Kilimanjaro

With the charity climb of Kilimanjaro being in the news at the moment, I was  reminded me of the climd I did back in 2000. So, here is the original text account from a web site that never happened.

 

Background

For at least the last five years I have threatened my mates with the ultimate holiday to end the millennium. Usually during a session in the pub, after a couple of pints, I would say that in the summer of 2000 we would climb Kilimanjaro and then go on safari. This has always been met with replies of, “yeah, yeah, your round isn’t it?”

Summer ’99 arrived and various problems with people having no money and no commitment meant I went to America by myself for 3 weeks, and returned determined to sort out the next holiday earlier and better. Over the Christmas period I got the chance to speak to everyone again, and put it to them. Again there was not a lot of commitment, but I think they were beginning to realise I was serious!

The 8^th of January 2000 saw me walk into Thomas Cook and put forward what must be one of the strangest requests for holiday they have had. I had done my research, and not only did I want to climb Kilimanjaro, I wanted to climb the Machame route; then I wanted to go on a specific safari. Strangely you cannot book the holiday I wanted out of a brochure! After a lot of searching through brochures we found the safari I wanted for a reasonable price with Hayes and Jarvis. While the travel agent phoned the company I continued looking through the brochure. On about the next page a small paragraph caught my eye, ‘Kilimanjaro – The Machame Route’!

The paragraph stated that you need to be fit, but the rewards were worth it because, as I knew, the Marangu route could be crowded, and was generally too quick an ascent anyway. It included a phone number, and nothing more! As we were only on hold to Hayes and Jarvis I interrupted the travel agent, and showed the paragraph to her. We immediately phoned the number. After literally 50 minutes of hold music we got through, made some enquiries, and I was ready to go back to my mates!

Out of the 4 people I wanted to go up the mountain with me, 2 said yes. The other 2 begged off for poncy reasons like work commitments, and lack of money!

The 13^th of January 2000 the holiday was booked, and the deposit paid. We were going to Africa!

Build up

If you want to do a holiday like this, then plan early! There are a number of hassles. For a start you need to be immunized against the following:

Hepatitis A

Polio

Tetanus

Typhoid

Yellow Fever

You also need anti malaria tablets, and because the mosquitoes in Africa are some kind of super mosquito you need to take Larium.

You also need a visa to get into Tanzania (at the time of booking you also needed one for Kenya, but they abolished that soon afterwards (they knew I was coming!)).

The currency in Kenya is Kenyan shillings, and in Tanzania is Tanzanian shillings. At the time of booking you could not export either currency out of the country. Closer to the departure time you could get Kenyan shillings, but were still not allowed Tanzanian Shillings.

We sorted our visas out through the visaservice for about £34 per visa. At the same time we made sure our passports were up to date. You must have a valid passport (obviously), but it must still be valid for six months after you return!

As we have walked for years there was not much to get in the way of kit, but a new sleeping bag was purchased, as well as a few items of clothing.

We were as ready as we were ever going to be, and eagerly looking forward to Saturday the 26^th of August.

Day 1

I woke on Saturday morning at about 08:00 having been to an office party the night before. No hangover thankfully! I kicked one of my workmates who had stayed the night out of the house and packed my final items of luggage. For some reason I looked at the plane tickets. Two of us were due to travel to the airport by car from Chester to, I thought, Gatwick airport. The other traveller was coming by plane from Aberdeen, and was to meet us in London. When I looked at the tickets I realized we were due to fly out of Heathrow! This was not a problem for me, but Russell was flying into Gatwick at 17:15. We had to check in at Heathrow by 18:00!

A couple of hasty phone calls later, and Russell was woken from a final morning in bed with his girl to find out that he needed to sort out getting to Heathrow. He phoned the airport, and luckily managed to change his flight so he could now get into Heathrow for about the same time. Problem solved!

I reckon that there has to be at least one thing go wrong with any holiday. At least we got ours over with at the very beginning!

A couple of uneventful journeys later and by 17:45 we were all together, checked in, and ready to go.

Now is as good a time as any to introduce myself and the other two.

I’m Steve Nixon, a 23-year-old technical analyst

This is Tristan Jones, a 23-year-old farmer

This is Russell Betney, a 23-year-old perpetual student

We have been walking together for about 10 years, and between us have climbed just about everything worth going up in Scotland, England, and Wales. I was the only one of us three to climb outside of Britain, and the only one to go above 10000 feet (I climbed Taylor’s peak and a couple of other mountains in Rocky mountain national park, and have been to 13147 feet). We were all relatively fit, Tristan had joined a gym about a month before we went, but none of us had done any special training for the climb.

At 20:00 we boarded flight KQ0101 Kenyan Airways flight from Heathrow to Nairobi. The plane was older than me! It shook, and wobbled, it got us there!

Day 2

We landed at 06:40 local time, and were met by Benny. Hayes and Jarvis run all their African operations through Rhino Safaris, and Benny was the Nairobi customer contact. He had arranged transport to the Landmark Hotel were we had a small briefing covering the safari the other two couples who had arrived on our plane were doing, and our bus journey to Tanzania! Rhino Safaris do not run the Kilimanjaro climb for Hayes and Jarvis, and had been asked to arrange transport to the Keys Hotel Moshi, and then return travel for Monday the 4^th of September. What we did in between was up to us!

That afternoon we went on a tour of Nairobi, visited the museum, the snake farm, and the Karen Blixen museum. Very informative for all the wrong reasons. Nairobi has become the place I would least like to live. The poverty, the rubbish, the roads, and the blatant abuse of money by those with power; together with the fact that everyone who saw us either saw us as a source of income, or just seemed to despise us makes Nairobi a hard place to like.

The real shocker to us was the temperature; here we were in spring, less than 150 miles from the equator, and it was 15 degrees and overcast! We spent the rest of the day sleeping ready for the journey the next day.

Day 3

We had all repacked the night before, and now left our safari stuff with the hotel. A quick breakfast later, and we went to the bus. We were travelling with the riverside bus company who travel daily from Nairobi to Arusha, and then from Arusha to Moshi. The bus stopped at a few other hotels in Nairobi, and then headed out to Arusha. The road we took is the main road through East Africa, and I would hate to see the smaller roads. At times the bus drives off the side of the road because it is smoother than the tarmac! Sometimes the tarmac just stops for no reason, and then continues 500 metres later. Workers dig extra holes in the road, and then I can only assume leave them dug and go and dig some more!

It takes a while to get to the Kenyan Tanzania border. Once there we got through with no problems, out visas were in order, we didn’t look the terrorist sort, and we smiled at all the right jokes! You hear about people having major problems at the borders but I cannot add to them. The only problem is the ten or so Africans who surround the bus trying to flog you worthless junk that nobody could ever want. If you don’t like this sort of thing do not go to Africa; you get it everywhere!

We continued on to Arusha. The bus stops at the Novotel for you to change to another bus to Moshi. Sounds simple? Not for us! Of all the years, months, weeks, and days we could have picked to try to travel from Arusha to Moshi, we had to pick the one when Bill Clinton wanted to travel from Moshi to Arusha! Pleas that Bill should wait while we got to where we wanted to be fell on deaf ears. Don’t these people know who we are?! Four hours we had to wait. It only takes an hour to travel to Moshi! We did get a glimpse of the man himself, with Chelsea and Hilary, and about a hundred support vehicles! The daft thing was that even though Bill Clinton the president of the United States was coming to the Novotel for an important conference we were allowed into the hotel, we were allowed around all the grounds, no one stopped us doing anything. If you were in charge of security for the president of the United States would you let 3 scruffy looking young people wanted unrestricted around the same area that your boss is due to be in?

Eventually we left for Moshi, and were awarded our first glimpse of the mountain. The sun was going down, and rising out of the clouds was this huge white monster. I was the first to see it, as I knew roughly where I was looking, and what I was looking for, and the sight was fantastic. Unfortunately the light was really bad, and the mountain just blends into the cloud in the photos we took. You’ll just have to go there and see it for yourself!

We arrived at the Keys hotel, had some tea, and then gathered in my room. Russell and Tristan were not over-enthusiastic about the forthcoming climb. There seemed to be very little organization, and no amount of explaining that this was the way things were done in Africa was going to reassure them. We agreed to sleep on it and see what happened in the morning. I put their lack of enthusiasm down to lack of sleep, and being tired from the journey. We slept.

Day 4

After breakfast we met the old guy who runs the climbing tour company, and he explained the route, showed us maps, and introduced our guide Fanuel.

Our gear was loaded onto a Land Cruiser, we were given our lunch, and then we were off. It took about 45 minutes to get to the trailhead with a short stop in Machame for food supplies. We were unable to glimpse the mountain again due to the cloud cover.

At the trailhead we put on our walking boots, and then went to sign in. You have to give your name, tour operator, and passport number at the every stop. Once the formalities were completed we were ready to start walking.

Whilst Fanuel sorted out our porters we were told to head off up the trail behind our assistant guide. Just to get in perspective what we were about to do I had brought along a GPS, so the figures given throughout should be fairly accurate, although sometimes it took me a while to get a signal from enough satellites for an accurate height reading. We have all climbed Scafell Pike in the Lake District, which is just over 3000 feet; Kilimanjaro is 19341 feet. At the trailhead we were already at 6000 feet. Basically we were to climb 6 Scafell Pikes and were starting at 2. Only another 4 to go!

