Rugby Special Train? My arse.
Saturday, 5 September 2015
England v Ireland
Just spent a pointless 20 minutes queueing at Waterloo due to some idiot from TFL deciding to coral us and hundreds of othe fans at platform 22, we missed two local trains because of it.
England v Ireland
Fucking pigeon just shat on me, all over my jacket and onto the collar of my brand new England shirt. Had rush back and change, fortunately I had another Shirt and jacket.
Not a good omen
England v Ireland
Off to old Londinium and to Twickenham to watch England's last warmup match against Ireland before the RWC.
I have to say that I am apprehensive, we really need to get that set piece sorted especially against a side that has quite possibly the best set piece game in the world at the moment.
In the Six Nations they kicked us all over the park and won comfortably, I don't see that happening a lot today but what I do see is them shoving our scrum back and challenging our lineouts.
I feel the need... the need to numb myself with alcohol.
Friday, 4 September 2015
Autumn Mellow Fruitfulness
Now that we're approaching the latter half of the year it'll soon become necessary for me to wear a jacket... this is great as it doubles the amount of pockets available.
Here is a lump of vinyl...
I've just weeded it out of a load of cut jobs, it's fresh vinyl... and it smells lovely!
I love the smell of vinyl :)
I love the smell of vinyl :)
Fast food or healthy food... makes bugger all difference sometimes.
Boy, I have been shitting through the eye of a needle this morning, clearly it was something I ate last night.
I'm thinking that if I'd gone to Five Guys and gotten a burger last night whilst walking through my local shopping centre yesterday evening I probably wouldn't be in this situation now.
However at the time I didn't because I had no cash on me and couldn't be bothered to go to a cash point plus I had some sweetcorn and asparagus in the fridge that I wanted to use up, "a healthier choice" I'd thought to myself.
So I cooked the sweetcorn and asparagus and had them with some breaded chicken, oven cooked straight from the freezer, all were cooked properly and tasted great. Granted, the asparagus was a day or two over the 'use by' date but they smelled and looked fine and had been stored in a tupperware dish in my fridge rather than left to rot in their original cling film packaging.
So I felt better for eating a supposedly healthier meal and being richer by around £10 (Five Guys burgers are ridiculously expensive but soo good!)
That ended around 11.15pm when I was roused from my slumber with a dash to the bog... then two more this morning after I got up, one of which was preceded with a very uncomfortable walk from the train station to work.
When England play Ireland at Twickenham tomorrow I'll be there and I'll be the one making a beeline to the burger vans!
I'm thinking that if I'd gone to Five Guys and gotten a burger last night whilst walking through my local shopping centre yesterday evening I probably wouldn't be in this situation now.
However at the time I didn't because I had no cash on me and couldn't be bothered to go to a cash point plus I had some sweetcorn and asparagus in the fridge that I wanted to use up, "a healthier choice" I'd thought to myself.
So I cooked the sweetcorn and asparagus and had them with some breaded chicken, oven cooked straight from the freezer, all were cooked properly and tasted great. Granted, the asparagus was a day or two over the 'use by' date but they smelled and looked fine and had been stored in a tupperware dish in my fridge rather than left to rot in their original cling film packaging.
So I felt better for eating a supposedly healthier meal and being richer by around £10 (Five Guys burgers are ridiculously expensive but soo good!)
That ended around 11.15pm when I was roused from my slumber with a dash to the bog... then two more this morning after I got up, one of which was preceded with a very uncomfortable walk from the train station to work.
When England play Ireland at Twickenham tomorrow I'll be there and I'll be the one making a beeline to the burger vans!
Thursday, 3 September 2015
That's A LOT of trees!
According to new research, there are 3 trillion trees in the world, or roughly 420 per person...
So now, on my regular travels I shall claim ownership of trees I like, up to a total of 420.
I love trees, I used to climb them a lot as a kid (and fell out of a fair few as a result) the world was so much more interesting from the top of a tree.
So now, on my regular travels I shall claim ownership of trees I like, up to a total of 420.
I love trees, I used to climb them a lot as a kid (and fell out of a fair few as a result) the world was so much more interesting from the top of a tree.
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| Trees - pine fresh! |
My opinion of the new Google logo (2015)
Hmmm... I'm undecided, I think it makes them look too much like a toy manufacturer (although if their new self drive car is anything to go by, anyone would mistake them for precisely that!) Apparently it's more optimised to scale better on mobile devices so that's fair enough, as the previous one had serifs they do tend to break up more at smaller sizes and lower resolutions, plus the single G version with all colours on looks good:
Of course if Jony Ive had gotten involved that logo would have been inlined to make it way thinner, and had a pink grad through it before you could say "Google it..."!
Anyway, it's brave new world for the chocolate factory in terms of brand identity, it will be interesting to see how well it will fair for them :)
Wednesday, 2 September 2015
FU ICC Media People
For all you ICC profiling people out there who no longer support the Epson GS6000 Stylus Pro:
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| This was printed on a polyester canvas which will be wrapped around a picture frame, and it was printed using a generic ICC profile! |
Still around, and still printing awesomely on pretty much anything printable! FU all!!
I say that because I can rarely find ICC profile for new media these days, they all seem to have a hard on for the SureColor series and HP's Latex printers.
Tuesday, 1 September 2015
Empyrion: Galactic Survival
I've been playing the pre-alpha of this game for a few weeks now and I'm loving it, more so than Reign of Kings which I've taken a sabbatical from because they recently decided that even the community servers had to be flattened in order to accommodate a fix to remove a bad bug, which pissed me off because I lost a castle that I'd spent an entire weekend building.
Anyhoo, back to Empyrion, I've now got a good base up and running and a couple of spaceships in my collection, hopefully the devs are competent enough to not have me lose this base in future updates!
Crafting is very in-depth, much more complex than other survival games I've played, trouble is, that can get frustrating in terms regularly of sending me off on a tangent when all I want to do get my sodding ship finished.
The game is very early in development - you can't visit certain parts of each planet (the poles are closed off), vegetation just looks like it's been plonked down half-assed and the ship flight control mechanics are very sludgy.
