Captins Blog

Slash's new album rocks!

2010-03-30T20:09:00.003+01:00

Been a while eh!

Well strolling around the world of youtube, searching for my favourite artists in the hope of some new bootleg I stumbled across Slash's new album (not out for CD release till May 2010 - praise be to YT!). Can't believe I didn't know about it before... actually I can believe I was unaware as I'm unaware of most things that occur outside the four walls of the office I work in or home I reside when not working (things are busy!)

Anyway, for those of you who read this or give two hoots check out;

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ptTDsdri_OY - Slash Cyprus Hill and Fergie with a nice rendition of the classic Paradise City

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ylaroxf_sRU - A new track titled Ghost from the new album, featuring vocals of Ian Astbury from the Cult

The album rocks, more than enough to keep me going until Cobus's new releases tomorrow

Enjoy

What new look?

2010-02-22T14:12:00.002Z

Yeah so ignore (or don't) the post below, I've reverted back to the old template style and figured out how to remove the stupid navbar on that instead - exactly the same procedure just in my own CSS file.

Whether there will be a new site design depends on lots of things - it is definitely something I'd like to do now I've thought about it but we will see.

Oh, and all this has been done for work not just pleasure - we use the blogger engine for clients so the loss of the whole FTP upload doesn't just affect me which is why I've spent time during office hours sorting this out.

Of course now I've figured out what needs to be done I can apply it to the client designs too

Why the new template look?

2010-02-22T13:52:00.003Z

If you are reading this and wondering why the blog doesn't look like the rest of the site anymore it is because Google are evil!

I used to host my blog on my own webspace and use blogger.com to create the blog and ftp it across. Google say they will not do this anymore because it uses too many resources (yeah whatever, surely my server uses more resources to host the blog and serve it to all 3 visitors I get a month than Google's do to ftp the blog across?)

So this blog and the rants are to be hosted on Google's server so they can analyse all the traffic it generates and sell this data on for a gazillion pounds. I shouldn't really complain as it is a free service so Google have to get some money from somewhere?

One of the benefits of hosting the blog on my own server was the fact I could remove the stupid blue navbar that blogger insist on putting at the top. Now though it has returned, or rather it HAD returned until I removed it.

Removing it was simple, all I had to do was put a tiny amount of code in the CSS (#navbar-iframe{ display:none !important;} for all those who care) but to do this I had to upgrade from my own template to a Google created one, which as you can currently see has trashed the original design.

Garrr!!! So now I have to spend an hour or so re-creating my own template, and no I cant use the old template as that isn't to the current template standards.

The question is though, do I redesign the site first? It is two years old after all and perhaps a redesign will prompt me to blog/rant more often.

I guess only time will show what I can be bothered to do.

Happy New Year

2010-01-11T19:10:00.002Z

Yeah OK so the NNY is a bit late but bah, any readers that I do have of this blog are aware that it now takes me forever to do any updates so deal with it :P

Twenty Ten is off to a good start, a good cold freeze for a couple of days bringing the country to a complete stop, people blaming everything for the weather and the apparent lack of preparation for it - to these people I have to question "what weather were you expecting in WINTER!"

I'd start with one of them New Year resolution thingies but the couple that I have tried in the past don't seem to last, even something as simple as blogging or ranting once a month is a difficult task - and it will become even harder with the news that I bring the happy reader.

Ruth and I are expecting our second (and FINAL) child, due date is 8th August 2010, to the right you should be able to make out the all important bit of the scan - there is only one child!

There will naturally be more posts on this as the time flies by but for now this is it.

Peace

Governmentium

2009-12-16T11:40:00.000Z

Occaisionally I recieve an email that amuses me, this one more than others because I really enjoyed science at school (before the below element turned it into a class of watching people do stuff rather than you doing it yourself as now seems to be the case)

Anyway, this is not my work, don't know where it originates from but I got it from my amazing Uncle Neil

Queens University researchers have discovered the heaviest element yet known to science. The new element, Governmentium (symbol=Gv), has one neutron, 25 assistant neutrons, 88 deputy neutrons, and 198 assistant deputy neutrons, giving it an atomic mass of 312.
These 312 particles are held together by forces called morons, which are surrounded by vast quantities of lepton-like particles called pillocks. Since Governmentium has no electrons, it is inert. However, it can be detected, because it impedes every reaction with which it comes into contact.

