Archive for January, 2006

The IT Crowd: funny or not?

January 30, 2006  |  General, Personal, Web Finds  |  View Comments

Funny: yes, but unfor­tu­nately it is unerr­ingly sim­ilar to my real life. :(

Except I wear a suit, we are on the top floor not the base­ment, I don’t have toys every­where, nor do I have per­sonal hygiene issues, we do answer our phones, the top boss isn’t so much of an nutter/idiot, We all have fam­il­ies and wives, No body beats me up, I haven’t had hook­ers in Ams­ter­dam (although I have been there 13 times) and (thank­fully) the female crap man­ager got fired.

Apart from that, there was much sim­il­ar­ity as we are Linux FSF geeks, web nerds, there are mon­it­ors etc. stacked every­where, reboot is the best rem­edy and the lifts don’t work well.

Down­load the first episode

Bonsai!

January 30, 2006  |  General  |  View Comments

I was given a mini Bonsai kit for 'xmas.  This is very cool, thinks I, and the opportunity to grow something like this:

So, I spread the peat, dropped in the seeds and have been water­ing it every day for a week. And here are the results:

Hmmm. Not quite what I was hop­ing for. Keep tuned for updates in the com­ing weeks.

Basho

Shanter sings! The Rocketman

January 30, 2006  |  General, Web Finds  |  View Comments

Finally, evid­ence that Wil­liam Shat­ner is the very devil!

Someone stop him!

The ABA: my thoughts

January 24, 2006  |  Airsoft, General  |  View Comments

QUOTE: Hiss­ing Sid: “It’s dif­fi­cult to have con­fid­ence in any organ­isa­tion that refuses to dis­cuss its object­ives, it’s meth­ods, it’s plans or its qual­i­fic­a­tions for the task at hand.”

The Asso­ci­ation of Brit­ish Air­soft (http://www.associationofbritishairsoft.org/) are a body set up to fight the Air­soft purchase-and-manufacturer ban sec­tion of the VCR Bill. Has it gone astray?

My feel­ings are that the ABA are not reach­ing out to the com­munity it rep­res­ents. We have many smart and exper­i­enced people avail­able that could make a real dif­fer­ence to the oper­a­tions of the ABA and they feel left out.

For example, a com­mit­tee could devise the argu­ments to present to the gov­ern­ment in this meet­ing that is up and com­ing next month. I have a degree in Philo­sophy and frankly am more than will­ing to help strengthen the argu­ments. Every­one could do some­thing to assist mak­ing the ABA a focus. Con­sider, for example, the state of the ABA web­site. Frankly, its ######. Many people on this board have con­tacts in the web design industry that could assist in mak­ing a much bet­ter site, but no.

Is the ABA sup­posed to be a one way organ­isa­tion? No. It is a com­munity body and should be work­ing with that com­munity in such activ­it­ies as rais­ing money to fight a cam­paign. It is far too exclus­ive at the moment.

The gov­ern­ment are not stu­pid. The only real prob­lem with air­soft is the real­ism. Unfor­tu­nately this is also the heart of air­soft. It will take very strong reas­on­ing to change the gov­ern­ments minds, reas­on­ing I don’t think the ABA are cap­able of (judging by the posts here).

The ABA had a golden oppor­tun­ity to unite air­softers and effect­ively get what in polit­ical terms is a fant­astic grass roots man­date. None of this has happened and people on this forum (the forum eld­ers you might say) are upset that such a chance has been squandered. Sure the ABA are fight­ing the gov­ern­ment, but they are left the rest of us behind.

I am not sit­ting down on my back side. I have writ­ten to my MP, the Prime min­is­ter, the Blears lady, the Home office, the police com­mis­sion, all the major news­pa­pers, all the spe­cial com­mit­tee mem­bers and the Lords. I was inter­viewed in the TV doc­u­ment­ary and had my let­ter read out on the radio.

No one can say we are sit­ting down and not doing anything.

I just want to do more! If the ABA lead­ers feel too busy to organ­ise more then appoint new mem­bers to do so for you. This is the key to effect­ive man­age­ment: del­eg­a­tion! The lack of this is another reason that we are get­ting stressed.

I ask the ABA to become more rep­res­ent­at­ive and not with­draw even more; that would be the most tra­gic of mistakes.

Basho

New Geek test

January 19, 2006  |  General  |  View Comments

Are you a Geek?

Find out here: LINKAGE

I scored:


My computer geek score is greater than 57% of all people in the world! How do you compare? Click here to find out!

Which proves I am not an über geek, just a web/UNIX geek.

Why Macs suck…

January 19, 2006  |  General  |  View Comments

Great google video

LINKAGE

Extra Cheese?

January 18, 2006  |  General, Personal  |  View Comments

Oh won­der of wonders!

Kieran, who works for me, put his brand new busi­ness cards to a very good use; he dropped one in a bowl at Sub­way and won a com­pet­i­tion for a sub­way plat­ter worth £35!

Nat­ur­ally the rest of us in the office are help­ing pol­ish them off, what a great way to relax after last nights hard­core skirmishing!

Spe­cial­ist in toasted and cold sub­mar­ine sand­wiches and salads, the SUBWAY® chain has exper­i­enced sig­ni­fic­ant growth in recent years as a fresh and great tast­ing altern­at­ive to other options. The chain also offers a deli­cious range of deli-style sand­wiches, salads and wraps, crisps and freshly baked cook­ies and muffins.


Man that is god­damn Airwolf!

Basho