I'll let Natzoid recount what she experienced this morning in her own inimitable fashion but I do have a question to pose to the masses. What the feck is the point of protesting against the US being in Iraq outside a charity that feeds children around the world? It defies all logic. The people who run the charity put in literally tens of thousands of their own dollars each year and travel to the most hostile environments on the planet, risking life and limb as they do so. So what exactly is there to protest about?

Even when I was younger (cue boring 'when I was a lad' tale), I had little passion for protesting. For some unknown reason, I had the bizarre idea that the ballot box was a more effective route to change and that anyone whose opinion could be swayed by an army of opinionated, undisciplined yobs screaming banal one-liners probably didn't deserve the right to go anywhere near a ballot box. The only time I have even considered any form of protestation was during the miner's strike in the eighties.

The Iron Handbag killed a much needed, if unsafe and unsavory, lifeline to a myriad workers. The result was a strike that is the longest in UK history. The issue was very dear to my heart. My mother's father was a miner, as was his father and every generation dating back to the late 1700s. It had been their mainstay. They had each tried (and usually failed) to do something other than mining but inevitably the lure of the pit and the desperation had pulled them back, miles underground.

The witch who ran our country at the time with as little compassion as has ever been recorded in a head of state, stood her ground and won; an ungodly amount of jobs disappeared overnight. It was obvious that it was going to happen. But for the sake of the people of my town, I felt compelled to make a stand. Did this stand involve assembling and jeering? No. Did it involve pasting posters or haranguing people? No. It was simple. I donated my meagre earnings from a paper-round that I did (for a spell with a broken knee-cap) to the families of the miners, so they could eat while the political war raged.

So what again I ask is the point of harassing a charity that feeds kids? If your desire to preserve life is that great (and I'm making a sweeping assumption that that is your motivation), rather than protest outside a charity, go get your vacuous arses a job as a greeter in Walmart and donate the proceeds to an apolitical organization that genuinely (rather than cursorily) cares and demonstrates the fact with their money, time and risk.

It's easy to sit on our collective Western arses, decrying the fate of the world and objecting to wars or regimes. What's not so easy is to try to do something tangible about it. There are few people with enough compassion to do that so our collective arses are not in a position to judge, object or protest.

Assuming my current predicament is resolved, I'm going to volunteer some of my time and energy into this organization. And if you happen to be one of the protesting masses, my advice is to use a modicum of what little common sense you have and stay the hell away...what your feeble intellects fail to grasp is that your disruptions stop shipments of food that people desperately need.

Ok, I've stepped off the soap-box and have put it away. Until next time.

February 24th 2004

Man, I wish I was twelve years younger

Get a load of this. If I were fresh out of university, I'd be diving all over it. The bit about the starting salary would have pricked my ears up; my first job after university paid a mind-boggling £8,200. These guys start on £20k. Oh, wait a minute, you probably need nerves of steel. Damn!

Oh, and while I'm at it, why is this worthy of an amendment? Absolutely pathetic. Really. Like we've not got enough to worry about.

Comments (), Permalink, 19:30 CST

Odds and sods

Caution peeps: ZZ in vi can be your friend or your foe. I once lost two days worth of taxonomy handling C code due to my propensity for using that most loved and loathed of tools. And don't give me the blogger/MT/Emacs/notepad/<insert random editor here> 'cos I ain't buying it.

By the far the biggest story of today is that I actually got to speak to a real, live adult last night that was not Natzoid (not that there is anything wrong with talking to Natzoid, actually quite the contrary). But it was another being, in person, i.e. not by telephone or IM. I'm loathed to say what the conversation was about since me even mentioning anything here appears to jinx the Lording Bejebus out of anything even vaguely positive. Suffice to say, I had an interesting chatlet about 'bidness over a couple of pints of vitamin G. Talking to real people in real life isn't quite as nerve-jingling as I remember it. Then again, it helps when they are reasonable people who are "with" (as my mother terms it).

In other news, I fear for Nic who does not appear to have inherited his father's crippling vertigo. I have twice caught him stood atop the kitchen table thus far today, cheesing away.

Finally for this installment of I'm a Neurotic Agoraphobe, Keep me in Here, I point you to this. Honest to God. Have you ever been to Singapore? It's bloody hot. Whose bright idea was it to take a creature that is indiginous to Minnesota seriously cold places and plonk 'em in Singapore? In the immortal words of Lois, "What the hell is wrong with you people?"

Comments (), Permalink, 13:05 CST

February 23rd 2004

Don't send me back

Maggots? Next it will be leeches, followed by trepanning. We love the NHS don't we kiddies? If the UK advances any more, it might just fall off the edge of the world.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:15 CST

February 22nd 2004

How I learned to stop worrying and love the election

So Ralph Nader has thrown his hat into the ring? Great that he didn't learn his lesson last time eh? The Republicans must be pooping popping corks all across the land. Were I cynical, which of course we all know I'm not, I'd be advocating not even entertaining the expensive bother of an idea that is an election. As Paul Weller said "the public wants what the public gets."

I've said this before, and it's a good thing I cannot vote since I would be a pollster's worst nightmare in America, but I fall into neither of the two-party camps and to be honest, I have no idea what policies Ralphy-boy would run on.

Like most democracies though, the US government is dictated by the combination of politics, self-advancement and religion. We know my opinions on the latter. If the fervent religion dominates this November, we will be no better than Iran.

I know that's an over-simplification on a grand level. But to have one's elected president be empowered by what I consider to be a fundamentalist majority is scary beyond belief. If the constitution dictates that there should be a division between church and state, there are a multitude of people who are breaking the law each time they vote. Government isn't about high-tailing it down to church. Sure, some of one's political views will be influenced by one's religion, but ultimately aren't you all voting for what you believe to be best for the US? There should be a big wake-up call for the religious voters here; following your Sunday school lessons delivers a regime like Iran's. I for one would like to see Ned Flanders defeated in November no matter what his incarnation.

Given that I hope to be staying here, please consider your decision. Mindless partisanship wastes dollars that could be better spent. And therein lies the problem. The eighty-twenty rule kicks in again. Six sigma my arse, three sigma dictates it. Pathetic really innit?

