Musicness

Is it freaky or weird not to have much interest in music?

Most bloggers, I have noticed, have a section dedicated to what music they're interested in or which bands they enjoy - alternatively, they have something like SwissToni's "Earworms of the Week".

Me? I barely know the names of the tracks being played let alone have enough for an "Earworms of the Month".

Only two bands particularly shine out for me:

1) Gwen Stefani.

Pretty much whatever she does, I like. I stuck her original album onto an mp3 player and listened to it when going to work and I liked what I heard. Occasionally, she does an annoying track with grating girl-like screeches but that's easily forgiven.

2) Sol Invictus.

A Neofolk/Folk Noir "band", I've had a hankering for them ever since my elder brother introduced me to them back in 1991 - indeed, my avatar piccie is taken from them.

They're not really a band in the main sense; the lead singer, Tony Wakeford, sings and does some percussion work, and there are numerous guest musicians who are invited to join in on the work.

I did once play the music to some Old Ealonians, which was a pretty bad mistake. These two Old Ealonians did not easily understand that Sol Invictus was not about making money but about making music.

"They should get a professional Singer to do the lyrics"

Yes and quite possibly get a professional band to play the music as well, yes?

Anyway, I like them but it's not the sort of thing you can normally bring up in a music conversation/discussion:


"So, what bands do you like?"

"Oh, I like [insert name of band]."

"Hmm, I like [different name of band]"

"Nice one. What about you Crucifer?"

Oh, I like Sol Invictus.

"Mm? Who? Anyway..."

So, back to my original question. Is it freaky or weird not to have much interest in music?

Back to the drawing board #2

Right after my last post (on the monday before last), one of my old work colleagues rang me.

"Hey, I heard you were out of work. Do you fancy coming back here? We really need some help and everyone here remembers your work!"

I'm not entirely sure how he managed to find out I was out of work. At that point in time I only told one other guy about my being let go, so I'm guessing it was him. Presumably he told one of his mates where I used to work, and word spread verbally.

The fact that they wanted me back perked me up a lot. I don't think I did that good a job there, swapping enthusiasm for technical skills but it seems they think I did a wonderful job.

So, after informing the guy hiring me that I was really looking for permanent work (better to be honest and open, is my motto), I sent off my details via the recommended contract agency.

30 minutes later and I was hired. The agency rep, who's never met me, had to go through standard agency policy and pull me in for an interview, even though he had the contract signed up and ready to go.

In that interview, he confessed that this was the fastest hire he's ever had. He didn't even know I existed an hour before I rang and an hour later, I'm not only on his books but I'm pulling in a decent amount of pay!

The good news is that everyone here is aware of my current dilemma - I'm still looking for permanent work but doing the contract until I manage to get it sorted. In the meantime, this place gets another contractor who knows the ropes for a bit longer.

Back to the drawing board...

I had some bad news on Friday evening. Work related. Yes, I'm sure you can see where this is going.

I was "let go".

My boss cited 2 separate reasons for this reason:

1. "You weren't proactive enough. For a company of our size, you really have to get involved more."

The size of the company was 4 people (including me), consisting of a programmer, the technical director and MD. Quite frankly, there wasn't anything I could be proactive in - I would have had to sabotage things so that I could fix them.

However, there is an element of truth in what he said. I didn't get involved as much as I would have liked, and by the end of 5 weeks, I had become a mind-numbingly bored worker who had absolutely no motivation.

I did have a conversation with him on Thursday morning that sort of went counter to his exit-interview statement though - "I know its frustrating not having any work at the moment, but once it starts to come in, you'll be in the reverse situation. You'll be rushed off your feet."

Now, that doesn't sound to me like I wasn't being proactive. That sounds to me like I had no work and they knew it.

2. "Your technical skills aren't up to scratch. I asked you to produce a document on the product, and what you wrote wasn't up to standard."

The problem here though is that in my interview I told them I didn't have any technical skills apart from server administration and installation. Beyond writing a thesis and this blog, I don't have any technical writing skills to speak of. That was also evident in my interview when they assured me that any required skills I would need, they would train me up on.

As I have come to realise, they could have shown me what standard they had expected and asked me to write more in that format. Asking someone to write up a document in an industry they have no knowledge or experience of is pretty counter-productive unless you offer them some serious help.

