7264

After three years, 7264 photos and a lot of mistreatment, my beloved camera is finally beyond repair.

The LCD screen is completely beyond use. Which means that most of the features that set a digital camera apart from film cameras are gone. Now essentially I have a camera that can take a lot of photos but doesn't do much else. It really has done me well. It has taken a lot of photos and punishment but I've always considered it a sound investment

So here, for posterity's sake, the final photo my camera will ever take...

(A quaint little streeet in Devizes)

Thank you for all the memories you've captured.

Just for a laugh....

One of my settings had disappered from Google - and in trying to reset it I found something really quite cool. Google has language settings for people all over the world as you would expect. And it would appear languages for those who are not quite of this world...

This is Google in Klingon, 'Hacker', Swedish Chef - Bork Bork Bork, or even Elmer Fudd!

On the home page select preferences and just select your languge from the drop down box.

Google just became so much more cool in my book.

our place in the universe...

Photo of Earthrise courtesy of the astronauts of the Apollo Space Program and NASA

Two nights ago I had the fortune to see a total lunar eclipse. It was quite amazing. There is something about the moon, our silent neighbour on our journey round and round the sun. The moon has that magic quality to it. Since the early days it has captured the imagination of scientists and philosophers, writers and dreamers. Humans went there but have yet to go back but we are still innately curious about its origins and the adventure that its exploration presents. One of the most stunning views from the entire moon programme is the one I’ve included here. Not man walking on the moon, but man looking back at the Earth. The world is bigger than any one person, and yet from our nearest neighbour it looks so small and so far away.

But in all of creation this place is really quite special. The position of the Earth and its transit around the sun and the position of its moon are such that the Earth can on occasions block all the light that reflects off the moon. And on the converse (and more rare and less magical) the same is true when there is a total solar eclipse. That with all the distances and space involved it is possible for that to happen.

That eclipse was something special though. I was lucky enough to be up on Exmoor where the night sky is the blackest I’ve ever seen. It was a perfectly clear, completely silent and still. I’d almost forgotten what dark nights could look like – you see stars and constellations that are never visible in towns. The moon gradually waned until all that was left was a red silhouette against the blackness of the night sky floating amidst a sea of stars.

And a lone animal howled against the silence of the night.

It was quite marvellous to behold.

The dreamer in me didn’t know quite what to say.

if your life was a movie what would the soundtrack be?

1. Open your library (iTunes, Winamp, Media Player, iPod, etc)
2. Put it on shuffle
3. Press play
4. For every question, type the song that's playing
5. When you go to a new question, press the next button
6. Don't lie and try to pretend you're cool

Opening: I have a message/ Come to Minbar - Babylon 5 Sleeping in Light Soundtrack

Waking Up: Keep on Moving – 5ive

Falling in Love: Have You Ever – S Club

Fight Song: Bring the House down – S Club

Breaking Up: Ticket to Ride – The Beatles

Prom: The Bear Necessities - From the Jungle Book

Life is Good: Design for Life – Manic Street Preachers

Mental Breakdown: Shiny Happy People - REM

Driving: Could it be Magic – Take That

Flashback: Counting Down the Days – Natalie Imbruglia

Getting Back Together: From me to you – The Beatles

Wedding: It’s the way you make me feel – Steps

Paying the Dues: Three Lions – Baddiel & Skinner and the Lightning Seeds

The Night Before the War: Unbreak my Heart – Toni Braxton

Final Battle: Music to Watch Girls By – Andy Williams

Moment of Triumph: The Closest Thing to Crazy – Katie Melua

Death Scene: You are all I have – Snow Patrol

Funeral Song: You’ve got a friend – Andy Williams

End Credits: Sugar Sugar – The Archies

There is something about music. Its got something that I think speaks to us all in different ways. I go through phases of listening to lots of music then listening to none (although the iPod has made those phases occur more often). I quite often just listen to music on shuffle andI find it amazing the different things I think about and the things I remember as I listen. Some songs take me back to my childhood, some draw my thoughts to the future, and some help ground me firmly in the present. I think music is intrinsically linked to our memories, our hopes and our dreams.

After all what are we without hopes, dreams, and memories?

what really matters...

Life is full of people. Some are just acquaintances, some are important. And some really, really matter.

