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Nothing to report today.

What I need is a really big rant about something... But nothing is annoying me just now. I need inspiration...



Okay, got one.

If there is one thing in the universe at the moment that really annoys me, it's the physical distance it can put between people. I'm not sure the words exist in this world to adequately express my feelings on the matter. So feel free to insert a few choices ones of your own here:

[[__________ __________ __________ __________ __________]]

Thank you.



"Laughter is the shortest distance between two people." - Victor Borge (1909 - )

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Well, the Forces of Darkness did not appear to prevent me taking our stuff, so now we are all but totally settled in our new digs. Which have the added bonus of a deli/sandwich shop opening up right next door, owned by the same 'secret' director guy! Hopefully we'll get a discount....

We'll be getting the rest of our stufff on Saturday in a van. But, there's bad news.

Tomorrow I'll actually have to do some work. Bummer.



"It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do." - Jerome K. Jerome (1859 - 1927)

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The situation has grown interesting.

Seems I forgot a part of the tale somewhere. Specifically the bit where the MD said that we were in that office "at his sufference". I thought I'd told everyone that he'd said that; maybe I did and they forgot, maybe I didn't. But translated this means "I didn't want you here". So.... By not talking to us he forces us to make the move and go instead of having to tell us to, saving face. All in all a helpful excuse for him to get rid of us without him looking like an idiot.

Too late.

So our other, "secret but needed for the books" director, who owns a little hotel, has offered a back room for our office, at a modest fee, of course. And I'll be going in tomorrow to get the most important gear I need to get on with doing my job (and hopefully find out what's what in the process). Then all the rest moves out once we hire a van for the duration. And that, dear reader, will be that.

Dumbass MD guy. Needs a good kicking.



"Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former." - Albert Einstein (1879 - 1955)

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Well, today was a big zero.

Just as I almost got there my boss phoned me and said "wait till I call you back". So I waited. An hour later he phones back and tells me he still can't get in contact with the MD, he just never seems to be available and doesn't return calls. So, back home I went.

Tomorrow we'll be scouting for new offices and maybe looking in on that accurséd place. Maybe we'll even track the guy down, kick down his door and demand some answers from the fuckwit.



"IDIOT, n. A member of a large and powerful tribe whose influence in human affairs has always been dominant and controlling. The Idiot's activity is not confined to any special field of thought or action, but "pervades and regulates the whole." He has the last word in everything; his decision is unappealable. He sets the fashions and opinion of taste, dictates the limitations of speech and circumscribes conduct with a dead-line." - Ambrose Bierce (1842 - 1914), The Devil's Dictionary

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Well. Not much going on today.

I wish I was one of those people with an interesting life and things to rant about. Maybe being at home all week waiting for mobile phones to ring (the office phones, yes, phones, are redirected to them) has meant that nothing else of even vague interest has happened. But tomorrow... Tomorrow it all changes. Tomorrow I find out what the decision of the dumbass MD is.



"A deadline is negative inspiration. Still, it's better than no inspiration at all." - Rita Mae Brown, 'Starting from Scratch: A Different Kind of Writer's Manual'

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Okay, some quiz things to fill in the gaps. I have no more news on the job front, so....




take the antisocial test.
and go to mewing.net. because laura's feeling social.





what's your battle cry? | mewing.net | merchandise!




"I approach these questions unwillingly, as they are sore subjects, but no cure can be effected without touching upon and handling them." - Titus Livius (59 BC - 17 AD)

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So now I'm getting really pissed off.

Seems the MD is not relenting or backing down at all. Maybe he doesn't want to lose face or something. But my boss (who's currently away on a big contract job, seemingly too big to return and deal with this emergency in person) tells me over the phone that if it doesn't get sorted out, we'll either be moving the two most important computers out onto my dining room table until we can get a new office, or the company will fold.

Well, ain't that jolly.

