Spice Girls are back

Yes there are more important things happening in England at the moment BUT

the spice girls are back.

Here they are courtesy of the BBC


Cant believe Geri still has her dress....

Blakey

I have had some blakeys fitted to a pair of my shoes and whilst they are dead loud and make me sound like a girl walking down the road they will hopefully save me having to keep getting the heel done.

It did get a couple of us thinking about the era of blakeys. Burgundy stay press trousers, White towelling socks or one pink and one green, karate slipper, highlights, dyeing just the front of your hair !, Choose Life T-Shirts, Parker and harrington coats.

Happy days

Eggs Banned

Can you believe it, an advertising watchdog has banned an egg advert (from the 50's) because it does not promote a balanced diet !! The amount of crap and junk food on the TV and they ban this.

Story is on the BBC site

Ban on rerun of eggs TV advert

Tony Hancock
Comedian Tony Hancock featured in the advertisement

The 1950s TV adverts
Reruns of a TV commercial from the 1950s which urged viewers to "go to work on an egg" have been banned.

An advertising watchdog said the slogan went against the principle of eating a varied diet.

The Egg Information Service had wanted to screen the advert, which featured comedian Tony Hancock, to celebrate its 50th birthday.

Author Fay Weldon, who headed the team which came up with the slogan, has described the decision as absurd.

"When you think of what can be run and what is being run, like low-cost airlines and cars - cars kill, eggs aren't actually likely to do so," she told BBC Radio 4's Today programme.

She said she was proud of the adverts and remembered how Hancock was reluctant to take part.

"He hated doing them, he felt it was a great comedown, he didn't want to do them and did them as a kind of mockery.

"I sat in the studio listening to him moaning and complaining, so we just wrote what he wanted.

"One of them said 'I hate doing this advertisement' - we just thought the truth might work best."

'Accepted advice'

The Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre (BACC) defended its decision, insisting that the adverts did not suggest a varied diet.

BACC spokesman Kristoffer Hammer said: "Dietary considerations have been at the centre of the new rules for advertising and in consideration of this we felt that these adverts did not suggest a varied diet.

"The concept of eating eggs every day for breakfast goes against what is now the generally accepted advice of a varied diet and we therefore could not approve the ads for broadcast."

British Egg Information Service spokesperson Amanda Cryer said: "We have been shocked by this ruling as eggs are a healthy, natural food which are recommended by nutritionists."

"What's more, there are no restrictions on the number of eggs people can eat, which was recently confirmed by the Food Standards Agency, and between five and seven eggs a week would be totally acceptable for most people."

Ms Cryer added: "In addition, many other advertisers clearly promote their products to be eaten every day such as breakfast cereals so we are very surprised that eggs have been singled out in this way."

Facebook

I still dont really get it but have met a couple of mates through it all but if you would like to link or be my friend over in facebook here is my profile link http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=622101555

Palace 1 Dowie 0

Finally a judge in the land who understands something about contracts. Foot ball has always made me laugh by the fact that you can do such a bad job mnaging a team that you get sacked but then you get paid up your contract. Anyway this is aboout Dowie getting his just reward. I have nothing against Dowie but I am glad that we won the case.

I posted this last year ....

Tuesday, May 30, 2006
Why Dowie, why?

I'm glad that Jordan is serving Dowie a writ. BBC story here. At the end of the day he left Palace to be nearer his family so was mutually released from his contact at Palace and then he turns up at Charlton (Who for some reason think they are our rivals, your not). Not good and not right, on the Palace sites they are saying he is worse the Steve Bruce when he walked. At least Steve Bruce asked for permission to talk to Birmingham, not that he was allowed but thats another long story !

AJ has signed for Everton and I wish him all the best.

Never a dull moment being a Palace fan !!

Mr Dowie will get one back when he signs Borrowdale though. A good player but again greed has the better of him and he is leaving.

Ouch - Woman jailed for testicle attack

Men, get something to dry your eyes before reading on.....

From BBC

Woman jailed for testicle attack
A woman who ripped off her ex-boyfriend's testicle with her bare hands has been sent to prison.

Amanda Monti, 24, flew into a rage when Geoffrey Jones, 37, rejected her advances at the end of a house party, Liverpool Crown Court heard.