This is the first job that I have been unsuccessful in and it really hurts. Could I have done more? Could I have been better? People whom I've worked with have said to me that the chances are, they hired me too early. There was no work for me to do, and they finally realised it would be less expensive to let me go and then in 3 months hire someone else as opposed to paying me for 12 weeks of twiddling my thumbs.

I had a long talk with Elsha about this and the fact that sticks out is that after 5 weeks of no work, they let me go during my probationary period which should only have a day notice. They've given me a week paid and references. That's not something you do for a lazy worker.

But it still hurts.

...says it better than me...

Tobold is a blogger I read on a daily basis, and in this case, says it much better than my previous post.

Reputation grinding

I said I would blog more but with Work occupying my time recently, I haven't had much of a chance to sink my teeth into a blog post. Seeing as how I've finished my latest exercise though, and now I'm waiting for some feedback, I thought I'd write something new up on Gaming.

I haven't said much about my exploits on World of Warcraft except to skim over them and say that I'm having fun. I'm not sure I *am* still having fun but I continue to plod my way through the game.

Currently, I'm trying to hit Exalted reputation with the Netherwing faction so I can get a Netherdrake to fly around on...

...I suppose some explanation is required, for those reading who have no idea what the hell I'm talking about.

In World of Warcraft, in order to achieve certain items or goals, players have to obtain an amount of reputation by doing quests for certain factions. For example, if you want to go through the Timbermaw Hold from Felwood into Moonglade/Winterspring, you either need to become neutral/friendly with the Timbermaws or run really fast. Since running really isn't an option, you have to do the quests instead, which isn't too bad. The quests themselves are repeatable and can be handed in over and over, each reward amounting to a certain amount of reputation points. Before long, you can get past the Timbermaws and carry your journey on. For those who want more though, you can continue to gain reputation past neutral/friendly/honoured/revered to exalted for special items that will only be purchasable once you gain that reputation rank.

Of course, that example is from the Old World (a term to denote the game before The Burning Crusade expansion arrived). With the Netherdrake, the pre-requisite is to have purchased the epic riding skill, costing 5000g and be mounted, costing another 200g. This pre-requisite is actually hard to achieve although not as difficult as many make out. I spent around 2 weeks of gaming farming materials (oh dear, another explanation?) so I could sell things to make the money to buy the skill and the mount.

Once you have the skill and the mount, you can set off to do the Netherwing quests. Which quite frankly, suck.

There has been a lot of recent murmurings about the issue of World of Warcraft, and it seems finally the bubble has burst. For the first time since the game launched, subscription rates are not going up. In fact, they appear to be slowly dropping.

One of the big issues that has been uttered over and over again is that of The Burning Crusade expansion. It's clearly not doing what it's supposed to be doing - actually driving away the people it was supposed to be retaining.

The expansion was supposed to allow players huge amounts of solo content over a lengthier period of time. This means that players who don't wish to play with other players can go off and do their own thing. If you want to play in dungeons with groups though, the expansion also introduced "instances" where you could meet up. And finally, if you wanted to raid together against huge opposition, you could do that too.

The problem, though, is that the expansion took something away from the original game. For example, the end game that you reach eventually has changed. Instead of gearing up with mates and raiding, you have to handpick your raid mates instead. Essentially, the original game catered for "casual" players, those who weren't essential to your victory but kept your morale up for the 3+ hours that the raid required. Bards, for want of a better word (in the Dungeons & Dragons game, bards were a cross between mages and thieves but didn't really offer much else). So for Molten Core, a 40-player raid dungeon, 25 players were heavily involved, 10 players were semi-required and 5 players were just there for the hell of it.

In The Burning Crusade expansion though, the 40 and 20 man dungeons have dropped to 25 and 10 so the "casual" characters aren't being taken any more. This reasoning, although brilliant on paper, has destroyed whole guilds in their efforts to get ready for the raids (Swords of Justice, the guild I'm in is no different).

All of this is slowly making me want to try out City of Heroes once more. I just can't wait for Stargate Worlds to come out...

EDIT: Blizzard recently announced that they were changing the requirements for raiding in World of Warcraft. No longer will players have to become "attuned" to various dungeons in sequence. Essentially, this suggests that Blizzard's number crunchers have realised that subscription rates are slipping considerably and have pushed for a change. I'm not entirely sure, though, that this is enough.

Pain...

Dentistry really does has to be a profession with one of the worst reputations you can possibly have. Not only are you dealing with people's teeth - arguably one of the places that people could never reach by themselves without inflicting large amounts of damage - but you also have to deal out some pain.

