Dave Hulbert's series of fortunate events

O2 and Wescot

2008-08-26T17:53:00.002+01:00

Grrr no.1:
I canceled my old O2 contract last year and they have only just sent (via a credit agency) a letter to my old address, saying I still owe them money. What I want to know is why O2 didn't try emailing me (they still have my current email address). Then I could have paid in minutes, instead of months.

If anyone from O2 is reading this: try emailing people with the email address you already have! It must cost them quite a bit to get a credit agency to track people down. Maybe that's why O2's prices have just gone up.

Grrr no.2:
I went to pay the outstanding debt at Wescot. Have a look at their payment page. The submit button is a link to a page that doesn't exist. That means when you've filled out the form and click submit you get a 404 and loose the data you entered. Luckily I have Firebug installed, so could fix the website.

I changed the erroneous:


<a href="paydetails.html"><input type="image" src="https://www.paywescot.co.uk/_images/submitbut.gif" value="Submit" alt="Submit" tabindex="28">

to:

<input type="image" src="https://www.paywescot.co.uk/_images/submitbut.gif" value="Submit" alt="Submit" tabindex="28">

And then I did the same on the confirmation page. After submitting the form I received a confirmation email (that GMail couldn't view properly -- bad Content-Type header I think) saying I'd paid. Pheww!

Reunion

2008-08-08T11:59:00.001+01:00

Nice.
http://twitter.com/dave1010/statuses/881361438

Building survey post

2008-03-01T14:57:00.002Z

As you may be aware, there was a post here about a company which offered us a free survey of our flat, trying to sell exterior wall paint. It was expensive so we said no. We later looked up the company on the web and found they had lots of bad reviews. I blogged about what had happened, warning people not to be taken in by pushy sales people.

People then began to comment on the post. There were over 100 comments at the last count. One company providing a similar service was mentioned by a commenter. This company contacted me, asking me to remove the whole post as some comments were defamatory. I have removed the whole lot as I do not want to be responsible for what other people say on here. I am sorry I've had to do this.

If you would like to comment about these companies, I suggest you Google for a suitable forum. Try something like ukbusinessforums or moneysavingexpert.

Google

2007-07-13T19:42:00.000+01:00

Can anyone else get to the top position for a Google search of a single common English word? Bournemouth and Poole College are no.1 if you search* for college. I'm not completely sure how we managed that. Anyone want to hire me to do SEO?

*Actually, just Google UK, but if you go to Google.com then it should redirect you to .co.uk

Update: now we're 2 again :-(

Time for bed now everyone

2007-04-24T21:47:00.001+01:00

Good night people.

Websites you should use

2007-04-24T19:02:00.000+01:00

Web development ideas

2007-04-24T18:40:00.000+01:00

Because I code all day at work, my brain keeps trying to code when not at work. Can be annoying but here are some things (web sites) it's thought of:

Wedding gift list creator - I already made a basic one. Could be a good business.
Wiki'd Bible notes - let people add notes (public, shared with friends or personal) on verses / passages of the Bible. Would be nice to have lots of people explaining things. Could be used on other books too (eg for school projects). On a similar note, it would be cool to have 2 separate wikis side by side about Christianity in general, one side edited by atheists and the other by Christians, both with credible references and sources; e.g. The Case for Christ is a good book but it would be good to see it compared to an atheists viewpoint. (This page is interesting.)
Can't remember what else now.

If you're a web developer have a look at the jQuery JavaScript library. It's pretty amazing.

Still alive and well

2007-04-24T18:23:00.000+01:00

Due to popular demand* I'm going to try to start blogging again. To start with, I'll give you a brief history lesson of the past couple of months.

On the 24th Feb Hannah and I got married! How cool is that? We're still married and exceptionally happy together. I've uploaded a few photos my Dad took here. There's a fair few more if you look either me or Hannah. Hopefully more photos to come. Thanks to everyone who came and made our day special.

We also now have our own flat over here. It's very nice and you're welcome to come and visit - just give us a call.

We're both still working at The College, Hannah as a librarian and me as a web developer. Seems to be going well but it's a shame we can't stay at home all day!

I better go now - need to sneeze.

*Well, not really demand, I just thought I'd blog a bit.

End of DRM soon?

2007-02-10T09:39:00.000Z

The Register has a good article about this. Soon, partly thanks to Apple, DRM (at least on music) should be going.

In case you don't know, DRM (Digital Rights/Restrictions Management) is what stops you from playing lots of the music you download legally on the device of your choice. It means you can't play iTunes music on a Zen and can't play music you download from your phone on your eyePod. Or car, or friends computer, etc.

Important things to note:

DRM makes it harder for the average consumer to do what they want with their music. It does not stop piracy - pirates can always crack DRM. In fact, even with DRM, it is still easier to download a song illegally than it is legally. The illegal song will work on any phone / computer / MP3 player.
There has always been lots of music downloadable (free and paid for) which does not have DRM. e.g. eMusic. Though this is only music which hasn't been signed by large record companies.

What's happened recently is the record labels are realizing that customers don't want to buy restricted products. They are also beginning to realize they'll make more profits (esp in the long run) by selling music without DRM on it.

This is all good news for us customers because it means it will be easier to buy music and easier to play music.

The bad news is that online video downloads have only just started becoming popular and they have even more DRM than music downloads.

14 days until Wedding!

2007-02-10T09:30:00.000Z

So, we're still at stage 13 of How to buy a house. Hopefully we may be on step 14 on the 16th Feb. Other housey things are going OK. We're mostly just waiting for solicitors.

Wedding plans are going well but it seems like there's so much to sort out. Getting very excited now - only 10 days of work left!

Work is going well. Though since my web development skills are getting better it makes me realize like sites like this are poo. Also if I think too much at work then I sometimes dream JavaScript. I wonder if I could pull the RSS comments to this blog through XHR with some kind of AJAX stuff (probably based on jQuery - v cool).

House situation

2006-12-24T13:38:00.000Z

Good news everyone. Hannah and I have decided to get a different flat, instead of the one we were getting before. The flat below the old one was really run down and not worth the risk. The new one is a little more expensive but has a nice garden and a super kitchen. It's also much nearer work and Poole town centre. It's close to the far West of Ashley road, near where Amie (lil sis) lives. We'll let you know how everything goes. Hopefully moving before we get maried!

Merry Christmas!

2006-12-24T13:31:00.000Z

Well it's that time of day again - lunch. It's also that time of year - Christmas. Most excellent.
Can anyone tell me: what's it like celebrating Christmas if you're not a Christian. As a Christian I can't quite imagine, but i guess it must be like your celebrating someone elses day. Kind of like if Ramadan got really popular amongst athiests and we all celebrated it. I don't know. Anyway, Merry Christmas everyone.

How to buy a house

2006-12-04T18:41:00.000Z

In a few simple steps.

Find someone you want to get a house with
Get a job
Work out how much you can afford to borrow; either by talking to a mortgage broker / adviser or online.
Start looking at houses
Talk to more mortgage people and decide on a mortgage
Get a mortgage in principle
Find a good solicitor
Find a house you like
Work out how much its worth and put a bid in
If your bid's accepted, instruct your solicitor to do stuff
Get a mortgage
Sort out building's insurance, life assurance, MPPI, etc.
Wait for ages
???

More thinky stuff: Evolution

2006-10-31T23:19:00.000Z

I don't want to get into a huge discussion, as my brains mainly thinking about cannibalism (obviously I'm not actually thinking about that lots, I just mean thats my current hypothetical discussion topic).

Here comes the question: How did bats evolve? Hannah was given a leaflet thing with that very question. Bats are mammals so evolved from another mammal. Most people ("evolutionists") think it was something like the shrew.

For us to believe in evolution (which I mostly do) we then have to accept that:

There was some creature between a bat and a shrew (or similar) that existed long enough to give enough offspring to be the father of all bats (possible, 1 mutation could produce offspring in an isolated place where they multiplied)
The in-between creature (randomly) mutated longer and lighter fingers (I can see how this could mutate a bit, but not enough for a bat to emerge without creating a really unfit creature, the fingers would not be strong enough to dig, not light enough to fly). Update: Tom's commented again saying a gradual process would work, like with gliding squirrels. The problem I have with bats though is that when a ground-dwelling, digging animal starts mutating wings, the hands will be less fit at digging and not suitable fit to start gliding. I don't think it could be a mutation over millions of years. Maybe nuclear radiation or something mutated a few creatures lots and they got lucky.
There are no intermediate fossils between species around today (acceptable, I haven't done sufficient digging myself). Update: Tom's commented again! He says the creationist argument of the eye not being able to evolve (e.g. 1/2 an eye wont work) is poop. I think it's poop too. Tom also says not having fossils isn't really a problem. I'm not so sure. As there's lots of fossils, by chance there should be fossils of inter-special creatures. I don't think there are any. If there were then everyone would know about it. Let me know if I'm wrong.

It definitely seems possible. Personally I find it much easier to believe that God took a shrew and converted it into a bat. I bet he even said "Hazzar!". What do you think? (Tom, I expect another prize-winning comment :-)

Update: Mike's said "evolution is a fact (probably)". Facts and theories aren't opposite things, they're different categories. Evolution is a theory based on facts (and I guess some assumptions too). Becky says "appreciate them for really cute furry flying machines". I do. Becky also seems to like simplicity (maybe that was a bit rude. Sorry :-).

Cannibalism. How wrong?

2006-10-29T22:55:00.000Z

OK, for those of you who don't want to think about cannibalism, don't read this post. Seriously. Stop now. For those of you who like thinking about random things, culture, ethics, society, etc. read on, you may find this interesting...

What I'm wondering is why cannibalism is so wrong. If someone dies suddenly of natural causes (e.g. broken neck) should it be wrong to eat them? Presume the dead person is definitely healthy to eat. Note: these are only my own (crazy) views / ideas. I could be wrong.

On a desert island you may have no other food sources. I bet most people would resort to cannibalism if they had to. If you think you would resort to it, do you think it's actually wrong to resort to it? If it's not wrong to resort to it, what would have to change to make it wrong?

