20 recent entries:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Tuesday, November 23rd, 2004
10:14 pm	Bugger My life has been rated: See what your rating is! Created by bart666 (Comment on this)
Thursday, April 8th, 2004
12:38 pm	Things..... I really should stop reading the news. Some things make me depressed. Some things anger me. Some things make me angry and depressed and some thing just break my heart. You'll notice much of it revolves around the Middle East and the ever more reprehensible behaviour of those claiming to be civilised. I particularly like the line in the Sun from a US military source saying "We felt we could engage the enemy in the area with disciplined and well-aimed fire without needing to cause extensive damage.". I'm assuming this is an ironic reference to dropping a 500lb bomb on a mosque and killing 24 women and children rather than an attempt to justify their actions. Sooner or later people are going to long for the return of Saddam Hussein :( Current Mood: cynical (Comment on this)
Friday, March 5th, 2004
6:30 pm	Something's very strange here.... So... to continue the saga. I got the job offer (only with loads of my salary tied up in bonuses). Which is good but all the contract seems to do is protect the company and leave me exposed. In the meantime I left a voicemail volunteering for redundancy with the senior manager in my current company. Since then I've had two directors ringing me up to tell me that I'm definitely not on the list for people leaving and the chances are they won't accept my offer. Confused? I certainly am. I'm starting to think the universe is particularly random and twisted today. Net result: I feel totally drained and not really mentally prepared to dance my ass off at my friend's birthday tonight. And to add another spicy element to the mix, my potential boss/partner from the company with the job offer is heading down to Brighton tonight. What're the odds of running into him when I'm caned tonight? (Comment on this)
1:59 pm	Send in the clowns.... (part III) Ok, enough was enough. I decide to volunteer for redundancy. Only the HR woman has taken today off the and senior manager doesn't answer his phone. Way to go guys. Looks like email is the only option for contacting them. Hoping I won't have to sweeten the deal by telling them what is likely to happen to their IT infrastructure if they really piss me off ;-) Current Mood: cranky (Comment on this)
11:12 am	Send in the clowns.... (part II) After the motivating and uplifting events in my job over the last couple of days one might have thought they'd exhausted their playbook of incompetence and moved onto a higher plane or grudging competence. So imagine my delight when I receive the employee information pack dated 3rd March (yet strangely postmarked 4th March) 2 days after the conference call. Finally, I thought, here are my options laid out in precise detail including any potential financial settlement. These fine and thorough individuals would at last be able to share the secrets of their restructuring plan with me. BzzzZZZZZZZZT wrong. Not only is it just a cheap rehash of the conference call on snazzy company headed paper but in the process of calculating what I'm worth they seem to have had insufficient time to look up either my salary details or holiday entitlement. The upside of all of this is I got to use erroneous in my bitchy email back to them. Now sitting waiting for a phone call (hopefully) telling me I have the job I went for so I can begin to treat this process and instigators with something approaching the contempt that they deserve. Current Mood: nervous (Comment on this)
Thursday, March 4th, 2004
10:59 am	Send in the clowns.... Well, it's been a while has it not. And the intervening time has passed. Bad things have happened. My gran and grandad dying within 2 weeks of each other for example. You may recall my excitement of starting my new job and the excitement of their professionalism in getting ready for me joining the company. Well, that excitement has been replaced by a sense of awe that these people are actually in business. It was the first and last professional thing they did. It turns out the "we have more work coming in than we can handle" line at the interview was something of an overstatement and so for the last six months I've been on crappy internal projects or left to drift. The manager who I was working with to set up a new practice in the company got sent to Canada on no notice so that stopped. The company website (woo the thrills) got canned and now to cap it all they have no UK business stream so want people to relocate abroad. To this end there was a conference call yesterday morning to tell 12 people that 5 of them are using. It was then I realised I still could learn something from this company after all. And that was that if you are going to make people redundant you shouldn't do the following: Tell 12 people that 5 of them won't have a job in a week's time. Set no schedule for consultations with the 12. Not be available to discuss the matter with the 12. Send out the stock options forms to their home addresses on the same day (oh what bitter irony). Tell