As you can imagine, I am not a good patient when it comes to dentistry. Whilst Elsha can go without a dentist for years, I can just about manage around 3 months.

Tops.

I haven't been to a dentist since June 2006 - mainly because we were moving to another country and, with dentists in the UK now going private, we couldn't afford the quarterly checkups. So I stopped going and thought that once we were ensconced in our new place in Perth, I'd start up again.

Now, back in January, Elsha hit upon the bright idea of joining a private health insurance firm called Medibank. You pay money to Medibank, they help cover your health costs. One way that they do this is to give you two free dental exmainations and scalings with their local dentist.

So far so good. I checked - yes its all free and anything not is happily subsidised by Medibank. So, today, I went down for an appointment.

"Well, your teeth are in a pretty bad state of affairs. You're going to need 3 fillings. And most likely root planing as well. But if you get back onto track with your regimented cleaning practises, you won't need as much care."

Succintly put, and filling-requirements all pointed out. X-rays taken, and wrists slapped.

All in all, its a much better experience than it was in the UK.
...

Just more costly.

Each filling comes to around $117, about £45 each. Is that normal? I suppose it is for a private dentist.

Of course, now I get to spend days going on about the state of my teeth to poor Elsha who, quite frankly, puts up with a lot of whinging from me.

...it's in the trees...

Night of the Demon is a black and white horror film made in 1957, and based around the story "Casting the runes" by Montague Rhode James. The screenplay was by Charles Bennett (of Hitchcock fame), and the film was directed by Jacques Tourneur, famously known for his other horror film, 'Cat People'. It has gone on to pursue the claim that it is one of the best horror films in movie history (although The Haunting probably equals, if not outdoes, it).

The plot revolves around the eccentric and strangely powerful Julien Karswell, a man who, it is claimed, leads a devil-worshipping cult. The story opens with Dr. Harrington racing to Karswell's house, where he tries to get Karswell to "call off whatever it is he's started". In return, Harrington will publicly announce that he was wrong and that Karswell was right; a refute which Karswell turns down as well. Karswell does not want media attention. A simple letter would suffice. Harrington agrees and leaves, amicably and knowing he has just put off a monstrous death. However, it is too late. Harrington dies the horrible death he tried to avoid.

Enter Joanna Harrington, the niece of the Professor, who begins investigating her uncle's death at the same time as an American professor arrives on the scene, Dr John Holden, who is also investigating, although this time its Julien Karswell and his devil-worship cult.

The two end up together trying to solve the mysteries of the runic symbols found inscribed on a parchment that Karswell has slipped Holden, and why Holden's death is evidently going to happen very shortly.

As the film picks up its pace, its clear that something is haunting Holden. The pages in his diary are ripped out after a certain date - "when a witchdoctor curses his victim, he always let them know well in advance" as Holden puts it to Ms. Harrington. However, that doesn't explain the many oddities of events plaguing Holden.

In an attempt to sway fears, they both head down to Karswell's manor to obtain a book missing from the British Library, entitled "The True Discoveries of Witches And Demons".

It's here that the audience, and Holden, are properly introduced to Karswell, a character supposedly based on Aleister Crowley himself. Karswell and Holden talk about magic and about the human mind - and whether the two are entirely seperate entities.

The film has many wonderful scenes, revolving around the idea of witchcraft and that, perhaps science can't explain everything away.

If the film could have a tagline, it would that of the Rime of the Ancient Mariner (which is also featured in the film):

"Like one along a lonesome road,
Doth walk in fear and dread,
Because he knows a frightful fiend,
doth close behind him tread."

I would heartily recommend this film for anyone wanting a fright. It doesn't have gore or screams but it does have plain old goosebumpy horror.

5/5!

Technically Fun

I haven't written much in this blog recently I've noticed. I definitely haven't written up a movie review for "Night of the Demon" especially. As it's a really good movie, I'm going to have to spend some time doing that soon. And, for reasons that will become apparent later in this post, I'll do it at work.

The initial jubilation at having a macbook soon turned sour when I realised the delete key didn't work correctly. Now, for those of you who have never experienced a Macbook, some interesting comments:

1) The delete key when working from Windows (via Mac's Boot Camp) does not function as a delete key. Instead it is a backspace key. You can trick it into thinking its a delete key by having the FN or Function key depressed.

2) The keyboard itself is completely flat. Or rather, the keys on the keyboard are completely flat. This is something of an unnerving experience (as Elsha found out) as pretty much every PC keyboard has a curve to it so your fingers know where the middle of the key is, so when you depress it your fingers have purchase.

