…
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Comment-less blogs
Russell Coker asks why people have blogs that don't allow comments. One thing: comment spam. But there are other reasons. It's a weird in-the-middle-of-nowhere forum system that never gets looked at a…
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Moved in
Well after the major hassle on Saturday, we finally got moved in yesterday. The house is pretty cool and we're already really enjoying hanging out in our lovely garden. Certainly makes a nice change a…
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Should I go to linux.conf.au?
Registrations are open for linux.conf.au and the programme looks quite interesting. For me it looks like Wednesday and Thursday are the most worthwhile days. Thing is, I'm a contractor and going means…
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Holly has a job!
Good news everyone: Holly has a job! She'll be starting next week at Odyssey House, an addiction charity. It's in the city, which means we're both working centrally. That'll be nice for a change.
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Moving!
Turns out we got the house in St Peters. Excellent stuff. We move on 18th November, so still a while to wait.
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Hopefully a home
We put a deposit and application in to rent a house in St Peters on Saturday. It's a lovely little two-story semi with a bit of open space at the front and a nice little unpaved garden out the back. T…
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Hot hot hot
It was damn hot from Thursday to Saturday last week. 37°C on Saturday! We went up to Wamberal and had a swim at Avoca and then Terrigal. Amazingly Terrigal had decent surf, which meant I had a bit of…
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Google love
I just had an enquiry from someone looking for a technical author. Sounds like good people, but it's in Brisvegas and wasn't paying enough to justify another move. Anyway, I was wondering how she foun…
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Got some work
I've finally got myself a job, doing content management at AAPT. Should be an interesting gig. It's interesting it's taken me a while to get work. The usual experience of recruit-scum being all hot fo…
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Plans for the next week or so
We're going to be in Sydney, staying at my parents' place in Gladesville, this week. We'll both be doing the job hunt thing and hanging about looking after my Dad who's got some back problems at the m…
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New site design
After four years with the old design, I've finally got around to redesigning my site. This time around I've used CSS for layout, which was one of those things I've been planning to do for a long time.…
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Holly's birthday
Last night we celebrated Holly's birthday and had our leaving do here in London. Lots of fun had by all. Thanks to all who came! Photos here.
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Well that's it for work
Today was my last real work day. Tomorrow is my last official day but we're having our end-of-project day, which means going to the National Gallery then boozy lunch and more drinks. Nice that work ar…
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Translation tools
This interweb thing is great! I've been translating a bunch of strings in our software at work from English into French. We used a translation company for most of it, but these are the little bits tha…
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Not a good start to the day
We had a rather abrupt start to the day this morning: the ceiling in our kitchen collapsed! There's now a 2m diameter hole in our ceiling. A few months ago upstairs had a leaky bath. The ceiling start…
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Howard's 10th Anniversary
Today is a good day to reflect on the fact that there will be kids in Australia starting high school this year who can't remember a prime minister other than John Howard. Scary. The sooner we get the…
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Moblog
Holly having a rest. I've defected to the snowboard team too. We still need some snow! Icy.
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Moblog
Interesting translation they've given on the second item there. For those not in the know, cheval is horse, not that you'd know from this translation. I'm sure they have a good giggle about it.
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Moblog
I trekked across the whole ski area today to Roche de Mio at 2700m. The glacier is higher but I need to cover some ground before the snow arrives. Snow is good though!
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Moblog
Here's Holly having (yet another) rest on the way down. She's improving fast!
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Moblog
Well now there's no snow forecast until Thursday but the snow groomers seem to have been out after their weekend break so the artificial snow is better distributed at least. On another note, I've swit…
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Moblog
Holly's taken some damage on the knees. Nasty.
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Moblog
Aidan just after midnight. Turning thirty does that to you.
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Bring on the newspaper wars!
Today we bought three DVDs with free newspapers attached. I love these newspaper wars! Daily Express went straight in the recycling, but we'll enjoy the Cary Grant film.
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Xmas at Pyrland Road
We just got home from Xmas at Scott and Katie's place. Fabulous day had by all. An appropriate level of gluttony and exuberence was had by all. Recipe for me curried cashews and cinammon almonds will…
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Brain warmer time
You can tell it's getting cold when I have to start wearing my sexy brain warmer on the bike. Keeps the ears warm. Holly bought it for me for Christmas last year, and it makes a real difference. Pity…
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We're going to Germany!
Australia won and we've qualified for the World Cup finals for the first time in 32 years! How fucking great is that? A video someone sent me of the fateful penalty.
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You lot who don't wear glasses wouldn't understand!