She pulled off his left testicle and tried to swallow it, before spitting it out. A friend handed it back to Mr Jones saying: "That's yours."

Monti admitted wounding and was jailed for two-and-a-half years.

'Pulled hard'

Sentencing Monti, Judge Charles James said it was "a very serious injury" and that Monti was not acting in self defence.

The court heard that Mr Jones had ended his long-term but "open relationship" with Monti towards the end of May last year.

The pair remained on good terms and on 30 May she picked him up from a party in Crosby and went back for drinks with friends at Mr Jones's house.

An argument ensued and Mr Jones said there was a struggle between them.

In his statement, Mr Jones said she grabbed his genitals and "pulled hard".

He added: "That caused my underpants to come off and I found I was completely naked and in excruciating pain."

The court heard that a friend saw Monti put Mr Jones's testicle into her mouth and try to swallow it.

She choked and spat it back into her hand before the friend grabbed it and gave it back to Mr Jones. Doctors were unable to re-attach the organ.

In a letter to the court, Monti said she was sorry for what she had done.

She said: "It was never my intention to cause harm to Geoff and the fact that I have caused him injury will live with me forever. I am in no way a violent person."

The letter added: "I have challenged myself to explain what has happened but still I just cannot remember. This has caused much anguish to me and will do for the rest of my life."

Ouch. I love her statement that she is not a violent person. Could you imagine what she would of done if she was :-0

Stats

I was reading a blog about stats so thought I would check mine out.

My mates are currently doing a round the world tour (see link on the right, Matt and Michelle)

At least I thought they were until I see that they have been on my blog for nearly 24 hours.....

Have a look at their blog there has been some good posts.

Micro Chips

We have all been in the Isle Of Wight the last 5 days. We had a great time but wish I was there over the weekend for the festival.

We left Friday and there was loads coming over on the ferry.

I had not been to the Isle Of Wight since I was little and really enjoyed it, we stayed in a caravan and I took my laptop. I wanted the laptop to try and get some wireless but only managed to get online once in Ryde centre.

When I never took the laptop I "hid" it in the grill section of the oven. Great idea I thought until we came home and just put Max's food in the oven and turned it on. After about 30 mins I realised that the laptop was above it in the grill !!! Luckily everything seems OK although it was very hot !

Here are a couple of photos from the trip.

Happy Blog Birthday

Today is the 2nd birthday of this blog and I have managed just, and I mean just, over 200 posts. It's still fun and something to keep my friends and family up to date with things happening in the world of the Simmonds'. Sometimes it feels like a chore rather then a pleasure and I wish I had a "thing" that made people come back to the blog but I do have repeat visitors so thank you if you are one of them. When I started I had various ideas i.e. fact and joke of the day plus what happened on this day BUT again it became a chore rather then something I enjoyed so I dropped it.

What do I wish I could do, well to be brutally honest I wish it was more "secret" i.e. I could never really talk about my work because I know some of my work colleagues read the blog, I know my family read the blog and you know sometimes I would like a good moan about them (very rarely of course !!)

I still love you all though......

Happy Birthday to Slothblog and Wyndham as well

MacBook Pro and Vista Ultimate

Oh my gawd I have joined the darkside... I have loaded on Vista Ultimate on to my Macbook.

I am working on a new project at work and it means working with Vista so I got a copy ordered and have installed it.

Shocking but my first impressions are good :-0, Will NEVER take the place of OSX though.

Will post more on Vista and how it compares with OSX. I am interested to hear how other people are finding Visa and how it runs older apps.

200th Post !! Joost in time

I'm hopefully going to get an invite to have a look at Joost thanks to Random Good Stuff.

I mean I have given him my 200th Post so it's only fair.

Please visit his website HERE

Sore Testicles

Faye is not feeling well and says she has swollen testicles, I think (and hope) she means tonsils !!!

Wonder what sort of google search traffic comes my way this week with the title as is.

Dizzy

Max has now started to just make himself dizzy by going round and round until he stops, giggles and then falls over. Quite a worry really but makes us laugh.

He is also pulling this rather funny face all the time:

The Agents did it...

