News/General

From Bottleneck.org

France 2010

I got back from a week away in France recently, I took a few photographs, and also recorded a couple of walks around the area in the Google Map below.

I Have Never Voted Tory, But...

As I write this, it looks likely that the UK is going to be in hung parliament territory at this general election, with the Conservatives having the largest number of seats.

What this means is that, with no party with an outright majority, the current Prime Minister (Gordon Brown, Labour) has the right to remain in office until it's clear that he cannot command a majority. Of course, one would normally expect him, if he tried to do so, to be voted down on the Queen's speech, or to suffer a vote of no confidence, at which point the Queen would normally invite the party with the most seats (the Conservatives) to try to form a government.

The way out, should he wish to remain, is to spend the next few days trying to do deals with other parties (the Liberal Democrats and/or others) to have them agree to support his government. Given how far short of the required number of seats for a majority Labour are falling, this would be most likely to take the form of a coalition government, with representatives from both Labour and the Liberal Democrats in the cabinet.

One of the conditions that the Liberal Democrats would impose on such an arrangement is certain to be electoral reform. We could expect to see a referendum on electoral reform over the coming months, and then the dissolution of parliament again, probably within 18 months to two years, followed by another general election under the new electoral rules, some form of proportional representation.

I believe the proportional representation is a fairer system than the current first-passed-the-post system, and that any situation in which the United Kingdom has a wider range of parties who can have a genuine influence on the country is a good one. I want to get away from politics that are about "I'm not the other party, so if you don't like them you must vote for me" and on to politics where parties actually have to be elected on their own issues.

So you might think I'd be in favour of a Labour-Liberal Democrat pact that forms a coalition government and brings through electoral reform. In many ways, I am - but not right now. I've come to the conclusion, and I hate to say it, that a minority Conservative government would be the best thing for the country right now.

The problem is that the nation, while it hasn't fully endorsed the Conservative Party, has certainly sent a message that they no longer want Gordon Brown in charge of the country. My fear is that, should Labour manage to hold on to power by forming a coalition with the Liberal Democrats, the people of this country will feel cheated. They will feel that they have no real influence over the outcome of the elections, that sly double-dealing by politicians has taken place to stifle the opinion of the electorate. In that case, I fear that, even after electoral reform, the country en masse will turn to the Conservatives, believing that still stronger tactical voting is the only way to guarantee the outcome they want (Brown out). Those who saw hope in the idea of voting for a third party this time will abandon that idea as a failed experiment.

And what of that electoral reform? What happens at the referendum? The Conservative message will be clear: "Look how Labour and the Liberal Democrats conspired to overturn your election result, to force themselves back in to power despite the clear wishes of the country. Look at how now they have forced their way back in to power, and realising that they cannot win an election under the current system, they're trying to change the system to their advantage" I suspect that would be a message that would be believed by a lot of frustrated and angry voters who thought that they had already evicted Labour once.

With a minority Conservative government, there is sufficient opposition in the house to keep in check the worst of the Conservative ideas and to keep the Conservative government continually under scrutiny. I hope that it will lead to more debate, and more possibility for parties to find common grounds that provide a reasonable compromise that works for the majority of the country. Ultimately, with a minority government the next general election will probably have to occur much sooner than another five years, which limits the degree of impact the Conservative government could have. Perhaps by the time we get to that point, the Liberal Democrats and Labour party will have been able to explain the case for electoral reform to a more sympathetic ear, the ear of a nation that's got the result it wanted, and by then may not be any happier with it than they were with Labour.

So, I've never voted Tory, but... I hope that they form a minority government, in the hope that in turn leads to us getting a second chance to vote for real change.

Far Cry 2

One of a number of PC games I got for Christmas last year was Far Cry 2. I quite enjoyed the original Far Cry game, so it seemed natural enough to go for Far Cry 2 and stretch my graphics card a little. I recently completed the game, which took a hell of a long time really; it's a big game, with a huge "open-ended" world to explore. Overall, I really did enjoy the game, but in some ways frustrating, so I thought I'd share my thoughts with you.

1. It's not Far Cry 2

It's essentially a completely different game to the original Far Cry, which can come as a bit of a surprise when you've bought it because it's called "Far Cry 2". It's still a good game, and I still enjoyed it, it's just not what I expected.

Okay, so both are set in large scale worlds which are graphics-rich, and they're both essentially first-person shooters with optional sneaking. The original Far Cry, though, essentially walked you through a linear storyline, whereas Far Cry 2 provides a whole range of missions, only some of which advance you through the main plot.