Comments (), Permalink, 20:30 CST

Don't blink or you'll miss it

Within a few short hours, our house has been transformed from being something the social services would have taken our kids away for due to the mess, to being something the social services would take our children away because we are denying them any fun in life (and having toys as ornamentation).

You just can't win with these people can you?

I mention the state of the house because it's a major-league event people.

Comments (), Permalink, 16:15 CST

Portsmouth 1 Liverpool 0

More evidence:

...but Hislop saved Michael Owen's weak effort from 12 yards.

...but Owen's spot-kick was rolled tamely to Hislop's left and the keeper saved comfortably.

I know Ruud had a bad game yesterday against his bogey team Leeds (a big thanks to all those people who took the time to point that out to me within minutes of the final whistle - and a big thanks to McKay for asking how Von Mistletoe was on a banjo), but Owen shows a pattern of behaviour. I can't remember the last time I read anything good about him.

It's not an anti-scouse thing. It's just that I do think this kid showed promise in his early career but he has failed to live up to that promise. Liverpool should be doing better than they are and I lay some of the blame firmly at Owen's feet (damn, that was nearly clever).

Comments (), Permalink, 14:25 CST

February 21st 2004

Say it ain't so

My worst nightmare is coming true. This is coming out of retirement:

One can only hope that they don't record it.

If anyone ever doubted Darwin, look above. That, right there, is the missing link. I have always found myself spooked by men who think she's sexy. She's hideous in the same way that I find Jennifer Anniston (sp?) and Jordan (sorry Katie dear) hideous. There is no redeeming trait in any of them.

Maybe God sent me a pointer as to why he doesn't exist? Next time the God Squad come to the house, maybe I'll hand them a flier of Tina et al and scream "QED - this and David Beckham are why gays should be allowed to marry."

I now promise to stop Bible-basher bashing. I have nothing against the gentle souls who turn up at the local church on a Sunday with a live and let live attitude, but anyone who turns up on my doorstep to try to engage me in conversation about my lost soul is justifying the second amendment in ways that the founding fathers forgot to consider.

I digress. Please don't let Tina ruin the second half of my life as much as she did the first. Now I'm getting older, I'd hate to find my opinion changing (can mid-life crises be that bad?) and for the unthinkable to happen. If there is any justice, recording of said monstrosity's said monstrosity will be prohibited.

Comments (), Permalink, 21:20 CST

Penance

Well I nearly paid for my sacreligious comments of the last few days. The God Squad have just been to our door positively determined to salvage my debauched soul. Armed with token infant to prove their holyness, wholesomeness and a whole bag of other ness's, they are patroling the neighborhood looking for recruits.

As a kid, my parents used to send me to the door when they suspected a doorbell meant a Jehova's Witless or a double-glazing salesman, to explain my belief in one true God. That God over time has evolved from Joe Jordan to Paul Scholes (with intermediate phases as Michael Atherton and Eric Cantona). My diplomatic skills were honed at an early age to quickly shut down ridiculously controversial discussions. "Feck off ya red-nosed bastards."

As it happens, Samantha was a perfect scape-goat and once again, I realised that my parents have taught me well. The door was open for about 30 seconds while she took a flier and explained that daddy was busy blogging about religious zealots and how he hoped they slipped on the uncleared ice on the path. Sometimes I just know I'm a great parent; I tell you, these kids will thank me.

Comments (), Permalink, 10:40 CST

February 20th 2004

Oh, how my life is about to change

You may remember that a few days ago, I started working on a way to automate my postings rather than typing HTML and that I would start using it on March 1st. Well, the thing is growing out of all proportion and I now have something that may be capable of being made very generic. All that would be required is PHP and MySQL on your hosting service. It's incredibly light-weight and simple. The only things I have left to do are busy, busy things like tidy up some the code by making some generic functions and do some kind of template parsing.

But as it stands, it's good enough for me to use so I will start on March 1st to avoid archiving problems but it will be pretty transparent to readers apart from an added RSS feed and tidier (but probably not perfect) HTML.

Behold a screen. Sometimes I forget that I once wrote code for a living and I'm not that bad at it. It makes my cockles glow (ooeeerrr missus).

Of course, the downside is that Natzoid wants to use it now which means making it do all the things that she wants it to do (can we say PDA version?) and I know that my life can be potentially ruined by not providing. Yes darling, I'll get cracking on the Kanji interface tomorrow. I know you always wanted one of those.

Comments (), Permalink, 21:20 CST

Madness - we're all doomed

I cannot get my head around the fact that people are challenging the legality of gay marriages in California. Other than the obvious bigotry, I can't think why anyone would waste so much energy on something that does not have any impact on their own lives. Actually, I can. It's pathetic for these people to hide behind the legality debate when it is clear that for the most part, their objections are founded in religion. And right there is why I do not subscribe to religion; the good parts of religion are just common decency and ethics. The bad parts are the negativity and passionate moral activism. What threat is there in gay marriage? If anyone can give me a good answer to that, I'd be very interested to hear it.

And on to the next topic of unbelievable lunacy.

I read this and couldn't believe how stupid the masses are. The report concludes correctly that humans are failing the Turing test rather than computers passing it. Judging by the fact that people still SMS'd something they knew to be a computer, I would say that Turing's prediction of intelligent computers is a reality due to devolution.

And the final piece of mindless idiocy is here. That this is even an issue worthy of being considered, let alone reported, is mind-boggling. The religious nutcases strike again.

Did I wake up in a different world or has humanity stooped to a new low this morning? Un-frickin'-believable. I think I'm going back to bed. Please make it go away before I get up again.

Comments (), Permalink, 10:15 CST

February 19th 2004

LA cancelled

Due to a lack of child-care and an unwillingness to part with money, I will not be doing this next week in the LBC.

But the good news is my new rap album is due to hit the shelves next week. I am already preparing for next year's Superbowl half-time show where I will upstage Ms Jackson using only a ring of shaving foam. Bet you can't wait eh?

Comments (), Permalink, 15:10 CST

The wolves in my living room

I know we treat them as pets and teach them to do tricks, but there are some canine characteristics that are just so deeply entrenched in their make up as to give away their origins. They are wolves and they are scavengers. We may call them Sasha, Stella and Bowie but they are wolvine scavenger beasts roaming the house in search of food.