But you can get over those two. You can't get over having a delete/backspace key that you have to HAMMER, to do anything.

Mac Desktop Support is also different to PC/Dell Support. I'm normally used to explaining the situation and booking either an engineer to come fix the issue, send a spare part out for the user to fix or having the computer picked up by courier.

Mac Support said "Oh. Right. You're best off buying another one."

What? Buy another one? What's wrong with this one?

"Well, you just said, it's got a dodgy key."

Yes, but I don't want to buy another one when I can get this one repaired. It's only a keyboard issue, how long would it take to be repaired?

"4 weeks. Give or take a week."

WHAT?!? 4 weeks for an engineer to unscrew the base, remove the connectors between the motherboard and the keyboard plate and then to check/replace the key connection?

"Yup. Or you can buy a new one, and send the old one back in. Since you're on your 14 day 'remorse' period, it may work out quicker."

So that's what I did. Bought a new laptop, had the old one picked up. Total swap out time, 3 days. BUt I still can't work out why it takes 4 (!) weeks to repair a keyboard...

Anyway, laptop is back with me and I've already installed Warcraft 3 on it.

Warcraft 3 is a Real Time Strategy (RTS) game where you do some exploring, build things and generally go around destroying other people's bases. Blizzard (for it is their product) have added some unique features into the game, like having Hero Units that can pick up special in-game items that increase their statistics and off-side quests to complete. So your paladin hero might get a quest to go destroy an Orc base but on the way there, he gets a quest to go save little davey from the bad gnolls - upon completion you get rewarded with a special item.

RTS games are a favourite of mine, especially Starcraft, but I still have a hankering for TBS - Turn Based Strategy - games like Laser Squad or Ufo: Enemy Unknown. TBS games differ obviously in that you take your turn by positioning your units, and then the enemy (computer or human) takes their turn, and if anyone moves into your line of sight - *BANG* they're dead.

The difference between the two is that in TBS there is of course no real time requirement. You don't need to pause the game because there's no timer ticking away.

On the other hand, assembling a vast army in, say Starcraft is monsterously satisfying. Nothing beats sending 12 Terran Battlecruisers on an errand of absolute carnage (except perhaps 12 Protoss Carriers or 12 Zerg Guardians).

Finally, I've been doing a bit of background reading - one of the things I love the most about World of Warcraft is its lore. The history and storylines behind the the game make it, in my opinion, a much more immersive experience. It's ok not to know who Medivh or Illidan are, but knowing what they did and the consquences of their actions make the game come more to life.

So I've read The Last Guardian by Jeff Grub and Lord of the Clans by Christie Golden. And just for good measure I did some reading of the Diablo universe - written by the excellent Richard A Knaak, who should be known by every fantasy reader, if not on their bookshelves somewhere.

So, anyway, laptop working correctly, but little or no work to do on it at the moment. I've been browsing various websites, reading up on lore and just generally increasing my knowledge of Small Business Server 2003 in the hope that it may be of some use later but, currently, there is no web testing going on.

I hope that will change soon, I'm so ready to start...! So, in between increasing my knowledge of all things technical, I will try and catch up on some blogging. :)

Learning all over again

So, this is what I'm using at work:



*


That's right, I've been told to use a Macbook. This is because in my new job as Software Tester, I have to test all kinds of websites on different browsers - Internet Explorer 6, Internet Explorer 7, Opera 9.2., Firefox2 - and Safari, the Mac Browser.

Which means that occasionally I have to dip my toes into toes into the tepid waters of the Mac OS. I had a play around with it yesterday and found it ... quite daunting, actually.

Everything is there that is on the Windows version but subtley different. Different enough to actually make you scratch your head and wonder how to get it to work like Windows. And then, of course, you wonder if Mac users have the same problem with Windows - do they sit there scratching their head and wondering how to get it to work like a Mac?

Anyway, day 1 was interesting, to say the least, and I'm ready to go back for more.

* That's not my desk by the way. Mine has nothing on it at the moment.

...To Boldly Go...

"Hey , Check this out!"

"Mmm what is it?"

"It's a job where you play computer games!"

"Mmm. It's a job where you have to 'test' websites of computer games."

"You should apply for it mate."

"I have no qualifications in software testing or in any of the listed requirements for that position. Beyond playing computer games, I can't see why they would even want me for an interview."