Had something amusing, though annoying too, happen yesterday. I broke my glasses frame last week and the new ones aren't ready yet, so I'm walking around like a dork with tape holding them together. L…
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Loads of photos
Been a busy few weeks and I've got a buttload of photos. James Foster's memorial ride Lovely warm Summer nights on the Thames Optronica at the National Theatre My 30th birthday party July Critical Mas…
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Big stuff today
Well in case you're wondering, Holly and I are fine after today's bombings. I rode my bike into work. Tavistock and Russell Squares are a few blocks from my work. Everyone at work (old and new) is fin…
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Last day at Pilat
Today is my last day working at Pilat Media. Judging from this nice little news story, not a moment too soon! What a delightful area. Anyway, I now have a week off work including Glastonbury, then sta…
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Tennis and football
Holly and I went to see Lleyton and The Poo at Queen's Club last night. We get freebie tickets because it's at the end of our street. Was good fun, though the Aussie lads really weren't at their prime…
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Week off
I've managed to score a week off in between jobs. Can't wait. Lots of things I need to catch up on, and little projects I've not got around to.
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Back on the bike. At last!
Finally got back on the bike today. Foot seems pretty much healed now, so I can ride again. Of course, luck being what it is, that will likely mean a wet ride home in London Spring drizzle. Was a nice…
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New job.
I just resigned from my job. I'm moving to Searchspace who make anti-fraud and anti-money laundering software. Quite looking forward to new challenges. Very much looking forward to using Framemaker ag…
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Apparently my foot is fine
Went for my appointment at the hospital's fracture clinic this morning. After an x-ray, the doctor said it should be fine now for me to start doing sport and the like. Disturbingly, he said that the x…
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Hey it's not just stupid me
On the London Perl Mongers list right now there's a discussion about mobile phones. Turns out I'm not the only idiot who has put a mobile phone through the wash. Yay!
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Ouch sore!
This broken foot is quite a pain. The flight from Australia was a nightmare with the foot swelling up enormously and an annoying bitch behind me kicking my seat constantly. Swelling has gone down now…
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Ack! Broken foot.
This has been an eventful trip to Sydney. I'm flying back to London tomorrow morning, but this afternoon while walking in Bronte, I slipped off the footpath, twisted my ankle and broke my foot. ARGH!…
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In Sydney for now
Results from my Dad's tests have shown his heart is fine. That's excellent news and means his chest pains were probably the result of stress over the last few weeks, and nowhere near as worrying. So I…
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I'm in Sydney
Haven't had a chance to post to the old blog for a bit. My grandmother died last weekend and so I flew into Sydney for the weekend. Now my Dad's sick, so I'm not sure how long I'll be here. I've alrea…
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Warming up!
It was snowing only a couple of weeks ago and this morning I rode to work in shorts and t-shirt. Beautiful weather and looks set to stay this way all weekend. 19 degrees yesterday! If this keeps up I'…
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Doh moment
Guess who managed to wash his mobile phone with a pair of trousers over the weekend? Doh! Amazingly, the thing still works. I let it dry out overnight, then tried switching it on and it's fine. Screen…
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A real dump of snow
Finally a decent dumping of snow. Even Stonebridge Park looks nice in the snow. The picture shows the view from work, with Wembley Stadium in the background.
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Snow!
After a week of false starts, looks like we've finally got a decent dump of snow. You can compare this picture with this one from the Summer.
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Invasion Day 2005
Last night we marked Australia Day, commemorating the big land-grab that was whitey's arrival in Australia, with a barbecue in Scott's backyard. Being in London, it is of course the coldest, bitterest…
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Bloody hell my foot!
I seem to have injured my foot. Possibly a stress fracture, according to the quacks. Hurts like buggery ("Nothing hurts like buggery" - Doug Anthony All Stars) and was throbbing all night. I'm off to…
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Reminder why I'm in a different country
Well, apart from this, anyway. I just spotted this out the back window of our flat. As you can see, autumn is well under way and the squirrels are gathering their supplies.
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Warm glove time
I switched to full-finger gloves on the bike today. Had the heading on briefly last night too. We all know what that means! cold weather here we come!
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Ouch! Snowdon
Holly and I went hiking in Snowdonia over the weekend with Andrew Allen and one of his mates. Andy, being the gung-ho type, insisted on doing the hardest route via Crib Goch which was more a rock clim…
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Satellite navigation for bikes?
Yesterdays ride ended up about 120km. My legs are very very tired, but it was a good ride. Good preparation for our big ride in a couple of weeks too. Gonna be a few days around that distance! Part of…
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New photos
Phew. Mammoth photo upload session and here they are. Memorial ride for James Visit to Sam, Stu and Alfie in Leicester Birthday drinks last week
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Summer?
So has summer finally arrived? BBC weather forecast has five days of sunshine. First time I've seen that in a long time! We're going cycling on Saturday, so some sun would be good!
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Silent Running
Got my bike serviced yesterday ( Mend-A-Bike in Fulham, very good) and oh what a joy it is now. All I hear is the wind whistling through my ears, which makes a change from the grind-crunch it's been m…
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Moved house...
We've moved into our new pad in Barons Court. Very nice place! Lots of sunlight in the lounge room and both rooms are very big. Now waiting on Ikea and their crap delivery service so we can get the re…
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Stock options are worth something?
Wow, apparently my work's stock is worth something, which means my stock options are actually worth something. Well, there's a first time for everything! Must be time to buy into Bubble Goo again.
