Uncategorized
Summer Learning…
What I learnt this summer… The summer is never as long as you think it will be. Shorts are de rigur for hot days spent at a desk. Shorts should not be above the knee, unless you are a Scout or can pull it off (I’ve certainly tried but my pins / buns don’t quite […]
Some Frequently Asked Questions
It occurred to me that there is a pile of (literally) Frequently Asked Questions of me and by me, some that are asked on a daily basis, or at least a handful of times a week. I’m sure I’m not alone in addressing some of these questions asked of us by our loved ones, house […]
Sxsw day 0 . Getting to Austin
I kiss my dressing-gowned wife a goodbye and my journey begins. The taxi driver to the bus station tells me how he went on a long haul flight for the first time last year on a holiday to Florida and he found it scary, but it was okay. We chatted about what I might find […]
Alan Dix – Walking Wales
Alan Dix is an author, professor, and it seems, a keen walker. His primary interest at large is how people interact with computers at large. Initially, his research has been around the physical input methods and user interfaces of the devices we use and the ways in which we engage and work with others through […]
2012
It’s January 2013 and today is my 35th birthday. There’s nothing inherently peculiar about that – a year has ended and another begun. It’s that mid-point through the first month of a new year and the Idea of a new date is settling as it does every year: cheques have been signed with an incremental […]
Twitter in wordpress Woes
Just a quick note to anyone experiencing twitter feed difficulties in WordPress – specifically ‘twitter for WordPress’ or old jquery.twitter plugins. It seems as though a twitter api agreement has changed (probably set in motion a while back, but only the last few days has made the switch) For ‘Twitter for WordPress’change the line: $messages […]
Thrifty times
It was an early start to the day with a rude awakening from one of the other house guests, Maya the bengal cat. She and mariska are staying with my parents for a few weeks while a friend moves house from Porthcawl back to her home country. They are magnificent beasts, with very individual temperaments […]
Richmond in heat
After arriving in virginia late Saturday and a lazy Sunday, aside from a spot of gardening in the morning, today was labour day in the U S of A. Commemorating the signing of labour laws, but now a good excuse for a Monday off work and traditionally a big BBQ day. My parents aren’t really […]
Back to Pisa
After breakfast, we bid farewell to the mountains and made our way back to Milan by bus and train to get our long train back to Pisa. We originally thought our flight was tomorrow, but turns out it’s Wednesday, so another night in Pisa has been booked. I’m quite looking forward to Pisa, despite a […]
Giorno cinqo
Lazy day. Walked down the hill to Argegno town, pizza by the lake. Walked back up the hill, nap in the hotel. Cola and reading on the lawn.Shower and walk back down the hill for dinner. Made cultural faux pas by confusing the locally tart, slightly fizzy red wine with something gone bad.Had three gelatos […]
Giorno tre
Our last morning in Milan was a quick affair. Despite my best intentions, I failed to make an early morning wander / photo ramble on any of our days in the city and Friday was no exception. After breakfast we got to the train that would take us north to lake Como where the wedding […]
Giorno quatro
Waking from a long hot sleep, we joined the other guests at the breakfast table for brioche and nescafe instant cappuccino (when oh when am I going to get a decent coffee in Italy?). Thankfully the rain seemed to have stayed away despite the forecast. Once all suited and booted (or jacket and sandled in […]
Giorno duo
My romantic vision of today was to wander through the brera part of town. The guide books promise a wealth of interesting little shops, galleries, studios and cafes. We didn’t quite find the bohemian treasures I had imagined, but were did take a peek around the astronomy department of the university and stumbled upon ARMANI’s […]
Giorno Uno
Luckily I awoke to the sound of the underground (literally – the metro is below our hotel) as the shutters on our window betray any sense of the time if day. I was worried that we almost ‘Did an Osaka’ (where we slept in until 3pm due to the effectiveness of the curtains), but we […]
Milano
Debbie and I are taking our first (non-family) based holiday in a while. We’re heading to lake Como in the north of Italy, but first, we’ve decided to spend a few days exploring the sights, sounds, and smells that the country’s second largest city has to offer.We arrived in Pisa yesterday morning and Emory got […]
channelling
The day’s task was to get back to the hook of Holland in time for our 2pm ferry. In my mind that would be a genteel trip to Massluis (where we got Gareth’s bike fixed on the first day) where brunch would be taken before meandering back to the port. however, the weather finally caught […]
Rotter. Damn.
