Sunday 30 September 2012

Bad TV and films, Facebook pruning & internet memes/comedy

Today was a bit of a novelty as Toni went off alone to meet Jade and do some shopping leaving me to my own devices. I decided to utilise the chance to watch some bad TV and films. I kicked off my viewing with Rock Rivals, a very silly take on things like X Factor and other talent shows. It's actually nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be and has some bizarre camp charm. Don't get me wrong, it is NOT good TV.


Next up was War Of The Dead. This was not a great zombie film either but again was quite enjoyable as far as bad zombie films go! Second world war film with super soldier zombies, had to be done!


Toni and Jade returned and after a cup of tea we all headed out to Coffee Town for late breakfast/lunch. There was much sleeping once we got back home again, from Toni and Jade anyway LOL. I took the opportunity to do some fine tuning of my friends list on Facebook. Did a bit of moving around and deleting but I still have WAY too many although I just can't be disciplined or brutal enough to just hack it down to a smaller size!

The day was finished off watching various internet memes on YouTube and then various comedy clips from the likes of Foamy The Squirrel, Bill Hicks, Doc Brown, George Carlin and Robin Williams.



Saturday 29 September 2012

Macmillan Coffee Morning, what is it & Gangnam Style

Today Toni and I headed off to Daraline Towers in North London for Caz Mumin's second coffee morning in aid of Macmillan Cancer Support. Lots of coffee was drunk and some delightful cakes were munched, some like this:

We had a great time and met some new folk too. Surprise of the day was Darren Tite unveiling this little device that he had bought on eBay. Despite lots of investigation and online searching nobody could work out what on earth it was. If you've seen one before and know what it is then please let me know! Answers on a postcard....

One of those crazy moment came with a quick flip to the TV to watch PSY's hilarious Gangnam Style video:


Cake was followed by kebab goodness before we headed back and indulged in Wipe Out, Mock The Week and Doctor Who!


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Friday 28 September 2012

Meh day at work, kebabs, round the houses & The Borgias

It was a really meh day at work today. Had a niggly headache that I just couldn't shift which didn't make things easy and then every thing just seemed really really frustrating! Next week should be really interesting as Billy Smart is over from the other side of the pond. I have a feeling misdirection could be coming thick and fast!

As it was just Toni, Sam and I at home for dinner we opted for kebabs as we hadn't had them for a while. Very nice they were too. After food we headed over to Downham to go and pick up Gemima from her friend Tara's house. We ended up staying for tea and a long chat with her mum. Next stop was to go and get Aaron although we ended up having to back to Tara's as Gemima had picked up the wrong bag. Fortunately we hadn't gone too far. Correct bag collected we then continued on to Erith to get Aaron from Michaela's before finally heading back home again.

The rest of the night (and into the small hours) was spent watching the final four episodes of Season 2 of The Borgias. Sadly we now have to wait until 2013 before Season 3 starts. Boo hiss!

Thursday 27 September 2012

Orpheum rehearsal: set licked and new songs coming

Fantastic Orpheum rehearsal tonight! We did a couple of warm up numbers before doing a stonking run through of our set for Watford. The trick must have been doing the warm ups which we hadn't done before. Job done, result!

After that we had the luxury of spending the rest of our time working on two new songs. Both are going to be epic when they are finished and are coming together really well!

Wednesday 26 September 2012

Flash Gordon Quote Along

Toni and I met up at London Bridge after work and headed off to Camden for a chinese vegetarian meal at Qing. As usual the food was delicious and we both left completely stuffed for bugger all money!

Next stop was Leicester Square and the Prince Charles Cinema to go and see a Flash Gordon Quote Along. We met up with Robin and Ellie (plus a few of their friends)

The event started well with a singalong to the Flash theme and then Ming The Merciless graced us with his presence and had those who had dressed up try the wood beast for booty! We were then encouraged to participate and heckle throughout the film.

As for the film, what can I say! It's sci-fi cheese that took on a whole new life with the addition of an auditorium full of people heckling the on screen actions and simultaneously joining Brian Blessed for a DIIIIIVE!

A brilliant laugh and we'll definitely be attending more showing like this!

Last.FM listening post

Here's last week's top picks music lovers!

Top weekly tracks:


Top weekly artists:


Overall top tracks:


Overall top artists:

Tuesday 25 September 2012

WFH, no stress, Chinese and The Borgias

It was a working from home day today as I was struggling with a slightly iffy belly. Thankfully it did improve as the say went on. Work was a novelty as it was stress free and there was no cleaning up operation for me to carry out!