"You never know unless you apply for it."

Which is why I did apply for it, with a jokey email, never once thinking I may actually get a response.

Imagine my astonishment when I receive a reply email:

"Well, you are correct. You do not meet any qualifications for the listed position, however we are still very much interested in meeting with you. Would you be available for an interview?"

So, I attend the interview, am asked lots of questions like:

"Do you know .Net?"

- NO

"Have you had at least 6 months experience of Linux"

- NO

"have you ever done any software testing?"

- NO

"Have you played World of Warcraft?"

- Err. Is this a trick question?

"No. So have you?"

- Well... Yes. Hasn't everyone?

"No. Have you played Unreal Tournement?"

- The original or the 2003/2005 versions?

"Good enough answer. What other Online games have you played?"

- City of Heroes, Silk Roads Online, The Matrix Online...Phantasy Star Online.

Next day, I receive the email I've been waiting for:

"Congratulations. You have been offered the position of Software Tester."


... Wait.

I've been offered a job based on the list of Online games I've played?!?

Anyway, I cannot go into more details, mainly due to the Non-disclosure Agreement I signed when I said yes to the job. All I can say is I have no idea what the future holds for me.

Hopefully, lots of game playing.

P.S. It's Night of the Demon. Movie review to follow.

Memorable Movie Quote #1

This is a quote from one of my most favourite movies - one that whenever I get a chance to watch, I'll quite happily sit down with a hot cup of coffee and just laze the day away.

Do you know what movie its from? No cheating, mind...

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


"Do I believe in witchcraft? What kind of witchcraft? The legendary witch that rides on the imaginary broom? The hex that tortures the thoughts of the victim? The pin stuck in the image that wastes away the mind and the body?"

"Also imaginary."

"But where does imagination end and reality begin? What is this twilight, this half world of the mind that you profess to know so much about? How can we differentiate between the powers of darkness and the powers of the mind?"

Unbelievable!

Do you remember my old Boss's leaving speech in October 2006?

I certainly do.

It was where he went on to tell all my friends and colleagues that I was a gamer and a geek. If he had said it with a bit of tease in his voice, I wouldn't have minded so much, but he didn't - he said it from the point of "This man has no life, no purpose. He is a waste of space."

I've had lots of people from my old workplace tell me they couldn't believe his leaving speech, couldn't believe that I just shrugged it off. Well, I had dealt with far, far worse at his hands. Being told to "curb my internet usage especially on game sites" during my lunch hour when it was company policy to allow you to look up personal websites was particularly chafing but I dealt with it.

Amazingly, in my new workplace, my new boss is completely different. He also plays an MMO although he's derogatory towards WoW - but in a friendly way. There is that look of amazement that I play World of Warcraft which is compared in every way to his MMO - EVE Online - and how I'm playing a game with no hooks or penalties (as far as he is concerned).

However, I don't mind it so much. Now I'm in a workplace with people who love gaming, I can look up internet sites about games all day long if I wanted to (although I would have to do my work too!) and, best of all, people don't look down their noses at me. In fact, having my boss play an MMO means at least we can talk on a level playing field. I did try and keep secret the fact that I had to get up early on the weekends to play with the Europeans but he astounded me one Tuesday by telling me he was up until after midnight playing EVE..!

Bliss.

I've also been asked to try out a different MMO called Silkroads Online - a trading/WoW-like game. I've installed it but yet to try it out...

I really should...

...make a post.

Considering how it's been around a month since I last put fingers to keyboard, I would love to say a lot of things have changed in the past month but really they haven't.

I'm still in Oz, still working away in a contract, still gathering up the energy and bravery to start learning to drive. Still taking things easy and saving up to pay off the debts we have in the UK still. And still getting up at 5am to go to the raids in the UK.

I did write something up awhile back but Blogger has this horrible re-formatting ability that takes single space lines and turns them into double space, so everything that reads out well suddenly looks like it's been written by Uni students trying to bulk out their essay or thesis. I don't need to bulk out my blog, I could happily witter on for hours in this style of prose - called conversational prose or some such, as if I'm actually talking to my audience.

Other than that, I have continued my voracious reading of books via Joondalup Library. A great resource centre that unfortunately has made a mistake of unmitigated proportions. They've re-shelved their books into categories and then alphabetical order. So now, rather than browsing General for any books that might be a good read, I head to Sci-Fi & Fantasy straight away.