We always seem to operate just this side of collapse. As he's said before, we never seem to get any breaks. Will this be the proverbial straw to snap the equally proverbial back of a certain dromedary?

If that were to happen, my boss has said he'd like to give the guy a good kicking. I said that'd be a bad idea unless I was to get in some time myself with him with a baseball bat.

Stupid idiot.



"Whenever you are asked if you can do a job, tell 'em, 'Certainly I can!' Then get busy and find out how to do it." - Theodore Roosevelt (1858 - 1919)

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So I was watching Babylon 5 today, and up came a quote I'd been trying to remember for ages. It has particular reference now, I feel, regarding the shuttle disaster....

"Is it worth it? Should we just pull back, forget the whole thing as a bad idea and take care of our own problems at home?" "No. We have to stay here and there's a simple reason why. Ask ten different scientists about the environment, population control, genetics and you'll get ten different answers, but there's one thing every scientist on the planet agrees on. Whether it happens in a hundred years or a thousand years or a million years, eventually our Sun will grow cold and go out. When that happens, it won't just take us. It'll take Marilyn Monroe and Lao-Tzu and Einstein and Morobuto and Buddy Holly and Aristophenes... And all of this... All of this was for nothing unless we go to the stars." Mary Ann Cramer interviews Cmdr. Sinclair in Babylon 5:"Infection"

Okay, so maybe we aren't that far "out there" yet, but for some reason I find it a compelling arguement. I suppose I'm just odd that way.



"Space isn't remote at all. It's only an hour's drive away if your car could go straight upwards." - Fred Hoyle

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So I'm still waiting to hear about the work thing.

My boss has talked to the point of contact guy and he's real embarrassed about it. He knows we've had priviledged access to their stuff for years, even used it to test programs for other customers before, and he has no problem with it. The MD, he tells us, is known as being something of a hothead with a short fuse.

So maybe tomorrow afternoon I'll be back there, and my little holiday will be over.

Shit. I was beginning to enjoy it.



In other news....

Nothing much has happened, beyond me making a fool of myself recently, more than I usually do anyway. It's all smoothed out now though.

Although I remain a fool.



"A witty saying proves nothing." - Voltaire

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So let me give you a quick bit of background before we get to the real story.

So the company I work for has a customer we've done a lot of work for in the past for over five years or more. Recently we moved into one of their back offices for a few months so we could do a shedload of of work for them.

I suppose I should mention I'm a computer programmer, working with the fourth generation language Progress. It does clever things with relational databases. All far less interesting than it sounds, and that is very scary. This customer uses a product called PECAS, which is basically a big stock, order and ledger system.

After we, or rather I, did all that we negotiated a deal to basically set up permanent offices in their place; no rent and they pay the phone bills, in exchange for two free days work a month. Not that they've made much use of that, so it's been a sweet deal.

Now, the story.

Today, I was doing a little work for one of our other customers, which is fine. They too use PECAS. But because our own unix server, which has PECAS on it, had bugger all data on it, making testing difficult, I decided to give it a go on our host's test system instead. No problem, done it before. But this time there were too many users on the system and there were not enough Progress licences for all the people wanting to use it to be able to and the thing crashed.

While they were checking up to see who was doing what, they found I was logged into the system and wondered what I was doing, as they knew I was not doing any work for them at that time. So I told them, just testing a program for one of our other customers because our test system had insufficient data to allow us to do so.

They got quite tetchy, quite unnecessarily so. The bloody managing director himself comes in and starts complaining at me about breaches of confidence and shit like that. As if I'd been leeching vital company info out and selling it to the highest bidder or something. Or purposefully crashed the system for jollies. He was even threatening to kick us out.

Eventually he comes back and says "get yer coat, I'm escorting you off the premises". Whoa, I thought. Over-reaction or what. So I shut down our computers and left, forbidden to return until talks had resolved the situation, if at all.