Today, I want to talk about someone who really matters. My Dad.

Born in 1930 in Co. Cork, Eire. Dad lived there until the age of 6 when the family relocated to England and moved to the village of Box, near Bath. He grew up during the war years, and had completed his National Service and was married with 2 children before the swinging 60’s were out. From the stories I have heard, I have a feeling he used to be a bit of a scoundrel. After the breakdown of his first marriage, he married my mum in 1975 (on Valentines Day no less) and I was born nine years later.

A little about my Dads personality – he is most accurately defined as having a quirky sense of humour. It’s that odd that it’s even filtered down through all three of us ‘kids’ and his grandkids. But more than that – he is a sweet man, very loving, and he has always been there when he’s been needed. Very definite political views, a lifetime of experiences and skills – he is quite unique.

I have lots of memories of my Dad. Lots and lots. We’re still making memories, but the ones from when I was little seem more special somehow.

During school holidays we used to go on adventures. Lots of them when I was little, but we still continued right up until I left school – and maybe once or twice through Sixth Form. We used to explore the moors, the little villages, the rivers and streams, the castles and big houses. I also spent many happy days playing around the beach at Watermouth Cove. It was always fun and it was always different. I think in those trips I saw more of Devon and Somerset than I ever will again.

One of my abiding memories (from when I was very, very, young) is of Dad’s vegetable garden. He grew everything from Carrots and Cabbages to Gooseberries and Blackcurrants. I even I had my own vegetable patch with a few seeds thrown into the soil with a lot of hope they would grow. But Dad’s garden was really something. We used to test all the produce before it left he garden – especially ‘purple ice-creams’ (Purple Sprouting). Its all grown over now, it has been for many years. But the memories remain.

During my early school years we had to spend two hours waiting after school for my mum to finish working. We spent the time sat on the seafront in Combe Martin reading the delights of Roger Red Hat and Billy Blue Hat. And that was really how I learnt to read. Not just learning though – I love to read even now. We would then play on the beach, explore the rock pools, and in the summer have an ice cream.

Dad is older now. He’s not too well and not up to doing much at the moment. He’s still got that sense of humour though. He is still my Dad. And I love him.

Here’s to many more memories.

mixing alcohol and physics?

From my calendar:

"Warning: consumption of alcohol may obstruct the space-time continuum. Small, and sometimes large gaps of time may disappear from your memory bank."

Now, who has never experienced this phenomenon?

living a second life...

Meet LJ (not her SL name).She is me. At least, in Second Life she is me. She is my avatar; she represents me in the online world known as Second Life. She looks a little like me – except for the weird sideburns and the fact she looks a little Russian. It’s pretty close. But the joy is, she doesn’t have to be. She doesn’t have to be female, in Second Life (SL) she could be a man, woman, alien, animal – it doesn’t matter.

LJ had a pretty uneventful start. She walked into a lot of trees, waded in a few rivers, and walked into a lot of walls during her orientation. Actually, she still walks into a lot of walls. She spent two days on the help island before she took her first brave steps onto the main grid (where most SL residents are). And then she took them again. And again. And again before she realised her graphics card couldn’t cope with very high resolution and she managed to make it into the bustling help area. Which she left again as soon as humanly possible. In her first ten minutes, she was propositioned for sex, saw a big red ball bouncing around the welcome area, hid from a monster, and got totally obscured by an array of bubbles.

Needless to say the whole experience was a little overwhelming. At this point LJ was beginning to wonder what she had gotten herself into with this SL malarkey. Luckily, she remembered a notecard that advertised a place called ‘Spaceport Alpha’ – the International Spaceflight Museum (ISM), and she embarked upon her first adventure.

If anything was going to make or break the experience, this would have been it. LJ is a self confessed nerd, and this is almost as nerdy as it comes. Put it this way, LJ doesn’t have a home in SL, but she does keep going back to the ISM. (A side note from the biographer – if this place existed in RL (Real Life) you wouldn’t need SL). Still struggling to stick to paths, and rambling through many trees, LJ began her exploration – by talking to another SL resident about all the weird things in SL. IT might be an interesting side not to mention that this resident had the appearance of a 2ft black cat.