After the tourist saturation and relentlessness of Amsterdam,Rotterdam feels more spacious and laid back, albeit with an underlying seriousness. in many ways it reminds me of Osaka. having been demolished during WW2,it’s full of quite brutalist modernist architecture, and seems to have a decent amount of cultural things going on to give it an important […]
Dam day
I woke quite early and went to forage for breakfast with orjon. after a few rounds of coffee and toast,we made our way back up to the centre. I cant remember if there ever was a plan to ‘do’anything,but it was agreed that eight people feels like a critical mass when it comes to touring […]
On a boat.. .
All meeting up at Liverpool street station, each of our trusty steeds in tow it was suddenly real. A night spent catching up over beers on a ferry and 5 hours sleep later and the rudest of tannoy in the face wake up calls, we’ve hit the cycle paths of the Netherlands.Today was marathon trip […]
Venezia!
Aaah, venice with your open sewers and creepy carnival masks, you’re so romantic! We disembarked this morning and spent a few sunny leisurely hours wandering up and down canals around the piazza de roma before grabbing a pizza and beer for lunch and mozy-ed onto marco polo airport where I’ve just had the best coffee […]
Cruise culture
Yesterday was ‘easter saturday’ at sea. Perfect – a time to catch up with done reading, drawing and music listening. Although it did feel like a lot of finding a spot on deck for half an hour only for the wind to pick up and for a tea break to raise it’s head.It was decided […]
Rhodes
“what’s Rhodes like?”“you drive cars down them”A heavily fortified port town that appears to have had it’s fair share of power struggles and handlers over the years. We had a good amble through the walled old town, ate some dolmade and greek salad in the sun. Had we more time, it would’ve been good to […]
Yissaou!
I think it’s thursday. I’ve still not managed to upload my blogging, but still intend to write this bastard thing till the end for the heil of it. Yesterday we arrived in grecian waters and stopped at the port of katakolon, famous for being near olympia, the birth place of the games. Shunning any organized […]
Toot toot, all aboard!
Belated Monday 18th AprilWell, this is a report on the first full day at sea. I did write a rather long post yesterday on our first day of travel and my initial apprehensive thoughts on the matter of spending the next week on a cruise ship. Technology failed my uploading and seemed to have erased […]
Toot toot, all aboard!
Well, this is a report on the first full day at sea. I did write a rather long post yesterday on our first day of travel and my initial apprehensive thoughts on the matter of spending the next week on a cruise ship. Technology failed my uploading, so I will consider it gone and attempt […]
Android apps to get
This list is a little outdated, but might be useful for folk who’ve just got themselves a new android… ASTRO – file manager. there’s a full feature free version (with ads)This is kind of like ‘finder’ on your droid – you can back up apps you’re not using and reinstall back up apps from your […]
Musings on androids and i-devices
So, I’ve been using an android phone (HTC desire) for the best part of two months now after a fair bit of research and although I could have gone iPhone, I made a considered decision to sell my part of my soul to Google (Apple have had a good share of it up until now). […]
Going Android
I do indeed have an ‘Android’ phone – the HTC desire.I had initially wanted to get the Legend – it’s a looker, and seeing as my main computer is a macbook pro, I wanted a ‘mobile computer’ to match (that is after all what these smartphones are – computers, say goodbye to the simplicities of […]
in org your ay shun
They say yesterday was the most depressing day of the year. Without realising it, I was indeed very down in the dumps for no real reason. it was raining on me during my cycle into work, I was REALLY tired and brain dead after a weekend away and I had far too much to think […]
You shouldn’t be on the Pavement
My bike is my main mode of transport. Closely followed by my legs, taxi’s, buses and as a passenger in my girlfriend’s car (I do have a license to drive, but I”m out of practice, scared of driving and feel eviro guilt). I cycle to work every day, and back again. I normally adhere to […]
ripped jeans
It’s a few years late, but I’ve finally got myself a pair of ripped-in-the-knee jeans. I’d had a day of not much direction and very little focus – going from errand to errand, which involved buying a new inner tube for my bike as my back wheel was so peppered with punctures it only seemed […]
back on the horse. (not that one)
Maybe it’s my lack of getting up early over the winter months, a periodic dissatisfaction of always being ‘on’ , or forgetfulness but after not touching my blog for a while, I fancy getting back on the wild horse that is wasting time writing my blog. Most of my entries seem to start this way, […]
