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Journo Dotage
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April 29th 2003 20:30 CDT
On ex-pats
I had lunch today with a fellow ex-pat who, it turns out, lives about 10 minutes away from me. It's strange how after only a few moments with someone with a similar accent, the trust comes instantly and good, open and honest conversation just happens. The guy was bloody hilarious as he recounted tales of rebuilding his deck to "Yorkshire" standards rather than the ones his city has, his riding lawnmower and how many 'people-carriers' you could fit in the trunk/boot of a Chevy Suburban. We ate at what passes for an Indian restaurant in Minneapolis (it's not bad but a bit lacking in bite) and we only really had about 45 minutes of conversation but it was refreshing.
The reason that I found it so refreshing is that sometimes when you meet people in America, you think you understand them but you're just a couple of degrees off target - I think I can count on two hands those that I think I communicate properly with here; the rest I sometimes feel like I'm managing by attempting to speak in American terminology and phraseology. It's nothing personal, just the old adage that the US and the UK are divided by a common language.
Anyway, having lunch with a fellow Northerner was a bit of light relief after a presentation in the morning and before what ended up being a pretty heavy afternoon.
So no wit, no pith, just a little sunshine in an otherwise mundane work week. Normal cynicism will resume shortly.
Comments ()April 27th 2003 16:40 CDT
On classics
This is so priceless that I had to share it with you all...
Natzoid: You know perl right? So does this guy. Have you ever noticed how many computer geeks are on the internet?
Comments ()April 27th 2003 12:10 CDT
On Weapons of Mass Destruction
Like dude, I am so never ever going to allow this to happen again.
Even the Iraqis couldn't have devised such an evil weapon.
Doesn't a maid sound good?
Comments ()April 26th 2003 19:40 CDT
On a little slice of hell on earth
The only thing that could be worse than this is if they were all six years older because then, like, they'd all have cell phones and, Oh My God, driving licenses. And I'll be all like "Dudes, keep it down" and they'll be like "Sooooooo lame - make me" and I'll be like "Feck off".
Doesn't a brandy sound good?
Comments ()April 26th 2003 18:45 CDT
On it getting worse
"Look, there's a spider."
In unison, TEN scream "Ewwwwww."
"It might be a flying spider."
Cue screams and a stampede of kids.
NB - I have omitted the "Oh My God's", "Dudes" and "She's like's"
Comments ()April 26th 2003 16:35 CDT
On sedatives
It has started. Approximately half of the guests have arrived. There is water, there are screams and there is awful music echoing around the back yard. Samantha has regressed to being 5 with the excitement. I feel I may need to regress to my teenage years in order to cope, but I don't know anyone here. I wonder whether we have any nutmeg or banana skins.
Doesn't a beer sound good?
Comments ()April 26th 2003 09:25 CDT
On Spring mornings
To coin one of Natzoid's phrases, I'm about to blow a little sunshine up your ass, not.
Today is the day when 10 of Samantha's school friends descend upon us for a slumber party. Read it again. Yes, TEN. The thought of having TEN of the little darlings reminds me why I never, ever, ever, ever wanted to be a teacher.
In preparation for tonight, Samantha had her friend stay over last night to help clean up the shit-tip that we nominally call a basement. There wasn't much cleaning went on but there was a dry run of sorts...kids awake at 07:00 and start making the mother of all rackets thus alerting the dogs to the fact that it's daylight and they don't feel much like a lie-in. This inevitably means that I have to drag my sorry arse out of bed.
At this point, a word of caution is probably appropriate. I get up somewhere between 06:00 and 06:30 during the week. On Friday nights, I'm knackered and if I make it to midnight, a small miracle has occured and you should be looking for a hippy guy with a beard and sandals (probably sweating profusely) screaming "I'm back"; Saturday mornings are sacrosanct for yours truly.
So this morning's practice run at waking me up at an hour that should not even be spoken of on a Saturday is over and I'm sure with 9 more kids tomorrow morning the manouver will be a perfected art.
You may be asking yourself "why tell us all this?"
Well, the fact is that after about 03:00, I'm a very light sleeper so anything will rouse me. And I have been roused this morning and I'm pissed. I'm pissed that I am awake. I'm pissed that I know this will be repeated in less than 24 hours. And I'm pissed that Monday morning looms large and I'll, once more, be bereft of an adequate amount of rest.
