Friday, February 28, 2003
In the run up to Wendys return to work on Monday (which, naturally, she's dreading....who wouldn't after 3 months off) and the end of me being able to take the car to work every day, I decided to dust the cobwebs off my trusty MTB and start cycling to work again.
Last year, I biked in more or less every day during the Summer months, and felt quite fit by the time that the Autumn rain came and, lucky for me, Wendy went on maternity leave so I could use the car. I also kept a log of my time and distance and plotted a chart of my (slowly) increasing speed over the time I was biking in, culminating in an average of 17 MPH over 5 and a half miles last September...really should get some road tyres...
Anyway, For some inane reason, I figured that not cycling AND coming home every lunchtime to a feast of mammoth proportions prepared by my darling wifey type wouldn't have had *that* much of an effect on my fitness level and I should aim to get somewhere near my best time last year when I biked in this morning....
BIG MISTAKE!!!!!
If it was any other day, it probably wouldn't have been so bad, but I gave the day off to both of our fitters thinking that it would be fairly quiet and quite good fun to get out and fix stuff for a change. So, having arrived at work after nearly giving myself a collapsed lung through trying miserasbly of get anywhere near my time from last year, it was wonderful to be presented with a whole bunch of urgent maintenance requests. You can imagine my joy....
This is the first time I've actually sat down today....and in a strange way, I feel really good. Getting busted stuff to work again is very rewarding, especially when you haven't done any welding for a while and what you patched up actually holds together... but now that I've sat down, I'm starting to feel the aches and pains and stiffen up.... really great when I've got to cycle home in half an hour.....AND its just stated raining too.... bugger.
I haven't even had time to read The Friday Thing which is an excellent weekly email comment sheet... like private eye, only better....
On a happier note, my buddy Phils wife, Abbey gave birth to a bouncing baby girl yesterday morning. Hello to Taylor Jane who weighed in at 7lb 1oz at 0213 on Thursday morning.
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| Posted by: An-D at 16:20
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Tuesday, February 25, 2003
Man who catch fly with chopstick can accomplish anything....So I'll not be doing very much then...Think I'll stick to Superdudes Xtreme Pinball which is a lot easier and *must* be good cos its got an X in it.
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| Posted by: An-D at 13:37
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Friday, February 21, 2003
I've been reading up on my GPS this week, learning the finer points of routes and waypoints. Little did I know that my search for GPS stuff would lead me to a secret world. A world of hidden treasure, free internet access and cryptic puzzles. It was during some idle browsing on the GPS newsgroup (sci.geo.satellite-nav) looking for some info on mapping tools that I came across several posts with the phrase 'geo-caching' and 'war-driving'. Curious, I fired up Google and went straight to geocaching.com (quelle suprise). There before me lay the biggest game of hide and seek EVER...As it turns out, GPS owners have been playing this game for years...the rules are pretty simple, you hide some stuff in a box, tell people the co-ordinates (as indicated on you GPS) then people go looking for it, find it, take something out of the box, then put something they brought with them back in.... sounds exciting eh?
From what I can gather from my brief visit to the site, there are geo-caches in over 163 countries, the nearest one to me is about 10 miles away...all this time, a treasure trove on my doorstep. sheesh.
War-Driving is pretty similar to geocaching but the co-ordinates that are logged relate to a wireless network location. Basically, peeps drive round with a scanner sniffing for an 802.11b compatible signal (about 2.4Ghz). Once found, you can simply plug your wireless network card into your laptop and ride piggyback on the network signal you have found to get access to the internet....clever stuff eh.
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| Posted by: An-D at 16:02
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Thursday, February 20, 2003
Seems as though the gap between science fiction and science fact is narrowing. Apparently, the USAF are looking into the possibility of using a nuclear engine to power the Global Hawk unmanned, high altitude 'reconnaissance' system. Look out for the stream of gamma rays streaking across the sky in a war zone near you soon....
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| Posted by: An-D at 11:11
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Wednesday, February 19, 2003
Make a mini version of yourself withWeeMee....see
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| Posted by: An-D at 15:08
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Bloody bugger.... Y'know, the incredible talent that some peeps have really makes me sick. Take a look at sofake.com and you'll see what I mean.
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| Posted by: An-D at 13:46
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Tuesday, February 18, 2003
Guardian Unlimited | Online | Google gets Blogger
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| Posted by: An-D at 13:17
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Sunday, February 16, 2003
Did I ever mention that Wendy's been to Everest Base Camp?
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| Posted by: An-D at 02:25
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Friday, February 14, 2003
What do 404 error pages look like in Iraq...probably a bit like this
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| Posted by: An-D at 14:52
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What do you get when you cross a skipping game with barbed wire? Barb Jump from rudeplay of course.
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| Posted by: An-D at 10:43
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BBC NEWS | UK | Census returns of the Jedi This is great...I'm part of a new religion (sorta) Personally, I think the number should have been bigger, but I know that a lot of people who I forwarded the request to wimped out...yes, that includes you 'DT' of St Annes and 'MB' of Preston. Good job in a way I suppose. I mean, we don't want any old nerf herders joining our religion do we?