It took a little time to figure out which missions are going to advance you through the plot. I tend to play one plot-driven game at a time, and work through it to completion, after which it sits to one side and gets picked up for a bit more fun or side exploration at a future time when I'm less absorbed in it. Which brings me on to the next point.

2. When you're done, you're done

Yup, once you've completed the main plot line of the game, you can't dip back into the map in single player mode and carry on exploring, driving around, trying out the hang-glider, perfoming the various side missions you might have missed, nothing. Game over. Either start again or load a save game, both of which pop you back into the plot line. Given the huge range of the game, this is disappointing. While it might not seem logically consistent with the plot to be able to continue past the end of the game, there's no reason there couldn't be a "free time" mode to let you pop back in and carry on exploring as though you were at a point in time prior to the end of the game. As it is, if you want to "do everything", then it will take forever to complete the main plot line.

Speaking of exploring...

3. It's a real pain to travel across the map

The map is huge, and littered with checkpoints and enemies. That means that getting between any two points on the map means fighting multiple battles. All before you actually get to the place you were trying to get to in order to, er, have the big battle that forms your mission. So it takes forever to get anywhere, and as a result it takes forever to complete missions, meaning it takes forever to advance the plot, and forever to complete the game. All because you're spending all your time driving a little way down the road, fighting out a checkpoint, healing, recovering ammo, driving a bit further... oh look, another checkpoint!

Then, you reach your destination and complete your mission. Excellent. Now you just need to go and get another mission. Which, if you want a mission that will actually advance the plot line, means going back to where you came from. Through all those checkpoints. This very quickly becomes repetitive and frustrating.

The bus system does offer some help, assuming you're near one of the five bus stops per map, and so is your target; generally they're not. The river system is a bit quieter than the road, but still has enemies, is slower, and not every target is anywhere near a river.

Oh and by the way, if you clean out a checkpoint, then run in to a roaming technical that shoots you up a couple of turns down the road, you might think it's a good idea to pop back to that cleaned out checkpoint for the health pack that you saw there. Bad idea. Once you're a couple of turns down the road, the checkpoint is now suddenly repopulated with bad guys.

Which leads us to...

4. It's repetitive 5. It's repetitive 6. It's repetitive 7. It's repetitive

Travel is dull and repetitive and consists of clearing out checkpoints every few minutes. The missions are essentially all the same and can all be completed by just shooting all the bad guys in an area. The format of every mission is "go to A (with inherent multiple checkpoints en route), kill all the bad guys, pick something up, go to B (checkpoints), kill all the bad guys, do something with the thing you picked up." Unless you choose to follow your buddy's add-on mission as well, in which case you can include "Go to C (checkpoints), kill all the bad guys that are trying to kill your buddy."

Then after all that, you can go back to the place you started (checkpoints, checkpoints, checkpoints) and get another, identical mission.

8. Malaria is bad

Ok, so that's pretty self-evident, but I mean in the context of the game.

You have malaria, which means every 30-40 minutes of real-time play, your vision goes all blurry and you have to take a malaria pill before you can really function again. This I didn't mind particularly, it rarely occurred in the middle of a fire-fight and I thought it added an element of challenge.

The problem is, your pill bottle only has a few malaria pills in it. To top them up, you need to go and perform a mission for someone who has some medicine to give you. You know what that means? No? See items 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 above. Of course this mission doesn't advance the plot.

9. You're stuck with the same weapons all game

This is untrue, but here's the problem. Weapons you pick up from enemies are much more unreliable and jam more often, so you don't really want to bother. Weapons you buy from gun shops using diamonds are much more reliable and can always be replaced free of charge at a weapon shop, but the weapons shop has a limited range of weapons available. You can increase the range of weapons on offer by doing missions for the weapons dealer. Which brings us back to items 3, 4, 5, 6 and 7 again.

This wasn't a major problem - I found the three weapons I was happy with, upgraded them as much as possible and stuck with them through the game. It's just a bit of a shame.

10. Diamonds are forever (difficult to find)

Finding diamond cases out on the map is tricky. Even when you're in the locality of one, they can be well protected with bad guys, and in an obscure location, access to which requires extreme lateral thinking. Once you've dealt with all of that, you're rewarded with anything between one and three diamonds.

Bear in mind that for most missions you'll earn a reward of between 10 and 40 diamonds, so soon you have loads of diamonds that you can't actually spend on anything (see 9 above), and you quickly realise that life's way too short to bother with finding diamonds out there on the map.

11. What was the plot again?

I'm trying to avoid spoilers here, so I'll try to keep my comments general. I was disappointed in the plot itself. I found it hard to follow, most of the time. I felt it took me in directions with which I didn't feel particularly sympathetic. It became obvious that on the rare occasion you were presented with a choice in the main plot line, it didn't actually make any difference to the final outcome. Even the final choice of the game, which I expected to take me to two different end points for the plot actually both result in the same ending. Which wasn't an ending I particularly cared about by that point in the game.