The trail from Machame trailhead starts off as a wide track through the forest, it is not at all steep or strenuous; however we were told that right from the beginning to walk slowly. “Pole, Pole” would be heard many times over the next few days; this is Swahili for slowly, slowly. At some point on the mountain one of the guides told me, “There is no hurry on Kilimanjaro, there is no hurry in Africa!” We walked for about 2 and a half hours as the trail wound it’s way up the mountain steadily becoming narrower with a few slightly steep bits over tree roots, and a few tentative circumventions around muddy spots. We then reached a clearing where we stopped for lunch. The lunch was not much to look at, a meat pasty, a sandwich, a banana, and a couple of other bits and pieces but as it had been packed at the hotel we were to look back fondly at it in the days to come!

Fanuel caught up with us at this point, and the assistant guide disappeared up the mountain. It is worth noting that the package he was given to carry was Russell’s other rucksack with his and Tristan’s stuff in; even though it was a perfectly good rucksack, he carried it on his head!

Fanuel let us finish our lunch, and then led us further up the trail. Another 2 and a half hours of walking saw us climbing ever higher, and moving along a rocky spur to just below the limit of the cloud where we reached our first camp; Machame hut.

Our porters had reached the camp before us, and were in the process of erecting two tents. We put our stuff down, and started to help with the tents thinking that two three man tents would be cosy as there were three of us, Fanuel, our assistant guide and three porters. Just as we were starting to help one of the porters came over to us and motioned that we should sit over to one side. He then produced three folding stools! They had carried seats up the mountain for us! We could not believe it. The tents were soon up, and three carry mats were produced, and they started to put 2 in one tent and 1 in the other. I pulled up Fanuel and asked what was going on. He replied that the two tents were for the three of us! The rest of them would sleep in another tent. I could not believe it, but that was the way it was going to be. We decided to sleep the three of us in one of the tents, and put the kit in the other. This done we sat outside the tent, put a little bit onto our video diary, and waited to see what we would get for tea.

The first thing to approach us was a thermos of hot tea, and a large tray of popcorn! Yes, popcorn! The porter who brought it over first brought a tablecloth, and breaking branches off a nearby bush he made us a table. We were amazed at this point, but settled down to tea and popcorn. A short while later another porter appeared with plates, knives and forks, and napkins. He then folded the napkins, and set out the table like we were in a hotel, and not sitting 10000 feet up a mountain.

For the meal we were brought soup and bread, followed by meat and fried potatoes with a vegetable stew; all this with more tea. The food was fine, the meat had been well cooked though; although as we had seen were it came from that morning we thought it just as well!

Meal finished we went to bed. It was only about 20:00!

Day 5

We all woke up during the night at about 02:00 needing the toilet! It is not fun getting dressed at 02:00 just to stagger outside, relieve yourself, stagger back and get undressed again, but it is too cold not to get dressed! We were then woken at 07:30 for breakfast. This consisted of bread, more of last nights meat, some kind of omelette, cucumber, and then porridge. Now most of you reading this will read porridge and think, like we did, of oats, lumps, stodge etc. A few may think of Ready brek. What we got when we lifted the lid was watered down wallpaper paste! I was the only one to try it, and it was tasteless mulch. I tried adding some honey to it, but here honey was much sweeter than ours, and made the whole thing taste like sugar water. It was horrible. I had to throw it away. Tristan got rid of the rest of the porridge in a bush!

After breakfast we packed up, and set out up the mountain. The first part of the trail led steeply up a bank behind our camp, and soon broke out to a small ridge just above the cloud level. A quick scramble to the top of a pile of rocks and we were rewarded with our first proper view of the mountain. Wow! It looked large, and a long way away.

We walked for about 5 hours again stopping about half way for lunch just after a small rock climb up some steps that my guidebook called an 8m scramble! If that was a scramble let me at the proper climbing routes! The route led us further along the rocky spur we had climbed before crossing a couple of other rocky spurs, and finally coming out onto a plateau below the mountain. This is called Shira plateau, and a 30-minute walk along the plateau, away from the mountain saw us at the campsite. We were now at 12500 feet.

It being only 13:30 we were at a bit of a loose end, and passed the next 6 hours reading, resting, admiring the view, and generally not doing very much. About 18:30 was teatime, seeing a repeat of last nights meal with the only difference being the meat was recognizable tonight as chicken. As soon as we were finished it started to get dark so we went to bed. It was cold when the sun went down, and there was nothing else to do. It was about 19:45!

Tristan and Russell had to get up through the night; I couldn’t be bothered!

Day 6

Up at 07:30 again, and the first thing I did was rearrange my rucksack. 3 years ago I dislocated my shoulder canoeing, and occasionally I get the odd twinge in my upper back because of it. Carrying a rucksack for 2 days had given me more than a twinge, and I emptied most of my unnecessary weight into my other bag that a porter was carrying. Poor guy!

Breakfast was the same as the day before with a repeat of the porridge. Unfortunately Shira plateau is rocky, and we could not get rid of the porridge. We just had to leave it.

I had spoke to Fanuel during the previous evening and had asked that today, instead of following the low level route to the next camp, we could climb up to lava tower hut before dropping to our camp. My guidebook had recommended this as it was scenic, and helped with acclimatization. Fanuel had expressed doubts, but relented, and that was to be our route today.

Not long after setting out I started to get a headache, and as we crossed 13000 feet, it was becoming too much. We stopped and I took some acetazolamide and some ibuprofen. For those who don’t know acetazolamide is a diuretic that is supposed to help with altitude sickness. We carried on walking; my headache got no better. When I stopped the headache got worse, when I walked I couldn’t concentrate. Eventually I just shut out everything, and just concentrated on walking. Thankfully the walk wasn’t strenuous, and the height climb was gradual. About 3 hours into the walk the patch split, and we continued upwards to lava tower. The extra height gain was not large, only about 200 metres; my guidebook had made it sound much larger, I can only assume there is a second, lower level path to the third camp that no one used that day.

We ate lunch at lava tower. None of us felt great, but no sickness as yet, just headaches. Lava tower looked impressive above us, and we joked about a quick ‘gnash’ up and down!

Lunch over we headed down the other side of lave tower, and very rapidly lost height. Lava tower had been at 14200 feet, the highest any of us had ever been. It hurt! The way down from lava tower was very steep, and the jolting did not help my headache. After 1 hour we rejoined the path, and 1 more hour later we reached camp. It had taken us just over 5 hours. Fanuel had estimated 7 hours to us the previous evening. He was quite impressed.

As we sat looking at the fantastic view, I took some paracetamol, and my headache disappeared. The view of the mountain was amazing, and only slightly spoilt by the worrying sight of the Barranco wall that we would have to climb the next day. We were now at Barranco hut situated at 13100 feet.

We had the now common ritual of tea and popcorn followed by tea about an hour later. As we were finishing tea the sun started to disappear, and it got cold. Very cold! We quickly went to bed. Only Tristan got up through the night.

Day 7

Both Tristan and myself woke up needing the toilet. Lets just say that things were a little looser than I would have wanted! A couple of Imodium accompanied the paracetamol and that seemed to settle things. I couldn’t face breakfast, and just nibbled at some cucumber. Just looking at the meat and the omelette made me feel ill. The other two had no problem eating my share. Once again the porridge wasn’t touched.

We set off after breakfast, and slowly made our way up the Barranco wall. The going is not difficult, but there are some very small scramble sections. At the top the view was amazing, but the altitude sobered the occasion slightly. We were all feeling a little rough, and just wanted to carry on. We spent the next 2 hours walking up and down over valleys before dropping very steeply to another valley where we stopped for lunch.

The previous days lunches had been sandwiches, fruit, etc. prepared by Fanuel and handed to us in the morning. Today he had apologised for not having anything to pre-make lunch with, so he cooked us basically another breakfast. We finally found out what happened to the porridge. One of the porters reheated it, and drank it straight out the bowl! I almost threw up!

After lunch we climbed up the equally steep other side of the valley, and made our way around the mountain. This part of the walk was the only part my book did not have a description for, but looking at the map I had estimated it would take 4 hours. It took 4 hours to reach lunch! As we continued around the mountain we could see another rocky spur heading up the mountain, and Fanuel told us that was the Mweka trail which we were to join to move up to Barafu hut our last stop before the summit. The trail looked no more than a mile away, and only about 100 metres above us, but it took ages to reach it. It was getting harder to walk, and harder to breathe, but the effect was so subtle that we didn’t notice it until we were on the final approach to Barafu hut. We could see the start of the camp above us, but the trail became slightly steeper before reaching it. We could only walk a few paces at a time before having to stop and catch our breath. Slowly we made our way upward. Our porters already had the camp set up when we reached it, and whilst Russell and Tristan had tea and popcorn, I went to bed.

We had walked for 8 hours; it was just after 3 o’clock. I slept until about 17:30 when Fanuel woke me. As I was assuring him that I would be fine for the summit attempt I threw up! I was not in a good state, but I was determined to go on. We sorted out our clothes for the attempt, got our supply of water together, and I convinced Russell and Tristan to help carry my kit so all I had to carry was my camelback with my water in. I went back to sleep while Russell and Tristan had some tea. They then went to sleep too.