Bear in mind I was running a simple report that just printed data out, no actual changing going on; bear in mind that if we wanted to rip them off somehow we could have stolen their data anytime and they'd never know; bear in mind that I've got better things to do than fuck about with their pissy little customer list or whatever.

Fortunately, my boss is on my side; he knows they're over-reacting too and is sure he'll talk them round and they'll be all embarrased and welcome us back. If they'd gotten talking more to be at the time I think I'd have ended up saying "yeah, fuck you too" and walking anyway. For some reason their attitude made me inexplicably belligerant and ready to rumble.

Screw 'em.

In the mean time, I've got the next couple of days off, by the look of it, until our point of contact guy gets back from wherever he's gone.

Fun, eh?



"It could be that the purpose of your life is only to serve as a warning to others..."

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So that was an interesting weekend.

Friday

I arrived in Edinburgh at quarter past seven p.m., and once I dropped my stuf off at my brother's flat-

That reminds me. You know Rebus? You might know him from the ITV series rather than the books by Ian Rankin. He's a detective based in Edinburgh, pretty much the usual maverick type but Scottish. But what's interesting is that he lives on a flat in Arden Street in Marchmont. Which is the same street my brother lives on. Weird, eh?

Anyway, I digress. That'll be my lunch. Oh no, that's digest... As I was saying, then I went to the event itself, the Edinburgh Goth Weekend, the St Valentine's Heart of Darkness. Point: I am not a goth. I was invited by my brother, who is one of the organisers and did the website, so I went. I was certainly the most normal-looking person there, though I certainly make no strong claims on normalcy. But at least I was in black, so I blended in a bit.

At the other end of the (entirely black) spectrum were some very entertaining people. Some women who shouldn't even be shown fishnets or corsets, let alone wear them, and a load of people in plastic (black), leather (black) or velvet (black), or a combination of these. The usual array of frilly shirts and cuffs. Mad hair. 'Normal' hair. A few kilts.

There were three rooms, one "trad goth/industrial/punk", one "cybergoth/EBM/darkwave" and the third "ambient-experimental". Between an hour or so of apparently well-known DJs playing "appropriate" music in the various rooms, I saw a set by Spermwhale (one of the cybergoth ones, I think) who were not too bad but hard to describe and another by the massively popular Screaming Banshee Aircrew. They were quite good and very, ah, distinctively dressed.

I only left way after it ended at three a.m. because I had to wait for my brother who, worst luck, had to be the last to leave. I dozed off at one point (it was late after a looong day) but finally got to go to sleep at around four p.m. All in all a most entertaining day.



Saturday

When I finally regained my senses enough to check the time, I found it was six p.m.. Yes: I didn't see daylight on Saturday. I slept for fourteen hours. Don't ask me how that worked. I completely missed the trader's stalls and other stuff during the day, so I have no idea how that went.

As it turned out I almost immediately got drafted into action: I had to take a vital consignment of cakes to the venue for the bands or they were not going to play. Yep, that's right: the darkly scary goth and/or rock band members were going to walk out unless they got cakes.

So I headed down there for another night's excitement, which this time featured the quite superb and popular Maya29, a sort of punk band, I guess; the even more punky Je$us Loves Amerika; and the darkly techno Revolution By Night, who ended with a version of "Stupid Girl" by Garbage. Strangely, the sets and DJs in the cybergoth room had projected images of the Transformers and The League of Gentlemen as a backdrop. Freaky.

Again, a late night.



An aside: food was an interesting experience. I've never had so many "chips with X" in one weekend before. And everything deep fried in batter, of course. Nice, but eventually fatal. But I can recommend "sauce", which is an Edinburgh thing; basically brown sauce watered down with vinegar. There are fights between people from Edinburgh and Glasgow over whether sauce is better than vinegar. Seriously.



Sunday

I actually saw the sun that day. Stunning. Wandered down to the venue and saw some goths in the stark light of day; bizarre. I saw the trader's stalls this time, though there wasn't much going on. They were setting up a karoke system at one end, though I think they were only going to play music, not actually have people sing.