The constant need to replenish oxygen and food bars is a bit annoying because they go down too quickly, which affects game balance because you're too distracted trying find food and manufacture oxygen to enjoy the scenery and explore. I'm hoping that future updates will 'slow' them down just a bit. Although having said that, I do think that they are an important part of the playability as this is a survival game and after all, the whole point of survival is to find items to, well, survive!
Anyhoo, back to Empyrion, I've now got a good base up and running and a couple of spaceships in my collection, hopefully the devs are competent enough to not have me lose this base in future updates!
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| This is my farm... ohh arrr! |
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| Not sure what I was thinking when I created this but it does kick ass... or NPC towers |
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| This is my second, smaller, hopefully more manoeuvrable spaceship |
The devs are promising a lot in future updates like a fully working galaxy for instance, which is a big ask when the game has seamless exits and reentries to planets, God knows what the processing and data size requirements will be from a technical standpoint if they expand it galaxy wide... I guess we're trusting the devs with that one. However, if it does work out okay it will be awesome to be able to seamlessly fly from one planet to another in a massive multi-system universe... this game might even be the replacement to Freelancer that I've been searching for ever since Microsoft dropped it's development (and let's face it Star Citizen isn't going to be released anytime soon with all the faffing around they're doing).
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| My rooftop garage, complete with oxygen station... |
Empyrion is hugely addictive, I often find my oxygen bar flashing red because I've been so embroiled in figuring out how to build my ships I've forgotten to replenish it prompting me to rush to the nearest oxygen station. I'm at the stage now where I've built so much stuff and taken so much time to build it all that I'm fearful of losing it. I have a huge list of game 'backups' that have array of confusing names, this is where the dedicated server part needs to come in so my progress is out there in the cloud rather than on my PC's local hard drive, the results of my addiction need a decent save point system!
In terms of stability for a pre-alpha it's pretty good, the only two bugs I've found is it hanging when I quit out (forcing a Windows 'searching for an answer to your problem' 'close' dialogue box) and a situation where I lose power cells when I try to mass load them into my water and oxygen generators (pro-tip to work around this bug: just load them one by one instead).
Definitely worth a go for £13, especially for the building system, it really has great potential.
Sunday, 30 August 2015
Key Inmarsat rocket flight from Kazakhstan 'a success'
Congrats to UK based Inmarsat for their rock launch... all those hours playing Kerbal Space Program paid off then eh? ;)
Rewind Festival #4
During the Rewind Festival we went to a Silent Disco, it was basically a large marquee full of drunk people all wearing headphones, all singing along to one of two channels of music two attendant DJ's were playing out wirelessly to each headphone (which is selectable via a switch on one of the cans). They are lit green for one channel and red for the other, more colours seen means that one of the DJs is playing the catchiest song!
It's quite bizarre really when observing whilst not wearing headphones, no music heard, just dozens and dozens of yelling voices...
Imagine if they had this back in the eighties? Everyone would be weighted down with heavy headphones and tripping over each other's wires!!
It's quite bizarre really when observing whilst not wearing headphones, no music heard, just dozens and dozens of yelling voices...
Imagine if they had this back in the eighties? Everyone would be weighted down with heavy headphones and tripping over each other's wires!!
Thursday, 27 August 2015
Rewind Festival #3
More content from Rewind 2015, this one is my recording of Midge Ure's Vienna, I think it was safe to say that at this point during the day I'd imbibed enough alcohol to cause a small army to collectively stagger into a ravine during a drunken forced march... hence the swaying camera work ;)
Midge Ure was awesome by the way, a brilliant songwriter, musician and a great showman, I am surprised that he didn't headline.
Midge Ure was awesome by the way, a brilliant songwriter, musician and a great showman, I am surprised that he didn't headline.
Random Thought #238
I think it's important that you eat the unheated contents of a processed food tin occasionally so that, if an apocalypse happens and you have the luxury of one to eat, it won't be as much as a shock...
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| Other food tins are available ;) |
Wednesday, 26 August 2015
Beginning to feel human again...
After 48 hours of dancing and alcoholism I am finally beginning to feel normal again... what a weekend though! Will definitely be doing that again...
I have to sort through all my pics and videos and will post some soon...
Here's a taster:
I have to sort through all my pics and videos and will post some soon...
Here's a taster:
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| It's Pimms O'Click at Rewind 2015! |
Friday, 21 August 2015
Rewind Festival #2
I'm off to the Rewind Festival today... 3 days of beer, 80's music and dancing with thousands of other drunken like-minded forty to fiftysomethings, with perhaps a smattering of bewildered-looking teenagers and twentysomethings mixed in :)
We're going in a camper van so that should increase the comfort level somewhat plus I've purchased a wristband for access to the posh loos so I can have a crap in relative clean comfort.
Aside from that there'll be queueing, probably some mud, expensive beer and gut busting fast food to contend with but it's all worth it to see Belinda Carlisle live :p
Now off to get my funk on!
Saturday, 15 August 2015
Friday, 14 August 2015
The days before the Web
Ah I remember those days:
When, in conversation with someone, they took what you said as gospel instead of 'Googling' it and correcting you.
When people actually talked to each other in the pub, rather than gawping at their smartphones to check their failbook wall updates or responses to their Favourited entries in twatter.
When we could remember place names, phone numbers or shopping lists, instead of relying on the 'cloud'.
We were all so much more 'genuine' in those days, it's hard to explain what that means but the closest explanation I can come up with is we were less like drones slaved to a huge network of computers like we are today. I mean if I need to find my way around I go to TomTom on my smartphone, or if I need a friend's phone number I look it up in my address book on my smartphone/computer etc. The fact that I can look up my personal information anywhere at anytime is pretty awesome but somewhat lame at the same time because I really should be able to recall most of it without help. The Web is giving us collective lazy brains.
I know, I know, I'm sounding like some old fogey - complaining about 'new fangled computers' and 'when I were a lad...' etc. etc. but I feel qualified enough to speak up for the forty somethings in this world who knew what the modern world was like before the Web but sufficiently after gas lamps in the streets lighting the way for carts and horses. Where it was sophisticated enough for us to enjoy our leisure time but not so sophisticated in our working lives, forcing us to be proactive in order to get stuff done.
