In the Paper again, this time a city wide one

This was unexpected but Sarah set this up about a week ago and I knew nothing about it till Sarah text me earlier today. Shes been having a hard time recently and I really want to thank her for doing this and holding things together. I know we will end up being long term friends through-out.

So yeah a work paper yesterday, city wide today, national tomorrow? Well funny enough I'm having a interview with a national paper tomorrow about the Edinburgh TV Un-Festival. But seriously you won't see me tomorrow in anything, hopefully

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You can’t stop the beat…

Ok when I first started watching this I was thinking oh no I didn't know it was a musical. But before long the story line had kicked in and it came clear that the whole thing was a comment on segregation in the early 60's. Yes I know its a remake but its a very good remake and dare I say it, prefer it to the 1988 original. Not only that but how amazing is the lead actress Nikki Blonsky…

Anyway this was perfectly timed after a couple of things which have happened recently.

First up the internet discussion about geek women which exploded on the Girl Geekdom blog (also blogged myself). I made the comment at the end that,

if the environment and people are inherently corrupt how do you reverse that? The answer isn't simple and its something most people hate but most people have never faced such corruption.

Some people have asked me what did I mean. Well …. if you switch corruption for racism or sexism you get the general idea.

Back to Hairspray a second, although its classed as watery fun the idea of dancing together really has reminiscing of the early days of hardcore when house music brought people together. Which leads nicely on to yesterday.

I went out yesterday to the make your mark connectors event. First time and I met some very interesting people. But one sticks out more that everyone else. Rebecca a self described Feminist. Yes imagine the kind of discussions we had with me being a self described Geek. (Yes we did talk about the Woman Geek stuff) After most people left there were 3 of us and we decided to go and have a dance. The music was slightly progressive house but was certainly danceable. Well what surprised me was Rebecca's freeness
of movement.

When dancing in normal bars and non dance clubs I can tend to be quite a normal or average dancer because I tend to work up a sweat very quickly and usually don't want to attract too much attention to myself. Rebecca didn't seem to have any of this in mind and to be honest I started to wonder what had happened to me over the last few years which made me adopt this boring average dancing?

I love dancing, watching it on Hairspray (although very different type) and seeing Rebecca dancing really brought it back.

So I'll be hitting the clubs more that monthly again now. I'm also going to check out some of those clubs I've heard about but never been to like the End and the Cross.

 

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Redbull Air Race from a distance

Yep I went along and watched from outside the Anchor and Hope Pub about 2 kilometers down river towards the east. I saved myself about 60 pounds and grabbed some decent shots using a 12x optical zoom camera and tripod. Christiano was correct, its certainly more thrilling in person that the TV programme could ever show, and even from 2km away, you couldn't help but get a little excited.

The only thing which was missing was commentary of what was going on, so maybe next year I think I'll be less cheap and go and buy tickets well in advanced. More pictures
here
. Adams pictures are much better but are from the day of qualifying on Saturday.

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Like to share a house with me? Here’s your chance

backgarden in the summer

House share with 1 professional male Woolwich SE18

2 Bedroom terraced house. 10 min walk to Woolwich Arsenal Station (20 min to London Bridge/Waterloo/Charing Cross).

Sharing with professional male owner age 28, web designer/developer. Shared Lounge/Dining Room has large TV with Cinema system & Xbox. Bedroom has double bed and a Wardrobe. Property has a Garden, Patio and Parking space, Interior is modern decor. Wireless network through-out house and garden. Flat share would suit another internet/new media centric person.

Price includes all bills, council tax, fast broadband connection.

450 pounds every calendar month, room available from mid August

meta-technorati-tags=houseshare, house, flatmate, woolwich, london, home

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To the scumbag(s) who stole my scooter top box

Had a wonderful day hooking up with friends and ex-students from Ravensbourne. Our lecturer John Durrant was retiring from his role at Ravensbourne and Lisa setup a get together through Facebook and email to celebrate his clean break from Ravensbourne. Anyway it was going so well till I went to get my coat and a baby play rug from my scooter.

I walked the short walk to my where my scooter was parked and noticed from a far something was wrong. Yep some fucking loser had stolen my top box from the back of my locked silverwing scooter. I couldn't believe it and started swearing out loud before checking my scooter for any damage. The rest of the scooter was fine, they had not even tried the ignition.

I don't know what it was but I've never had a top box stolen from my scooter before and I've parked it over night in places like Kings Cross and Euston. Maybe it was because I decided to put my helmet out on the top of the scooter (it was hot and sweaty, so I wanted it to cool down in the natural air. Anyway it was gone, so I checked the local bins and asked a couple of women from a close by bar. I figured anyone carrying a large black and red box would be easily seen. Unfortually they didn't see anything so I called the Police and they ran me though the criminal reference stuff.

Generally I'm pissed off because I had my scooter coat, gloves, bungy net and baby play matt in the back box. SO when the thief/thivies open the box, there going to be pretty pissed off.

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Redbull air race comes to London

I'm sure everyone else has seen this for weeks but one of the nice things about traveling on the train and tube is the advertising (not that I really like advertising). But the Redbull Air Race comes to South East London on 28th/29th July.

 

I don't know what it is but since Redbull sponsored the Wipeout series on the first playstation, I've always thought Redbull should setup some racing league using something a little special. Anti-gravity crafts which do up and over 200 miles per hour was always going to be a tall order but I got to say this air race isn't that far off in principle. However I tuned in a while ago at my parents house and watched the show from a desert in America somewhere and I got to say it – Wipeout it certainly wasn't.

