Category > Personal
Life and times of Nicholas 'Aquarion' Avenell
Trust me to install Linux...
*sigh* Trust me to install Linux as soon as my erganomic KB breaks. I'm almost quite literally stuffed, I have a pain in my wrists, so this is likly to be short.In other news, there is a couple of new links to the left (click on them, I liked them :-)
The chances are are you have come here from one of my E-mails. People kept asking me why I sign everything is "In Total Sincerity". There is a reason. it is this:
It is sarcasm
there is another reason, it has to do with Irony, and something I have to do this week, which is why I have restarted signing like that again. Which reminds me, I have a letter to write...
Nothing interesting enough to post on has happened, so I'm...
Nothing interesting enough to post on has happened, so I'm going to repeat the most creative thing I've done all day (apart from watching the South Park Movie DVD) which is my delurk post to RHOD:The minds eye is an infinitely versatile object, capable of rendering objects that the most dedicated artist would find impossible to make look real. In dreams we see another reality, and it is in dreams where this post begins.
Imagine, if you will, the multiverse. A huge sphere of multicoloured points linked in ways our minds, conceived in one of these points, cannot possibly see. And yet there is something around it. A sprinkling of blue sparkles surrounds the entire area, around every point they eddy and swirl, gradually focusing on one point, pointing, leading, like iron fillings to a magnet, and onto one point they focus and the mind shifts perspective.
We are inside one of the points of the multiverse, one of the nodes, one of the universes. There are many more, governed by magic, words, or just the same more-or-less logical rules that bind our own universe together, for that is where we are. And the blue sparkles are here also, spinning and flowing towards another, smaller point, a swirl in the galaxy, and we zoom in further.
And further, though the clouds of stars, focusing on a string that is orbiting the galaxy in mindnumbing slowness, and yet travelling faster than many thought possible.
Onto a single star, orbited by 9 rocks of varying size, and as we circle the sun - as all the rocks do - we can see the sparkles head toward a single planet, a blue-green planet.
We spin past the lands, though the daytime, the evening and into the night, and in the darkness we focus on a small triangular country which for the sake of argument we shall call "England" and from there into the south-eastern corner, midway between the bright lights of the big city and the calmness of the sea to the south.
And closer do we zoom, to a single room, and a single computer, as the blue sparkles collate and solidify into a young male, typing at his keyboard. The figure of Aquarion, making his de-lurk post to RHOD.
Spent another day doing nothing. Didn't even play games, just...
Spent another day doing nothing. Didn't even play games, just surfed the net & talked on IRC.Happy Happy weekends.
Watched DVD's, Played games, read Lord of the Rings. Having a...
Watched DVD's, Played games, read Lord of the Rings. Having a week off uni gives me time to slob around in style :-)Also created a new webpage for my new program, Quoth.
My parents have abandoned'd me in charge of a seventeen year...
My parents have abandoned'd me in charge of a seventeen year old, a thirteen year old and a four year old for three days. The only upside to this is that the four year old is a dog. I still have to make sure my brothers don't kill a) one another, b) themselves, or c) me.to this end, I am surfing the internet and drinking tea. I can do this babysitting stuff :-)
Ok, Webirc clients working and online. All announcements given...
Ok, Webirc clients working and online. All announcements given or posted. If you havn't got a URL for a chat client on this site, start reading a newsgroup that does. Hah.
In other news, I have precisly 7 days left before my exams. My, doesn't time fly? It seems like only yesterday that I was yahooing for a whole two weeks of holidays.
I think I had better start revising :-)
Happy May, BTW. Wow, 5 whole months of Aquarionics, and only...
Happy May, BTW. Wow, 5 whole months of Aquarionics, and only one major redesign in that time :-)OK, back to Visual Basic Project now.
Mmph! Microsoft DirectX SDK. 128 Megabytes! I am not...
Mmph! Microsoft DirectX SDK. 128 Megabytes! I am not downloading that!Anyhue, I leave for University again tomorrow (sigh) so this may be the last update for a while. The front page is fixed, with a spiffy new background on the blue bit, Portal has been fixed and the links work properly now. Revision is going badly, and projects are going worse.
