02.27.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 9:45 am by GaZ
There will be delays in my oh-so-regular blogging service this week, as I’m off down to Camberley to study on Sun’s SL-314 (”Web Component Development With Servlet and JSP™ Technologies“) course. The course syllabus looks quite interesting after the first couple of modules, so maybe now i’ll finally get an idea of what the hell i’m doing at work 
I’ve got a company car for the week, so one of the other recent-graduates and I are driving south this evening.
Hanne and I have also decided to move out of this apartment. We’ve decided we don’t need a place this big for just the two of us, so we might as well get a 1-bedroom place and save some money. It’s gonna be a nightmare to pack and unpack everything again so soon, but it’s for the best. As long as the new place has a balcony i’ll be happy.
Right, i’d better go pack my stuff for this week. I have no idea what the dress code is, so i’m just gonna turn up in my loudest bermuda shirt, surfer shorts, and a big rainbow wig, and take it from there.
PS Now Hanne’s the one that’s caught “the bug” so she’s coughing and sneezing all over the place. Bleh.
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02.21.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 5:27 pm by GaZ
Just Gizoogle it, ma nizzle.
PS Forget what I said last week about no training. Looks like I spoke too soon, coz i’m off to London next week, fo’ rizzle.
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02.20.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 6:48 pm by GaZ
Bleh… estimates for our car repairs have come back at around £250… i’m sure glad we don’t have to pay for it, as we’ve got enough financial worries.
We might be moving to a smaller apartment in the near future… the second bedroom here is mostly going to waste so we might as well move out and pay less.
Anyway, have a go at the Hapland puzzle… once you figure out what everything does it’s easy enough to put it all in order, but it’s still quite clever!
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02.17.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 8:26 pm by GaZ
…is unluckier than any Friday the 13th i’ve ever experienced!
First off, during work I found out i’m probably not going to go on the J2EE training course I was hoping for… not just that, but ANY external training in the near future! Looks like it’s crappy, old C.B.T. manuals for the time-being.
Secondly, during our regular Thursday evening football session I, and the others on my team, played abysmally, and got to a point where it was about 25 - 3 to the other team. The humiliation was only cut short by the fact that my mentor, Ian, took a nasty spill and injured himself quite badly around the shoulder/collarbone area, forcing him to go off to hospital.
Then, worst of all (at least from a completely selfish perspective) SOMEONE RAN INTO OUR CAR!!!!! Our precious Kia has been blemished with a large (relative to the size of the car) dent in the bumper! BAH! The foolish woman driver (of COURSE it was a woman) was trying to pull out from behind while Hanne was waiting at a roundabout, but she (the other woman) didn’t leave enough room and went straight into ol’ PVR. Phooie. So this weekend we’re off to get a guesstimate as to how much it’s gonna hurt the womans wallet (she didn’t want to go through the insurance companies unless the cost is rather high).
Then again, 17/02 isn’t all bad… it’s ‘APPEH BUFFDEH over at Chez Hesam! Have a good one mate!
And other good news: my grandfather is coming along ok and is (slowly) recovering and getting some strength back! rah!
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02.12.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 6:20 pm by GaZ
Well, you certainly get what you pay for… although our 8Mb service has been officially active for about 3 weeks now, for almost a week out of that (several separate occasions, not a one continuous week) we’ve had connection problems and speed issues…. but it’s free, and when it does work it’s much faster than a crappy old 1Mbit…. pah
Recently in the news there’s been talk of NTL having plans to launch a 100Mbit service sometime in the not-too-distant future, using their nation-wide fibreoptic network. BT and AOL have also recently upgraded their 1Mb customers to 2Mb for free, so it’s good to see some progress in the UK broadband market. Hopefully sometime this year we’ll also see the launch of ADSL2, with speeds of up to 20Mb!
In security news, some guys at work came across an article about specially-formed URLs that use alternative letters to the traditional alphabet to fool the user into thinking they’re on a different site. The URL in the given example uses an “a” from the cyrillic alphabet, which looks practically identical to a normal “a”. So don’t go clicking on URLs from any e-mails you receive claiming to be from your bank/paypal/whoever! Actually these urls didn’t seem to work in IE… probably because it just can’t handle the funny character codes.
The team over at Mozilla working on the Sunbird project have recently released the first official release. I’ve been looking for ages for a decent open-source alternative to the Outlook calendar, and because Sunbird is based on the Gecko engine (as is Firefox and Thunderbird) there’ll be plugins and custom skins galore to provide all sorts of additional functionality. One of the best functions already built in to Sunbird is the ability to subscribe and publish to public calendars, such as those over at iCalShare.com. Sure, this isn’t a new idea or anything, especially for Mac-heads, but it’s cool.
I’ve also started work on some of my New Years determinations… last week I found out there’s a language centre just down the road that does classes for over 30 different languages (including Welsh and Norwegian) for a very reasonable price! Unfortunately the classes all start around September and run through to the following May/June, so I’ll have to wait a few months before I can start. Also, I’m participating with some guys from work in a charity event on Monday to raise money for the British Heart Foundation. It’s only a short relay, but i’ll just start with a small event then work my way up to bigger stuff.
Finally, a story about how monkeys use their hard-earned bananas. Those dirty little monkeys.
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02.07.05
Posted in Uncategorized at 8:49 pm by GaZ
Yeah, it’s been a while since the last post, but I haven’t really been in the mood to write anything lately. I think that formula that everyone was on about a while back, while maybe not exactly correct about the day, has a point for this time of year. But there’s more to the gloom than just that…
Towards the end of last year, when my grandparents came down to Birmingham to visit Hanne and me, I noted that my grandfather wasn’t in the best of health… at the time I presumed it wasn’t too big a deal, and it would eventually pass, however I soon found out how wrong I was. His health continued to deteriorate rapidly, and it turned out that he had suffered from kidney failure. As a result, mum made the decision to come over to Wales just before Christmas (the very day my brother flew out there, actually) to provide support. To add to the misery, Taid (my grandfather) has now been diagnosed with myeloma, a form of cancer which affects the bones. The doctors can’t give a strong-enough dose of chemotherapy because he has a weak heart and because of the kidney failure, so it’s just a matter of hoping the steroids they’re giving him will kick start the kidneys and somehow slow the cell growth. Coincidentally, there was a story on the news the other morning about the benefits of holistic therapy and alternative medicine, especially with regards to cancer treatment… I’d say anything is worth trying once, even if it’s all in the eye of the beholder. Many studies have been performed to investigate the so-called “placebo effect,” with mixed results, though from my own brief research i’d say the general opinion is that there’s something to it…
Currently the situation is relatively stable. Taid is in hospital, and from what I gather through the grapevine from Wales he’s relatively ok. At least at the hospital he can receive anything he requires immediately, and there’s always a nurse at hand. Hopefully things will somehow pick up a little.
Anyway, i’ve been sitting here writing and re-writing this entry for ages now, so i’ll just leave it as is. Spare a prayer/thought for my grandfather if you get the chance. Thanks.
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