From a non-social viewpoint (e.g. if you were a recluse cannibal and no one knew), most people would probably not eat another person due to the fact that the dead body represents the past life of the person who's body it was. If you believe people just die when they die (no afterlife) then there should logically be no connection between a dead body and a persons life.

If you believe in an afterlife it could get complicated. Christians believe a dead body does not contain a soul or a spirit, so they should have no problem eating them on that basis (although they would have other reasons, see below). As far as I'm aware, Muslims and Jews believe the same (please correct me if I'm wrong, I'd like to know).

People who believe in reincarnation, ghosts, contacting dead people, etc. would probably attach more value to the dead body. I don't really know though. Anyone care to comment?

Christians, Jews and I expect Muslims believe that God (or Allah) provided people with food such as plants and animals to eat, not other humans. In that case, it would be a sin (wrong) to go against what God wanted for us. Though, is it a sin to eat a dead body if you're starving on a desert island? Would you be tempted to sin, or would it be the right thing to do? Would God want you to die when you could easily live?

What about the millions of starving people in places like Africa? It isn't very ethical to waste chicken, port or beef meat when there are people who haven't had a meal in over a day. Is it ethical to waste human meat?

I guess this all sounds controversial, disgusting, distasteful, and so on. Sorry about that. Our culture has taught us that it is wrong to eat dead people. Why has it taught us that? Our society used to be mainly Christian in the UK, that cold be affecting today's culture. Or maybe cannibalism isn't evolutionally very efficient. Maybe it's because eating creatures which have naturally died can give us diseases. Maybe it's because people associate eating food with killing it.

I'm not condoning cannibalism. I think it is wrong as God did not tell us to eat other humans. I know it's socially wrong: eating people from car accident scenes is sick. I know medically it's probably a bad idea. Though I'd like to know why non-Christians think it's ethically wrong to eat someone.

Anyone like to fill me in? Argue? Correct me? Back me up? I'd really like to know what people think.

Update: Tom's commented nicely. To summarize (not very well, sorry Tom):
Cannibalism is bad because of the same reason stealing and murder are wrong. It affects families / friends. People want to know where their deceased loved ones are. People want to visit where their corpse is to pay respects.
Last-resort cannibalism is like donating organs as its saving someones life. People could say there's nothing wrong with necrophilia if casual cannibalism is alright.
You don't need a God to tell you not to do something to make it wrong, people always know murder and stealing is wrong and the such things, its built into most people's morals.

My reply: If cannibalism is bad as it affects families / friends then it should logically be OK to eat someone with no family / friends. Maybe? On a different note, why do we as living people like to know about dead people? Why does it help with grieving? I don't really know psychology stuff.

Good point about cannibalism being like donating organs. I never thought of that. Necrophilia is a whole other (grim) topic, but to summarize I think sex is best when 2 people are in love (e.g. married). I think necrophilia is wrong for the living person, though I don't (personally, at least yet) respect dead bodies. For example, I would have no problem with my body being chucked away or used for ammunition testing if I was dead.

Where did we get morals from? If we murdered then our friends would not like us and we would be at a higher risk of getting murdered ourselves. The same with stealing. It's bad for society, so society affects our morals. Do we get our morals from anywhere else? Cannibalism is only bad for society as it is bad for society. If it were socially acceptable to murder, steal and cannibalize then people would stop killing, for fear of death; they would stop stealing, for fear of burglary. What reason would they have to stop cannibalizing?

Becky has also commented about vampirism, (most probably as it's that day of the year when little kids come round, knocking on your door and you wish you had one of these). Vampires generally only take blood from living victims. This is basically murder. If the person is dead already and someone just wanted to drink their blood (some people are actually into that kind of thing) then that's a different matter.

What about if a living person has a limb amputated then donates it to you for food? That would be a weird thing to do but I don't see anything morally wrong with it. What if that same person said when they were dead they would be OK with someone eating them? That is it morally right? What if on average the general population didn't mind their dead body being eaten? In the same way that most people are OK with donating organs. Then would it be morally wrong?

All very interesting hypothetical situations. Though remember readers: eating people is wrong (at least for now).

A time zone to remember

2006-10-29T09:53:00.000Z

I woke up an hour early today. Except i didn't. My phone woke me up, after changing it's time zone from BST to GMT. My watch was still on BST. My brain wasn't on anything.

You're probably thinking that you like time zones most of the time, except when they change. I don't see their point. Now we live in a 24 hour world. We go to Tesco at 3am, some people start work at 11pm.

What do there times actually mean? Well, there's "elevenses" and "after eights". Is there anything else based on the name we give to time? You could argue midnight and midday are based on specific times, but what if meant what they actually meant? The middle of the day and the middle of the night.

China seem to have a good idea. They have 1 timezone for the whole country, even though China covers about 4 time zones laterally. This means sunset is a few hours different across the country. We have this in the UK to a much smaller extent. The Sun rises about 25 minutes earlier in the East than in the West of the UK. It makes sense to standardize time in the UK, even though it means midday is at different times. We don't have sub-hour time zones in the UK (because we communicate with the whole country, not just our own town) as that would be silly.

Now we live in such an international world, isn't it a bit silly to have sub-day time zones?

What if every country used UTC (basically GMT, but more international)? Events would not have to have a timezone stamped after their description. People would no longer have to ask what time people meant. Meetings would be much easier to schedule. People would still get up when it was light, and go to bed soon after it was dark. In the UK it would get light around 8am, whereas in the USA it would be light around 2pm. There, people may go to work 3pm-11pm. In Japan people may sleep from 6am until 2pm.

Any switch from different time systems will be chaotic, but in the long run I think it would work well.

Any comments?

Photos of Hannah and her gall bladder

2006-10-29T01:11:00.000Z

Just before Hannah's operation we went for a walk. here's the photos with this BubbleShare thing. It seems to work quite well. Click on the photos to see them larger.

Larger

Exeter Reunion

2006-10-29T00:27:00.000+01:00

The week before last Hannah and I met up with people in Exeter. Here's an exciting photo thing of what happened (as there's no good way to upload more that 4 photos to directly blogger yet).

I don't know what happens if you click here.

Wedding gift list

2006-10-28T23:19:00.000+01:00

As you may or may not know, Hannah and I are doing our own gift list for our wedding. This is mainly because we didn't want expensive things from somewhere like John Lewis, or to be too confined by somewhere like Argos. We'd much rather recieve gifts people had some input on themselves; more suprise gifts; and people buying 2 cheaper things than 1 more expensive thing which we don't really need anyway.

So we decided that I should make a wedding list website. I planned out the site then started making it. It's getting there but I still have quite a bit to do. Unfortunately the server (called "pinkstuff", named after a strawberry angel delight food) is currently down. When it's all working you'll be able to log in and see ideas of the gifts we'd like, follow links to buy them, reserve your interest and add notes and much more. If it works really well I may think about selling the gift list site itself.

IBM Hursley

2006-10-28T23:09:00.000+01:00

When I was looking for jobs I applied to IBM as a software developer. I got through the first few rounds and was told I was through to the next round, but they never contacted me. They had really nice grounds as you can see from this photo. Luckily I now have a much better job at Bournemouth and Poole College, as web developer.

Brownsea Island trip

2006-10-28T23:01:00.000+01:00

A few weeks ago we went to Brownsea Island as it was nearly free. It was also pirate day. I got the highest squirrel count: 1.

Conspiracy theories are true!

2006-10-27T23:05:00.000+01:00

They were right all along! Spiderman does have clones and he does form a brass band. I knew it!

Trip to Arne

2006-10-27T23:01:00.000+01:00

This is Long Island, where camping occurs
This is a huge hairy catterpillar. Probably tastes nice though.

Oh deer

2006-10-27T22:56:00.000+01:00

A while ago Hannah and I went to a place called Arne. There were loads of wild deer! This little one didn't seem to mind humans (and me) being really close. I took way to many photos but this could be the best.

Mike's many blogs

2006-10-27T01:19:00.000+01:00

It's official: Mike has too many blogs. Here's a (incomplete) list:

spaces.live.com/mjroberts55
mikeyj55.blogspot.com (used to be the main one, but I don't think its updated now)
www.walkingwithoutcheese.com/blog (lots of posts recently, seems to be a good bet)
blog.360.yahoo.com/blog-QZBJMrA8cbR4pR.0RLAvHfCE9A--?cq=1
mjroberts55.vox.com (has the most recent post, but is very new)
www.bebo.com/Blog.jsp?MemberId=578255016
mjroberts55.multiply.com/links/item/2
www.arandomstudent.co.uk/blog/blog.html

To save all you people the trouble, I'm going to try to keep this post updated with Mike's most recent blogs.

New idea: Community Parking

2006-10-26T23:07:00.000+01:00

Many people have driveways near town centers which are free lots of the time, especially during working hours. Many people would like a cheaper parking space near town centers. If the person who owned the driveway could charge a small fee and allow anyone to park in their drive then both parties would benifit.

Problem: No one can find Community Parking spaces.
Solution: Text where you are to a short code number and you'll recieve a text with locations of the nearest unocupied parking spaces.

Problem: People renting out their spaces cannot install a ticket machine or make sure everyone pays the whole day.
Solution: People pay by text, sending their car registration and the parking ID to a premium short code. Most of the money from the premium text goes to the space owner.

Problem: It'll never work. Who's going to do it? It's a silly idea.
Solution: No solution yet. It may be a silly idea but don't you think it's an interesting one? I challenge you to come up with a better idea.

Hannah has no gall bladder!

2006-10-26T17:15:00.000+01:00

It's true! The operation was a success. Photo updates coming soon. She's a bit sleepy but recovering well. I should get back to see her now.

Woop woop! Honeymoon booking alert!

2006-10-24T18:07:00.000+01:00

Hannah and I have just booked a honeymoon! Woo! We're going to a cottage in Gloucestershire! Awesome fantastic! Log fire and 4 poster bed. Nice.

My blogging skills are virtually no more

2006-10-21T12:24:00.000+01:00

It's been so long readers. Too long. I bet many of you don't bother reading my blog now as it's never updated. If that's the case, subscribe to the news feed, then you get told when it gets updated. Brilliant! Use the links on the right under "Feeds".

I have loads and loads of photos and videos I've taken which are just left on my phone. Bad me. They'll hopefully be online some day.