Dinner was Chinese accompanied by Warehouse 13. This was swiftly followed by another two episodes of The Borgias. We seem to be cramming as many episodes in as we can at the moment, it is just such a good programme.

Monday 24 September 2012

Backlogs, chocolate cake, The Streak & The Borgias

It was fun fun fun at work with a massive backlog building up and so many other stupid distractions getting in the way not to mention the fact that I am now scheduled to attend four meetings every Monday. Fortunately one of those is led by me and I can usually cancel that one! Things just don't seem to be quieting down and I think we are going to hit critical mass very soon.

It was very nice to get home and forget about the tribulations of work. Sam cooked a lovely spicy rice dinner followed by gluten free chocolate cake/brownies with chocolate cream sauce! That was SO nice!

We watched the first disc of The Undertaker's The Streak DVD before settling down for more Catholic intrigue and deception with The Borgias!

Sunday 23 September 2012

Nice fire, Grimm, Haven & The Borgias

Today was a lot colder than it had been all week. We decided that it was time to try out the fire in the living room. We weren't even sure if it would work as we hadn't tried it when first moved in. We had nothing to fear though, one click and a pilot light later we had a lovely blazing fire which made the living room all toasty :o)

The first four episodes of Season 2 of Grimm were followed by the first episode of Season 3 of Haven. Life is good, all our favourite TV shows are returning and so far are all running their excellent previous form.

Toni and I then finished the day humouring some historical inaccuracies watching the really rather good drama based around the 16th century Catholic Church, The Borgias. Although I am no fan of religion or the Catholic church this series is worth a look, so check it out if you haven't.



Saturday 22 September 2012

Lazy day, baking day

Today was a day of not doing very much. There had been plans but sadly we had to change then as Toni wasn't well. She ended up spending half of the day in bed :o(

Sam and I took on the cooking duties today with gluten free goodies on offer. Bread rolls (and a normal loaf) and pizza were the order of the day.

Before the goodies hit the oven:

....and once they been cooked!

The bread stuffs was just for another day though. The pizza de resistance was these little babies:

KT's gluten free pizza

Toni's gluten free pizza

Sam's glutenous pizza

I have to admit that I have enjoyed cooking over the past couple of days. I know I can do it but I guess I am just too lazy to knuckle down and do more. Will I? Nah, probably not! LOL

TV catch up was provided by Alphas, Doctor Who and the totally awesome Total Wipeout. Sam encouraged us to watch it and I am so glad that we did as it was hilarious.  I have a feeling we'll be watching a few more episodes.

The final part of my day was spent pruning my emails and doing some general maintenance which was LONG overdue as I started with over 6,000 unread messages which I managed to get down to a tiny 1,900!



Friday 21 September 2012

iPhone 5 day and cooking surprise

Today was the day for people to show off their iPhone 5 delights. Not for me sadly but it was nice to get to see one and find out how good they really are. At work Jat turned up with his having attended a launch in London the night before. Needless to say he generated a lot of interest and buzz around the office. Nirav then popped out at lunchtime and turned up with one as well.

Toni received her upgrade in the post today so I have to admit that I was feeling a little bit of iPhone 5 envy by the end of the day being around so many people that had them. I am not worried though, my time will come and I am very much looking forward to getting one.

It was my turn to cook tonight and I actually surprised myself and did some very nice and out of my own head! Jack Daniels glazed pork chops was accompanied by pan fried potatoes with stir fried white cabbage, peppers and carrots mixed up in a pomegranate sauce. The stir fry was completely random but worked so well with the pomegranate giving it a very nice touch.

Thursday 20 September 2012

Orpheum rehearsal

It was off to Storm In Holloway Road tonight for another Orpheum rehearsal. It was much better than the previous week with a lot of the silly mistakes being consigned to the bin. Confidence for the Watford gig is growing.

Once our set run throughs had been completed we did a refresher of a couple of songs that didn't make the list before spending some time on new stuff. When Watford is out of the way we'll be getting down to a hard push on polishing off new material so that we can start mixing up our future set lists even more!

For those of you that might be interested we have just put in our first order for some nice shiny Orpheum t-shirts, more details soon!


