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August 29, 2003

Heads Bravo Tails Men and Motors

How sad am I? Went to the pub and had one pint of cider and four pints of coca cola. Need to stay sober to pick Rebecca up in town tonight. She is on a leaving night out, last known location The Apartment.
I can't bear to think of her getting a taxi back on her own, I am going to have a lot of late nights and embarrased kids if I ever have any!!
Got an invite to the e-excellence BT awards this Friday in The Edge. The project I work for won one of the monthly awards for e-excellence and the final is on Friday. I'd like to thank my parents, past and present workmates....

August 28, 2003

120 years of electronic musical instruments

http://www.obsolete.com/120_years/

Lovely Kylie

Kylie's great, I have had a real soft spot for her for many years, she went off the boil when she was going through her alternative phase arsing about in a river with Nick Cave.
But she's back to doing what she does best, she gives us men what they want, and here she is in full glory in the advert for her new lingerie range 'Love Kylie'

Last Meal Request

I love the one half way down, number 287 must be a socialist:
"Same meal that is served to all other offenders in the main dining room."
http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/stat/finalmeals.htm

Nsp

I am doing some work with some data from the students record system.
The two useful fields for most of the systems here are the student record number and their pin.
The pin is stored in the database with the column name Nsp. This confused me until I asked an old hand why this was so. Apparently the guy who set it up knew the pin was sensitive and instead of storing it in an encrypted fashion, he called the column Nsp for 'Not student pin', in order to confuse a would be mailicious hacker.....Genius!!!

Mercaptan

The things you overhear in work.

Are you sitting comfortably? Then I'll begin. Today's lesson concerns Mercaptan.
Natural gas normally is non-toxic, tasteless, colorless and odorless. A scent known as mercaptan, is added to the gas to make it 'smellable'.
Mercaptan is an acrid chemical, that can be recognised immediately, should there ever be a leak. Mercaptan makes natural gas smell like sulphur, or rotten eggs.

Is this real?

Please could someone with a more advanced sense of irony inform me if this is real?
http://www.theholylandexperience.com

Google Calculator

This one's new to me:
http://www.google.com/help/features.html#calculator

August 27, 2003

Megalithomania

Never be stuck for somewhere to visit again, without doubt one of the best websites I have ever visited. Love the pdf a fieldsheet feature..fantastic:
http://www.megalithomania.com/

why i love ebay so much

Just loggeed on to check the progress of one of my sales and two old eps sell for £31.00, I had a reserve of £3.50 on them:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=2552758523

Belfast Flash Mob

I promised a guy who posted on some earlier comments that I would help to spread the word about his forthcoming Flash Mob in the Corn Market.
He was annoyed at the lack of effort put into the last, so took matters into his own hands.
Details
30th august... cornmarket 1400... props... rubber band...wear on wrist... safety pin...hook on band... balloon...uninflated... at cornmarket... twang yer band... you will be contacted... and given details of the 'hit'!!

You can sign up for more details here:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/belfastflashmob/

August 25, 2003

Spent yesterday in Portrush, ate

Spent yesterday in Portrush, ate in the Ramore and walked to White Rocks, the weather was so good up there, glorious sunshine, I don't think there is a nicer beach than the East Strand in Portrush on a good day.
Dandered along the beach in Holywood today up through the Gold Coast at Cultra, boy are there some impressive houses up there, if only I had a spare million or two, I'd love to see inside some of them, in an MTV cribs style. Watching the MTV cribs day at the moment, amazing money pots some of those houses, but fair play to them.
The Darkness video was on the other night, and I love it, am desperately channel hopping in the hope of catching it but to no avail.
This is a real barbie blog at the moment, and lacking any substance, must try harder.