When Nico eats, they adopt a seemingly oblivious inoccuous prone position. Right under his chair, just waiting for the inevitably bounty. If they could whistle to look inconspicuous, they would.

When I clean the kitchen counters or load the dishwasher, the same nonchalant and demure poses are adopted as they wait for any delicious morsels I may drop, no matter how small.

Then there are their extraordinarily persistant experiments with telekanetics. To observe these, one merely has to place an amount of food on a surface beyond their reach. They will sit prettily below, willing it to move itself until it either falls or is close enough to access.

And the ultimate is, of course, the garbage can. Home of every doggy dream. Where all of Durrack's best treats are stored and denied to them. Where children scraping plates routinely drop some manna from heaven. Where occasionally the lid is up just enough to get a snout in and feast on expired left-overs. Or diapers.

So our canine chums are now mostly domesticated but their ancestors would be proud of them. They have ascended to a realm where they have their owners trained to absent-mindedly leave a candy bar within reach or their owners' children will vacantly leave an accessible dish. All this and they can still eat diapers and play with frozen poop. Durrack be praised.

Comments (), Permalink, 12:30 CST

February 18th 2004

More proof to substantiate the photo

From Ananova:

28 mins: England's first openings. Owen crosses, Couto misses but Rooney can't take advantage as he wasn't expecting the ball. Then Bridge crosses well but Owen doesn't get much on the finish.

29 mins: Best chance of the game falls to England. Scholes dinks on over the Portuguese rear-guard, Owen takes it on the volley in an unganely way and spoons it over.

40 mins: Owen gives the ball away cheaply and the move ends with Petit's shot being deflected over.

When I'm right, I'm right. You'd be better off fielding Trevor Brooking. Cow's arse with a banjo? The lad really is a talent non?

Comments (), Permalink, 16:10 CST

We interrupt this program to bring you a news flash

It's above freezing people. At this moment a wopping 2°C or 36°F. BBQ time!

Comments (), Permalink, 12:10 CST

February 16th 2004

Thoughts for today

If ∃ 3 kids, 3 dogs ∈ Household ⊂ ℜ then:

Is it worth putting the vaccum cleaner away?

Is it realistic to aspire to having no dishes?

Would it be appropriate to shave your hairiest dog?

Can anything ever be clean?

Can anything ever be complete?

Should the UN be contacted?

Comments (), Permalink, 13:20 CST

A tribute

I know, my usual Monday post about Prime Minister's Question Time. I'm sorry. While I am not 100% behind Tony Blair's policies, you have to admit that the guy is damned good at what he does and the closest thing the UK has had to a leader since Churchill.

PMQT was exceptional tonight. I should start making notes of the brilliantly crafted responses to Michael Howard's pathetic jibes. Surely it must be the only country in the modern world where the ruling party have more serious questions to ask of the PM than the opposition.

And after a dose of PMQT, what better than the West Wing? Now should I watch Death Wish 4 or retire feeling slightly erudite?

PS - RSS feed and archiving code completed, deployment is scheduled for March 1st.

Goodnight.

Comments (), Permalink, 00:20 CST

February 15th 2004

Romance is me

So yesterday was Valentine's day eh? I spent the early part of it romantically writing code and by a curious quirk of fate, created something that could be very useful to me in that it will allow me to do this kind of thing from within a window rather than writing HTML in vi. Very much a la blogger. I may well expand it to do more like handling archives, generating an RSS feed and such. Coding is very therapeutic to me; you know, last time I looked it was Thursday and I was casually having another nervous breakdown. And lo and behold, it's Sunday and I'm feeling like James Brown doesn't - yet another dip and rise that is the essence of yatescentral.

After I had finished romantically coding, we settled down on the sofa to a steak and lobster dinner. Seeing that Sam did her usual Saturday trick of disappearing to her friend's house and Zoe declared lobster disgusting, Natzoid and I were left with a full lobster each to wrestle with, along with steak and a beautiful combination of sauted mushrooms, onions and bacon. I, of course, ate the whole lot and then proceeded to eat about ten eclairs before declaring myself satisfied. Natzoid will be living off hers for another week.

Comments (), Permalink, 15:00 CST

February 13th 2004

The art of coding

Someone requested a sample of my PHP code today. I started reading through the numerous canned prototypes of things that I have long since abandoned and came to a horrible conclusion; I'm a complete hacker. Just looking at any one of my functions makes me jibber. I spotted potential bugs as I was re-reading the code. It was awful. Like a really bad spy novel. So tomorrow, I'm going to do something I haven't in a while; sit down and write some seriously tight code.

When I'm on a roll, I can code like a mo-fo. For example, I wrote something that took straight text and converted it to an RSS feed in an hour or so. No big deal really but it does take some talent. It's just sloppy - when I prototype, I do it rapidly and error detection is not top of my list of concerns. Tomorrow will be an exercise in restraint and good coding practices. I'll be firmly in the Conners school of being so good at software development, it hurts. I'd have put a link to Steve Power there too but he's a Cambridge boy and blogging is beneath him. ;)

I'm off to design a few objects. Feel free to fall asleep.

Comments (), Permalink, 17:25 CST

This is your life

Natzoid has just called and asked me what to expect when she gets home. All I could say was that the children are still alive. And that is an accomplishment in my world at the moment. Nico has spent the day climbing the tables. I have spent the day preventing it. What a grand purpose.

Comments (), Permalink, 16:20 CST

Back to the future 2

I've just had one of those moments where my sanity disappears. I got a waft of soap mixed with tobacco smoke. It took me back nearly thirty years to when life was a lot more simple. When all I cared about was being seven miles away from my parents' house. Where summer days consisted of a walk to a split-park with a tennis court and my brother to the left and a beautifully manicured bed of roses to the right. And there was always a cricket bat (size 4 and dowsed in linseed oil). Always.

These days, and four thousand miles away, there is never a cricket bat. Never. The only combination of soap and tobacco I ever get is made by me. And I don't have the charisma to carry it off.

Comments (), Permalink, 00:50 CST

February 12th 2004

Domesticating a wild Kenny

I have never been a shining example of domesticity. As a child my parents did way too much for me so when I escaped left home, I had to wake up to the reality that there was no-one around to pick up my messes. Only I didn't. And I never have done. I must have lost the gene that my parents and my brother have that dictates everything be pristine.