Full Effect
I was thinking just the other day that something was missing in my life. Not physical things – I have an amazing girlfriend, a house, a cat, a speedy bike and just about enough gadgets (although a DS would be nice). No I realised I was lacking a certain ephemeral something. I tried some yoga, […]
Twothousandandeight – Don’t be late
aaaaaaah! the feeling of a freshly laundered year is here again just like clockwork.I’m back from America now – I had intended to be up early every morning and type away musing on the oddities of US living while sipping a mug ‘0’ Joe, but before I knew it xmas was done and I was […]
Back in the USSA
After 21 not so long months I find myself back in the Not-so-United-States (which can’t even make their own laws anymore without the feds busting asses) of-Dissary. Oh I mean America. I don’t mean to sound so jaded, but it’s barely 7.30 in the morning and I can’t sleep due to jetlag. Yesterday when I […]
Folicles Nonicles
Well it finally feels like the shock of the new is wearing off. No, I’m not talking about Contemporary art’s 20th Century rebellion against the bourgeois, I’m talking about my new haircut.For those of you that don’t know, I got a haircut last week. No great shakes I hear you cry, but all weekend, if […]
needles
I had my first ever acupuncture session yesterday, quite by accident (and no this isn’t a euphemism for anything hypodermic). I’ve been having a problem with styes and odd lumps on my eyelids that have come and gone for well over a year now, and the last wonderfully disfiguring bunch have been with me for […]
better than crack
AAAAAAAAHHHHHHH! It’s that first sip of ‘espress’ froth from the top of my milky-yet-atomic strength steaming mug of coffee in the morning. I don’t care if it’s an addiction, it’s damn fine. That is all.
Done to your hair
Well, I’m into my second week of full-time freelancing, and while it’s had it’s fair share of downs as well as ups, it has been great. Still trying to build up a portfolio of good habits, my ‘getting up at 6.30am’ only really lasted Monday and Tuesday of last week but were then scuppered by […]
Clawing and Biting
Egads! it’s been well over a month since my last posting here, and I guess a fair amount has been happening in my life and the world generally (the crazy flood weather, I went to Egypt for a holiday, my friends are all still getting married left right and centre, and Mord the cat still […]
salad days
I don’t know what it is with the Autumn, but there’s something in the air that means an astonishing number of Birthdays in May and June, I guess it’s the realisation of the cold winter months approaching that makes folk need to cuddle more? I’m not complaining, but so many people I know have birthdays […]
don’t fade away
It’s sad that in order for everyone to meet up in solidarity, warmth and a common bond, to catch up with long lost relatives, friends you haven’t seen for decades (or in fact an excuse for a good old chin wag with good friends that live round the corner, but you never normally manage to […]
life and loss
As I was leaving Allen’s Bakery this morning (Allen’s is a glorious place hidden in an alley way in darkest Roath, Cardiff with an old Victorian oven and fresh organic breads, ciabatta and pastries.yum) I was stopped by an elderly gentleman, in his 80’s. I’ve seen him getting a morning pastie from there before, but […]
werking and Conning
Again I feel I need to begin this entry by aplogising for not updating my blog enough – crazy really because I doubt anybody reads it ever – but to just make sure they don’t I’ve added the google analytics thingy to it.the last few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind really – […]
Homey-oh! Path
This time last week I was pretty much caffeine free and in the throes of a psychological and emotional purging. One may have enhanced the other, I’m not too sure, all I know is that I’m back with the drug I love (caffeine, although not to extent I was) and I’m still feeling the effects […]
cafeeeeeeeeeeeeeine
Well, maybe my last post was a tad reactionary and off the cuff, but I had given drinking coffee this week in a vain attempt to quit caffeine, but ended up drinking loads of tea for the first few days, but today all I’ve had so far is a couple of cups of DECAFFEINATED coffee. […]
Sprung
Well well well, I’ve finished my 6 month post-grad-dip at dimension 10, and now I’ve got a few freelance projects bubbling away for the next month which is rather exciting. I’m meeting someone tonight to hopefully get placed on a work attachment with their company and learn my mystical ways of the motion graphics ninja! […]
Glaswegian kiss
Och aye! I traveled up to Glasgow last week with my friends the Panacea Society for a gig at the National Review of Live art. It was great fun – I was doing the visuals for the band and got to hang out with some lovely people including my old college chum Richard. Glasgow seemed […]