Summit attempt / Day 8

We were woken at 23:00 and immediately wished we hadn’t been. It was VERY cold. Even sitting doing nothing our pulse rate was above 100 bpm. It took a little while to get dressed and put our boots on, and then we loaded Russell and Tristan’s rucksacks and were ready to head out. To give you some idea of the temperature we had all walked the previous day in a thin pair of trousers and a thin fleece top. We were now dressed in thermal trousers, normal trousers, and waterproof over trousers, thermal base layer, mid fleece layer, fleece, and gore-tex jacket, woolly hat, and gloves.

We left camp at about 23:40 at an altitude of 15300 feet, and set off up the mountain. We were all wearing head torches, and the only thing we could see was the small patch of light on the ground in front of us. Fanuel led the way through the rest of the camp and on up the trail to the summit.

The next seven hours were agony. We walked at a very slow pace, all feeling extremely tired, suffering from aches and pains, headaches, feelings of nausea. I was the worst hit, and was the one who dictated the pace, we were walking for what felt like ages between each rest break, but was probably only 15 minutes. At each break we all collapsed onto rocks and fought to catch our breath for a few minutes before forcing ourselves back to our feet to carry on.

We met a number of other people going up the mountain, all of them in the same situation, but nobody going the wrong way, nobody giving up as happens on the Marangu route. At about 6 o’clock the horizon started to lighten, not enough to see by, but clearly getting lighter. Above us was the Rebmann glacier glowing white in the darkness, and somewhere above that Stella point. We struggled on.

At about 06:25 I called for another break and sank down onto a rock. The horizon was very light now, and daybreak was not far off. We sat there for about five minutes, and I could not get up. I physically had no energy left; I could not stand up, I was finished.

Fanuel came over to speak to me, and I explained the situation. He was very understanding and said that he would carry on with Russell and Tristan to the top, and when I was ready I was to climb to Stella point if I could with the assistant guide, but either way he would give me a certificate with Stella point on it. He moved on with Russell and Tristan, and I just sat still for about 10 minutes.

I then reached into my coat pocket and pulled out some Kendal mint cake. As I started to nibble on the mint cake the sun came up. The sight was fantastic. Mawenzi was off to my left, and in the far distance other peaks were visible above the cloud. I just sat and watched for about five minutes finishing my piece of mint cake.

What you have to realize was that the mint cake was the first thing I had eaten in about 36 hours, and my body was just about finished. However, after eating the mint cake I was able to turn around, and as the sun had now come up I could see Stella point. It was about 40 metres above me! Russell and Tristan were both there waving at me to come up. The assistant guide helped me up, and then we set off up the mountain. It took me less than 10 minutes to reach Stella point with the assistant guide telling me to slow down the whole way! I just went from boulder to boulder pausing slightly at each to catch my breath. I knew that if I stopped that would be it, and so I pressed on.

I was exhausted when I reached Russell and Tristan at Stella point. They were not much better, it had taken them over 20 minutes to reach Stella point, and they were just about done from the effort. We all had a piece of Kendal mint cake, and looked at the rest of our journey. From Stella point my guidebook reckons that it takes about an hour to reach the summit, and the height climb is 100 metres. If I had reached this point in the dark I doubt I could have gone on, but with the sun up we could see the summit, and it looked possible! Fanuel asked me if I could go on, and I just nodded and set off thinking everyone else was behind me.

As I set off I remember looking around me and starting to sob. Russell told me later that the same thing happened to him. There is nothing to compare to being there, seeing the crater at the top of Kilimanjaro, and the glacier that runs along the side of it. Along with the fantastic sight before me was the feeling of almost accomplishing a dream, almost not accomplishing a dream, physical and mental exhaustion, and a lack of sleep. I walked on towards the summit, smiling and sobbing most of the way there, but not once stopping to catch my breath. I was running on almost pure adrenaline (coupled with the pure sugar I had just eaten) and wasn’t going to stop until I reached my goal. In all it took my just over 20 minutes to go from Stella point to Uhuru peak the top of Africa, and I reached the top at 07:20. Russell and Tristan were 20 minutes behind me, which shows just how fast I was actually going!

The feeling of reaching the top was even more intense than when I set off from Stella point. I sat at the top looking at the crater before me sobbing for about 10 minutes, and then just sat smiling and laughing until Russell and Tristan joined me.

Once we were all together we sat and congratulated each other while Russell and Tristan caught they’re breath. We then took the obligatory photos, added some more to our video diary, and just enjoyed the view.

All too soon it was time to start back down. We retraced our path to Stella point with Fanuel leading, and then spent 1 and a half hours slowly moving down the steep path it had taken 7 hours to climb. The ground was made up of very loose gravel, so we were able to rest our legs by almost skiing down the mountain! Even with the loose surface my feet hurt. I have always had problems coming down hill, and cannot remember when my big toenails were not in the process of falling off or growing back!

When we returned to camp we were exhausted. One of the porters brought as some blackcurrant squash; the only flavoured drink we had our entire time on the mountain. Fanuel then allowed us some time to rest before heading on. We spent the time lying in our tent too exhausted to do anything, but unable to sleep due to the heat and the feelings we were experiencing after completing the climb.

After an hour Fanuel brought us some soup, which I managed to eat, and then we packed up and started out, down the mountain. It was 11:45; we had already been up over 12 hours, and had been walking for more than 9 of them!

As we headed down the track towards Mweka hut my feet really started to hurt, every time I put my foot down my big toes hurt, and on the occasion my boot hit a rock it was agony. I have always set a quick pace going down hill, and this time was no different, I figured I could get to the camp, and then do something about my feet; there was nothing I could do on the trail at any rate. About half way down to Mweka hut we passed a ranger hut where we rested for a short while. As we set off I asked Fanuel how much longer it would be, he told us it would be about 2 hours. I realized my feet would not make it.

We carried on with me leading, I tried to ease the pressure on my toes by kicking my heals at each step, but nothing was working. After about 45 minutes I had to stop. I took my boots off, and my toenails were a lovely shade of dark red. I decided to walk in my socks, but Fanuel wouldn’t let me. He told us to carry on slowly, and he would hurry to the camp to get my more comfortable shoes that I had brought for the evening around the camp. Before I could protest he was gone. About 40 minutes later we hadn’t got much further as the best I could manage was a hobble. One of the porters came up the track to meet us carrying my boot bag with my shoes in it. I have never been so happy to see someone! I put my trainers on, and the extra give in the toes allowed me to move at something resembling a normal pace. It still hurt, but I could move. It took about an hour to reach camp. We celebrated with a coke as they were selling it from the hut.

I managed to eat some tea, and enjoyed another coke; and then as the sun went down we went to bed. I was too exhausted to notice when Tristan got up during the night!

Day 9

We were due at the Mweka trailhead today, but to reach it we had about a 4-hour walk down a very steep trail through the forest region of the mountain. There isn’t much to say about the journey other than it was very steep in places, very muddy, and very slippy. We all made it down to the old logging road that marks the last section of the route without incident. My feet hurt the whole way, but as I was wearing my trainers I could keep going. The only drawback to wearing trainers was the total lack of grip in the mud; but I made it.

We reached Mweka trailhead, and went to the office to collect our certificates. At this point I had mentally finished the mountain, so when Fanuel told us that the van didn’t meet us here, but stayed a further 15 minutes down the track I almost collapsed. My feet were killing me, and I honestly didn’t know if I could walk much further. I had pushed myself to reach the trailhead. Anyway, I gritted my teeth, and just ignored the pain in my feet to reach the bottom where we were met by the van, handed some lunch, and driven back to the Keys Hotel.

We spent the afternoon cleaning ourselves up, and relaxing. You have no idea how good a shower feels after 6 days on a mountain. Even with extensive cleaning it took a few days to remove all the grime from our skin!

We enjoyed our first ‘proper’ meal in days that night, and then had a well deserved early night in a proper bed.

Monday morning, a new week, a new age.

The weeks feels full of possibilities today. It isn't always this way, however, I do find that Monday brings with it a positive outlook, a feeling of having left the previous weeks troubles behind, a chance to strike out in a different direction. Of course, this is gone by 10am when you relise that not everyone feels the same, and the problems of last week are the problems of this week.



Nice feeling while it lasts however.



I don't feel the same about birthdays. I had one of those on Saturday. The whole year older thing; doesn't wash. I'm only a day older than yesterday. Same as I am every day.



Saturday was a good day though. Presents, cards, my parents were visiting, so we got to see them too. The morning was spent assembling my daughter's birthday present, her trampoline. The first part of the afternoon was spent bouncing on it. She loved it.



In the afternoon my parents took her to a park, and my wife and I went looking for somewhere for Sunday lunch. We found a nice place but it'll have to be for another day; they couldn't sit us until 3pm! So, instead, I went to Sainsburys and got a roast in.



Saturday evening my wife and I went to an Indian restaurant, and had a very nice meal before returning home and retiring for the night.



Sunday brought swimming, and a frustrated daughter who's finally worked out that her desires exceed her abilities. She wants to swim without her floating aid, but she can't. She sinks. Bit of a stand-off moment, and then a tantrum as we left. All forgotten by the time we were dressed. Home for a roast, bid my parents bon voyage, and then intertwined housework and play. An evening of struggling to upgrade the computer to 64 bit to take advantage of the new kit was successful in the end. Then, the inevitable bed time.



Which brings us to here. Optimism for the day remains, but reality is beginning to push in. Busy week ahead. Lots of reports, lots of demands.

Blogging birthday

On the 5th of March last year I started blogging properly. The blog itself dates back to the 8th of March 2006, but wasn't used properly until last year.