Charlton are relegated

Last year I posted this:

Wednesday, May 31, 2006

Agent Dowie takes his seat

Agent Coppell moved from Palace to Brighton and took them down
Agent Tuttle played for Palace and took Millwall down
Agent Bruce went to Birmingham and it took a couple of seasons but finally did his job and took them back down, he also gave us Johnson and then gave us back Morrison so in total from that deal we made about 12 million and kept Morrison :-0. What an Agent.

AND NOW

Agent Dowie goes to Charlton or the Clowns as they are somtimes known, lets see what happens :-)

Now it didn't quite happen as posted but it was OK because Agent Pardew (or Super Al as he is known to the Palace faithful after THAT semi V Liverpool) did actually take them down after taking over from Dowie.

Dirty cheating Leeds

Leeds have gone into receivership today and been deducted 10 points so therefore are relegated.

What gets me though is that if they had done this after Sunday OR had already been "mathematically" relegated then they would be deducted 10 points at the start of next season but what they have done is knowing that if they don't have a miracle on Sunday then are down. Hull need to lose by 5 goals and Leeds win by 5 goals !

What I think should happen is that they should play until they have accumulated 10 points starting from now. So should they happen to win on Sunday they would still start next season with minus 7 points.

Guess who bought the club straight off the receivers......Ken Bates the current chairman !
The story is on the BBC here

Lawn Bowls

Went to lunch today with a work colleague, Pete for those that know him, well we went and got a sarnie and strolled to the bowling green because they have seats and also the sun beats down.

Halfway through lunch a few people came out to play when Pete turns round and says "I remember that guy with the beard from last year. I always like to see that they made it through winter"

The picture is "borrowed" from Flickr, it was taken by a member called ukalipt and the original can be found here

Choo Choo

Footy News

Well we played really well today and for once all the fans were behind the players. Lots of singing and a great atmosphere. We beat Derby 2-0 and deserved the win, as mentioned though we put Sunderland and Birmingham up. Mixed feelings or what !

Car News

Mmmm not a cheap day Friday, my car has been misfiring, running lumpy, going like a dog with 3 legs I dont know what you call it but it was not right. It needed a service so I had it booked in anyway and asked the garage to check the misfire, nothing turned up on the computer so it meant that they would have to try and diagnose it the old fashioned way. They did work it out in the end, the rocker gaskets had gone and meant that oil had got into the spark plugs and everywhere else. It had also messed up the ignition leads and meant that under load it was misfiring. New leads £150 plus VAT !!! Could not believe it and non Audi ones would cost £100 BUT I managed to get a 2nd hand pair from them and had those fitted. Car flys now ! and my pockets are very very light !

Toddler News

Max is teething quite a bit now. He has not had many teeth i.e. he is 17 months and only has 4 on top and just 3 on the bottom but it looks like all the others are coming in one go !!

Heres Max on Friday.

The News

House News

Faye has been busy painting the house, we are almost done now and have some touch up's to do plus the interior doors need to be done. Can not wait until we have finished everywhere. Also think we are going to have to replace the carpet because it is a very daft colour for a house containing a red wine drinker, a toddler and a puppy. It's cream. Well it's not very cream now !!!

I have also managed to build a small fence so we can let Max play out in the garden without fear of him falling over the wall.

I worked up quite a sweat......


Toddler news

Max has got so cheeky recently but it is so cute. He is running around everywhere and into everything. His hair is starting to grow back now so we should be able to get him to a proper hairdressers soon for a real cut rather then me having another go.
He has started to really like trains so every time he sees one he shouts choo choo.




Footy News

Well Palace have nothing to play for but a few players are out of contract so hopefully I will see a good game tomorrow against Derby. If we beat them though we send Birmingham and Sunderland up. After our history with Steve Bruce not sure I want us to win :-)

Hopefully next week when we play Colchester we might play the youngsters as neither team have anything to play for.

This time next year I will posting about our promotion. What went wrong, well our defenders forgot that they had to play together and midfield forgot to turn up for most of the season. Also really hope that we stop bringing all the players back when we are defending a corner as we can never counter attack.