Today's news: It's the weekend! Woo! I've just got TomTom (sat nav) working on my phone, which is very cool.

Yesterday's news: Saw Dav Vinci Code with Hannah last night. For a film of a book it was quite good, though there were so many parts which (because I know a bit) are blatently wrong and I felt like shouting "Muppets!" at them.

This week's news: Hannah now officially works for The College! Woo! Though that means we don't work together any more as she's in a different building :-(.

Last week's news: Went to Exeter to see the peeps. Had fun, didn't drink too much, though Hannah was a bit ill. Alex has a very comfy floor. Props to Tom for How I Met Your Mongoose. Silly Looloo not coming, hopefully he'll be around in the future.

This month's news: I've been working at Bournemouth and Poole College as a web developer. I'm working on their new site, going live soon, whilst keeping the old site working. For technical people: I get to play around with things like PHP and MySQL; whilst battlling with CSS in IE and hacking around with RSS and Web 2.0 stuff.

Wedding plans news: Hannah's blog (she's not Jareth, nor in Surrey, but hey) is probably more informative, though we've now finalised the place (Chapel in the Valley), the reception (the CMC, near Canford Church / School), the car (RR silver wraith), caterers, florist, and Hannah has a dress (green with pink stripes). I'm working on an awesome wedding list site, which will be awesome. So will our wedding.

As bloggers around the globe say: Bye.

General updateyness

2006-09-17T14:52:00.000+01:00

Good Sunday fellow people. This is a moblog from my phone so please excuse the lack of amazing photos.

People generally know that my fiancee Hannah + myself are engaged. Additionally it is soon to be common knowledge that the date of our wedding is February the 24th 2007. We're getting married at Corfe Mullen Baptist Church and probably having a small reception at the
Candord Magna Centre. All very exciting stuff!

Further updates include the news that Hannah and I both have jobs working for Poole College. We'll let you know how things go when we start (whenever that is).

Dates for my diary:
Hannah's birthday 26th Sept
My baptism 1st Oct
My birthday 9th Oct
Hannah's gall stones operation 26th Oct

That's all for now. Remember to leave comments if you think.

Visiting Mottisfont House

2006-08-28T12:14:00.000+01:00

Hannah, her parents and I went to Mottisfont House a few weeks ago. They had very nice grounds, super-trees, spiders, weird plants and unusual roses. As well as a shop which sold hangover cure sweets.

Becky's Edwardian party

2006-08-28T12:05:00.000+01:00

About 100 years ago some Edwardians built a house...

They were all very happy...

Until... from up in the sky...

An ALIEN came! Argh!

Nooooo!

"Hmmm", thought Chris...

Maybe the alien was a friendly alien

They were right. Very friendly... Though a little strange...

Random photo update

2006-08-28T11:57:00.000+01:00

Glasses with glasses!

Hannah's always smiling

Even when she has packaging wotsits stuck on her face

Or is nunnified with towels.

Exeter Graduation 2006

2006-08-26T14:05:00.000+01:00

Hannah's graduation at Royal Holloway

2006-08-26T13:59:00.000+01:00

After a few too many Champagnes

Exeter Graduation Ball

2006-08-26T13:52:00.000+01:00

Amelia's birthday party

2006-08-26T13:46:00.000+01:00

For some reason the only photos I took were of Ed wearing strange hats...

Even at Jumpin Jack's

Our awesome garden

2006-08-26T13:43:00.000+01:00

Our awesome garden had many awesome things, including a Tom...

A floaty Mike

A pirate flag

A hippodrome

And a BBQ. All awesome.

Hoovers and giant black tubes

2006-08-26T13:39:00.000+01:00

On realising that one of our hoovers was not working, Nick and I made it work. Backwards. Where as most vacuum cleaners suck, ours blew. It actually worked really well as a leaf blower (and a stone thrower).

We used our hoover to inflate a series of black bin liners. The blackness made it heat up. Heat rises. Lots...

Hannah's Summer Ball at Royal Holloway

2006-08-26T13:32:00.000+01:00

The most beautiful Hannah almost ready

Hannah, Hannah and Robyn in their yellow kitchen

The Founders building

Unfortunately aliens came to invade!

Tho they exaplained later all they wanted was to take over the rubbish collection

Chocolate fountain! Woop!

Lou and Andy from Little Britain

The Green Day tribute band were very cool. Very very cool.

Scott wondered how the Predator could chat up 2 girls at once

Then a Yeti took Hannah! Nooo!

We survived to the morning

The final days at Exeter

2006-08-26T13:19:00.000+01:00

We decided to replace Pete's body with Fosters.

A cunning ploy, pondered Mike

Some one switched our face with those of crazy people!

The rest was a bit of blur...

But mostly consisted of cards in eyes and fingers up noses as usual.

Some one told Tom the plot of Bambi! Noooo!

Manchester

2006-08-26T13:08:00.000+01:00

Hannah and I went to visit Dad in Manchester before we went on holiday to malta. We saw lots of ducks.

This is Dad's dog Dexter.

Oh no!

Soul Survivor 2006

2006-08-26T12:25:00.000+01:00

A week or 2 ago Hannah and I went to Soul Survivor. It was highly awesome.

It's a Christian camping event thing run by a guy called Mike Pilavachi. There are 2 main events every day with loud modern music (e.g., not old hyms) / worship and a talk. About 10,000 people go to the events in 1 huge tent.

Also in the day they have smaller seminars about lots of things. Hannah and I went to 3 on gifts of the Holy Spirit and ones on generation Y, politics, conformity, evangelism, and a few more. The speakers were all really good and we went to as many seminars as we could.

They have other events throughout the day like sports (skating, football, basketball) and dancing. I tried breakdancing there but failed as I haven't done any in about 6 months. There's generally water fights going on most of the time too but Hannah and I stayed away.

In conclusion it was a highly awesome time. It's on next year and I guess Hannah and I will probably be going again. Talk to us or go over here if you want to find out more.

Home alone

2006-08-26T12:04:00.000+01:00

Hannah's gone to see her uni housemates this weekend so I'm home alone with nothing much to do :-(. Fortunately, that does mean I have time to blog and email!

On Wednesday I had an interview with Teleca in Winchester but they later called to say they didn't want me (awesome interview technique but not so good technical stuff that they wanted).

Thursday was awesome. I had an assessment day at IBM near Winchester. Their campus there consists of an old country house with amazing gardens, a fountain, a few office blocks, pub and great sports facilities.

We had a group excercise, which went pretty well and 2 tests, which I found fairly easy. I'm really hoping I get through to the next round of interviews. Working there would be uber-awesome. Mostly because:

Amazing setting in the country
Great resources for social stuff
Super flexi-time
Very flexible holidays
Great pay
Friendly people
Education (you have training week type things all through your employment)
Bonus pay for things like patents
Loads more!

Basically, try to get a job there, even if you're not a software developer.

More to come...

2006-08-11T01:19:00.000+01:00

There'll be lots more photos coming soon, including more of Malta, graduation and random other stuff.

A list of completed things from my todo list:

Stay engaged to Hannah
Apply to lots of jobs
Have a couple of interviews
Go on some trips out for the day
Do some drinking
Dress up as an Edwardian
Watch lots of Smallville
Eat lots of nice food

Here's a list of things I've nearly done:

Got a job
Planned a wedding
Shaved
Slept
Go to Soul Survivor
Planned an Exeter reunion
Finished this blog post

Random links:

Memory for pirates (click on the flag)
Mike's noises (from Tom, nice work)
Buy an electric car
Freecycle stuff (in Poole)
Go to the Symbian Smartphone show in October
Another Riddle Game (step 1, change the 1.html to 2.html)
Send a Snakes on a Plane message now!
A PBS TV show about the Universe, free to watch online
My CV

That's all folks!

Malta Holiday - 1st July: Gozo

2006-07-17T11:14:00.000+01:00

We got a car ferry over to the island of Gozo

Ggantija Temples

Xerri's Grotto

Azure Window

Fungus Rock

Malta Holiday - 29th June: Valetta

2006-07-17T10:52:00.000+01:00

This was our hotel room

In the morning we went to Valetta, the capital city. Unfortunately Hannah was ill so we went back to the hotel

We went back in the evening when Hannah was better

Malta Holiday - 29th June: Temples and Lagoons

2006-07-17T10:36:00.000+01:00

Tarxien Temples

Hagar Qim

Mnajdra

Blue Lagoon

Diana's Bar

The Little Waster Pub

Malta Holiday - 28th June: Mdina and Rabat

2006-07-17T10:23:00.000+01:00

On the 27th we hired a car, drove round Qwara (where we were staying) for a bit, went to a small bay, then went to a bar.

On the 28th we went to Mdina, called the "silent city" becuase there're no cars.

This church has one clock (on the right) telling the corrent time and one on the left to "confuse the devil".

This is the grotto where St Paul was shipwrecked

Some catacombs

The best view inthe only wooded part of Malta

This is the car we hired

A small bay we found

Malta Holiday - 26th June: The flight

2006-07-17T10:12:00.000+01:00

I'm still alive

2006-07-17T10:04:00.000+01:00

So much has happened! More detail will follow soon, but here's a summary:

Hannah and I are now engaged!
We went on holiday to Malta
I've left Exeter

Random photos, again.

2006-06-05T23:41:00.000+01:00

Nice view from Holland Hall

Tom fights evil with his power saucepan and wins!

Imperial "Spoons" Wetherspoons ahs a nice window mirror thing. The photo would have been better if I stood back a bit.

Enterprise Java Beans and CORBA acronyms, along with some random photos.

A Cat! In my Car!

Three International Businessmen of Mystery. Bargain!

Ooh, it's an old Tom! Except the photo is old, Tom is young.

An old photoo again from the Ram. A classic. Woo!

Reason why I'm not a poet #62

2006-06-05T23:31:00.000+01:00

Post-exam chillage.

Pre-sunset viewage

Pretty-tree foliage

Proximate-river flowage

Hannah came to visit on Friday

2006-06-05T23:24:00.000+01:00

We saw some flowers and some more flowers.

And a beautiful Hannah! (That's my girlfriend! Woo!)

There was a Mr Duck, waiting to enter the unknown waters before him.