As I survey the house at the moment, it looks as if the entire cast of the Young Ones has been in residence for the last two years. Yesterday I did nothing other than entertain the kids. Today the horror is too much and I must act.

But life works against you some days. In exactly the same way that Natzoid manages to call every time I'm mid diaper-change, just as I get up to do something constructive, a thought will strike me and off I go into limbo land until some scream pulls me back to reality for long enough to rescue Nic (who is usually standing on a table, a very worrying trait - I only ever did that after many, many pints of Guinness - shut up Wart, you were always too drunk to notice so your allegations are delusional).

At least today I have managed to load the dishwasher. As I completed the monumental task and went to change yet another diaper, Natzoid called. She may be home early. Which means my arse has got to get bazzizay in the hizzouse given that I was a vegetable yesterday (my preferred state). Only as I considered the impending judgement, I thought about the web and the wonderful joys it offers, rapidly coming to the conclusion that it would be far more fun to write about cleaning than physically doing it. So here I am, knee deep in dishes and filth, blogging about doing something about it. What a waster.

Sometimes I annoy myself. I can't imagine how much I annoy Natzoid.

Comments (), Permalink, 14:05 CST

February 11th 2004

Jury?

The banner above features my handwriting, scanned and lovingly manipulated. I don't do cursive and I don't care. All of my writing looks like the above. Natzoid hates it and thinks that it is an abomination. What say you? Keep in mind that I will hate you passionately if you don't like it.

Comments (), Permalink, 20:30 CST

I'm dreaming

Oh no. Non Man U people may leave now and shut the feck up. I waited for two thirds of a lifetime for success and I treasured every moment of it. Don't let it end now.

Comments (), Permalink, 17:00 CST

Why I hate Nerys Hughes

OK, that really isn't what I was going to write about but the sentence does fall so easily from my lips and, more to the point, from my fingers.

Me and the kids are hanging out while Natzoid enjoys her first day at her new job. Nic's a top bloke. He's hanging around in his diaper and I'm wondering how long I can get away with not wearing any trousers. Quality time together non?

I know some people have a thing about blogging naked (or in Mancunian, nekkid) but I don't have morals so will quite happily disgust you all.

A quick trip around the web this afternoon reveals that Maynard is finally getting the respect (and beer) he deserves although Steve does appear to be starting to become more than a little obsessed with a certain subject (and I ain't talking politics here). Meantime, poor Rita has to face up to the reality that politically correct lunacy has even penetrated Arkansas. And in a shock revelation, Cathy has outed herself as a soccer hooligan (I secretly knew she was an Arse-nal supporter). Dr Conners' journal (he refuses to admit it's a blog) turned two today. Melly has been smoking nutmeg but tells the world something about a doorknob.

I guess I should put some trousers on now. Don't you feel dirty?

That is all. Be gone.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:50 CST

February 11th 2004

I loved Maria

When I was at school, I joined a club called DAB (Disabled and Able Bodied). My compassion was limitless. I was young and I loved every one of the kids that attended. I learned sign language to communicate and how to change diapers of people who were way older than me.

Those that were younger than me and that died of afflictions I didn't understand hurt me the most. I remember Andrew Chadwick, a guy who was confined to an electronic wheel-chair, whose arse I used to wipe because of his disability. He was my guy. Unfortunately I turned up one summer and he was dead. At the age of 19.

I took on the responsibility of looking after Maria who was deaf, dumb and destined for a life of rejection. I don't know where she is now but at this moment she seems very important to me. She loved me like a kid loves a parent, and I too looked forward to seeing her every week. I hope she's still with us.

Another guy I had the ultimate respect for was Pikey. He was born with Spinabifida. He ended up being the UK champion of disabled weight lifting and was an absolute inspiration to me. He died Christmas 2002. He was a figure to behold. I think he left behind a sprog or two. If he did, it is a gift; his resilience was incredible. To be born without any advantage yet win awards for weight lifting and athletics is amazing.

He taught me how to do a no-handed wheely in a wheel-chair. How cool is that? I can still one-hand or no-hand a wheel-chair.

It's been over a year since his death but I still think about him on a daily basis.

Natzoid starts work tomorrow for an organisation that is beyond reproach and my older days flooded back as I recall the good I've done. Maybe I'm not the selfish arse that I have always considered myself, having immediately volunteered to fix techie stuff for them.

Bless you Pikey and Dave. You taught me how to empathise.

Comments (), Permalink, 02:50 CST

February 10th 2004

And while I'm talking geek

I'm a bit miffed with the people who are working on Firefox and Thunderbird. While I appreciate their efforts, the fact that I cannot use any of the latest versions of Firefox and none of the versions of Thunderbird kind of grates on me. First they insist on having glibc v2.3 and then they start relying on libXft.so.2, neither of which are available for Redhat 7.2 although the website claims support for Redhat 7.x. I would be happy to download it with statically linked libraries if such beasts exist. Also, the lack of any release notes in the distribution is criminal.

Comments (), Permalink, 18:50 CST

What not to code

There are very few finer examples of bad software than the Peoplesoft HR software interface. Go here and search the jobs.

Processing?

And it flashes! It might as well say "initializing microprocessor" (you want to get me to say that phrase in Chinese, it's hilarious) for all the use the message is.

I have come across a number of companies using the Peoplesoft software to manage their job positions and can honestly say that it is the most clunky piece of rubbish I have ever had the displeasure to interface with. And it's not just crap software, it's expensive crap software. Oracle, who themselves are not reknowned for their ability to write usable software, want to buy Peoplesoft for $9.4 billion. Has the world gone completely bonkers?

Comments (), Permalink, 15:10 CST

I'm a talentless bimbo, get me out of here

Nothing highlights the descent of the UK better than the recent reality show I'm a Celebrity, get me out of Here. Apparently a record 62.2% of the television audience tuned in to watch the mind-numbing twaddle that was the final episode. What makes it even more arse-wipingly bad is the amount of media coverage it got. Ananova had multiple stories per day about who was doing what with whom, mostly centered around John (Sex Pistols) Lydon and some nobody called Jordan. The rest of the contestants were a bunch of B-rate celebs or has-beens.