Now I'm off to download another book onto my Kindle.
When, in conversation with someone, they took what you said as gospel instead of 'Googling' it and correcting you.
When people actually talked to each other in the pub, rather than gawping at their smartphones to check their failbook wall updates or responses to their Favourited entries in twatter.
When we could remember place names, phone numbers or shopping lists, instead of relying on the 'cloud'.
We were all so much more 'genuine' in those days, it's hard to explain what that means but the closest explanation I can come up with is we were less like drones slaved to a huge network of computers like we are today. I mean if I need to find my way around I go to TomTom on my smartphone, or if I need a friend's phone number I look it up in my address book on my smartphone/computer etc. The fact that I can look up my personal information anywhere at anytime is pretty awesome but somewhat lame at the same time because I really should be able to recall most of it without help. The Web is giving us collective lazy brains.
I know, I know, I'm sounding like some old fogey - complaining about 'new fangled computers' and 'when I were a lad...' etc. etc. but I feel qualified enough to speak up for the forty somethings in this world who knew what the modern world was like before the Web but sufficiently after gas lamps in the streets lighting the way for carts and horses. Where it was sophisticated enough for us to enjoy our leisure time but not so sophisticated in our working lives, forcing us to be proactive in order to get stuff done.
Now I'm off to download another book onto my Kindle.
Wednesday, 12 August 2015
Mike Tindall - Rugby Legend
Mike Tindall is a Rugby legend, he has the scars to prove it, is married into royalty and is a thoroughly all round great dude... and every time I see him the OS X logo pops into my head...
Sunday, 9 August 2015
Elder Scrolls Online
I've been hitting ESO hard this weekend because I moved all my gaming PC's components into a brand new case - a Corsair Obsidian 450D. The old case didn't have good enough heat dissipation because the PSU and graphics card were too close to each other... every time I played ESO the top and back would be red hot, I'm not surprised the PC didn't transform into a molten mass sooner!
Anyway this case is bigger and channels air movement much better so now I can continue my marathon ESO sessions :)
As usual, Zenimax continue to outdo themselves for graphics:
Anyway this case is bigger and channels air movement much better so now I can continue my marathon ESO sessions :)
As usual, Zenimax continue to outdo themselves for graphics:
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| I spent ages staring at this waterfall, even got surprise attacked because of that! |
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| Sunset over Bankorai |
Thursday, 6 August 2015
and a good morning to you sir...!
Whilst headed toward work on my daily morning commute I noticed a guy walking towards me, he was dressed in typical builder's garb - hardhat, hi-vis jacket, paint-splattered cargo pants and hobnail workbooks. He had a roll-up ciggy in his mouth and carried a cup of Greggs coffee, as he passed me he said 'morning' quite loudly.
I was surprised but recovered quickly enough to mumble 'm-morning' in response before he got too far away.
I have to say that it cheered me up somewhat because usually everyone around me silently shuffles off the train looking miserable, then head en-masse through the ticket gates and disperse to their various workplaces continuing to look miserable and nary a word of how well the morning was fairing is ever spoken from anyone. Mind you it would probably get a bit grating having loads of people say 'good morning' to me every day.
This guy though, probably without a care in the world, had his nicotine and caffeine fixes and was off to go and build stuff, fair play to him! I just wish I could be like that in the morning.
I was surprised but recovered quickly enough to mumble 'm-morning' in response before he got too far away.
I have to say that it cheered me up somewhat because usually everyone around me silently shuffles off the train looking miserable, then head en-masse through the ticket gates and disperse to their various workplaces continuing to look miserable and nary a word of how well the morning was fairing is ever spoken from anyone. Mind you it would probably get a bit grating having loads of people say 'good morning' to me every day.
This guy though, probably without a care in the world, had his nicotine and caffeine fixes and was off to go and build stuff, fair play to him! I just wish I could be like that in the morning.
Wednesday, 5 August 2015
Photography #101
This is an example of using a slow shutter speed and water is a great subject matter for this type of photography. Taken at a lovely seaside village called Sennen Cove, I've been there twice for holidays and had a great time there.
Photography #101
Here's another pic of a Long Tailed Tit, I took it from a bird hide at Centre Parcs Longleat... yet another great example via a telephoto lens.
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| Soo cute! |
Is our universe FAKE? Physicists claim we could all be the playthings of an advanced civilisation
Typical Daily Fail article...
However if we are indeed part of a huge video game, then the alien controlling me has probably fallen asleep from sheer boredom...
However if we are indeed part of a huge video game, then the alien controlling me has probably fallen asleep from sheer boredom...
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| Yawn... |
Note to Google...
Stop asking me to add my mobile phone number to my account for so-called security reasons... I know that you only really want to so you can sell it to a bunch of marketeers so they can bother me with unsolicited phone calls.
This is the thing that pissing me off about social media, they just want to be ultra nosey and poke deeper into our lives in order to fine-tune targeted advertising, they couldn't give a fuck about us personally, it's all about making money for the shareholders... we're just cattle to be milked.
That's why I don't go on facebook, Mark Zuckerberg can fuck off.
This is the thing that pissing me off about social media, they just want to be ultra nosey and poke deeper into our lives in order to fine-tune targeted advertising, they couldn't give a fuck about us personally, it's all about making money for the shareholders... we're just cattle to be milked.
That's why I don't go on facebook, Mark Zuckerberg can fuck off.
Saturday, 1 August 2015
A question of immigration...
You know, it's just occurred to me that if I travelled to France right now I wouldn't get in because my passport is out of date, they'd stop me at passport control and strong-arm me back to Blighty.
So my question is this, why the fuck is it so easy for thousands of immigrants to wander into France and cause such chaos in Calais? I mean, if I went to France I would go there with no intention whatsoever of causing trouble yet they would not let me in because of a small piece of documentation that has a past date on it.
Just goes to show how fucked-up this world really is.
Thursday, 30 July 2015
Playing with 3D in Photoshop
Haven't posted for a while due to an insufficient amount of interesting stuff going on my life worthy of posting about... I have, however, been playing with 3D in Photoshop CC:
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| This could be an abstract for an album cover... |
The above render is a mix of two planes perpendicular to each other (to create the walls) and two built-in objects, I deliberately kept it simple because I'm trying to understand how IBLs work. They certainly add an extra amount of realism to a final render. The wall and floor textures are a bit shit but I only quickly added some simple textures in order to see how the IBLs I imported worked on the sphere and doughnut.