August 23, 2003

Portaferry

Doing the tourist thing again today with Rebecca's sister ended up in Portaferry,
visited the aquarium, which was excellent, they had cuttlefish which was a new exhibit (I think) since I was last there. They change their colour based on what you put in front of them (within reason), which was very neat. They also had sea horses, evil looking wolf fish, and some beautiful wrasse.
Ate in the Corn Store, good honest grub at a reasonable price, and huge baskets of chips given with everything.
Took the ferry across to Strangford, and drove back home through Downpatrick and Comber, nice part of Northern Ireland.
Heading out on the tiles tonight in Belfast, to put some more money in the pocket of Jaz Mooney.....hello sore head tomorrow.

August 22, 2003

Shiver me Timbers Matey

Saw Pirates of the Caribean last night. Fell asleep for 30 minutes at one point, but I think I didn't miss that much of a plot, just another huge fight scene.
Johnny Depp's character Jack Sparrow was a great hedonistic laid back pirate, jolly entertaining.
Kiera Knightley is a very beautiful woman, and only 19 years old!!!
I hate cinema with a passion, but the film was bearable.

New one

Mail this morning amongst the 'Your Details':

PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A ONE TIME EMAIL AND I APPOLOGISE IF IT OFFENDS ANYONE

Hi My name is Andy
I live in england and i could really use your help
im not going to scam you and i promise nothing in return for your help
The fact is that i work as a security officer long hours and low pay and
since my partner left me for another man she had been seeing for six months
i was left with lots of debt.
i am now faceing loosing my home and everything i am working to keep
I dont know if it is leagle to ask for money so i wont but if you would
like to make a gift to me it would be your choice and very much appreciated.
If you can help i thank you very much
and if you cant help then i thank you for reading this.

Gifts to
Abbey National
a/c No 43591553
Sort Code 09-01-26

PLEASE NOTE THIS IS A ONE TIME EMAIL AND I APPOLOGISE IF IT OFFENDS ANYONE

Blinking Moth

I am being deluged by emails, over a hundred comments now on the hawkmoth post, and another 100 My Details mails this morning...when will it stop.
And to top it all off I was stung by a wasp when I was out for a run this morning, haven't been stung in well over 15 years...definitely not as sore as I remember as a kid.

August 21, 2003

Nuts

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/3169049.stm

Star Wars Kid

This is not new news. I raed about this recently and never got round to checking out the videos. I am glad I did this morning.
The JediMaster. The kid who recorded himself with a mock light sabre and left the tape in the video club's camera.

August 20, 2003

Guesthouse in Dublin

We have been invited to a birthday do in Dublin at the beginning of September. I was researching guesthouses in the area where our mate lives. I called a couple of places and was told no room at the Inn. I was suscpicious however because the people on the phone gave me a 'Hold On while I check the availability' then just sat on the end of the phone for a few seconds and said sorry we are full.
I had heard that people with Northern accents especially blokes may not get a room because of the reputation of stag dos etc. I got a colleague who is female and from the south to call one of the places back just out of interest and lo and behold we have a booking for one of the full nights when I phoned.
Scandalous, I don't want to give them my money, but it is the only nice place in the area. Instead I am going to wait until I am checking out and then confront the owner, and get her to admit her underhand tactics.

156 emails

The email address which I deal with here had 156 emails this morning all with one of three subject headings. Yesterday the mail box was hammered with .pif and .exe attachments. Last night and this morning the culprit has decided on sending plain text emails in huge volumes.
They all originate from addresses to do with companies in Belfast mainly recruitment agencies, grafton,randtstad etc, which leads me to believe it is someone annoyed at missing an opportunity in the last recruitment drive.
An analysis of the header shows it is the following customer of unite solutions:
Received: from BO2P03 (modem-233.cust-176-3-212.adsl.unite.net [212.3.176.233] (may be forged)), so I have sent them an email.
I don't think the email header is forged, but I don't know how difficult it is to forge it, so perhaps it is.

August 19, 2003

200 Cds

200 cds burnt with stick on labels and with printed covers by tomorrow. Aye dead on, I'll put a brush up my arse and sweep the floor while I am at it.
Aint no Perl script could do that job.

boxty

This Belfast based crowd, resident company in the Old Museum Arts Centre are trying to beat the record for the humber of people in a phone box to promote their Fringe festival production. They need volunteers.