And a very orange tree. Many branches too.

We have a garden!

2006-06-05T23:18:00.000+01:00

in our garden we have:
A Tom!

A Mike!

Some clever chairs...

... which Spiderman broke

A hippodrome (apparently)

A BBQ and an excited Pete

More photos at a time from my phone

2006-05-31T21:40:00.002+01:00

More photos at a time from my phone
Originally uploaded by David Hulbert.

This is what EJB can do. Awesome. CANT STOP or CATS PONT. Ooh, i'm uploading lots of photos. This will use up lots of my bandwidth.

More photos at a time from my phone

2006-05-31T21:40:00.001+01:00

More photos at a time from my phone
Originally uploaded by David Hulbert.

Here's some useful EJB acronyms, thanks Hairy Stu! Ooh, i'm uploading lots of photos. This will use up lots of my bandwidth.

More photos at a time from my phone

2006-05-31T21:40:00.000+01:00

More photos at a time from my phone
Originally uploaded by David Hulbert.

Nick + Mike have been altered a little. Nice. Ooh, i'm uploading lots of photos. This will use up lots of my bandwidth.

Post from Lifeblog on my phone

2006-05-31T21:14:00.000+01:00

Post from Lifeblog on my phone
Originally uploaded by David Hulbert.

I'm writing this in the Nokia Lifeblog program on my N80. The photo is Enterprise Java Beans revision notes from the green room Hopefully this'll work. Woo!

I have a Nokia N80!

2006-05-26T16:05:00.000+01:00

I'm not going to blog much (yet) about this as I'm revising for exams. Here's a few random notes.

The screen is aweseome. 4x the resolution of my last phone. You can read about 30 lines of text in it!
Wi-Fi works really well. Fast enough to stream radio from the net.
The camera is very nice. Does great videos too.
Seems fairly rugged and sturdy. I'm not going ot try dropping it though.
It's actually quite small. Thicker than many phones but not too big at all.
128MB included miniSD is a bit small, so I'm getting a 2GB one soon.
Call clarity is very good. Signal seems very good too.
Battery is OK. Runs down if you use it all day for Wi-Fi. Turn off 3G to get more life out of it.
SIP (VoIP) doesn't work yet as there aren't any applications for it.
There's not many apps for 3rd edition S60, which is a shame. I've installed and got working Putty, Screenshot, Internet Radio, Opera Mini and Google Maps. I haven't got VNC or eMSN working yet.
Skype would be awesome, but it's not here yet.
QuickOffice is quite good for openning Office files, though you cannot edit them.
The music player seems good. You can fast forward by holding down on the "next track" button. There's a big gap for album art, where there could be a playlist. No Ogg support yet, but hopefully soon.
Image gallery thing is very nice, though I can't zoom to 100% as I keep getting out of memory errors
The browser is fantastic, though it occasionally closes on large sites. YouTube doesn't work, nor does Google Video or Google Maps. ORB seems to work ok as long as you open Real Player first. Google Reader does work, GMail looks quite good. Singing fish works well (at least for music).
The phone can tell you who is calling with text-to-speech. This is very cool. The voice dailling also works with speech recognition, so you don't have to record lots of names.
I haven't tried InfraRed. I don't know if it woul work as a TV remote.
Python isn't out for 3rd edition yet :-(
uPNP works OK to my PC with some PC software. I can do slideshows streamed from the phone, controlled by the phone.
FM radio works fine, though the Visual Radio bit needs non-wi-fi net access for some reason.
The display is awesome!

That's all for now. I'll post lots more in the future.

WizBit

2006-05-24T00:21:00.000+01:00

Whoah! So I have this idea of creating a BitTorrent client for my phone, as non exist at the moment. I start doing this for my final year university project. It's a lot of work but I'm learning lots and it's quite fun, although quite difficult.

Suddenly the final report deadline gets really close. I need to write thousands of words for a write-up, including the testing for the program. To test the program it has to at least work a bit. I code like a monkey (google for that song, it's good). I code some more. Then I think: hmmmmm.

During that thought I decide to create a small page about my program (now called "WizBit", as I couldn't think of a better name) on my GooglePages page. This is for "distribution" as my report puts it. Even though the code isn't finished I decide to advertise the site in an IRC channel.

People tell friends, some friends have lots of friends, friends tell friends, people google for "s60 bittorrent", people blog: WizBit becomes almost famous. It's exciting but almost scary. So many people now know about WizBit!

I have to give a demonstration the day after my last exam (7th June, silly timetabling), which means by then it should have basic functionality. That's quite a lot of coding in not a lot of time.

After the 7th I'll probably chillax for a bit, then try to get WizBit working really well over the Summer. I'll release what I've done under the GPL so after the 7th people will be able to help if they want. It's really amazing to create something that lots of people really want. I really hope I can get it working all properly.

This is the news

2006-05-24T00:13:00.000+01:00

Like many a post, the post just before was a long time ago. Hannah came to visit again! We had a great time and even went to Dartmoor. The weather wasn't that great but we still managed to do lots. We found lots of really cheap good books and Hannah even found some Left Behind series books super cheap! Before that I'd been working on my university project lots and lots. Now I have some more to do, whilst revising for exams! I'm sure it'll all be fine.

The photo site Riya is actually really cool and very good. It has face recognition, is free and will soon allow importing nad exporting. Overall seems much nicer and more innovative than alternatives like Flickr. I'm not sure of thir revenue model yet though, so after beta they may have premium services or adverts.

Pete, Tom, Mike and I had a BBQ this afternoon. Their blogs may have photos. Pete doesn't ahve a blog. Pete: go to www.blogger.com and get one.

It's sunny at night again

2006-05-11T06:02:00.000+01:00

Work is finished! Over 4 hours before its due in! Unfortunately we missed the nighttime again and it's now light outside.

Picasa

2006-05-06T14:17:00.000+01:00

If you haven't got it already then you should download Google's Picasa. It's really good at organising photos and doing simple edits. It also integrates well with Flickr, email, Blogger / Blogspot and lots more. You can order prints online and make gift CDs. Seriously, if you have any photos on your computer you should download it now. There's a link on the sidebar to the right. -->

Dad's new dog (Dexter)

2006-04-29T14:03:00.000+01:00

Dad's new dog (Dexter)
Originally uploaded by David Hulbert.

My Dad got a new dog a while ago. He's very small and cute.

Hannah!

2006-04-28T13:30:00.000+01:00

I haven't blogged about my incredible girlfriend Hannah in ages now. Nothing bad's happened, I just haven't had much to say. We're still going out and love each other very much.

January 2nd: I asked Hannah out! She said yes! Happiness ensued! We had a great week together then had to leave for seperate universities. Hannah visited the next weekend so we weren't apart for long.
January 21st: We went to my cousins wedding together! There was also more visiting.
February 14th: Valentines day! My car broke a bit though. A fantastic week!

During March and April we've been seeing each other about every 2 weeks as we've both had way too much work to do. Hannah's finished her disertation and now just has exams. We'll hopefully see each other soon as we really miss each other lots.

Over the Summer we're going to look for jobs but hopefuly not start work until Autumn. We're going to Soul Survivor and hopefully somewhere nice on holiday! It's going to be an amazing Summer as we'll have each other and no work to do!

Nokia N91 vs Nokia N80 (Updated)

2006-04-26T21:02:00.000+01:00

Update: Mike has posted why he thinks these phones aren't very good. See below for his opinions and why (I think) he's wrong.

Informed speculation: The N91 is coming out probably in a week or 2 in the UK. The N80 should be out about a week after (I guess). Pre-ordering the N91 ranges from free on a £45 contract up to about £200 on a cheap contract, which should go down to £100 or less in a month or 2. The phones themselves can be pre-ordered for around £500. Both definately available on O2, most likely all other major networks too.

Random note: phones that are free on cheap contracts should sell for £100 to £150 on eBay fairly easily. That means you could upgrade to the best free phone they'll give you, sell it and buy a new phone sans-contract.

Features on N91 and N80:

Symbian 9.1 OS with S60 Ver 3
uPnp (easily stream stuff if you have the right software / hardware)
USB mass storage profile
Bluetooth 1.2 (I think; means no A2DP - Bluethooth headphones)
Wi-Fi 802.11g
FM radio
CPU around 300MHz (I think)
Super-cool web browser with zoom and other exciting stuff (e.g. find as you type, frames, loads more)
FOTA (Firmware Over The Air) which means the firmware can be upgraded free without going to a Nokia center. I think.

Nokia N91 better:

4GB hard drive vs expensive miniSD (128MB, max 2GB) on N80! Very important
3.5mm headphone jack built in vs needing in-line remote on N80
Music playback keys
Shiny metal chromeyness

Nokia N80 better:

4x screen resolution (352x416) of N91 (176x208)! Very important
3.2Mp camera vs 2.0Mp of N91 (and presumably better video recording too)
Front video conferencing (0.3MB, VGA) camera vs none on N91
Infra Red (IrDA; not really used much but may be useful for remote controlling stuff if it's CIR)
More world network frequencies (not that I'm going anywhere)
Black hotness (unless you get the grey one)

Other alternatives (phones with Wi-Fi)

Nokia E70:
HTC Universal: Very feature-rich phone with everything you could want (tho only 1.3Mp camera) but is a huge brick.
Nokia N92: Just about every feature of N80. Slightly smaller resolution but larger size screen. Includes DVB-H for TV reception. Takes SD. Is a bit bigger. Won't be out for longer.
Sony Ericsson P990i: Touchscreen, silly keyboard though.

Ogg support
New Symbian S60 v3 phones don't seem to support ogg (vorbis) audio ou tof the box, even though they support AAC, WMA and MP3. Older Symbian phones can play ogg fiels with OggPlay, which has a codec for ogg so any audio program can play them. As far as I'm aware this does not exist for the latest S60 platform. Hopefully someone will write a codec for ogg on Symbian v3 soon.

N80 reviews:
http://www.sotovik.ru/catalog/reviews/Nokia_N80-2-rev.html

Update:
Mike's words are in grey (sometimes smaller when he goes off on a rant :-). My replies are black. View his post, which he copied from me without linking! Naughty Mike.

