Well, the Candymania 2: The Revenge made have had its revenge on me, but something else did as well. I was ill on Sunday night and most of Monday. Yesterday I wasnt sick but still visited the loo on more-than-regular occasions. Today I'm feeling a bit brighter, but my stomach is aching from all the movement and twisting its been going through...

I have however, accomplished some bits and bobs while at home. I have replaced my Origo ADSL router with a Smoothwall firewall using my ADSL modem. It rocks! Running on a Celeron 333 with 64mb - it is way overspecced. It also has 2 NICs. One is for my network, the other for my DMZ (as I have VLAN'd my switch), so I can now access my home network from the web. So far I have got web services up and running, but I will be implementing fetchmail, webmail, etc in the near future to use from work. Sadly, I still have spare machines to use, although no hard drives. I think maybe SME Server deserves a try...

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[link]   Posted @ 12:03

Saturday evening, we went to Cheers/Back Bar Live and I was blown away by Evanfly. They were truly awesome. I have downloaded the couple of tracks from their site and should hopefully have their CD within a couple of weeks. Definately going to see them again. Good to see a local band coming good, as they are going to be huge!

Shell came home early yesterday (as she wasn't well) and later in the evening, we went to The Nelson in Cleeve, which is a Hungry Horse pub. We both had steak and then indulged in a Candymania 2: The Revenge. When we got home, I spent most of the night on the toilet. Damn those allergies of mine...

The Olsen Twins. See them here and here
Would you or wouldnt you? That should prompt some discussion...

What Movie Do You Belong In?
Me?

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[link]   Posted @ 15:28

I have never been summonsed for speeding (been stopped and cautioned a few times) but if I did, I would want it to happen like this. Well worth a read if you want a laugh.

Reading on the BBC News site that a new law has been brought in. After reading through it, it suddenly concerned me about a number of innocent things that will be prevented:
pupils walking along in crocodiles holding hands and kiss chase to name but 2. No more year 11 students making out around the school and around town, or copping a quick feel in the local park. Yes I agree something needs to be done, but this seems a bit pointless - especially as it seems as if it wont be properly enforced. I despair!

Had the house inspection today from the landlord. That all went fine. However, 10 mins before he turned up, Tim told me that he was moving out at the end of May, as he could no longer afford the rent (his boss has been mucking him around and he hasnt got much guaranteed work). So its all a bit pants really. Especially as the landlord has put the rent up by �30 a month. Even if Shell moved in, I dont think we could afford it between us. Gonna have to start looking for something cheaper I think. Darn it!

Plus this morning I got notification of a CCJ against me from the Inland Revenue. They didnt agree to my suggested pay schedule and have asked for it all up front (as if!), so I now have to appeal on Tuesday and ask for the court to consider it as I patently cant pay them back.

Everything is going tits! I'm going to court about the kids (costing me more money), gonna have to consider moving, might have to apply for bancruptcy to sort out the IR problem... sheesh! Maybe I should buy a lottery ticket fot this evening and see if I get supremely lucky :)

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[link]   Posted @ 12:37

I have updated the spam thingummy on my Amiga. Now using a newer version and am awaiting ver. 3 in the next couple of weeks. I used to get around 250 SPAM messages a day, but this is now down to around 30 - which is fantastic improvement.
Most of the Spam that is still getting through is using the lots-of-random-words-put-into-stupid-sentences-as-the-subject system.
Spam Fryer plus an upgrade to a new beta of YAM, has sped up my mail considerably. This pleases me. The amount of spam thats being deleted before I see it still displeases me though.

I had a day off yesterday. Spent the morning in bed watching Angel with Shell, and after dropping her off at work, I started cleaning. I tidied, polished and vacuumed my office, the kids room and the stairs/hallways. I cleared out under my bed and emptied the hallways of everything. I cleaned windows and everything I could see (radiators, etc) in the aforementioned rooms.

My office is now extremely tidy, but also has 11 system units in it! Not all are in use, but hey - I'll sort all that out later on. I may take pictures later to show its splendour...

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[link]   Posted @ 11:31

I did stuff yesterday. I weeded the front garden. I mowed the back garden. This evening, I will be putting wood bark on the front garden, weeding and woodbarking the back flower beds and giving the lawn another once over (at a slightly closer cut). And my legs are aching due to the lawn mowing. How does that work? Is it some kind of bodily campaign against gardening (I hope so) or am I just incredibly unfit? I can hardly walk today - its pathetic. Maybe I should start another form of exercise apart from wild, crazy sex with my girlfriend. Brisk walking or running...

Smacking people in the face. I thought about this a couple of weeks ago, but didnt mention it here (although I did on IRC). Have you ever been stood chatting to a close friend, either at work or in a pub, etc and thought "I could punch them so hard, smack them in the face right now, and they would never expect it and it would be awesome!"