A tiny amount of Governmentium can cause a reaction that would normally take less than a second, to take from 4 days to 4 years to complete.
Governmentium has a normal half-life of 2 to 6 years. It does not decay, but instead undergoes a reorganization in which a portion of the assistant neutrons and deputy neutrons exchange places.
In fact, Governmentium's mass will actually increase over time, since each reorganization will cause more morons to become neutrons, forming isodopes. This characteristic of moron promotion leads some scientists to believe that Governmentium is formed whenever morons reach a critical concentration.

This hypothetical quantity is referred to as critical morass. When catalyzed with money, Governmentium becomes Administratium (symbol=Ad), an element that radiates just as much energy as Governmentium, since it has half as many pillocks but twice as many morons.

Windows 7 Upgrade, or not...

2009-12-14T19:35:00.001Z

Any IT person who is not aware of Microsoft's lack of upgrade program in Europe is either still wearing nappies or has been hiding with Osama bin Laden for the past year.

For those reading this who are not in IT or so deep into IT that they don’t use Windows or pay any attention to any Microsoft news that isn’t titled “Blue screen of death replaced with green screen of death” or the like (yes all you Mac and Linux obsessed sheep that believe Microsoft is worse than the dark lord himself – see the upcoming rant on this topic), for you people the Windows 7 upgrade program in Europe is... non existent!

How can it be non existent I hear you not say or type, well because some Microsoft bod/lawyer decided that it would be best not to have an upgrade program in Europe because the European courts have done a good job of fining then for anti competitive practice (all of which was a complete farce if you ask me).

Instead of releasing an upgrade version and a full retail version they instead decided to only release full retail BUT do some upgrade style pricing between release and the end of this year. Anyone buying a new computer will get it anyway so I guess upgrade pricing in the long run is a bit pointless for some.

I got a message this evening about a colleague who had had his pc attacked and thought instead of rebuild to XP he’d upgrade to Windows 7, my work pal wanted me to place an order with one of our distributors for Windows 7 Home Premium at a cost of around £70 plus vat and delivery. I informed him that I could indeed do this, but they wouldn’t ship it until tomorrow so he’d get it on Wednesday at the earliest – why not get it on our account at a local purple coloured mega computer franchise. I popped onto their website and found that he could get Windows 7 Home Premium *upgrade* for about £70 inc vat, OR he could pay £140 for the full version.

Have Microsoft then decided that they WILL indeed release an upgrade program? No, the mega computer franchise who sell to the dumb have decided to sell both discounted and non discounted software when both are the same product!

A blog with a moral

2009-11-10T19:53:00.002Z

Moralistic... me? Well I guess so. Perhaps it's age that causes me to now look at situations and what lessons could be learnt from them, perhaps its the new management role I have taken over the last few months, or perhaps its down to Frank. Who knows, but I do get the feeling that there may be more blogs of this type later on - we will have to wait and see.

Anyway, onto the story.

Several months back the local council here decided to reduce the size of our normal rubbish bins and replace them with a variant half the size and a more regimental recycling process. Bags for paper, green bin for glass and tins and a red builders-bag style thing for cardboard and plastics.

The normal bins get collected every week, and the recycling every 2 weeks which initially looked like it would be a problem, time though showed that this was not the case.

Things (like everything I guess) started off OK, and it was actually quite self rewarding knowing that we were doing our own little bit - as small as it may have been. But then some good for nothing thief decided to pinch our green box. Seriously what good will it have done them? You can get another for free by ringing the council so why bother pinching them?

Yes, you CAN get another for free by ringing the council - but I didn't do that did, instead I choose to put it off for months and months and eventually forgot all about it. That was until the weekend.

Saturday (as you all know) is now cake-day, the day that Emily and I make cakes. Its a new tradition but we like it so long may it continue. Whilst finishing the cakes off and Em was decorating I went to put something in the bin and decided to push it down.

