A tale of a Scotsman living in SW london...

Saturday, December 13, 2008

Why is it that you plan to buy a smaller Christmas tree than the year before, and yet when you actually get there you decide to buy one that is much bigger than you'd planned? It's currently drying out in the hallway, ready to be installed in the lounge tomorrow morning.

We need to venture out in the wilds tonight (literally!) to our friends in Kent to are having a Champagne party. Fortunately, our friends who live near us have decided to drive, so we'll get a lift home. Always nice ;-)

Thursday, December 11, 2008

We've been getting very good at late at planning the shopping we need so we minimize the lack waste food we have. It takes a lot of effort to do it while managing two homes (one for the project, one we own) but it's satisfying to do it, plus it means your less likely to weaken and get a takeaway!

Heading home today, which is always welcome. It's been a long week away from home this week, even taking into account that we have a cottage we stay in during the week, but there is nothing like your own bed. Only downside will be the ever present traffic on the M25 on the drive home, but you can't have everything.

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

Another day, another bun fight. Fortunately, I wasn't in this meeting, and I really appreciate the team here and the work they've done around it to keep me out of it!

It seems though, that my time here is almost at an end. It will be a shame to go, I've made some good friends and the work is interesting. However, this is an absolutely horrible time to change projects as nobody is doing anything in December, so that's probably next years utilization screwed before it's even begun. Deep joy.

What with everything else that's going on just now, it doesn't exactly leave me in the happiest place, but there you go - that's the so called joy of services work. You do the job, your expendable. You go into this with your eyes open though so you know it can and will happen, but after 3 years it still smarts a bit.

Monday, December 08, 2008

One of the joys of using Firefox is the add-ons you can get. There are lots of clever ones out there, but one I really like is called property-bee. Now, if your not buying or selling a house just now, this will not interest you very much, however what you do is install the little add-on and then visit rightmove, which is the biggest property website going. The little add-on is viewed in the left hand toolbar, and shows you all the details of the property listed with the changes that have happened to them, such as when it went on, what has changed in the description, and most importantly, the differences in the prices between when it went on and what it's at now. This is vital information in the current market!

At the very least, it's interesting to see which massive 5 bedroom pile has lost the most money ;-)

Sunday, December 07, 2008

I've recently discovered, via the medium of the Freeview box, BBC 6 Music. Now, I like listening to radio, you don't have a choice when you spend a s much time in the car as I do! So, Radio 1, 2, 4 and XFM (when in London) all get listened to. However 6 Music is different to all of them. They play superb music, I'm listening to it now and it's all 70's and 80's classic (good classic stuff!) like the Clash, The Beat, Elastica and the like. Awesome stuff. Now, I've not listened to it during the week, but will definitely give it a try.

The other music source I discovered was Last.FM. You type in the type of music you want to listen to, or an artist, and it streams similar stuff to you. Some are better than others, but overall, very good - essential when you forget your ipod in the office! You can also "scrobble" music when you sync your ipod, so it learns the type of stuff you've been listening to and plays tracks your more likely to like. Impressive stuff, and the best bit? It's all free ;-)

You have to love the internet!