I'm Dithering. Having planned to go yesterday for three weeks,...
I'm Dithering.
Having planned to go yesterday for three weeks, I started packing this morning, at about 2am. It's now quarter past twelve, I've missed the train I intended to catch, and I'm aimlessly wandering, hoping I haven't forgotten anything vitally important.
Like clothes, for example.
Three weeks back at Uni. Fun. Three weeks of exams and panic. Fun Squared. Although my Dad has lent me his Laptop for the duration, which makes life a lot more interesting. So i managed to use that excuse to play with the Laptop, installing C++ Compilers and other things I possibly won't ever use. But D-Time is approching, and I must find some shoes before the train ride. Who knows? I may even pass.
Naturally, I did forget something important. Not least my...
Naturally, I did forget something important. Not least my razor, not most my Text Book, my mainly my front door keys. I arrived at the flat at 7:00pm with a security guard to let me into my room*sigh*
More good news, The New Aquarionics background screws up in Netscape 4 (any version below 4.71, which is what I use)
*double-sigh*
Add to this my lost credit card (lost before I even left home) and the impending doom of 7 exams spread over three weeks, four of which are this week, and one of which I've done, as well as three projects (of which I have finished one) and, lest we forget, my my brother's birthday.
oh yes, And a partridge in a pear tree
So how did I spend sunday? Restocking the empty cupboards? Revising? Nope, writing the next part of my Eddings Fan Fiction, Worlds Apart, on my Dad's Laptop.
I think I'm digging myself a hole here
treble-sigh
ARGHHH! I HATE Exams. exams, exams, exams. hate, hate,...
ARGHHH!I HATE Exams.
exams, exams, exams. hate, hate, hate.
Just finished the retake of the exam that I slept though all those weeks ago (literally, I slept and missed the thing. Doh) as well as a Hardware Software Config Multiple Choice Thing. I now have to read and work on a 53 page booklet before my exam tomorrow morning. Faskinating.
Incidenally, the thing I am taking the exam for tomorrow is VBA, the more advanced version of the old Visual Basic Script, in which an entire network was taken down in minutes. A script which cost the world (or, more specifically, the parts of it that open attachments without knowing who they are from) just over £1 billion.
Heh. Heh. Heh
In other, less advanced news, I am bored, terminally so, and so much so that I have started wandering though the Blogger Archives gazing into the lifes of other peoples. Which is always fun. Best things I find wandering the net will, as ever, wind their merry way into the bar on the right of this box, to be clicked on at your lesiure. Or however you spell the blasted word.
In more-advanced-than-that news, Aquarionics is going haywire. My Archives are dead, the FTP server is refusing my password at reguler intervals, and the whole site screws up Netscape to a degree unholy. Plus it has been pointed out by referal to other sites that the main Aquarionics design is, in fact, duller than a very dull thing on a day when it's cloudy (and, what with me living in the sunny state of Angle-land, that is a fairly reguler occourance). So I am in the process of Paper-Desiging a new Aquarionics interface, which will be fast-loading, Quick, and so great the inventor of sliced bread will rise from his grave to add to it's list of counters.
maybe
Anyhue, I suppose I should get something done, after all I have a deadline (...from the WWII expression, which is the line the gunmen can see, as in, I'm dead if I cross it...) on Monday, then a one-to-one examination on Wednesday, a Room Inspection (Worse than the army round here) on Thursday, followed by a final assesment on my groups pointless database (which I have to stop being pointless in T-minus-2 days) and, lest we forget, again, my ticket home for my brothers birthday to do.
So what am I doing? Updating web-pages. Hmmmm...
Examination
Seventeen days are remaining,
Six hours left then to go,
3 minutes added to that,
and then fourty seconds must flow.
Seventeen days are remaining,
Six hours left then and such,
three exams still here to pass now,
not that I'm counting, much.
Two of the tests are "assessments",
About stuff that's there and gone in,
and I can't do sod all about them,
except sit here and hope that I win.
For exams are all just a game now,
Me v the person in charge,
To them it's just pieces of paper,
But to me it's my future at large.
One is the Final Exam Thing,
On course COH106,
Before which I have 8 days of nothing.,
And just proves the timetable's a bitch.