This was not a good move! Naturally with the theft of the recycling box there were items in the household bin that perhaps shouldn't have been there, and quite soon I realised that the sharp pain in my little finger was due to a quite sizable chunk being almost sliced clean off by a tin can!

The moral of this all is quite obvious (to me at least) DON'T put things off!

Recommendations

2009-11-05T23:13:00.003Z

Currently a short post - though this may increase in length over time, as the intention is to edit this post with future recommendations - and post a separate blog indicating an addition.

So on to the initial recommendations;

Blind Pilot were the support act that my sister Em and I saw when going to see the Counting Crows in the MEN earlier this year. And I hasten to add were almost better than the crows themselves. Their debut album "3 rounds and a sound" is definitely one of the best albums I have heard in a long time and I would struggle to currently rate many other albums higher than this one. The title track of the album was used at the end of one of my favorite series Chuck and the Spotify users of you lot out there can listen to it here

Cobus Potgieter is a young South African drummer who has posted some of the best drumming covers I have had the pleasure of listening to. I say drum "covers" but he doesn't accurately cover any of the songs, and instead he plays his own beat over the top. Whilst his timing may occasionally be out, his drum beat is consistently better than the original. Cobus's story is quite amazing, as due to his success on YouTube (no link needed) has caused him to receive sponsorship from a number of drum related companies. Now I am not a drummer nor do I remember how I stumbled across this guy - it certainly wasn't searching for drum covers that I do remember - and as such I hope you will not dismiss this recommendation and view one of my favourite tracks here and also listen to a few of his other tracks that are posted along side that video

Failing memory, anger management and a thank you

2009-11-05T21:56:00.004Z

Continuing on from yesterdays great step forward I thought I would do some updates to the site, such as turning the rants page into a separate blog for ease of content addition. This of course led me on to wanting to make more changes to the site, more improvements and more content. Emily's section needs a HUGE amount doing to it, I have an immense amount of photo's that too should be published, and I DID have a wealth of rants to get out of my system... but when I tried to put them down on paper/screen I have completely forgotten all of them.

I was kinda hoping that writing a new blog entry would somehow refresh my memory of things I should rant about but perhaps it's due to my present lack of rage? This could be down to the fact I am sat quite happily listening to a relaxed playlist on spotify (listen here) its not the largest of playlists and I think you can add to it, please do. The other reason for the lack of rage could be down to something which may surprise a few of you out there...

I have recently been attending anger management classes! Well, I say classes, they were a one on one session and the real deal.

Some of you readers may be shocked completely and have never considered that I would ever have such a need for anger management therapy, others may quite rightly so think "well about time!"

There may be many questions flying around in your heads now such as "was he REALLY that angry?" or "why didn't he say anything about it before?" some of these questions I may answer in this blog, others I may not.

I was never one for being physically aggressive towards anyone else, more likely to be aggressive to myself doing stupid acts such as punching or kicking walls (the wall ALWAYS won). My anger came out in the form of sometimes uncontrollable shouting, other times making me just want to ignore the world. In short anger WAS ruining my life whenever it appeared.

I'd tend to bottle things up, not mention them for many reasons and then something as small as mouldy food in the fridge at work, or a piece of rubbish on the side next to the bin but not in the bin where it should be at home, would release all the pent up anger I'd stored for weeks or months.

We won't go into the event that caused me to finally decide to seek help before this anger became totally uncontrollable as that is not the point of discussion, but I am happy to admit that for many years (back to when I was at school) I have occasionally thought that I should speak to someone, and though the catalyst for this therapy was not a nice occasion I am glad it happened for without it I would not be where I am today.

After 6 rather fantastic sessions with my counsellor I have learnt a great deal about myself, obtained a better understanding of anger and a HUGE amount (I think anyway) about communication. Things like the fact that it is OK to be angry, it's natural and that if I don't get angry from time to time then things will just build up and explode in a manner that nobody likes. It is how you get that anger across that is important, be angry by all means - just don't let your anger make other people angry at you. It is possible to be angry without screaming and shouting, and when you deal with it properly anger can actually be constructive and not totally destructive as it seemed to be for me not so long ago.