Also, wouldn't it have been nice if your choices of side or extra missions, or the way in which you chose to persue them, or the degree to which you helped or used the help of your buddies, or the extent to which you opted for APR versus UFLL missions actually made a difference to the plot choices and ultimate outcome of the story?

Microsoft-bashing

Microsoft has been forced by the EU to offer a choice of browsers to users. Through blindly following a link somebody posted on Twitter the other day, I ended up at the BBC's Have Your Say page on this subject. Reading this page is a mistake for any rational human being, as you'll quickly discover if you spend any time reading the amusing collection of the most stupid comments which have been collected together on the spEak You're bRanes (sic) website.

So, having got to the Have Your Say page related to Microsoft offering a browser choice, I was very quickly infuriated by the degree of ignorant Microsoft-bashing and free-software smugness on display.

I feel before I continue that I should declare any bias. I am not a Microsoft "fanboy", and I do have some idea what I'm talking about. I am an IT professional, and I've been involved with computers as long as I can remember. My primary technical skills lie much more in Unix and Linux systems than in anything to do with Windows or Microsoft, and this very website is managed by me on a Linux server. I have no particular pro- or anti- Microsoft or Linux/Free Software stance.

Having said that, I use Windows 7 64bit at home with Internet Explorer 8 as my only installed browser. This is a conscious, informed and reasoned choice on my part, and I believe I'm qualified to make it. So let's take a look at why I am supposed to be wrong about this.

The arguments put forward on the Have Your Say page seem to fall into a number of camps. So let's look at each of these, and let me explain why it doesn't work for me.

1. Free browsers and operating systems are the best, I can't believe you all still use Windows

"How quaint. You mean there are still people who use Windows?"

Grow up and stop being so smug about it. If you want to use free software, then by all means do, but if you can't offer any reasoned argument for why your choice is better, then don't expect anyone to take you seriously, or indeed ever find you anything other than an utterly smug cock. There's really nothing to answer in this point.

2. Microsoft products are too expensive

"I'd be happier using MS if they charged a reasonable amount for their software. They are far too expensive."

Fair enough, I've got no problem with the idea that you might not think their software is good value for money. I happen to think it is good (enough) value for money. Here's what I get with my current version of Windows 7:

• An easy-to-use operating system
• Out-of-the-box support for a vast array of hardware
• A web browser
• A gaming platform
• Basic tools for producing documents
• A web server
• A media centre including PVR capability
• DVD authoring software
• An email client
• ... well, lots of stuff

Of course all of that is available for free on Linux. Well, except the gaming platform and the "easy to use" parts. I just find it all works together a lot easier and more simply with Windows, and I'm prepared to pay for that, just as Microsoft are at liberty to charge for it. As a society we seem to be increasingly assuming that we have a right to service without having any expectation of needing to pay for it.

3. Internet Explorer / Microsoft products are unstable and crash all the time

"I installed it and it crashed my PC, which required a rebuild to resolve the problem. Nice one Microsoft, I see you still peddle third rate flakey applications that dont work"

I just have to disagree. I keep my systems updated with the latest patches, and I very, very rarely see Internet Explorer crash or Windows blue-screen, and normally when I do, it's an error in third-party software or drivers that cause it (e.g. Flash, or in a device driver). Now I will accept that the software and OS should be resilient to the effects of badly-written third party software, but I believe that Microsoft are as close as anybody to this, and that it simply does not happen often enough for it to concern me (and believe it or not, I've seen Linux panic enough times as well!)

In general, when I find someone telling me that "Internet Explorer crashes all the time" I find a myriad of third party tool bars, aborted installations and upgrades, or other general user fuckwittery which has made their machine an unstable pile. Have you all ever considered that it might be you who's breaking your PCs?

4. Internet Explorer is utterly riddled with security holes and your identity and money will be stolen if you use it

"as someone who used to do Internet Banking using IE6, I am lucky I didn't get hacked"

Yup, it's all down to luck. Nothing to do with there being nothing particularly unsafe about the browser you were using. Where is the evidence of all these potential identity-stealing vulnerabilities you're worried about anyway?

I've used Internet Explorer for my online banking (and everything else) for years and guess what - I've never been hacked. (Please do not take this as a challenge!) I keep up-to-date anti-virus on my machine. I keep it patched with the latest updates. I don't download and install ropey software from all over the place (and I think this is the key mistake you might all be making out there!) just stuff that I believe I can trust. I occasionally run the free version of Ad-Aware across my PC just to feel good about myself.