This time last year I was posting about Millwall going down and to be honest I thought that they might of come straight back up. Not to be though and this year it looks very much like Dirty Leeds are going to be joining them. Unless Hull lose and Leeds win by 8 goals they are down. All in all not a bad season :-)

Mii Creations

I have created a couple of Mii's on the Wii:





And the one everyone does:
Blakey from On The Buses, Only joking it's Adolf

Wii-tastic

Hooray, have got my hands on a Wii. Been a while coming and I have been trying to get one for a bit now. On a positive note though the stock levels are starting to come through. I work for Comet and have heard that quite a few of our stores are getting them very very soon. I actually bought mine from Toys R Us !! traitor I know but I had to have it and we are not getting a staff discount on it anyway. Missed out on a few on Thursday during the day i.e. Woolworths and Virgin plus a few online but got a phone call in the evening of Thursday and if I wanted one then I had to drive over to Watford and get one from there.

First impressions are good and been having a good laugh on it.

My fitness rating / age on Wii Sports is 47 so will have to try and get that down over the nexrt few weeks !!!

At the start of March I posted that my card had been skimmed, only happened again ! different card BUT this time it was a card that I only use for business. It has though narrowed it down because I am now sure that the card was only used in 1 place that the other one was. It is the Total garage in Berkhamsted. Going to go in there and talk to the manager at some point this week. The police have been informed by my card people so we will see what happens. Got a phone call to ask if I happen to be in Canada ! I wish.

Pizza anyone?

Today Faye and I didn't fancy cooking so while I was putting the boy to bed Faye gave the Pizza company a call and I went to pick it up after he was down. Best to collect as you get a free pizza and they are only a 5 minute drive away.

I picked up the pizza's and got them home but half way though we both realised that we had the wrong ones ! I dont know why it took so long for us to realise ! I ring them up and start asking what he thought my order was because it was wrong. He starts going on that I have not ordered anything, I start saying of course I have blah blah blah, when it hits me that Faye has rung up one branch of Dominos and I collected from another. I humbly said I would call him back........

New post

I found an old post that I never actually poste so I posted and thought it would pop into todays date but it never :-0

Post is here

Max needs to lay off stuff.

Max, who is almost 16 months, got some medicine today. On the bottle it says he has to stay away from alcohol and driving. He is a bit upset about no alcohol and not driving but it is for the best.

Bath

Had a bath today, yes it's my birthday.

Toad the size of a dog

No not a Peter and Jordan story but in Oz they have found a huge Toad up in Darwin.

Story from the sun here

When we was traveling we went to a cane toad race night and had a good laugh, no damage done to the toads !

I do have to say though the Aussies fucking hate Cane toads as they have killed loats of Oz wildlife. The toad happen to be poisonous to most animals but a few are doing well and just eat the legs !!!

The toad, if I remember right, was only introduced to eat a sugar cane beatle in the 1930's but it never ate them and loved living in Oz so much it met a wife and had kids that had kids that had kids etc. etc.

Secret discovered.......

Damn those BBC News articles, they have now printed a secret location that we have been to and I was hoping to keep it that way as it is hard enough to park round there anyway !!

The place is Walter Rothschild Zoological Museum, Tring, Hertfordshire, dont tell anyone !!!

It's really good and costs you nowt.

BBC site article here

Their website is here

Have a good weekend.

Edward Scissorhands meets Kit

Nearly walked out in front of a car yesterday. It was one if those hybrid cars by Toyota, a Prius, and I really think that they are great cars and very good for the environmental BUT you can not hear them !!! They are quieter the Kit from Knight Rider in hush mode. Personally I think that they should have some sort of noise so that a child does run out in front of it.

Here's a tip to Dads out there, Your child's hair should be cut by a pro ! For some reason I thought I could trim the fringe but I was a bit worried about his eyes so went a bit higher then maybe I should of and then he moved oops end result is a boy that has a dumb and dumber fringe. Doesn't look too bad when you brush it over to the side. Looked like Faye was going to cry tears of happiness. She has now taking the scissors away from me and to be honest I'm a little scared of sleeping tonight :-)

Here he is looking very happy before the event.


Not so happy now :-) I think it is alright actually. Just waiting for the phone call from his Grandma when she looks here !




I thought all the trendy "kids" had really short fringes at the moment !

Old man

I mentioned before about turning into my dad, well this weekend I was driving my dad style A4 auto estate when it hit me again......I was driving to pick up a 2nd hand roof box ... At least I never had driving gloves on. I did mention to Faye that I quite fancy changing my car to a manual because it doesnt feel "right" and started to look into a S4 Avant but they are about 2K more then mine and about the same age so I do not think that I can afford it (see below !!).