At first (some would say still) I didn't know what I was going to write about. Didn't know if I could keep it going. My normal routine at the time was to read RSS feeds, and the free newspaper until work arrived. Pushing blogging in there got rid of the free newspaper, and delayed some of the RSS feeds to the evening. Still, I thought it was worth it.



I now get an average of 8 hits per day on the site (no idea on RSS, it's not trackable), and get around 30 unique visitors a month (most in error!) But it's not about the numbers. I don't write this to get huge amounts of people to come along. If I did there would be more posts like the R.E.M. Set list. A post that had 160 page views a day at one point.



No, I write this as a journal of life. It's always relevant to what is going on in my mind at the time of writing, and is interesting, for me, to go back through and see what I was thinking.



Posts like "The Daddy drive" won't come around again, I can't see there being a need for that, but it's now recorded and available along with all the posts on my changing life. Yes, there are a huge amount of posts about travelling, but as I spend over 3 hours a day doing it that's not surprising. Even some of those are interesting. There are also the occasional technical posts. These are definitely written mainly for me. I find something out, it fixes an issue, but I know I won't use it again for a while. If I don't write it down, or keep doing it, it'll be forgotten. I'll have a vague memory which will send me off on a search for something I already know. Now, I know where it is. I search one site, and that's it.



So, what can the next year bring? More of the same probably. When I get my phone back, and continue the process of tying myself more and more to the internet that's bound to have an effect. I'm still very new at the idea of posting photos. And I know there are other things out there that I haven't tried yet at all. In line videos, live blogging. Will I? Maybe.



Anyway, thanks for sticking around, reading my mutterings. Onwards into the second year...

Stuck in phone purgatory

I had to send my Gphone off for repair in the end yesterday. So I'm stuck using my work phone to send these out, and my old blackberry, with no data connection, for calls and text messages. It feels like a part of me is missing. I can't look things up on the spur of the moment, I can't access my data whenever I need. I know that just a few years ago, the things we do today were unavailable (not unthinkable, just dreams); but having had them, and come to rely on them, do now be without them is really quite difficult.



The phone will be away for some time, 2weeks, maybe more, so this is only going to get worse.



I'll now stop whinging, and get back to blogging about something more interesting.

Writing from the trenches

Ast night, for reasons that escape me, my phone stopped working. One minute I'm on the jubilee line playing a puzzle game, the next, literally, I'm on the bakerloo, and the screen isn't displaying anything. A few reboots, and reseats of the SIM card, and I conclude it's stuffed.



So, today, my SIM is in my old blackberry which is only allowing calls and texts, and I'm writing this on my work blackberry. With a keyboard I hate.



I'll be heading to the nearest t-mobile store this lunch time to get myself a replacement, so, hopefully, normal service will resume tomorrow. I'm not looking forward to having to re-install all my apps, and then configure them. At least I'm with google, so all my mails, contacts, and clendar appointments are safe. I think the only thing I'll lose is my notes, and I've got most of them backed up. In total, I'll lose time, and possibly a couple of present ideas for my wife. Could be worse.

My over-large arse

A little over a year ago my wife and I made the, then yearly, pilgramage to M&S to buy me a suit for work. My previous one had worn well, but worn it was. We found a perfect suit. Well cut, with colouring the suited me, we knew this was the one. I discarded the other possibilities and made my way to the changing room.

I had picked up a couple of jackets, and a couple of trousers in different sizes to try on. The jacket was easy, and one was quickly discarded. Trousers were a little trickier. I was too slim (!) for the 36 inch waist, but not slim enough for the 34. The suit itself, however, was looking good. We decided that we shoulld go for the long haul. I bought 2 jackets, one pairs of 36s and 3 pairs of 34s. The suit was good, and the theory was (well mine was anyway) that I would continue to lose weight, and the 36s were a stepping point to the 34s.

Cut forward a year.

I've never stopped wearing the 36s (except on the couple of days where they've been in for dry cleaning), the only thing that's gone is the need for a belt! Trousers don't last for ever, and when you wear them for a year they start to go. I'd noticed a couple of threadbare points on the legs at my inner thigh, but ignored them in the hope that they would last until my weight loss (yep, that again) could drop to the point where I could get into the 34s. No hope.

I looked down last Wednesday and found a small hole instead of a few threads. Thursday brought a bigger hole, and the danger of revelation! I went home Thursday night and begged. My Mother-in-Law was staying with us to help out my ailing wife, and I showed her the problem. My initial solution has centered around tape. Electrical tape. That would work, wouldn't it? No, apparently not.

She then spent the evening altering a pair of 34s so I could squeeze my large prosterier into them. She's also took another pair home to do the same so I have a spare. The final pair of 34s is sitting in the cupboard, unused and taunting.

So what have I done to achieve this weight loss? Well, three sessions of a Davina exercise DVD that my wife has, and I've signed up for a half marathon in May. Haven't even run a mile yet, but I've signed up. Must count for something. Right?

At least the incentive of having my boxers squeezed up my crack every time I walk (especially up stairs) gives me a constant reminder to sort out my ever expanding waist line and fat arse!

First Great Western - 17:30 27/02/2009 Paddington to Taunton farce

An announcement came over the train P.A. asking people to get off the train because it was too crowded! This just after the delayed 17:15 train passengers were asked, by First Great Western, to leave their train and join ours because theirs was broken and ours would leave sooner!

There were no further announcements before we left. 13 minutes late.

In the waiting period, one of the directors of First Capital Connect approached the buffet area, and asked to speak to the train manager because, and I quote, "There's plenty of room in first class, why are we still sitting here?" She left telling the poor buffet guy that there were 3 of them sitting in first class if they were needed! Nice to know.

If we don't hit Reading in the next 8 minutes, I'll miss my connection. Joy.

Annoyance update

Fixed one of them! My problem with the delicious add-on was a clash with another one called tab mix plus. Clash only happens on linux though. Both add-ons work fine together on Windows.

Removing it also fixed a problem I've been having off and on with the Google Toolbar.

Now, tweetdeck...

My gorgeous wife

4 years ago, on Sunday the 27th of February I asked my now wife to marry me. She said yes. That was silly!

We'd been going out since September 3rd the previous year, but had both known very quickly that we were going to be together. (I won't embaress her with the story of her asking me to marry her.) In fact, the whole thing was destined from the beginning. We both had a rule of not dating workmates, or housemates; well you know what two negatives make...

I'd first met her in July when my landlord came round to show this girl, a prospective tenant, our shared house. I was sitting eating microwave bangers and mash when he brought her into the lounge, introduced us and said that we worked at the same place. What followed was a very stilted conversation where we realised that not only did we work for the same company, but in the same building, wing and on the same floor. I didn't know her, or any of her team, and vice versa. Not exactly Shakespeare! I did, however, realise I quite liked her.

Over the next 2 / 3 weeks we passed occasionally in the hall or carpark, and I smiled. A bit. Shyly. (She thought, I found out in retrospect, that I was standoffish and rude. Actually I'm just painfully shy!) And then, on her bithday (which she didn't tell anyone about until a few days later) she moved into our house. Into the room next to mine. She asked me to change a light bulb. I failed. I was too short.

Over the next few weeks we spent more time together. She crashed her car the first week. She was fine, the car wasn't. So I started giving her lifts to and from work. She was appaled by what I was eating, so offered me some of hers. Within a couple of days we were shopping and cooking together. At first I didn't want to tell her that I didn't like most of what she was cooking (courgette!), nor did I drink wine, for fear of being seen as an idiot. What I quickly found was I did like what she was cooking, and I did like wine with her.

On September 3rd I picked her up from work, and took her to a fish and chip place on the Northumberland coast. I enjoyed that more than she did. We then walked for 3+ hours along the beach while I plucked up the courage to ask her out. Eventually, I did. She said ok.

We'd bought the ring a few weeks earlier, and she was under the impression that I was going to propose on top of a mountain when we went to the Lakes for my birthday. I know she hates walking up mountains.

I was working in London at the time (I'd left her on valenntines day a couple of weeks earlier), so was only there for the weekend, and had to leave later that day. We'd agreed to meet my grandparents, and my Aunt and Uncle for lunch as it was my Uncle's birthday the next day, and to pass the time in the morning, we went for a walk.

I took her to her favourite tree, beside a river, got down on one knee, got asked what I thought I was doing, and asked her to marry me.

She is, to me, the most gorgeous, intelligent, beautiful person. I love her more every day. There isn't anyone else I could spend my life with. Since that day, we've moved twice, got married, had a child, and changed so much; and yet, through that, she is my rock, and the one thing I cling to at times of stress and trouble.

Thanks babe. I love you. Xxx

So that's what early looks like!

For the first time in a long time I'm,just, on time. What you can't see in the pic is the train right beside me that I nearly missed. However, I didn't. So here is the view from 07:02. Different to last time. Definitely light. Spring is on its way.

King of the line

To travel from Winnersh Triangle to Canary Wharf (and back again) with maximum efficiency avoiding all the human traffic black spots all you need to do is follow these simple instructions.

At Winnersh Triangle you want to go to the very far end of platform 2 (check as you do that the train will have the expected 8 carriages on the overhead display. If it only has 4, wait at the "4 car stop sign). Reading is the end of the line, so being at the head of the train will get you out first. Stand to the side of the doors. On the 02 trains you want to be at the left of the train, the 32 on the right (general rule, doesn't always work). On arrival at Reading you should be first off, onto the concourse, hugging the wall to the steps, up and over with a quick glance at the monitors to discover whether you need platform 5 or 8.