oh seven
In this coming week I’ll be busy moving house and looking forward to the shiny new year that is 2007.Going against my grain of previous years, I’m attempting to make some resolutions for the coming 12 months… I’m going to become vegetarian again. I’ve recently found myself getting greedy on the flesh front in a […]
Traaaaaaaas
A week ago I shot, cut and sent off my entry to the Radar Festival. I doubt I’ve a Rat asses chance in hell of getting anywhere with it, but I’d be kicking myself if I didn’t at least try. Admittedly I had all Summer to make this, but the deadline got extended, I started […]
Rock, Paper, Saddam
Saddam Hussein: Sentenced to death for the 1982 killings of 148 Iraqi people in the town of Dujail. G.W. Bush: President of the most powerful nation on earth after presiding over an illegal war based on lies that has killed over 650,000 Iraqi civilians. He was a murderous, nasty and often down right crazy leader […]
animal emotion
I just read this article on whether or not pets and animals in general have emotions and consciousness. Is it just me or is that not absurd? not the fact that animals have awareness of themselves and others around them, but that some people find it so hard to imagine that humans might not such […]
Idiots
I’ve been off school with a flu type thing all week, and so have rarely ventured out of the house. Yesterday, I popped to Abdul’s (the corner shop by our house) to pick up some washing up liquid only to walk into a crime scene… A Policeman, Abdul, his wife and one shopper who witnessed […]
Fight
Over the weekend I travelled down to Bracknell (between Reading and Slough) to take photos of a Kickboxing Tournament called “Armageddon”. I went down with the Widelode boys as they were making a DVD of the event and needed a photographer, So I donned my photographers pants and had a quick round of Streetfighter2 on […]
me and the doctor!
Well well. For some bizzaro reason I recieved an invite to the torchwoood premiere in Cardiff Bay last night. It was quite a funny scenario with a whole host of fellow reprobates I know huddled about drinking far too much free wine and eating mini food off trays – the mini fist-sized chipolata bangers and […]
10th dimension
Well my internationally renowned and top rated blog has admittedly been on the back burner for a while, but I’ve been busy in the real world, only to spend more time in online funnily enough.I’ve just started an Interactive media post graduate course with CYFLE so I’m currently going bloggin’ crazy! – I’ve set this […]
Dead Animal Round up
Well I’ve been in a whirlwind of change and busy-ness the last few weeks – and no bloggin action has taken place! I was going to write a blog about my worry over what forms my blog should take – should it be an emptying of my heart? A soapbox for my politcal thoughts? a […]
KIT no KAT
Well there I was – fending off a mid-afternoon pang of choco need, so I popped down to the cornershop, and bought myself a KITKAT. I always feel a bit guilty buying them because Nestle apparently rape babies (RAPE BABIES I TELLS YA!) but they do taste good. Just that right balance between chocolate and […]
weeky
The weekend, it came and went – Ian and Heather had a birthday party on Friday night at Buffalo – it started swinging, but what with gatecrashers ahoy and muscling in DJ’s with shit records, it turned a tad dull – so much so the birthday boy and lady left before anyone else.Saturday I tried […]
Achy Breaky Toe
Well it is my fault. I was attempting to play Rounders bare footed last night and during the furore of the game, I slipped and felt my big toe bend down. It hurt, but brushed it off as an awkward bruise, but it didn’t stop paining all last night and today I can barely walk […]
The Great Outdoors
During my mid-week jaunt into town this afteroon I discovered that the open air market is closing down for three years while the city centre gets it’s millions of pounds worth of makeover. It’s a sad shame – it was one of those places you could get a bag of veg for few quid and […]
Heatwave
Yes it’s hot. But at least your house and town are not being bombed.(If they are, I apologise from the bottom of my heart) “if the option of peace fails as a result of Israeli arrogance, then the only option remaining will be war, and God alone knows what the region would witness in a […]
Silver Jews
I went to see the Silver Jews last Saturday – I had a great time. Debbie said it would be like this: But it was more like this:It was still a great gig non-the-less.
Dead mouse
First of all, welcome to my blog. After many years of thinking of writing a blog and not doing so, bar a few ‘news’ pages on some of my websites, I have decided to take the plunge. I don’t know if this will be a log of my daily deeds, my thoughts, doodles and photos […]