So I sit down here at my computer,
Revising the odd re-design,
and awaiting the end of the world now,,
when disaster shall surely be mine.
yesterday, when this couldn't be posted :-) One wire, that's...
yesterday, when this couldn't be posted :-)One wire, that's all it takes to change "Networking" to "Notworking". For obscure reasons too complex to reveal here (Ie, I dunno, the techies dunno, and janet dunno either) the entire Internet (with the exception of other universities the Local Network and, for some odd reason Google's homepage (but not it's search engine) is dead. Either:
- The entire internet has crashed and Sunderland (and Google) are the only things to remain,
- The USA (except Google) has been nuked and the BBC hasn't mentioned it, or
- Somebody somewhere has tripped over a cable and disconnected Janet's transatlantic backbone (Janet being the Joint Academic NETwork, our "ISP").
- Oh yeah, and they havn't told anyone yet, coz Janet's outages site says nought.
wonderful.
network dead again, which is doubly a shame since I have a...
network dead again, which is doubly a shame since I have a couple of things to post here. Nevermind, the Macs seem to be working. But I can't use my floppy disk on the macs!Ok, three things for this update. First, i have a C++...
Ok, three things for this update. First, i have a C++ assignment due in a couple of days (or tomorrow, actually) which I havn't started, so now would be a *very* good time. Unfortunatly the network (which started working again at 9:30am) has stopped working again. *sigh* it left me with exactly the right amount of time to upload the updates I mentioned and screw up the Header file (hence the multiple "News" things above)In other, neater news the Missing Chapter of Worlds Apart (My Epic fanfic set in David Eddings' Belgariad world) has been uploaded and can be found here
So what are these fantastic updates then? Could it be another poem? Yes, it is. An Ode to the flat above:
I live on the ground floor,
with a bastard in the flat above,
who's dance anthums rock his world,
with the basslines he seems to love,
I would quite like to go up there,
and smash speakers with his head,
but I really cannot be arsed to,
So I sit and write poems instead,
Its when at 2 in the morning,
with his Armand Van Heldan CD,
He decides to use the full volume,
which is really irritating to me,
I could phone the Resident Tutors,
about Noise in the Quiet type zone,
but I really don't need the hassle,
and in 12 days I get to go home.,
As well as a short essay on Wot I Dun on my Weekend (Aka, Nick's Report on the Sunderland Student Games 2000) And that, as far as today's entry is concerned, is it. Unless I decide to come in this evening :-)
Yeahey! Return of the Net. Now I have... four hours to finish...
Yeahey! Return of the Net. Now I have... four hours to finish my assignment...I think I may have found an excuse. After all, I have only been waiting four hours for the network to get back, on top of the last few days.
It's hard. Last night I was working on the next part of Worlds Apart and I got to the point I have been dreading since I started. The story arc I designed six months ago calls of the death of one of the main charectors. Part of the main party. Destroying the charetor I have spent the last two years working on in various forms was one of the most difficult pieces of writing I could do. And I'm not - and probably won't ever be - 100% happy with the words.
I'm not telling you who, coz I may decide not to kill him (Which will involve a substantial rewrite of the plot, but hey) and suspense is, as the producers of Dallas once said, good for the ratings.
New section, just because I can, based on my exploits in Ultima Online. That makes 17 sections now!
New section, just because I can, based on my exploits in Ultima Online. That makes 17 sections now!Finished my Visual Basic presentation (MCD, the Mind Control...
Finished my Visual Basic presentation (MCD, the Mind Control Defender, I'll upload it in a week or two) and I now have just two University related Thingstm to do before I can leave this place (hopefully) forever.I bought Ultima Online the other day. Here is a hint for you: Ultima Online Renasance is a con. Ultima Online Renasance is Ultima Online: The Second Age with all the patches. If you have UO:T2A, you don't need UO:R, Even if you don't Game (In the UK, other places shop somewhere else :-) sells UO:T2A for a tenner if you have a reward card, and £15 less than UO:R otherwise. As you discover if you - and this is important - read the box.
Tales of Britannia as and when, folkets.
Decision Made. I cannot be arsed to finish my C++ assignment,...