Symbian:
Like all phones before them they have an operating system.
All phones have an OS, but Symbian is very open - you can develop your own applications which use phone features very easily. Like Java but simpler (IMO) and can actually do phone stuff (e.g. access phone databases).

uPNP:
Rather specific don’t you think?
Not useful now as nothing supports it but it will prob be as common as Bluetooth soon + be very useful. Maybe not this year. Soon it will tho. Open spec for sending data to other devices.

Bluetooth:
Bluetooth is kind of useful for sending pictures and stuff between mobiles but I cannot remember the last time I used it.
I use it lots. Fair enough if you don't. I like the way phone manufacturers give us the option though.

GPRS vs Wi-Fi:
Do you need ultra fast internet on a phone? Current GPRS technology allows for quick download of text based news on my mobile and that is all I really need it for.
GPRS is very slow and limits you to text or small images. I want to send the 3MP photos I take to a server. I want to download TV episodes onto my phone. Wi-Fi also means you can access the Internet free at home. Also means you can transfer music to / from phones / computers very quickly. Finally, when VoIP gets bigger phones which support it will be huge sellers due to the 0-price calls.

FM radio:
I have FM radio on my phone!! Never used it though because you have to carry the silly headphones around.
Not particularly useful but I've never had one in a phone.

Processor:
Reasonable processer- the XDA 2 managed 400 Mhz but that was more of a mini computer rather than a electronic swiss army knife.
Symbian is more lightweight than Win Mobile so needs less CPU. Symbian phones are computers. Possibly more so than Win Mob.

Web browser:
Just download Opera [mini]. Does everything you shall ever need.
Opera mini is cool but doesnt have many features. I want videos, downloads, RSS, large web pages, java script and lots more. Ooh, streaming too. Opera mobile has more features than Opera mini but is slower.

FOTA:
Why would you have to go to a Nokia centre to download firmware can you not just get it online? Or is that the name of the Nokia website? If it is the first point I raised then it is another reason not to get a Nokia.
SE do this already Nokia are just starting. That means these phones having it is a good thing.

Nokia N91 hard drive:
Oh the joys of hard drives. I know you know what I am going to say and I know what you are going to say in return. Ease to break. Then you tell me how the N80 has passed XXX number of tests back at the Nokia factory which is a useless fact. Testing in the factory and testing in real life are completely different things. (Here comes the ubiquitous F1 comment). F1 engines are put through thousands of miles of simulations on the dyno back at the factory to simulate track conditions. However, 9 times out of 10, when they come to actually track test them they only manage 20 laps before exploding in a fiery mess. Given that a F1 engine manufacture spends $150 million just on producing 18 race engines (1 engine for each 2 GP’s) you would think they would be able to produce an excellent engine. Nokia however likely spend less on development per phone and therefore it should not be assumed that they are not fragile in the right conditions. And yes I do know that the N80 is not an engine and should not be compared to one but it is a just point and well made I believe.
The hard drive may make it more fragile but I bet it'll be less fragile than your SE K750i. I believe you have a Creative Zen with an older version of the same hard drive. Is that broken?

Clock-pen mp3-phone:
A very nice feature but I personally don’t listen to music on my phone for one reason- the clock pen! The clock pen combines two great things, a clock and a pen, into one device and it ends up being a heavy and horrible pen and a useless clock. The same can be said for any device which tries to take on more than one purpose- the device will usually do the task but not as well as a device that was designed specifically for just that purpose. In your case however it would make more sense as you don’t have a MP3 player, or not a very large one at least.
The thing is about the N91 is that the MP3 playing functionality is actually better than a Zen or iPod. More file formats, more expandability, more output, even better sound quality (seriously, check the SNR ratios). Anyway, don't you use your phone for SMS and photos? That's convergence. You accept that now, you'll probably accept that phones play MP3s sometime...

Music playback keys:
Very useful. Nothing more boring than having to go into the software to try and change track etc.
They both have music keys on the remote so it's not a big deal really, just slightly nicer on the N91.

Scratchyness:
But could it scratch easy? Don’t tell me it has been factory tested. Do they happen to test using it on the way back from Arena at 2am in the morning when you manage to scrape it against a wall?
It's just as resiliant as any other phone. Have you scraped yours on the wall coming back from Arena?

Small screen:
In terms of looking at pictures it makes a big difference but for video why bother on such a smaller screen, just end up hurting your eyes.
It may hurt your eyes but it doesn't hurt mine. I don't know why. Maybe I'm just lucky. The DS has a small screen.

Camera:
It is the clock-pen argument again. But now we are talking about 3 features in one. I have generally been impressed with the pics on my K750i but they are nowhere near as good as I would expect from a similarly spec’d digital camera.
It's because they can't fit / afford high quality lenses in them. Carl Zeiss lenses are coming soon. Much nicer.

VGA video conferencing phone:
Might as well have no conferencing as 0.3MB is weak. My XDA 2 was 0.3MB so I should know.
This is only for 3G video calls. It's the same resolution as your webcam.

Infra Red:
They still making IR?
Not used very much at all now. Still used on many laser printers in offices. Also lots of keyboards use IR because it uses lower power. TV remotes also use IR, so the N80 could be programmed to work with any TV / DVD player etc.

Entering this domain of knowledge is an unwise move for me, just as if you entered the F1 domain- I would bring the smack down swiftly. I do think though that there is a lot of silly stuff that should not be on phones, like infra red, video conferencing and whatever this uPnp is! Take my advice and avoid the N91- hard drive will break.

These phones are better than than many of the devices they converge upon. It's also easier than taking 2+ devices.

Google may pay me money!

2006-04-24T18:25:00.000+01:00

I've eared $0.02 so far from people clicking on adverts on my blog. Excellent. I may get another 2 cents if people search using this search bar:

Get £2 for signing up to this... Updated!

2006-04-24T17:07:00.000+01:00

Update: This actually works. I've recieved over £20 in my bank account from signing up lots of people. They don't (so far, 2 months) text you any more (spam). You can also sign up other people and get money. Go for it! If you don't want to add your bank account then transfer me the money and I'll give you the cash (after taking a commision :-).

Luup is mobile payment thing. Basically means you can send / recieve money using your mobile. To sign up, text "go dave1010" to the number 81100. You get £2 and I get £1. They don't spam you. Texts you send are usual text price (10p or free if you get free texts) and texts they send you (confirmation) are free.

You can send money to other users (eg try texting "pay dave1010 2" to 81100 to send me £2) and you can also activate a bank account if you sent and add / withdraw funds. It only costs you the texts you send and 20p (from your account) to send money to a bank account.

It could be useful for when you owe mates a bit of cash. Instead of writing IOUs you can send 1 text message and they actually get the money! Some eBay members also take it. Hopefully it'll get really popular and everyone will use it. It'd be cool to go to 'spoons and pay for drinks without taking my wallet.

So go now and sign up! You get £2 and I get £1. It only takes a minute. To sign up just text "go dave1010" to 81100.

26 Websites

2006-04-24T15:25:00.000+01:00

There seems to be a meme going round with browser history's beginning with each letter of the aphabet. Type each letter into your address bar and blog what comes up. I can't be bothered to make all mine links. If you want to go there then drag them onto your search/address bar or highlight, right click + search for them.

Amazon
Blogger
Cbfsms.com (free texts)
Del.icio.us (bookmarks)
En.Wikipedia
Froogle
Google
Hotxt (IM over GPRS with drop-call notification)
IsoHunt (bittorrent search)
Johnvey.com/features/deliciousdirector/ (bookmark organiser)
Komplett (computer sales)
Localhost (that's me!)
Mininova (bittorrent search)
Nintendowifi (only coz of Opera for DS coming. I don't like the games)
O2
PocketGPSWorld
Q: None (strange)
Redoute (clothes shopping)
S60bt.blogspot.com (my other blog)
ThePirateBay.com (bittorrent search)
Uncyclopedia
Vodaphone
WhatIsMyIP
XenuWasFramed.org (Scientology weirdness)
YouTube
Z: None (strange again)

Back to work now.

MP3 players comparison

2006-04-21T15:43:00.000+01:00

What's the best Windows MP3 player? Just MP3s, no videos or any other audio format. These are some of the most important features for me.


Player:                            iTunes          WinAMP             WMP
Global search (150GB on 2GHz CPU): Yes             Yes, 8sec          Yes
Directories:                       No              Yes                No
Auto-updating library:             No, 3rd party   Yes, in background Yes
Desktop integration:               Google Sidebar  Google Sidebar     Explorer
Alarm clock:                       No, VBScript    With plugin        With plugin
Smart playlists:                   Yes             Yes                Yes
Sort by any attribute:             Yes             Yes                Yes

What other features are useful? What other good players are there?

The coolness of GPS

2006-04-19T16:06:00.000+01:00

Last Thursday I got this Bluethooth GPS reciever (cheaper than listed here). It sends GPS co-ordinates to any Bluetooth device which supports serieal profile (phones, PDAs, computers, etc.). That in itself isn't too interesting. Numbers generally aren't fun.

On my Nokia 7610 I have TomTom 5. It's super cool. It has maps of the whole of the UK and knows about POIs (points of interest) like Tesco and garages. With the GPS it's a complete navigation system. If you ever get lost, just turn on the GPS, load up TomTom, wait for it to connect and find a few satellites and press 1, 1. It'll then guide you with voice prompts, street maps and directions.

Generally it's very good. I told it to take us to Lidl and it did so almost perfectly. At one point the GPS lost satellites and it didn't know where to go but then it soon fixed itself. It even beeped when I was coming up to a speed camera.

The interface is very polished and options are very easy to get to. The maps are very clear and useful even if you have no GPS. The on screen directions are clear and the voice seems OK. I may try random voices soon (E.g. KITT from Knightrider! That'd be fun.) It can't tell you which lane to get into in roundabouts so crossing Ex Bridges it just said turn left after a bit. I had to look at the map to know which exit it wanted me to take.

The GPS accuracy is very good and probably accurate to under 10m. The little arrow corresponds exactly to the car / me. The GPS signal is not so good in areas with tall buildings but should be OK.

If you don't like a route it suggests you can easily change it. If you want to go a different way just start driving that way and it will automatically recalculate the route! It's very easy to find petrol stations or anything on your route to stop at.

