Dave Williams

I read this over the weekend

Fascinating that people are in such a flap about this work of fiction. It is a bit of a page turner though, that much is true. I'm up to chapter 33, about a third of the way through and I can see this occupying most of my train journey up to Glasgow tomorrow. but ultimately I guess the reaction to this book is more interesting than the book itself. Can't wait for the Da Vinci Code film schedule for next year.

Check this out, what a very cool idea. What would the old boy make of his diary turning up as a blog online 340 years after he first wrote it.

I was amazed to find that my router which I only bought 18 months ago is no longer listed on the Netgear site. Ah but it's still on the ADSL Guide site, so I wasn't dreaming after all.

Off to see Rob. as in rob who came to New York with me in 2003.

LONDON EUSTON 19:06
BIRMINGHAM NEW STREET 21:09
Duration: 2:03
There are no reported incidents affecting this journey.

Well that's the plan.

Upon returning to Epsom having spent the afternoon in Putney meeting someone from the Arts Councel who is coming on secondment with work, Martin and I attended this busy little curry house early on Friday evening. The food and service was tremendous. Although this place may be in danger of becoming a victim of it's own success. The tables are very close together and the staff seemed to be seriously busy. However, no compromises were made on quality.

This was followed by the Rising Sun and a valiant but ultimately failed attempt to get the Bluetooth Braille display to work. With have another crack at that today.

Fantastic story.

Dave's Cottage pie was just what the doctor ordered after journeying from Preston to Epsom. Good to see the Roberts and Jade. Had 3 pints of Progress bitter and felt even more bitter about not being able to smoke in the pub. ah well tis the way of the future.

We got talking to this couple Sarah and Pete who seemed like a good laugh. Came back to the flat and are doing geek stuff. Ah well the battery is running down so I better zip.

Well apparently I made it. a bit of a slow start this morning, but I'm on the 15:46 from Preston and should be meeting Martin and Jade in a couple of hours. Haven't seen him for a couple of months so should be good to catch up. The finances are pretty limited but hopefully we can get out a bit over the weekend. I'm also going to try and meet Chrissie who lives in Putney and probably stop off at Brum on the way back to see rob.

John called and it looks like we're all set to meet next Thursday in Glasgow. Ok, London, Brum and Glasgow is hardly doing it Michael Palin style, but should at least put my wonder-lust on hold for a little while.

On Monday evening my girlfriend and I spent a very pleasant 3 hours on the East Lancashire Railway special Valentine diner service. The train left Bury in Greater Manchester around 7:30PM and returned in plenty of time to allow for a couple of drinks in the Trackside bar which can be found just off the platform at the Bolton Street Station.

The Valentine Dinner menu served abord was: Melon & Pineapple Cocktail with Malibu & Coconut Syrup, Fillet of Sole with Shrimp Sauce, Leg of Lamb with Sun-dried Tomato Tart Served with a selection of vegetables and potatoes, Passion Fruit Tart with Fresh Cream, After Dinner Mints & Love Hearts and coffee etc.

We stayed overnight on Monday in Bury at the 14-room Rostrevor Hotel on Manchester Road. This small family run establishment was welcoming, and Pete and his family were very helpful.

Tuesday was a bit of a right-off work wise, just as well I'd prepared for this possibility. The day started right enough with a splendid full English breakfast at the Rostrevor. We then took a cab, followed by the Metrolink tram service into Manchester and then a train back to Preston where we went to the pub for a drink ... And another drink ... And another drink. Oh dear, oh dear. A liquid lunch turned into a 12 hour session culminating in one of the regulars admiting he was bi-sexual at around midnight!

I managed to get Main Menu to air for it's usual time of 1AM, but I am obviously slurring through the introduction. Not good at all. Feeling much better after getting some lunch in me today. Also got on top of 2 days email.

I'm supposed to be going to Epsom to see Martin tomorrow, but my funds are starting to dry up. The chieve financial officer sadly passed away this week after being ill for a long time, so no clue who will be processing my invoices.

I should now be going to Glasgow next Thursday for a meeting. I am hoping to meet up with John after he and his wife put me up for the night around a year ago when I got stuck up there after missing my train home.

Oh bugger. Saturday was really a bad day all round. And to think I used to pay to watch this rubbish.

Is he indeed. Well well well, the Great British public will see about that. :)

Lost DSL service on Saturday around 1PM and it came back at about 6:30 this morning. Hopefully this is an isolated insident. I'm just a couple of hundred emails behind now. It's quite worrying how much one misses the net when it's not there.

This can't be true. It reads like an April Fools story.