I'm not professing to be an expert now, nor am I saying that I am able to manage my anger perfectly every time - because that in itself is just not normal. What I am declaring is that my life (not that it was in dire straits - great band!) is now so much better than it was. Many things are the reason for this but I do feel that controlling my anger is a massive contributing factor to them all.

For all this I am totally and eternally grateful to Frank - without whom none of this would have taken place. Thanks Frank!

The death of facebook and the return of website updates?

2009-11-04T22:16:00.002Z

So... some of you may have noticed the complete lack of updates on my personal website - this one here. Some of you may have wondered why this was, others may not.

It was something that was beginning to really grind me, and I would come up with lame excuses as to why, and false promises that I would update it tomorrow or at the weekend. The reason for all this FACEBOOK!

I got completely absorbed by it all and looking back am now ashamed of my actions. I decided to post updates to a huge social networking site, pointless updates too as opposed to updating this site with meaningful content that will be read and appreciated by whoever does still pop by here.

So, the life eating distraction is gone, (well... not really because it wouldn't let me delete my account, just deactivate it!) and in its place should "hopefully" be the return of updates to this site instead.

There are a lot of rants unranted, a lot of pictures without galleries, an Emily with half a years updates to write about (that's about a 5th of her life so far!). Expect updates soon (or notice that I have returned to the dreaded Facebook and mock me for eternity!)

M

A visitor and a trip to see the Counting Crows

2009-05-13T21:15:00.002+01:00

So... update time eh? Well last weekend Luke graced us with a visit - if only the good weather had been as courteous to the same. Tried to do a bit of climbing at Birkrigg, but despite a good start the weather then came in and turned the once nice limestone into slippy unclimbable rock - so a trip to Booths for supplies and a few beers later naturally the sun comes out when we are no longer able to drive! Ah well you can't win them all.

It was great to catch up with Luke, although we do tend to talk most days on MSN there is no comparison for an in person visit. Anna, Luke's better half, was sadly unable to visit due to "new mum to be" commitments. We will no doubt see the very merry three of them after day zero finally arrives (pictures may be posted subject to approval)

All in all a great weekend, plenty of laughs, drinks and xboxing - and Luke taught Emily to "bo" like a rapper due to her insisting on keeping the "2 pk" sticker on her new top (for those older generation readers 2pac was a rapper).

Monday should have been a work day, but not this week, a nice train journey to Chester (after the mess of buying the wrong train ticket!) then to Manchester for an afternoon in the pub and then a rather fantastic evening's entertainment courtesy of Blind Pilot, The Hold Steady and of course one of my favourite bands the Counting Crows.

Blind Pilot, an indie band from Portland US, were brilliant and are well worth a listen and purchase, their last song involved 2 people playing one drum kit which resulted in some outstanding beats.

The Hold Steady (notice the lack of link!) were really just not my cup of tea, or cup of anything for that matter. Saw them support the Crows at the Echo Arena in Liverpool last year, and they haven't grown on me.

The Counting Crows though, were as soul brightening great as ever. Adam provided some more insight into the origins of some of the songs, and gave a really different acoustic version of one of my favourite songs Miami. Really hoping that this concert will be released on Live Counting Crows but we shall have to wait and see.

Due to perhaps the worst road crew I have seen, their set was a lot shorter than I was hoping for, they should have been onstage at 9pm but sadly didn't appear till almost 9:45! Watching overweight men standing on a stage not actually doing anything, or then walking back on to touch something that hasn't moved since they put it there was excruciatingly difficult to both comprehend and endure. To put it bluntly, if you are a stage hand and don't have a job to do, you should not be on the stage. And if you have to go back to something THREE TIMES then you made far too many mistakes when you set it up initially.

Perhaps I am getting a bit less tolerant in my age (my birthday next week so its all about me moaning I'm too old at the moment - and yes I know most people who read this are older than I am).

Well, having just returned from Wednesday football (yup that's still going on, and I'm still enjoying it - keeping me fit and a lot trimmer than I was) I need to go now and have some food and then a bath.

Till whenever...

Visitors, Birthday and Counting Crows

2009-05-09T08:25:00.002+01:00

May is turning out to be a really busy Month. Had hightower Amran visit last weekend for some cooking goodness, zoo and beach visitations and naturally a healthy amount of xboxing madness. The weather (for a bank holiday weekend) was actually quite bearable, though Amran and Ruth still complained that it was cold!