I also moaned about todays music, the "drippy" nature of the youth and found grey hair in my sideburns although I like to think of it as Silver because that is cooler. The Neil Young song Old Man is really starting to be my song.

Need a new freezer now !! our fridge / freezer has now gone bang, well not bang more of a really annoying loud buzzing noise that vibrates through the walls to directly where we sleep. It only seems to affect me though as Faye just sleeps through it. It has been in the garage since we moved and to be honest I think that has killed it. Now we need to see if we want a chest or tall freezer. Quite like the idea of a tall one. Just glad I have got a bonus coming this week ! not that there is anything left of it. Need to sort the fencing out (think I will have to get a man to sort that) , lay some slabs to create an additional parking space and also need to look into a new kitchen.

To be honest I think the fence will be my bonus. Any one know a rough price for about 20 meters of fence 6 foot high to be supplied and installed?

Look out for the blog when I approach the neighbour about a 6 foot fence because he currently has a 3 foot one up thinks that he owns that part of the fencing and it will also, unfortunately, lose him some light. We have a raised garden so the actual garden is about 2 foot higher then the bottom of the house and we can both see right in to each others house :-0 Should be fun.

Also what is the best slabs to use to park a car on and how deep should I lay hardcore?

Stinging Soup

Had bit of a role reversal yesterday, Faye sanded down the stairs, lounge windows and then painted it all while I took Max for a stroll round the roads, we then went shopping and off to the park. When we got back I made nettle soup. Had a great day, I hate decorating !

Nettle soup, yep, heard Chris Evans talking bout it on Friday radio 2 and thought MMMmmm I could do that so on Saturday morning we collected the nettles. Like a fool I forgot the gloves !

Best time to pick nettles is now and until the end of April while they are young. Try to just take the tops off so that they continue to grow.

To make it I used a Veg Stock, potato grated, 4 small carrots grated, an onion, 2 sticks of celery, some butter, Garlic, Ginger, some spinich and of course a small bag of nettles.

First of all I washed the nettles and took them off the tough stalks, I then fried the garlic, celery, onion and ginger up a bit in the butter. Chucked in the carrot and potato and some stock while I boiled or the fancy word might be blanched the nettles for 2 mins in a little water. I then added this to the pain and bolied, once bolied I simmered for approx 10 mins and added some salt / pepper and a handful of spinach to help with the colour. Left to cool and liquidised it. Heated it up and served with a spoon of creme fraiche and some grated nutmug. Bloody good it was !!
The Nettles


The ingredients


The green soup


We are lucky to have Ashridge woods near us and here is a shot of Faye, Max and Jasper the dog from Sunday.

Went to the footy on Saturday and have to say i was shocked that some fans actually booed Ben Watson for taking the penalty. Fuck knows who else was meant to take it and I'm glad he rammed it down the throats of those morons by scoring. Well done Ben !!!

Skimmed

According to the fraud people my card has been skimmed. luckily nothing has gone from our bank account. Very strange as the card that was skimmed never goes into cash point so it must be one of the following places:
B&Q Watford
Toys R Us Bedford (interchange retail park I think it is called)
Matalan Bedford
Mothercare Bedford

Thats all the of the places I have used the card but I would of noticed if they reswiped the card and was watching me put my PIN in. I work in the retail industry so do keep an eye on it.

The only other debit that has been made is for Pipex who have finally billed me for my broadband. Realised the other month that i have not paid a penny for my broadband since July last year ! My card has now been cancelled so I will have to change my details or Pipex wont get anything next month !

We have got a dishwasher now. Got a good deal from Comet on a Smeg (Saved £100) and when I went on line to check out the Smeg site it turned out that there was a free 5 year parts and labour warrenty on it !! Result so I have sent my receipt off to them and hopefully will get that. It is plumbed into the hot water :-0 had to use a 'Y' adapter to split the pipe but Faye told me today that the washing machine has started to leak after I plumbed it all back in. Job for the weekend.

Not too happy with the quality of the glasses but will check that we are loading it correctly etc.

Max had his MMR jab today but I have not seen him because I have been down in Clevedon for work. Never cried, Max not me, when he had his jab.