them to look at the internal vacancies page where there just happen to be 5 vacancies to relocate to the US (coincidence?). Leave writing the information pack describing the procedure to after you've made the conference call. Ring up to ask if someone has any questions and then be unable to answer "will I still have a job?" or "what are my options?". That wouldn't be so bad but what you really shouldn't do is try and tell them you were trying to make the process as quick or painless as possible (painless to who? HR perhaps). Be late to the conference call. Be in a noisy place where your phone keeps cutting out. Leave people of the distribution list for a mail telling them when the managers would be free and then forward it on to them 5 minutes after missing the first window. Tell two people 1 minute beforehand that the conference call they actually needed to go on was tomorrow rather than today. All in all an absolute tour de force in muppetry (I think I may well have missed out some of it too). Even if I'm not chosen (or in the unlikely event I choose not to start applying for other jobs) I'm not going to be happy staying at a company that I know treats its employees like that. If I wanted to go back to working for a half-assed bodyshop I'd go back to contracting and double my salary. It is here that you may think I could be about to explode but they're so bad it's funny. The prospect of getting out of this company fills me with hope and puts a big smile on my face. No one should ever be treated this way and I hope that if I'm ever in the position to treat people with as much dignity as possible. And, as I once said, revenge is a much better spectator sport. It's better to sit back and watch what goes around comes around (preferably with some popcorn) than be an active instrument in it ;-) Current Mood: amused Current Music: Groove Armada - Doin it after dark (Comment on this)
Saturday, November 22nd, 2003
8:59 pm	Revolution, Rugby and Paint Well, the march was great. Too lazy to mess around cropping photos at the moment so no pictures yet. Patience though. Can't help but feel that it's somewhat convenient that a couple of bombs went off in Turkey the same day attacking British interests. Which nicely relegated the march from top billing in the news and most likely dropped it from US news altogether. Though from that perspective the whole Michael Jackson thing probably did as well. Still, now we have another reason to go to war and the Turkish military have more backing to support their US sponsors (I seem to recall reading that the opposition to war in Turkey was ~ 90%). And, England won the rugby world cup today. They went in at half time comfortably in front and then started playing suicidal stuff in the second half leading to extra time. By the end I was drained. It always astounds me the punishment rugby players take and still keep going. Then came the fun part of my day. The spontaneous urge to repaint my lounge. 9 hours later and I have a few little bits left to do and a newfound respect for painters and decorators. When I catch the guy who was beating me with that stick..... Right, I _am_ going to make one last effort here and regain access to my sofas and TV. So much for the revolution ;-) (Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 19th, 2003
5:24 pm	Gearing up for the protests Yessirree. George has come to London, England to stay with Liz and talk up his bosom buddy Tony. After enjoying the last anti war march earlier in the year I'm heading up there again. Feelings are mixed though because the thought of several hundred trigger happy Americans is not one I'm happy to entertain. Especially when you add in how emotive a subject the Iraq War and general colonialist attitude of the West is (and that's before we even bring religion into it). If I were a terrorist though it's the last place I'd think about taking a pop at him. The big question really revolves around the British police force and their reaction to matters. It only takes one spark and you have a riot on your hands which really is not part of my intended agenda. But, the estimated numbers of like minded folk is up at around 300,000 so far and hopefully more people like myself and my friends will be going. If it gets to that many I really don't see the police doing anything other than keeping as low a profile as possible. Because no matter how you slice it: 14,000 police are not likely to be able to control a mob of several hundred thousand. For a while training and equipment count but once you reach a certain critical mass things are no longer controllable. So this really is a hopeful prayer to no deity in particular that both sides show restraint. And as Ken Livingstone said "let's not lower ourselves to the level of the person we're protesting against". Then again, I don't think it's necessarily fair to demonise a single person (namely Bush) for all this. He is, after all, just a figurehead for the faceless corporations wanting to increase their slice of the pie by all means fair and foul. If he resigned tomorrow we'd get another figurehead to implement the same policies. So, we should all spare a thought for that before our vitriol focuses on a single person. Hopefully I'll get some photos anyway so if I don't get trampled to death by a bloodthirsty mob or shot by overeager bodyguards I'll post them later. (Comment on this)
