Steelso vs Real Life

Away Day ‘07

Yes, it’s that time of year again. This time the theme was ‘Back to Basics’ and we all went up north and stayed in wigwams. Except Marc and I who stayed in a yurt. Above Marc and Al are excited about “nature at it’s finest” and I was lucky to catch Marc finding the simple joys in a stream. We played silly sports, made fires and had great barbecue. More pictures on Flickr.

An evening of excess followed. Not quite sure what the shame will be like this morning. I imagine it’ll be quite high. We’ll wait and see…

Fresh From the Fairway

Proquip. Gowf wear. The clothing of champions!!! Launched today.

Tease!

While browsing O2’s website for more details I noticed that they are saying that the date for launch is 19th October. It’s more likely that someone didn’t up date the website but I’m interested as to why it was possibly pushed back? EDGE netowrk, wi-fi sorting, not enough inventory? And no cash either? Hrmmmmmmmm.

In with the Old!

The smoking ban came in place in Scotland in March 2006 and it’s been deemed a pretty good thing for health and the like. It’s seen publicans  having to change how they provide for their customers, mainly in introducing a nice and friendly area outside for smokers to indulge. Other places such as shopping centres have just banned smoking outright. The image above is from Tesco in Maryhill. Rather than throwing out the old ashtrays/bin someone has reinvented it as a plant pot/ bin. Loving that work.

Not been blogging much recently though I’ve got lots of things that I want to write about. Things like how photography’s changed since digital, the process at work, finding and retaining inspiration and 10 reasons I know that I’m a dad. Outside the fact that I have two kids. I know what I mean.

Things are not so much hectic but heavy at work at the moment and until that’s resolved I can’t see the Muse coming to visit for a while. I’m going to try though, the whole point of this is to stretch me and I’m not keen on stopping just because my head’s mulchy.

iPhone on Nov 9th at an expected £280. Amazed at the deal that O2 supposedly have done with Apple to secure the rights. It does seem a little mad, esp with them having to install an EDGE network that’s inferior to the 3G network that O2 spent billions buying and then trying to monitise. However, the other side of that coin is that the hype for the iPhone will help shift customers from other operators to O2. Seemed to be quite effective with AT&T in the US, we’ll see how it goes here. I have 6 weeks to decide to get one. Yeah. Right. I’ll be camping outside a Carphone Warehouse with all the other geeky-must-have-on-launch saddos.

Park

The team took a little trip out to Hogganfield Loch to feed the birds. It was fun but I’m still terrified of swans. Marc, our resident bird master, seemed quite subdued which was too strange. Images taken and flickrd. It was Al’s idea and a lovely way to spend lunchtime.

Peace.

Excellent

It’s Steelso Thursday! It happened last week, at work last week I got to listen to Cosmosonica last week, all 2 CD’s.Big Al was in some kind of music hell, I was in a alternative universe music heaven.

Yesterday I was listening to Radio 6 and it was mentioned that Volume 2, Crazy Covers, has been released. Faster than you could say, “OHIMGOD, OHMIGOD, OHMIGOD!!!! ” it was ordered. Amazon did a great job, it was on the normal post deal and it arrived this morning.

I can’t wait to share this box of musical oddities with the team. Big Al, not so much.

I shall share my thoughts later. I’m so excited!

Harsh

Clickcomments, the little things below that allow you to pass feedback, have finally allowed me to add icons that can let you tell me if I’m writing pish. So knock yourself out though if you do feel that I’m writing pish I’d really like to know why rather than just clicking a button. I’m cool with criticism just would prefer the constructive variety. Lovely.

2Gb

Upgraded my beloved MacBook today by doubling the RAM to 2Gb. Noticed a couple of improvements, mainly graphical as a MacBook takes any graphic RAM from your main RAM.

(Honestly I’m not going for the most-amount-of-times-RAM-can-be-mentioned-in-one-post achievement. Honest).

And everything shuts down all the quicker. Which is nice if not really the reason I bought the upgrade. And I can load that massive spreadsheet I made in Numbers without making my iTunes begin to slur.

Jake won best costume at the Pirates and Princesses party he was at on Saturday. All the more remarkable as he was dressed as Spiderman. It has only fuelled his belief in self-individuality even further.

The reason I like the picture above of the wonderful BBC Micro is that the picture represents, for me, the future 80’s style. I loved playing Elite…

The above link take you to a visual hell. Apologies….

Why

Every so often something happens that you can’t quite believe. Something that the more you know about it the less it makes sense. This story is one of those things.

Even rarer though is when it does happen you realise that it changes everything. This, to me, seems like the 00’s Bulger moment where we, as a nation, reflect on a terrible, terrible event and ask, “How could this happen?”. It seems to be the pinnacle of a spate of gun violence that the UK has seen recently. That fact that the gunman was allegedly under 16 only adds to the disbelief.

The interview with the parents is the one of the most crushing things I have ever seen. My thoughts and love go to them. I wish, I wish, I wish I could do anything to help you. I am so sorry for your loss.

Danny, my seven year old son, is crazy about news. He can tell you anything, he loves BBC news, he loves knowing things and being curious about the news. “Why” is a word he knows and uses to learn more. I love him so much for that.

Knowing that he’ll be talking about this, I was wondering what Newsround, the BBC news programme for young people, are saying about this terrible event. Danny and I often watch Newsround. He likes it because I used to watch it when I was a kid. I like it because, as a kid, he loves it as much I did. Do. It’s a shared experience.

As always, their coverage was spot on. They tell the facts and then reassure you. They also tell you that it’s ok to be upset at the news. I know this will be comfort to my son. I can’t tell you how much of a comfort it was to me. Thank you.

I’m crying for the family of Rhys Jones. My thoughts and love are with you.

Popped

While getting ready for work I saw the above on the back of a Rough Guide. Made me think about AOL and what the hell happened. I was never a member, I never connected to them. But it really does represent the whole INTERNET to a whole lot of people. Discs for AOL signup where everywhere, every Sunday newspaper, every magazine, every shop. I have no idea how many they produced but they must have filled a couple of landfills.

And the Ads! The commercials on UK tv with Connie, the rather school ma’am-esque guide to AOL. I can’t find any of the old ads but I did find a story of her getting her phone nicked! A very informative story about her being 5ft 11″. Her name’s Rachel Willis and she’s been pretty quiet lately. And I can’t find the ads anywhere.

Seeing the keyword made me realise just how far AOL has declined, at least in my perception of them. They were massive, they were the Internet for a great many people. The phrase “You’ve Got Mail” was made their own and was the basis of a film. The AOL/Time Warner merger was seen as the most influential pairing of old and new media evah! I remeber the feeling of acceptance I had when I saw the AOL/Time Warner logo at the end of “Friends”. It seemed like the Internet and all that carry on was legit and part of media as opposed to being a bit of a fad.

And now? All seems so long ago. What the hell went wrong? Where did Connie go? If anyone knows of any good books or articles on this I’d be most grateful.

Thinking a bit more I did have a 90 day trial of AOL back in the day. It was just so I could hear the Lumley welcome me and tell me I had mail. Bless you Lumley.