I have a particularly deep loathing for Jordan, the supposed glamour girl who doubled her bodyweight a number of years ago by adding metric tons of silicone to her upper torso. I have been trying to find a photo of her that Ananova had shown about a week ago but have failed. In it the reality behind the woman who ran for office in 2001 was revealed; she's a man. She looked just like a chap and had a complexion that made the surface of the moon look positively smooth in comparison. I think what I'm trying to say is that she's got a face that would frighten a police horse. It's amazing what air-brushing can do; given the technology, I too could be a fashion model.

This is not the photo I was looking for but it suggests a pattern of hideousness:

 

 

Am I so shallow that I would allow someone's hideous ugliness to taint my view of them? Mais non mes petites. Not content with being a crime against art, she is messing with the King of England, having also alluded to some kind of relationship with one of the Schumaker brothers (I don't know which one and I'm too lazy to find out). Now in my world, you can spit at the Queen, moon Prince Charles, defecate on the steps of Whitehall, but you don't mess with David Beckham. Yes, he's not very bright but I consider him about the best role-model the UK has. His work ethic is unquestionable, his manner polite and he's respectful. He's the anti-thesis of the aforementioned B-rate wannabes whose desire for fame is so strong that they will do just about anything to get a byline (including riding his coat tails).

Jordan's actions, words and the associated sickening reporting of them in every detail epitomises everything that is wrong with television and to a lesser extent, the UK. It's titillating (no pun intended) mindless claptrap aimed at the lowest common denominator. And sadly it sells, whether that be on TV or in the news.

I tell you, I absolutely despair. How much lower can we go? Don't answer that. If Benny Hill is dead (again I can't say whether he is or isn't), even he will be turning in his grave. Shameful.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:05 CST

February 9th 2004

sync; sync; braindump;

I watched my favorite British comedy last night, Prime Minister's Question Time. It's an absolute hoot. The clever snipes, the vocal outrage, the probing questions and the triple adverb responses. I audibly giggle while watching it. I'm sure to the average American it looks like the most uncivilized method of governmental process they could imagine. Only the Brits who have grown up with it can appreciate the finer points of the House of Commons and that holy period that is PM's question time.

One thing that I find very disappointing is that in an age where the popular soap operas in the UK are screened with increasing frequency (I think BeastlyBenders is on 4 times a week now), Tony Blair changed the parliamentary agenda and reduced the number of PM's question time sessions from two down to one. The script writers must have had an offer that was a more lucrative proposition (writing Sunday's Archers?).

I can't help but like Tony Blair. He does so enjoy question time. Probably in the same way that I do.

Sweeping change of subject

So Natzoid has a job. Typical of her to leave me in a time of need to join those elitist bastards who are employed. She called me and gave me the scoop as she was leaving the place, sounding all triumphant just like Sammy does when she gets her awards for being responsible. I should chastize Natzoid like I do Sammy; another God damned award/job - I'm just so sick of hearing about it - go to your room and beat yourself for me.

What this means is that we have a problem Houston. I had planned on going to a trade show in Anaheim the week after next to get some face time with various people. It would involve me being away from Saturday until Wednesday or Thursday (using airmiles and hotel points) but now I'm a tad worried that I won't be able to go (no-one to look after the kids). But if I do go, just think, no internet for five full days. Gulp. I think that deserves a "damn dude".

Well, it's about this time of the day that I don't like to get in the shower and shave because we have to go to Sam's school to hear how sickeningly good, responsible, empathetic and reasonable she is, but it must be done. We really should devise a technique to extract half of Zoe's attitude and gift it to Samantha. What fun are parents' evenings/conferences when you can't come home and punish the child? Where's the damned sport in beaming proudly and having to compliment the kid? Life's never any fun. I should have taped Question Time.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:50 CST

February 8th 2004

I feel tired

Maybe this explains the 100,000 miles on my Metro 1.3 CityX...

I've visited the counties in yellow. Which counties have you visited? made by marnanel map reproduced from Ordnance Survey map data by permission of the Ordnance Survey. © Crown copyright 2001.

Them were the days. I'm sure I have visited more of Scotland when I was a kid, but can't remember where. I just have a vague recollection of ginger beards and incomprehensible language (which is rich coming from me).

Oooh - I've just remembered it's the Grammies tonight. Time for my annual look at who I have never heard of, and the subsequent questioning of whether I should keep it that way.

Comments (), Permalink, 16:00 CST

What ludicrous assignment should I attempt today?

Seeing that, for the most part, people have suddenly decided to acquire lives and thus not provide me with an endless stream of entertainment, I need a project. I would sooner it was a project that didn't involve leaving the house (thereby preserving my body heat and avoiding any interaction with snow) and would also prefer it be achievable while sitting on my arse. So that pretty much narrows it down. I either need a coding project or some fiendishly difficult configuration problem to solve.

I have a really small nagging problem on teapot in that when in vim, all the control characters are visible and when in vi, the backspace produces a ^? so I have do a manual ^H to delete, which is annoying. I have considered looking into it but have thus far refrained.

Another contender for my time is very ambitious. My Fuji Finepix digital camera doubles as a webcam. Could I get it to work with Linux? Hmmm. I imagine this to be a fairly complex task with very little reward in that the only time I ever used a webcam was when I was traveling, which I'm not.

If anyone has some PHP that needs writing/debugging, feel free to throw it my way.

Maybe just two minutes on the vi thing eh?

Update: vi problems fixed (stty sane duh!).

Update 2: Thanks to this chap, I can now download my pictures from the Fuji to teapot and so don't need the Windoze box for anything! Simple modprobe usb-storage followed by mounting /dev/sda1 (ooeerrr missus) and away we went. Still haven't got the webcam bit working though. Hmmm.

Comments (), Permalink, 11:45 CST

February 7th 2004

It's a bloody travesty

Riddle me this fat man...if you're balding and decide not to shave your head for a couple of weeks, so are starting to look like a very fuzzy tennis ball, why does some of your hair start growing out grey and some of it white?

I'm not even thirty-five and have been hit with every hair condition going. Alapecia and now grey. And the annoying part is because of the combination, I'll never get to look all wise like Jack McCoy because my head will be a wasteland. Parasites will die of exposure so I suppose the various afflictions that kids contract will not be passed on so there is one upside.