Platform 5 requires you to loop back on yourself and keep an eye on the floor for a yellow arrow. Stand about 4 paces before that point, and the door for standard class will stop right in front of you. Position yourself just to the right of the door as it opens to the left effectively blocking anyone there. Open the door to let the alighting passengers off, then be the first on to the train.

On platform 8 the trains stop earlier than on 5, so you need to head further up the platform. There is a mind the gap painted onto the floor just before you reach opposite WH Smiths. This is where to wait. You'll now be in the same position as platform 5 door wise.

On entering the train you have a choice. Risk it all for a seat (if you lose you will be stood in the most uncomfortable position between the seats deep in the carriage), or head to the buffet. I head to the buffet. Somewhere to lean, a surface to put things on. If things are really cramped, go just beyond the buffet to the point just before the door into the kitchen. There are some bars to lean on, and a nice view.

As you approach Paddington you will notice a series of numbers on the wall. Small yellow disks counting down from over 4000. When these reach the 1200s set off to the front of the train. You should reach the front without hassle just before all the first class passengers stand up. Best to hang in the middle here, let someone else claim the door post. It is pretty much 50/50 as to which door will have the platform. Let someone else make the call and you will be off second.

On exit, head straight across the concourse to the underground. If the gates are shut, bear left, outside, stay left and go round the corner at the top, there are alternative stairs down there that will get you ahead of the crowd. Once down, head onto the Bakerloo platform, use the second entrance, and keep left heading down the platform. As you move down you'll see the wall jut out and a maintenance door, just beyond this are 4 seats. Stand opposite the fourth seat. The train doors will open in front of you. Head straight across the carriage and stand to the left of the opposite door.

At Baker Street you'll be immediately opposite a short passage to the Jubilee line. Stay left, and head down the platform a short way until you are directly opposite the first of 2 posters towards the end of the platform. The first set of double doors in the last carriage will open in front of you. You want to stay as near to these doors as possible to ensure you are the first out and up the escalator in front of you at Canary Wharf.

Return is reverse, hit the first set of double doors you get to on the first carriage of the Jubilee line. At Baker Street you need to traverse the longer passage way and then head half way down the platform. You will see an underground roundell next to a line map. You should stand directly opposite this roundell, and stay by those doors on the train. This will ensure prime position at Paddington and allow you to lead the crush for the escalator. The train from London is up to you, but you want to be at the front of the last carriage at Reading, at the left hand door to be straight off. You then want the very front of the train to Winnersh Triangle. And your back. Simple eh?!

Annoyances

My wife isn't well. This isn't an annoyance. It's unfortunate. I hope she feels better soon.

I'm late today. Very late. This also isn't an annoyance, it just is.

No, the annoyances in my life are trivial, minor things. That's why they annoy. Like, why does the delicious extension for firefox refuse to add the toolbar buttons on my home copy of firefox? Is it a linux thing? A kubuntu thing? I doubt it. Google doesn't turn up with anything useful. So it's probably something local to my machine. This is an annoyance. I've tried recreating my profile to no effect; so, temporarily, I'm stuck. Annoyed.

I installed tweetdeck to try to get on top of the hundreds of tweets @wossy sends. So far I haven't had a single Adobe Air app work properly on Linux. I installed the BBC iPlayer, which works fine until you reboot, then, seemingly, can't access it's config file and sits useless. However, back to tweetdeck. Installed fine, on running the window comes up, a bunch of buttons, and nothing else. Apparently it's a problem with kwallet, but kwallet is working fine. I use it daily for kcheckgmail and kopete. So the app is useless. An annoyance.

Plasma restarts once a day at random. I have no idea why.

My system monitor app stops reporting stats occasionally. Uptime stops ticking and the app is useless until next reboot. Except temperature. This keeps working, so the app hasn't crashed. It seems related to the screensaver, but I have nothing but gut to go on.

None of these things are problems as such; I'm a little less productive with my time, but no different to last week when I wasn't aware of these apps. It's just annoying.

At least I don't have something important to complain about.

"Controversial internet law on hold" - Update to earlier post

Controversial internet law on hold - Key - Technology - NZ Herald News

So, the law is now on hold. Blogs were re-directed, ministers see sense. Seems a tenuous link at best. If I were a more cynical person, I'd say the law was there to push the compromise. There is now talk of a voluntary code of practice.

Maybe I need to more open to the options. Can we now all blackout until Gordon steps up, announces it's all his fault, and resigns from government and public life forever?

Censorship

I'm recently into twitter. I like it. It's an easy way of making a comment or statement on something that has happened or occured to me without having to write a whole blog post around it. I can also follow other people, some of which I know, some of which I know of, and some that just seem interesting.

Twitter as a source of information, or as a method of information transport is fantastic. In the time it takes to write a text message, your info can hit all your followers. They can then "re-tweet" it, with no effort, to all theirs. Information can reach hundreds of thousands of people in seconds.

Because of this reach, twitter can be, and is, used to rally individuals to a cause. "Click this to help out", "Re-tweet this to raise awareness". Etc. Now this works, but to work it has to be passive. You're not going to get people, who wouldn't normally have gone anyway, to go to a march for example. You're going to get bandwagon jumping of the simplest element of your crusade at best.

Which brings me to this: "it's the last day of #blackout today http://creativefreedom.org.nz/blackout.html yes, I'm not from/in NZ but supporting the protest "

The background to this is a daft piece of legislation in New Zealand. They, like others before them, want to censor the net. The details are a little different than previous attempts (China, North Korea, Australia) but the outcome will be the same. Failure. The internet is borderless, and the protocols too open for something like this to succeed. Encrypted proxies would be in place before you can say "Waste of legislative time".

However, there is a valid argument for protest. The bill is being proposed by a specific MP belonging to a specific party. By all means, write to these people, explain your problems with the legislation, point out the errors with the execution of it that will follow, and, if you're lucky, raise the issue for debate, and get your point across.

The site linked in that tweet above gives you the details to do just this. However, the page linked asks you to black out your twitter picture in protest. This is where I have an issue. What's the point!? All this does is make the little avatar that accompanies your tweet go black. Nothing else. This makes it slightly more difficult, at a glance, to see who has tweeted. Your name comes with the tweet, so it takes a little more effort. Nowhere do you have to justify your blackout. People will generally re-tweet something similar to the tweet above, and then move on. Tweeting as normal. No blog posts, no action, just a silly black picture.

Now, how many New Zealand politicians are quaking in their boots thanks to a few hundred blacked out pictures in twitter (and probably facebook)? None. What has this achieved? Nothing. An ill-conceived campaign bringing awareness to nothing. (The tweet above was in reply to someone asking why they were blacked out. I've seen dozens of these in the last couple of weeks. People don't "get it", there is no obvious connection).

So where does this get us? At best we stay as we were, a small number of people will campaign properly, and something may be done. If the bill passes it will fail, and, quietly, it'll be forgotten about. At worst, a bunch of people will have assumed they are doing something worthwhile when their efforts haven't even been noticed by those they were hoping to influence. I think that's a shame.

Steve needs...

So, a meme passes round. Go to google, type in

<yourname> needs

and hit search. Post the results.

Apparently,

Steve needs to find a squirrel hitman. (Possibly the best answer that could have come up, and it's the top link!)
Steve needs a new home. (Hmm, something I'm not being told about?)
Steve needs to cop himself on and tell Michelle (Not exactly sure what this means)
Steve needs serial thrillers (All bad pulp fiction, send it my way)
Steve needs your help (Not sure what with, but all help appreciated)

There you go. Over to you.

If this was a popular blog I'd tell you to leave yours in the comments, or answer on your blog and leave a link. But it isn't, so I won't.

Friday

All day.

I spent last night on the computer, sorting some paperwork out, and saving us some money. All worthwhile.

My wife was out at a restaurant with friends until late, and my daughter went straight to sleep with no fuss, so I had the evning to myself.

Once the paperwork was sorted I cooked a quick meal (quick apart from heating up the oven. I'll be glad when we get to tomorrow and I can replace the fan motor in the quicker oven), watched a little TV (there really isn't much on worth watching), and then retired to "World of Goo". I'm now part way through world 2, and the game is getting interesting. Multiple problems per level, and a little lateral thinking. It leaves me hoping for a real challenge a bit further in.

Apart from fitting the fan motor I don't know what the weekend has in store. Thats ok though, everyone needs some mystery in their life.

One of these days...

...I'll right something more interesting than:

Feeling tired
Travelling to work
Woken in the night
Meetings today
Looking forward to the weekend
Etc

Today is not that day.

Tomorrow might be.

I'm not promising anything.

Late post

This post is late. As am I. But I'm going to be late this evening, so it balances out. That's my theory anyway.

Did some exercise last night. 30 minutes of cardio box. The upside was that I felt like I was boxing with Davina, the downside was that I was doing exercise.

I don't feel too bad this morning. A little tightness in my calf.

Other than the exercise, we ate and went to bed. Well, one of us did. Someone may have stayed up writing e-mails and surfing the net.

Off to work now. It's exactly a month until all my staff are back in the office. Back from all their seperate holidays. Something to look forward to.

Short one?

I didn't get home last night until 20:30. We ate, and went to bed.

Not the most interesting of tales.

I didn't get woken in the night, for the second night in a row. As a result, I feel better this morning.

