While I’m not too busy, a review of 2006:
Read more…

It feels like I’ve been home forever. It’s so nice to have all day to do what you want, although often the day ends up getting away from me. I’ve done most of the things I need to have done this holiday though, so that’s good. I’m sort of looking forward to going back, if my 8 meg broadband is up, because I need to unpack, and it’ll be so much nicer once I have. But I’m also not looking forward to going back, not just because there’s no cat to sleep with (and get up my nose) and it means going back to work, but also because I’ve only been there a few days it doesn’t seem like home yet. It’ll be better when I get a few things up on the wall, though.

I got all my shopping done today. Well, apart from buying some food, since I’m going back up on New Year’s Day when there’s nothing open. I got to drive to Focus and B&Q, which was okay, apart from the Fleetwood roundabout, which is designed to be confusing. And dad being a backseat driver. My entire reason for driving was because I already didn’t want to drive and the longer I leave it the worse I get and the more I forget what I’m doing. But hopefully the roads won’t be too busy when I go back up.

My mum’s managed to involve all of us in trying to buy a Playstation 2, so she can play Lego Star Wars, now that my sister’s taken it away (to go and move house). So it’s all a bit exciting round here at the moment.

The funniest thing I’ve seen this Christmas is mum playing on the Playstation 2. My sister has one, along with the two Lego Star Wars games. It’s very cool but I’m quite crap at it (it doesn’t help that I get confused about which person I am and confused about which button is which, and so tend to die a lot), but mum is worse. It’s so funny watching her trying to jump on a ledge and just dive bombing off the end of it. I actually can’t breathe from laughing, watching it.

I quite liked the podracing level, except I had to cross my hands to do it because my right hand is better at controlling direction, which is on the left, and all that’s needed on the right side of the controller is to hold down X.

Although I can’t play for too long because it still gives me a headache after a while – although not as blinding as the ones I got at uni playing a console of some description.

It’s quite handy having my dad as my web host. He had an email this morning (as did I, but I thought it was spam) to say I’ve used 80% of my bandwidth. I have no idea how much I’ve used at any time, but it’s academic because I never knew what the limit was anyway. But now it’s twice what it was

I dreamt last night that I’d woken up and although it felt like the next day it was actually one year later. The latest version of listening to music was called torrenting and involved a standard pair of headphones, but they were connected to the biggest power pack ever. Stargate was still going for another season, although it had General Hammond back in it. And Stargate: Atlantis had been renamed to Stargate: Arena.

I’ve had a play with Windows Vista on dad’s computer (he has it as a virtual machine) and it’s not too bad – it’s not such a big jump from XP to Vista as it was from 98 to XP. So I’m not hating the idea of having a computer with it on so much. I’m still reserving judgement on Office 2007 and the whole ribbon idea. But as I use Open Office at home and work are still on 2000, I don’t think it’ll be an issue.

I know there were 8 days for me to say that and I entirely missed them. But it didn’t really feel like Chanukah till Friday night when I was home, so we had candles, song and presents. I now have an Avengers calendar, some knickers, some bowls to make flapjacks in, kitchen scales, Hogfather poster, puzzle book, some oil to make the microwavable rabbit hot water bottle smell nice again. Thank you to everyone who put something in my Christmas stocking, they were all very cool things.

I did completely fail to pack any jeans, though, so I’m wearing an old pair of mum’s I’m slightly amazed I can fit into them because I thought I was fatter than her. Although she’s taken the legs up, so they’re just short enough to look silly.

Coming down was a bit of a trauma because after a while my car decided to get slower and slower. I almost made it to the services, but not quite. The RAC man who came out was great and very helpful. Turns out there’s a switch in the engine which was still on summer and mean the carburettor was full of ice. Apparently they changed this to be automatic in the 80s but as my car was born in 1989 it’s obviously a bit of a throwback. But I got home in the end. It was quite strange to get no fog once I reached the M3. And I’m now doing much better at roundabouts.

