Just returned from a long weekend in France (courtesy of Mr Broadway) and it was excellent as always. Very good to catch up with old friends and a shame that some other friends were unable to join us (maybe next time?). This year seems to have been very devoid of gig activity for me, I'm hoping to see more bands live next year and may even dare to attempt to purchase festival tickets in 2009.
For now, Christmas is approaching and I am not quite as skint as last year, but by no means "well off". This of course means the usual traumas over what to buy for everyone.
Looking forward to upcoming Halloween parties (of which so far I have been invited to two - fortunately both are on separate days). The second of the two will take place at the humble abode of Mr Anderson and I am sure will involve the usual level of bizarreness that I have now come to expect (and in some ways rely on to provide entertaining after dinner anecdotes)! Should be a good laugh anyway.

A recent article in "PC Magazine" discusses the future of robotics. It talks of how robots could eventually work side by side with humans (picture a robot carrying a windscreen over to a car in a car factory, with a human worker guiding the windscreen into place). Already companies such as Honda and Toyota have built robots that they have employed to carry food and drink across to the tables of employees in their cafeteria. Both companies are quick to point out that their robots would be put to use to work with humans - to enhance life for humans - not necessarily to replace them.
For example robots could be employed in a military aspect, in dangerous situations in order to reduce the loss of human lives.
An interesting concept.
But as is the nature of humans, surely if one country employed robots instead of human soldiers, wouldn't everyone else follow suit? That being the case, would we not ultimately end up with a world war being fought by robots? With human leaders of the world sitting back, smoking cigars and not having to worry about the loss of life or moral implications of the war, it very much proves how pointless war is and in the event of the addition of robotic soldiers, how pointless war would be. Because in all instances, the point of a war is to basically inflict your opinion or control of people (not robots) and is measured by the amount of human destruction and suffering that is caused. The aim is to win by weakening your opponent, usually by destroying the opponent's human military force and bringing down systems that humans rely on. If your battle is being fought by robots for which there is less moral guilt regarding death rates, surely the whole purpose of war is negated? Read more...

...it seems such a long way away. I am desperately trying to sell the flat to raise funds to pay debts and reduce the number of bills I have to pay. This has necessitated a move back to my parents (bless them for taking me back in) in order to accomplish this. Additional strain is caused by the extended drive to work now involved (100 mile round trip). It seems that however hard I try to resolve this "debt thing" it will continue to haunt me for some time. I am over the overdraft by an astonishing £94 and I am still paying bills on the flat even though I no longer live there (water and electricity at the moment have yet to be cancelled). The best part is the cancellation of my Internet access at the flat - provided by Supanet. I have so far spent a total of 3.5 hours holding on their cancellation line, I sent them an e-mail requesting assistance with getting the account cancelled - only to be told to call the cancellation line!

My good friend, Craggle, described the beginning of Summer thus "I acknowledge the beginning of Summer by the sighting of a bird".  Nice, any particular variety?  So when in Scarborough mid-November, you spot a Seagull gently bobbing on the surface of the sea, you will know that this marks the official beginning of Summer!

This week so far, the weather has been fabulous (as far as UK weather goes) and it has filled me with joy, I need the weather to continue in the same vein over the weekend and particularly next week when I will be working an early shift (leaving me to sit in a beer garden and bask in the sunshine).

It's the weekend!  What more is there to say?  I am hoping that the weather will be lovely as it will make the weekend all the more pleasant, but I'm not too bothered if the weather decides to be rubbish because I am heading down to see Toby and Louise in their new abode near Greenwich!  I will be catching up on all the latest gossip regarding Baby Louby too!

I refer, of course, to the review skills of Miss Wilson.  An emerging critic in the world of the music connossieur as she discusses the finer points of Tom Baxter in her own unique style!

The "Ministry of Crap Ideas" has been active recently and have obviously been commissioned to assist Virgin Money with designing their telephone system.  All I want to do is find out why, 2 weeks after requesting it, they have not transferred my balance from another card to my Virgin card.  I can find out the current balance of my Virgin card and even the last transaction, but no-one will explain why the balance transfer has not happened.  I can even request a balance transfer by phone, but no information about a current balance transfer request.