Tuesday, November 11th, 2003
5:31 pm	Ups and Downs As it happened the need to agonise wasn't there. The company decided they didn't have that role any more and so that was that for Amsterdam. I think I'm relieved because it's a big scary decision I didn't have to make. Which is illustrative of my cowardice of these matters. However it would indicate that I am not entirely happy in the new job. So it's time to return to being more mercenary again I think. My three month trial period is up fairly soon so that's a useful way out. Ironic that I was a little wary of them putting a trial period on me when I read my contract. But, as they say, the door swings both ways. And having worked in the company on a project (albeit the coding parts behind their website) it is fairly apparent that things get delivered down to bloody mindedness or luck rather than any particular process. And if that's the case I think I'll go back to my old job and double my money thank you very much. Off to see Matrix: Revolutions tonight for the second time. I think I liked the first one though two things really grated. Namely the aimless pretty patterns the sentinels were making when they attacked Zion and the length of time Trinity took to die. With the first one I understand that there were probably more sentinels than the humans had bullets but trying to make them run out of ammo seemed like the hard way of going about things. And as to why they fired every gun into the opening rather than staggering their fire (like old musket infantry) to maintain the rate is a bit perplexing too. As for Trinity, I'm no doctor but I think she'd be dead of shock before she had 30 seconds (let alone 5 minutes) to deliver one final cringe inducing soliloquy (hmmm is it really spelt like that - dictionary.com seems to think so and it was my first guess so we'll assume I was right). Of course that probably makes me a heathen with no romance in my soul. So be it ;-) The only other news really is that Basement Jaxx's "Do Your Thing" is an utter bastard to mix out of. Been trying to work out how to leave it cleanly for a mix I'm working on and it's just not happening. Which might explain why I almost never hear it in clubs. Mental note to leave it playing when I hand over the decks to Alex next :) (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 29th, 2003
7:36 pm	Questions, impulses and listlessness I spent the first two days this weekend in Newcastle (that's the north east of the country). Didn't see much as I was working silly hours trying to impose some form of tenuous order on the project. Which I think I've done now. Wasn't particularly happy with sleeping in a room full of whirring computers (or rather not sleeping) and the fact that the plane back was propellor driven. Even less happy with the fact that 2 months into my job the company is merging with another one. So what to do? I haven't been doing what I joined the company for which is disappointing. And into the bargain the promise about leaving me my weekend has already been broken. I am still on my 3 month trial period so there's a week notice on each side. Tempting tempting tempting. No one has come out and said who is the senior partner in the merger or whether they intend to make cuts. So there's quite a large tract of gray area. Added into that, with my new single status I start looking at the kind of random impulses which have always tempted me. In this case the chance of moving to live in Amsterdam. "Moving to live in Amsterdam". It sounds so simple doesn't it. Of course it's not. It involves quitting this job (not that difficult). And then the choice - do I sell my flat or rent it out. And here's the gamble. If (as I believe) the property market has maxed out and is due a correction then now is the time to sell up and take the money. If not then selling up effectively removes me from the property market forever. Set against that is the hassle of organising my life so I could move abroad. I've been through this without the fun of home ownership before and it was no picnic. Though of course, Amsterdam is easier to pop back from than Tokyo. And pulling me onward is the lure of living in a vibrant city full of open minded people. How many chances do people get to do this kind of thing? I remember regretting the chance of working in Silicon Valley when I got back from Tokyo. Am I really so happy here that it's worth staying? Would I really be so happy over there? Questions without answers. Or rather half the answers that would be obtained by choosing one of the alternatives. It's times like these I understand how mutable and unknowable the future is. And wish there was a manual for operating me and my part in it. And so to the massed empty seats of the audience out there - what do you think I should do? Current Mood: tired (Comment on this)
Sunday, October 26th, 2003