Thursday ended up being a bit of a traumatic day since a bulb went and I discovered what I thought were trip switches were actually fuses. But now I have lots of fuse wire and know how to change them.

It’s nice to be home now, catching up on my sleep, trying to get more bed space and quilt than the cat, watching all the stuff dad’s got on his hard disk recorder, and generally lazing about. And gradually catching up on my RSS feeds.

I went to Tescos last night, in the fog, which was scary, and hard. Not least because the car wouldn’t behave and kept feeling like it was going to stop whether I put more choke on or less. The roads were nice and quiet though. I thought since I’ll end up having to drive in the fog sometime, it might as well be when I’ve got someone else with me. It’s not something I’m planning on doing again out of choice though.

I realised I’ve got loads of reading and email writing to catch up on at the weekend when I’m home with a fast internet connection. As well as TV and radio that dad’s taping for me. And shopping to do. But I thought it was great that reading LJ through RSS feeds meant I can read them offline. Which I can, it’s just so slow to update I’m not getting them all. So I’ll probably have absolutely masses to read once I get home.

After last night’s Rotaract meeting most of us went back to mine to have a look. And one of them understand storage heaters, so now I have them sorted. Well, mostly. The one in the bedroom is just an ordinary heater with a timer but is crap. Hopefully after a few days I’ll be able to get it up to a temperature where I don’t freeze. And I think I needed both plugs turned on on the one in the lounge because that’s freezing. But the fan heater in the bathroom warmed my clothes up nicely while I showered this morning (with the aid of a plastic jug). And it is nice to have my bathroom smell of white musk afterwards.

It’s not feeling like it’s home yet. Probably because I’m still living amongst crates and can’t find anything and because I’ve not put anything on the walls, due to not being able to find anything or get to anything.

I did still manage, on Sunday night to post chapter 8 (definitely of 11) of Doctor Who: The Soap Opera where I continue to not actually torture Sarah.

• The analogue signal from the TV is crap – but the digital one is good. I thought my issues with the Freeview card were due to lack of RAM (even though I have 7768Mb) but no, it was the signal. Only problem is frequency at 850 is crap, so no ITV or Channel4 (or ITV2, 3, 4 and More4). Dad found a digital signal booster in Maplin, so we’re going to try that. And maybe get a Freeview box for the TV. So I’ll still be able to tape one channel and watch another
• My bedroom heater doesn’t work. I don’t really need it that much but it would be nice not to get up in the freezing cold
• The shower doesn’t work due to lack of hot water pressure. Only solution is for the estate agent to see if the landlord will get an electric shower put in
• The shelf space on top of the wardrobe is a really annoying size, as is the space under the rail. But I have moved my clothes so I have two free big drawers
• I’m still waiting for Comet to call me about picking up the hoover and microwave. Apparently it’s in a queue and they can’t do anything until it reaches the front of the queue. Which is helpful
• I want my broadband connection!

Edit: You’d think that ul for Unordered list and ol for Ordered list would be simple, but no…

Because this is very long: Read more…

I have survived my move, although yesterday was v stressful – more details later. I’m currently on 1p a minute dial-up because freeserve changed their number, so it’s no longer my best friend. Will be staying late at work to catch up on the internet!

My freeview works, so I can watch Torchwood. My computer works. I still need to make my bed, wash up everything so I can eat and find whatever I need for tonight and tomorrow morning, but still…

Last night was the District Exec meeting at the Chairman’s house in High Wycombe. Which I ended up driving to, on my own. There’s pretty much just one road to get to the motorway, which is a mad road – if varies between 50mph and 30mph for a few hundred metres each, with slight variations to 40mph, national speed limit, and max speed signs for the bends. It was windy as well, which I could really feel at times at 50mph.

Once I got onto the motorway I intended to stick to the left lane. Except that there were lorries on it and there’s only so long you can go at 50-60mph keeping your distance, so I made it into the middle lane. I’m quite glad John Cleese (my sat nav) warns you when you’re going to need the exit because I was passing a lorry when he said, ages before there was even a sign about it.

