Thursday 26 April 2007

Childhood Memories... Not What They Were



Where I live we're not that far from some major shopping centres... such as Lakeside and Bluewater... but before they were built there was other smaller ones in the area. My earliest memories of a shopping centre are Hempstead Vally... to me this was a magical place... they had so many shopping trolleys they used a tractor to pull them around. But the best thing was the interior... everywhere was fountains and waterfalls... big globes made from water... jets of water making pretty patterns in the air... it was amazing in the eyes of me as a child... outside the shops every now and then they had big ponds with koi carp (Massive goldfish to me) that you could sit around. It was the best shopping center ever to me... not like town centres where I got bored traipsing from one shop to the next.
Sadly not all things stay the same, and when I revisited Hempstead Vally (I was in the area and had time to kill) I was horrified to find out that none of the fountains existed anymore and instead a hairdressers and a coffee bar replaced them :-( I was gutted... the ponds have all been filled in bar one I have no idea why they left one... but I'm glad something remains.
I'm sad to see something that probably brought the designer much joy to create and brought a smile to so many frustrated parents to be removed for plain old commercial gain.
I still have my memories tho... shame their isn't any pictures of it in it's glory days.

Wednesday 25 April 2007

Gettaway car has no wheels



I'm calling it the getaway car, but I don't really know what happened. The shop that had all the firemen and police outside has now been boarded up and the sign says due to a fire. The car's still there though... typically it now has no wheels! People will steal anything won't they!

Later on that day the car was totally missing... I assume the police thought it safer to remove it than let everyone pick at it's carcass like vultures.

RIP

I got some sad news today, yesterday an old coleague of mine passed away. Dick Cummin was the man who inducted me into BAE Systems and pushed me to finish my Degree. He was the first face I met in the frightening world of full time employment.

I'm kinda lost for words really... he wasn't my boss, but he was the same level as my boss, yet we always talked as if on equal footings. He was a good man, an excellent boss and a excellent engineer.

He'll be sorely missed by all the peopple that had the good fortune of meeting him.

RIP Dick

Tuesday 24 April 2007

Alternative route


This morning the train was late getting into London bridge station. As a only have a couple me mins to change trains this meant i had to use my backup route of going via the elephant and castle. It's a wierd place... obviously built in the 70s it looks a little dated now. It has this interesting bit me artwork inside... I like it and the more you look at it the more tongue in cheek references you can see in it. Such as the Tesco metro logo on the train.

Monday 23 April 2007

Ram Raid or Rubbernecking

On the way to work I walk past a parade of shops, this morning one of them had 2 police cars and a fire engine outside... there was a lot of water on the ground so I can only assume the fire brigade had to put something out, the shutters were all smashed in... was it them getting in or was it a robbery and the place was set on fire when they left? I doubt I'll ever know, but futher down the road was this abandoned car all smashed in... the question is was that car used in the possible robbery or was the driver just rubber necking at the fire brigade and stacked it?


Saturday 21 April 2007

Mr Toad


My dad found this rather docile frog whilst raking some leaves up. Beth got a chance to give him a stroke before we put him back. Funny how some things she just wont go near yet other things fascinate her. Glad she's not frightened of frogs and toads... Otherwise she'd never find a handsome prince :-)

Friday 20 April 2007

Mechanics or Magic?

As an engineer most people assume I can strip a car down and put it back together without a problem. In theory yes I can do that, but I'm not a mechanic so unless I know what needs to be replaced I'm pretty useless... which is why when recently my car went wrong I sent it to the garage for trained profesionals to look at.

My problems all started Nov 2005 when the water pump seal went, this was no big problem in itself... a tow by the AA and several days in a garage having it replaced and otherwise checked over it was ok... or so I thought. The heat from the water draining out of the radiator somehow caused the radiator to degrade. This shouldn't have been a problem except the garage didn't know why it kept overheating eventually the raidiator failed totally the following June (2006)... this caused the head gasket to go, and a hairline crack in the head. Mucho expensive (Thanks to Dad for bailing me out on the £1500 bill for that!). I thought my problems were over... until a couple of months ago the Catalytic converter blocked up. It turns out that when the head gasket went the ensuing mix of oil and water shot into the Cat and gummed it up, the garage blew the worst out but the damage had already been done and the Cat started falling appart internally and eventually blocked itself up (Inside it's a honeycombe... or was... it now lookes like a ball of wire wool)... this was duley replaced at quite an expense. This is not the end tho... a week after the Cat was replaced the engine started making some funny noises and kicked out blue smoke... I thought oh crud not a new head gasket, asssuming the back pressure from a blocked Cat had damaged the head gasket... so back to the garage... a week later they return it saying it's fine we can't find anything wrong with it. Magic? or them fixing a problem they created and not telling me? I dunno... but it's working... except for an orage warning light on the dash that implies there's an engine fault... I call the garage, they say leave it for a bit and come back if it doesn't go off. So I wait... and the light stays on... Yesterday I heard a worrying noise, sounding like something is caught under my car... it's a cable from the manifold sensor (I assume judging by where it's attached) . I find it's respective mate and reconnect it. Hoping that this would solve my orange light issue. It didn't... or so I thought... this morning the light is gone... hurrah!!! was it the cable? Was it Magic? I don't really care... but if necessary I'll set up an alter the the mechanical gods and pray that my car stays working as I can deserve a car-grief free life for the moment.