No meetings until 13:30, so I might get some work doe for once.

No late meetings planned, so I should get home on time too.

Probably out tomorrow with work. My lovely wife is out Thursday with friends. A busy week.

Too much to say, no way to say it.

Here I am standing (for a change) on a train with, maybe, three blog posts going round my head. They are competing with several work thoughts, and a number of home thoughts. As a result, nothing is getting through. I have the oppsoite of writers block!

So? Summarise:

World of Goo on Linux - a very fun game, ported well. An interesting design decision to make it run fullscreen at 800x600 which is interesting with 2 monitors. A quick change of config.txt fixed that, and the game has worked perfectly since. Sound, graphics, it all looks the same as the windows version (as you'd expect). It really is a good game, if you enjoy fun games that make you think a bit, pop over and get yourself a copy.

Swimming - took my daughter swimming on Sunday morning in the first of what will become regular sessions. I got her a jacket with lots of floats to keep her upright, and she loved it. By the end of the session she was able to swim 2 widths of the pool under her own steam. A natural!

I've now changed train twice, and completely lost my train (!) of thought.

Can't think. Need to get my head straight. Busy, important week starts now. Oh dear.

World of Goo released for Linux

A *good* native game has finally been released for Linux. World of Goo is an extremely simple and fun problem solving game.

I've played them demo through wine, and really enjoyed it, but had held off buying the game as I don't like running things in emulation mode. The game has now been released natively for Linux, and I bought a copy this morning (downloading as I type).

I'll report back on the excellence of the port once I've installed and tried it out.

Friday, finally. The "will I make it to the end of the day?" edition.

Whinge, whinge, moan. Whine, whine, whine.

Right, that's out of the way.

Friday! No doubt a fun day.

Then the weekend. Bringing sleep. I hope.

2 calls in the night, and I'm still feeling bloicky.

Taking my daughter swimming this weekend. Went last weekend, and she loved it. Just me and her this week, give Mummy some time off.

Not much else really (unless I complain lots, but we all know how that goes).

Time to suffer in silence, and get through the day.

Better

One indigestion tablet and a couple of polos later I feel better. Stomach returning to normal, mouth tastes better.

I'm coming to the conclusion that I've got too much on at work, and that my daughter waking me several times a night isn't helping. Time for some baby valium!

Out tonight for a leaving do. Don't think I'll stay long.

Out last night with my wife. A pint in a recently refurbished local pub, and a chat. It was nice. We don't get many opportunities to sit and chat away from the daily grind very often.

Weekend approaches, no idea what's planned yet. Hopefully some sleep!

Been better

So, my stomach hurts, I feel bloated, and my mouth tastes of vomit. I haven't been sick though. Just stressed. Boots at Paddington I think. I'll write more once I'm settled.

Late? Glacial travel

Our local river burst its banks last night. As a result, everything stopped dead this morning. I don't know whether the time stamp on this will go on post time or send time (they get sent underground and posted when the phone surfaces), but it is now midday and I'm still not at work.

I'm parked at a train station on a different line, getting home will be interesting, and I'm supposed to be in some very important meetings today starting at 11:30. Oops.

In other news, google have finally put calendar and contact sync in place for the iphone; so, finally, my wife and I can have a shared calendar, and an easy way to maintain contact data. Woo. It took long enough!

Now, better concentrate on thinking about work. Easier said than done, the girl next to me is wearing the brightest, most hideous red jacket and I've forgotten my sun glasses!

Digital identity

Having a quick think about it, I have presence on:
Facebook
Picasa
Google
Flickr
Yahoo
Twitter
LinkedIn
MSN
Microsoft
Hotmail
Pipex
Virgin
Bulldog
ICQ
AOL

I'm sure there are a few more. Some of them are defunct, you'd be hard pushed to find me on AOL, some of them require effort, and some of them I see as pointless.

I like Twitter. It's easy, it's simple, it's quick. I dislike Facebook. Status updates are fine, but all those daft applications (that I've now deleted, so stop throwing polar bears at me!), walls, super walls, status comments. It's like they've taken the best bits of twitter and IM, removed the near time element, and rehashed the annoying MSN nudge function. As a photo app, picasa or flickr are much better (even for comments). Twitpic let's you share that funny pic right now, and a targeted mail, or public folder on picasa shares the rest of them the next day.

"But what about catching up with all those old friends?" I here you ask. What about it? Usually, if I want to keep in contact with someone I will. If, for whatever reason, that contact slips, I have e-mail, phone numbers, old addresses. I'll find them if it's that important. In the main, everyone I connect with on facebook I speak to in other ways, and for those older friends; the majority have connected and then nothing. Empty silence across a wasteland of status updates and photos of people I don't know.

I've never used myspace. I accept I'm too old. It just looks a mess to me. I tried bebo for less than a week, but didn't "get" that either.

Side note, I keep pressing alt for a comma on this phone, but that gives me a ? it's really annoying.

I'm also on LinkedIn? But I *really* don't get that one. I now have a bunch of people I work / worked with linked to me. So what? No one I've ever worked with is in a position to get me a job. I've never re-worked with anyone? And if I did it would be a coincidence. Other than a couple of agents, everything else on there is just one more voyeristic online snoop.

All this begs the question, "What am I doing on there then?", and the answer has to be snooping. Although, actually, in both cases I have a small amount of people that keep in touch that way, and I don't want to lose contact.

So, from this, I you want to know what I'm doing, check twitter or this blog. Or e-mail me (novel idea, I can't remeber the last time I got a decent personal e-mail). If you want me to know what you're doing, don't rely on online sites to do it.

Found these...

Thought of you.

http://www.flickr.com/groups/farside/pool/

I analysed my blog

I Typealyzed my blog. This was the result:

ISTP - The Mechanics

The independent and problem-solving type. They are especially attuned to the demands of the moment are masters of responding to challenges that arise spontaneously. They generally prefer to think things out for themselves and often avoid inter-personal conflicts.

The Mechanics enjoy working together with other independent and highly skilled people and often like seek fun and action both in their work and personal life. They enjoy adventure and risk such as in driving race cars or working as policemen and firefighters.

Sign

We have a sign at work that stops you leaving through an automated door and forces you through a turnstile type door instead. Neither door has security on it, but the automated one gets people through quicker. Why it's blocked is beyond me.

The sign states that the door is for disabled use only. They then stick the sign right in the path of the opening door. So it won't open. Utter genius.

Hopefully the pictures come out clearly enough.

An entry

I have a headache. I've had a headache since yesterday evening. I'm not in a good mood.

It snowed overnight. They cancelled trains, but I ignored them. I took the *looonnng* route, slowly, and I'm nearly at work. At least all the trains far underground aren't complaining about adverse weather conditions this time.

Too much to do, too little time and staff to do it.

Meetings late into my home time yesterday just gave us more work, more reports. These ones won't go down well either. Name and shame is the new game in town. CYA. Management is different now. Bridges will be burnt. I think a few quiet heads-ups may be in order. I hate surprises, I'm sure others do too.

I read a lot of other blogs (a large portion of which are found down the left of the screen if you're not reading this over RSS), and the one thing that strikes me is how boring my life seems. Are all these other people working? Are they making all the stuff they write about up? Or are we just so safe and boring, that even when we do things, those things don't impart fun tales?

That was a really bad sentence.

I can't be bothered to fix it.

Onwards we go. My daughter has started repeating us. After months of simple two word structures, we're making leaps and bounds now. However, new words get repeated. New words we don't always want her repeating. We're pretty good about our language, but sometimes things slip out; and when they do, they're caught, copied, and filed for future reference. Oh dear. This parenting lark keeps coming up with new curve balls.

She knows what she wants too. It's bendable at the minute though. "Do you want to get out the bath?" "No". "Do you want a cookie" "No". "Really! Do you want a pony?" "No". "Ever?" "No". "Ok".

She wouldn't stand up the other day. Every time I said stand up, she sat down. Eventually, I said sit down. She stood up. Job done.

Can't see that working for long!

Time to stop rambling. Must go and make up some interesting stories.

Wednesday, the new Monday

A few flakes of the white stuff brought the south of England to a halt this week. We didn't get that much, but the train companies used any excuse to stop running. Even though we had no extra snow Monday night I still couldn't make it in yesterday.

The funniest bit about the whole thing: the main problem with my route on Monday was the underground. Deep level lines were suspended due to "adverse weather conditions". Underground. In a tunnel. I can understand the above ground parts having a problem, but all lines have emergency underground junctions for just that occurence. Didn't stop them halting everything.

Travel problems aside, the last couple of days have been good. Plenty of time spent with my daughter, and a snowball fight with my wife.

We've also managed a little more sleep of late which is definitely helping.

Still finishing off Dexter. This evening will be the last episode. Managed it quite quickly this morning. I left for work early, anticipating problems. 7 minutes early. I arrived at the car park 10 minutes late! This on clear roads with no excuses for slow driving. People down here just don't get it. A little bit of white at the side of the road, and suddenly they drive at 5mph everywhere, and don't pull out at junctions unless there is a half mile gap in the traffic!

New week, new month. I've finally got all my company and personal tax paperwork sorted and filed. Thanks for your help Jon, just one more to go and that one should be easy!

Waterloo is approaching, (I'm coming in the long way) so time to think about exiting this crush and getting to work. More tomorrow.