If you choose the option to transfer a balance in the vain hope of speaking to someone, the call is placed in a bottomless pit known jokingly as a "queue" and I am told that the "Customer Support Team" (aka spotty, 18 year old chav with ever so slightly more concern for my plight as they have for, say, what colour pants I am wearing) are experiencing a large volume of calls.  The conclusion I have reached is, that Virgin Money must be really, really shite if so many people are having to call them to correct things and thus I should take my "custom" elsewhere.

I believe I would have more success in contacting the Tooth Fairy via fax than receiving any "support" from Virgin Money, perhaps I should invest in shares of bananas.  I anticipate that the banana trade will blossom and flourish since this appears to be the staple diet of the chimps that are employed to answer the phone for Virgin Money.

2008 clearly is not going to be my year.

So far:

1.  I'm in more debt than ever before.
2. The toilet broke, once repaired it developed a leak.
3. Some demented old man ran into the back of my car.
4. My Granddad's health deteriorated.
5. The washing machine is being "temperamental".
6. I can't book the necessary dates off work in June to partake in a proposed trip to France.
7. And finally, I get home from work today to be greeted by...

Marvellous. 

I pray that it can't get any worse (can it?).

Rising house prices, rising fuel prices, rising energy prices, increased taxes and interest rates on loans/mortgages, increased food prices, credit/debt problems. 

I could fix the problems of the UK in one fell swoop; the UK's biggest problem is people.  We have far too many of them and what do we need them for?  Why do we need a huge population?  Answer; we don't.  People cost money - lots of money (unemployment benefit, housing, policing, medical support etc) it's a bloody huge bill and it just keeps getting bigger.

Read more...

I found this item while browsing the net earlier and rather than finding myself astonished and disgusted, I in fact find myself intrigued by the comment "..by extracting the red body material from pregnant beetles".  How, exactly, do you "extract" the red body material from a pregnant beetle?  Ask it nicely?  Gas it and use a microscopic syringe?  It is my experience that beetles never sit still, even if you ask them nicely.

Does this then mean that we are unethically murdering innocent beetles just for their body pigments?  In much the same way as the evil poachers in Africa murder elephants just for their tusks?  Surely this is indecent and we should all be protesting against the cruel treatment of beetles.  That being said, I am pleased that this is not happening, since I would be sentenced to death for the number of spiders I have violently murdered - purely for being a spider.

I can't help feeling that on an enormous scale, someone is taking the p*$£ out of us all over the reasonably serious matter of the continuous destruction of our environment.

Don't confuse what I am saying, I am all for awareness and education and we should all be playing our part to help reduce the damage we are doing and give the planet a chance to try to recover - after all we are ALL responsible.  In fact, that is exactly my point.  Why are people such as you and I being made to feel as though we are directly responsible for the destruction of the Earth's delicate ecological balance, when all the time the fat cat, greedy money grabbing corporations are sitting back on their fat arses on huge super comfortable over indulgent arm chairs smoking enormous Cuban cigars and drinking the finest Brandy that money can buy?

Read more...

My already too short weekend has been obliterated by the joy of weekend callout. A seemingly minor customer test taking place over the weekend should not have required any support, yet I find myself being called into the office at 11am. What started as a simple VPN not working, became a SecurID authentication nightmare and the result? My bosses involved and me being at the office until 1:30am this morning! Pants.

I completely missed all of the days Rugby and spent the day tearing my hair out over something relatively trivial. My only salvation is that ITV will be broadcasting the Australian Grand Prix at 3pm today so I will be settling in to watch this before preparing for work this evening (dear god, I feel as though I have never been home).

Rant over, time for coffee...

It's interesting how some people just seem to be "plagued by demons" no matter what they do. I have a friend or two that, despite their best efforts, seem to be surrounded by an aura of misfortune.

This is also true of many other random people who I have never met, but see walking the street, it just seems that probably they are quite nice people, but there is something (perhaps spiritual, I don't know) that interferes and makes things difficult for them.

I am sure that the same is not true for all of them and that in many cases their troubles are all self inflicted (i.e. they could have prevented some things had they have actually mad an effort), but there seem to be some people in the world who just cannot avoid having rubbish things happen regardless of how hard they try. Read more...

I am so looking forward to going to Iceland to see the Northern Lights - I can't wait it's going to be awesome (and cold)! 1st of Feb here we come!!

A new year and hopefully a serious improvement in life.
I am feeling genuinely good about 2008 and so far I have stayed relatively happy and stress free. I am determined this year to learn to play the electric guitar properly and to keep up with regular visits to the gym - I will lose weight ready for the summer time and trips to the beach!