A variant of this is "Using a less popular Browser reduces the risk of being attacked"

Well, you're quite right, people do tend to target the more popular software. I'd go on telling everyone to use the browser you use, since it's less popular. Erm.

5. Internet Explorer is slow

IE is pretty slow and only used when I need to check something works in it

If you say so. It's fast enough for me, and I don't tend to find that page rendering times are the limiting factor in my enjoyment of the web. Flash is a bit slow, though, and my broadband might be a bit slow sometimes, too.

6. Other browsers have better features built in or available as add-ons

"I find AdBlock Plus absolutely invaluable ... other useful little touches too like spellcheck in web comment forms"

Well done, this is the only argument that I believe has any real weight behind it. As it happens, Internet Explorer has all the features I particularly care about. I just don't find the adverts that offensive, and to be honest if we all start blocking them it begs the question of what other horrible means the site designers will have to come up with to raise revenue.

I don't believe that, if you look objectively at the products, there's anything fundamentally bad or evil about Microsoft products. It really boils down to this: Microsoft bashing is fashionable.

So there we have it - that's why I'm happy enough with Windows and Internet Explorer. It works for me, it performs the functions I need it to, it's sufficiently simple that I can stop being an IT professional when I get home and just use my PC. What's so wrong with that?

Birthday Number 1 Singles

This from EveryHit.com - the number one single in the UK singles chart on each of my birthdays. With apologies for the poor formatting!

• 1977 On your birthdate the No. 1 single was Rod Stewart - "I Don't Want To Talk About It / First Cut Is The Deepest"
• 1978 On your 1st birthday Boney M - "Rivers Of Babylon"
• 1979 On your 2nd birthday Blondie - "Sunday Girl"
• 1980 On your 3rd birthday Mash - "Theme From MASH (Suicide Is Painless)"
• 1981 On your 4th birthday Smokey Robinson - "Being With You"
• 1982 On your 5th birthday Adam Ant - "Goody Two Shoes"
• 1983 On your 6th birthday The Police - "Every Breath You Take"
• 1984 On your 7th birthday Frankie Goes To Hollywood - "Two Tribes"
• 1985 On your 8th birthday The Crowd - "You'll Never Walk Alone"
• 1986 On your 9th birthday Doctor & The Medics - "Spirit In The Sky"
• 1987 On your 10th birthday Whitney Houston - "I Want To Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)"
• 1988 On your 11th birthday Wet Wet Wet / Billy Bragg - "With A Little Help From My Friends / She's Leaving Home"
• 1989 On your 12th birthday Jason Donovan - "Sealed With A Kiss"
• 1990 On your 13th birthday Englandneworder - "World In Motion"
• 1991 On your 14th birthday Color Me Badd - "I Wanna Sex You Up"
• 1992 On your 15th birthday Erasure - "Abba-Esque (EP)"
• 1993 On your 16th birthday UB40 - "(I Can't Help) Falling In Love With You"
• 1994 On your 17th birthday Wet Wet Wet - "Love Is All Around"
• 1995 On your 18th birthday Robson & Jerome - "Unchained Melody / The White Cliffs Of Dover"
• 1996 On your 19th birthday Fugees - "Killing Me Softly"
• 1997 On your 20th birthday Hanson - "Mmm Bop"
• 1998 On your 21st birthday B*witched - "C'Est La Vie"
• 1999 On your 22nd birthday Baz Luhrmann - "Everybody's Free (To Wear Sunscreen)"
• 2000 On your 23rd birthday Sonique - "It Feels So Good"
• 2001 On your 24th birthday Shaggy feat. Rayvon - "Angel"
• 2002 On your 25th birthday Will Young - "Light My Fire"
• 2003 On your 26th birthday Evanescence - "Bring Me To Life"
• 2004 On your 27th birthday Mario Winans featuring Enya & P Diddy - "I Don't Wanna Know"
• 2005 On your 28th birthday Crazy Frog - "Axel F"
• 2006 On your 29th birthday Sandi Thom - "I Wish I Was A Punk Rocker (With Flowers In My Hair)"
• 2007 On your 30th birthday Rihanna featuring Jay-Z - "Umbrella"
• 2008 On your 31st birthday Mint Royale - "Singin' In The Rain"
• 2009 On your 32nd birthday Black Eyed Peas - "Boom Boom Pow"

Flight Simulator X

These tracks show a series of Microsoft Flight Simulator X flights I've been making recently, visiting every country on the way down the West Coast of Africa. This is a tour in progress, so I'll update the map as I go.

Note that the tracks sometimes look a bit awkwards because of where the IFR airways run.

