Hectic day and rat care

Today ran like a usual hectic day. As I finished I went to feed the rats as I do every day now that Zoe is over with Jade and Aaron. I put the food in and 3 of the little devils attacked the stash but I noticed the Orion was not really moving. The water was low so I refilled that and he struggled to make his way across the platform to get to the water and he seemed to be having issues with his back legs.

Toni came up and we tried to give him some food and treats but he was really disinterred. We wondered if he had taken a fall from one of the platforms. He didn't like being picked up as a rule but Toni managed to get him out of the cage and gave him a cuddle and we managed to get a little water and a tiny bit of food into him. CBD oil and reiki was applied but he was still out of sorts. We called Zoe and she came over in a cab as soon as she could. Here he is snuggled up with Toni.

Zoe then took over cuddle duties while Toni and I prepared a second cage for him to stay in to hopefully recover, this one isn't very high and doesn't have any platforms. TLC continued through the night and he had at least perked up a little bit and seemed less stunned than he had done. Watch this space on how things go......

RIP Dave Prowse, music, The Withcing Hour and Rock Of Ages

I woke up today to see the sad news that Darth Vader and Green Cross Code Man actor Dave Browse has passed on to be with the force. He was a really lovely down to earth man and this photo represents a very treasured moment in my life.

Today was mostly made of music and reading. I stuck on a gothic rock and then a hard rock playlist and immersed myself in The Witching Hour, the first of the Lives Of The Mayfair Witches series by Anne Rice.

My usual Sunday roast was accompanied by the extended version of Rock Of Ages.

Not an early start, baking, working and Interview With The Vampire

Today was not an early start which was a welcome change. I didn't get up until gone nine. As is customary it was baking day and another lovely batch of rolls was created. 

As part of the migrations it was back to the work grindstone for a short while to do some tasks and then it was back to relaxing again.

We caught up with Hell's Kitchen and then embarked on some Four In A Bed as we fancied a bit of trash.

Dinner came courtesy of Nando's (via Deliveroo) and we revisited Interview With The Vampire for a bit of Tom Cruise vampire fun. I shall repeat this again just for the benefit of my family..... yes I do now enjoy this film even if it did take me many years/watches to get there!

Exercise, the day off that was not a day off and The Mandalorian

So today didn't really go as planned. I did 20 minutes on the treadmill first thing and did a few hours work even though it was my day off and had planned to at least relax for the rest of the day. As you can probably guess things did not go as I wanted and I kept getting dragged into various emergencies so I pretty much carried on working for the rest of the day. Grumble grumble. I have now pencilled in next Wednesday for a break and it will be phones off all day!

After work it was time for the latest episode of The Mandalorian and what an episode it was!

Now that was a really good episode, it's all coming together very nicely now!

Not a great day and Sam's eBay experiment

Today was also not a great day! Not only did I forget that I had to cover a late shift but I had also forgotten that I had booked tomorrow off..... On the plus side some things did go right which is a positive results for our server migrations. 

So Sam conducted an interesting experiment on eBay to prove that people really do not read things properly. As the PS5 is in high demand they are going for silly money on eBay. He posted a listed selling a PICTURE of a PS5. Everything in the listing was totally honest and factual, nothing in it claimed at all that it was an actual PS5 console. People started bidding.... hone person retracted their bid when they must have re-read the listing and realised what they were bidding on. Sam did get a couple of messages asking about the listing and he confirmed to these people that it was as stated, a picture. The bids went crazy, I managed to grab a screenshot. It actually went up to £10,000 when eBay pulled the listing and suspended his account as they suspected he had been hacked. It was a fun ride, his account is back up and running again now but no listing. Here are the details

It was hilarious watching all this unfold and certainly brightened my day!

S*** day and good memes

Today started reasonably well but very quickly went to shit. Oh well, I enjoyed the up day yesterday LOL For every step forward I seem to go two back! Just grrrrrr!

It was a good day for memes though, these two being my favourite.

The best one however is this!

Hooray for memes. Hooray for Botched!

Constructive and productive day

It was a constructive and productive day today. I continued to channel yesterdays sage fuelled calm and got lots of things done and managed some troubleshooting as well and felt very focussed. It was a long day, I started at 8 and finished at 7 but I don't mind that when it does end with me being stressed.

An Indian take away was a nice treat for dinner and we indulged in a load more Botched to wind down.

Stressful day, sage and Four In A Bed

Well that was a day and a half! Migration days can often be stressful but this one was far from smooth!