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Beer is coming along
Well if you've been following this, I've been brewing some beer recently. I now have something like 60 litres of beer conditioning, and another 20 litres fermenting at the moment. The first two batche…
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Email down
By the time we arrived in Oz, my computer seemed to have lost contact with the outside world. The ADSL it's on might have crashed, but who knows. Major pain in the arse. If you're in Sydney, you can c…
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Got Glasto tickets
Well here's an example of how not to handle ticket sales for a large, high-profile event. Glastonbury tickets just went on sale, which meant getting up at 5am here in Sydney to start trying. It's now…
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Merry Xmas
If you're reading this and I missed you from the mass mailout of our xmas card, I apologise. Here's what you should have received.
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Off to Sydney
Holly and I are off to Sydney tomorrow morning for three weeks. If you want to call me, I'll mostly be at my parents place: 02 9879 0308. Should have access to email while I'm there too. Holly's havin…
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Still in Sydney
We're still in Sydney, until Sunday this week anyway. If you haven't managed to catch up with us, get in touch. Probably do drinks in Newtown on Thursday night. I'm actually working in the Sydney offi…
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Summer is here at last
Well it looks like summer has finally hit here in London. It's a beautiful sunny day outside. Last night we slept with all the windows in the house open. Great, except for the annoying fly buzzing aro…
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We're moving
We're moving house tonight. It's been a bit of a drama so we're technically homeless for the next month or so. We had found a brilliant place in Baron's Court, but that fell through from the landlord'…
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We've moved
Well it was a very long weekend, but we've managed to move house. We're staying with friends in Blackheath until we're back from Oz when we'll look for our own flat. Computer is off the air until toni…
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In the bucket
Well the beer's in the bucket and on its way. Looks good! Mmmmm.
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Mmmm. Beer.
Last night I started my first solo batch of homebrew beer with a yeast starter. The yeast were bubbling away this morning, multiplying like mad and looking good. I'll chuck the kit in the fermenter to…
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That's Uncle Simon to you
Well it looks like I'm an uncle again. After a protracted labour eventually requiring caesarian, Holly's sister Sam gave birth to Alfie early this morning. Mother, baby and dad are reportedly all well…
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Great party
We had a housewarming/birthday party on Saturday night. Had a fabulous time with loads of good friends. Such a good time that I forgot to take any photos. London's transport system causes an interesti…
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Email is back
My email is back up and running. Due to a failed backup CD, I lost about month of emails... Grrr... Time to work out a better backup system.
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Email is down
My second hard drive failed on Saturday in the major hot spell. It really is rather annoying how much heat hard drives put out these days and how poorly their design dissapates that heat. Worse, you c…
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Now it's back
Well the problem wasn't as serious as I thought, though I'm still getting loads of IDE errors. Email is flowing again. For now.
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Mabye not
Well now it looks like my computer is really fuxx0red. If you need to contact me, email won't be working until I fix it. Try other methods.
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Email is back
Email is working again, so you can contact me that way again if you need to.
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Email is down
Something strange going on with my computer at home. Getting all sorts of weird errors on the IDE bus. Looks like I'm gonna have to strip out all my drives and test each one to work out what the probl…
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Fun day out
Wow it's a been a busy weekend. Last night we, on the spur of the moment, went to Soxan in Whitechapel which was excellent. It was really really good, with excellent music and, here's the amazing comb…
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The sun is out!
The sun is out and it's lovely! After the usual long and dreary London Winter, the spring has finally arrived. The trees are blooming, daffodils are breaking through the grass and our basil, chive and…
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We wuz robbed
We got broken into on Monday night and a heap of our stuff was stolen. They broke in while we were out for only 35-40 minutes and my guess is that they had a key because they knew they could get in an…
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A forgotten public institution
Yesterday I joined up to our local library. It's been years since I've belonged to a library. Probably the last one was the university library just after high school. I'd forgotten what glorious place…
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Spring is coming
Well the days are getting longer and it's getting warmer. The daffodils have been poking through the last few weeks. It's quite amazing where they come through, mostly they're not planted but just pok…
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Flat is go, heating and all
Well it took a bit of hassling get everything right but we now have our flat all kitted out. Yay! Considering it's going to be -4 degrees tonight, I'm pretty glad we've got the heating going. We've ha…
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Moved in, just one problem
We moved house over the weekend. The new place is fantastic: large, bright, airy and clean. We chose the place for those reasons. There's one rather major problem though: the central heating doesn't w…
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We found a new place to live
Holly and I have been hunting around for a new place to live for the last couple of weeks. We've decided it's time to live on our own, adult-like, the already-noisy road outside our bedroom window is…
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Bleurgh
Feel like shit. Holly brought home the gift that keeps on giving: a cold. Yucko. Off work today and about to go back to bed.
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Snow!
Wow. The last couple of days it's been dumping down snow. It started yesterday morning when we got up and saw snow everywhere. Then last night, around 17:20, it started really dumping. Probably droppe…