In order to convert the Flight Simulator X flight plan files (.pln) to Google Earth / Google Maps format (.kml) I wrote a bunch of macros in an Excel 2007 spreadsheet - I can't guarantee it will work for you, and I'm quite certain it won't work for earlier versions of Flight Simulator, but you're welcome to make use of the file if you want to!

Download Flight Simulator X .pln to .kml Converter

View FSX Flight Plan tracks in a larger map

Walking in Santorini

This is a GPS plot of a walk we took in Santorini in 2009. We started at our hotel and climbed up the hill to the ruins of Ancient Thira, stopping at a little church on the hillside on the way up. Then we walked down to Kamari to meet some friends for the afternoon, and finally took a boat trip back to our resort of Perissa.

Click on the markers for a sample of pictures taken on the way, and click on the thumbnails to open a larger version in the gallery. Also, check out the full collection of pictures from Santorini.

View Santorini 2009 in a larger map

Skiing GPS Tracks

I've finally put online some GPS tracks I've recorded on a couple of occasions when I've been skiing, just for casual interest.

First there are a set of tracks from Serre Chevalier in 2007. I started splitting this one down into individual pistes and lifts and colour coding them accordingly, but ultimately I decided that life's too short and just dumped all of the tracks together.

The second set is from Alpe d'Huez in 2009, and I didn't bother mucking about with this at all.

The final set is the most recent and is from Tignes and Val D'Isere in 2010. It's a bit smaller than the others because I had battery issues and so didn't get tracks recorded every day.

The tracks don't necessarily represent every slope skiied, but they give an indication of terrain covered. They look fine in Google Earth but they don't work particularly well in Google Maps because there are too many tracks to fit on to one screen.

Christmas

Well, a decent Christmas was had by all, and a decent haul of presents this year. Microsoft Flight Simulator X: Gold Edition, for geeking around the virtual skies for hours on end. A couple of other PC games too - Bioshock (oldish, but good I hear), FarCry 2 (ditto!), Grand Theft Auto IV. Some CDs that I've been meaning to get for ages - Leftfield/Leftism, Just Jack/Overtones and Fall Out Boy/Infinity on High. Some Cat Tracks for my ski boots, plus a bunch of other stuff.

On top of all that, I've got a new car to look forward to! No, it wasn't a Christmas present, it's because our car is falling to pieces and we got £3,500 off the new one as part of the current scrappage deal. I just need it to arrive before the old car dies now!

So, I hope you all had a good Christmas, and I hope you're looking forward to 2010 as much as I am!

Spendthrift

Well, what with one thing and another I seem to have been a bit of a spendthrift this month.

First, I bought myself a pair of ski boots - and if anyone out there is wondering if it's worth it... well, it is. I can't believe ski boots could be so comfortable! I got them from Filarinskis in Havant, who I can heartily recommend. They also gave me a voucher to try them out for an hour on Southampton's dry ski slope (which they also manage). Dry skiing is, it's fair to say, very weird! All in all, the boots were pretty comfortable - I had slight muscular/feet aches, but nothing like I'd have had with hire boots, and probably mostly down to it being a long time since I'd last skied, along with tension and bad technique on the dry slope.

Secondly, I've just bought a nice shiny new PC! I got a "Ricochet" from Novatech - Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83GHz, 4GB RAM, 500GB Hard Disk, ATI Radeon 4650 1GB graphics, plus a shiny 22" widescreen LCD :) So far I don't think I've made it break a sweat, so if anyone wants to suggest some games to challenge it, mail me!

Steve's Laws of Burgers

1. A burger comprises, at the minimum, meat and bun.
2. Other toppings are optional.
3. There is freedom in bread choice.
4. A burger should be able to be hand-held.
5. It should be possible for a normal person to take a bite clean through the buns and the contents.
6. A burger must not require use of a knife and fork, and must stand upright without the assistance of a skewer.
7. Content spillage is acceptable, but only in limited amounts.
8. The burger and bun must retain their structural integrity whilst being eaten.
9. A burger does not require you to answer the question of how you would like it cooked. It is not a steak.

I hope that clears the matter up.

Honeymoon (part II)

Hi,

Just a quick map of the places we visited on our honeymoon. I'll probably add some tracks of the various drives we did at some point too.

spEak You're bRanes

"A collection of ignorance, narcissism, stupidity, hypocrisy and bad grammar.

All the comments quoted were found on the BBC "Have Your Say" site. Yes, people really have written them. On purpose as far as I can tell."

http://ifyoulikeitsomuchwhydontyougolivethere.com/

Album Covers

This stolen from Iain Tatch who also stole it from AndyC.

---

How to design your own album cover

1. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random

The first article title on the page is the name of your band. You can remove bits in brackets - eg. "(Seinfeld epsode)" - if you like, or you can leave them in.