Monday 16 April 2007

Down with the Sickness

I have no idea what caused it, but both me, Beth and Beckie have been rather poorly the last couple of days.

It all started on Sat with Beth being sick in the car, this is no uncommon thing as travel sometimes makes her poorly, but this was bad. We went on to go upto Gt Yarmouth and thought nothing more of it. Until Sunday when Beckie started feeling poorly, Beth was still complaining and I thought it was just her being ratty as she was tired... then she promptly threw up in my car again (Well at least I hadn't cleaned it up properly since last time). This prompted me and Bex into thinking the two weren't unrelated. Today Beckie is laid up at home with Beth, and I'm at work... I'm starting to feel really crappy at the moment so I hope I feel better for the train ride home, as that will not be fun with a dodgey stomach!

Fingers crossed.

Saturday 14 April 2007

Teach Em Young


Not that I dislike childrens shows... They're funny to watch and sometimes informative. But after watching CBeeBies for 3 hours your brain turns to mush. So as a compromise of not putting on normal TV I decided to see what Beth would think of Anime. I've not got much at my new house that is suitable for children (IE not too complicated... or violent), but I do have a copy of the Slayers Movies. Now I'm a massive Slayers fan, It was one of the first Animes I bought... in fact it was the first NTSC video I bought (That shows you how old it is!). Thankfully Beth loved it... so much in fact that she's watching Slayers Premium for the 2nd time whilst I type this (She begged me to put it back on honest!).
The above photo is from our first Cosplay (Back in 2000). I played Zelgadis from Slayers, Lou was Ifurita from El-Hazard, Kevin was Ashram from Lodoss War and Matt played a pizza delivery boy. Ironically in front is Mark playaing a character from Princess Mononoke (sp?), We didn't actually talk to him untill the next con. We all rapidly became good friends and the following year he become part of our cosplay group.

Friday 13 April 2007

Grass is Always Greaner in the Land of The Rising Sun

I love Japanese culture... don't ask me why I just seem to like everything about the country. Anime and Manga are my favorite forms of entertainment, I love cooking and eating Japanese food. I like Technology (much to the detriment of my bank balance), and I admire the way they still have big industry and engineering as the source of the countrys wealth. To an non-otaku (Fan in Japanese, usually refers to Anime or Manga Fan) this can seem very wierd as the culture is so vastly different from our own. It'd take forever to describe the differences in this blog, and I doubt anyone could ever define what makes Japan Japanese. I hope to highlight some of the things I like about Japan in this blog... but right now I'm suffering writers block... so maybe later.

Thursday 12 April 2007

Time for a Break

With the exception of people that work part time or night shifts I'd like to hope that everyone has a lunch break at work. What they do with that time varies from person to person... me personally I catch up on web comics and a bit of news or post to this blog. However as I spend the hours of 9:00-5:00 at a computer unable to make any personal calls and so on, thus I value my lunch break as a time when I can get done the things that I can't do at night when I get home.

Problem is everyone I need to speak to is on their lunch break too :-)

Wednesday 11 April 2007

Job Satisfaction

I'm an engineering designer and as such in my career I've designed many things from weapons to aircraft to oil rigs and now connectors... Yeah I know it seems to have gone down hill in terms of coolness hasn't it? Ironicly it has instead gone up in salary... now this is mainly due to my experience, but also because boring jobs are paid more I suppose. The age old adage You either work for the Money or for the Love of the Job applies in this case, and I'd say without reservation it's for the money. Especially these days. Not that I hate my job, it just doesn't get my pulse racing. Everyone has jobs they'd like to do, and I'd like to hope that most people attain them. Others have downright fanciful aspirations to being airline pilots or investment bankers when quite frankly they can't fly a paper airplane or balance their own finances. Me... I do what I love doing (Of a sorts), being creative, working out engineering problems and so on. Yet somehow I still remain un-fullfiled. I guess if I could describe my ideal job it'd be one where I design something, then go make it, then test it and sell it... I surpose "Inventor" would be the best way to describe that. I know I'd not be able to do that, as although I have a sharp creative mind I doubt I'd be able to make anything marketable... I'd need a eureka moment like James Dyson and his vacuum cleaners to make that fantasy work. Another alternative is my love of model making and pyrotechnics (My thanks to the MOD for that one!). I'd love to combine both my hobies and my work to be a SFX model maker like Stan Winston (SFX works on Termiator and Aliens to name but a few), but this is virtually impossibe as it's almost like becoming an actor... you need to know somebody in "the know" to get anywhere in a buisness like that... So here's a big shout out to my sis, when you're famous remember me... I'll gladly give the SFX work on your next blockbuster film a try and I'll do it for the love of it rather than the money :-)