Decision Made. I cannot be arsed to finish my C++ assignment, after they (m)ucked about with everything else. The fact this decision was made whilst playing Prince of Persia (Not PoP3d, it's not good) has nothing to do with my sloth at all, whatsoever.I go home tomorrow! Yey!
Home, Home of th strange, where the dears and the kappa kids...
Home, Home of th strange,where the dears and the kappa kids play,
Where always is heard,
an insulting type word,
and the skys are all cloudly all day. Back, playing Ultima and... doing nothing else. Life is good.
Hellfire. I have four minutes to type this Blog before...
Hellfire. I have four minutes to type this Blog before BTInternet kick me into the ether (It's 23:56, I die at midnight) You would be suprised how addictive Brittania is, I have been playing on and off all day. Now I have to start the redesign of Aquarionics, Wow. 2 minutes spare... I *need* to improve my typing :-)Ok, Missed the time slot by a couple of minutes (it *was*...
Ok, Missed the time slot by a couple of minutes (it *was* sunday when I wrote that, Honest) I have spent the day (my brother's birthday, incidentally) playing Half-Life and GTA London Deathmatches. Fun. Now I am working on the (new, improved, better than ever before) Aquarionics Design Mark III. And playing Ultima, Natch.This was removed from the Cool bar coz it screwed up my new...
This was removed from the Cool bar coz it screwed up my new design :-\Bondgirl 007
I am reaching the conclusion that all the Geek-Girls are living somewhere else. I make my mission to find them. In the mean time, Go here. Now.
(It could be fair to mention that the Webmaster (mistriss?) of that site is slightly more famous for her other blog which you could find here if it wasn't risking my RASC rating to do so :-)
New day, New design. So much for Sunday :-) Seriously What do...
New day, New design. So much for Sunday :-)Seriously What do you think? There are some tweaks to be made (noticably the load time and the width of the "Cool" bar) Thanks go to Paul, Known as Sarabian across the globe (who has a website called Worldsphere) for pointing out the flaws in the design within seconds of it being uploaded :-)
basically today was spent doing that, and not (for example) studying for the exam I have on Thursday. Nevermind, only four days until the holidays start.
Tomorrow I head back to Sunderland 'til Sunday, I dunno how frequent updates will be for that time. Anything you want to tell me about the new design (or anything) E-mail me (Aquarion@Aquarionics.com, or click the contact page.
Moron. Me, I mean. It's 1am, and I just Cooled the Bondgirl...
Moron.Me, I mean. It's 1am, and I just Cooled the Bondgirl thing on the right, linking to "http://www.Bondgirl 007" with the text as the URL.. Anyway. The new AqMk6 design is almost done, but since I have Uni commitments (as in, I have to be at Uni) on Thursday (Damned Exams) and Saturday (National University Scifi Event) I probably won't get it online 'til mondayish. I still have to do the base part and the stylesheets, as well as transfer it into SHTML for site use, but the (very) early preview is here
Ok, New design up & running. I've still got to fix this Diary...
Ok, New design up & running. I've still got to fix this Diary to the new layout, and repost New & Cool, but Hey, what do you think? Tell me!Webdesign Ok, Personal thing this, What should you use to...
Webdesign
Ok, Personal thing this, What should you use to design Websites?
I use a simple ASCII text editor (all right, not simple, but easy and non frilly). Why? Does it make me feel like more of a Real Coder? No, the answer is simple, and it is this:
Cost
Aquarionics costs me $10 per month, Web access a mere £10 (about $15) for unmetered off-peak (that is, for those UKians out there, an 0800 number from BT Internet), so I spend about £17 a month on the internet, I get paid zip, zap, zilch and nothing for that (I'm trying to fix that, but anyway) Which is why it makes no sense to spend $300 on web-design software (although I *really* would like to buy Flash) unless I get some kind of return on my investment. And since my current situation (Student, if you are new to this) gives a direct monetary position of minus (As in, I am going to spend 20 years of my life paying off my debts to the govenment) I cannot justify it.