LJ was very impressed with the museum. Especially the ‘Low Earth Orbit’ exhibit where you can tour the solar system close up, view the International Space Station, and the Hubble Space Telescope. (Biographers side note – Likelihood is I’ll never see these in RL, so SL will have to do) Geeky fact that LJ noticed was that the description of Earth reads ‘mostly harmless’ (a wonderful reference to Douglas Adams). Back on the ground, the Saturn V rocket and the Space Shuttle were most interesting to see, it was even possible to walk all the way up the launch tower alongside the Saturn V – although one wrong step at the top meant a rather fast plummet to the ground. LJ (unhurt) decided that in the future it would be much simpler to fly.

The museum was relatively quiet, but LJ did meet some people – even someone who seemed quite ‘normal’ by SL standards. And this was how the next adventure occurred. LJ was taken on a magic carpet tour of Nantucket (a region in SL) which is a New England-esqe Sim and saw the un-tackiest and most normal place in SL. It was pretty, quiet, and she also picked up some of the jargon and saw a bit of the main grid.

So far LJ has met people from America, Belgium, Ireland, Israel, and the UK. Of course no one in Second Life is who they appear (with the exception of the few big names who have kept their identity in SL). And that is perhaps the charm of SL; anyone can go and be someone completely different. There is no ‘face’ to maintain. No image to live up to. You can be a geeky or as extrovert as you want. There is something for everyone. The only proviso is – if it’s not so mainstream, it may be a more difficult to find (so just like RL).

So with one or two new friends, LJ signed off for a while (it was 2am), happy in the knowledge that she had survived the experience to log back in another day. After all, one of the things she noted before she logged out was the existence of a number of Star Trek museums in SL. And those are definitely worth a return visit.

SL is getting bigger. The big corporations are taking notice. Reuters has an office in SL, major clothing brands are creating virtual stores. SL even has its first millionaire in Anshe Chung, the property tycoon with an online empire. Second Life keeps hitting the press, sometimes for good things, sometimes not so good things. But it’s all publicity. It’s a big machine with a lot to gain (and a lot to lose). As the hype grows, the residents increase. When I came online about a month ago there were usually about 16,000 people online at peak times. As I write there are 26141 residents online. Maybe it’s a fad, maybe its not. It may be the next logical progression in communication. From the days of IRC chat, to message boards and live chatrooms, now it is interactive in a way we could never imagine. One conversation LJ had in SL was about how the SL world is akin to the Holodeck in Star Trek. The Holodeck is a virtual world, an interactive form of entertainment – so is SL – aside from the lack of actual holograms, the SL environment has only one main difference – instead of interacting with virtual characters, you interact with real people.

I think Second Life may stay around for quite a while if its current popularity is anything to go by.

is Google taking over the world... and is it a bad thing?

Google has become a synonym for success. It had grown exponentially from a garage to a googleplex in very little time. It has become a monolith, a monopoly and even a verb! Add to that it there are ever more graduates of Google labs every day. There are tools for every occasion –Maps, Calendars, E-mail (Gmail), Spreadsheets, Photo Editing tools (Picasa), Academic Service (Google Scholar) and the acclaimed Google Earth (even though it is by no means the best free map service on the Internet), and of course, Blogger. Blogger is a fairly recent acquisition, as to is YouTube . Youtube is the most likely to cause a dent in Google – it is currently subject to hundred of copyright issues over the use of protected content. But there are plenty of things that Google doesn’t own – yet – Flickr (Yahoo), Second Life (Linden Labs), and Skype to name but a high profile few.

Google has become almost all encompassing. But why are so many people opposed. Some of the best services have been those which are not subject to the forces of competition. The problem is that until there is something worse, people don’t realize what they’ve got. Think of nationalized railways – they were seen as unfair and not allowing business to flourish – and now they’re gone we are left with expensive and relatively poor services. If there was no Google, we would be at the mercy of all the small companies – think of all the flotsam and jetsam on the ‘net. Pretty good thing then that Google can be relied upon. There is an argument that the ever expanding presence of Google is taking away the ‘independence’ of the Internet. But I think that actually the Internet is plenty big enough for everyone to have say and stand a chance.