On the cooking front this time I decided to not plan and just play it by ear, which resulted in the creation of a Cottagy Shepardsy Pie with Reggae Reggae sauce. It turned out quite well but I always seem to have a problem with putting too little potato on the top - ah well.

Sunday, being a "roast" day allowed us to create a sort of sweet and sour pot roast chicken - which sadly was a bit to hot (chili) for Emily to eat, and Ruth would have preferred about half the meat, but was really fantastic and sooo easy to do (will get round to putting these on the recipes page in due course). Served on a bed of free range egg noodles it wasn't exactly your traditional roast, but since when did that matter!

Monday we got some extra visitors in the form of the inlaws, apparently their decision to turn up for lunch was solidified when informed I would be frying my own chicken "roots" style (that's Levi for those not in the know). This required an overnight marination in a combination of various spices that were mixed "me" style (just shoved in, no measurements) which completely stunk the fridge out. Due to the larger numbers, which is not normally a problem, and the small fryer I have, the cooking process involved half frying 3 loads of chips, then 3 loads of chicken and then re frying the chips once more (with an oil change between chicken and chips). The result was delicious but sadly I shall not be doing this again for numbers greater than 3 or 4 unless I either have a bigger fryer (nothing worse than smelling nice food for an hour and a half and not being able to eat it yet!)

So all in all a great bank holiday weekend, more visitors and visits are planned this month in the form of Luke, and then Auntie Emma and Uncle Nick, with a trip to see Grandma Choc Choc in between, my Birthday and ermm... oh yeah, me and Emu are off to see the magnificent Crows for either the 4th or 5th time (but definitely not the last) more on that no doubt after the great event.

Not as painful as expected

2009-03-13T17:54:00.002Z

Huge thanks to all those who have donated so far, over £800 has been raised - which whilst below the initial target set it is a fantastic amount. If you didn't donate and still want to then go to http://www.myrednoseday.com/furnessinternet and hit the sponsor button. Not sure how long that will be around for as RND '09 is today.

Massive thanks also go to Sandra Houldsworth and her team from Kalipso Beauty Room in Barrow for doing such a good job.

You can check out a short video of the event at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWGZQcxtJvo - sorry about the poor quality, its just a mobile phone camera. The propper HD version will be uploaded later, just have to cut it down from 2GB to something youtube will accept!

Oh, and if you watch and you havent donated... well... think about it!

I must be mad!

2009-02-18T18:25:00.002Z

For years the most I have ever done on Red Nose Day is to buy one of the noses or products that give some of my money to charity. I sadly have to admit that I have never phone up apart from the one time I wanted to buy a tie from one of the presenters but failed to. This year I wanted to ensure I made up for my past and actually do something.

Doing something at work is really the only way for me to raise money as;

A. It raises the company profile (and thus mine within the company)
B. RND is on a work day, so unless I take a day off it has to be done during work time

So the next question was what to do? Ideally I wanted to get the whole office involved, but we can't do things like "wear your pyjamas to work" as we are a mainly male company and I doubt many of us have pyjamas - and it would also be difficult to go to see a client whilst inappropriately dressed. Thankfully though not too much time was spent thinking about what we could do as Heather (our accounts lady) is evil and twisted and thought we should do some leg waxing.

Before my brain would think of the pain my mouth said yes! No other member of staff at work is daft enough to put themselves forward to join me but they had all better donate and donate well!

I've set a fairly nice target that is achievable but only with the help of my colleagues, clients, friends and family. So... if you relish the idea of subjecting me to what I am repeatedly told is a huge amount of pain, please donate what you will to help hit and beat the rather modest £1000 total by visiting here http://www.myrednoseday.com/furnessinternet and giving me your money.

Don't forget too that if you are a UK tax payer you can claim that 25% giftaid thingy which will mean I should raise around £1250 for the good causes.

I will be posting both before and after pictures on the RND site, hoping to get some sort of local media coverage, and as I work for an IT company we will be web casting the video and publishing it on youtube or wherever after the event.