That sentance *does* make sense, you just have to read it without the brackets once or twiceThis isn't really fair. The real reason I use unadulterated HTML is even more simple, I have two HTML programs installed on my computer as I type, Dreamweaver V1 and Frontpage Express, both of them generate HTML (DW better than me :-) and neither supports the SHTML (Server Side Includes) that Aquarionics uses lots (Every page except the photo archive is server generated). So I don't use them. This is changing, for AqMk6 (Aquarion Design 6, Three of those were two years before Aquarionics, and that is the third redesign in the last 6 months, Hopefully I get it right this time) I am using Stylesheets, and although I can write them, it is one hell of a lot easier to build the Design and Graphics in PSP5, the HTML in Editplus, and import the lot into Dreamweaver for the CSS', then split into differant files in Editplus to be assembled each time you download. Fun, no?
No. If I had a a generator for decent SHTML (like Fusion) I would use it, but I don't, so I have to stick with what I know. Comments and suggestions to Aquarion@Aquarionics.com, as ever
This is important
The british govenment are trying to push though a bill which will force ISPs (not defined) to send copies of every byte that goes though their network to MI5 (Roughly equivilant to the US' CIA) just in case it comes from a terrorist. http://www.fipr.org/rip/ is a page for more infomation.STAND's Three Minute Guide to RIP
STAND's Detailed Guide to RIP
It will cost £30 million (or more) to tap the Internet in the UK of Taxpayers money (not that I pay tax, as a student, but anyway)
Internationally? Well, this creates a precident, a term which means, "If they did it, so can we". The only country that has a defence is the USA with their right to freedom of speach, of which ours is slowly being revoked. Fight. Now.
Oh Hellfire. Forgot to add the Webring links to the new...
Oh Hellfire. Forgot to add the Webring links to the new design. Blast.(I can't do it now, coz the code is over 300 miles due south of here)
On the plus side, I have now finished all my exams (Woo Hoo!) and now I am just awaiting...
What?
Why am I still sitting in the University computer room?
Is it because I have Assignments? No. Because I don't.
Is it because I a needed? Nope. Nothing to do, nowhere to go
Which is rather the point really. I have a Sci-Fi exec meeting tonight (My first, I got elected as next years Secretary last week) A National Scifi quiz night to attend on saturday, and after that I go home.
In the meantime I am trying to remember how to touch-type. I took a course in it (both a computer and a book based one, and gave up when I realized that since I could type much faster than I could touchtype. Now my bad typing habits are causing physical pain, So I have decided to learn again.
The net effect of this is that my typing speed is down 90%, and my error ratio is up by a similer amount. nevermind. It's not as if I'm in a hurry.
Exams over, homeward bound. Not now, obviously, Now I am...
Exams over, homeward bound.Not now, obviously, Now I am sitting at a random computer at Uni, awaiting tomorrow morning when I leave. Today was spend in an entertaining whirlwind of catching a train to Newcastle in order to buy some bags so I could carry stuff home. I now have two large bags, two small rucksacks and a poster-tube to carry 300 miles (not on foot) and then I have enlisted my Brother to meet me at Kings Cross to assist my trapse across the Underground. Fun.
Home again, for keeps this time. 6 hour train journey. My...
Home again, for keeps this time. 6 hour train journey. My typing is screwed to buggery (it is taking me two trys at every word) I'm going to bed :-)OK, missed yesterday dispite being online most of it. Found...
OK, missed yesterday dispite being online most of it. Found nasty pictures of me online (there is a link on Aquarionics somewhere :-)
Reguler viewers will notice that we are now about 400% faster, due to a slight re-design (most of the pictures had some of their colours confiscated). In addition, and in case you hadn't noticed, Aquarionics is joining in the fine tradition of Webrings, and a couple have their buttons on the left. Also around are the "I support this" type buttons reminding people not to pinch my graphics or design (though why you would want to isn't clear) and reminding me not to be nasty to people in my blog.
Technically this happened before the redesign, but it was a matter of hours before, and I forgot to add them and/or create the buttons until now.