On the plus side there was a massive sage burning session in the house today so despite the work stuff I was massively calm and relaxed which was fantastic!

Round two of Sam's schnitzel with Toni's added mushroom jaeger style sauce helped me to relax and Four In A Bed kept us laughing.

The Voice, rats, The New Mutants and Botched

Got up this morning and had a real desire to watch a load of rock/metal audition clips from The Voice. We watched a couple of hours worth which was great fun. There is some really banging talent out there! As a result of one of the songs I dug out a compilation of Sting and The Police to remind myself how good they were.

Shite job of the day was cleaning the rats our but it wasn't as bad as it could have been and at least they are now very happy and don't stink LOL 

Decided to watch the final instalment of the Fox X-Men movies, The New Mutants. Dark Phoenix was quite good so I was using that as the bar to measure this one.

Sam's delicious schnitzels were accompanied by lots more Botched.

Early start, baking, working, Four In A Bed and The Blacklist

It was an early start today. Toni got up really early as she couldn't sleep so it was early morning coffee for us which was nice change. After the coffee it was baking time again with another fabulous batch of gluten free keto rolls.

I did some work for our weekend migration and then it was time for breakfast and a catch up with two episodes of Hell's Kitchen.

After this I sadly had to go and do more work to complete a task that one of my team had not done yesterday but needed to be completed before Monday. That was definitely a grumpy moment!

A chilled afternoon and a return to Four In A Bed was most welcome. It was my cooking night so my weekly roast chicken was on offer again! Nom nom nom!

Had a bit of a tV catch up with the latest episode of Young Sheldon and then the first two episodes of the final series of The Blacklist.

The day was rounded off with a nice cuppa and more Botched.

Good day, gym, The Mandalorian and Botched

It was a good day today. Planning and progress continues and finally some of my team members seem to be reacting to things at a speed that I would consider reasonable. That's not to say that there weren't a couple of hiccups but we are definitely heading in the right direction.

At lunchtime Sam and I did a good work out in the gym which gave me an extra boost. 

After work it was time for the latest episode of The Mandalorian. 

This was a really good one that had a much more Star Wars feel to it than some of the previous episodes. 

The story is slowly developing now and I can feel some excitement building for me. More post Empire stuff please as I want to see more Moff Gideon!

Finished the day off with another dose of Botched!

Less stressful day, Bill Bailey and Botched

After the sensible decision being made yesterday we were able to do some major replanning and felt like everything was back under control again. As a result today was WAY less stressful.

Lunchtime was spent watching some Bill Bailey clips on Youtube, Here is one of them....

It was back to Botched in the evening for more car crash TV. It's amazingly how compelling it is watching a show about surgeons fixing other people surgery disasters!

Kaboom...... and relax!

Everything came to an explosive climax today as things started to go critical There were crisis meetings and updates and senior escalations. After all of this a sensible decision was finally made and then we had some hope for where things would head next.  and relax!

 To take the edge off of the day many episodes of Botched were watched.

Wedding Anniversary

It was out wedding anniversary today. 8 years of being married, 13 years together and 34 years since we have first known each other! It has been an amazing journey so far and I can't wait to see where we go next!

Work was meh but enjoying out wedding anniversary more than made up for that!

As my surprise plan for this year fell through due to Covid and lockdown meaning we couldn't go out we decided to go all out romantic and have a Nando's delivered LOL Bliss!

Not a good day.....

Today was not a good day! It was busy, it was stressful, things went wrong. I worked far too many hours!

I was all a bit out of sorts and an early night happened.......

Garage reorg, Vampyr and Best Ink

After a good night sleep I was up pretty early today. Made myself a cuppa and then went and reorganised a few things in the garage as we are soon going to be housing a treadmill as part of our exercise equipment. Hopped on the bike for a short while and then realised I need to get back into the garage gym regularly in the week as I can feel I have definitely gone backwards from a cardio and muscle strength perspective.

I did a quick bit of work as some shit was dumped on me yesterday that had to be actioned. Technically it wasn't my responsibility to make sure the work was scheduled but in the interest of the wheels running smoothly I did it just so we don't end up with pain once clients start working tomorrow. 

It was then time to relax so I started up the PS4 and began playing Vampyr which I had just downloaded for free courtesy of PSN Plus. 

It's a good game. Not really fast paced which suits me down to the grown with a story that slowly unfolds as you progress.

The rest of the day was spent chilling out and watching Season 3 of Best Ink.

Rolls, Hell's Kitchen, Best Ink, Botched and Young Sheldon

It wasn't an early start today for a change which was most welcome. I got up and knocked up this little batch of beauties.