People have suggested that I go for a BSC too (if you don't know what it is just think more immense pain than just leg waxing) but as much as I want to raise money I would need a personal donation to ME of at least £500 plus £1000 extra to charity - so if you have £1500 that you want to donate give me a call or email and I will sort it out! (it has to be a single donation not a target to hit, and no I wont do it for less!)

So... what are you waiting for, do something for once and make me endure pain for charity, go donate now!

Finally, some updates

2009-02-10T22:05:00.003Z

Ok, so the previous blog made me feel a bit bad, so I've negated a session on GH, and gone for some updates instead.

As today is my daughters birthday it made perfect sense to revolve the updates around her, so at last there is an Emily photo gallery in place, there will be additions to this as soon as I figure out how best to put 2 years worth of pictures on there!

I'd pestered friends for recipes for the recipe section - as whilst it would be easy to fill it with things from various cook books I have, if I haven't made it or at least eaten it then why post about it? Thanks do go out to Amran and Heather's Auntie Stella for their contribution, feel free to pass your own on and I shall add it in the customary 2 months later!

More updates may come later, there is definately some sort of rant brewing, though Dave made me promise him that SUCSIS get the first draft. There are always new photos to add and hopefully I'll get back on the blogging train and keep this area more updated.

Ahh to be in a band...

2009-02-10T21:00:00.003Z

Well I'm going to come clean, I guess the reason for the complete and utter lack of anything on this website is due to the fact that when I do have the time to do any updates I seem to get drawn by the call of Guitar Hero and entertain myself on there instead. It's not because its the best game in the world ever but more down to the fact that it allows me to pretend beyond all doubt that I am the latest and greatest guitar hero in my own band Fishtacula!

I was in a band once when I was at school, and sadly had the opportunity to take the frontman's job when Aaron left for pastures new. But alas I was too shy and concerned that others may laugh at me so I just hid behind the keyboard until the band split up. It's not like I had grand dreams of "making it" but unless you have ever played live music to any amount of people there's something about it that is truly awesome.

Guitar Hero allows me to pretend to live the dream of being in a band (not necessarily a successful band) either playing guitar, drums or bass (which I can't in real life) or singing (which I can do but don't as I'm a scared wuss). One day perhaps I may either play an instrument or sing in a band for now though, Guitar Hero will do.

Has Amran booked his CBT yet?

2009-01-15T11:33:00.003Z

Please feel free to post a note if you believe to know the answer to the above :)

Decline of interest

2009-01-08T20:38:00.003Z

Ha, the title is more than suitable for toady's post I think, as the interest rates have been cut once more to "new fantastic low levels" or whatever other daftness the media want to call it. Though its not that kind of interest I am blogging about.

Checked the stats the other day and understandably I've noticed a decline in the number of regular visitors to the site - though I did notice that someone had stumbled across it after googling for chocolate tiffin and finding me which was very amusing (hope they liked the end result). A decline in the first kind of interest can possibly be seen as a good thing, but decline in this sort of interest should never be a good thing. I'd ask the few people who do read this to click on the comments link and provide some sort of feedback, but I've moaned about the comments link before and don't get much of a response.

I guess the reasons for lack of visitors is quite simple - the content is hardly updated on a regular basis. The blog isn't doing toooo bad I don't think, but I'm still to add Emily's gallery to the photo section, or the Christmas ones, or the many other albums. And I really should get my fingers out and do that, as now I have a nice shiny new camera I should be using it and updating the galleries regular too.

Its not that the galleries are hard to update - they are easy really, clever design and all that. No it's more down to the idea of deciding which pictures out of literally thousands might be of any interest to others - and that's a daunting idea sometimes.

I thought of a new rant that's been a favourite since Emily was born, but not going to reveal what it is until I do the official rant bit - which may be today, may be some other point who knows with my scheduling skills!

The recipes section is in some SERIOUS need of help, I do have several good cook books but will refrain from just copying Jamie's or Levi's hard work and putting that on. I would much prefer to put on recipes that are hard to find, or have been tried and tested by either myself or the other more avid cooking fiends amongst the readers. Again, its a fruitless (the recipes can have fruit in them though!) request but any content that you feel you could pass on would be helpful and appreciated.