2. http://www.quotationspage.com/random.php3

The last four words of the very last quotation is the title of your album. You can use the last three or five words if it sounds better.

3. http://www.flickr.com/explore/interesting/7days/

The third picture, no matter what it is, will be your album cover. If it won't let you save the pic (if this is the case, it will call the file "spaceball.gif"), press shift and print screen to take a screenshot, then paste it into the program.

4.Use your graphics programme of choice to throw them together, and post the result. You can get fonts from www.dafont.com.

5. Write a blurb about your album's musical content (optional).

---

Inspired!

Let it Snow

Good morning!

Well, it's been a little while since I've done much in the way of updating my site, so it seemed it was about time.

First of all, I've finally got around to booking my Christmas skiing holiday, which marks the welcome return of the super skiing countdown banner

(no longer available)

Well worth the cost of a ski holiday just to be able to use that at the top of the page again, I'm sure you'll agree.

So as you can see, I'll be off to Serre Chevalier, in particular to Villneuve, for a week in a catered chalet over Christmas with a couple of my friends. We just need to watch the snow reports now!

So, Christmas is coming along and I'm happy to say I've already pretty much finished my Christmas shopping. I've one more gift to buy, plus wrapping paper and cards, and then I'm all done! That also means that fairly shortly I'll also be able to pull out my dusty bottleneck.org Brick Testament Advent Calendar, my personal Christmas countdown with images from the utterly fantastic Brick Testament, an enaging rendition of the bible in Lego. I'll be plugging them extensively, including adding their link over in my links section. For those who've not seen it before and simply can't wait until December 1st, here's a sneak preview of the first day, click on the image to see it full size, or read the full nativity story at The Brick Testament:

(no longer available)

As much to pad out the banner space on the home page, I've popped the details of my engagement back up there, this time with a link to more details about the wedding, though I must admit I've not added an awful lot of detail just yet!

Not many more changes on the site at the moment - I've added a few more things to the Recipe Collection but that's about it. Life's going pretty well for me at the moment, though I'm swamped with work and don't seem to be getting through it very quickly. I hope you're all well, and a quick mention to Richard and Sarah, who should be having their first child any moment now, to Peter and Katherine and to Mark and Sarah, who will be having their second over the next couple of weeks, and to Lynne and Matt, who're just recently pregnant with their first! Good luck to all of you ... sincerely!

Pea Soup

I was driving in to work the other day in what can be described as a light fog. The headlights of oncoming vehicles passing the street furniture made some rather pretty patterns on the mist, and it crossed my mind that it would be a lovely, but nigh-on impossible, thing to photograph.

So, we reach the motorway, and my passenger Ruth comments on the number of people who are showing their rear fog lights. Having recently passed her driving test, Ruth is quite familiar with the highway code, and pointed out that foglights should be shown when visibility is less than 100m. Since visibility today was getting on for half a mile, she was naturally perplexed as to why so many people had their rear foglight turned on, particularly as she found it quite distracting and dazzling.

The answer is, of course, that they're idiots. Now this doesn't wind me up particularly, I've got used to keeping the bright light out of my direct line of vision, and I've accepted the fact that, at the first hint of a bit of mist, some people will turn on the fog light - because that's what it's for, surely? I've even accepted that fact that, as recently, when visibility is reduced to about 50 meters by a torrential downpour, some people won't turn on their fog light - after all, that's for use in fog, right?

What did get my goat, though, was the car I saw with its front fog lamps turned on. I mean really - were you struggling to see the road?

Now, this morning I was awoken to the sound of foghorns on Southampton Water. Note the subtlety with which that is phrased - I was not awoken by the sound of foghorns, merely to the sound of foghorns - they're not invasive to the extent that they keep you awake, and in fact they're rather a nice, mellow sound, and is one of the reasons I like living here. So it was with no surprise that when I peeled back the curtains this morning I found I could barely see the other side of the street (it seems that the captains of ocean-going container vessels know exactly when it's appropriate to use their fog 'lights'!) As I sipped my morning coffee, content in the knowledge that I had a day off work, and no need to leave the house today, I smiled at the thought of all the happy motorists who will get in their car this morning and punch the fog light button on with great satisfaction - finally, unbeknownst to them, appropriately.

Notice

Mouth ulcers suck.

That is all.

Up to Date

Well, I've finally got all of my recent photographs online and up to date, the latest addition being pictures from the Renault World Series at Donington Park recently. Unfortunately, I'm bound to take more pictures some time soon!