I then had to do a short bit of work before my weekend kicked in properly.

Breakfast and three episodes of Hell's Kitchen got us all caught up on Season 19.

We didn't want to think today so we went to car crash city and took in some Best Ink. After we had finished Season 2 we then moved on to more Botched.

Young Sheldon finished things off nicely.

Minor progress, The Mandalorian and The Return Of The King

Today was not a complete disaster and neither was it massive triumph! There was however minor progress made a glimmer of hope for things going forward on this big project so that's good. I am working for a short while tomorrow but this means things are coming along.

After work it was time to watch the latest episode The Mandalorian. This was a good episode getting us to the plot again with more Mando and a lot less of The Child, plus some Imps too! 

We finished out Middle Earth quest tonight with The Return Of The King. 

Day off, Botched and The Two Towers

Day off today which was very nice. I accompanied Toni to an appointment for her diabetic retinopathy and then we returned home and chilled out. After having nasty liquid put in her eyes Toni certainly needed some time to get her eyesight back to normal again.

We've now started watching a show called Botched that Sam told us about. It's two plastic surgeons that correct botched cosmetic surgeries to give people a better life. More car crash TV to enjoy!

Our evening viewing was a return to Middle Earth with The Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers.

Better day and Best Ink

Today wasn't too bad. Manage to slowly wrestle some stuff to the ground and I can see a very very small speck of light at the end of the tunnel. I am off tomorrow so can forger about it all for a day at least.

We starter season two of Best Ink tonight as we didn't fancy another four hour Tolkien quest. 

Worse day and The Fellowship Of The Ring

Today was worse than yesterday, that is all LMFAO

Musical accompaniment was mainly New York Hardcore legends Agnostic Front. 

Our movie tonight was The Lord Of The Rings: The Fellowship Of The Ring for some fantasy escapism.

Yes, we did opt for the extended version :) 

Stressful work and Terminator 2: Judgement Day

After a nice relaxing weekend it was back to work and stress. It's going to be tough for the next few weeks as we do more and more migrations. There will probably be less work talk and more focus on the after work activities as we go on or i might run out of expletives LOL.

It was back to movies again tonight with Terminator 2: Judgement Day continuing our franchise run. 

Star Wars stuff and Best Ink

Well the word has changed a bit and we don't have any new Star Wars movies on the horizon at present but there is still plenty going on in the Star Wars Universe. We have the Mandalorian on Disney+ and the Obi-Wan Kenobi series starts shooting in 2021 so the TV fix is still there.

Coming to Disney+ on November 17th we have the LEGO Star Wars Holiday Special. Thankfully this is not a remake of the truly dire Star Wars Holiday Special (nor are we ever likely to see that abomination appear in any official format). The LEGO Star Wars Holiday Special does look fun though (as the LEGO Star Wars things usually are).

I've almost finished reading all the current canon Star Wars novels now. I just have the expanded The Rise Of Skywalker to go and then I'll be done. So far nearly all of these novel have been excellent and I hope this trend continues. Once I am done with TROS I think I might return to working my way through the Legends books. 

As Toni had a rough night I left her to catch up some much needed sleep so I spent a few hours playing Star Wars: Squadrons on the PS4. Loving the story mode and I seem to have become at playing it so there was no rage quitting today!

We exhausted Tattoos After Dark today so moved on to our next tattoo shop fix, This was a competition show that was very similar to Ink Master called Best Ink. Once we have done this one we'll be burning out way through Miami Ink, LA Ink, NY Ink and London Ink. That will keep us going for a while!

Baking, rats, Quavers, Four In A Bed and The Terminator

It was baking day again today. More gluten free keto rolls for Toni that have once again come out feeling nice and soft like 'real' bread. I must have been bang on the ingredient level today as I ended up with a little tiddler whereas usually I get seven full size ones. Back to being slightly more generous next week.

A sausage based breakfast was accompanied by Hell's Kitchen and Young Sheldon. 

Once the food fest had gone down it was time to clean out the rats as Zoe is still over at Jade and Aaron's on the wrong side of lockdown. We took the opportunity for a good clean all over and reorganised things to make it easier looking after them going forward.

Sam had ordered some supplies from Morrisons (via Amazon) and it turned out that when a certain type of crisps was out of stock they would user Quavers as the replacement. He did order ONE bag of Quavers so it is just as well we like them!

The afternoon saw us return to our Four In A Bed TV crack as a change to our recent tattoo fix LOL.