Which is good because I don't have to spend so much time looking for the authors that I know I like but equally bad because I have to scour categories for potential new authors. Even worse, if I like an author that writes in different categories - like Sci-Fi and Horror, I have to search two sections instead of just heading over to the one area.

On the up side, they have a marvellous collection of DVDs - recently I managed to acquire the miniseries of the re-imagined 2003 version of Battlestar Galactica. Back in September last year, I watched the first episode of Season 1 of the show but couldn't work out what was going on. Why did Baltar, the traitor of the Colonial Humans, have a first name - Gaius? How the hell had the Cylons designed and created Human-like models? Why in heaven's name was Starbuck now a woman?

The miniseries (which actually is just 3 episodes) serves as an introduction to this new universe and it actually works quite well, except for the bit about Starbuck being a woman. I'm not quite sure why they thought that should be changed. Is it more acceptable now to have a woman drinking, getting into brawls, swearing?

Or perhaps the real issue is, which demographic is this new show being aimed at. After all, the original show was aimed at a family audience with kids emulating their new tv stars (we always had to flip a coin for who got to be Starbuck) and now I suppose the target audience are young 20 somethings who can't quite remember the original show but quite like the sassy attitude of this new show.

Another show I'm watching - and voraciously devouring - is Alias. We're on Season 2, about halfway through now, with Season 3 waiting in the wings. It's a pretty good show, mixing James Bond-style spy stuff with a lot of Sci-Fi. What Elsha and I both love about this show are the cliffhangers. Pretty much every episode ends on a "Omigod, what's going to happen next?" that always has us coming back for more. Actually, it gets pretty horrible because you just want to keep on watching to find out what's going to happen next. Apparently, Seasons 4 and 5 are much weaker due to writing issues, etc.

Anyone have any other shows they like to watch?

Picking up...

As you may have guessed, the past few weeks have been a blur of activity as I've been getting to grips with my new job. It has not been an easy start nor did I expect it to be. The computing environment is very much different from my old workplace, with the emphasis on very.

As its a government position I'm loathe to reveal details but essentially the environment is completely locked down - meaning, for those of you with less than perfect computer understanding, that permissions have been stripped from the users.

This of course creates multiple problems for the administrators. When things go wrong, it might be the program or it might be that something that needs to be run isn't being run.
But, even with a steep learning curve, I'm slowly lowering myself into work.

Other news, Friday 26th January was Australia Day. This is basically the day when the Colonists arrived in Australia en masse - what the Aboriginals call Invasion Day (or even Survival Day because at least some of their ancestors managed to escape with their lives), because they were invaded by Europeans intent on colonizing/conquering the country.

People over here have a public holiday. People go to the beaches, they have bbqs, they sit in town squares drinking beer listening to music. Sometimes, all 3 things at once, I guess.

I spent most of the time sleeping, playing WoW or watching Season 9 of Stargate SG1. We had already got through Season 2 of Grey's Anatomy. I have just one thing to say - even though I hated the character of Addison Shepherd (played by Kate Walsh) initially, I now love said character.

A) She's very attractive (in that 1940's style of Hollywood Actress)
B) She gets some terrific scenes and lines.
C) She's not like Meredith Grey - Thank God.

We've also been loaned Season 1 of Alias (in exchange for the 2 seasons of Grey's Anatomy that we have) and I managed to bag the first 8 episodes of Farscape - after all, Brian Bowden and Claudia Black have already been introduced to us in SG1.

Other than that, I spent my time off playing Wow:BC and really enjoying myself. The expansion has easily opened up new areas of gameplay and a lot of people are having lots of fun. FOr the time being though, the onus is on levelling up, doing quests and having fun. All too soon, it will turn to raids and we will as a guild go back to doing that.

Finally, I have been browsing the blogging community again. I've managed to locate a few Australians out there, as well as one who's made the amazing and counter-trip to the UK. It's pretty weird to read her blog about all the differences between Oz and the Uk, but from her perspective - she can't believe the UK has Argos, and I can't believe they don't have it here...

My timing sucks!

I have a job!

Yay!

...now that I have World of Warcraft working...

Boo!

Infinite time vs lack of things to do has now been replaced by lack of time vs infinite gameplay on WoW.

:(

Displacement

It's been about a month since I last visted my blog so in the New Year spirit, I decided to make another post.

Yay.