It was funny to see what happened when they tested the volume: the stereo belonging to the witches in the corner had just finished playing "Bells, Books and Candles" by Graeme Revell (used in 'The Craft' amongst other things) and started playing the theme from the TV series 'Charmed' when suddenly the Atomic Kitten cover of Blondie's 'The Tide Is High' (the original is just infintely superior) blared out. The witch's heads suddenly popped up like they were wiccan meercats. Most amusing.

Then came the so-called "GothZoo". Contrary to what you might think, this did not involve providing goths for the public to see and stroke. Instead it was what I suppose you could call 'goth-friendly animals' if that makes any sense. No cute fluffy things, just the strange and maybe scary.

So one womam brought her chocolate millipede (cool); two cockroaches (friendly and they walk all over you); a BIG snail about the size of a cricket ball; a tarantula that didn't like the noise much; a frisky scorpion that was no longer safe to pick up; and a young king snake, which was very nice. The snake was very cool to the touch and smooth like leather, and clambered around on me for ages.

Another load of people brought owls. One small grey one that was very interested in the cockroaches across the room, a European Eagle owl (which was about two feet tall and very big and heavy) and a barn owl. Unexpectedly, much like most birds their actual bodies and heads are smaller than you think under all those feathers.

Interesting point: apparently, if (by scale) we had eyes as big as an owl's they would be the size of watermelons. Once we'd stuck them in our heads about half of the remaining space would just be ears. With so much space taken up it's no wonder they can't actually move their eyes like we can.

Then I made a sudden rush of purchasing and made my exit, for my train was due in but one hour.



And that, oh reader, was that.

HAN SOLO You're a loveable rogue maverick, a little bit woo, a little bit way. Beneath all that scoundrel schtick you are essentially good. When a dog barks, you know what it's on about. Take the Film Four Force-O-Meter

FROM A T-SHIRT- "Goths: Where were you when we invaded Rome?"

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I've got to mention it.

"A man is being questioned by anti-terrorism police after smuggling a live hand grenade into the UK through Gatwick Airport. The arrest followed a security clamp-down at London's other major airport, Heathrow, which involved tanks and a military cordon. The BBC's Margaret Gilmore said she had learned that the military operation was sparked by MI5 intelligence that a group was plotting to shoot down an aircraft.

A spokesman for the home secretary said people should not "jump to conclusions" about the Gatwick arrest. "It is not uncommon for people in airports to be discovered with some form of weaponry. It doesn't mean they are all al-Qaeda terrorists," he said."

- BBC News

Scary stuff.



On another note, I am currently wrestling with my new (but second hand) laptop. The damn thing won't talk to my PC, though it should. I have far too much stuff to shift across to do it with, like, floppy disks or anything. I could do a CD for it, but what's the point of a network card if you do that?

I'll tackle the little bastard tomorrow. Or rather later. Because.....

No work tomorrow!! Just my car getting seen to (lost mudflaps, whacked out tracking and possibly worn brake pads) and then the train all afternoon up to the freezing wastes of Scotland.

You know, sometimes I really wish I had more interesting things to write about. But then perhaps the Edinburgh Goth Weekend will produce interesting tales aplenty....



Gort... Klaatu... Barada.... Ni-hur-hurg-hurgh!

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"War - what is it good for?"

Glad you asked.

In a way, I get the feeling that our very reluctance to go to war is a good thing. We should in no way be clamouring for causing the sort of death and destruction war causes with the same apparent eagerness as The Dumb Shrub is. And if he takes his country to war without the backing of the United Nations (probably dragging us in the UK with him, unfortunately) do you think they'll be punished for that (theoretically) illegal action?

Me neither.

So, two questions. No, three.