But then came the bit I was most dreading: the Handycross roundabout. I think they’re had roadworks on it ever since I’ve been near Wycombe. And I’m not good at changing lanes on big roundabouts at the best of times. So I started off in the wrong lane, managed to get on the roundabout in the wrong lane, and was still in the wrong lane even after I changed lanes. It was just as well there wasn’t many people on it.

After the motorway, being so close to people in front seems really strange. Wycombe seems to delight in randomly giving you two lanes in the road for no apparent reason, so I spent most of my time trying to work out whether I was in the right lane or not, only to find it was academic not far on. And the triple mini roundabout was almost as confusing as the Handycross roundabout.

Once I got there I parked, decided 1st gear would be good for leaving it on the hill. Took my foot off the brake and the car went backwards. I was parked on a bit of a bend but it was because I had parked badly. Once it rolled a bit it stayed, just creaked a lot. And it stayed where it was.

After all that I was light headed and shaking, but I had survived.

On the way back there was less traffic, which was good, although it seemed to involve stopping on hills going upwards. I think I did more hill starts in Wycombe than I’ve done since I started driving again. The motorways had only increased in the number of lorries, who seemed to think it would be a good idea to drive next to each other, so I went into the very scary right hand lane to pass them. Although it got a bit strange when the lorries started passing me, later on.

Turns out, the exit off the M40 to get home is about 2 metres long. Well, I exagerate, but not by much. After that it was strange to have cars coming at me so close down the country roads. And blinding me, which is so not fun.

In comparison, going home shouldn’t be as bad, not least because it’ll be in the light and I should have a good idea of where I’m going once I get close. And John Cleese is a pretty good guide – he’s just not much use when he says ‘take the next road on the left’ and I ask, ‘do you mean this one?’. And I won’t have to drive in Wycombe again till the end of January (if I drive to Burns Supper) or the beginning of February, if not. Why do people want to live there anyway?

Anyone who has to drive in Wycombe or on the motorway on a regular basis has my sympathy. Although the latter is worse the more lorries there are. I survived and didn’t hit anything, full story tomorrow as I am on the verge of falling asleep sitting up.

Because everyone else is doing it and I’ve never had one (this is the point at which people say Banbury to me), even though the green is impossible to read on the red.
Read more…

If there’s anyone who hasn’t heard about it by now, the story of theVerizon employees and their inability to do basic maths: starts here. There was briefly a Wikipedia entry about a new form of maths called Verizonmaths but unsurprsingly it’s not making them look good and it’s been taken down.

Torchwood has a second series, on BBC2 this time.

Most excitingly, I think, Blakes 7 is getting a radio series. It’s slightly surreal because I was talking about this with someone at the District Christmas party on Saturday. I can’t decide whether to be excited about new Blakes 7 (there are some interesting people in it, like Craig Kelly and India Fisher). I just don’t know if it’ll be the same with new actors. But the Cult of Blakes 7 is on in half an hour, so I’m sure that’ll help.

Just been to see Casino Royale and I really enjoyed it. Even though there was no Moneypenny or Q. But I liked the technology in it and the chase sequence at the beginning had me biting my fingernails. I wish Craig Daniel had kept his clothes on more often, though, that was not a pretty sight. But then he’s generally not a pretty site. I hope they go back to dark haired handsome men next time. The part I didn’t like was when I left and my car was not only steamed up but trying to ice up as well. And the water I left in there nearly froze my tongue off.

I did discover though that Ewan McGregor is in that film about Beatrix Potter. With a dodgy moustache. So I might have to see it. Contrary to all expectations, I don’t like Peter Rabbit. I don’t know why, so I’m not that excited about seeing a film about her. Or Ewan McGregor in a moustache. But then I saw two Star Wars films with him with long hair, a beard and doing a dodgy accent, so I expect I’ll cope. I’m just glad his wife is sensible and prefers him clean-shaven.

I really enjoyed last night’s Torchwood. So I was really surprised to read all the posts this morning from people hating it. It was a bit different because it didn’t involve most of the Torchwood people but it was an excellent whodunnit. There were some things that didn’t quite make sense but it was really interesting. And I’m reliably informed by my dad that the answer is a parabola; I didn’t hear the question.