Don't get me wrong it was exciting but not in the same way and it could be made more exciting if required. Also the time slot of 4pm seems too early for a dare devil fast paced air race. The show needs a shake up, like give the footage to a bunch of skateboard video artist and watch them remix the show into something amazing.

I guess what I'm saying is the pace of the flying is ok but the actual pace of the show is pretty slow and really lets it down. I guess I'll have to pay for a ticket to get a feel for what its like live. But its not cheap at 50 pounds, although I just missed this.

10% of all general tickets are being given free to local residents of affected borough (Greenwich, Newham and Tower Hamlets). For Newham and Tower Hamlets residents, these free tickets have been allocated by online ballot through this website. The ballot opened on Thursday 17th May and closed on Monday 2nd July. Ticket winners have been notified by e-mail.

Greenwich Council will be organising the distribution of their allocation of tickets. If you are a resident of the London Borough of Greenwich please contact Michele Douglas on 0208 921 6405 or by email at michele.douglas@greenwich.gov.uk in order to apply for free tickets.

 

 

Oh well I missed out this time. Oh by the way, they also tucked this rss feed away.

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Never fly Go Globe Span

I'm never flying Go Global Span again after my experience flying to Canada this week. Here's my twitters from the plane while I was sat on the tarmac in London Stansted and Birmingham. Also notice the times, I was in that plane for a bloody long time.

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A Holiday in Toronto, Canada

Canada is one of those places I've always wanted to check out since I was young. Well now I'm off to check out Toronto, which just had a heatwave and would you believe it, its Canada day on 1st July. Now if someone would give me a iphone to smash, I would be very happy… (wink)

This obviously means blogging will either slow down or speed up depending on what I do while I'm in Toronto. Oh if your in Toronto and would like to meetup, please drop me a comment or email. I checked upcoming and eventful and theres little on it would seem.

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Gabriel and Dresden Featuring Molly Bancroft – Let Go

I've been listening to this tune a little too much I think. This is certainly the trance equivalent of a breaking up tune. Its very mellow and limited on vocals, but clear and effective at reminding me of current position.

 

I swear I don’t know, what time it is,
But I know this means, nothing much to me,
And I hear the voices, bring in my head,
And they keep telling, telling me to let go…
Let Go
Telling me to let go
Let go…
*It could be better that way*

Let it Go, Let it go,
*It could be better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go,
*It’s just better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go,
*It could be better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go,
It’s just better that way.

And I hear the voices, bring in my head,
And they keep telling,
Telling me to Let Go…To let go…
Telling me to Let Go…To let go…
Telling me to Let Go…To let go…
Telling me to Let Go…To let go…

*Aah a ah..let it go..*
*Aah a ah..let it go..*
*Aah a ah..let it go..*
*Aah a ah..let it go..*
*Sink me better that way.*

Let it go, Let it go
“It could be better that way”
Let it Go, Let it go
“It’s just better that way”
Let it Go, Let it go
“It could be better that way”
Let it Go, Let it go
*Sink me better that way..*
Let it Go, Let it go
*It could be better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go
*It’s just better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go
*It could be better that way*
Let it Go, Let it go
*It’s just better that way*

Scary how effective music can be sometimes…

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Breaking up is hard to do


Picture from our recent holiday in New York

Sarah and I are both announcing today on our blogs that we are going to get divorced after four and a half years of marriage.  This was a joint decision, and it wasn't made hastily.  We have tried many different things to make it work, but have come to the conclusion that staying married will cause a lot of unhappiness for both of us.  We would rather end it now while were still on good terms, and plan to stay friendly.

We know this is pretty public and quite shocking news for many people who know me. We hope that everyone will accept that we know what is best for us, and give us our privacy about the reasons.  We are both sad and under a lot of stress, but are also somewhat relieved to have made the right decision.
 
A lot of people were also surprised about the speed at which we got married in the first place.  We didn't take that step lightly, and neither of us regrets getting married.  We did believe at the time we would be married forever, and we do still love each other.  The problems we have do not have anything to do with the manner in which we met or the speed of our marriage.

We both admire and respect each other and hope that our mutual friends will never feel that they have to choose sides.  At some point, we may even continue the podcast, but it is undecided at this time.  We consider ourselves 'separated' now, but will continue to live in the same house until we can sell the property or make alternative arrangements.

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My unofficial Out of Office message

odd part of paris

Thanks for your email,

I'm actually in a odd part of Paris for the Xtech 2007 conference. So won't be picking up work emails till the weekend because my bloody work laptop can't connect to public wireless! However if you would like to email me on my personal email, I'll be carrying my laptop and phone around everywhere so will be able to reply that way.

For urgent queries twitter me or im me.

Cheers…

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Still on Pacific Standard Time

Its 12:30pm GMT and I'm still awake after a night battling with my old laptop.

I made the mistake of selling my old laptop on ebay before going to America. I didn't clear anything off of it and had to get Dave and Sarah involved while I was away (thanks guys). But in the end, the buyer was happy to receive it today in completely working order. And honestly at 6am this morning I was going to call it quits and email the buyer to offer there money back.

But out of pure chance while looking for a decent Dos Boot image, I found this site which also has a version which includes Symantic Ghost client. I also finally tracked down a util which does bootable discs in Windows XP/2000, thanks to HP. Once I loaded the Recovery CD roms on to the hard drive and moved them to the right part using Partition Magic and a load of Dos commands (geez give me chmod over attrib anyday).

So now thats done and out the way, I'm going to spend the rest of my Easter Holiday with Sarah and writing my paper for Xtech which was due the day I came back from the states.

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