Google has made the Internet easy for people. Blogging is now easier than ever before, there is no need to buy expensive software to make things like spreadsheets and website design easy. The Picasa tool provides everything that the home user really needs from a photo suite. For the more technically minded there is now a 3D sketch tool (linked to Google maps). Google isn’t doing a bad thing by making the web more accessible to people who otherwise never would venture far online. The Internet has long been the preserve of the ‘Uber –geek’, and to be honest it’s been a bit elitist. I would consider myself a bit of a nerd, but why would I want to spend hours coding my Blog, when with Blogger’s tools, I can tweak it a little and get on with the business of writing like this. For some people it’s about all process of creating a site, but for others it’s more of a matter of what they put on it. At the end of the day for some it’s about the journey and some it’s about the destination. Google is just working to make it a little less difficult for those who are interested in the destination.

No matter all the argument and debate over the nature and purpose of Google, we are pretty much guaranteed that it is here to stay. And it’s just going to get bigger.

unpacking the package holiday...

Package holidays have gained a reputation over the years. They are seen as the haven of the family, visions of harassed mothers. ballroom dancing, karaoke, and kids clubs all spring to mind at the very thought. I imagine in the summer the package holiday would be something reminiscent of a nightmare - at least for me.

But in the winter, it turns out its actually quite a pleasant experience. Four of us travelled to Tunisia (yes, I went with people this time!) for one weeks full-board at the Hotel Tour Khalef in Sousse courtesy of Thomson.

Now I'm not going to go into the details - that would be boring. But I'm going to pass on a few tips to make the most of the package holiday.

We were lucky - our hotel had two great Dance Leaders (for the 'young at heart' travellers) who did a number of walking tours of local sights (for free no less) - and very helpfully around the hotel complex itself (so on our first day we found the cheapest water, the local Internet cafe, and had an idea about what to expect from the local area).

As on all package tours you have the trips and tour organised by the operator. We did a couple of these - well - one day trip and a couple of activities. The best activity we did (well it was so good we did it twice) was a quad biking trip. If you imagine quad biking here - usually a 'dirt track with a couple of bumps' to quote James. In Tunisia, to borrow an Americanism - it was Awesome! We were riding for a good hour, down dirt tracks off-road, with huge holes and steep hills, even a bit of riding on actual roads!

Some of the trip was decidedly tacky - the Reps gave a 'welcome' sales pitch - of the more expensive excursions, there was Karaoke and Kids Clubs, and all that malarkey going on. To be honest though, all these things are what you make of them - we went Ballroom dancing and Line dancing and thoroughly enjoyed it even if it did prove that I had two left feet!

All in all it was a good holiday. We did a lot and saw a lot. It was a quiet time of year with it being the week before Christmas. I would never try it in the summer, and a week was the right length of time. If I was there for longer I think I'd need to go off and do some proper travelling and not stick to the tour operator plans.

Oh yeah - and one other note - go swimming in the sea the week before Christmas, even in Tunisia, it doesn't half look odd!

on life...

Since the early philosophers, we have been seeking out the answer to life (the universe and everything). There have been a great many answers, and much discourse. In giving the answer '42' Douglas Adams had it right. We don't even know the question. But we are no closer to the 'big' answers. As humans we are all unique, and we are all different. History has demonstrated that there can never be 'one' answer to anything. So why try? Maybe, just maybe, its not all about the big answers. Perhaps it was never supposed to be.

I think the meaning of life is down to each individual. We are all searching for our own purpose, our own meaning of life. We make choices and decisions every day in our own personal quest for 'the' answer. Our unique answer. Its the decisions we make every day - big and small. And its all ours.

The answer may have been there all along. We just didn't ask the right question.

poor neglected blog...

I was reminded earlier today that I have neglected this Blog a little over the last month or so. I've still been writing - just struggling to finish anything. A minor tendency to get distracted, a holiday, Christmas, a new job - all the sort of stuff you should be reading about but I haven't had the opportunity to inspiration to finish writing about.

Plus, I spend all day at work staring at computer screens - the last thing I want to do is spend more time staring at them when I get home. I know - not very nerdish of me. So, I've got stuff on paper everywhere with not an ending in sight.

I'm sure it will be good when I'm done.

In the meantime, I'll try and post a little more regularly.

Over and out.

have you ever seen a penguin company?

Stocktake, originally uploaded by moonshine037.

This tickeld me when I saw it in the paper on Friday.