On the home stretch

After a lovely 5 days away from the grindstone I am now happy to report that I am on the home stretch. One and a half full days left to work before the shackles come off for a whole 12 days of hassle free goodness. 12 days to kick back and relax, eat, drink and be very merry and generally not have to worry about anything whatsoever work related. I fear 12 days will be nowhere near long enough though and am already braced for the barrage of hell that is likely to descend upon us in early January to make up for 12 lost days.

Anyway, what have I managed to achieve in the time since my last wafflings? Well, our Christmas tree is now up - and it’s not bare like it was when we first decorated it. A second trip to Home Base for more decorations saw to that. However, I am sorry to report we have succumbed to the chav ways and strayed from the traditional multi coloured flashing Christmas tree lights, and opted for the more “cool” blue L.E.D affairs. Still, at least the outside of our flat isn’t lit up like a beacon off the coast of the Orkneys so we are still relatively normal - unlike certain households elecrtricity bills in our street.

My new monitor for my PC has arrived. I can now look at “art” in all its twenty inch widescreen glory. Hurrah for Dell who also saved me best part of thirty sniffs  by including a DVI to DVI cable in the box with it. There was distinctly something of the microwave oven about the last abomination that sat on top of my computer desk and has now been relegated to the spare room.

Naomi has also very kindly let me have my birthday present early - an Alesis Photon X25 (right). Been after a decent MIDI controller to complete my production set up for a while now and after much deliberation, decided the Alesis was the best one for the job. Nice and small so is easily portable, and packs enough features for even the most advanced of users. It makes MIDI mapping all the easier as it comes pre programmed with generic maps for a whole range of software - ideal for me as Ableton and Reason are included - which are my weapons of choice. MIDI mapping is of course - fully customisable if your program is not included in the presets. It also has 10 assignable knobs and 3 layers over which they can be assigned, so in effect that is 30 assignable knobs. Add to this 10 assignable buttons, modulation wheel, pitch bend wheel and a “3 dimensional control dome” (pass on how that works, havn’t got that far yet) and what you have here is one very versatile MIDI controller.

Finally, I am happy that for once, I have managed to get my Christmas shopping all done and dusted before Christmas Eve. This means I will be able to stay about 300 miles away from any town centre over the weekend. I hate shopping at the best of times, but I think I would rather watch Hollyoaks for a week solid than go shopping on the last weekend before Christmas. Yes, I would hate it that much. While countless fools are out there rushing around for the last minute presents, I will be sat in the pub enjoying a nice cold pint of their finest, being bored to tears by The Mighty Wolves trying to grind out a result against East Midlands Crisps. Bah humbug!

Weekend deconstruction

Another hopelessly short weekend has flown by and here we all are back at the grindstone for another weeks toil. The only positive I can take at the moment is that next week will be my last full week of work until the New Year. Which is great news. Time to eat, drink and be (very) merry (and turn 25).

So then? What to report from the weekend? Well…..

Firstly, I was woken at the crack of dawn yet again Saturday morning by hayawatha downstairs. I swear to God this woman doesn’t know how to communicate quietly. I’ve been trying to work out where she is from - because it certainly isn’t England - but I can’t work out the crazy language she rants on in at 7am every morning to all and sundry. Imagine a turkey through a megaphone, that’s what it sounds like. Still, nothing some Jason Hodges or Derrick Carter through my very loud and bassy speakers at 4 o’clock in the morning can’t cure. Yes, I can be an anti-social scrote too.

My new PC is broken - already. Well, saying that, it never actually worked. Spent hours Friday night trying to ge the operating system on it but could not do so for love nor money. It is now in the capable hands of a superior geek for an expert diagnostic before making the decision whether to have it put down or get it fixed. I suspect it will have to go back to be replaced as one of the RAM slots appears to be broken. but we’ll have to wait and see. Following these hours of ball ache i ventured out for a few light ales in Oakengates then Cats.

Saturday I managed to get out of doing a big shop in exchange for doing the washing up. Excellent business there if i may say so myself. Saturday night was a messy one round Dean The B******s. I was even in bed before Midnight. How sad.

So Sunday was to decide our fate for World Cup 2010 qualifying. To tell you the truth we could have come out of it much worse. Ireland and Scotland have much tougher groups again. We have said it before but i’m going to say it again, we should easily qualify from this group. No if’s or buts this time, no excuses, we need to get out there and put these teams to the sword. Croatia are mediocre at best, Ukraine are a step up from a pub team and Belarus, Andorra and Kazakhstan are glorified pub teams.

Much gossip was mongered and much bile was spouted in the red tops over the weekend about the England manager situation. I still maintain that I have sufficient experience with Championship Manager 2 to warrant at least an interview.