Watch This Space

For some reason I've been finding it hard to muster the enthusiasm for a fresh blog post this week. Don't know why. Anyways, work stuff is under control, got a new project, just a tiddler but it'll do. Although change does not appear to be thrusting itself upon me in this new year, I've sort of talked myself into it I think. So we'll see what happens work-wise. I'm up for change. Watch this space.
Worked at home today cos I had a dentist appointment this morning. Ouch. Later in the afternoon we popped into the Citroën dealer and spotted a Picasso that we liked. Top end of our budget, but it's got all the bells and whistles on it. Having a test drive tomorrow to check it out some more. Watch this space.

Next Project Please

Finished the project at Manchester today. Glad to be finished, I've been stuck in Excel hell for months. It will be interesting to see what projects are available when I return to the office on Monday. I've done a little bit of groundwork to check out options if it's time to move on. The more I think about moving contracts the more exciting the prospect seems. Talking with Trapper this afternoon he talked about work down at Grain where the BIG money is, I doubt whether the opportunity will arise or if I have the commitment to go for it.

iPhone

Followed the Macworld Expo keynote by Steve Jobs live this afternoon by constantly refreshing the live blog page on Endgadget. It was quite exciting watching the event unfold piece by piece with every new press of the F5 key. So it turned out that the iPhone DID exist and wow, it looks so sweet. The way it brings together all the things you could want in a portable device is just so cool. Apple really know just how to do things RIGHT. It seems so obvious when Apple show their stuff but how come no-one else can get anywhere near them? It just makes other devices look DUMB. Seems that Europe will get the phone at the back-end of the year, I wonder in what form that will appear and on what networks. I know which phone I'll be getting when my current contract runs out.

Happy New GTD

Spotted in Merlins del.icio.us links, an interview with him in which the New Year is mentioned as a popular time for adopting the old GTD. You could say this is obvious, but it was news to me (duh). I think I should take a return visit to GTD-land this week and try and get my act together. Check out the interview/podcast here.

Computer Down, We Have A Computer Down

Urgh. Our main PC 'Pooter' has died. Hard disk boot failure. I can fix it, in fact I've still got some warranty cover on the damn thing, but part of me doesn't even want it fixed (even though I have to rescue a whole bunch of photos and mp3's). Why don't I just go and get myself a shiny new iMac instead? Maybe later in the year I guess. Let's see what is announced at MacWorld next week. I'm really looking forward to hearing the news. It's interesting to note how my media landscape has changed over the last year or so in that it's podcasts like MacBreak Weekly that I'm looking to for my informed opinions. Go Leo!

The Old School

Yesterday I took trip to see the Smethwick Photographic Society in Oldbury and came away unimpressed. There's a thread on flickr where I discussed this so I won't duplicate, but suffice to say, it re-enforced my rejection of the 'old school' of photography I remember from the eighties. And it seems a couple of people in the Birmingham group have had a similar relationship with photography to me, being re-inspired by the arrival of digital and the very wonderful world of flickr.

Nice Timing For A New Year

Back at work and hearing stories of possible slow times at the company I'm working for. Thoughts immediately turned to my options and I called up Phil for his always positive advice (thanks friend). Of course I'm slightly over-reacting, but that's deliberate. If this does turn out to be the moment to change contracts (and I'm not completely sure that it is), then it's good to be prepared and have all avenues explored.

So time to do some networking and see what's out there. I must admit that the prospect of some sort of change is quite invigorating. Nice timing for a new year.

Post-Holiday Mind

So I've fallen back into the rut of dull posts of late, just recording events. Well, as enjoyable as this Christmas holiday has been (and it has), it doesn't really make for great postings as my mind has been generally on just enjoying the moment (unusually for me). With the working year about to force it's way back into my life tomorrow, the mind re-emerges from this holiday-mode bliss and maybe I'll have some drivel to blog about again.
I suppose I should have been at work today but as we're all still just getting on our feet post-vomitting virus I went easy on myself. So today has been a sort of limbo-day where, in the background, I've started to try and reconnect with various work-related thoughts and tasks. To be honest it's been a struggle to remember where I'm at, so I hope I can pull off a convincing 'committed' return tomorrow when in reality I've had a complete brain-wipe and I'm totally chilled. For myself I'm pleased about this mental state, but I don't suppose work contacts would be that thrilled if I were to share my enlightenment.

One Last Post For The Year

This Christmas holiday has gone so very fast I can't fathom it. It seems like just a moment ago we were unwrapping the prezzies and now it's a week later and thoughts are turning back towards the working week. New Year holds no attraction for me whatsoever so we probably won't be doing much. I'm just recovering from a bout of vomitting that took down me and Harriet in the last few days, hopefully the other two have dodged it. Our wonderful Nintendo Wii has sustained so much fun during this week that it's already earned its keep in our house.

Boxing Day

Mary's team were all sick so the gathering at our house was five less than normal. Still, a pleasant time nonetheless. Loads of food and goodies left over, oh well, I suppose I can finish it off ;) Dylan getting into his new Zelda adventure on the Wii and Harriet designing everyone in the Mii channel. Everyone loving the Wii (Rayman was a big hit) although as usual I'm not getting much action. Browsing the internet from the Wii works easy enough although it would look much better on a HD TV!

Merry Christmas!