August 18, 2003

Daddy has too much money!!

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=3621809683&category=7297#ebayphotohosting

August 17, 2003

BBC's Restoration

BBC have been running a show called Restoration for a few weeks now, it is well worth a watch. By donating to the Restoration Fund you can help preserve some of our architectural heritage. The last show had a real gem of a house and most probably will be the winner IMO. Mavisbank in Edinburgh was last owned by a dodgey bloke who revelled in allowing the house to fall into disrepair to the annoyance of those who have an interest in preserving heritage. He turned it into a scrap yard and eventually burnt it down.
They are coming to Northern Ireland soon, full details here. Crescent Arts Centre, Lissan House and Herdman's Mill in Strabane are competing for a place in the final.

August 16, 2003

Man Post

Managed to do loads of jobs round the house this morning. Fitted a new timer on our central heating system, not sure if it is done right, wired it all up and turned it on and there was nothing, so I switched a few wires and tried again and it powered up, however I can't seem to get hot water without the heating, I never could previously but that was because I had wired them both into the same terminal because I broke one of the terminals. The instructions say if the system is gravity fed or partially gravity fed then it is unlikely that you can get hot water without heating, so that's good enough for me. Just told Rebecca that it's a gravity fed system which is why she has to use the immersion in summer, appearing all knowing. ;-)
I also made a stop for the gate out of an old fence post, and cut the grass. I celebrated all these achievements with my last tin of Skol in the garden, times are hard when saving for a wedding.
The wee rugrats broke into an old shed behind us yesterday, they got hold of some old spray cans and I could hear them at work on next doors back wall, I got myself all psyched up to go out, convinced they were writing paramilitary slogans. They looked really dodgey, baseball caps down looking mean. So heart beating I opened the gate into the alley, and they had drawn a butter fly and written Bob the Builder woz here, the drugs must be good round here. ;-)

August 15, 2003

Moth Yolk

This post http://www.jaffs.com/trumpet/000214.html has now got 24 comments. The humming-bird hawkmoth appears to becoming very popular in this summer's heat.

Warning Warning

Those of a nervous dispostion or are easily shocked please do not listen to this guys lyrics.

For those with a sense of humour, and wanna be shocked go visit
Belfast's Rod Hull of Hip Hop, Roysta He's creating a bit of a stir recently. Hip Hop with a Belfast accent, with a huge dose of humour. This is not for the faint hearted, but I am recommending him based on his punk spirit, posting out free cds to greedy message board peeps, and the fantastic lyric "F**k cash, if you wanna book me, pay me in f**king bucky."
He also has a t-shirt sideline linked from his website which are not for the faint hearted, so I will not supply the link.

Update

He's on in The Menagerie on Saturday night 16/08/2003.

August 14, 2003

http://www.shazam.com

http://www.shazam.com
I am sure this has been done in many places before, but Shazam appears to be getting very clever. For those that haven't tried it, it is phenomenal, call the number 2580, point it at your music source, 20 seconds later the name of the song is texted back to you. It seems to be best with electronic music.
http://www.shazamentertainment.com/technology.shtml

August 13, 2003

NIR & no delays

NIR get a lot of abuse for a variety of reasons, but I got the train to work today both trains were bang on time, the carriages were clean, and the conducters were friendly. The new coffee shop in central charges £1.75 for a crap latte but that isn't the fault of NIR.
Memorable part of the journey was two English tourists asking the conducter how far a walk from the station is the abbey in Whiteabbey. I fear they are going to be very disappointed.

August 12, 2003

Honeymoon

Honeymoon is booked, apparently it is in poor taste to tell people where you are going. I aint ever heard of such tripe, but I will respect those views, so I can't say where it is going to be, but I will be sitting here in just over a year's time.