I went to get my post redirected this lunchtime. Which involved queueing in the post office for 10 minutes to get a form, then I joined the back of it again while I filled it in, then handed it in. I almost decided to come back later but it’s not going to get better till after Christmas. I took a stack of things into work to phone to tell people I’m moving but only managed my car insurance (which doesn’t change price, unlike my house insurance which saves me 64p). I know what I’m doing every lunchtime this week.

And lastly, I posted my entry to the SG Rare Pairings Ficathon: Never Easy, which is Jack/Elizabeth. There looks like being loads of interesting pairings there, I just need to find the time to read them.

I have nearly everything I need for the new place, I just failed on the toilet cleaner brush front. But since I’m only going to be there a week till I go home, it’s not desperate. I do love Wilkinsons though, they sell everything, even though it’s only a little shop (in comparison to the one in Poole).

I’ve packed seven crates, one is full of clothes, the rest are all books, DVDs, paperwork and other things. The rest is going to wait till Friday when I have two more crates left (I’m sure I had one more spare though, so I don’t know quite what I’ve done there) and take down the rest of my posters, so I have even more depressing walls to look at. I do have quite a lot of things in boxes, which seem pointless to put in crates. I can foresee several trips – it’s just as well I’m only going five minutes down the road.

I’m so tired though. Last night I went to the District Christmas party, which was good, apart from it being freezing out on the walk home from the bus. And I didn’t get in till 1.30, so I was hoping my system might realise that sleeping late to compensate would be a good idea. So I woke up about 8.15, which is half an hour after my alarm goes off for work and still fifteen minutes before the heating comes on. I was fine this morning but since about 3pm I’ve been quite happy to just go to bed, if I thought for one minute I’d sleep. I’ll go to bed to watch Torchwood and if I sleep till my alarm goes off, I’ll be happy.

I did stop the packing because I was so tired and watched the last Seventh Doctor story I had to go, which was his first, Time and the Rani. I enjoyed it, the first episode particularly was delightfully silly. I liked him misquoting proverbs too. It could have got really annoying if they’d kept it up, but for four episodes it was funny. I remembered why I really like Sylvester McCoy as the Doctor. You can’t tell so well in the audios because it’s his actions that do it. He’s always doing something, usually in a silly way and I love that. He did look quite funny in Colin Baker’s costume too.

Work looks like not being too bad next week after all, but the week after (ie the week before Christmas) will probably be hideous. But since I have less on then, that’s not so bad. Tomorrow I’m going to see Casino Royale, which I’m looking forward to.

And as I’ve actually remembered, I posted chapter 7 (of 11, probably) of Doctor Who: The Soap Opera. This one’s back to a Sarah & Harry chapter, after Lavinia’s cameo in chapter 6.

This morning I’ve filled up four crates of stuff. And taken all the small things off my walls so sitting at my desk I’m looking at suicide yellow walls, with brown patches where the blu-tac has taken the wallpaper off (there’s something about this wallpaper because it has nothing to do with the amount of time the blu-tac’s been on there). This is the depressing bit now, where I live in a room where I can’t get to anything round the crates and can’t find anything because I’ve packed it.

Tonight is the Rotaract District Christmas party, which should be fun. And at some I have to brave the crowds to buy more crates and some food. What I’d really like is to sleep in. This morning I gave up at 10 to 8. Although as the heating doesn’t come on till 8.30 I finished my book, my magazine and my DVD from amazon before I was so hungry I had to get up.

Very excitingly, though, I got a virtual gift yesterday. Definitely from an American given the message, but an otherwise anonymous mystery benefactor. Thank you, whoever you are.

Moving is stressful, I’ve discovered. Although this is mostly because I wanted to tell Pipex I was moving but it turns out this means they cancel your current account and give you a new one. Which can take 7-10 days after you move in. So I could be broadbandless for a few days, till I go home. I don’t know how I’m going to survive (although I can see it involving staying after work…)

I posted the latest chapter of Doctor Who: The Soap Opera, Chapter 6: The Truth, where I don’t torture Sarah at all. But am making up for it in other stuff I’m writing.