Lovely christmas morning with all of the unwrapping. The kids loved the Wii, got that up and running and online in no time, real smooth installation. Jacq and I didn't do presents for each other for the first time this year and to be honest, I didn't miss it.
Stayed away from the goodies all morning to clear the way for christmas dinner which was a gorgeous feast. Lots of Wii playing in the afternoon mostly with the Sports and Play titles. Everyone wearing their straps and no injuries to report (although Jacqs arms ached the next day from the tennis!).
My parents came over at 4:00PM for more prezzies, a bite to eat and more Wii play. Even my mom was enjoying having a virtual bowl so Nintendo were right, the Wii IS for non-gamers.

Jacqs 40th

Jacquies 40th birthday spent up town in a posh hotel in town. My parents came over to look after the kids and off we went. We checked in at the hotel about 4:00PM and I requested a corner room for the extra space. The room was fantastic and the floor to ceiling windows gave a great view out from the ninth floor.
The complimentary bottle of wine was swiftly necked as can be seen in the photo. In the same shot, you can spot the MacBook with me in its camera sights enjoying the free broadband. I was well impressed with the design of the toiletries and was compelled to take a photo. Well, I don't think it's weird.

We went out to eat and more drinking around the canal and Mailbox area. Town was chilly and christmassy, it was nice to be wandering around just the two of us. We went to the Electric Cinema to watch Pan's Labyrinth. We watched teh film from a sofa with a nice bottle of wine. The film itself was good but pretty harrowing in places. After the film we hit another bar, the Sunflower Lounge. Standing at the bar amongst the young people was entertaining as was the conversation. And of course, more drinking. Can't remember what time we left there but it was a short stagger back to the hotel and straight into the hotel bar. We took our drinks back to the room but couldn't even finish them. Game over.

You can imagine how we felt in the morning. It wasn't pretty. Some nice fried food at breakfast helped steady me. Then we made our way slowly home for a quiet Christmas Eve.

Armed With Torches

We got a Wii!! Jacq took the kids to the cinema and I popped into town to pick up the Nintendo goodness. Phew, that's a relief, the kids have a main Christmas present after all. Who's that saying that the present is really for me and Jacq? Shame on you!

Tonight Mike and I went out with Paul for the obligatory Christmas drink. Not that it wasn't pleasant, but when things get to the once-a-year state, what does that say? I don't know. The highlight of the night was walking back from the pub and talking a short-cut through the woods armed with Mike's torches. Mike always has torches about his person, he's that kind of guy.

Not Christmas Shopping

Lovely day today, blissfully away from the hellhole that is christmas shopping around about now. We went to see Flushed Away which was great. I laughed out loud plenty of times. Great voices, great slapstick humour, rats getting their nuts bashed, and a healthy dose of French-baiting, everything that a movie needs for greatness. CG not bad but could have been better. After the cinema we took a stroll around the German Market which was not too packed as everyone was probably going headless-chicken-crazy around the shops. Sampled many yummy foods then popped into the Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery for some culture. A choir in one gallery was providing a very festive ambience. I lingered a while in the Buddha Gallery. We did some interactive and craft stuff in some of the other galleries. I liked an artist called Robert Perry a local guy I'd not heard of before who paints exclusively outdoors. Next door to an exhibition by Patrick Hughes of his perspective paintings that the kids liked.

Having my say.

Hi,

Wife here. Went to Dylan's school play today and what did Mark do throughout? Play games on his phone!

Then we went to the dentist and Mark was the only one that needed treatment - hurrah.

Christmas Disco

It was the Christmas disco at school tonight. Dylan went for the first time. Sounds like he and his mates had a great time. He said they were dancing but I bet they were also doing their share of kung-fu fighting and the like. Harriet went after, looking cute. She also won two prizes in assembly today, runner-up in a card design competition and a 'respect' award for just being generally nice I think. So proud.

Tonight on the computer I discovered MediaMonkey which looks like a real good management tool for large mp3 collections. I'm loving it right now. Hopefully it will assist me in grappling with the huge admin task of sorting out my tags and coverart.

Christmas Tree

Thankfully, this morning I wasn't suffering from the beers the night before, which was a bonus. I got down all of the Christmas stuff from the loft and we set about putting up the tree. Weather was dreadful so we spent the whole day inside. The weekend finished off with another splendid episode of Lost.

Chancers Winter Meetup 2006

Today was the Chancers meetup and it was truly awesome to see everybody, Phil, Dan, John (Trapper), Adrian, Mike (The Fox), Chi, Dave, Geoff and Steve.

Phil and I travelled into town together and worshipped a short while at the Apple store before heading into the German Market for some knoblauchbrot and glühwein. We then met up with everyone else at the Malt House pub. It was a joy to see that pretty much everyone had turned up.

Chancers chow-down at the Big Wok

Plenty of beers and much chinese food was consumed and LOADS of good conversation was had. A few of the guys expressed real pleasure at the common experiences we had during our time at Siemens and the fact that we are making a real effort to keep in touch with the meetups. Long may it continue I say.

Chancers 'chilling' outside the Sunflower Lounge

Chancers bid farwell at New Street station

See you all at the Summer 2007 meetup guys!

Drifted By

The week has drifted by without a blog post. Just haven't been in the mood. It was Jim's funeral on Wednesday. Not a fun time, but went as well as these things can.

A gathering tomorrow of the Chancers. Looking forward to it. And on Sunday it's putting up the christmas tree time.

This is a rubbish blog post and I thinks I'd better just stop and go to bed.

Through The Viewfinder

Finally, after scoring myself a Kodak Duaflex on eBay, I took my first TTV snaps today. I haven't yet built the required tube for it but I just wanted to click something in the back garden. I'm really expecting a big boost in photographic inspiration with this contraption as I love the grungy square format. Expect my photostream to be flooded with the stuff soon.