It's a beautiful day out there. I should be out pottering around the garden, planting things and mowing. But at this moment, I cannot bring myself to do it because I'm so God-damned pissed off that I was woken at such an hour. And it's not just a little malaise; it's a huge great stonking feck-off funk that, were you here, would be visible in the form of a red dusty cloud surrounding me wherever I move.
And you know what else? Only one of you people has had the decency to update their blogs. Happy bloody Saturday.
If you're one of the TEN darlings descending on my house this afternoon, be warned that the dogs may look like their misbehavior is randomized but each one of them is carefully trained to attack upon a secret signal that I give out, and nobody in the world knows it but me.
Comments ()April 24th 2003 20:10 CDT
On Spring days
If you work and have more than a twenty minute commute, you miss them. Life's a bitch like that. Still, we have our search terms to amuse us.
evil tundra plants
my wife site adult
where can i find pictures of bean plants under red filtered light
paul mccartney sneeze in a bag
places to vist in the tundra
tundra poop
katherine zeta jones new baby
lawnmower flat inflate
natalie bean
ice cream truck sine waves
sheryl crow wonderful body
Sadly, all these people went away unfulfilled. I'm a failure to provide for the masses who really want to know. Ho-hum.
Comments ()April 22nd 2003 18:40 CDT
On "God Damns"
God damn. In the luckiest of all lucky coincidences, I've just spilled a drop of beer onto where Zoe (or Natzoid) has smeared meringue candy onto my desk, dissolving it and eliminating the sticky spot. Now tell me there isn't a God. Wait a minute. Aren't I an atheist? Damn. All I can offer is that this is a proof by contradiction. I'm not sure what I've contradicted apart from myself, but there's definitely a contradiction in here somewhere so I'll draw my own conclusions...QED, there is no God.
Comments ()April 22nd 2003 18:30 CDT
On doppelgangers
By popular request (well Natzoid and Ms Underpants) I thought I would put the images of me (taken about 8 years ago for a PR shot and shamelessly converted to sepia for effect) and of a young Peter Gorner side by side. The results are below.
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Now you can vote.
In other stunning news, I have purchased a keyboard for my Linux box (teapot) that is the size of a laptop keyboard and it is a truly wonderful thing. I can now type at a reasonable speed. I have been using laptop keyboards for over 10 years so full size keyboards that I use usually have a faded backspace button on them. No more - this thing is sweet. It measures approximately 12" by 5" and has the conventional US laptop layout. This makes Kenny a happy bunny.
Comments ()April 20th 2003 15:45 CDT
On ancestors
My mother has just emailed me some pictures of my grandfather and my great-grandfather.
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| My grandfather | My great-grandfather |
What astounds me the most is that the picture of my great-grandfather (who died of lung cancer at the age of 42 in 1935) could actually be me. It's quite given me the proverbial heeby-geebies.
By the way, can you tell the weather has been shite all weekend? It's like bloody Manchester here at the moment...fog and drizzle. Ug.
Comments ()April 20th 2003 14:25 CDT
On Demonthighs
Natzoid has found some photos of me and has added a "not my husband" item to her blog. It should be said, for the record, that most of the photos were taken during times of my toying with being a hippy. My definition of being a hippy is having visible hair or, to be more scientific, a head that has not been subject to a number "0" within the past week.
Looking at them has infuriated me and I have been screaming "bastard hippy" at myself for a while now. So I'm off to do the honorable thing. Normal baldness will be restored in the next ten minutes.
Comments ()April 20th 2003 11:30 CDT
On sputniks
Be afraid...
Nic, when you're older, I'll tell you about the time your mum decided you should be Van Gogh.
Comments ()April 18th 2003 17:35 CDT
On record clubs
// Recipe for disaster
function course_of_action() {
$order_count=0;
if ( (strstr(date("D j"), "Fri") && CD_Club_Magazine.Arrived() )
{
while ( (cd.InCatalog() != null) && CD.IsLame() )}
{
Offer.Kenny( cd.InCatalog() );}
if ( Kenny.Accepts() ) $order_count++;
if ( $order_count==0 && Kenny.IsPissed() )
{return( Kenny.SingleMiddleDigitExtended() );}
else
{return( Natzoid.FitsOfHysterics() );}
}
Arse.