My dad introduced me to Pandora where you tell it what music you like and it finds other things it thinks you will. I told it various artists and it came up with a Garbage song, and I’d forgotten to tell them I liked Garbage, so that impressed me.

I’m less impressed by the book I’m currently reading, which is 12 in the Star Trek New Frontiers series. I haven’t read any since about book 4 and I think it’s gone downhill since then, as I’m not interested in any of the plots in it. But what got me last night was the science being completely and utterly ridiculous. Basically, they’ve just found out that back in Kirk’s era a god and a human reproduced and had a daughter. She had a daughter, who had a daughter, who had a son. None of the daughters showed any signs of godhood but the son did. The explanation was that the difference was that he had a Y chromosome (fine so far) and the godhood gene is on that. Er, no. You get your Y chromosome from your father, so the son can only be a god if his father was descended from one, not his mother. They could have made it work like colour blindness, where the godhood gene was on the mothers’ X chromosomes but was cancelled out by the fathers’ X chromosomes, but that bits missing on the Y (where the brain is, according to my A level biology teacher).

That’s all fairly basic biology as well, like GCSE level stuff, so no-one should be getting it wrong in a published book. It’s slightly more excusable in fan fic. I read something recently that was set now and had someone in this country paying with pound notes. And another where someone British was described as African American. (although it always comes up at work when we do an American questionnaire and ask ethnic origin, if you can be African American, [anything else] American why can’t you just be American?)

I now have some furniture. My sister took me to IKEA yesterday in Wembley. Although the sat nav tried to direct us to the Tescos behind it instead. I now have a table and chairs and a couple of chests of drawers. Most of the rest will wait till January, although next weekend I’ll be getting any last few bits from Wilkinsons amidst some serious packing as I’m not really going to be in much next week. I can’t do too much now, though, because there just isn’t the space for it.

I also managed to order myself a bed and headboard. It seems like just a small place mum found, but they were really nice to talk to, so I’m happy. Certainly more helpful than Comet, who declined my card because I hadn’t realised that my billing address had to match my credit card now, rather than where it will be. It took twenty minutes to re-order my stuff. Helpfully they will only deliver sometime between 7am and 6pm and I can’t pick the keys up until the estate agent opens. They are apparently going to phone me first but if it’s before 9am there’s not going to be much I can do! Although having said that they are delivering stuff that will fit in my card, so I suppose if the worst comes to the worst I can always get them to come round here.

Now I just need to organise myself with telling people I’m changing my address and setting up a standing order with the bank so my rent gets paid.

On a TV note, I watched Robin Hood on Sunday as mum told me Rene Zagger was in it. I missed the last ten minutes due to the electricity running out (so glad I’m moving to somewhere with proper electricity) so I had to ask dad how it ended. I don’t feel that I’m missing anything by not watching though, I’m just not feeling inspired by it. And last night’s Torchwood, was Ianto really suggesting what I thought he was suggesting?

It really shouldn’t be that hard to buy a bed. I was going to quite happily get one from Argos except that eventually I found that they don’t deliver large items on a Saturday. So I went round loads of other websites they either think you want a fancy bed that will just create dust underneath and/or want to spend more money than I earn in a month. Or want something that has no drawers which is pointless. And none of them want to deliver on a Saturday. What do they think the majority of the population who work Monday-Friday do?

Eventually managed to find somewhere who also sell headboards and deliver on a Saturday, although need to ring them up. Hopefully they will be able to understand my attitude on headboards (they are there so you have something comfortable to lean against when you sit up in bed reading. And that’s it).

I’m so tempted to go and see Melli when she’s in Virginia, on the basis that it’s closer than Tasmania, and a shorter flight so I can take all my own food in case they’re crap. And it’s not far from New York, which I do want to go to for more than five hours. Not sure I can actually afford to though. Will have to see.