Updates

2009-01-03T01:28:00.000Z

Just a quick post to point out what other updates have happened to the site recently. I'm sure you all check it regularly anyway but Emily has a nice new update, there is an update to the rants page and some minor corrections elsewhere.

I am aiming to get some more photos up this weekend but we shall see. For now though its far to late and I'm off to bed!

Watch big brother... me?

2009-01-03T00:13:00.003Z

Well I have to be honest and admit the fact that this very evening with nothing better to do (no xbox in this house!) I sat down and watched the whole entrance to the house along with the aftershow on E4.

Now as a reader don't pretend you don't have the faintest idea what I am on about, as unless you lived in a cave for the last 12 or so years it is more or less a given fact that you do understand the above. At least I have the gall to sit here and type the fact that I watched it, and whats more thoroughly enjoyed it too.

I don't usually care for the whole reality TV stuff as they do end up being mundane, but I have to hand it to C4 for the list of celebrities they have in this time. Terry Christian! What a legend! I mentioned his name in the office and was stunned that one of the younger lads had no idea who he was, but then I couldn't explain why he was a legend or what he was famous for, as, well, he's famous for being himself and nothing but that - there certainly will be more than a few arguments in the house with him there.

It was surprising to find Verne Mini-Me Troyer in there, but to have Coolio as a housemate, well that's something completely different. Yeah OK there are some people in there who I really wouldn't be that bothered about, and who are in there for obvious reasons (why else would you have a glamour model or a politician in there) and I think I could do without there being one of the many Jackson offspring in there, but all in all it seems to be an entertaining bunch - though I've been wrong before (8th May 1994 if my memory serves correct) and it could quite easily turn into the tripe it really is.

I promise though that the blog will not turn into a BB festation, but as the show amused me so much this evening I thought best to blog about that as opposed to anything else so :-p

Christmas Party

2009-01-01T21:41:00.000Z

Ouch, or at least I think ouch... It was the office chrimbo party last night

MMIX

2009-01-01T00:39:00.002Z

Well here it is, 2009 is officially well on its way now, and how shall I greet this glorious year? well with a rant that's how!

Mobile phones, the main method of communication for this generation has to be through the mobile phone, first it was SMS, then came MMS and now (well for a while now) you can even email from your phone. Except that is, if its new years eve/new years day. For then you can't text, email or even make a flipping call!

This year I was all ready, had my text all pre typed and saved in my drafts folder ready to send to all. Midnight came, I opened a bottle of bubbly, kissed and shook hands with people in the room and hit "send to all" on my phone. Its now 45 minutes past midnight and I STILL am unable to send this flipping message. At this rate it will be pointless it being sent at all.

OK so there isn't actually enough network capacity for everybody to make/receive a call at the same time and that's fair enough, I don't expect the network operators to ever have a 1:1 setup, but things do seem to be getting worse. I remember back in the days before Emily when we used to go out on NYE (I'm not complaining, prefer to stay in than pay through the tooth for a drink that you wanted 4 hours earlier) that you had a brief 10 mins max where you were lucky if you could make a call or not, but three quarters of an hour!

Now I will take this moment to point out that I have not been sat staring at my phone pressing resend every 10 seconds, my mobile device for those who don't know is rather sophisticated and is clever enough to just sit there and constantly try to resend the message as soon as it can, and it is still sat there in my outbox.

To make matters even worse, I have failed to receive a single text of phone call of new years blessings - that's nothing too special as I don't tend to get a lot of personal calls or texts anyway, but neither has my wife - and that IS something, I mean, Ruth will get at least 2 text messages if something 'big' goes down in Eastenders or the like. And because of that I think things definitely are getting worse each year.

I may, and probably will, rant on about this more in the rant section later - when I have had a little less to drink - for now I shall jump happily out of rant mode and into joyous mode once more.

So, 2009, thoughts... predictions?

Well, to start with thoughts as the penultimate year of the decade I think it has to be something special, the news would have you believe that it will all be doom and gloom but I refuse to believe that will be the case, and contrary to the above would prefer to start the year on a pleasant note.