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Wednesday 19 September 2012

Green stuff, Kindle hacking, Dead Like Me, brownies and iOS 6

Dinner was accompanied by a whole load of things that Toni had grown in the garden. It's so cool to know that we are eating things that we have produced ourselves. Here's a little selection of the goodies on offer which just look gorgeous:

After many attempts in the past I finally managed to get hold of a Kindle hack that would allow me to replace all the crap screensavers that come with it by default and to install some of my own. Unlike the previous attempts that just caused much frustration it was a breeze tonight and my Kindle is now the proud owner of 50 beautiful H.R.Giger images. Here's an example. It doesn't look great here but it's fantastic on the Kindle!

Pork chops and wedges was accompanied by Dead Like Me. It's a film I'd not seen before but really enjoyed. Next stop will be watching the TV series. Sam served up some gluten free brownies with cream for pudding which was a most welcome treat.

Final bit of joy today came with the release of iOS 6 and me being able to download it and update my iPhone and iPad! There are some fantastic new features that I like already and I am thoroughly looking forward to exploring more! 

Last.FM listening post

Here's last week's top picks music lovers!

Top weekly tracks:


Top weekly artists:


Overall top tracks:


Overall top artists:

Tuesday 18 September 2012

Work, trout and intense discussion on politics and econonics

After a relatively quiet few weeks at we are now seeing our queue getting longer as stuff that was supposed to have been trickles to us over time all arrived at once with more to come. On top of this we are having to get involved with new projects as well as the usual troubleshooting and cleaning up of other people's mess! Oh well, keeps me off the streets I guess!

Delays getting home added to a strange mood that I'd had brewing all day leaving me feeling a bit flat and meh and I have no idea why :o(

Trout and Warehouse 13 made things a bit better.

Sam and I then engaged in quite a heavy discussion about politics, economics and taxes. It was an interesting session I must say which I think opened Sam's eyes to a few things and left him wanting to go and do some research on political parties in the UK. Hopefully it will have helped to think a little more outside the box on political and economic cause and effect! It was hard work at times but was definitely good to do.

Was still very flat and meh by the time we went to bed but Toni did manage to lift my spirits :o)





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Sunday 16 September 2012

The X Files day, hand fasting work and more curry

Today was most spent watching The X Files. We wound back to the very beginning and are working our way through the whole lot starting from Season 1. I provided a lunch time breakfast of bacon, scrambled egg and toast which went down well with Toni who is suffering in decorator hell at the moment.

Later in the afternoon we took some time out to do some research and planning on our hand fasting as time is getting short. After a brief moment of hitting a brick wall we suddenly got the creative juices flowing and we made some positive strides in our planning. Next stop will be Wicca Moon to go and discuss what we are looking at.
The X Files returned once again and we ordered in another curry to help us through.

It's been another fantastic weekend!

Oh, and before I forget, the shower is fixed and working and it is bloody wonderful!

Saturday 15 September 2012

Garden, Azalea's birthday party, TV and curry

We were up quite early this morning and hit the garden for some watering and plant maintenance. To be fair, Toni did the maintenance but I did help out with the watering and holding some of the tomato plants while she tied them to bamboo poles.

We have some quite impressive things growing at the moment.

After a lovely breakfast/lunch in Coffee Town we then headed out to Woolwich to go to Jodie's for Azalea's first birthday party. There was quite a lot of LOUD R 'n' B going on which was not music to my ears but it was quite fun anyway.

 After the party we headed back home and chilled out for the rest of the evening with Doctor Who, QI and curry!

Friday 14 September 2012

Dredd 3D

Tonight Toni and I made an impulse decision to go to the cinema and see Dredd 3D. I was a little worried as I am not a fan of 3D films but I needn't have.


It was a fantastic film that completely blew away the foul memory of the Stallone abomination Judge Dress from 1995. It might have taken 17 years but we now have the Dredd film that we deserve!




If you were a fan of the comic book hero then this film is for you. It is dark and gritty and well deserving of the 18 certificate that it was tagged with. I don't see how it could have worked with anything less. If you are a sci-fi fan then you will enjoy this without needing any prior knowledge of the character.
As for the 3D? WOW is all I have to say. I don't like 3D films but the effects used in Dredd were breathtaking have now restored my faith in how this visual style is used in films.
Go and see it!