Do I think Ole Saddo is hiding weaponsofmassdestruction? (It's all blended into one word these days) Certainly. It's just obvious, isn't it? What isn't obvious is why the US isn't handing all that intelligence they've got over to the inspectors so they can make good use of it.

Do I think Ole Saddo is actually backing al-Qaeda in a true sense, i.e. resources and the like? Probably not. Just because there are supposedly cells in Baghdad does not mean the government there is backing them. If that were so, we'd need to investigate the UK's backing of the IRA, for example. That announcement from al-Qaeda notwithstanding (And is it bin Laden? Why does it matter?) they are supposed to be non-compatible in the ideolgy stakes. Though Iraq might do it just to annoy the US... But would al-Qaeda accept that help?

Do I think Ole Saddo needs to go? Absolutely. Trouble is, start on toppling one tyrant and you can never stop with the next or the next or the next...

But how, if not by war? Leave a message if you have a good answer....



Are photo phones any good?

I have no idea, you see. I understand the resolution is not very good, but the major problem is sending the pictures on. Who can they go to? What does it cost to do it? It's probably easy to find out, but I just haven't bothered.



Gaming is good for you, apparently

Yes, online shooting games like Counterstrike aren't just about shooting and kills, they're about community. You're as likely to hear laughter from players as swearing, or so a recently completed research project says. So get out there now and join a game and laugh at pathetic so-called game players; alternately, join a game and get laughed at or even killed for being useless or having a shit connection.

What fun.



-ERROR 1313- Your request could not be processed. Requested process *GET A LIFE* has caused an invalid page fault in MODULE:INTERNET at address 3NO:HELLNO

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This just interested me when I saw it, so here it is:

I am the sonnet, never quickly thrilled; Not prone to overstated gushing praise Nor yet to seething rants and anger, filled With overstretched opinions to rephrase; But on the other hand, not fond of fools, And thus, not fond of people, on the whole; And holding to the sound and useful rules, Not those that seek unjustified control. I'm balanced, measured, sensible (at least, I think I am, and usually I'm right); And when more ostentatious types have ceased, I'm still around, and doing, still, alright. In short, I'm calm and rational and stable - Or, well, I am, as much as I am able. What Poetry Form Are You?

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...Yeah, so that's how it is, okay? And no, we don't have to "live with it".



If you've just joined us, we're talking about violence and all round nasty behaviour.

It worries me sometimes just how much of it there is in the world, from the viciousness between two people all the way up to the sort of intolerance and hatred that shakes the world. I wish there was a solution, because we really need to sort it out.

I want to go on a mountain top, with a radio and good batteries, and play a joyous tune and free the human race from suffering. - 'Alarm Call', Björk

If only it were that simple. Can you imagine the size of the speakers you'd need to reach everyone?

And then, one Thursday, nearly two thousand years after one man had been nailed to a tree for saying how great it would be to be nice to people for a change, a girl sitting on her own in a small cafe in Rickmansworth suddenly realised what it was that had been going wrong all this time, and she finally knew how the world could be made a good and happy place. This time it was right, it would work, and no one would have to get nailed to anything.

Sadly, however, before she could get to a phone to tell anyone about it, a terribly stupid catastrophe occurred, and the idea was lost forever. - 'The Hitch-Hiker's Guide To The Galaxy', Douglas Adams

We're all searching for the Ultimate Answer, even though we aren't sure of the Question.



Getting deep all of a sudden, isn't it?



On a more personal note: I'm beginning to hate my job. I've spent so long not having to do anything that now I have to I don't want to anymore. Like most people want to work, anyway. And it's the worse time to feel this way; the end of the tax year is approaching, which means lots of complicated crap with the payroll package we support needs to be done and I really just can't be arsed.

Perhaps I just need a holiday. Or more sleep. Or to get my mind back on doing work rather than thinking about other things. The only problem with the first two is the job is still there afterwards. And the last? I don't want to, I like thinking about those things.