White hair. Jesus H. That just about takes the biscuit. Having gone prematurely bald and now prematurely grey, I fully expect to be prematurely incontinent and prematurely kiffing it.

Comments (), Permalink, 17:05 CST

Lord prevent me from felinicide felicide having a cat

Natzoid is on a crusade to convince me to get a cat. Every conversation is manipulated into a finale that predicts a cat is a necessity. Natzoid is feeling unwell? A cat will fix that little problem. Like we haven't got enough damned mouths to feed. And dare we even imagine what the dogs would do to a cat? Or cat litter? Hell they play with their own frozen poop so some nice stinky cat litter would be a dream to spread through the house.

Besides, I hate the feckers. We all know that cats have an innate ability to seek out people who hate them and rub themselves up against their legs or sit on their laps. Evil creatures.

So Natzoid, here are the top 10 reasons why we are not getting a cat:

1. They are evil.
2. The feckers always get run over but seldom die on the spot, instead prefering to ensure that you pay vets an enormous sum of money to save their miserable lives.
3. We already have a fur carpet thanks to the hounds, we don't need yet another layer.
4. The bastards catch critters and bring their half-dead bodies into the house.
5. You think the dogs go nuts when they see a squirrel?
6. Cat food stinks.
7. Cats stink.
8. Half-dead critters stink.
9. I would be forced into an experiment to prove simultaneously that cats do not always land on their feet and neither do they have nine lives.
10. I don't own a gun so reason 9 would be unusually cruel, even for me.

Do we understand each other now?

Comments (), Permalink, 11:45 CST

February 6th 2004

Buggering geeking Nora

<geek>

So I set myself the challenge this morning of getting Thunderbird working on my Redhat 7.2 dream machine. It had been failing because I didn't have the libstdc++.so.5 on it. I had spent some time trying to find a RPM that would provide it for me without any success. It appears that it only exists for Redhat 8.0 and later, which begs the question that if they claim support for 7.x, they obviously have a version so why don't they statically link the library? Grumble.

Not to be beaten, I downloaded the source for gcc 3.3.2 thinking that if there are no RPMs, I'll just compile it myself. I started the build at 11:00. Hell's Teeth. It was the mother of all compilations. At around 15:00, Natzoid asked me what I was doing to which my answer was 'recompiling the damned universe'. Her predicatable retort (well, predictable if you know Natzoid) was 'well for God's sake, don't forget to carry the one'. At 16:30 it finished and there was a positively glowing libstdc++.so.5 just begging to be dynamically loaded by Thunderbird.

But it wasn't to be. It then started complaining about glibc, wanting version 2.3 or later. And I know that isn't available for 7.2. Bugger. I have had enough for today but I am not beaten...tomorrow is another day and I will be a Thunderbird user soon.

In the unlikely event that you have Thunderbird running on your Redhat 7.2 box, please point me in the direction of how you did it. Even google isn't helping.

Next week, if you are really lucky, I'll tell you about my version problems with up2date and how I solved them, stopped worrying and learned to love the SRPM.

</geek>

Comments (), Permalink, 18:00 CST

Normal service has resumed

Man, was I in a bad mood yesterday or what? I should check my seratonin levels before I start typing. Don't worry; I kept my murderous inclinations in check and then started censoring myself (what a bastard - Ed).

The Mac contingent can have a laugh at my expense today as I struggle to install the appropriate versions of libstdc++ to get Thunderbird to work. Now bugger off. I'm busy.

Comments (), Permalink, 11:25 CST

Pigeon congestion?

Apparently pigeons have given up their map reading secrets. It has long baffled the scientific community that pigeons have a homing instinct, citing everything from magnetic fields to smells in an attempt to explain the phenomena. Apparently they were wrong. They follow roads. Which leads me to suggest a follow-up study; when they hit the M6, do they stop like the cars do?

Update: I'm suffering from wild mood swings today (as if he doesn't usually - Ed) so I have to ask the following question: Who on earth thought that funding a bunch of post-doctoral Oxford research associates for ten years was a good idea? Don't get me wrong. Oxford and Cambridge are fine institutions (they are where we and our enemies get our spies and politicians from) but pigeon research above NHS waiting lists? Pathetic. I'll be pissed if I end up working in the UK and paying taxes to support this kind of epic research in an effort to prove that the UK is a leading authority on the habits of rats with wings.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:10 CST

Back to the future

Seeing Natzoid obviously went to bed very late and hence I have no adult with whom to communicate, I'll relate my disturbing dream. In it, I'd had to return to the UK, armed with only a suitcase of clothes, much like I had arrived. I'd got some work doing some project management for an old friend's company. I managed to scrape up the money to buy an old banger of a car to get me to and from work and for reasons that I won't go into here, I was staying with my grandmother in Ashton. During my dream, I found myself sat on a Saturday afternoon in the Brittania pub in Bryn (which was closed a few years ago) analyzing my lot and was somewhat amused but mostly astounded to realise that I was going to end up living my life much as my grandfather did; in a council house in Wigan. I cannot describe the enormity of that prospect. From international man of commerce who travelled business class to a rusty banger and GM buses, all while frantically trying to pay for Natzoid and the kids to stay in the house here.

The realism was phenomenal; I'm not a reliable voyeur of most things but the dream brought back levels of detail that I had long since forgotten but knew to be true. Details like the slate floor in the Britannia sloping downwards from the bar and its Greenall Whitley pumps to the vast oak door, the dimpled copper-top tables and huge green ash-trays, the delightful yet nauseating scent of stale ale and pipe-smoke. Old Wally behind the bar, smiling a grimace. Bert checking his betting slips to see whether his nag in the 3:30 at Haydock had come in for him so he could stay out longer. The hanging smog of desperation.

And it was all me. I could feel Ashton's steady grip pulling me in. If I take Bert's advice on the 4:10, I could make two mortgage payments. I know it's only 3:45 but should I have a whiskey chaser with that pint of mild? I really should stop smoking cigarettes and take up a pipe; it would be much cheaper. I wonder whether Wally will lend me a two-spot until payday? I wonder what's happening on the internet. Is our web-page still there? I wonder what Natzoid has written about today. I'd take that second job but the bus won't get me there on time. Feck it. I will have that chaser Wally.