There's a traffic + weather service which looks useful but you have to pay lots for. Maybe when I have a job.

When I was driving it only distracted me when I wasn't sure. I think it's best to either do exactly what it says or just go your own way and let it adapt. If you're not sure which road it wants you to take either get a passenger to check, take the road or ignore it. Don't look at it yourself and try to figure it out. TomTom does not (yet) tell you if you're about to hit into another car!

TomTom seems to be the best navigation system there is (according to reviews and my own testing). It works with (hopefully) every Bluetooth GPS unit there is. Just eBay one.

The display on my phone is fine for maps and directions. A larger screen (e.g. PDA) would be nice but is definately not needed. I really need a phone holder for my car. The voice prompts are loud enough unless you have loud music on. They can also be turned off if you want, though it's funny when it says things like "turn around at the next possible location".

TomTom seems to leave just enough memory free in my phone to send / reciece texts and make phone calls. It probably couldn't do much more that that.

A seperate GPS system would be very nice but if you already have a phone with an OK screen then you can't beat this for price. The GPS is under £50 and you should be able to get just the TomTom software for under £100.

Hopefully TomTom will work on my next phone. (Nokia N80?) I'm sure I'll let you all know if it does.

The coolness of Google Calendar

2006-04-19T15:38:00.000+01:00

Google Calendar is really great. Really. Sign up for an account now. You don't need a GMail email address but it is useful as they go well together. If you live in the UK you need an invite (just ask me) to get a GMail email address. You don't need an invite to sign up for the calendar.

Google Calendar does all the usual things calendars do and more. The interface is entirely web-based so you can access it anywhere. It's really easy to use too. Just click on the date or time you want a new appointment / event and it'll start creating it.

Google allow you to have multiple calendars. For example I have a main events one and one just for birthdays. I can share any calendar with the world or just my friends. Here's my friends birthdays in XML and iCal. You cannot edit them but my some of my friends can edit our joint one.

You can also search other peoples' shared calendars and "subscribe" to them. For example Tom has Arsenal football things. Hopefully Google Calendar will become imensely popular and our university departments (e.g. Computer Science, Careers service, the Guild, XNet) will publish important events which can be viewed by students but only be edited by staff (with changes showing up immediately).

The interface is amazingly slick. I love the way you can select days or weeks in the mini-calendar to immediately customise the main view. There's also the usual Google search box meaning if you've forgotten when an appointment is you can easily find it. Finally there's a print option which actually creates a PDF file.

It's still in beta (meaning there's a few bugs but is fairly stable) so there may be more features on the way.

To improve it I can only think of:

Have everyone use it. It's be great to know when people are around / busy. Also you could see who's planning on going to the pub that evening! It'd be useful for organisations too.
UK text alerts. They do this in the US but mobile operators charge companies lots to send texts so I doubt Google will do this for some time. Until they make the Google Phone...
A todo system. Not really used but would be useful. Maybe just a small notpad thing.
Better code / stability. This will happen; soon I hope. The beta sometimes doesn't save things and it takes up lots of memory sometimes.
More color options. Not exactly important but where are the bright colors?
Tags for events and tags for celendars. Or search terms for events. For example I could search for every even mentioning Exeter University and just see them. I don't want to have to subscribe to every band which say they're playing here on some day, then the rest of the calendar is useless to me.
Re-arrange the days of the week (with drag and drop). I'd like Thursday to come after Monday, then it'd almost be the end of the week on Monday. Google Calendar currently doesn't support this but I hope it does soon.
Featured calendars, search by location, topic, etc.

Google Calendar link creator

2006-04-19T14:34:00.000+01:00

Use this form to make a new event in your Google Calendar or to get a URL you can give people (e.g. in on your blog, like this or an email). People can then add the event to their calendars. Google have provided this page of how to do this manually. They also have some buttons you can put on your website. I've just made it into a form. I'm sorry about the confusing dates. They look really confusing but once you understand them they're actually quite easy. I could fix it with JavaScript but can't be bothered.

Instructions: Fill out the form. Click Go! Copy the URL (in the address bar of your browser) and either email it to a friend or put a link to it on your website or blog.

Bamboo and loo roll

2006-04-08T16:29:00.000+01:00

I haven't blogged properly since the end of Feb. Since then I've seen Hannah a few times which has been awesome-fantastic, done lots of work and got a new car! I've also been watching too much of Lois & Clark (The New Adventures of Superman).

For lunch today I had a burger sandwich with a variety of vegetables including bamboo. Weird.

Recently we've had too much loo roll. (Can you ever have too much?) Luckily it's fun to make things with. Mostly towers. I also nearly broke the lightswitch (Sorry Louis).

I'll take some more photos as I / we make more interesting things. Please post comments of what we should make. (I've made a mini igloo but haven't photo'd it yet.)

I'll also take a photo of my new car soon.

Ode to The Mushroom of Excitedness

2006-03-30T18:00:00.000+01:00

A poem by David Hulbert

The mushrooms lie together
Waiting for tomorrow
They know not whether
To expect happiness or sorrow

Every year it's the same
At midnight the picker comes
Carefully he takes aim
With a pinch from his thumbs

The mushroom is so excited
Its life is now complete
Into the stocking it is invited
There satsumas it shall meet

Random thoughts while shaving

2006-03-30T17:45:00.000+01:00

I often have random thoughts while (or sometime while not) shaving. Today I had 2 (update: it's no longer "today" any more). Here's some of them. Post your own too!

Why isn't there such ting as a Jelly plant? What would it be like if it existed? Could "jelly plant" be a verb? E.g. "Did you see when Jack jelly planted Bob?" That would be a cool sentence to say.
Why don't icecream vans get fitted with GPS devices? Kids could then use Google Maps to have a live display of when there are vans in their area. Savvy kids could even subscribe to a geographically expressed RSS feed.
Will I ever get all my work done?
Instead of having all the confusion about Dalight Savings Time, British Summer Time, etc., why not have one of the following options:

The simple option: don't bother with DST. It seems to create more confusion than it's worth.
The technical option: have DST but get every time device to pull the latest DST information from the 'net. This means that it doesn't matter if DST is slightly different every year or in different places.
My favourite: have the same time everywhere. Does it really matter that we get up before 12pm, have lunch at about 1pm and go to bed around 12am? I think not. If everyone used UTC (or CST, EST, GMT) then things would be a lot simpler. Instead of it being dalight from (for example) 8am to 8pm everywhere, it'd be daylight 8am-8pm somewhere and 4pm-4am somewhere else. The only problem I can see with this is that with the curent system we have Australia as an early waring of World destruction. E.g. if aliens were going to destroy the World tomorrow then we'd already know about it as it's tomorrow in Australia.

Blondes to die out?

2006-03-29T12:53:00.000+01:00

There's a BBC news article (not April fools) published a few years ago that says that blodes may die out. Hmmm. The article states:

The researchers also believe that so-called bottle blondes may be to blame for the demise of their natural rivals. They suggest that dyed-blondes are more attractive to men who choose them as partners over true blondes.

It then has a photo of Ann Widdecombe and says:

Bottle-blondes like Ann Widdecombe may be to blame

Hmmm... Firstly, I can't think of anyone that Ann Widdecombe is more attravtive than. Secondly, never trust news / articles from unreliable sources like the BBC (they still havent corrected it) or The Sunday Times. Luckily I found it was a myth from Wikipedia.

Faces

2006-03-28T13:30:00.000+01:00

Some people in the department of comupter science at St Andrews have made a really cool Java applet which modifies photos of faces you give it. You can have ago here. I uploaded a photo of me and it's done some marvelous and some scary things. I'm glad I'm not a woman but I'd quite like to be (more of a) monkey.

GMail down?

2006-03-27T21:26:00.000+01:00

It seems as though GMail is not working (at least where I am in the UK):

Server Error

We're sorry, but Google Mail is temporarily unavailable. We're currently working to fix the problem -- please try logging in to your account in a few minutes.

I wonder why. Does anyone have any details? There doesn't seem to be any news anywhere about it. POP access also doesn't seem to be working.

Update: Now it's not responding. How can I check my email???

The Official Best Films in the World List

2006-03-25T12:19:00.000Z

Tom tried, Mike tried too, even the IMDb tried. This is the only list you'll ever need* and it's even in order! (Not from best to worst, just from top to bottom.) This list is a list of films I like, have enjoyed or would recommend. As Tony the tiger would undoubtedly say: "They're Grrrrrreat!"

The Matrix trilogy
Butterfly Effect
Memento
Fight Club
Batman Begins
Sin City
Kill Bill 1 & 2
Back To The Future trilogy
Love Actually
V for Vendetta
X-men 1, 2 (and 3)
Blade trilogy
Die Hard trilogy
Terminator trilogy
Minority Report
The Shawshank Redemption
The Usual Suspects
American Beauty
Se7en
Lucky Number Slevin
Requiem for a Dream
The Princess Bride
The Notebook
The Pirates of the Caribbean
Lawnmower man
Police Academy
Naked Gun trilogy

*Except for shopping lists, they're really useful.

There's probably lots more too.

Random funny things I may need to remember

2006-03-22T19:30:00.000Z

I don't want to forget these so I'll post them here. They're from the web and random emails. I appologise for the formatting and spelling.

An interesting 'fact': "Although the Earth is larger, the moon is farther away."

An email forward
Dear Friends :

At this time of year, I want to thank all of you who have taken the time
and trouble to send me your chain letters over the past 12 months. Thank
you for making me feel safe, secure, blessed, and wealthy. Because of
your concern I no longer drink Coca Cola because it can remove toilet
stains. I no longer drink Pepsi or Dr Pepper since the people who make
these products are atheists who refuse to put "Under God" on their cans.

I no longer drink anything out of a can because I will get sick from the
rat feces and urine. I no longer use Saran wrap in the microwave because
it causes cancer. I no longer check the coin return on pay phones
because I could be pricked with a needle infected with AIDS.

I no longer use cancer-causing deodorants even though I smell like a
water buffalo on a hot day. I no longer go to shopping malls because
someone will drug me with a perfume sample and rob me.