Otherwise life carries on regardless. I spent Sunday (yesterday) at work, chatting on IRC and loading paper into the printer. Then I made a screwup (the kind that is compounded because you didn't realise it was going wrong) and now I have to explain nicely to my boss why we may have to reprint 4000 slips of paper.
bugger
Anyhue, I am currently working on a new page to review things. Could be fun :-)
Good evening :-)
Good evening :-)So much for the "Every Day in May" thing. My computer was unstable yesterday. I had a wonderful rant on the pointlessness of existance before my computer proved it by crashing :-)
New webrings to the left, New section for blogs I like also to the left, and a couple of cool new things on the right!
Now posting from the comfort of Linux (I really should update...
Now posting from the comfort of Linux (I really should update the Linux page) in which I can now revieve (if not send) mail. I also have fixed all the broken links and started the transfer of all the old Top5 stuff to the new Reviews format. Fun
That is my life at the moment, while I find a job I sit here playing and learning in equal measure. I now know more about SMTP & POP & PPP than I ever wanted to.
This daily typing isn't doing my RSi much good :-( What with...
This daily typing isn't doing my RSi much good :-(What with me being such a *nice* brother and everything, most of today was spent helping my brother buy a 3D card for his new Computer. Fun. Ouch. Hurting. Thats it for today I think :-(
Right, more stuff. I have created an IRC chat channel for...
Right, more stuff. I have created an IRC chat channel for Webloggers and Readers. The settings are as follows:Server: Irc.Esper.net Channel: BloggersThis is how it works, In mIRC or any IRC program, set up nicknames and everything, connect to the internet, and then type:
/server irc.esper.netThen wait for it to finish connecting. If you get a message saying:
This nickname is protected by Nickserv, type /msg nickserv identify Password to continue
Then you have chosen a nickname that is registered. Type /nick (your-new-nickname) to change it.
Finally type
/join #Bloggers
If I'm online (most evenings GMT and some weekdays) look for Aquarion.
If you can't be bothered with all that click the link below for a Java Applet that connects you to the Blogger channel (It may say "Tell your webmaster to register this" and I will, soon. Promise :-)
Some bastard decided to post multi-megabytes of MP3's of...
Some bastard decided to post multi-megabytes of MP3's of copyrighted material to alt.fan.douglas-adams. I posted this there and to him. His address bounced. Figures.
Dear Sir or Madam,
There are many forces in the Universe, and on Usenet. Two of the ones you may be aware of are Etiquette and Law.
Etiquette is politeness, it is the general guidelines people are meant to adhere to in order the society should continue to function on a reasonable level without everybody hating the rest of the world. These include things like not putting your elbows on the table, eating with your mouth closed, and helping people who are carrying heavy bags in both hands though doorways.
An addition to etiquette is Chivalry, where you go out of your way to make a persons day better. Crossing the street to help little old ladies, that kind of thing.
The point to this is that society has unwritten rules which enable it to live happily ever after. On a freewheeling society such as the Internet there are a great number of conventions that let everybody exist together in harmony. These include technical things like the way E-Mail is delivered, more minor things like putting additions to usenet-posts at the bottom, putting a "-- " separator before your .sig and keeping your signature under 4 lines.
AFDA is one of the more relaxed newsgroups around. They don't really care much if your sig is five or six lines, or if your quotes are at the top. Groups like Alt Fan Pratchett tend to bite your hand off if you feed them that kind of thing.
But usenet is a text-based medium, no graphics beyond that which ASCII can render, no HTML (another of those conventions I mentioned earlier) and no files that are not Text. For those that wish to post other files, "binaries" as they are known, there is a whole tree of other newsgroups where you post them. By convention, if you think other people should have these files, you either put them on the Internet somewhere (Geocities, Angelfire, try heading to
Because the Internet is not yet free, many people pay for the time they spend online. This means that a common way of getting at newsgroups is to press a button that downloads all the messages on a newsgroup, so they can be read offline, replied to offline, and then you can go back online to post your replies. This means that people do not *chose* what they download. They download the lot. Everything. Including any multi-megabyte files that some moron has decided to place on a non-binaries group. Please remember this.
Lastly is Law. I am a computing student and an Internet Citizen, not a law student. Douglas Adams writes very good books. He my not write them fast enough for us to be totally happy with it, or consistent enough that everybody understands them, but they are very good and very funny, and this newsgroup was set up to discuss them along with life, the universe and everything.