Comments ()April 16th 2003 18:55 CDT
On baby food
Many have questioned my parenting skills over the years. I poo-poo those people. An incident that displays my exemplary parenting vision happened when The Bean was around 9 months old (maybe a little older). I had insisted that we construct a baby jail in the front room - it was a jail in the nicest sense of the word, it's purpose being to allow The Bean freedom to wander around but ensure she didn't go flying down flights of stairs or knock herself out with a poker.
The Bean was ensconsed in the baby jail and Natzoid was out somewhere. I had heated up a little curry and was enjoying dipping bread in said curry while watching something. She was, at that point, just starting on solids and was particularly fond of bread. The Bean had honed in on the fact that there was bread around so started to demand bread with menaces. Being the caring dad that I am, I offered her some. Rather than take the piece that I offered her, she yanked the piece with curry on it from me and promptly stuffed it into her mouth. Her face lit up at the taste of the curry and to cut a long story short, we ended up sharing a bowl of curry and the better part of a loaf of bread. It was one of those bonding moments. Kids and curry - they love it.
My take on it was that I had broadened her cultural horizons, even before she could stand up unaided. Natzoid's take on it was that I had somehow scarred the kid for life.
I mention this because Nic is starting to get fairly big and he looks like the kind of guy who would enjoy a good curry. He also looks like he'd enjoy a good curry after a gallon of Stella Artois and a bit of a street brawl, but I figure that he needs to be a bit older before I treat him to that little life lesson. Again, great bonding moments...those that must be documented for posterity.
Comments ()April 13th 2003 18:55 CDT
On wasted days
Is the yard bereft of dog poop? No. Are there seeds just waiting to germinate? No, well at least not ones that were planted by my hands. Am I going to take a day off this week to catch up on what I should have done this weekend? Could be.
I've been meaning to look up how to do curves in CSS for a while and finally got around to it today. Totally bloody unimpressive.
I think that Fiona is on to something. Having a high speed, always-on internet connection is not always a good thing. At work, I don't get much chance to use the internet due to running ragged for 8 hours or more but when I get home, there is my little Linux machine begging to be played with, screaming at me to not do other things but focus all my attention on it. This weekend, it won the battle. Next week, I'll win the war.
Comments ()April 13th 2003 11:00 CDT
On Saturday nights
The dogs have developed a "big night out" kind of mentality. Something in their canine psyche trips every Saturday and they party like it's 1999. Last weekend heralded the destruction of my boots. This weekend saw the de-stuffingTM of the sofa and the dismantling of the cable remote control.
At least they have an excuse. They're dogs, and stupid ones with it.
Those with no excuse are the fuckwits that inhabit Minnesota and think that the University hockey team winning whatever damned tournament for the second year in a row is a good excuse for rioting, burning cars and generally advertising their fuckwittednessTM. In the aptly named Dinkytown mayhem ensued and even here, we had people in our back yard and on the deck. I naturally slept through the lunacy while Natzoid considered setting the dogs on the idiots. Had I been awake, I would have been fighting the dogs for who got first pop at them.
If I employed the same logic, the year that Manchester United did the treble, I would have nuked a small South American country in celebration. Sound stupid? Yup. But no more stupid than trespassing or burning cars. And to finish, I'll say it again. Utter fuckwits.
Comments ()April 12th 2003 15:15 CDT
On this day in history
Apparently, on this day in 1682, the first pressure cooker was demonstrated in London and in 1918, 27 German bombs landed on my home town. So says my Wigan and Leigh calendar for 2003.
Given that 24 hours ago, I would have sooner disembowelled anyone who said anything more antagonistic than "hi", I'm in remarkably good spirits. It's one of those beautiful Spring days that's not quite warm enough for me to be comfortable outside (although it sounds like tomorrow will be suitable) and I've just got back from taking Sammy down to the airport. The sensible subset of Minnesotans are starting to emerge from their hibernation and Winter Midwesterners are slowly but surely starting to be out-numbered by the summer ones. Those that live here will appreciate the difference.
It's one of those days where, when I drove down 35W and then back up it, all I could do was marvel at the view of downtown Minneapolis. As cityscapes go, it truly is beautiful. When the sun appears and the mercury rises, I start to love the place again. Nine months out of every year, I bitch about either the cold or the mosquitos; we're now in that ecstatic bit in the middle where there's a chance for both but neither have really surfaced so it's a little slice of heaven just now.