I no longer receive packages from UPS or FedEx since they are actually
Al Qaeda in disguise. I no longer shop at Target since they are French
and don't support our American troops. I no longer answer the phone
because someone will ask me to dial a number for which I will get a
phone bill with calls to Jamaica, Uganda, Singapore, and Uzbekistan.

I no longer eat pre-packaged foods because the estrogens they contain
will turn me gay.

I no longer eat KFC because their chickens are actually horrible mutant
freaks with no eyes or feathers. I no longer date the opposite sex
because they will take my kidneys and leave me taking a nap in a bathtub
full of ice. I no longer have any sneakers -- but that will change once
I receive my free replacement pair from Nike.

I no longer buy expensive cookies from Neiman Marcus since I now have
their recipe. I no longer worry about my soul because I have 363,214
angels looking out for me and St. Theresa's novena has granted my every
wish. Thanks to you, I have learned that God only answers my prayers if
I forward an email to seven of my friends and make a wish within five
minutes. (I don't remember that in the Bible.)

I no longer have any savings because I gave it to a sick girl who is
about to die in the hospital (for the 1,387,258th time). I no longer
have any money at all, but that will change once I receive the $15,000
that Microsoft and AOL are sending me for participating in their special
e-mail program. Yes, I want to thank all of you soooo much for looking
out for me that I will now return the favor!

If you don't send this e-mail to at least 144,000 people in the next 70
minutes, a large dove with diarrhea will land on your head at 5:00 PM
(CST) this afternoon and the fleas from 12 camels will infest your back,
causing you to grow a hairy hump. I know this will occur because it
actually happened to a friend of my next door neighbor's
ex-mother-in-law's second husband's cousin's beautician.

The Rules

We always hear "the rules" from the female side. Now here arethe rulesfrom the male side. These are our rules:-Please note these are allnumbered "1" ON PURPOSE!

Breasts are for looking at and that is why we do it. Don't try to change that.

Learn to work the toilet seat. You're a big girl. If it'sup, put itdown. We need it up, you need it down. You don't hear uscomplainingaboutyou leaving it down.

Saturday = sports. It's like the full moon or the changingof the tides.Let it be.

Shopping is NOT a sport. And no, we are never going to think of it thatway.

Crying is blackmail.

Ask for what you want. Let us be clear on this one: Subtlehints donotwork! Strong hints do not work! Obvious hints do not work!Just say it!
Yes and No are perfectly acceptable answers to almost everyquestion.Come to us with a problem only if you want help solving it.That's whatwe do. Sympathy is what your girlfriends are for.

A headache that lasts for 17 months is a problem. See adoctor.Anything we said 6 months ago is inadmissible in an argument.In fact,all comments become null and void after 7 days.

If you think you're fat, you probably are. Don't ask us.

If something we said can be interpreted two ways, and one ofthe waysmakes you sad or angry, we meant the other one.

You can either ask us to do something or tell us how you wantit done.Not both. If you already know best how to do it, just do ityourself.

Whenever possible, please say whatever you have to say duringcommercials.

Christopher Columbus did not need directions and neither dowe.

ALL men see in only 16 colours, like Windows defaultsettings. Peach,for example, is a fruit, not a colour. Lilac is a flower. Wehave noideawhat mauve is.

If it itches, it will be scratched. We do that.

If we ask what is wrong and you say "nothing," we will actlikenothing'swrong. We know you are lying, but it is just not worth thehassle.

If you ask a question you don't want an answer to, expect ananswer youdon't want to hear.

When we have to go somewhere, absolutely anything you wear isfine.Really.

Don't ask us what we're thinking about unless you areprepared todiscusssuch topics as Sex, Sport, or Cars.

You have enough clothes.

You have too many shoes.

I am in shape. Round is a shape.

Thank you for reading this. Yes, I know, I have to sleep onthe settee tonight, but did you know men really don't mind that, it's like camping.

A brief history of the past.

2006-03-14T18:34:00.000Z

I've just been reading through my really old blog from the first year. Some highlights (if you can call them that):

Currnet blood - alcohol level: slightly more blood than alcohol, unless I stand on my head, then I get shoe prints on my face.
Next year Nick is thinking of getting a bouncy castle.
"Without farmers, we wouldn't have farmer's wives" is a fairly sexist quote I think.
In one lecture, the lecturer passed round different types of phone and network cable round so we could look at them. It was very exciting! We also played on space hoppers for a while, but not in lectures.
To make it more interesting, get different coloured celophane and wave it in frount of your computer monitor.
Im now eating crisps. I got them free with lunch. Ive finished them now.
The sports center (note American spelling, just for added amusement) is further up the hill...

In conclusion, I was very weird. I think I still am...

DRM music

2006-03-14T12:33:00.000Z

Engadget recently had a post about French law and DRM. I wrote a seriously long comment about DRM whoch I posted here. For those of you who don't know, DRM stands for Digital Rights Management. It means that when you buy (most) music online you cannot play it on an incompatable player. Here's my post:

OK, you buy a legal DVD of some film. You play it in your living room, then get tired and finish watching it in your bedroom on your DVD player up there. This is perfectly legal in (hopefully) just about any country in the world. If you think this isn't fair use then I think you may have a problem.

What if you're listening to an album you bought from Yahoo music, iTunes or whatever on your computer. You then realise you have to go out for a bit so you put the music on your MP3 player. With DRM'd music you cannot do this (unless you choose to let 1 company rule your life until you never want to listen to that album again).

Here DRM is stopping fair use. It is pretty good at it too. I could break the DRM, which isn't difficult to do but does take time. The legality of breaking DRM isn't too great under the DMCA or EUCD either.

I choose not to buy DRM'd music, burn to a (virtual) CD (which some DRM doesn't let you do anyway), then rip back.

Instead of buying the DRM'd music I have 4 options. Firstly I can buy the CD. This means going into town and paying for some of the tracks on the album I don't want. I do this sometimes but not very much.

Secondly I can choose not to listen to music at all. I don't like that option.

Another option is only buying music online in MP3 from sites like magnatune or emusic, or listening to free CC music. This is what I would do but it is not possible for me to listen to many popular artists this way (even if I want to pay). This would become very popular if DRM didn't exist. I'd definitely buy a lot more music.

The only way I can get MP3s of the music I want without having to encode a CD (bought or burnt from DRM) is currently illegally. That means piracy. That means they lost a sale. That means artists like Britney Spears and Eminem get no money and starve. To be honest (no offence to you Britney or Eminem if you're reading this) I don't care.

I have quick searches in Firefox for the pirate bay and isohunt. I can get virtually any album I want in a few minutes.

DRM has stopped me from paying many artists. I do sometimes buy CDs of music I've downloaded if I want to support the artist.

What I'd like to see is artists offering MP3s for sale. They could also have a donate button on their websites for people who got the MP3s illegally but want to support the artist.

To summarise: DRM doesn't stop piracy, it just stops fair use. It is a tool used by distributors to deny ownership to the consumer after they have paid for a product.

Update: Mike has put a post about DRM on his blog. Add a comment to it saying why DRM is bad for the consumer!

The name "Hulbert"

2006-03-08T09:58:00.000Z

OK, my name's David Hulbert but I don't really know anything about my name.

There were 2 Hulbert actors called Claude and Jack from the 1930s.

There's also 2 towns in the USA called Hulbert, in OK and MI. There's under a thousand people in them both together. Let me know if you're one of those people!

As far as genealogy goes, I have no idea. There's a site here with links to lots of sites like this one which seems to say the Hulbert changed to Hurlbut on going from the UK to US. The name is most comon in the UK but also common in Bohemia and Germany. We're mostly in Wiltshite, Gloucestershite and Lancashire in the UK.

You can also stay in Hulbert House in Queensland, New Zealand, get a Hulbert credit card or go to Hulbert school.

Please add a comment if you are a Hulbert or know anything interesting.

Cat + Chicken = Cute

2006-02-28T20:59:00.000Z

I recommend watching this:

New blog!

2006-02-28T20:00:00.000Z

This won't be too intersting for most of you, sorry. I'm starting a new blog at s60bt.blogspot.com/ for my final year project. If you don't know what it is then either read the introduction or just ignore it.

Down to my last ~40 tictacs

2006-02-23T18:35:00.000Z

I've just got back from ice skating in Plymouth. It was with the CA youth project, which has older (12-14) kids and I hadn't volunteered on before. The skating was really fun, though it makes feet hurt. I changed my skates to size 12 half way through and they gave me some cool ones which didn't ahve laces! Unfortunately they were more slipery than skates should be. I kept doing silly stuff but unfortunately didn't manage to fall over. There were too many people there really. I say "bring back IceTrax".

Now my feet are a bit owy, though not too much. Slippers feel incredibly comfortable.

I don't think I've done anything that exciting this week. Never mind. You should just imagine I have.

Through liveplasma I have found Shpongle. They're great. Type in an artist you like and it comes up with similar ones. Try it after you've read this post. I've found a lot of cool music. If only there was a quick way to aquire music albums... That reminds me, I need to take my washing out the machine. (Prizes for anyone who can guess what machine, even incorrect guesses get a prize!)

This weekend (under 24 hours!) Hannah's coming to stay in Exeter for the first time in what seems like ages! The weekend after is DJ Yoda. That reminds me: need to get Lemon Jelly tickets soon.

Coffee time now peeps. Keep it unreal.

Tips and Tricks

2006-02-20T16:10:00.000Z

Here's a load of random tips and tricks. Mostly boring, geeky stuff, though it could come in handy to someone someday (probably me, when my computer / phone breaks). Unfortunately I can't be bothered to link all the things here. just use Google - it's not hard. Please feel free to add your own in the comments.

