Had a lovely few beers down the Lass o Gowrie in Manchester with Stewart Stansfield and Martin Smart last night. Lots of real ale and a lovely bowl of chips and vegie burger. Outstanding. Talked mucho nonsense about roleplaying and history, Stew a History PHD student soon, and some bollocks about politics (started by Martin who doesn’t like my “they’re all a shower of bastards, I won’t vote for any of the feckers” approach”). A pleasant evening, it was weird to get back on the train at 8:30 and come all the way back to Leeds. A taste of nights out to come and a much needed break from nights in alone.

mmmm coffee mmmm coding mmm feta cheese sandwich mmm beers in evening..

Life tis good

I’m currently sitting on our School communications group review commitee. I work at the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Social work at Manchester University as School Web Developer.

The commitee is looking at communications within large organisations. So far they’ve only looked at Manchester Metropolitan Police’ communications toolkit. Basically what this is a set of simple guidelines, How to use email, when to organise a meeting etc. I was wondering if the DOH has ever produced such as set of guidelines, and if so if someone could send me a copy? (newtus AT ntlworld DOT com).

An idea nicked and modified from itsjustaname‘s post which reviewed her year by taking the first paragraph of her first post for each month.

Ladies and Gentleferks, I present to you

My condensed Live Journal

“Computer games don’t affect kids,
I mean if Pac-man affected us as kids, we’d all be running around in darkened rooms, munching pills and listening to repetitive music.”

Feeling yuck again, but I suppose I could have it worse. Combination of poor diet and lack of sleep still getting me down.

Things have taken a turn for the worse with Rach’s Grandma. Apparently she’s not being fed properly at the hospital she’s at. They have an automated menu system, were you put a vertical line in a box next to the meal you want on a menu form. Well Ethel doesn’t understand that and also keeps on missing the box (she has arthritis in her hands). She then ends up missing meals. And when something comes up it is less than appetising. All this makes me several shades of angry and sad at a system that lets our old people rot in hospital. Rach has gone over to her parents until Thursday so she can visit her.

Work continues to be a grind, but gradually getting there. Potentially an exciting web programming project in the new year. Watch this space sports fans.

Not sure what to do tonight, got the chance to go rpging playing Cthulhu Rising, but feel that hibernating at home may be a better option.

Last night I decided to take a break from playing my usual first person shooter games and try a different type of computer game. This resulted in one of the most humiliating gaming experiences of my entire life!

Ladies and Gentlemen I present…

“Why I shouldn’t be allowed to play the Sims“

So another chapter of my exciting life begins to unfold. Finally beaten off the dark cloud of depression that has held me in its thrall for the last week or so. A good session of chilling out with beers and Men shouting over loud guitars, specifically my favourite punk band ever Fear (which is a tad worrying) and Fudge Tunnel’s “Complicated Futility of Ignorance”, which both fitted my mood perfectly. “Have a beer with Fear”? Well yes I did and most pleasant. As keefybabe used to say “The Terror never ends, it just stops for a pint once in a while”.

Rachel is now off nights until Sunday, which is joyous, and I’ve broken the back of work with my big project now easily achievable instead of a humiliating disgrace. However I’m exhausted so apologies to bitvacuous & dr_misrule but I won’t be joining you at The Damned this evening as previously advertised. Instead I shall be gently geeking out at home after a nice home made tea packed with lots of fresh vegetables (vegetable biryani seems a good choice here).

Currently working from my warm home, steeling myself to go out into the great cold outdoors to stock up on provisions just after lunch. Stripping down an old PHP/Mysql website I wrote yonks ago which was in itself based on the dynamic site I wrote for my MSc almost five years ago!! The idea being that I’ll have a very simple CMS that I can use for a site at work and for my own personal web pages. If I get it robust enough I’ll make it available for download. But then again……

I had a wonderful moment on the train home yesterday. For half an hour I slept peacefully. It was a good sign for the coming sleep in the evening. My head touched the pillow and without tossing or turning dropped off.

The only problem was that I haven’t woken up properly . Worshipped at the altar of Coffee on the way in, and boy was the communion intense. Kinda sleep walking my way through work, occasionally grumping about this issue or that (my milk of human kindness is low today).

Tonight I’m going to have a rest full evening and make a deliberate point of not switching the PC.

Back to my perky self this morning. Noticeably better humoured for sure. Some residues of grumpiness, but rapidly being replaced by an almost giddy sensation.

Off to a wedding this weekend. A course mate of Rach’s is getting married in Oldham this Saturday and we’ve been invited to the evening do. So off into town today I marched to get a present. It struck me as I manfully strode through the crowded streets of Manchester that this is going to be hell on earth in a couple of weeks. therefore tomorrow war is declared on Christmas shopping. It will be a brief and brutal campaign, with presents successfully located and purchased.

As they say “It will be all over by Christmas!”