Wednesday, 22 July 2015
Planck Temperature
Firstly can I congratulate Max Planck for becoming a massive part of human history with a name like that...
On to the theory, this is taken from Wikipedia:
As for most of Planck units, a Planck temperature of 1 (unity) is a fundamental limit of quantum theory, in combination with gravitation, as presently understood. In other words, the wavelength of an object can be calculated by its temperature. If an object were to reach the temperature of 1.41 x 1032 Kelvin (TP), the radiation it would emit would have a wavelength of 1.616 x 10−26 nanometers (Planck length), at which point quantum gravitational effects become relevant. At temperatures greater than or equal to TP, current physical theory breaks down because we lack a theory of quantum gravity.[2]
Wow, so at a temperature of 142,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 physics breaks down!
So, basically, someone needs to fucking hurry up and understand quantum gravity... count me out, I have difficulty sorting my socks out in the morning.
On to the theory, this is taken from Wikipedia:
As for most of Planck units, a Planck temperature of 1 (unity) is a fundamental limit of quantum theory, in combination with gravitation, as presently understood. In other words, the wavelength of an object can be calculated by its temperature. If an object were to reach the temperature of 1.41 x 1032 Kelvin (TP), the radiation it would emit would have a wavelength of 1.616 x 10−26 nanometers (Planck length), at which point quantum gravitational effects become relevant. At temperatures greater than or equal to TP, current physical theory breaks down because we lack a theory of quantum gravity.[2]
Wow, so at a temperature of 142,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 physics breaks down!
So, basically, someone needs to fucking hurry up and understand quantum gravity... count me out, I have difficulty sorting my socks out in the morning.
Tuesday, 21 July 2015
Interesting Google Search Result
I was bored at work and feeling pretty down so I typed in the following text (in the pic) into Google Search and got some interesting results...
Now I can't decide that the results are based on some very clever SEO or Google's AI-like algorithms... or both.
Now I can't decide that the results are based on some very clever SEO or Google's AI-like algorithms... or both.
Monday, 20 July 2015
Fallout Shelter
I've been playing Fallout Shelter on my smartphone for the past month, kudos to Bethesda for bring out such a cool free little game with no pay-to-win or paywalls in sight.
My vault is coming along nicely:
It's a careful balance between power, food and water, get them well into the green and you have happy dwellers, if not, they get sick and very unhappy! Although it's advisable to get the power room count up because no power = none of the other resource-producing rooms working regardless of how many there are.
Occasionally raiders will attack and this is where, for all you budding Vault admins out there, I offer this advice: upgrade your Vault door to maximum early on because when it is at max it'll take the raiders longer to get in. Giving you time to move your dwellers into the best positions possible to attack them... and believe me, when they get in, they are a pain as they run around randomly all over the place stealing your resources and killing weaker dwellers. Make sure you've got two well armed dwellers with good body armour guarding your Vault door too as they'll slow the raiders down.
Sending dwellers off into the wilderness is useful for getting loot to equip them later on, but make sure they have plenty of health boosts and Radaways so get the medical and science rooms built early. Also if you do send a dweller out, don't forget them, they'll keep going and will eventually be killed, it's so much the being killed that's a pain because you can revive them but for every mile they go they have to head back the same amount and it can potentially take ages for a dweller to return.
Most of all though, don't take it too seriously, as it doesn't seem to me to be the kind of game where you can lose. I just dip into it a couple of times a day, collect resources, level up dwellers, occasionally build a resources room etc. uses up a spare few minutes of the day ;)
My vault is coming along nicely:
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| Where's the loo? |
Occasionally raiders will attack and this is where, for all you budding Vault admins out there, I offer this advice: upgrade your Vault door to maximum early on because when it is at max it'll take the raiders longer to get in. Giving you time to move your dwellers into the best positions possible to attack them... and believe me, when they get in, they are a pain as they run around randomly all over the place stealing your resources and killing weaker dwellers. Make sure you've got two well armed dwellers with good body armour guarding your Vault door too as they'll slow the raiders down.
Sending dwellers off into the wilderness is useful for getting loot to equip them later on, but make sure they have plenty of health boosts and Radaways so get the medical and science rooms built early. Also if you do send a dweller out, don't forget them, they'll keep going and will eventually be killed, it's so much the being killed that's a pain because you can revive them but for every mile they go they have to head back the same amount and it can potentially take ages for a dweller to return.
Most of all though, don't take it too seriously, as it doesn't seem to me to be the kind of game where you can lose. I just dip into it a couple of times a day, collect resources, level up dwellers, occasionally build a resources room etc. uses up a spare few minutes of the day ;)
Childishness in Windows 10
I updated to the latest release of Windows 10, started playing with the new Edge browser and found the annotation feature... couldn't help myself:
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| It's only what millions of others will have done on finding that feature! |
Saturday, 18 July 2015
My new aquarium
I decided to sort out my virtual aquarium project today...
I've been mulling it over for the past few months, I wanted an aquarium but didn't want all the mess involved with transferring the fish, cleaning the tank, water spillage, slime, smells etc.
So I decided to make it virtual instead, which would involve a PC and monitor, I have a spare PC that I can dedicate to running the aquarium, I just needed a monitor.
I have some space on my sideboard in my lounge (which is where I would have placed a real aquarium anyway) however the vertical space above the sideboard is limited as the ceiling angles down towards the sideboard and ends roughly 350mm above it. The horizontal space, however, is much, much longer. This meant that I needed to get a monitor slightly wider than normal and with a fairly low stand so it could sit back against the wall and not touch the sloping ceiling.
I did some shopping around and found that LG produce a 25" 2560x1080 resolution monitor, HDMI with built-in speakers. I also needed a 7.5m HDMI because the PC was nowhere near where the monitor needed to be and I couldn't move it.