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| Posted by: An-D at 10:13
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Wednesday, February 12, 2003
Our new camera turned up on Friday and I've been busy taking several zillion photos of Alex. I suppose one of the very few downsides to digital cameras is the fact that you can take as many photos as you like and it doesn't really matter if they're crap as you can just delete them...though you still have to sift through them all and look at how crappy they are. Anyway, I've sorted through the first batch and added them to Alexs photo album...they're the ones where he looks older than all the rest ;¬)
I saw a really strange sign last night while going to collect some grub from the excellent Lalveena Tandoori... It was outside a nearby pub called 'The Mill' which resides at the junction of 2 villages (Walton-Le-Dale and Higher Walton) on the outskirts of Britans newest City, Preston (A great honour bestowed upon is by Lizzie as part of her Millenium tour)...Anyway, in big bold letters on a blackboard the sign read "Topless Barmaid Every Thursday".....
Now I don't know if this is an effect of our new, cosmopolitan 'City' status filtering out into the suburbs or a ploy to draw in a younger crowd...but I have to wonder, who the hell would want to go in a pub an look at a hairy fat bloke with no top on?
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| Posted by: An-D at 14:14
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Woooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo....spooky mind reader
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| Posted by: An-D at 11:35
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Monday, February 10, 2003
Its not often you see anything groundbreaking anymore when looking at the humble 12" piece of grooved black vinyl, but this has got to be a first...though I'm not totally convinced of its authenticity.
Seems as though someone has (apparently) come up with a way to scan a record, extract the audio by looking at the profile of the groove, then convert it to wav. On the surface, it sounds improbable, but I'd love to know what Emile Berliner who invented the gramophone in 1888 would think about it.
What do you think? Digital Needle - A Virtual Gramophone
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| Posted by: An-D at 13:37
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I'm beginning to suspect that Wendy neglected to tell me something about her encounter with a spider in the bathroom last January....See
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| Posted by: An-D at 09:01
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Sunday, February 09, 2003
Umm...things have changed a bit....dunno if I like it yet...
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| Posted by: An-D at 03:54
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Friday, February 07, 2003
GPS's are great.... We've only had it a couple of days and I already feel I'd be...hahha...lost without it! Yesterday, I navigated my way home from work, plotting my track on the way, then this morning, using the power of GPS, I managed to find my way back to work!! Amazing!
The plan is to make amends for the lack of trekking last year (due to Wendys bump) by doing loads this year...which means going a bit further afield..which is why we got the GPS. Anyway, I started wondering if there were any GPS utilities about that can make programming routes etc a little easier...turns out that like any other software niche, theres loads.
The best one I've come across so far is OziExplorer. Catering for most brands, it allows you to upload / download waypoints, tracks and routes to your GPS. Probably the best feature is its ability to load scanned map images (jpg, bmp, gif etc), calibrate them, then plot routes over the map image before uploading them to your GPS....cool.
So, as soon as Alex's neck is up to it (He's still a bit wobbly) He'll be making tracks for adventure on the mountain tops, sat in his groovy new baby carrier carried by Sherpa Dad led by mountain experts Mum and Jessica....can't wait...
Finally, my dad comes out of hospital today. Everything went really well with his op... in fact, if you ignored the 12 inch scar under his arm, you'd never know he'd been operated on... Big ups to Mr Carr, the specialist who's given my dad (if he behaves himself) the chance to grow really, really old.
Oh yeah, nearly forgot, heres a whole bunch of games and stuff at mohsye.com
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| Posted by: An-D at 16:04
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Wednesday, February 05, 2003
Woo-oo! and Yay-ay! Our GPS has arrived from the US.... and we only ordered it on Friday!!! Crikey!
After the wedding ring fiasco last October (Parcelfarce lost Wendys wedding ring coming from the US) I had reservations about ordering stuff from the US, but paying £93 for a Garmin Etrex Venture that I had seen in the Outdoor Shop in Preston retailing for a hefty £215 was too good an offer to resist.
As I said last week, we ordered it from The GPS Store and I'm totally impressed them. Excellent service all round... If you're even only remotely considering getting a GPS unit, you need go no further than here.
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| Posted by: An-D at 14:00
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Tuesday, February 04, 2003
Become an overnight news sensation by creating your own fake CNN page at FakedNews dot com
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| Posted by: An-D at 16:44
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Java Arcade emulator with Battlezone, Defender, Berzerk and Arkanoid to mention but a few...Mmmmm...Niiiiiiiice
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| Posted by: An-D at 12:03
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Monday, February 03, 2003
Thought Provoking...TIME.com: The Space Shuttle Must Be Stopped -- Feb. 10, 2003
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| Posted by: An-D at 15:49
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Ever wondered if your site makes it past Chinas internet filtering system? Have a look here and find out. Real-Time Testing of Internet Filtering in China
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| Posted by: An-D at 11:38
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