Since my write-up of my trial flying lesson has dropped off the bottom of the blog now, and as I'd quite like to keep a diary as I learn to fly (assuming I ever do learn!), I've also linked it from Learning to Fly - entry 0 - I'll put a contents page on the front of it and add entries as I learn.

Personally, things are settling down a little at the moment. We'll be getting a new garage door fitted on 2^nd October, which will be welcome after the vandalism it suffered. Ruth and I will probably start looking for a honeymoon in earnest pretty soon (what is the flying time to earnest anyway...? ho ho ho!) which will be the last of the major elements of the wedding sorted out at least to some degree - that's not to say I expect it all to be easy from now on!

Events-wise, things are quieting down there too - I've got a trip home to my parents' place coming up, a weekend away caving in Wales, and then I'm pretty much free for the rest of the year until Christmas - to be honest, that's welcome, I'm starting to feel like I've been doing too much living lately! It's also good practice for if I ever do learn to fly, and I'm too poor to do anything else ;)

Anyway, that's about it for now!

Renault World Series

Just a note to say I spent the weekend at the Renault World Series race at Donington Park this weekend, and saw plenty of excellent racing - unfortunately that means I have still more photographs to put up online soon! I think I may have to spend some evenings this week working though them all. Watch this space!

Come Fly With Me

Well, on Saturday morning I had my trial flying lesson, and I'm pleased to say that, while it was less exciting, in an adrenaline-pumping way, than I'd expected, it was certainly a lot of fun.

The day started at 8am on Saturday morning with a quick ground briefing about how aeroplanes work, after which we piled Ruth into the back seat, me into the left seat and the instructor into the right of a Piper Warrior II PA28 161. We took off from HMS Daedalus (now called Lee-on-the-Solent Airfield) on an "Explorer" trial flight from Carill Aviation at about 8:30am on Saturday morning. It was a beautifully clear and sunny day, blue skies without a cloud in sight, and no wind to speak of. The takeoff from Daedalus takes you out directly over the beach and into the Solent, so it's a beautiful spot for it.

The instructor took us up to between 1600 and 2000 ft, then demonstrated the controls and overflew us around Portsmouth for a while, a great place to do this sort of thing, as you get the scenic view of the coastline, Isle of Wight and the Solent, as well as getting a good from-the-air look at the Naval Dockyard.

After this it was over to me to take the controls for a little while. I must admit, I struggled to get the feel of them at this point, and was quite jerky on the controls - this I think was partly due to trying to be a bit too clever and perform nice, coordinated turns (a coordinated turn is when you apply sufficient rudder in a banked turn to keep the nose of the plane pointing in the direction of the turn, thus avoiding slip - it's not too easy for a novice!) I also got told by the instructor to stop looking at the instruments and look out of the window more - both to enjoy the view, and get my visual cues about what the plane was doing. I guess that habit came from playing Microsoft Flight Simulator a bit too much, where the view out of the "window" gives you no sensible information at all!

After bimbling about over the Solent and the Isle of Wight for a little while, the instructor took the controls and bought us in for a landing at Bembridge Airport, Isle of Wight. We sat and had a cup of coffee and a chat. I explained how surprised I was that there was so little need to continually re-trim the plane, but the instructor did say that it was a particularly calm day. He also told me not to worry about performing coordinated turns, and instead to just throw the plane about a bit and enjoy it.

By 9:35am we were taking off from Bembridge again. The instructor put the plane in a climb, gave me control, and told me to take it up to about 2000 ft, level out, and trim for level flight. I was quite surprised how easily that came, getting the trim correct in particular. That's quite difficult on a flight simulator, because the joystick always pushes back with a constant force for a given deflection - so the process becomes iterative - trim a bit, ease the joystick back towards the centre, see how the plane responds, trim again... In a real plane, it's so simple - you're maintaining pressure on the controls to keep level flight, and as you trim the plane you feel that back-pressure decrease until the controls feel light again - at which point, you're trimmed. It took me about a second to re-trim the plane for it's new level attitude, it was so natural.

So, I played around a bit more with the plane, and both enjoyed it more and felt smoother at the controls once I'd stopped worrying about the technicalities. After that the instructor popped us in to controlled airspace to look at my home in Hamble (most interesting listening to all the radio chatter from Southampton) and then it was back to Lee-on-the-Solent.

All in all, I think I'd rather like to learn properly - as the instructor pointed out, the total cost would be of the order of £6500, which is similar to the cost of a second hand car - it's also something I could save for reasonably easily if I wanted to. I also like the idea of one day being able to drop my career and just do something like flight instruction to bring in enough cash to get by - who knows? Either way, though, it'll have to wait until after the wedding!

Photographs from the day are here!

Expelliarmus!