So today I set out to purchase either the monitor described above or an equivalent, I didn't want to order it online because I wanted to get on with the project today and didn't want to wait for delivery. Even if I did have it delivered, I didn't want to have to have it delivered to my workplace and have nosey management/coworkers asking me what it was for and I didn't trust an evening delivery service to my home to happen when I'm there (Sod's Law dictating that it would come when I'm still on the train heading home).
So I got to [shudder] PC World...
I wasn't surprised to be informed that they didn't have the LG monitor in stock but the girl serving me said she'd be happy to order it for me. I mentioned that I wanted to sort it out today so I went with a second-best choice, which in the end was a Samsung 25" widescreen TV with HDMI and speakers, it has 1920 x 1080 resolution so not as good as the one I wanted, but I chose it because it was the perfect physical size to fit in that area on the sideboard. I also got a 5m HDMI cable.
The cable isn't long enough but I knew that anyway, it does reach but not enough for it to be properly hidden so, for now, I've fudged it around stuff (I rarely have visitors, so aesthetics don't matter). The TV itself was a doddle to set up and the PC's graphics card (a nVidia GT610 low profile card) is working fine at the TV's max resolution... it's not as good as a native monitor res but it's good enough.
As for the aquarium, I've used serenescreen aquarium, $19 for the full version, it's really good, has a shitton of configurable options for different species of fish, background colours, sound and even personalised logos. To start with, I've gone with 7 Lionfish and they look great! The bubbling sound and visuals are very therapeutic, I found myself sitting there for half-an-hour today just staring at it, in fact, with my medical condition the way it is I think it'll really help in the future. I may even fuck Sky TV off and just sit there and stare at it each evening, or maybe just read my Kindle and enjoy the bubbling sound in the background! It's nice to have alternatives to just staring at TV shows/Films when I get home from a hard day's work.
So my little virtual aquarium project is off and running, whenever I'm home I'll have it there, running in the background to chill me out. It'll 'evolve' over time as this setup is very much version 1.0 right now. In the future I'll probably get a better, more widescreen monitor plus a longer cable longer HDMI cable, plus they may bring out a newer version of the aquarium software too or something better may come along.
Ah, it's these little computer projects that keep me sane... some people collect stamps, or paint model army figures, or collect film memorabilia, I collect computers and try to come up with novel ways to use them!
I've been mulling it over for the past few months, I wanted an aquarium but didn't want all the mess involved with transferring the fish, cleaning the tank, water spillage, slime, smells etc.
So I decided to make it virtual instead, which would involve a PC and monitor, I have a spare PC that I can dedicate to running the aquarium, I just needed a monitor.
I have some space on my sideboard in my lounge (which is where I would have placed a real aquarium anyway) however the vertical space above the sideboard is limited as the ceiling angles down towards the sideboard and ends roughly 350mm above it. The horizontal space, however, is much, much longer. This meant that I needed to get a monitor slightly wider than normal and with a fairly low stand so it could sit back against the wall and not touch the sloping ceiling.
I did some shopping around and found that LG produce a 25" 2560x1080 resolution monitor, HDMI with built-in speakers. I also needed a 7.5m HDMI because the PC was nowhere near where the monitor needed to be and I couldn't move it.
So today I set out to purchase either the monitor described above or an equivalent, I didn't want to order it online because I wanted to get on with the project today and didn't want to wait for delivery. Even if I did have it delivered, I didn't want to have to have it delivered to my workplace and have nosey management/coworkers asking me what it was for and I didn't trust an evening delivery service to my home to happen when I'm there (Sod's Law dictating that it would come when I'm still on the train heading home).
So I got to [shudder] PC World...
I wasn't surprised to be informed that they didn't have the LG monitor in stock but the girl serving me said she'd be happy to order it for me. I mentioned that I wanted to sort it out today so I went with a second-best choice, which in the end was a Samsung 25" widescreen TV with HDMI and speakers, it has 1920 x 1080 resolution so not as good as the one I wanted, but I chose it because it was the perfect physical size to fit in that area on the sideboard. I also got a 5m HDMI cable.
The cable isn't long enough but I knew that anyway, it does reach but not enough for it to be properly hidden so, for now, I've fudged it around stuff (I rarely have visitors, so aesthetics don't matter). The TV itself was a doddle to set up and the PC's graphics card (a nVidia GT610 low profile card) is working fine at the TV's max resolution... it's not as good as a native monitor res but it's good enough.
As for the aquarium, I've used serenescreen aquarium, $19 for the full version, it's really good, has a shitton of configurable options for different species of fish, background colours, sound and even personalised logos. To start with, I've gone with 7 Lionfish and they look great! The bubbling sound and visuals are very therapeutic, I found myself sitting there for half-an-hour today just staring at it, in fact, with my medical condition the way it is I think it'll really help in the future. I may even fuck Sky TV off and just sit there and stare at it each evening, or maybe just read my Kindle and enjoy the bubbling sound in the background! It's nice to have alternatives to just staring at TV shows/Films when I get home from a hard day's work.
So my little virtual aquarium project is off and running, whenever I'm home I'll have it there, running in the background to chill me out. It'll 'evolve' over time as this setup is very much version 1.0 right now. In the future I'll probably get a better, more widescreen monitor plus a longer cable longer HDMI cable, plus they may bring out a newer version of the aquarium software too or something better may come along.
Ah, it's these little computer projects that keep me sane... some people collect stamps, or paint model army figures, or collect film memorabilia, I collect computers and try to come up with novel ways to use them!
Thursday, 16 July 2015
Photography #101
Just try to not feel chilled out whilst looking at this ;)
I always try to get a few pics like these, they're always an interesting mix of contrast, colours and depth.
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| So tranquil! |
I always try to get a few pics like these, they're always an interesting mix of contrast, colours and depth.
Photography #101
Below is a picture of a Red Admiral butterfly I took whilst out on one of my jaunts, my camera saves the pics in RAW format by default... I prefer RAW format because it means the pic is saved with none of the manufacturer's processing and filtering junk.
The other good reason for using it is being able to parse it through Photoshop's RAW filter, if you spend the extra time with it's colour controls it can make a hell of a difference:
The other good reason for using it is being able to parse it through Photoshop's RAW filter, if you spend the extra time with it's colour controls it can make a hell of a difference:
Wednesday, 15 July 2015
Tuesday, 14 July 2015
Hellooo Pluto!