When I awoke to the sound of Sam getting up for school, I was dazed. A portrait of the past or a future landscape?

Comments (), Permalink, 10:00 CST

List o'trifles

First and foremost, congratulations have to go out to Manchester City for what was a stunning second half of football yesterday. From being 3 down at half-time and being down to ten men, to a fantastic 3-4 win, with the winner being scored in the dying seconds of the game. That had to be one of the best games I've seen in years. I just wish I had watched it live rather than on tape-delay. It was truly the beautiful game. Don't you wish that there was 52 weeks a year of that?

Secondly, after the football, I watched the X-Files. Mulder and Scully posed as husband and wife while investigating the suspicious deaths of residents of a community in California. The community in question had strict rules surrounding cleanliness, what could be visible, what color the mailbox was painted etc. As the plot unveiled, I realised where the inspiration had come from; if they had added some synchronised lawn-mowing to the script, it would have been Edina (a suburb of Minneapolis for those non-Minnesotans) and the actors were our old neighbors. Crikey 'eck. It's unnerving seeing your old neighborhood dramatized. I shudder to think what lived under the play-house in the yard of our last house.

I tried my hand in the kitchen again last night. It's difficult to screw up roasting beef and potatoes but I nearly managed it. I also tried another cake. Once again it tasted great but for the purposes of appearance and name-to-visual correlation, I had to christen the product 'ugly upside-down flan'. It's really hard guessing the weight of ingredients. To that end, I have added a set of kitchen scales to my wish list over there on the right. I am determined to get this right.

Comments (), Permalink, 09:00 CST

February 4th 2004

Ethical dilemma

Is it wrong to eat half a pound of delicious cheddar cheese by chopping off large chunks and dipping them in HP sauce? If it is, I don't ever want to be right.

Comments (), Permalink, 14:40 CST

I'm not old, God is old

Age seems to be the theme of the day. Natzoid is 27 today. Happy Birthday mi amore.

There's a bit of an age difference between us as well as a continental delta. It never shows up more than when dealing with the issue of popular culture (I use the term 'culture' freely). Take for example this report from the BBC which lists who will be performing at the Grammies:

Prince, Beyonce Knowles and rapper 50 Cent are among the other stars lined up to perform at the ceremony at the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

Beyonce Knowles, rapper Jay-Z and OutKast lead the nominations, up for six awards each.

The only one of these I have heard of is Prince. To me, the word rapper means "avoid at all costs - seriously untalented thug in the neighborhood". Natzoid actually aspired to being a rapper. I aspired to being in an eighties synth band with more eye-liner than Siouxsie Sioux and Robert Smith combined. Natzoid avoids eye-liner in general and has certain rules about how and where it may be legitimately applied. I have rules about how and where I apply to work. Natzoid thinks Steve Jobs is great. I think he's a prat. You get my drift...

Anyway, for a couple of months, the age-difference between us is a trifling seven years rather than eight. Now if the average man dies approximately eight years before the average woman (and I've just pulled that statistic straight out of the air because, you know, 67% of statistics are made up on the spot) and we foolishly assume that I am average, that means that I'll be dead a full fifteen years before Natzoid. Now if we factor in the smoking, lard and aversion to exercise, we can add a nominal five years on to that, making it a twenty year difference. Now let's say that the average man dies at 65, which would put me dying at 60, then that means Natzoid will be a spring-chicken of 52. Hmmm. She'd better not remarry or that twenty years will be like an eternity stuck in the Eighties for her. And if I do come back to haunt her for her ill-advised union, you can be damned sure that it will be wearing eye-liner to my rules and because I'm dead, see, I'll have that gothic palor that I always aspired to.

Random elderly rantings aside, I'd like to thank all the people who have sent Natzoid birthday gifts. It's good to know she has some presents to play with or read today since I can't get her anything until tomorrow. The rest of you be ashamed of yourselves and head on over to picklejuice and say Happy Bidet.

Comments (), Permalink, 11:10 CST

February 3rd 2004

It may be poor man's silver but...

Bolton vs Middlesbrough in the League Cup final. That's the second thing that has made me smile today, God knows nothing else has; although I will be having a fry-up for dinner now I have some HP sauce. I couldn't wait for breakfast so it's eggs and sausages etc tonight. Hmmm.

BTW, Go Boro', you deserve it.

Comments (), Permalink, 18:20 CST

Survival kit arrives

The Bazzer's package arrived today. Oh My God.

HP sauce, Lurpak (Danish butter), Mars bars, Crunchies, Stilton, Double Gloucester, Tea, Paxo (the rooster booster), Oxo...

For a bigger picture click here. I am in heaven. And it's all mine.

Nice one Bazzer!

Comments (), Permalink, 15:40 CST

Advice people

So Nico's crib is still in our room and normally he'll sleep in it until anywhere between 2 and 4 in the morning, whence he'll wake up, be transfered to our bed and go back to sleep. The problem is that he invariably sleeps across the top of the bed. As I explained a couple of weeks ago, if I'm not in bed before this happens, I'm doomed to freezing and/or discomfort.

Last night was a special kind of torture. I had stayed up to watch some drama on BBC America. After that had finished, I still wasn't in the remotest bit tired so watched one of the X-Files and then some other mindless drivel. That took me to 3am. Still wide awake, I checked my email and had an interesting series of emails with a chap who runs a company who compete with my former-employers - he was in Singapore so the emails were back and forth quite quickly. At 4:30, I was still absolutely wide awake but decided to at least try to sleep.

So I creeped into bed, where Nic was lying orthogonally to Natzoid. I managed to find a half pillow free and laid diagonally from under where Nic's head was with my knees wrapped up to my chin. And there I laid wide awake for another hour.

By this time, Nic had got into his night-time gymnastics routine where he will seek you out and make sure you are still there by climbing on you and feeling for your face and hair. Once assured that he is not alone, he then tries to return to a comfortable position. This inevitably means being kicked in the head, ribs and anywhere else where you can expect to feel a great deal of pain.