What am I doing, it's quarter to 6 in the A.M. and I'm still up in the chat room talking shop. Oh well late start tomorrow, i.e. today. Which means it'll be a late finish on friday and reduced time in the pub. Doh!

It's been a good day though, made a lot of phone calls and got a few balls rolling and initiated a few projects which have been hanging around for a while. Btw, does anyone read this blog? Heh, if I get brave I may switch on the blogger comments feature one day.

As my gf rightly said,

"I'm sick to bloody death of people saying they shouldn't get married. Obviously it's ok with his mum and kids or it wouldn't be happening. So if they love each other then why not?"

Was Diana really the sort of person who would have wanted him to stay single for the rest of his life? She always knew Charles loved another woman and famously said there were three people in their marage.

In other pointless news PopBitch reckon

"Green Day singer Billy Jo Armstrong has given his son the middle name... Danger."

I saw Green Day in concert at the MEN Arena a couple of weeks ago and they were awesome! What the front man calls his kids is ... well say no more.

Ok back to the email now.

Yep that is correct. Just trying to figure how nuch hastle it would be to post in this way. Well i guess it works at least.

Oh joy joy joy, it's been a long old day. Although finally I've managed to
amalgamate my various email archives. I have over a gig of messages going
back to early 2001 when I suffered a catastrophic system failure. I don't
keep everything, but a good slice of it. A lot of mail still need sifting
and sorting and I'm still a long way around reading work email. But I have
resolved that from today I'm going to spend a minimum of 4 hours per day on
email and start with the newest stuff. Playing catch-up just isn't working
and is becoming detrimental to my health!

Mine and Rob's May 2003 adventures in the Big Apple are now online for the first time.

BT reckons it's been miscast as the villain of the UK's telcoms sector even though it reckons it has a good track record of regulatory compliance.

Reading, The Tough Life of a Liberal Blogger by Justin Darr put me in mind of everything which is wrong with Fahrenheit 9-11 and all forms of bigots who try to force their transparent political agenda on the majority of people who occupy an increasingly crowded space somewhere near the political centre.
I am probably one of the few people in the world not to have watched Michael Moore's polemic Fahrenheit 9-11 prior to last year’s US presidential election. Having read and heard so much hype about this film and it having been recommended to me by people who's opinions I very much respect, I spent a couple of hours the week before last sitting down to watch Fahrenheit 9-11 when it was screened on Channel 4 here in the UK.
Regardless of who won the popular vote in the US in 2000, Fahrenheit 9-11 doesn't challenge the more important systemic problems with an electoral system which would allow for a ruling and ultimately an outcome which does not reflect the popular vote.
The film becomes distracted with details such as why George W Bush did not immediately rush out of a classroom full of kids at the exact moment that he heard his country was under attack on 11 September 2001. Would such a knee-jerk reaction from Bush have actually saved lives? With Bush's clearly limited intellectual capacity, taking a couple of moments to gather his thoughts before opening his mouth was probably a sensible move under the circumstances?
Fahrenheit 9-11 does as Justin Darr does in insulting the reader's/viewer's intellect by stereotyping and peddling cliché to attempt to make an argument. Darr suggests that folk of a liberal persuasion spend their weekends taking drugs and are unemployable while Moore played up heart-rending images of distraught mother's who's children had gone to war. Guys using these stereotyped images in this way is outmoded. Surely what passes for journalism and film-making has moved on since Vietnam?
Darr could be right that Conspiracy Theorising is rampant at the moment. But he fails, as Moore does, to recognise that the obsession with the notion that ones political opponents are unduly attached to a given Conspiracy Theory, is in and of itself pretty paranoid. Genius is not required to appreciate the simple truth that Conspiracy Theorists are not exclusively affiliated with any particular ideology.
The irony in Darr's accusing CNN and CBS of being prejudiced is hilarious when one considers how Fox choose to represent current a fares. I have a clear recollection of tuning into Fox News not long after American troops had passed over the border into Iraq in April 2003 and during a discussion about the cost to human life hearing one correspondent blatantly change the emphasis of the discussion by asking what the war would do to the cost of gasoline in the US! The problem which faces Darr's readers is similar to that which confront viewers of the Moore movie. These guys come with a political agenda, attacking what they do not or cannot understand, while at the same time attempting to spoon-feed it to a sophisticated connected public.
Many who opposed the war in Iraq do not subscribe to Conspiracy Theories about the outcome of the 2004 election in the US. Many who did not vote for Bush acknowledge that the American electorate has spoken and has chosen to have Bush as US president for the next 4 years.
By it's very nature American foreign policy extends around the world, and it has been suggested that the US of today is as influencial and is as powerful as the Roman empires of old. This topic is something in which we all must take an interest. While, like many I can't buy into this form of political pingpong, Barr and Moore may be succeeding on one level, i.e., getting people switched on to world affairs. However, evangelising any given philosophy too vigorously is just as likely to turn people away from your cause. While someone somewhere is logging on, someone somewhere else has just logged off.