This is the closest ever photo of Pluto, courtesy of the New Horizons probe:
Well done to all the NASA bods for their hard work in getting this photo... nine years in the making! It's funny to think that, if humanity progresses it's collective tech as scheduled (and we don't destroy each other with said tech) probably in a 100 years' time getting a photo like that will be much quicker. Probably involve a quick jaunt over to Pluto in one's local space skimmer, take the pic with some sort of cyborg-ish Microsoft built ocular implant that will immediately upload it to the galactic Facebook wall, via Google's neural net.
Well done to all the NASA bods for their hard work in getting this photo... nine years in the making! It's funny to think that, if humanity progresses it's collective tech as scheduled (and we don't destroy each other with said tech) probably in a 100 years' time getting a photo like that will be much quicker. Probably involve a quick jaunt over to Pluto in one's local space skimmer, take the pic with some sort of cyborg-ish Microsoft built ocular implant that will immediately upload it to the galactic Facebook wall, via Google's neural net.
Monday, 13 July 2015
Microsoft Fail
My Xbox One Kinect sensor has been acting up, suspiciously around when the warranty for it ended.
Thanks Microsoft, thanks a lot.
Thanks Microsoft, thanks a lot.
Tuesday, 7 July 2015
World of Tanks Update
Last weekend (Sunday actually) I spent a fair few hours playing World of Tanks (Xbox 360 version)... I've now acquired a Tier 7 Heavy - a Black Prince to be precise.
Although I'm reluctant to ditch my Churchill Mark IV as it's been a joy to fight... I've even gone as far as to choose a completely new crew for my Black Prince as I wanted to crew on my Churchill IV to continue to level up in it as I'll be playing it between Black Prince matches (for when I get pwned early and can't arsed to wait for the battle to finish).
So onwards and upwards... can't wait for it to come out on the Xbox One... w00t!
Although I'm reluctant to ditch my Churchill Mark IV as it's been a joy to fight... I've even gone as far as to choose a completely new crew for my Black Prince as I wanted to crew on my Churchill IV to continue to level up in it as I'll be playing it between Black Prince matches (for when I get pwned early and can't arsed to wait for the battle to finish).
So onwards and upwards... can't wait for it to come out on the Xbox One... w00t!
Google Neural Network
The bods at Google Chocolate Factory have been tinkering (as usual) and have created some sort of neural network... at least that's what we think they've done. The side-effect of this supposed 'self-learning' network is that it creates some pretty trippy images from image content these Google bods added... and they've now released the source code.
Trouble is, all the normal folk on the web have no fucking idea on what's required to get it up and running.
It appears that you have to install Python, a whole bunch of dependencies, add a few drops of the tears of a unicorn and voila! You have a partially functioning command line based 'thing' that only an advanced alien species would understand.
I took a look at it because from a graphic designer's point of view the art produced from it looked awesome. Shame really as I was looking forward to putting a few of my images through it to see what it would make of them...
The picture below shows a post that pretty-much sums up what people have been wanting to say in response to Google's source code release of deep dream.
Things I hate...
We have all acquired pet hates as we shuffle through life, these are mine:
Littering
Bad Manners
Ad breaks
Hip Hop/Rap Music
BMW Drivers
Reality TV
Celery
People walking behind me
Sunburn
The words said to me: "I know you're busy, but..."
Littering
Bad Manners
Ad breaks
Hip Hop/Rap Music
BMW Drivers
Reality TV
Celery
People walking behind me
Sunburn
The words said to me: "I know you're busy, but..."
Friday, 3 July 2015
Damned Stomach...
Despite it being Friday, it didn't start well...
I thought I'd come into work early as I'd got a complex vehicle wrap to work out (crap artwork that I had to pick apart to get printable), the previous evening I had what I thought was a reasonably healthy evening meal - some risotto 'vegetarian friendly' mushrooms (nuked in the oven) with some green, yellow and red peppers with some cold pre-cooked barbecue style chicken.
However around 2am Friday morning my stomach disagreed...
Two visits to the toilet in the early hours and one after I'd got up around 5am meant that my digestive system was dictating things for when I began my walk-train-walk to work.
By the time I was within sight of where I work I was struggling to avoid a potential disaster in my nether regions and the last few metres required a waddle-style dash, a struggle to unlock the front door and a further dash to the waiting arms of the works' toilet, just as I sat down heavily my arse exploded.
Not good, not good at all...
I think if I'd have had a greasy kebab instead of my 'good intentions' healthy meal I'd have been skipping to work instead of a sweaty mad dash to avoid soiling my pants.
I thought I'd come into work early as I'd got a complex vehicle wrap to work out (crap artwork that I had to pick apart to get printable), the previous evening I had what I thought was a reasonably healthy evening meal - some risotto 'vegetarian friendly' mushrooms (nuked in the oven) with some green, yellow and red peppers with some cold pre-cooked barbecue style chicken.
However around 2am Friday morning my stomach disagreed...
Two visits to the toilet in the early hours and one after I'd got up around 5am meant that my digestive system was dictating things for when I began my walk-train-walk to work.
By the time I was within sight of where I work I was struggling to avoid a potential disaster in my nether regions and the last few metres required a waddle-style dash, a struggle to unlock the front door and a further dash to the waiting arms of the works' toilet, just as I sat down heavily my arse exploded.
Not good, not good at all...
I think if I'd have had a greasy kebab instead of my 'good intentions' healthy meal I'd have been skipping to work instead of a sweaty mad dash to avoid soiling my pants.
Thursday, 2 July 2015
A big 'Well Done' to our England lasses!
I feel really sorry for poor old Laura Bassett... that own goal was a bad way to end a great tournament for us, however stuff like that happens and she'll get over it.
Laura, you and your teammates have done our country proud in this World Cup.
Now our men's national team need to forget about how much cash they're earning and step up...
Laura, you and your teammates have done our country proud in this World Cup.
Now our men's national team need to forget about how much cash they're earning and step up...
Monday, 29 June 2015
Things I look forward to in life...