Predictions... well I predict a proposal or two may happen this year, I would love to think that there will be some births that I am not already aware of (no there is nothing to read into that!) and that whilst the economy is currently on the down it will not be as bad as the news lead us to believe.

Peace love and happiness to you all.

Out with the old and in with the new!

2008-12-31T23:42:00.002Z

Well, that's it, another year gone by and a new one just itching to get itself noticed! I've been meaning to blog for a while now, but what with the festivities I just haven't really had the time to bother. Perhaps a resolution (no need to point out that I have blogged earlier about my hate for them!) is to blog more often - we shall see.

2008 brought so much joy and I guess some sadness too - though I can't for the life of me remember what this sadness could be, but then I do prefer to focus on the positive rather than the negative. 2009 will be a good year, why?... Well Winston Churchill once said "History will be kind to me for I intend to write it" I like that quote and its true, 2009 will be what we all make of it, and I intend to enjoy every moment of it and I strongly encourage you all to do the same.

For now though, I shall go and enjoy what is left of 2008 with a drink and a merry song, so here is me raising my glass to you and wishing you all a very happy new year!

Visitors from everywhere

2008-12-16T22:54:00.004Z

Aha, a blog with a topic, this should be more structured... yes

I may have mentioned earlier (think I did actually) but this site has been google analyticified and I get all sorts of bizarre stats about where people have visited from, and I'm quite amazed. yeah ok, its not incredibly accurate, and the only foreign visits I can be sure of is the one from Jon in NZ, and ones from Brian in SA. Who the visitor was who spent 2.50mins from Malaysia completely eludes me, or the 4mins from a visitor in Glasgow. Hi to you all anyway.

Being honest, the analytics stats were one of the reasons for posting - as visits have dropped a bit, so need to have more stuff for the tourists to read. I mean, there it defeats the object really if I have to tell people to visit and see the updates because they don't happen so often. It would be nice for people to notice new things for themselves and therefore think there is a reason to check back when they want to rather than because I've said "hey, check out the latest blog post"

But back to the topic, it really is quite amazing to get some sort of geographical map on where people are in the world that may have a slight interest in either me, or the life surrounding me. Not getting all egotistical or sentimental, but it is really warming to know that there are people all over the world who do actually willingly want to know whats going on all captin.co.uk. (Yuk sorry for sounding like one of those "send this to all you love to let them know" emails that pass around).

Oooh, competition time... This should be good for you all to play. Lets see who can visit from the most bizarre of places. Places in the UK don't really count, I'm talking international captin.co.uk visits now - there may be prizes for the most random visits, we don't need to go so far as pictures of where you are whilst posting (unless you want to, that's your choice not my request) we'll just let google analytics do the trick - and no cheating proxy users!

And about time too!

2008-12-16T22:43:00.004Z

Hmmmm, keeping this whole thing up to date is not as easy as I first thought... Yeah writing a blog entry hardly takes up much time - well the typing bit doesn't, its the "what DO I type" that takes forever.

Lack of blog entries recently has been pretty much down to that, I've either not had the time to update the site or I've not done anything worth blogging (other than being ill, but that's not blog worthy material)

I guess the one thing I could blog about is chrimbo - yeah its upon us again, sneaked up just like it does every year and gets us by surprise. Each year we tell ourselves we'll be more prepared next year but the honest truth is we wont get any better and more likely will just get worse. One thing I have been doing this year is the whole idea of pre-new years resolutions. New years resolutions seldom last beyond the first two weeks, let alone a whole 52, so I thought I'd take some pressure off and do things not as a new years resolution but as... well a standard resolution, (eek was gonna go all geek and do some naff joke about pixels and a standard 1024x resolution, jam done it now!) Anyway, back to the giving stuff up thing, err yeah, it didn't work, not for long enough anyway - yes I know I haven't said what it was I was trying to give up because that's not really the point, I failed at it is what I'm droning on about here.

You see here I am, trying to write a structured blog but its just not happening is it - I have all these things in my head like "oh write about what you did at the weekend" or "have a moan about something" or "aimlessly ramble on about nothing like you are doing now, someone will find that amusing"

Hmm, gonna stop this blog post, have a brew and perhaps write another, or do some updates, or neither who knows...