Airzooka

I finally got a hold of the Airzooka by driving to the parcel depot in Aldergrove and picking it up myself.
It's a great wee yolk, a lot bigger than I expected, about the size of a bucket, it makes a huge noise when it is activated, which makes it difficult to hit people on the sly.
It does fire the vortez of air a huge distance, and there is a soild whack when you get hit. It travels at a surprisingly high velocity. From twenty feet away you can smack a set of blinds as if a ball has hit it.
If you aim it at wasps and flys they get caught in the vortex and rotate for a while before flying off (unharmed). It also causes psychological damage to cats, but that's another story.

August 11, 2003

Too good to be true?

I deal with an email address for distance learning enquiries, a mail just arrived from a woman in UAE wanting to do a Phd by distance learning, here is the end of the email:
"Mean While, I'm pleased to offer you the following:

1- A free invitaion to you/or other staff member to come to DUBAI-AUH/UAE to visit <removed>, to meet <removed> to discuss and check department's lab facilities/capability to carry out this research.

2- I'm offering you a business class ticket and a full board accommodation for three days in a Five Stars Hotel in Alain/AUH/Dubai.

N.B. Pls send me your phone contact number to call you personally.

Fanta

You know Orange Fanta?
Twas invented in Germany during the second world war.
"Coca-Cola had been bottled in Germany since 1929. In the late '30s, the realities of war and the unpopularity of foreign-owned firms in Nazi Germany made it difficult for Coca-Cola's German affiliate, Coca-Cola GmbH (in which Coke held majority ownership), to get ingredients, maintain bottling plants, or even communicate with the parent company. So Max Keith (the leading bottler in Germany) decided to launch a new soft drink , relying on available ingredients, mixed with some of the German made Coke ingredients, the import of the secret formula was banned by the government). A salesman suggested a name based on the German word fantasie—Fanta.
When the war ended, a telegraph was received at Coke's Atlanta headquarters: "Coca-Cola GmbH still functioning. Send auditors." There wasn't much need for Fanta once Coke bottling got back into full swing after the war, but the trademark was later resurrected, and Fanta Orange reborn, in 1955 in Italy."

August 10, 2003

Looking North from Dunluce

August 08, 2003

Belfast Flash Mob

TBC
Time: August 23rd 2.00pm
Location: Cornmarket
Activity seems to be centred around the Shine message board, with Club Nut taking a lead in organisation.

Summer Blog Blues

Another case of the summer blog blues:

"Sitting at a computer does not seem to be the way to understanding, enlightenment or happiness when the long hot day is beckoning you outside, and reading other people's postings can seem like a waste of good thinking time. "

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3134629.stm

Ultimately Leisureless

Ultimate Leisure the owners of The Odyssey's Bambu Beach Club have purchased La Lea, Irene & Nans & Bar Bacca.
Full Story.
I'd love to hear the figures involved. I really like Bar Bacca, I really hope they don't change it too much, if any.

August 07, 2003

ascii matrix

Does exactly what it says on the tin:
Ascii Matrix

Flash Mobs

This could be fun:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/online/story/0,3605,1013317,00.html

August 06, 2003

Airzooka

Why does firebox always seem to find these great products at a price band that just screams impulse buy?
Airzooka

A review will follow by the weekend, if their delivery times are as good as they usually are.

Donner & Blitzen

What an incredible display of firepower last night. I only remember one other thunder storm of that magnitude in Northern Ireland in my lifetime, and only the second time I have seen forks here.
I was told last night that it takes 10000 volts to create one inch of lightning, that is 'awesome', there must have been millions of volts heading towards our roof tops last night.
There was footage on the BBC news this morning from a flat in Stranmillis which attracted a hit, a huge gaping hole the shape of a lightning bolt from the roof to half way down the gable wall.
I was watching the storm from Holywood looking out across Belfast, aswell as the sheets and forks I noticed blinding ball like flashes appearing, hanging in mid air, a few hundred feet up, then disapperaing.
A fantastic display. Here is a nice four page lightning primer

August 05, 2003

The Turtle

Channel Four have a great series of documentaries on at the moment called 'Machines Time Forgot'. Last night the documentary charted the progress of a team of enthusiasts making a working turtle (a revolutionary submarine designed in 1776) based on original designs. They were successful in their attempt, which was a pleasure to watch especially since the hydro engineers at the Marine base where their testing tank was based, were initally very sceptical.
Article on The Turtle.