11:42 pm	That was the weekend.... So I started the weekend seeing someone and now I'm single again. The self fulfilling prophecy is fulfilled though I'm still a bit shellshocked about the whole affair. Wasn't the prettiest of breakups if truth be told and I'm still reeling from the negative aspects of the thing. Still, I can fortify myself by reiterating that it was the "right thing to do" (tm). Inevitably the conversation tracked from "what's wrong" to me being completely dysfunctional and a bastard. Maybe I am. Hard to say when you're this subjectively involved. More disturbing though is my oldest (and probably) best friend from childhood. His mum has a brain tumour which they are going to have to operate on. News which is disturbing on multiple levels. This is the guy who knows me better than anyone. When my mum died of cancer he came down and spent the night with me. We didn't wind up talking about mum but his presence was a big factor in me staying as together as (well as together as is possible). The good news is that the tumour isn't growing and they should be able to remove it. But it's a taste of mortality that is hard to deal with and my fingers are as crossed as they can treat her. And I don't want to see my friend's world ripped apart. It's strange that when you're young you can't wait to get old. But you never realise what being old actually means in terms of what you have to deal with. If we knew that then none of us would want to budge from childhood. Then again, my own mum dying taught me more about myself and humanity than I could ever have learned on my own. And I know that she'd never want me to be a victim about it. There are times though, when I'm low, that I think about it and have a cry. Things like that make a person wonder about religion. Even though I don't believe, the idea of her looking down on me is an appealing one. And that doesn't really scratch the surface of how I feel about the whole thing. Maybe when I have an hour or two I'll write it down and try and explain what my mum meant and still means to me. In the meantime I sincerely hope that my friend's mum can be treated and he doesn't have to face that day. Current Mood: contemplative (Comment on this)
Thursday, October 23rd, 2003
10:00 pm	Does prayer work? So, out of curiosity and perhaps a smidge of boredom I turned on the program about Does Prayer Work? tonight. And my first though is how on earth did this guy ever become a doctor. At what point did any kind of scientific method enter into this? Ok, maybe I'm getting ahead of myself and you didn't read the synopsis. The premise was that of a heart surgeon who wanted to test whether prayer made people get better. So they got patients with a low expectation of survival (33% mortality rate I believe) to take part in their study. Not telling them or the patient whether they were being prayed for. So, how were they planning to isolate the effects of different religions, the personal faith of the person or anything? Then halfway through the study (they wanted 750 people to get enough data) they decide to change it and have prayer groups praying for the people praying. Interesting to see the reaction of the various religious people. The Bishop of Durham made the very salient point that God is not like a machine where you put a coin in the slot and get better. You can't make him prove he exists. Now I'm agnostic bordering on atheist but I have to admire the way he put his view across. Less impressive was the Christian fundamentalist who was interviewed at the start who was convinced there would be a huge difference from prayer but outraged that this wasn't a bake off between the religions. Anyways, the outcome was no statistical difference. But there were some "anomalies" when they had people praying for the people praying. Now, given that this was over the course of 10 years you might expect the treatment of patients to have come on in the meantime so perhaps those treated at the end had a better chance of survival. But, no, they now want to do another study. Now, you may think this a rant against religion. But I agree with the Bishop of Durham - it wouldn't have worked whatever your religious viewpoint. My rant is against the muppetry of those doing these tests or trying to read meaning into the random statistics at the end. Science is definitely the loser here. Current Mood: cynical (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 22nd, 2003
2:23 pm	Rain rain go away.... There is rain and there is rain. Today's to too cold for my liking. You know that in Tokyo you have to leave your umbrella at the door of bars and restaurants and shops? Because dripping inside would be a terrible breach of courtesy. Of course, not carrying an umbrella and walking in dripping is also frowned upon. But I do miss being able to walk out of a shop and just grabbing one of the identical 300Y umbrellas from the little rack. And the weird thing is the system works (I couldn't believe for ages until I saw for myself). If it's not raining people just leave the umbrellas there and there are enough in circulation so that you can almost always find one should it start to rain. All in all a thoroughly civilised system. In my country there would be people going around taking all the umbrellas and reselling them. Though getting people to leave their umbrellas outside would also be damn near impossible. Strange to think how there are many civilised things we never dream of because we aren't exposed to them. Of course, now I have wanderlust again - where was that emigration form? Current Mood: cold Current Music: Layo & Bushwacka (Comment on this)
