Archive for the ‘Life’ Category

It’s been tumble weed city here for the last six months as there’s been nothing much worth writing about. It’s kinda funny too, since the visual theme of this site was about dereliction, loneliness, decay: the forgotten. I realised that the destiny of the site could only be fulfilled by doing nothing with it…

It’s doubtful this blog will continue. Once the initial blogging enthusiasm wore off, I found I had neither the time nor interest in maintaining it. So, unless someone out there can persuade me that my musings are worthwhile and that you really can’t live without my inane ramblings, all my blogging will now be about work related stuff and can be found on my freelance web-design site, friskdesign.com, which will sport a new design in the coming months as I ramp up my business.

Thanks for reading. Have a great New Year!

If you look at my playlist towards the bottom of the sidebar, you’ll see it’s got a bunch of stuff that I never usually listen to. Why? Because for the last week or so, I’ve been listening to all the UK Number One Singles from 1953-2006.

So far I’m up to track 381 in 1975: Bay City Rollers with “Give a little love” — yes, I’m listening to every number one, in chronological order! There have been few really dire tracks so far and it’s a really fascinating exercise, with loads of stuff that I vaguely remember hearing when I was growing up and not realising they were number one records. The sixties really did produce some amazing music.

Anyway, when I’ve listened to the whole lot, I’ll post again with my thoughts on the state of the UK pop music industry for the last 50 odd years. Should be interesting!

Spammers used to try and encourage personal growth — literally — by using subject lines that suggest you need a bigger, harder, more energetic trouser snake*.

So it’s kinda funny to see a new trend with the subject lines in my spam box: “What a stupid face you have here” and “You look really stupid”. Rather than trying to encourage us or flatter us, they are now using the opposite tack: insult us. I think this will probably work better — no-one likes people to think badly of them and I reckon a few bruised egos or insecure souls will be clicking on those links.

This is briefly amusing, though it does alarm me somewhat to wonder how far this could go. It’s not much of a leap from this to use subject lines that are bullying, intimidating and downright threatening. Maybe if this happens, catching and prosecuting spammers will suddenly become as important as catching terrorists — with all the curtailing of civil liberties that seems to entail.

I shudder at the thought.

*Yes, even you ladies.

Hello again. It’s been a while. How have you coped without me?

Not having blogged for some time, I thought I’d just write something and see where it led me. I’m in a very weird place at the moment. The last few months have been very odd. Depression kicked in again around February and workloads went to practically nil for nearly three months (and thus all savings have also now gone). On top of that I split with my girlfriend. Safe to say I haven’t been too happy.

Yet it’s Saturday afternoon, it’s sunny, I’m listening to Dusty and about to head out for the domestic chore known as food shopping. It would be nicer to be able to do something with friends. But since moving to London (and my recent split), I still don’t really know anyone enough to just call someone up. Finances lack too.

But, you know what? It’s OK. Work is beginning to trickle in again. I’m getting better at promoting myself. Enquiries are coming through the website and referrals are more numerous. I have plans to get out there and meet new people. I’ve started daily exercising (ouch!). Onwards and upwards.

The next few years are going to be tough. I feel like I’m starting my life over. But it will be worth it.

Bring it on!

This is what you get if you fail to put the Beach Boys in your top selling music game.

I work from home most of the time, so any outside noise is an unwelcome distraction. It’s been especially trying over the last few weeks with gas men digging up the road, tree fellers at work and my neighbour having his flat ripped out and refurbished. But by far the most annoying is the lazy leaf blower.

These lovely maintenance men come out in force with their oversized hair dryers and proceed to blow leaves ineffectually about for a couple of hours before tiring of their sport and finally leaving them in a big pile. If they’re feeling a bit energetic, they might actually take the pile away too.

What I dislike about these damn devices, besides their incessant buzzing, is the fact that they are a massively wasteful tool. Not only do they require significant materials to build them, but they also need fuel. In this day and age when we should all be conscious of our energy consumption, it’s rather absurd.

You need three things to clear up leaves: Rake. Broom. Elbow grease. That’s all.

UPDATE April 8: Another guy is out there today and I got a good look at his setup: It’s a goddamn backpack mounted petrol driven engine the size of a large portable TV! Fuckin’ insane….

Here’s a quick follow up to the recent post I made about my neighbour and his complaint about my noise.

I went to see him a couple of days later to clear up the situation. It was odd to say the least. ‘R’ invited me into his flat and I ended up there for over half an hour. He turned out to be a pleasant enough guy but wetter than a haddock in a bathing suit. By the end of the conversation, he’d all but retracted his complaint, agreed that he’d handled it badly, told me I was the bigger man and finally said that in fact, the noise wasn’t that bad at all! It was awakward and embarrasing, for him. And at one point, I thought he was going to hug me.

I told him that I wouldn’t change my behaviour regarding my girlfriend but that if the noisy pump was a problem, I’d be more mindful in future. I left, went shopping, and when I returned home another note had been put through my door. It was a thank-you, an apology and a retraction all in one. We’d just done all that, why did he need to confirm it with another note?

People are strange. I feel a song coming on.

You’ve gotta hand it to the spammers.

In an effort to bypass spam filters, their “Enlarge your penis” emails now have even sillier subject lines. Just today I received these: “Bomb her womb from your huge cannon!”, “Elongation of your baby-maker size is not a dream! (Your banana is too small)”, “Most popular way to increase your dummy length (Your Big Daddy is too small)” and “Stop being a sniper, be RAMBO”.

I’m actually looking at my spam folder regularly now, just for new laughs. I guess their plan worked!

I live in a small block of flats that has a shared front-door and post box. Some muppet keeps letting Pizza Leaflet Guy in to hand-deliver leaflets to every flat and while I frown upon this security lapse, I’ve got used to it. So when something was popped through my door at 8pm last night, I thought it was another advert for Extra Ultimate Novelty Deep Pan Extreme.

But no, it actually turned out to be a note written by a neighbour, someone I haven’t even met yet, complaining about the noise. Read more »

Further to my recent post about poor spelling, I noticed this story on the BCC website the other day. It discusses how oral exams could be dropped from foreign language GCSEs because they are “too stressful”.

If this went ahead, it would be possible to get a pass in a foreign language even though you’ve neither written nor spoken a word of it under exam conditions. Unbelievable.

Kids, get this: exams are supposed to be stressful. Sure, getting a good grade is important, but what you learn from dealing with these stressful tests is the ability to better handle stress in real-life.

What is happening in schools? Why are we taking away all the difficult stuff and making it so easy for kids these days? Overcoming difficulties is crucial character building and we seem to be very keen to completely obliterate it from school life. Are we now churning out softies?

I’m all for continuous assessment if it genuinely tracks every pupil’s progress. But exams, stressful or otherwise, do in fact give you a good indication of the capability of a child. I was a reasonably intelligent pupil, but I hated exams and wasn’t very good at them. Yet I never claimed they were too stressful and I managed to get good grades — incidentally as the first year of people to take GCSEs after ‘O Levels’ were shelved.

If an otherwise bright child fails an exam because it’s too stressful, there is something else going on, it’s not simply the stress of the day. I’d argue that if kids are failing due to ’stress’ then they have been failed by a system that didn’t understand their individual learning needs or their personal circumstances in the first place.