Tell me you're not in love with this...
April 11th 2003 13:00 CDT
On becoming even more senior
Thirty-bastard-four.
I'm more worried about deadlines than I am about what kind of fun I could be having. Another year older and deeper in debt. Living the American dream - don't worry, insurance will pay for it all when you're dead.
To paraphrase and bastardize, these are days with a genius for anchoring you down to the floor and whipping horrible realization into you.
Ug - roll on tomorrow when I can happily spend the day in the yard, cleaning up leaves and dog poop. I may even spend some money on plants.
Man, if this is 34, I don't ever want to be 40 or beyond.
Comments ()April 10th 2003 20:35 CDT
On wine
2002 Yellow Tail Shiraz - South Eastern Australia - $7 a bottle
Oh my God.
Comments ()April 10th 2003 18:05 CDT
On creativity
Every now and again I surprise myself by coming up with what I would call a creative idea. Like today.
I have long been thinking of a way in which to convey a message to an audience comprised of truly technical people, non-technical people and those that walk a fine line between the two (i.e. me, that class of individual who talks a good game but can do neither all that well. Stupid left brain, right brain equivalence). When I say long, I mean over 3 years. There have been numerous attempts by others to solve this communication problem but in my opinion, all have fallen short of the mark by a good light year or so.
With an impending deadline looming, I started to go into panic mode at the start of the week, desperately calling the creative agency that we use to help me out in conveying the message in a comprehensive manner. As of this morning, I had nada. Zip. Squat. Squat-diddly. Feck all squared. Well, nothing that rocked my world anyway.
By 10:00, I had a line I liked but was still missing how to get the line across graphically. By lunch, I was at defcon 5.
At around 14:30, the temperature hit a high for the year thus far, the calories from lunch kicked in, my caffeine rush had dissipated and I started to think of a phrase that I couldn't remember the end of. The phrase, after a google, turned out to be a Douglas Adams staple, "if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck then we have at least to consider the possibility that we have a small aquatic bird of the family anatidae on our hands". As it turns out, that wasn't what I was searching for, but it helped.
Ten minutes later, I had it. It's the best anyone has come up with so far, so being deadly afraid of criticism of any form, I nervously knocked up a prototype graphic and sneaked around to someone who I knew would be honest about whether they thought it was a good idea or not. They gave a sagacious nod so off I toddled to my boss, to see if he'd fire me on the spot for being lame. Another sagacious nod. Everyone thus far has either given some form of nod or outright gushed about it.
So, this idea needs to be passed over to someone to refine (probably the creative agency who will be pissed that they are just executing rather than thinking great thoughts).
Usually when I have such ideas, within a day or so, I hate them with a passion. In this case, I'm still very happy with it but it may be that I'm just reserving my passionate hatred for later or, more likely, Jacques Chirac.
Comments ()April 7th 2003 10:50 CDT
On opening up firewalls
Yesterday, I opened up a couple of ports on my firewall and put my Linux box in the DMZ. Within an hour, I had several attempted code red infections. Absolutely bloody amazing.
Comments ()April 6th 2003 11:30 CDT
On Sunday mornings
If your name is Sasha, Stella or Bowie, stay the hell away from me for the near future. Those expensive boots that you ate during the night (and that were less than 5 months old) will be used to whip your canine arses into the next dimension.
Comments ()April 5th 2003 21:05 CST
On identity-crises
Due to my boredom with all things to do with Tundras, I have opted to try a small name change. As my good friend Dr Power pointed out "Yates in the States" is the right side of cheesy, but I tend to want to be a little more arrogant. So here it is.
Comments ()April 5th 2003 20:45 CST
On Samantha's birthday
So the Clampetts went out to the restaurant where we celebrated Natzoid's birthday, this time to celebrate Samantha's tenth birthday. It's a Midwestern family restaurant where the good food and good value are tainted only by the number of baseball caps on view (I haven't seen that many since I was last in the People's Republic of Moline).
Having groomed the kids to at least look like they didn't have a hidden grandma armed with a 12-gauge shotgun, we arrived in the Clampett-mobile (the van) and all five of us bailed out. Zoe, of course, demanded noodles with menaces from the poor waitress; having had it explained to her that there were no noodles available, Zoe eventually consented to chicken, changed her mind and opted for fish and then promptly ate a pack of croutons and two potato wedges before deciding she was done.