Monday, October 20th, 2003
7:27 pm	21 missed calls I hate mobile phones. To my mind they are one of the great evils of modern life. To which have been attached numerous gimmicks as the operators and handset manufacturers travel up the learning curve of how to extract the most money from their punters. You can buy logs to go on your screen. Or enter in the new horror of polyphonic ringtones. Now, I spent a good amount of time working at various phone operators where it was (seemingly) obligatory for marketing to have the stupidest and most annoying tunes. But now we have the rich timbre of the new tunes. None of which are any good so you wind up trying to find something which isn't completely offensive. Then there is the fact that they are so intrusive. There's no way (once the fckuer goes off) to discreetly kill the call without the other party knowing you cut them off. So do you stand there with the whole world thinking you're a or answer it feeling awkward. And if it's someone else's phone you wind up hating them momentarily for disturbing your peace. But today's gripe (amongst the mutltitude) is my answer phone service. Once someone has left you a message it becomes hyperactive in attempting to connect you to the service. Case in point: I went to the gym and one person rang and left a message. When I get back the screen says "21 missed calls". 21!?!?! Bloody hell has someone died? Did war break out? No. It was one person. Of course, now I have to pay to hear what they have to say (hence perhaps the urgency of my operator attempting to connect me to the service). And have to spend 10 seconds listening to them telling me I could leave a voice greeting before I get to the message. Upshot - mobile phones are evil. The tragedy is they are really useful as well. But like all useful things, evil moves in. The fate of USENET awaits us in the very things we are coming more to rely on. On the plus side, my guilt for drop kicking my first mobile into undergrowth has now evaporated ;-) Current Mood: bouncy Current Music: Eryka Badhu (Comment on this)
Thursday, October 16th, 2003
3:10 pm	...and apparently I'm 61% masculine Not sure whether to be reassured or worried ;-) My journal says I'm 61% masculine. What does your LJ writing style say about your gender? UsernameCommunity LJ Gender Tool by hutta (Comment on this)
2:41 pm	Psychoanalysed..... Questions (from a girlfriend) that fill me with dread: "What are you thinking?". Now I know the worst thing I can say to that question is "I don't know". Which is a shame because in the most part I leave my brain humming away in the background and just soak up my surroundings without attaching meaning to them and that answer is a valid one. Usually I can field the question ok by pulling up a thought from earlier like the fact that her hair really did look nice, or that I like it when people can pick my arguments apart. Because, believe me, that is the only safe kind of answer there is. To answer something else - specifically something which doesn't involve her - is to invite trouble. Where trouble is defined as a pathological need to dig around to find the precise psychological motivation. Failure to provide one is the next mistake in the inevitable chain (of course providing one is also a mistake because then you have to provide examples for why you think that way). But the lack of a psychological motive means one ending - the "we used to talk more" gambit. Now, call me cynical, but this is just a little bit passive aggressive and has the added bonus of being accusing without being confrontational (hence passive aggressive). This is where we come to a construct called a Johari Window and the idea that full disclosure is not necessarily a good thing (though Freud may disagree with me here). There are things I am comfortable talking to people about and there are things that I am not. On the whole I'm happy to talk over any event that's happened to me in life. That doesn't bother me. What does feel intrusive though is when I get questioned over things which are meaningless (like how I feel when I'm lying on a sofa). I'd like to think I'm an imaginative person but really I'm hard pressed for more than a couple of sentences on that one. Anyway, the self-fulfilling prophecy of insecurity appears to be on the verge of being played out. And to cap it all I've come dangerously close to providing concrete information about a relationship in my journal. Current Mood: drained (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 15th, 2003