Make Lots of Money, Enjoy the Work, Operate Within the Law: Choose 2.

The brain is a wonderful organ; it starts working the moment you get up in the morning and doesn't stop until you get to work. - Steven Wright

Work is the price you pay for money.

Hard work often pays off after time, but laziness always pays off now.



Man invented language to satisfy his need to complain. Amen to that.

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Some thoughts then. Hmmm....

Okay.

I like Harry Potter. Now I know he makes a lot of people very angry, because they can't stand the speccy little git, but I like the stories. They are very well written for "children's books". "Strongly internally consistent" is a term I'd use. And the films are remarkable adaptations; that girl just *is* Hermione, Rickman *is* Snape. Brannagh as Lockhart? Definitely. The great Mr Harris? Beyond superlatives.

The Lord of the Rings films are another set of fantastic adaptations. No, they aren't exactly the same as the books; in some places this is good (No Tom Bombadil! Yipee!) and in others bad (Faramir's been butchered, poor fellow) but just ace nonetheless. Looks, characters, settings, and the music...

Aah, the music... I like to listen to soundtracks. They are, in many ways, the emotional content of a film in sound format. Yeah, the dialogue and the acting may do the trick, but there's nothing like the swelling music for the Lothlorien bit to transport you right back there. And that goes for any film, or at least those with a proper, purpose-written soundtrack. What would Raiders of the Lost Ark be without that amazing "God" music? Star Wars without all the triumphant fanfare music? Unthinkable. And the music for Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is just sublime.....



Boring you yet?



Ummm... World news?

Why do The Shrub and his Muppet Meisters not seem to be listening to even a tiny little bit of reason? Anyone would think they really want to go and blow stuff up and kill people just because they can, rather than at least try and take a less painful way through it. I suppose the saying that war makes for profit is their mantra, or something.

Michael Jackson; yep, gotta mention him. He lives in a different world to the rest of us, doesn't he? One where what he does is simply innocent, playful niceness. Unfortunately, from where the rest of us is sitting, it looks like something much more odd and sinister. I'm not saying it is sinister, just that it looks like it. Either way, a quiet investigation should clear it up. If it was anyone more "normal" it would have been done by now.

And why does it matter if famous people wear diamonds that might have been brought into the country to be sold to finance terrorism, when they are free to advocate the wearing of clothing and footwear built on child slave labour in under-developed countries? Just a thought.



This is the echoing chasm between my ears, signing off.

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Hello? Pick up if you're there. .......... Are you there? Hello?

No?



So. I've thought about doing one of these before. Didn't think I'd have enough to say. But now....

I've always known that I'm a very quiet person. Small talk isn't my greatest talent, nor is speaking my mind. Sometimes I'm just content to sit there and say nothing, and to have even less going through my head. A few stray thoughts flitting here and there between the penguins that bustle around in the spare nine-tenths of my mind, mostly relating to what is happening around me at that moment. Music, news, what's on the television or the radio. Books I've read, games I've played, films I've seen. And, like most people I suspect, conversations that never were or just might be.

Everyone does that, they must do. They remember how arguments and conversations went in the past and wish they'd gone another way. What they should have said to make their point clearer. How they could have made more of their contribution. What they really should have said. Then we run through future conversations in our heads to ensure we say what we mean or need to say the next time.

I don't think that's madness, is it? It's normal, has to be.

So I'm thinking now of a few things I want to say to someone, which is how I got here. That's the trouble with this 'stream of consciousness' crap: it's very leaky and it carves it's own path. Thinking of that prompted me to push those penguins aside and organise my brain into something more capable of expressing itself. I'll talk to her later.

As for you, whoever you may be.... Welcome to the Scrolling Marquee Of My Mind. Read here in the future, and see what runs across it. We'll be bored, confused or surprised together. But I can't promise you'll enjoy it.



"When we remember we are all mad, the mysteries disappear and life stands explained." - Mark Twain

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