Samantha ordered a salad to replace the wedges and Natzoid ordered a bowl of chowder. Given my aversion to eating anything that wasn't once either running or swimming, I skipped the starter course and opted to enjoy the smoking lounge (OK, it was a bar at the other side of the building) and returned to find Samantha eating a bowl of chowder and Natzoid eating a salad. Reality check, yup, pulse is still there and there's wine in the house therefore I think it's all real.
Samantha devoured a sirloin and the better part of a bowl of popcorn shrimp, Natzoid got partially through a sirloin and I had too many ounces of prime rib together with some fantail shrimp. Nothing too bad there. All sounds very eclectic you might think. Until we were leaving.
Up until the end of the meal, we hadn't done too badly. Nic had only been mildly loud, Samantha was great and Zoe had only screamed at people a few times. Trust the parental units to be the give-aways...
"Should I box this prime rib fat for the dogs?" asked I. Horrified look from kids.
"Or should I leave it - they don't need pure fat." I continued. Look of disgust from kids.
"I think you should take it - they don't get it very often." chimes Natzoid. Visible nausea and increase in kid volume. Waitress approaches.
"Thanks - we've decided we'll not take the fat for the dogs." Waitress looks baffled and leaves. As we depart Zoe insists on personally saying goodbye to every individual and then as we leave the premises shouts "Bye-bye everybody" to the great unwashed but decidely baseball-capped. A communal tooth was displayed as the whole crowd smiled at her.
I tell you, we're a class act.
Comments ()April 4th 2003 18:20 CST
On leaving for a trade show for a week
I left for LA last Friday and arrived back yesterday evening, armed with Disneyland T-shirts for the kids. Now history should have taught me that whenever I leave for a trade show Natzoid will undertake a task that would normally require a week of no kids at all.
In the week that I spent hob-nobbing around Anaheim and Orange County, Natzoid has redecorated not only The Bean's bedroom, but also our bedroom (including the en-suite bathroom) and the kitchen. Four rooms in 7 days. And you wonder why the blogging was a bit sparse?
Leaving the beautiful temperatures of California and returning to what can only be described as Winter (snow and below freezing temperatures) was particularly unpleasant. This weekend, the clocks will go forward and we'll enter daylight savings time. Ah yes, save that daylight so you can marvel at the snow, sleet and overnight lows.
Comments ()April 2nd 2003 20:45 PST
On California
I could have moved to California in the mid-nineties. When my little twenty-something feet hit the ground at SFO and took a cab to Palo Alto, I thought I had died and gone to heaven. A subsequent acquisition and time spent in Santa Cruz only served to increase my love for Califonia's climate, geography and unique feel. I didn't move there because it was America. America to me was watching the TV and seeing guns, drugs, police, religious zealots and political correctness that made my ears hurt.
A more primary reason for not moving to California was that I was scared of being so far away from what I knew. At the time, I knew that there was a big reason not to move there, even though I had no idea what that reason was (and I still can't pinpoint what stopped me), so I didn't move there.
Fast-forward, if you will, 10 years. I still have a love for California and I still adore the climate, the geography and I still detest the political correctness, bizarre smoking mandates and drinking laws. If anything, as I've explored California in my working life, I've grown to obsess about San Diego and San Francisco more and more. Even Los Angeles is starting to appeal (and that was previously top of my list of no-no's). Even with this love, I still feel the doubt that I had nearly ten years ago. Somehow California is not me and I am not it, which is a shame because I'm sure we would benefit mutually.
As I strolled around in the sunshine this week, I gulped the air. It's coastal air that reminds of my time living but 200 yards from the sea in Wales. It's clean air that has nothing to do with gasoline laws or pollution laws; it's just the kind of air that you can only get by the ocean. It's the kind of air that you get when the tide is coming in...I have long contended that I can tell whether a tide is on the ebb or wane by the smell. To be by the sea is to know nature.
So, my time in California is coming to a close and as always, I'm plagued with dreams of living here. It will probably never happen. But that's life. I feel the same way about Northern Italy.
PS - Given the SARS problem, I have elected not to go to Shanghai next weekend. Indeed, I'm told that there is an outbreak that started at this show here in Anaheim. The sponsors of the Chinese show have kindly offered to provide free masks, but I think I may skip that.
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