2:45 pm	Chief Moose and the half-life of my wine glasses Firstly, it would appear that Chief Moose (of Washington sniper fame) is writing a book about it and the Guardian have picked some of it up. From the excerpt I can conclude a couple of things. Firstly, it's one of trashiest pieces of self indulgent writing I've ever read (and I've read Greg's and my own journals ;) ). And secondly, it could be abbreviated into the following paragraph... "We found some fingerprints and traced them to John Malvo. We saw his guardian was John Allen Muhammad and that he was an expert marksman. We looked up the car registered to him and went looking for it. We arrested him with his car." ...stand back Agatha Christie. But enough of such piffle. I have become aware of a very strange phenomena regarding the nubmer of wine glasses that I own. It would appear the half-life is about 6 months. I know this because until recently I had four (from the original 12 I bought at various times) and was down to three and got some more. And immediately (and I mean as I was unwrapping the new glasses), I manaaged to knock a pot onto one of the glasses on the draining board. So now I have six. Thinking back it appears to me that the number of wine glasses I own halves every six months. So mark this day (as of October 15th 2003 I have 6 glasses) - by April 15th next year there should be but 3 remaining... Current Mood: contemplative (Comment on this)
Friday, October 10th, 2003
2:16 pm	Solar Lottery Was wandering through a bookshop and came across Solar Lottery by Philip K. Dick. The plot synopsis reads as "The operating principle was random selection: positions of public power were decided by a sophisticated lottery. Everyone had a chance, everyone could live in hope that they would be chosen to be the boss, the Quizmaster. But with the power came the game the assassination game which everyone could watch on TV. Would the new man be good enough to avoid his chosen killer? Which made for fascinating and exciting viewing, compelling enough to distract the public's attention while the Big Five industrial complexes run the world, the solar system and the people, unnoticed and completely unopposed. Then, in 2203, with the choice of a member of a maverick cult as Quizmaster, the system developed a little hitch..." And then I started thinking. Was this so very different to the current state of play? After all, if Arnie can win Governor's office in California based upon no policies and take over vast tracts of journalistic real estate - what does that mean about the political systems. Then a friend sent me the following link about an oil pipeline through three countries and the ludicrous terms those governments have accepted for it. At this point even the war in Iraq or the Dr Kelly inquiry look like smoke screens. At the end of the day local dramas can be played out in the national press whilst big corporations do basically what they want. Sure, you have to have the occasional political fall guy from time to time. But I'm sure the corporations look after their own. All is not despair though because some of the people of the world are acquiring proper mistrust. I may have mentioned the increasing rate of fucked up-ness in the world. According to the Vatican (ie/ the Catholic Church), condoms don't prevent the spread of AIDS. And now I begin to see something of an exponential curve of FUN (Fucked Up Ness) over time :(. Added into the bargain, the Turkey v England game is on Sky tomorrow so I cannot watch it on my lucky TV. Us not qualifying automatically would just about be the cherry on the cake...... Current Mood: depressed Current Music: St Germain (Comment on this)
Wednesday, October 8th, 2003
9:24 pm	Is it me.... ...or is the world getting more fscked up at an increasing rate? Today's example of course being the election of a certain Mr Schwarzenegger to governor of California. It may just be the process of getting old but there is a feeling in the air that entropy is about to overtake what we describe as Western "civilisation". At least it's put paid to the idea that democracy works. Current Mood: horny Current Music: The 2 Deep Allstars (Comment on this)
Friday, October 3rd, 2003
10:24 am	So how does this work? The US weapons team looking for weapong of mass destruction in Iraq appear to have come up blank. You'd think that this might send the US and UK governments into some kind of state of self questioning. But no, the fact that he wanted them and might have lied about them is a case for war, at least according to Jack Straw. So, the existence of the US biological weapons program which no one is allowed to see must be reason to invade the US, right? Well, wrong because as we all know any country trying that would get nuked. Or in the modern scheme of things, have massive trade sanctions imposed on it. I guess I can't believe that these politicians who were so certain a while back can be so blase about it now. Unless of course the WMD were just a convenient excuse to get their hands on the oil and to turn oil into construction contracts for US companies and therefore recycle Iraq's natural resources into the US in the form of money. But that would just be cynical of me.... A very large part of me believes that there should be trials for crimes against humanity and if Saddam Hussein is going to be in the dock, then George W and Tony should also face the same level of scrutiny. Current Mood: angry (Comment on this)