An icey morning at the triangle

Days ticking by

Working late last night. 9pm. Remotely for the last bit, but still too late. My wife was fantastic. Proof reading for me, no complaints about the disruption to our evening, nor the lateness. She's great.

No disturbances from little one last night, so we got a full nights sleep. Even though we both still feel tragic, I think we're getting better. There are more smiles. It's been a tough couple of months sleep wise.

Tax tonight. An evening of forms and paperwork. Joy. Thanks to Jon for helping me out on this. At least this is the last difficult year. It's simple from here out. Unless I go contracting again!

That's London Bridge out the way, we're packed in and heading to work. Should be an interesting day. Major change going in to one of my systems, and, hopefully, some positive feedback to last nights efforts. We'll see.

No post, no time

Running late, and Dexter kept stopping (glitch in encoding), so no time.

Only two more days of Dex, and then, I think, a break. More writing for a bit.

A Tuesday dawns

We slept last night. No peep from little one until 06:50. Still going to bed too late / getting up too early; but uninterrupted sleep is a good thing!

I'm going to miss Dexter at the end of this week. Friday will have seen him as my companion for 36 journeys. I haven't got anything else lined up at the minute as my wife and I usually enjoy watching the same programs. It's only Dexter that, so far, she didn't want to see. Too disturbing.

So I'll have to think of new things to do next week. I'm thinking topic blogging, but so far I've only got a handfull of topics. Any ideas out there?

Failing that, a new program will have to be found.

Difficult dilemas in my life!

Tonight is a lateish one as we have a departmental meeting to remind us all how bad things are, but we're doing great, but things are tough, but we're toughing it out. Etc.

Other than that, clear morning, meetings from 14:30 until I go home. Joy.

Canada Water comes and goes, no one gets on, no one leaves. Work next, time to go.

Dexter

Watching TV isn't leaving much time for blogging. It's nice to break away and lose myself in a program, but I miss writing here.

Fortunately, it's the last week of season 3 which means I'll have to watch something different next week. I'll try and pick something shorter.

Weekend involved little sleep, huge amounts of cooking, and some other jobs. I got some clothes on Saturday, never that enjoyable an experience; however, 2 pairs of jeans, and 2 t-shirts will help bolster my ageing wardrobe.

Little one had a terrible night Friday. Waking at 01:30, and deciding it was party time. Finally slept, maybe, at about 05:30. Saturday night saw 2 calls in the night. Last night, finally, saw none. 

That's it we're at work. Time to get my head together.

Nothing to write

I went home last night, I ate, I watched a little TV, I talked to my wife, I went to bed.

This morning, I got up, showered, dressed, went to work.

My mind has been pretty quiet (read tired), so no profound thoughts.

It's Thursday, I have meetings, the weekend is a couple of days away.

At least my wife is home today. I've missed her and the little minx.

Here we go again

Slept well, but not enough last night. Monday saw a terrible night. So bad that I couldn't get up yesterday, and worked from home.

My wife and I are just dog tired now. It'll take many nights of good sleep to catch up. Which we see no sign of getting.

Last night, and tonight my wife and daughter are staying with my wife's parents giving me a chance to get a couple of nights. It'll make a dint, but I fear won't be enough. At least it'll be followed by a weekend. Bad nights, but late mornings.

Right, enough whinging. I'll talk about something else next time.

A frosty start

Cold one this morning. Wasn't expecting to de-ice the car. Still made the train.

A change arrives - Barack Obama's inauguration speech

Barack Obama has been sworn in as the 44th US president. Here is his inauguration speech in full.

My fellow citizens:

I stand here today humbled by the task before us, grateful for the trust you have bestowed, mindful of the sacrifices borne by our ancestors. I thank President Bush for his service to our nation, as well as the generosity and co-operation he has shown throughout this transition.

Forty-four Americans have now taken the presidential oath. The words have been spoken during rising tides of prosperity and the still waters of peace. Yet, every so often the oath is taken amidst gathering clouds and raging storms. At these moments, America has carried on not simply because of the skill or vision of those in high office, but because We the People have remained faithful to the ideals of our forbearers, and true to our founding documents.

So it has been. So it must be with this generation of Americans.

That we are in the midst of crisis is now well understood. Our nation is at war, against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred. Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age. Homes have been lost; jobs shed; businesses shuttered. Our health care is too costly; our schools fail too many; and each day brings further evidence that the ways we use energy strengthen our adversaries and threaten our planet.

These are the indicators of crisis, subject to data and statistics. Less measurable but no less profound is a sapping of confidence across our land - a nagging fear that America's decline is inevitable, and that the next generation must lower its sights.

Today I say to you that the challenges we face are real. They are serious and they are many. They will not be met easily or in a short span of time. But know this, America - they will be met.

On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord.

On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics.

We remain a young nation, but in the words of scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things. The time has come to reaffirm our enduring spirit; to choose our better history; to carry forward that precious gift, that noble idea, passed on from generation to generation: the God-given promise that all are equal, all are free, and all deserve a chance to pursue their full measure of happiness.

In reaffirming the greatness of our nation, we understand that greatness is never a given. It must be earned. Our journey has never been one of short-cuts or settling for less. It has not been the path for the faint-hearted - for those who prefer leisure over work, or seek only the pleasures of riches and fame. Rather, it has been the risk-takers, the doers, the makers of things - some celebrated but more often men and women obscure in their labour, who have carried us up the long, rugged path towards prosperity and freedom.

For us, they packed up their few worldly possessions and travelled across oceans in search of a new life.

For us, they toiled in sweatshops and settled the West; endured the lash of the whip and ploughed the hard earth.

For us, they fought and died, in places like Concord and Gettysburg; Normandy and Khe Sahn.

Time and again these men and women struggled and sacrificed and worked till their hands were raw so that we might live a better life. They saw America as bigger than the sum of our individual ambitions; greater than all the differences of birth or wealth or faction.

This is the journey we continue today. We remain the most prosperous, powerful nation on earth. Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year. Our capacity remains undiminished. But our time of standing pat, of protecting narrow interests and putting off unpleasant decisions - that time has surely passed. Starting today, we must pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off, and begin again the work of remaking America.

For everywhere we look, there is work to be done. The state of the economy calls for action, bold and swift, and we will act - not only to create new jobs, but to lay a new foundation for growth. We will build the roads and bridges, the electric grids and digital lines that feed our commerce and bind us together. We will restore science to its rightful place, and wield technology's wonders to raise health care's quality and lower its cost. We will harness the sun and the winds and the soil to fuel our cars and run our factories. And we will transform our schools and colleges and universities to meet the demands of a new age. All this we can do. All this we will do.

Now, there are some who question the scale of our ambitions - who suggest that our system cannot tolerate too many big plans. Their memories are short. For they have forgotten what this country has already done; what free men and women can achieve when imagination is joined to common purpose, and necessity to courage.

What the cynics fail to understand is that the ground has shifted beneath them - that the stale political arguments that have consumed us for so long no longer apply. The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works - whether it helps families find jobs at a decent wage, care they can afford, a retirement that is dignified. Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward. Where the answer is no, programs will end. And those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account - to spend wisely, reform bad habits, and do our business in the light of day - because only then can we restore the vital trust between a people and their government.

Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill. Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched, but this crisis has reminded us that without a watchful eye, the market can spin out of control - that a nation cannot prosper long when it favours only the prosperous. The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity; on the ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart - not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

As for our common defence, we reject as false the choice between our safety and our ideals. Our founding fathers, faced with perils we can scarcely imagine, drafted a charter to assure the rule of law and the rights of man, a charter expanded by the blood of generations. Those ideals still light the world, and we will not give them up for expedience's sake. And so to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation and every man, woman, and child who seeks a future of peace and dignity, and we are ready to lead once more.

Recall that earlier generations faced down fascism and communism not just with missiles and tanks, but with the sturdy alliances and enduring convictions. They understood that our power alone cannot protect us, nor does it entitle us to do as we please. Instead, they knew that our power grows through its prudent use; our security emanates from the justness of our cause, the force of our example, the tempering qualities of humility and restraint.

We are the keepers of this legacy. Guided by these principles once more, we can meet those new threats that demand even greater effort - even greater cooperation and understanding between nations. We will begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people, and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan. With old friends and former foes, we will work tirelessly to lessen the nuclear threat, and roll back the spectre of a warming planet. We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defence, and for those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents, we say to you now that our spirit is stronger and cannot be broken; you cannot outlast us, and we will defeat you.

For we know that our patchwork heritage is a strength, not a weakness. We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus - and non-believers. We are shaped by every language and culture, drawn from every end of this earth; and because we have tasted the bitter swill of civil war and segregation, and emerged from that dark chapter stronger and more united, we cannot help but believe that the old hatreds shall someday pass; that the lines of tribe shall soon dissolve; that as the world grows smaller, our common humanity shall reveal itself; and that America must play its role in ushering in a new era of peace.

To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect. To those leaders around the globe who seek to sow conflict, or blame their society's ills on the West - know that your people will judge you on what you can build, not what you destroy. To those who cling to power through corruption and deceit and the silencing of dissent, know that you are on the wrong side of history; but that we will extend a hand if you are willing to unclench your fist.

To the people of poor nations, we pledge to work alongside you to make your farms flourish and let clean waters flow; to nourish starved bodies and feed hungry minds. And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to suffering outside our borders; nor can we consume the world's resources without regard to effect. For the world has changed, and we must change with it.