I've been following this for weeks on the Team Ellen site.

Got instant messaging with one of my x-girlfriends on Messenger earlier:
XGF: hey do you remember when you got them kids suspended from school for sending you nasty emails?
DW: hahaha, jasus I'd almost forgotten about that rofl
XGF: god i can't believe how much i've changed since then
DW: well it's important to change a little bit everyday
XGF: that sounds like some self help mumbo jumbo
DW: yeh it probably is. But if nothing changes then everything stays exactly the same, how interesting is that?
XGF: it's weird tho...i mean i've been getting quite introverted in my old age, i think that goes with not having much of a social life, and it made me get very nostalgic about the time before i went away to uni....not a pleasant nostalgia either just weird....but now it's just all shot back into perspective and i can see how different i am,
XGF: all the hopes i had at the time that were subsequently ignored...i can see how much i've changed in that respect and it's weird
DW: I'm different from 3 months ago. going to South Africa was pretty mind bending. I guess we're meant to change and grow and all that crap.
DW: I'd say if you hadn't changed in the last 5 years then it would be stranger no?
XGF: yeah i guess i've not had any one major life changing experience in such a short space of time....i mean uni changes you but it's spread over several years so it's more like lots of small things so you don't notice it all at once
DW: yeh and I notice that working changes people too. All the people I know in their late 20s and who are in work have really changed a lot in the last couple of years.
XGF: yeah work certainly regulates your life
XGF: you wind up having to get sensible
DW: I think when you've only got a very small proportion of the day to spend on yourself, it can make one focus on what is important
XGF: ideally yes, but it doesn't always work out like that
XGF: altho it does make you appreciate your free time more
DW: well it usually doesn't always work out like that, but the very fact that it makes some folks reevaluate what's important to them is significant
XGF: before i got my first full time job i'd spent three months on the dole, just out of uni, totally broke and in a new town where i couldn't afford to get to know it properly...the most depressing three months of my life....so when i started my job i was too excited about actually having money in my account every month to worry about the important things
DW: yeh, but then the novelty wore off?
XGF: it was a shit job more to the point
XGF: i always appreciated the financial security of a monthly wage
DW: what and you don't have one now?
XGF: i still appreciate it
DW: good
XGF: i think if i didn't have to spend so much of my free time commuting, my life would be pretty pleasant all in all
DW: but there's a difference between appreciating it and getting excited "every month"?
XGF: oh, and if i had more friends in the area
XGF: oh god i do get excited
DW: If I had a hammer...
XGF: what would u do if u had a hammer
DW: I'd hammer in the morning.
DW: obviously

Well they said it would. although it took a while to appear. Not the instant gratification one would expect, but hey it's early doors and I've only just lost my blog virginity so still plenty to learn.

My gf called to wake me up, but was amazed to find me already awake. Hadn't really slept, but then I usually don't. No change there then.

I did some shopping online, nothing exciting, bread and milk and the like. Ok time to put the kettle on, I am apparently on the internet radio in an hour or two.

TTFN.

Everyone it seems.

3 ... 2 ... 1 and lift off of the space shuttle blog! Spewing yet more insecure vitriol out on to the Net. Like the Net needs more of this pathetic self-indulgent cack? Personal expression? Yeh right. An outlet for sad geeks with no friends or lives, to desparately try and give their lives or should that be our lives meaning, by inflicting our feckless opinionated ramblings onto the world in general. Oh and if they, we, can get away with a bit of Googlewashing at the same time, then all the better.

Right, now I have got that out of my system, a very warm welcome and all that jazz. I hate blogs. No I mean I really hate blogs. So why have I started one. Well there may be some possible reasons which may or may not be entirely true. But then you did not come here for the truth, or maybe you did?

1. I created a blog to try and get inside the insidious mind of the rampant bloggers who seem to be taking over. Taking over what? That, I have yet to figure out.
   
2. I created a blog because I subscribe to the “if you cannot beat them, join them” school of thought.
   
3. I created a blog because I am desperately unhappy and need to vent along with the rest of you.
   
4. I created a blog because I am a procrastinator and am engaging with any destraction however small to avoid doing any real work.
   
5. I created a blog because … oh I donno, it's probably just a blip. Normality will resume shortly.