Randomness

When I was a kid I collected a weekly magazine called 'The Art of Fishing' it was one of those things that entice you in the first week with a folder and some free gifts and you collect it weekly until you have a full folder.
I remember going in to Pollocks newsagents in Bangor (incidentally one of the best independent newsagents, not sure if it is still there) to get the latest edition of the magazine. I couldn't find it on the shelf, so I asked the guy behind the counter if he stocked it. He went off on one, and gave me a lecture about how he would never stock such drivel, that I would be better to save the £1.50 a month for a year and buy myself a good book by an author who was interested in the subject rather than some bored journalist knocking out 'The Art of Fishing' one week and the 'Collecting Antique Dolls' the next.
I remember thinking he was a bit of a dick at the time, but I would now like to publicly admit he was correct.

August 04, 2003

Liberty Project

One of the keynotes at the WebCT conference was Marc Hamilton the Systems Engineering Director, Global Education and Research at Sun Microsystems. His talk was pretty interesting, if I understood him correctly. He was talking about Project Liberty amongst other things, and was talking about single login, ie login details would be stored on a few secure central servers like the DNS systems instead of on a disparate collection of databases across multiple e-commerce sites and web services.
With reference to e-learning he was saying that a child of 4 would get a username and password when entering school and they could use that to login to any of their learning environments throughout their life.
It was the first time I had heard of Project Liberty. Here's a current list of members:
http://www.projectliberty.org/membership/members.asp

Oh Baby!!

http://www.boston.com/dailyglobe2/212/nation/Refusing_help_woman_gives_birth_aboard_T-.shtml

weekend

All I did all weekend it seems is eat, which is no bad thing. We were taking some English visitors round various places of interest. Did the obligatory Portrush/Dunluce/Coast Rd drive. The highlight for me being a stop in Burger King. Rebecca is a vegetarian and also has a liking for dining in poncey wine bars, so in my 5 years of knowing her, we have eaten in a fast food restaurant twice. The first time being our first date when I stopped at KFC on the way back from the cinema, and wondered why she didn't want any food.
We went to Fontana in Holywood on Saturday night. Great meal, what more can I say. Wine and co in Holywood have opened a wine bar, we went for a nosey, it's one of those places that can't make up it's mind if it's a bar, a restaurant or a cafe, and fails miserably at being a bar....IMHO. The guinness is the worst I have ever tasted, they make cocktails but only the ones on their list because their till has them programmed in, surely one of the lamest excuses for laziness ever, the staff went round at 10.00 cleaning tables and generally looking like they wanted to be anywhere else but working. We were the last to leave at 10.00 pm.
Sunday was a day of cooking and eating huge amounts of dead animals on a barbecue.

August 01, 2003

Wikipedia

This is a great wee site:
http://www.wikipedia.org/, apologies to all those who have known about this for years, I found it for the first time today.

Pub Quiz

Myself and a mate went to Cutter's Wharf for a few scoops last night. It has been wine barified since I was last there, and is now much more stark and uncomfortable, although they now will bring you table service pints which is pretty handy.
They had a pub quiz on, so we entered. Unfortunately neither myself nor my mate Mel are the sharpest tools in the box and we came second last, with 34 points out of a possible 70. We justified it by saying there was only two of us, so in theory we actually did quite well, answering on average 17 questions each.
The gaps in my knowledge are startling, I just have no interest in movies, nor music, I don't care who directed 'Black Hawk Down' or who has won the most Oscars (Walt Disney would you believe), but I do care about 'In which Eastern European country is Norman Wisdom most famous' (this was my proudest answer, it's Albania in case anyone doesn't know). My other greatest answer was 'Which actor has appeared in more Alfred Hitchcock films than anyone else?' I guessed Alfred Hitchcock and the quiz master agreed, which was fortunate.