After discussing this with several people, I have come to the conclusion that a lot of us have a mass of pent-up violence which we just seem to hold back all the time. I mean, there is no-one particularly that I would want to do this too (there are always a couple of exceptions), but its just the fact that I could do it. WHAM! Blood, teeth and bones everywhere. I mean, its not as if your good friend is expecting you to suddenly lunge at them with a face cracking punch, that'll send them flying backwards into a table...

What stops us from doing it? Conscience - that little voice telling us that it is bad? Sanity - the same thing that stops us from sticking our fingers into grinding machinery?

Maybe it would be theureputic to just launch an attack on someone. One of your close friends would probably be best, as if you go around attacking strangers, several things could go wrong - they might be tougher than you, they might be mad, they could call the police, etc. If anyone tries it, please leave me a comment on whether it worked for you, etc.

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[link]   Posted @ 16:10

Friday afternoon, it was pointed out to me that someone was linking to a jpg on my site and it was being hit quite often (due to being used in a sig on a forum), so I changed it :) It became a small 3k jpg that said "I steal bandwidth... See my ghey-dom!". I dont mind them using the original picture, but I do mind them using my bandwidth. So if you are the person, please remember to just copy the piccie to your webspace. Cheers

Had a fantastic day yesterday (no kids withstanding). We got up late, quickly put a picnic together and then made our way to Nailsea Lake to feed the swans, duck, geese and moor hens. After about an house, we then drove onwards to Bristol and went to Debenhams to spend my �50 award. �49.95 got me a pair of jeans, a T-shirt ("I am known for my hard tackle"), an egg whisk and a 2qt. mixing bowl. How awesome is that? Shell wouldnt let me spend any money on her, as she reckoned I earned the money so I should spent on whatever I wanted, unless I wanted to spend it on her. Still, �50 well spent I feel.

We went to Back Bar Live! last night to see Trouble and Strife - they were truly excellent. Although we only stayed for the first set, as Shell wasnt well. She wouldn't admit to it while we were there, of course. Oh no! I had to force her to put her coat on and then she admitted she wasn't feeling great on the way up the hill. But I knew that already. And when we got home - she threw up. I know her far better than she thinks I do :)

This morning I implemented a spam killer on my Amiga. A utility called SpamFryer off of Aminet. I configured it up, altered the program slightly to catch some more SPAM-like words (its written in Arexx, so is completely customisable) and added it into my email client (YAM) to be run before downloading mail. Deletes the damn things directly from the server, so I dont have to download them and delete them. Thanks to Simon Goodwin (the guy that wrote it) for this gem of a program.

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[link]   Posted @ 08:02

The latest entry from Pork Tornado is truly excellent. I have felt like doing things like that myself several times, but I have someone who keeps my sanity in check nowadays.

Lunchtime today, I went and collected my DVD writer from the parcel company and also went into Fowlers (the bike people). Wow! I want to become a biker again now. Every few months and it happens again. If I had some cash...

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[link]   Posted @ 14:53

Damn them dabs.com people. They have managed to not yet credit my card, even though I updated the details. Then said it was denied again, so I added another card to my account and said use the new one, to which they replied they couldnt see that card! So god knows what account they are using to check it out with! So I sent them screen prints to prove it :)

Got home yesterday to find that my new server case and stuf had arrived, and I had been carded for the DVD drive. So yesterday, I installed a 120mm intake fan, 80mm exhaust fan and the Rheobus into the case. I'll stick the DVDROM and the DVDRW in over the next couple of days and then move the mobo in next week while Shell is at work.

I received an award today at work, along with a certificate. But the best thing, �50 in Debenham vouchers! So thats pretty darned good.

Didnt play snooker with Ben last night, as I had a stinking headache when I got home (which had been building since 11am). Watched Angel, watched Shell try to complete Sonic 2 and cooked Fusilli Bolognese. I rule...

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[link]   Posted @ 11:06

Had an email from Dabs.com last night, telling me that my card issuer had declined my card. What are they charging me for I panicked!

They were trying to credit me with �80 because of the Pioneer DVDR 106 I had send back as it was buggered.

So this morning I ordered an NEC ND-2500 for �60, which leaves me with a better spec DVD writer and �20 in my pocket. Which means I might invest in those extra 80gb hard drives... giving me 1/3rd of a Terabyte of network storage, which should be enough for a little while :)

I also get very annoyed last night when someone outbid on a dutch auction on eBay last night, with 1 second to go. I was not happy. I only wanted 1 of them and this person dipped in and took all 4! So I am on the lookout for another 12+ port switch that supports VLAN, SNMP and RMON...

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[link]   Posted @ 15:01

"If I had a choice between Mila Jovovich or a crispy bacon and cream cheese toasted ciabatta, I'd... hmm - yeah, choose the ciabatta." Paul G, 2004

If you know of Mila, then that may suprise you. If you know my mate Paul, then maybe it wont :)

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[link]   Posted @ 10:29