The kicker to all this is that his diaper always ends up in my face. Always. Without fail. As I laid there semi-conscious this morning, after far too little sleep and with the stench of a diaper that needed changing wafting gently harshly into my nasal passages, I remember coming up with some triangulation technique that combined all of the events, kicks, flailing arms and screams of the night to form a unified theory for how it was that his butt always ended up in my face. Alas, as the moment arrived where I knew I had to get up, succumb to the daily oatmeal blackmail, diaper changing and dog melee, all I was left with were the three variables that formed the basis of the theory; A, S and V, none of which I can remember the meaning of. I do remember there was some field theory in there but to be honest, I don't really remember that much about that branch of mathematics (unless I'm in the state that I learned it - drunk - which I most certainly wasn't this morning).

So people, the advice I need is either an explanation of the ASV Diaper-Field Theorum, preferably an approximation using something I can remember how to do, like least squares or summot, or some advice on how to avoid a butt in my face first thing in the morning, no matter where I am in the bed. I'm thinking the answer may well be an anagram of ANDYBR, but I am not sure who it should be administered to.

Comments (), Permalink, 12:50 CST

February 2nd 2004

Jesus H Christ on a bike

As if the MyDoom virus and the returned faux emails aren't clogging up mailservers around the globe enough, the latest scourge to hit my inbox has arrived. See, because I'm a job seeker and because my resume is posted on various sites, the mail-harvesters have a field-day. If I get one more email suggesting that my chances of a job would be vastly improved if I went back to school and got a degree, I am going to not only scream, but probably inflict unspeakable cruelty on small fluffy creatures. I have a feckin' degree, which you would notice were you seriously trawling for prospects rather than using bots and mass mail-shots. And it ain't one of your namby-pamby BAs in Synchronized Flower Arranging either, it's a proper subject...a BSc in Hard Sums people. Perkin Frickin' Elmer, these people know how to push my buttons.

And to add insult to injury, having applied for a google-plex of jobs and dropped an enquiring note about a position with my former boss, I get a single response from him saying that I would be bored and underpaid. How does one take that? Candor or rejection? The stupid job was in electronic component packaging anyway (yawn).

I have emailed Mr "I'll be in touch" and asserted that I would be more than willing to go see him in California in a couple of weeks time. With a bit of luck, I can tag two more interviews onto the trip while I'm there. After that maties, there's some project management work in Northwest England that looms.

I might shut up for the day, just in case Teapot the Paranoid Linux Box's fan gives up the ghost. In the meantime, if you haven't been over to check out my Drupal experiment, feel free to do so.

Comments (), Permalink, 16:00 CST

Not one to stay clear of the bandwagon

I didn't watch any of the Stuporbowl (thanks for the nomenclature Rita) but apparently quite a few people did.

From the beautifully sensational on-line tabloid Ananova:

Justin Timberlake apologises after exposing Janet Jackson's right breast during a live performance. Take a look

A few questions. Is there any signficance to it being her right breast? If it had been her left would the other team have won? And who wears those things unless they plan a carefully orchestrated flashing or have a hot date afterwards? Wardrobe accident my arse. I've only ever worn my nipple adornments on Saturday nights when it looked like I might get lucky.

Comments (), Permalink, 12:00 CST

Unhappy times for dwarfs

As I absorb the vast white expanse outside my window, and then shiver, close the blinds and look at this morning's installment of winter weather advisories (the longest running series since Coronation St) and its details of how many more inches of rarified white hell may befall us, I have to spare a thought for the little people. A couple of more days like the last couple and their lives may well be threatened as the white blanket gets piled higher and higher.

The reason this uncharacteristic concern for those of the small persuasion came to mind is watching my dogs in the yard this morning. Being sizable creatures, they haven't really had any historical problem with the depth of the neige or the arctic temperatures. However, with the past few weeks misery evident all around and most of the way up them, they're starting to struggle to move outside and I have seen definite signs of them showing bipedal tendencies. And if the dogs are suffering, so must be the little people.

In an attempt to use the creative side of my brain to assist the midgetly, I have been wondering what gizmo could be invented to avoid losing them during this trying time. Ideas thus far are:

Stilts with large Doc Martens at the bottom.

Big 'boy in the bubble' bubble for distributed weight and comedy hamster on a wheel effect.

Free medeival rack treatment for those under 5 feet. Although I can see that $540b being quickly burned up in a rash of malpractice litigations.

Complementary Kobe Bryants.

Emergency tickets to Puerto Rico.

I know, none of them seem to be feasible. I'm disappointed in myself. Maybe I should concern myself with whether or not to take the plunge and move over to Drupal and just screw the little people. And I would but apparently Fox have the rights to air people screwing midgets in their new reality show (to be debuted Feb 13th, it's very sadly true) so I'll just have to cast the midgets from my thoughts and let the social services worry about them.

Comments (), Permalink, 10:35 CST

February 1st 2004

Something radical might happen

Well, here's a thing. I've been toying with automating this whole blog thing for quite a while now because I get bored with how manual it all is, but as regular masochists will know I loathe MovableType and there is no Linux version of CityDesk. So anyway, there I was mosying around Les's place when I saw a reference to Drupal. I headed on over there, downloaded it, had a play and I think I like it. There maybe some changes around these here parts!

Comments (), Permalink, 17:35 CST

Snidey Natzoid of the Sneaky Brew Tribe

<salt>Now I'm not one to moan and grumble about trivial topics</salt> but Perkin Elmer. Natzoid has just made a sneaky brew. By that, I mean that she made a cup of tea without telling me and without my cup in attendance. I can forgive her most things, for example this morning's question 'So when is your bitch-ass going to clean my kitchen so I can watch my Superbowl?', but making a cup of tea for just her? Is that not the lowest act of all? It's heinous.

Comments (), Permalink, 13:15 CST

Let me hear you say damn

Welcome to yatescentral where the build-ups are tense and the let-downs are shocking. Today's roller-coaster news is on the down side. Remember that interview that I had? Well I haven't now. It transpires that the guy in question didn't notice that I wasn't down the road from him and so has decided against an interview, prefering instead to "be in touch".

It shouldn't really have come as a shock to me. After all, into every life a little snow must fall. It's just that mine at the moment is one big long literal and metaphorical winter weather advisory.

Anyway, in the interest of remaining positive, I am going to assert myself and insist that we meet face to face, even if it's on my dime.

More later once I've removed all the toothpicks from my eyeballs and worked my way out of the straight-jacket.

Comments (), Permalink, 11:30 CST