Nokia Series 60 Symbian (specifically my 7610) applications
I originally posted this here but now it's also here:
Some apps I have (some freeware, others not) on my 7610:

FileMan (I think its better than FExplorer)
OggPlay (plays mp3 as well)
Lookup (search for parts of phone numbers)
Forward (save attachments to a directory onthe phone)
ControlFreak (Winamp control and full desktop control!)
Opera Mini (Great for stuffonmycat.com)
Nokia mobile search (good for maps in the UK)
Symella (Gnutella client)
S60Bible (the whole bible, very useful and easy to read, but no search)
Cocktail (Tells you how to make hundreds)
EggClock (handy countdown timer
smart dialer (essential - just start typing someones name/number 2 call them
SMSFace (displays a bit of SMS without you having to open it)
SMS-timer (send texts in the future)
FSCaller (full screen caller. dont know why s60 doesnt have this as standard)
CellTrack (random cell tower info)
PVPlayer (play videos full screen. ive watched a whole smallville app on my phone)
Disco (take a photo of someone + it makes them dance!)
SplashPhoto (gallery better than the nokia one)
AppMan (application manager)
ZipMan (unzip + unrar files)
SysMan (great task manager which replaces nokias one when you hold down menu key. displays ltos of info and is BRILLIANT. can also do system-wide shortcuts e.g. pen-7 writes a new text to my girlfriend)
Python (for coding stuff)
QuickOffice (open doc, exel and ppt files)

Firefox Extensions
Firstly, get Firefox if you don't already have / use it. It's safer, faster and has many more features than Internet Explorer. Once you've got it you can add extensions. I use these:

Adblock
All-In-One-Sidebar
del.icio.us
DOM Inspector
Download Embedded
Download Statusbar
Greasemonkey
Image Zoom
Session Saver
SmartSearch
Smiley Xtra

Windows programs
Here's some random useful tools to have on a Windows box:

SmartFTP
Picasa
Process Explorer
Google Talk
Azureus
UltraVNC
StrokeIt
AVG Antivirus
ShellEnhancer
Netlimiter
Google Desktop Search
VLC media player
KazaaLite Mega Codec Pack
AutoGK
DVD Decrypter
Notepad2
NetTransport
FileMon

Websites
These are useful to have bookmarked / open. Some work very well as bookmarklets. Check out the links to the right as well - they're actually useful.

del.icio.us/dave1010
Google Maps
Wikipedia
Coral Cache
Google Cache
Wayback Machine
BugMeNot
TinyURL
Google Reader

I can't think of much else at the moment. Maybe there'll be more in the future...

Anything is possible with enough selotape

2006-02-19T20:36:00.000Z

Like, for example, a zip line on our stairs, suitable for banister parts or umbrellas with knives attached. Hopefully I'll get some photos before it gets destroyed. In the latest installment of automated house attack mechanisms I made the umbrella fire activated. Nice.

Back to work now.

Err, why am I awake?

2006-02-19T08:46:00.000Z

My plan was to get up at 10am if I could. I got up before 8am. That's really weird. I don't know how I did it.

Q: A baby cage? Isn't this harmful to children?
A: No, All of our products are tested on third-world country test subjects experimentally for six months. After each experiment, each child showed no signs of physical or emotional damage. Using Baby Cage products are 100% safe! None of our products can cause permanant damage to a child or infant.
-- babycage.net

Ooh, moblogging. Awesome!

2006-02-19T01:58:00.000Z

Ooh, moblogging. Awesome!Do be doooo! This is fun. Try blogging with your mobile. Means I can blog whilst watching Smallville! I don't have much to say tho, so I'll just say a few words: twaddle, pie, antelope, digestion, chipmonks, trumpet.

Location : UK
Moblog from my mobile phone

Nick's back!

2006-02-18T15:11:00.000Z

Nick is back! Randomly. I have photographic evidence but I cannot publish that from the pub.

Update: I found a program (PicoBlogger) which can post small images. Woo! Go me!

Valentines: Good! Car broken: Bad

2006-02-17T15:58:00.000Z

Hello my fellow (and non-fellow) readers of my blog and welcome to today. My car is uber-broke and I'm half way through selling it. On a much more positive note, I had a super-fantastic week with Hannah!

I got there on Monday so we just chilled for the evening. Tuesday was Valentines day! Lots of fun romantic stuff! Wednesday was chilling day, where I sorted out my car a little and then went to London. We went to Camden market where there's a shop called Cyberdog, which has some quality stuff. I need to get some more money though. Thursday was the history society dinner, which was really nice. Hannah looked (and always does) fantastic! I was super lucky to be accompanying such a beautiful woman. The food was very good as it was chicken. No cheese though. Today is still Friday, which is / was the day I had to leave. Very sad. Leaving Hannah is virtually impossible.

I got a coach back to Dorset and tried to get insured on Hannah's car. It'd cost me about £400 to do it today, so I decided not to. Mum's kindly taking me back to Exeter tomorrow (Sat), where I'll be carless (not Carlos, he's Spanish) until I get one.

More good news: Stuff on My Cat (link) is back up!

A journey of traveling

2006-02-13T15:33:00.000Z

I'm writing this from my mobile on the coach. We're at Ringwood.

Friday was the day of almost leaving. The afternoon consisted of swimming with Community Action then we went 2 the Ram 2 election results + drinks.

On Saturday I got up, packed and drove 2 Dorset. About 15 miles from my destination my car started making funny noises. I pulled into a petrol station + called the breakdown people...

Update: It seems as though Opera Mini doesn't like me writing long posts. This is what else I'd written on my phone at the time...

Luckily I appear to still have breakdown cover until the 27th Feb. They took me to Merley, where I got picked up by Ed's Dad to go to Bournemouth for Ed and Rich's birthday.

We went to "Edwards" bar, which had some nice drinks and OK music. We then went to Jumpin Jaks and participated in much dancing.

I slept on Sunday morning then went out with my sister Amie in the afternoon. We sent skibobbing! Then we went to the Lantern Church, where they had a "cafe service". They had good cakes and biscuits but alas no coffee. The talk was very good and they did a quiz too!

Later on Sunday I went to the pub with Rhys and Becky. I almost lost my jacket.

I called the garage on Monday and got Britannia Rescue to take my car away. The garage said "car no workey". To cut a medium length story short: I'm gona get a new car.

I booked a coach and am now (when I wrote this on my phone, but not actually the real now) on my way to see Hannah for Valentines week! Woo!

Now we're on some road somewhere. It has lines and the occasional bridge.

Chaos in Culverland

2006-02-11T11:12:00.000Z

This is the story of how Tom and I temporarily destroyed our house. Step 1: Make sure Mike has drunk a little to much so he can't hear you moving furniture around. Step 2: Move coffee table and poof into Mike's room. Note: This would have been a sensible place to stop. We didn't stop. Next came the armchairs...

The armchairs worked amazingly and we laughed for quite a while. We then contemplated taking it to the next level: the sofa! Step 3: Try to get the sofa out of the lounge. It's a challenge.

Step 4: Pivot! Our sofa is slightly larger than our hall. Luckily our sofa is slightly squishy. At this point I think we had no idea how we were going to get it to Mike's room.

Step 5: Lift it over the banister, more pivotting. Step 6: Push it into Mike's room. It didn't fit. It kinda got stuck...

This was all very exhausting. That lead to the next step. Step 6: Take a break. You can also see our phone mobile in the foreground onthe left. We hope you like.

This was very scary as well as exhausting. Mike could have woken up at any point. He didn't though.

Step 7: Celebrate in our cunningness and stupidity. The existence of furniture in Mike's room led to the absence of furniture in the lounge.

The very messy lounge.

In all the confusion and excitement I'd put 2 difference trainers on! Luckily one was left and one was right, corresponding to my left and right feet. Excellent!

It was then time to sleep. I heard loud banging in the morning and remembered our incredible sillyness from the night before. Oops. Our house is a big mess, but it's getting better. We managed to get the sofa back. We'll do the chairs in a sec. Sorry Mike!

Art?

2006-02-11T10:35:00.000Z

I few days ago I bought some selotape. I thought what better way to use it than some kind of art-thing. It's made of apples, milk cartons, Frisbees, radios, loo rolls, plastic bags, medicine boxes and lots more! I hope you enjoy it. I call it Life2.0. I think.

Rachel's wedding

2006-02-10T13:26:00.000Z

A few weeks ago I went to my cousin Rachel's wedding with Hannah and my sisters. Here's a photo of (from right to left) Hannah and me that Vicki took with my Dad's gajillion magapixel camera.

Rachel's wedding 2

2006-02-10T13:23:00.000Z

Here's Amie, Me and Vicki (from left to right).

News from the crib: Valentines, iTunes, Power cuts and much more!

2006-02-10T12:32:00.000Z

It's nearly Valentines day! Woo!

This week I've done / doing a tripple dose of Community Action work. Tuesday was soundbase, where we played Trivial Persuit with some seniour citizens and had tea, coffee and biscuits. Thursday was homework club, where we helped some kids with homework and played some games. Today is Friday (currently) and I'll be going to swim club for the first time in a while, where we'll be taking some kids swimming and playing in the water. All lots of fun.

I've managed to get iTunes to wake me up now, alarm stylee, with these cunning scripts. I should have been able to get it to work with built in Windows scheduling but I couldn't, so I used this program to get iTunes to play at the time I wanted.

This is the most incedible user interface I've seen. It's kind of like Minority Report. Watch the video and be amazed.

Google reader is a great news / RSS reader and allows me to catch up on Cute Overload. Unfortunatelt StuffOnMyCat seems to be down at the moment and doesn't have a feed :-(.

Last night we had a power cut! It seemed to be the top half of Culverland Road and some of Union Street. It was crazy because we had nothing to do! No TV, no Internet, no anything! Insane! Luckily we had lots of torches. The oven worked so I had 1kg of lasagne. Tom's laptop was fully charged so we watched Austin Powers. Mobile phones still worked so we could get on the Internet a little anyway. The power was back on again after about half an hour or so, then it went off for a second, which was annoying. Now it's working fine.

This weekend I'm most probably going home as it's Ed's birthday today and was Rich's yesterday. After the weekend is St Valentines Week, where I'll be staying with my lovely girlfriend Hannah.

Last night I made some art-type-thing. Photos on their way.

When you've finished reading my blog, read Nick's.

Event Title:
Date / Time:
Use YearMonthDate/YearMonthDate (e.g. 20060419/20060419) for all day events or YearMonthDateTHoursMinutesSecondsZ/YearMonthDateTHoursMinutesSecondsZ for set times (e.g. 20060419T180000Z/20060419T190000Z). Times are in UTC so -1 hour if you want BST. The / seperates the start and end.
Details:
Location:
Busy? (true/false)