graeme.blog

Category: toreview

  • It is no hurricane

    but it is fucking windy out there today. Actually as I typed that, I looked on my weather map widget, and there is a kind of circular nature to the rain map today, so maybe we are getting the arse end of a circulatory weather system, if not an actual hurricane. I’m fairly sure that they do carry on over the Atlantic to some extent after blowing over/around America.

    Still playing a lot of Burnout and also now some Mechassault 2. Getting into the live thing, although I’ve broken my headset already, and now have something held together with surgical tape. Arse. If I get another headset, I’m gluing it in place from the start.

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  • and a pleasant time was had by all

    Good break from work last week. Bought the xbox on wednesday night, got that and live set up, very nice and easy to do. Have played a fair old bit of Burnout Revenge since I got back. Thursday, went to Bath to see T, Friday was out with him and H&J for Bath-based drink excess, then Saturday met mrsfb in Reading for a meal with R&J. Felt like I had a social life and everything.

    Quieter week and weekend this week, may try to sort dull life things out as I go along. May even try to get back into the way of posting here a little more regularly.

    Oh and if you are new here, check out the links to the right, this site is more than a blog, I have written lots of other dull stuff too!

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  • xday

    So I’ve got a bonus this month, and thus am treating myself to an xbox. My mate T has been raving for the past few months about xbox live, and its about time I got to beat him down at Burnout, so I am going to sort it out. Going straight from work to the shops tonight. Afterwards I’m having a little meal out with mrsfb, so a fun evening for all.

    *big happy new console face*

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  • Motivation

    Somewhat lacking in motivation for all the projects I want to do in my own time. I think I need to sit down
    and refocus, split them into smaller bits. And then actually do them. It would be a good idea I reckon.

    I was really tired in the evenings all last week, until I realised we had turned the heating back on for
    the winter, and had it up just a little too high. Much more awake now

    Looking into a site called Ning.com at the moment, it is a place where you can
    build web-based apps very easily. Seems to do google map mashups quite easily, so will have to have
    a play

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  • The longer slower Monday

    Back to work, first full week in ages, and boy am I tired. Really tired. Self-inflicted staying up late watching sport when I should be in bed tired. Ah well, one day I will learn my lesson. Maybe.

    Plan for this week, bit of work on some of the things that need doing for my sister’s French experience. I may even start trying to learn a bit more French, as that will come in handy I suspect. Oui, I shall.

    Right, coffee with me, podcasts to listen to, oh yes, and work to do as well. Lets go.

  • The Long Alright Friday

    Have been back at work nearly a week now, and I suspect today is going to drag somewhat. Got a few things to do this weekend, bit of web-learning to do, and want to write a couple of things, get ahead of myself on that count. Other than that, S’s parents are up to visit, so we get another trip to our favourite restaurant Next Door.

  • The joy of Sopranos

    We’ve had a new tv channel start here this week, More4, which is an extension of the Channel 4 brand. It is pretty good, but the key thing they have done is to start showing The Sopranos from the first episode. Now, I didn’t see it when it was first on, and when I did start to express an interest, fans told me “You have to see it from the start”. So this is what I am doing, and I have to say, it is fucking fantastic. I am so glad I made the effort, because it is just so beautifully done. You can’t beat an hour of quality tv a night, and the prospect of it going on for the best part of a year four times a week is frankly magnificent.

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  • Back in action

    Just getting back into the swing of things now. Had a great two week break, including a week in the south of France visiting my sister, which was also possibly the longest I have been offline in two years. Odd being away from it all, even my mobile. In a nice way, read loads, talked loads. In the main, just relaxed. Not that I am a massive one for stress, I am lucky with my work in that respect, but still, I am so chilled at the moment I could sleep on my desk quite happily.

    Lots to do, websites to design for a couple of people, so I am taking the opportunity to try and update my css skills, and do a better job. The idea is ultimately that I will then use those to improve the look and feel of here. That may be a few months away, but I may tinker a bit in the meantime. Fear change.

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  • Two weeks holiday starts in 7.5 hours!

    And I cannot wait. One week here, one week in the south of France, visting my sister. All sounds good to me, I must confess. I hope to catch up on my lazing and gaming in the first week, and will take it from there.

  • World of Sport?

    Wonderduck asked me in the comments to my previous post if World of Sport had anything to do with Wide-World of Sport on CBS. Am I going to miss an opportunity to write at length about World of Sport? Damn straight I’m not.

    It was indeed quite the rip-off. At the time it started in the UK (around 1967) if you watched sport on TV, you tended to watch it on the BBC, they had most of the contracts. ITV decided they needed a focus to their sports coverage, so created World of Sport, and borrowed much of the philosophy of Wild World of Sport, in particular the idea to show lots of different sports from around the world, rather than being particularly UK-centric. So this was where I first saw the Indy 500, NASCAR, and indeed the NFL, NBA and NHL, this was where my passion for American sports was formed. Along with also being the place to see Evel Knievel jump as well, and I believe the CBS show had the main contract for those jumps, then selling them on around the world. It also was where I saw James Hunt win the Formula 1 world championship in the rain in Japan in 1976.

    World of Sport was also where wrestling was shown in the UK. British Wrestling. Old School British Wrestling. Which I loved at the time, but in general it was appalling compared to its American counterpart. Bizarrely my mother can recall watching American Wrestling in the late 50s-early 60s on ITV, but once World of Sport started, we were “treated” to this endlessly.

    My first memory in life is watching World of Sport. Most Saturday afternoons, for most of my childhood would be spent watching it. The scary thing about the documentary was how many of the “weird and wacky” I can clearly remember watching. The World Firemans Championship from New Jersey in 1980 for one, along with the Lumberjack’s Championship from Canada, which I believe was in Autumn 1976. They also didn’t show enough barrel jumping on ice-skates, as that was a particular childhood favourite.

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