You know it says something about my life when I consider the high point of my working day is purchasing a bottle of Orange Lucozade then sitting at the station reading my Kindle whilst waiting for my train home...
Must be the Star Wars novels I'm reading.
Must be the Star Wars novels I'm reading.
Sunday, 28 June 2015
Boating Trip #2
After Friday night's snarl up in traffic my day-trip around Poole harbour more than made up for the inconvenience... on a bright sunny morning we headed to the marina and boarded Dad's boat - a Jeanneau Merry Fisher 365. He bought it after selling his Jeanneau Sundance 36 about a year ago and hasn't had a proper go out in it yet, this was where I came in insisting that he and I take it out in the summer for a good going over!
As the boat is moored in Holes Bay we had to go under two bridges in order to get out into Poole Bay itself... one of them is newly built and an impressive bit of engineering:
We also went past the Sunseeker factory:
Once through the bridges and past Poole Quay our plan was to head around Brownsea Island using a channel that we haven't used in a long time, so long in fact, that Dad and his mate Roy (who came along for the trip) couldn't remember the channel marker positions, and they are both veterans of sailing around Poole harbour! Said channel took us onto the 'Wash Channel' which leads out past the Chain Ferry and into Bournemouth Bay, Dad opened her up and we headed out about halfway then turned around and made our way back into the harbour and headed for the channel to took us to Wareham.
Wareham is a quaint little village that sits on the River Frome, getting to it is via a circuitous up-river route that few deep draft boats can do. Fortunately our boat only draws roughly a foot and good thing too because we went aground slightly as we approached Wareham quayside and that was with a fairly normal Neaps low tide! Anyway we made to the quayside, tied-up and did what pretty much every boat-owning person does at the end of trip - we went to the pub!
After several pints we thought we'd best head back so off we went...
By late afternoon we made it back under the bridges and into the marina... then we headed off for some much needed beer and meal... all in all a darned good day of boating and I even managed to avoid bad sunburn!
As the boat is moored in Holes Bay we had to go under two bridges in order to get out into Poole Bay itself... one of them is newly built and an impressive bit of engineering:
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| The bridge is split diagonally and as they come down they fit together... clever! |
We also went past the Sunseeker factory:
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| Some lucky rich git's bought one of those... |
Wareham is a quaint little village that sits on the River Frome, getting to it is via a circuitous up-river route that few deep draft boats can do. Fortunately our boat only draws roughly a foot and good thing too because we went aground slightly as we approached Wareham quayside and that was with a fairly normal Neaps low tide! Anyway we made to the quayside, tied-up and did what pretty much every boat-owning person does at the end of trip - we went to the pub!
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| I love pubs by rivers ;) |
After several pints we thought we'd best head back so off we went...
Once we were off the River Frome and out into the harbour we tried out the Merry Fisher's engine in an area that allows speeding (most of the harbour has a 6 knot speed restriction). The best we got was 14.1 knots but Dad reckons it'll be a bit faster once the hull has been cleaned and new anti-foul added.
By late afternoon we made it back under the bridges and into the marina... then we headed off for some much needed beer and meal... all in all a darned good day of boating and I even managed to avoid bad sunburn!
Saturday, 27 June 2015
Boating Trip #1
Well my trip down to Poole started badly when I got stuck in horrific traffic on the M40 which had been caused by two lanes being closed. It was so bad I was using my handbrake a lot and several times contemplated switching the engine off.
A two hour trip turned into a five hour trip, this is the 21st century ffs!
Still, after getting through the jam and after a couple of hours driving I was treated to a glorious incandescent sunset after driving through a rain shower.
Arrived at my dad's place tired but happy, now for a weekend of sea, sun, sunburn and beer!
A two hour trip turned into a five hour trip, this is the 21st century ffs!
Still, after getting through the jam and after a couple of hours driving I was treated to a glorious incandescent sunset after driving through a rain shower.
Arrived at my dad's place tired but happy, now for a weekend of sea, sun, sunburn and beer!
Friday, 26 June 2015
Off the Grid
I haven't posted for a while because, quite simply, I haven't done anything worthwhile posting about... my life isn't exactly a walk on the wild side, it's more like a slow, shuffling pace by some begonias.
Anyway, I am off to do something interesting this weekend - I'm heading down to Poole and am going out around Poole harbour with my Dad in his boat... pics to follow.
Anyway, I am off to do something interesting this weekend - I'm heading down to Poole and am going out around Poole harbour with my Dad in his boat... pics to follow.
Tuesday, 16 June 2015
Game of Thrones plot revealed… FFS!
Once again, an important plot point to an episode of Game of Thrones has been revealed to me before I've had a chance to watch the darned episode!
I'm sick and tired of these retarded journalists posting articles about the show literally less than a day after it was aired!
Can't you all find something else newsworthy to write about and stop thinking that all 9 billion of us have seen the latest episode?
Also - to Google, can you possibly put something in your much vaunted algorithms that either blocks a news article about TV episodes from appearing or at least append something like SPOILERS ALERT over the snippet text?
Really fucking ruined it for me now, I don't feel like watching that last episode.
Thanks a lot Daily Telegraph, I appreciate it (NOT).
I'm sick and tired of these retarded journalists posting articles about the show literally less than a day after it was aired!
Can't you all find something else newsworthy to write about and stop thinking that all 9 billion of us have seen the latest episode?
Also - to Google, can you possibly put something in your much vaunted algorithms that either blocks a news article about TV episodes from appearing or at least append something like SPOILERS ALERT over the snippet text?
Really fucking ruined it for me now, I don't feel like watching that last episode.
Thanks a lot Daily Telegraph, I appreciate it (NOT).
Friday, 12 June 2015
A Little Piece of History
When people talk about history it's usually stuff like what Richard III liked to read when he was taking a shit, or fossils purporting to be from some bigass dinosaur… you know, stuff that only revered historians or palaeontologists talk about, not really the stuff that plebs like you or myself can ever know or understand.
However what I found whilst rooting around some drawers at work the other day is a little piece of history that CAN be related to and understood by most people, well, people who grew up in the 80's at least - a Betamax video cassette! Now this is a relic that can be held by someone from the 80's and bring back a flood of memories (fond or not).