The last month has been a bit dream-like for me, what with looking for work and staring around in a sense of bewilderment at the scenery. Life is not what it was like in London but I think I'm finally over the honeymoon "holiday" period that everyone talks about when people emigrate - you know, that sense that you belong somewhere else and that you're only visiting, and that eventually, you will get back on a plane and soon re-integrate back in that place that you "belong" in.

Yesterday, it rained in Joondalup. Not for the first time in the last month I might add but it was an odd day for weather. The rain made it feel exactly the reverse that it does in London when it rains; instead of feeling clear and refreshed, it felt muggy and humid.

Things I miss about England:

1) Television Shows.

Here the shows suck. No, really. Much worse than even Channel 5. I would pay to be back on British TV. Hmm I wonder...

2) Keyboard region.

Arrrghhhh.... Why is the @ above the 2 and not above the ' where the " is. Who decided to move the \? For what possible reason would there be for making such minor but amazingly horrible changes to the keyboard?!?

The worst thing is that I want to change my keyboard settings back to the UK but if I find work, I'd have to do it there as well, which I may not be able to.

Elsha has a job now - she works for a big financial institution as Customer Support - Or Customer Relations as she is called now. I, on the other hand, do not have a job and am finding it a struggle to get work. Or at least, I was until Christmas and the New Year ended. Now, everywhere seems to be picking up the pieces (I can only imagine how many companies have had christmas party gossip, office liasons beginning/ending and people leaving to get away from those they accosted/been accosted by - ah the cynic in me).

And finally, I have my own pc on the internet. In theory. The PC belongs to Elsha's brother and is strictly on loan. It's on the internet through Internet Connection Sharing. Hence the theoretical part.

ICS - why do they have to make it so hard. Mind you, I'm not surprised. Anything that comes with a Microsoft tag should have fine print that reads "...if you get this to work, great - send your cv to us, we need people like you".

At the moment, I've taken great pains to re-install World of Warcraft (mainly to occupy my time until I get work - you have no idea how boring it is being on your own in a house without any of your personal effects save for a few boxed dvd sets) which involves installing via cds and then downloading and installing around 1gb of patches.

So far so good. All I have to do now is get up at 4am my time for those 7pm UK time Raids in Zul'Gurub.

Topsy Turvy

Singapore came and went and now we're firmly ensconced in Perth, Western Australia.

Its interesting that when you chat to people from the UK, they seem to think Australia is this overgrown savannah where you might expect to see crocodiles prowling the local swamps waiting for the latest victim to trot past.

Alas, Australia is as built up as England, perhaps more so since they have less history to worry about and more space to account for future growth. Looking out the window, I see nice clean houses with less than 30 years of history. The roads are all clean and wide, and the paving stones have yet to appear weather-worn by acid rain.

The greatest benefit though is the blue sky. It stretches from the top straight down to the bottom. In London, you would have had clouds, smog and light pollution that would have given a dismal bright grey look the closer the sky got to the horizon. Here, nothing but blue. So blue in fact, that it actually hurts the eye and makes the green grass look very green. Not dark green, but bright green.

I feel like I'm in a painting - that's how bloody good it is.

I'll see about getting a photo uploaded so you can all get jealous.

In Motion

I'm now sitting in the same place that I used to work at 10 years ago, although that internet cafe has now gone and another is in its place. Still, I do have this queer sense of Deja Vu about the whole thing - as if I should suddenly get behind the counter and ask people to pay up.

Out of a flat, living in a Travel Lodge is taking its toll on us as we ready ourselves for the flight to Singapore for the 4 nights that we are there. At this point in time, we are less excited about the holiiday and more concerned about money situations and wondering what the hell we do if the UK suppliers we were with don't take note of our status and stop payments.

Oh why does it have to be so hard!

More to come, perhaps from humid, rainswept Singapore...

Memories

Memories are such odd bizarre things, aren't they?

You have lots of memories and the further they go back, the nicer the world felt.

My earliest memory is of the feel of the carpet when I was in Primary School, in Yeading. It has a clean feel to it with a very short pile - more functional than luxurious. The other memory I have of that period is getting on to the school coach at the beginning of the day, and being driven to my primary school. My brother is sticking me on and telling me I'll have a great time. I'm sick inside and almost crying.

Other memories are not so banal. When I was 7 my mother died in a housefire, and I was there at the time. I won't go into it as it's always painful to dwell upon but a lot of my memories concentrate around that period.

After that, I have memories of outings, school friends long since gone and the closer we get to the present the more banal - the more average the memory - they become.