Getting back in to franchise movie nights for November we kicked the next batch off with the 1984 classic The Terminator. We'll be travelling with Arnie for the next few nights!

Looooong day, The Mandalorian and Tattoos After Dark

It was a looooong day today. On top of my normal working day I ended up having to cover the last shift due to an emergency with one of my team members. These things can't be helped but it wasn't what I wanted after the week I have had as I had been hoping to finish early today. Oh well LOL.

I did get some breaks though and so there was time to watch the latest episode The Mandalorian. This was a great episode. Not a lot in the way of story progression as such but it was great fun. 

Once work was done there was more Tattoos After Dark. 

Now it is time for the weekend...........

Better day, Tattoo Rescue, Beneath The Ink and Tattoos After Dark

Today was a better day. It wasn't without a little stress but it was manageable and I didn't feel horrible at the end of it.

Due to various timings we ended up not watching a film tonight which was a shame. We had planned to watch V For Vendetta as it was November 5th but we'll just pick it up another day.

We finished off the final episodes of Tattoo Rescue and then found ourselves wanting to watch more tattoo shows but we seem to have hit a drought. There were lots of variants of CITY Ink on Prime but these were very expensive to buy/rent which was a shame.

We did however find a show called Beneath The Ink which was more history based rather than reality show. 

Sadly it seems that most of the documentary and history tattoo shows just don't come across as fun or engaging. It's fascinating to me that they always seem to be made by people who take themselves way too seriously and as a result the shows just don't grab us and come over as very dry.

One 30 day trail to hayu on Amazon later and we found other tattoo reality shows to waste our lives too LOL. Next on the playlist was Tattoos After Dark, now THIS was more like it, total car crash!

Day to put behind me, Salazar's Revenge and Tattoo Rescue

Gah, that was a day I am happy to put behind me. I woke up at 04:50 and then couldn't get back to sleep again but did at least catch on some podcasts. Work was absolute chaos and a bit if a shiftest. It was nothing but stress and hassle. At least it ended with a semblance of being under control again! Roll on tomorrow!

Musical accompaniment today was Hanoi Rocks and Michael Monroe.

November countdown movie for today was Pirates Of The Caribbean: Slazar's Revenge (or Dead Men Tell No Tales depending where you are watching it).

We finished the night iff with another couple of episodes of Tattoo Rescue.

Good working day, At World's End and Tattoo Rescue

Another good working day today. Lots of things accomplished and a whole lot of potential stress brewing but I am bracing myself for that one when/if it comes. Hoping that this won't be as bad as I fear.

Musical backdrop to work today was provided by the new AC/DC album Power Up and the collected works of Brazilian thrash metallers Nervosa.

Tonights November movie was Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End

We finished the night off with a cuppa and Tattoo Rescue.

Back to work, Dead Man's Chest and Tattoo Rescue

All too quickly the long weekend was over and it was back to the working life again. The week started well so that's a good thing!

Tonight's movie was Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest 

Hot drinks and chill saw out the reset of the day We've just discovered a new Tattoo programme called Tattoo Rescue that runs very mich like Kitchen Nightmares but tattoo shops are being rescued rather than restaurants. It's a shame it was only one season that they made.

Morning exercise, Louis Theroux, Spitting Image and The Curse Of The Black Pearl

I haven't been particularly active of late so decided to start doing more in the garage gym. I started out this morning with a 5km cycle. I managed that but was feeling quite tired afterwards. This was not good as normally I would do a session on the bike, some weights and then another session on the bike. It's amazing how quickly muscle atrophy can set in so it looks like I have some work to do over the next few days/weeks to get bit fitter!

As nobody else was up I chilled out with a Louis Theroux documentary which saw him return to Westboro Baptist church after the death of Fred 'Gramps' Phelps. It was good to see that some of the family members have now managed to get out but sad to see that some are still tied in with these toxic religious nuts.

When everybody was awake we made breakfast and checked out the new Spitting Image series. Have to admit it was a bit hit and miss. There were some good gags int here but it did seem to suffer from some very lazy writings. Two episodes in and we remained to be convinced, we'll probably watch a couple more to see if it does improve at all. We dug out the DVD of the original Spitting Image series to remind ourselves how good it used to be.

Now that the Halloween countdown is over we have constructed playlists for November, December and January! Talk about planning! LOL

After I had put the dinner on we watched a bit of Four In A Bed for shits and giggles!

The November countdown started tonight with Pirates Of The Caribbean: The Curse Of The Black Pearl. We are doing franchises in November (with one exception that will be revealed on the day) so we are kicking off in Pirates mode!