Good morning,

Well, as you can probably tell, I've been a bit Harry Potter obsessed over the last week or so. I did, of course, read the final book on Saturday and (don't worry, no spoilers here) suffice it to say I thought the book itself a little dull, with the exception of the last few chapters of action, which wound up the series very well, I thought. I think I'd have preferred it not to have the last three words of the book, though...

Also this weekend we arranged a date for our wedding, having choosen a reception venue and spoken to the church, so it looks like being 26th July 2008. It's nice that things are finally moving.

Sunday was a trip to Longleat, which was my first ever trip to a safari park. It was all rather fun, and photographs will be online shortly.

Hope you're all well,

Mud, mud, mud

Well, the BTCC weekend at Donington was all good fun, pictures are available here. We did have to curtail the weekend a little, as the rain on Sunday simply got too heavy around lunch time. Despite the mud bath that constituted a camp site, however, we did have a good time - the barbeque worked well! All that remains is to organise a trip to Snetterton for a couple of weekends' time. With any luck the weather will improve.

Wedding arrangements are going along - we're viewing a number of venues over the next few days, so hopefully by the end of the weekend we can make some decisions about what we're doing and where we're going.

Anyway, that's all for now!

Holiday

Hello,

Well, since I last wrote I've been away on my holiday to France - photos here - where it was pretty much universally rainy and grey. That being said, it was still a nice relaxing week off work, so I didn't really mind too much. Now I'm back, we're going to get on with booking another holiday for the end of August - probably Kefalonia or Crete for a week.

Touring Car events are coming along. Myself and two friends are off to Donington to camp for the weekend next weekend - hopefully the weather will improve a little over the next week. I've got hold of a £8 Tesco round barbeque, which will be good for almost disposable cooking goodness. Should be fun whatever happens - and hopefully I'll be doing it all again a fortnight later at Snetterton, with a few other people.

The big hassle at the moment is weddings. We were hoping to get married in the church local to where Ruth lived, however they have been very difficult to pin down, as they were expecting some building work to be taking place at some ill-defined point in future time. They have now decided that this is likely to be over the month we wish to get married, so it's looking like we need a plan B. We did consider doing the whole thing abroad, but the cost becomes prohibitive if you want to bring any reasonable number of guests out with you. So the current plan is to try to do it in our local parish church, with the reception at a nearby country hotel. That could well be feasible - I'll keep you up to date!

Getting on a bit

Good day,

Well, much has happened since I last wrote anything of substance here. Perhaps most notably, I recently turned 30, which is not really the drama people seem to think it is. I didn't do much with the day itself other than chill out and relax, and have a meal out in the evening, but there was much revelry the day before!

The previous day had been the stag "do" of a friend of mine. The format of the day was to spend a few hours racking karts around at ~60mph on the Thruxton Karting Circuit, followed by a curry and a few beers.

The karting took the form of an 8 minute practice session straight out from the pits, followed by two 8 lap heats with grid starts, and a 12 lap final with grid start. That might not sound a vast amount, but believe me, it feels like plenty of action! I didn't make a fool of myself overall, despite getting well out of shape in the first heat and ending up in last position, two laps down! I started the final in 11th place, and finished in 6th overall, so I'm reasonably pleased with that, for a complete novice at these things.

I can't recommend this karting lark enough, it was an absolutely fantastic afternoon's entertainment!

The evening was spent have a beer or two, a curry at Kuti's, and then on to the classic Frog and Frigate for much dancing on tables! I think I got back into my house at 3:30am, so a good night all round!

Also, for my 30th birthday, I was bought a trial flying lesson at Carill Aviation. The lesson will take the format of a 30 minute ground briefing, a 30 minute flight to the Isle of Wight, a touch-and-go, 30 minutes at the controls, a landing on the Island for a coffee and slice of cake, then the flight back to Lee-on-the-Solent. So pretty comprehensive an experience! Suffice it to say, I'm looking forward to it significantly, and hope to actually have the lesson August 11th.

I'm off on holiday for a week from Wednesday, which will be a welcome break from work and period of relaxation. I'll also be going to Wimbledon on the following Thursday, all being well. After that, there are the usual numerous BTCC events coming along, so still a busy time for me. With any luck I'll get another summer holiday in around the end of August too.

Finally, there have been a couple of changes to this website. A lot of the changes have been behind-the-scenes tidying up and rationalising of things. I've got rid of a load of work content too, I just didn't care about it enough. I've also removed the ability for visitors to use the Comments tabs, as they only ever seemed to be getting used by spammers anyway. Finally, I've (at last!) added the necessary code and structure to support my Photo Gallery which is now linked from the sidebar on the left. I'll be populating this as we go along.

Cheers!