I speak of memories now because for the last few days, Elsha and I have been down in Bath, in Somerset. It's a wonderful place with great architecture and history, and its far, far from being like London. The old aldage, that people are friendly outside of London, was proved right when on our first day we tried to find our Guest House, we had 2 old ladies asking if we needed directions. And there I was thinking we were about to be mugged...

Finally arriving at the Athole Guest House, we were shown into very nice accommodation; a large bedroom with onsuite facilities, a shower that I can only describe as being out of this world, and a digital tv for those nights where we couldn't afford or were too tired to go out. It's all run by a very nice man by the name of Wolfgang and his staff, where "all you have to do is ask" is the motto. And, boy, does he cook up a mean cooked breakfast!

The next few days we travelled around, saw the usual sights, window shopped, but for the most part our trip out to Bath was to see and say goodbye to Elsha's relatives there, on her mother's side - the O's.

A large dinner with 20 family members allowed us to chat and dine with them and for memories to begin pouring out. And of course that was the most interesting part for me, being from such a small family with little or no ties to our families abroad.

Memories of Elsha's mother when she was young and how she interacted with her siblings. Memories of our visits down to Bath 8 years ago. Questions from the youngsters on what Australia is like and how it compares to England. The talk was rich and varied and fun was had by all. It was a shame for it to end.

We came away wondering why we hadn't moved to Bath so long ago, in the first place.

A New Day Dawns...

So, I've finished work.

After my last post, I had a few cups of coffee (yes I know, but I needed the stimulants) and then went to work, all the time thinking - knowing - that it would be my last walk to work. I put the mp3 player on and listened to some old time tracks by INXS, Gwen Stefani, etc.

Got to work and had a quick meeting with my boss who proceeded to dump a load of work on my nearly clean desk. I had a quick sifter, realised I would get perhaps one job done and then started beavering away on it. Meanwhile, my replacement was getting the rest.

All through the day, people came up and congratulated me on my imminent departure and asked when I would finally fly out - even though I had emailed everyone in the company with that information (I did feel by the end of the evening that I should have had it stickered to my forehead).

The last lunch is normally a time for a departmental reflection - where the boss buys the leaving man/woman a last lunch. I am proud to say that he didn't.

In fact, it got to the point where everyone else had got to the restaurant (Nandos by the way) except all the people in IT and me. I was then grabbed the secretary of one of the Directors and dragged away to the restaurant for some much needed food and chat. My boss turned up 30 minutes late, stayed 30 minutes and then left with his cronies.

After lunch, one of my colleagues (a senior guy) grabbed me and took me off to the coffee room/chill out area and told me to stop working (after all, what would they do - fire me an hour before my leaving presentation?).

Presentation time came. My boss launched into a speech about how I was a gamer, how I was a geek, how I was going to be missed and finally, that I should stay off computer games because it was a pointless exercise.

Sort of like working for him, I thought ironically.

I really didn't mind the leaving speech - because everyone I knew at work was there to see me off. My workmates had got me a wonderfully large collection (which will soon be changed into Singaporean dollars) and the very friendly secretary had got me some goodies from the various clothing departments - 2 wallets, 2 caps, a bag, some boxers, a belt (which doesn't fit me) and a sort of keyring thingy (don't ask me, ask Elsha). All in all it was a wonderful surprise and I told everyone assembled the truth - I would miss everyone and I would definitely keep in touch.

Shortly thereafter, we headed down to the various pubs where people continued to ask me when I was flying out and, more importantly, bought me beers through the night. It was a very good night but, boy, I was drunk by 8.30pm.

*******

Next day, Bufu (don't ask, it's a looong story) and I headed out to the Game On Exhibition at the Science Museum to check out some old, old games and some newer games.

After that, we headed out further to Temple Walkabout where we met up with Horse for his birthday bash and oh so didn't get involved in Kiwi drinking games!

It was actually a very nice day out where otherwise I would have spent hours on World of Warcraft getting more and more bored...

*******

Today, we met up with another work colleague (now ex) and Scythe (whom I used to play AC2 and WoW with before his wife, who also played, got pregnant). A nice meal in a local restaurant with a glass or two of wine and we came back and slept our way into the evening.

...which leads finally into me building this Duron 650 that I am typing on at the moment as the other two computers we have, have been reserved for selling off this coming Thursday.

So no more WoW after that. Elsha smiles a lot at that thought but I haven't yet told her I have loads of computer games that will work on this pc.

*Ouch*