He needs a haircut so I might try and give him one over the weekend.
Here is a couple of pictures of him, the first one is a bit of a cheeky sneer and the 2nd one is him having a rest after some walking in the woods.




What you all got planned for the weekend then? We are finally going out on Saturday !! Got a babysitter and off with some friends to the Thai and have some beers. Footy and food for me Saturday. We are out with Matt and Michelle (Plus another couple Gary and Eve if your interested) and they are off travelling round the world soon check out their blog. It's new and is being updated ! I will add a link soon. Actually thinking of having a change of format soon and redoing all my links etc.

Got to be gutted....

In a nustshell "the worlds most desirable car (in my eyes) the Bugatti Veyron has been crashed"
See Here

Oh well at least no one hurt and after all it's only a car :-0

Have plumbed in a dishwasher tonight but can not test the thing because we dont have dirty plates and no dishwasher salt !!! I got a few free samples with it but no salt unless I dont need any with a Finish 3 in 1 tablet. Maybe I will be able to test I have no leaks tomorrow night.

Turning into your dad

Peter Kaye says that you have turned into your dad the day you have a piece of wood just for stirring paint. I still dont have that stick but what I did over the weekend is turning into my dad for me.

My sister is 9 years younger then me and I remember when she was little and used to have powdered milk (SMA) my dad used to rinse them out and all the tins would have a bit of masking tape across them with the contents written on the said tape. I made my very own SMA tin containing curtain hanging "bits" over the weekend.

I have turned into my dad.........

Next week I am going to keep all the jars and stick the lids to a bottom of a shelf that I will create using an old plank and have my very own nuts and bolts rack with removble jars.

I'm joking by the way !!!!

Clowns are evil

There has always been something about clowns that unnerves me and makes me feel like that they must be evil

Lets face the facts, have you ever seen It by Stephen King.



The Joker in Batman, John Wayne Garcy who used to dress as a clown killed 33 men and boys all evil !!! Check out wikipedia for more on Evil Clown

Palace fans also call Charlton players / club / fans Clowns.

This story from the Daily Mail does not help things: Pictures available from the Daily Mail site

'Kasper the clown' faces jail for punching schoolboy
Last updated at 19:42pm on 20th February 2007

As a child going to the circus, you might expect the clown to throw a bucket of confetti at you, or squirt you with water from the flower on his lapel.

You certainly wouldn't be prepared for him to grab you by the scruff of the neck, punch and kick you and leave you needing hospital treatment for cuts and bruises.

As these astonishing pictures show, that's what happened when 12-year-old Amos Lutz met Kaspar the Clown at a circus in Leipzig, Germany.

Amos's mistake seems to have been to hurl a carton of his own confetti at Kaspar - otherwise known as Bernd Kalster, 47 - as he strolled by. Clown Bernd Kalster, 47, punched and kicked helpless Amos Lutzer, 12, to the ground at Leipzig, Germany, then claimed it was self defence.

Kaspar clearly failed to see the funny side.

He took hold of Amos and punched and kicked him, even as the youngster curled into a ball to try to protect himself.

The clown has now been arrested and charged with causing actual bodily harm. He faces the prospect of six months in prison.

Amos said: 'At first I thought he was mucking about. But I went down hard on the ground and I saw him balling his fists and growling at me behind his smile.

'He really hit me hard. He was punching and kicking, swearing at me the whole time. I was very frightened. It's not like I threw a stone at him, just some fluffy bits of paper.'

Kaspar claimed Amos had struck him in the face after the clown told him off for throwing the confetti in an area where there were 'no litter' signs. But bystanders said only confetti was thrown and nothing more.

Amos's father Stephan Lutz, 43, said: 'My son doesn't lie.

'He thought he was being jolly throwing the confetti and this is how he was repaid. The clown's a psycho.'

Fight Fight Fight

Saw an unbelievable article on the bbc site, now when we have had a few beers us Dads often have bit of a laugh about getting the babies wrestling but would we actually do it NO WAY.

Down in Devon though 1 family has actually started a Fight Club for their family toddlers.

The seven-minute footage, filmed at a house by one woman, was shown in a case at Plymouth Magistrates' Court.

In the clip, a boy wearing a nappy was called a "wimp" for not hitting a girl back after she struck him in the face.

Mad world we live in hey, Who wants to bet they are wearing Burberry.