Thursday 13 September 2012

Orpheum rehearsal

It was the first of a scheduled set of Orpheum rehearsals tonight in our run up to our gig supporting Edguy on 13th October at Watford Colosseum as part of the ROC(K)TOBER Fesitval. It's a HUGE gig for the band and so we'll be going all out to make things perfect so that we make a good impression.

Things didn't start too well as I realised that I had forgotten to bring my tuner and plectrums as they'd all got stuffed in my flight case after the Red Roar Festival gig rather than going back in my gig bag! DOH! Fortunately I can tune via the keyboard and play with my fingers, or borrow a plectrum from Fin.

Mars wasn't so lucky though as she realised that she had brought the wrong keyboard adapter! In the end she had to hire a keyboard from Storm. Much to her disgust it was a Yamaha which was certainly not up to standards of her Roland Juno! She was not a happy bunny!

It was a tough rehearsal with us taking a very brutal approach to mistakes and going over things until they are right but this approach appears to be working which can only lead to much better things performance wise. Hopefully things will get a lot easier over the next few weeks so that we are completely ready and confident for Watford.

Out of all of us, Erin probably had the least amount of issues which must be why she was smiling LOL

It was good rehearsal though and the excitement is slowly starting to build for ROC(K)TOBER!!!

Wednesday 12 September 2012

The iPhone 5 has me quite excited

The iPhone 5 has finally been announced ..... and I'm quite excited by what I've seen. The haters are already out, of course, spouting nonsense. Lots of people saying that Apple is no longer innovating. Really? Have you looked at the design?

It's much thinner, has a bigger screen without compromising width so it actually still sits sensibly in the hand, it's twice as powerful as the 4S, better battery life not to mention an improved colour display and 4G to boot. I guess people's ideas of innovation always expect something major rather than subtle but it's the subtle bits that win here. Just imagine if the iPhone 5 had come out looking or working like a Samsung Galaxy S3, there would have been outrage!

I actually can't wait to get an upgrade, the iPhone fits nicely with the way I run my life and gives me everything that I want/need so I'm more than happy to stick with Apple once again. I was the same with the old O2 XDA (rebranded HTC) phones, I used them for years until the features offered weren't enough for what I needed. That's when I moved to Apple and I haven't looked back since! 3GS and then 4S and very soon it will be the iPhone 5.

An Apple a day, keeps the haters away!




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iPhone 5 announcement today?



So today is the day of the Apple event and hopefully the expected unveiling of the iPhone 5 to the world! Fingers crossed it's a good one. personally I can't wait to it and what it offers! Yes I am an Apple fan girl!

Last.FM listening post

Here's last week's top picks music lovers!

Top weekly tracks:


Top weekly artists:


Overall top tracks:


Overall top artists:

Tuesday 11 September 2012

Word Bomber: Thinking Man's Terrorism

Given what day it is I thought this was an appropriate thing to post today. (OK this was the 7/7 rather than 9/11 but the sentiment is the same). If only activism/terrorism was fought using only words.

This song is about the suicide attacks in London of the 7th July 2005, where three bombs went off almost simultaneously, killing 56 including the bombers themselves and injuring more than 700. Three of the four attackers came from Chumbawamba's hometown, Leeds.


Strap these words
Around your waist
Open arms
A last embrace
Go make your peace
Commonplace

Take the train
A last goodbye
Throw your rhymes
At passers-by
‘One Love’
On your hi-fi

Words
Words is all
Around the underground
And ticket halls
Declaring peace
Wall to wall

Back in Leeds
The news we heard
No-one killed
And no-one hurt
Wish all the young men
Used only words

Words
Words is all
Around the underground
And ticket halls
Declare your peace
Wall to wall

 - Word Bomber (Chumbawamba)

Back to school day, WFH and the bloody shower!

It was back to school (and college) day for all the kids today.

Early starts for everyone which was a shock to the system for them! What was even funnier was Aaron getting up at the crack of silly and being all ready to go to college and then checking his timetable and realising he didn't have to be in until 13:30! DOH!

Here's Gemima in her new school uniform

It was a working from home day for me as the plumber was coming to fix the shower and Toni was out on a course. It was actually quite productive even though I did spend a lot of time on conference calls. Sadly the plumber still hasn't finished the bloody shower although he has done the bath and is coming back tomorrow (hopefully) to complete the work on the shower. Fingers crossed!

Kick back and relax time came in the form of WWE RAW and the sad revelation that Jerry 'The King' Lawler had suffered a heart problem during the show :o(  Good news is that his heart procedure today was a success!