Of course I nor anyone else at my workplace has a Betamax player so we can only guess as to what's on it, probably nothing juicy though considering what we do for a living but I'm tempted to get one so I can see what's on it!
However what I found whilst rooting around some drawers at work the other day is a little piece of history that CAN be related to and understood by most people, well, people who grew up in the 80's at least - a Betamax video cassette! Now this is a relic that can be held by someone from the 80's and bring back a flood of memories (fond or not).
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| I think it's safe to say it hasn't got JLaw's tits recorded on it... |
Of course I nor anyone else at my workplace has a Betamax player so we can only guess as to what's on it, probably nothing juicy though considering what we do for a living but I'm tempted to get one so I can see what's on it!
Thursday, 11 June 2015
RIP Christopher Lee
You were one of the best, scaring the shit out of me during my younger days watching Hammer House Horrors, right up to my adult life spellbinding me as the deliciously evil Saruman in LOTR.
Plus a special mention for your role in The Wicker Man, you made a creepy film even creepier!
Rest in Peace, Britain has lost one of it's national treasures.
Monday, 8 June 2015
Women's World Cup
England v France tomorrow, 6pm on BBC1... I'm looking forward to it :)
Go Lionesses!!
They seem pretty confident and I'm hoping that they'll outshine the lacklustre performance our male team turned out in the last World Cup.
Go Lionesses!!
They seem pretty confident and I'm hoping that they'll outshine the lacklustre performance our male team turned out in the last World Cup.
Sunday, 7 June 2015
Reign of Kings
I had a very productive weekend on RoK, I found a nice server with no-one one, not that I'd purposely looked for an unpopulated server as I thought that someone would turn-up at some point. As it turned out no-one came on for all the time I was playing, that meant I had access to all the resources on the server... built myself a nice sturdy, secure castle that should be a challenge for anyone looking to do any offline raiding.
Of course, who am I kidding? No matter how secure I make it, they will find a way but that's the nature of the game unfortunately... I'll see how it goes next time I log-in.
Of course, who am I kidding? No matter how secure I make it, they will find a way but that's the nature of the game unfortunately... I'll see how it goes next time I log-in.
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| Ooh Trees! |
Listening to the radio in my car... hnnnggg!!
I was on my way to Tesco in the car and was listening to Heart FM on the radio, Emma Bunton was talking about taking her bra off at the end of a long hard day...
I'm sorry but I simply couldn't get that thought out of my mind.
I'm sorry but I simply couldn't get that thought out of my mind.
My annual walk home
Last Friday I did my annual walk home... 10 miles of pavement pounding and crossing roads loaded with heavy traffic, clearly not a dream walk through sun streamed forest glades overplayed with a feel good soundtrack we all see on TV. I aways do it to get an idea of where my fitness is going for the year. I split it onto eight sections and this is how they played out:
Section 1: Start out, feel good, this section is roughly the same distance I walk to the station so all good.
Section 2: My right shoulder is aching a bit against my rucksack strap, hmm, worrying, still got a good 7-8 miles to go.
Section 3: This section is a little bit treacherous because during part of it I have to walk along a thin grassy stretch alongside a very busy dual carriageway, said stretch turns into a very thin (one person width) bit of pavement with a brick wall on the left and the road on the right. Fortunately this bit of pavement leads up to a pedestrian crossing and a roundabout which, in theory at least, forces drivers to slow down, anyway I made it without falling into the road and becoming road kill.
Section 4: I'm sweating profusely now and I have a long hill to walk up, knees are beginning to sing now, almost to the top of the hill and an Irish guy asks me for directions, I don't want to stop and lose momentum but neither do I want to be impolite so I help him with his directions and painfully get going again.
Section 5: A water break, ahh soo good! Putting my backpack back on is uncomfortable because it presses my now cooled sweaty t-shirt against my back! Lower back is also showing signs of soreness, I grit my teeth and press on.
Section 6: I am now officially hallucinating due to tiredness and the heat, I start thinking random thoughts - work, home, what's for dinner. Shoulder still aching, knees singing a tune... I walk past several takeaway joints and suppress the urge to go in.
Section 7: This section is a killer, it's sort's the men from the boys, or possibly turns men into boys - bawling, crying baby boys when they see the double hill ahead of them, especially after the distance they've just walked. For me, it's a tightening of the rucksack straps, gritting of the teeth and a mental "COME ON" yelled from the tired recesses of my mind. People in cars are looking at me funny.
I stop to rummage through my rucksack to find my keys, the reason why I do this is because it's been bugging me for the last few miles that my keys are somewhere at the bottom of the rucksack and I just know that Sod's Law will make it extremely hard for me to find them when I arrive home... I simply can't have that happen. This is the way a fatigued mind works after 9 miles of solid walking... I find my keys and put them in the side pocket, I feel better.
Section 8: Ahh, made it! This section is a blessed flat wonderland with a slight downhill section to massage my tired limbs, it's also the home stretch. There's a carnival in my home town and lots of people about, I keep my head down and walk through them, single-mindedly on course to home and the bliss of my couch and TV... I get a few strange looks. I arrive home, tired but exulted and I've done it for another year, my shins, knees and feet hurt! Still, that's why I do it on a Friday so I've got the weekend to recover.
I did it in 2 hours 51 minutes and, boy was it painful towards the end!
Monday, 1 June 2015
Photography #101
I took this one, again, with my telephoto lens, it was from a bird hide at a RSPCA sanctuary in Norfolk.
I used sport mode to better capture the birds' speed of movement as they kept randomly flying off, I did well to get four in one go!!
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| Chaffinch's and Tits galore! |
Photography #101
About time I posted some photography, my last load of entries have been me moaning and drunk-posting...
I took this using my telephoto zoom lens using automatic settings, yes I know, very lazy, but sometimes when you're capturing the unpredictability of nature, speed is of the essence!
I took this using my telephoto zoom lens using automatic settings, yes I know, very lazy, but sometimes when you're capturing the unpredictability of nature, speed is of the essence!
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| A ladybird, yesterday. |
National train strike postponed...
Being as though this Thursday's train strike has been postponed, I have decided to postpone my planned rant about it including calling the union bosses arseholes...
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