As we consider the road that unfolds before us, we remember with humble gratitude those brave Americans who, at this very hour, patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains. They have something to tell us, just as the fallen heroes who lie in Arlington whisper through the ages. We honour them not only because they are guardians of our liberty, but because they embody the spirit of service; a willingness to find meaning in something greater than themselves. And yet, at this moment - a moment that will define a generation - it is precisely this spirit that must inhabit us all.

For as much as government can do and must do, it is ultimately the faith and determination of the American people upon which this nation relies. It is the kindness to take in a stranger when the levees break, the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job which sees us through our darkest hours. It is the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke, but also a parent's willingness to nurture a child, that finally decides our fate.

Our challenges may be new. The instruments with which we meet them may be new. But those values upon which our success depends - honesty and hard work, courage and fair play, tolerance and curiosity, loyalty and patriotism - these things are old. These things are true. They have been the quiet force of progress throughout our history. What is demanded then is a return to these truths. What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility - a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world, duties that we do not grudgingly accept but rather seize gladly, firm in the knowledge that there is nothing so satisfying to the spirit, so defining of our character, than giving our all to a difficult task.

This is the price and the promise of citizenship.

This is the source of our confidence - the knowledge that God calls on us to shape an uncertain destiny.

This is the meaning of our liberty and our creed - why men and women and children of every race and every faith can join in celebration across this magnificent mall, and why a man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.

So let us mark this day with remembrance, of who we are and how far we have travelled. In the year of America's birth, in the coldest of months, a small band of patriots huddled by dying campfires on the shores of an icy river. The capital was abandoned. The enemy was advancing. The snow was stained with blood. At a moment when the outcome of our revolution was most in doubt, the father of our nation ordered these words be read to the people:

"Let it be told to the future world...that in the depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive...that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet [it]."

America. In the face of our common dangers, in this winter of our hardship, let us remember these timeless words. With hope and virtue, let us brave once more the icy currents, and endure what storms may come. Let it be said by our children's children that when we were tested we refused to let this journey end, that we did not turn back nor did we falter; and with eyes fixed on the horizon and God's grace upon us, we carried forth that great gift of freedom and delivered it safely to future generations.

Thank you. God bless you. And God bless the United States of America.

It was a wet and rainy Monday...

It's not often that I leave the house and it's raining. Considering that we live in a, supposedly, wet country, it's actually dry most of the time.

Had a good long (not long enough) weekend. Friday was my daughter's birthday, so we took her to an indoor play area. Essentially padded scafolding with some slides, she loved it. Saturday we tried to go and see some horses, but it was shut. Sunday, we had some garden play. In between all that we got some planting done, saw "Twilight", and I got my hair cut. A productive weekend.

My wife and daughter will be away three nights this week, so a chance to catch up on some sleep. I'll miss them, but short periods of quiet are good.

Who knows what work will bring. The "emergencies" of last week are over, time for some new ones.

So, I wasn't working today.

So why am I on a train underground in London heading for Canary Wharf? Because of pointless beauracratic paperwork, that's why.

Happy, not so much. My daughter watched me get on the train, and then went home, put a man in her little choo choo, and said "Bye bye Daddy"

These were supposed to be her days.

It doesn't matter if I do my job or not, but because some senior manager can run a report and see if a box has been ticked, this is important. Is this what my life has become?

I'll be going home as soon as I can.

Can't write

Feel bunged up. Have too much todo before 2 days off. Mind not in the right place. Normal service resumes Monday.

A blustery sort of day

Windy and wet this morning. The train is packed, it was busy at the start and has deteriorated from there.

Variable sleeps over the weekend. Good, but not enough. We've had two late mornings, but late nights to go with them. Daftly, I got into playing "the Force Uleashed" on Saturday night, and continued last night when I should have gone to bed. Don't feel too bad this morning, but I could feel better.

Short week this week. I'm off Thursday and Friday as it's my daughter's birthday. Be nice to have a relaxing long weekend.

Didn't do much this weekend. Filled the time with jobs and chores. Friday night I came home and worked until bed time. Saturday, my wife was out in the evening, so I tidied up and played computer games. Sunday was more of the same. I did manage to get all the Xmas stuff into the loft, so that's one less thing to worry about.

Apparently, our extremely cramped train is approaching Clapham Junction. Woo.

Don't know what to write, don't know why I write it. It is approaching one year since I started doing this properly. Time to think carefully about where it goes next.

Tired and emotional

Having an easy to press button that discards your message without confirmation is not the best UI feature ever devised.

Didn't get much sleep last night. My daughter was up in th early hours, and my mind had much to process. Thankfully, it's Friday. A weekend is almost upon me.

An advert in front of me reads:

"That it will never come again is what makes life so sweet" Emily Dickinson
There's probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.

A poster from the atheist campaign, it does psoe a thinking point. My mind today thinks there's probably no purpose to my job. I should stop worrying and enjoy my life. Why do we put ourselves through this? Essentially, my job boils down to keeping costs down so an institution that provides no real tangible benefit to life can make more money. And for this I travel for over 3 hours a day, take on a huge amount of stress, and put up with so much crap it's unbelievable. I bet I couldn't justify my life to, well, anyone really.

Good job it's the weekend eh!?

Time for some R&R.

No time

Over-running on Dexter this morning. Glitch in the last few minutes took me time to fix. Already I'm just 3 minutes from work.

No time to get my head straight.

Good job I haven't got many meetings today. Up in the night, so a bit tired. Early mornings starting to take their toll. Oh well, 2 more days, then the weekend, then a 3 day week, then my daughters birthday. That'll be good.

Cramped, therefore short

Can't move much as we approach London Bridge.

Things have got slightly better now.

Didn't get to bed that early, but did sleep through. Up again too early. Dragging my sorry butt to the shower.

Train only had 4 carriages, and they gave us no warning, so had to run half a platform for the train.

It was cold this morning, but dry, with no wind. It was snowing at 7 am. Quite pretty. Quiet.

Now at Bermondsey. No one gets off. No one can get on. It'll be the same at Canada Water.

Tired, but not too bad. Busy day ahead. Meetings throughout the day. Fun, if you like that sort of thing. The important ones are this morning. Everything else is filler. Or wheel spinning. We have meetings because we always have meetings. I've got work to do! Hopefully most of them are conference calls.

Canada Water is gone. Our destination approaches. Time for another day.

Atheist bus campaign goes nationwide

Genius!

Atheist bus campaign goes nationwide | World news | guardian.co.uk

Life at the dark end

Things didn't go quite according to plan, but I did manage to get up at 06:20. Unfortunately, my backup alarm went off before the quieter main alarm, so it was a bit of a rude awakening.

I'm ok, if a little spaced, at the moment; but this will definitely catch up with me. Must have a proper early night tonight or I'll be good for nothing tomorrow.

Travelling in watching TV shows isn't leaving much time for blogging. Also, it feels a little weird watching a programme about a serial killer in a crowded train. Wonder what my neighbours think if they glance over at the wrong moment. Still, Dexter is an interesting diversion.

Fast approaching work. It seems to creep up on me.

I got so engrossed in the program last night that I rode the tube 2 stops past mine. I ended up paying attention at Swiss Cottage, and had to quickly get off and ride back to Baker Street. Wasted about 15 minutes.

Busy day, and the low headache is starting already.

Steve's Tuesday Morning View - 06 Jan 2009

First of the year, and I almost forgot to take it. Clearly the eight hours of daylight we're getting at the minute don't include 7am!

Same old, same old

Here we are in a new year. A traditional time of change, of resolutions. And yet, the same problems exist this week that were there last week. We're still too tired; we're still going to sleep too late; little one is still waking us in the night; we're still sleeping in too late to compensate.

It's going to hurt, but tomorrow has to lead to a re-adjusted lifecycle. Alarms will be set where I can't reach them from the bed. Resolutions will be made. Things will change.

Also, tomorrow sees the start of "Steve's Tuesday Morning View" a photo of the dawn taken at the same time every week. It'll be Tuesday to avoid Bank Holidays (and also because I missed it this morning). Something to look forward to.

This twitter thing seems easy enough. I'm following enough people to get enough reminders to update. This, plus the blog, and the picasa photo albums suits me. Facebook is fading as a pull now. I feel I lost contact with people for a reason, if I'm not in touch, why do I care about your latest drunken weekend? I'll keep it going for a while, see how it fares. Time is, however, precious, and I only have time for limited updates.

Time to focus, time to change, time to start doing something, and make some choices over what can't be done.

The *all new* front of our lounge

Now with removed toy box and clutter!

The *new* back of our lounge

A veritable "children's play area"

New Year, same week

I really should have taken today off. Having worked from home Tuesday and Wednesday, and then having Thursday off, today seems a real drag. My mind is having issues working out what day it is. It's amazing how important routine is.

Last night, convinced it was Sunday (even after a conversation 30 minutes earlier where I had mentioned doing the ironing because it was Sunday, and then realizing it wasn't) I washed my daughters hair. Poor thing doesn't like it at the best of times, but now she's had an extra turn.

We visited Kew gardens yesterday, and had a nice wander. Little one enjoyed it for the most part, but it was a little crowded for me and my wife. We finished up our New Year with "Quantum of Solace". A good film, but a little too fast paced in the action scenes at times.

Next week, I feel, is the proper start of the year. People will be back from holiday, and we can start working properly. Today is just one last chance to get the paperwork up to date. Joy.