News article is here

Faye and Max made it home OK last week.

I picked up some glasses today, I have to wear them for computer work. Feels a bit strange wearing them but my eyes do feel better and less tired. Here is a snap of me using the built in iSight on the macbook.



I have bought an external disc and I am making a media center using the macbook pro and it is looking good. I have the MacBook connected to the TV using a DVI to HDMI cable to keep it all digital, For sound I am connecting to my surround sound amp using an optical cable, connecting to the external drive (bought a 400 gig Seagate through Maplins for £86. how cheap and it has 16meg of buffer) using USB2 to connect. On the MacBook I have created alias' under the movies folder and what that does is allows the MacBook to see the external disc under Front Row.
Whats left, well I need a bluetooth mouse so that I can keep the Mac alive when the screen is shut and I need to work out what i am going to do about my photos. I dont want to store them on the macbook and also my iMac so I am probably going to look into using shared and wireless connection to the iMac albums. I have worked out that I can choose the library that iPhoto uses by pressing the Alt key when opening so I could leave the full library on the external disc and a smaller one on the MacBook. I'm also getting some High Definition movies on Monday.

Snow Joke for this car

This is a video posted on You Tube that I created earlier while working from home. It was done in my lunch hour for the benefit of anyone from work reading my blog ;-)

Here is the video

Hopefully Faye and Max will be back tomorrow, I am running out of plates and the washing up is mounting up !!!

Snow Joke

Well today I am snowed in down south and Faye and Max are snowed in at her parents.

The snow here is quite deep and I have been filming some cars, 1 car mainly because he just kept trying and trying ! getting round the corner and up a very slight hill.

Worst I have seen for a long time and it is still falling quite heavy. Hope it sorts itself out today as Faye was meant to be coming home.

Here is a picture from 22/1 at 7.33

and this is today at 7.48


This is the slight hill and 1 man is trying to solve the problem with a shovel of grit MMMMmmmm good luck.

Ifill Good

Footy News

Palace have kept up their outside chances of a play off spot with another good win today over Ipswich (got a double over them), we are now 8 games unbeaten in the league.

I dont even think that we are playing that well, and have not for few seasons, but we are still getting the points and maybe thats the sort of luck that we need.

We won 2-0 today and both goals were good goals, Lean Cort scored his 5th of the season (had to check the cpfc.co.uk website) although for some reason it seems as though he has scored more. The most he has ever scored is 6 goals so hopefully he is going to beat that !

Paul Ifill scored his first goal for the club and being born in Brighton and playing for Millwall for 7 seasons I thought he might be more "upset" at scoring for us :-) as it happened he loved it. He got the the man of the match today but to be honest he had a great spell in the 2nd half but I would not of said that he was the man of the match. Shefki Kuqi was my man of the match. He just runs and runs, he also got a great reception from the Ipswich fans and fair play to them as they brought a lot with them.

After Ifill's goal the song I Fill Good by James Brown was played. Now I sat there thinking it must be his fave song but after a while the penny dropped and I realised (with the help of a couple of people including my Dad) that it was "Ifill good"


Baby Toddler News

Max is getting better and better at walking and according to our friend Lauren that he walks like Elvis although I think he walks more like a cockney doing the Lambeth Walk.

I will edit some video tomorrow and post it.

Faye and I picked a table up today so Max came in the front of my car and he loved it up there. he was only in the front because we needed the room in the back of the cars and had to drop the seats down on both and my car has the ability to turn the passenger airbag off.

House News

Well as mentioned we have picked up a table today and it's really nice and means that we almost have a "proper"dining room. What it now means in reality though is that we have to decorate all of downstairs, Landing and stairwells. We are collecting our curtains soon and just took collection of a new mirror. All starting to come together now !

Faye decorated the bathroom last week, I did help honestly !

Next week I will post a bit more on the new media centre I am sorting out using the Macbook Pro. It is all looking good.

Snow and an Apple XP

Woke up to snow this morning so put my trip to Hull on hold thinking it wont be the best to drive there. Here is my car about to be started:



Have not loaded Vista on yet but tonight I did manage to get XP on just to have a play and it was quite easy BUT I did have to plug my keyboard in from my iMac (usb) to get the install to run correctly and I used to think having windows running through Citrix was "strange" on a mac..............