Tuesday 10 April 2007

Holiday Time vs Work Time


Why is it that whenever you go away or do something enjoyable that the time seems to fly past. Despite the fact I've had the last 4 days off work becuase of easter I still feel like I haven't had any time off (Tho this is probably because I caught up on some lost sleep).

Despite this I know we did a lot (See earlier posts), Beths birthday and visited my parents up near Gt Yarmouth. My brain just can't seem to fathom how I crammed it all in! As, as far as it's concerned I haven't even left my desk.

Guess I better use my lunch times for something more constructive than reading webcomics and design myslef a time machine to slow down holiday time so it drags out like work time!

Monday 9 April 2007

The Simple Things in Life


The simple things in life are always the best. Despite the fact we went to numerous theme parks and places with rides Beth was more interested in playing on the 50p kiddy rides and trying to jam as many 2p's into the push slide games as she could. By the end of the day her fingers were black from handling all thse pennys! She had a grin ear to ear to boot.

Saturday 7 April 2007

Pirates and Fairys visit Whale of a Time


As a bit of a laugh and to spice things up a little for beths birtday Beckie suggested we should dress up, being a little girls party the obvious choice was Fairys... now not that I didn't want to get into the spirt of things I said hell no... I'll look rediculous in a tutu, so I said I'd go dressed as a pirate expecting Beckie to say "ok go casual", Instead she latched onto the idea and proposed that all the boys go as Pirates and the girls as Fairys... now I'm a sporting type and a bit of a show off (Guess it's because I'm a Leo) so I decided to go the whole hog... I particularly liked the Capt'n Jack Sparrow style beard so got my sister to apply some face paint to me (Inc eyeliner). I think It went rather well to be honest... think I might grow my own, but no way am I ever doing eyeliner! I'd make a rubbish girl!

Pop over to my myspace for some more photo's on Beths party.

Friday 6 April 2007

Time to diet me thinks


Apologies for the really poor photo. This is my computer chair, or what's left of it. It was on its last legs anyway. But I think it was trying to say something tonight when it snapped clean in two... Lay off those pies!

Well done Lady xXx


This is my beautiful fiance in her suit. She went to a job interview and landed herself a new job. Well done Lady xXx

Thursday 5 April 2007

Manga and Anime

I've been into Anime and Manga for at least 10 years, so I'd easily clasify myself as an otaku. However of late I've hardly watched or read any at all, maily due to time constraints and having a family. Now I find myself experiencing a resurgence in my fandom (Probbably caused by having one of the best MinamiCons in a long time last month) wanting to watch more and read more whenever I can. Thankfully I now have plenty of time to read on the trains in the morning, so I'm clearing my back catalogue. Just need to find the time to watch all my DVD's now :-)

Wednesday 4 April 2007

Missing Bridge


Every day on the way to and from work I go over the new Blackfriars bridge, yet it's only just occured to me where the original one went. If you look out the window towards the Blackfriars road bridge in the water there's several pillars that made the original bridge, and at the London Bridge end theres a ornate abutment. I found out that it was removed because it simply couldn't handle the weight of modern trains, but i find it odd that they left so much behind when they rebuilt it, or more intrestingly why it wasn't built over the old one, instead of right next to it. Funny how London cahnges so much that there's no evidence left of the connection to the station or tracks either side left... in fact there's a big office block right where it should have been. Makes you wonder how different London looked back then, and how it will look in the future.


Monday 2 April 2007

Does Anyone Listen To All Their MP3s?

I have a 2Gb card in my W850 Walkman Phone so there's plenty of room for music... so much in fact that there's plenty of stuff in there that I hardly ever listen too... and today I found one track that I'm now addicted to that I never even knew I had! It's totally random because it's a re-mix of The Prodigy - Voodoo People by Pendulum (The latter of which my future sister in Law introduced me too). Never even knew it existed on my hard drive (40Gb of Mp3s)! Shows you how much music I have, and how much I don't listen to it! Gonna see if there's any more unplayed gems in my collection tonight!