Douglas makes money by selling these books. The BBC and Mr Adams makes money by selling the CD's. Once you have bought the CD's you are legally allowed to make a backup of them onto MP3 or 4 for your own personal enjoyment. This means that both the BBC and Mr Adams get upset when people decide to give his work away for free. When Mr Adams gets upset, his lawyers get involved. When lawyers get involved (as you are about to find out) things get very nasty indeed. With all the press that pirating MP3's is getting at the moment, lawyers are just itching to find out how far the law will go.
So, to sum up, you have broken Internet Etiquette, Copyright law, and taken another step into the regulation of the Internet. Also, and this is worst of all, you have cost money to people who had nothing to do with your stupidity.
Not bad for a days work is it? I hope you enjoyed it. Have a nice day.
Yours sincerely,Nicholas Avenell
Free Internet 24/7! Aha! yey! and other positive...
Free Internet 24/7!Aha! yey! and other positive stuff!
Freeserve have come though with more free stuff than one poor student needs, free internet 24/7!
This gives me more time to do things like find blogs, read webcomics, and post blogs!
Gosh! lots of exclamation marks!
Wow!
Sign! Guestbook!
NOW!
Visit Geekland
NOW!
I think thats my positivity ration used up for the week. Back to the reviews :-)
Ok, Somehow I got listed on Threadnaught's GBLogs, and they are giving me hits. Woo hoo! Favour returned :-)
Ok, Somehow I got listed on Threadnaught's GBLogs, and they are giving me hits. Woo hoo! Favour returned :-)Hellfire. And Damnation And other non-positve stuff. My...
Hellfire.
And Damnation
And other non-positve stuff.
My secondary Hard-drive has kicked it's little heels in the air and gone to the great Format C: in the sky. This is the drive where, for example, Halflife is installed, Linux is installed, and (worst of all) my local version of Aquarionics is installed.
To be fair, it hasn't died *yet* but my Bios is giving me nasty warnings about "Status: BAD, Backup and replace" so now I dig out my Zip Drive & stuff and spend an entertaining while with it. Oh yes, and buy a new Hardd-rive. *sigh*
In More, and differant news, Melissa at Geeksuperstar (a page I shall keep plugging until you visit it. Yes Barry, this means you) has got her new design up and bannerless, with a small amount of help from Yours Truly. In fact, doing that has given me an idea for this page involving javascript. Ghod help us all :-)
Talking of Barry, and yes I was, my friend Barry has, after long deliberations, quit his job and abandoned Sunny Kent in this 'ere garden of England, and decided to head for the (admittedly hotter and sunnier) shores of the Party Isle, Ibiza.
*double-sigh*
But, back to the positve, and my Own Personalized 404 Messages Are Now Working! Yey!
Sound Familier?. Well, some of it does. I did think about running off an entry at 2am this morning when I got home, but didn't. Probably due to the fact my fingers were missing more keys than usual :-)
And finally, on a lighter note. I am *still* organising a christmas gathering. Last Christmas, as in.
*Wark*Wark*Opps*
Happy happy Joy Joy! Oh Joyous Saturday, that bringeth shiny...
Happy happy Joy Joy! Oh Joyous Saturday, that bringeth shiny stuff that we might live on. I have won a prize. 10 (TEN!) PC Games Courtasy of PC Gamer UK for hacking Ultima:Assecention to say this!. Yay Me!
By my previous happy reaction, you can probably guess that my...
By my previous happy reaction, you can probably guess that my new Hard-drive install went without a hitch.
You would be wrong.
One, I didn't plug the cable (motherboard end) into the socket properly, so it could see that the drive existed but not what it was. This took several hours of panicking, esspecially when I plugged my old HDD back in and it didn't work either. Oh hellfire.
Then when I finally fixed that, I tryed to reinstall windows from the Windows 98 disc that came with my computer when I first got it, and was fairly suprised when it told me:
"This is not an Acer System"
Which is true, sort of. It is the same computer, except that I have replaced the case, motherboard, graphics, sound, floppy-drive, CD-Drive, Modem, and now Hard Drive. Ahh, See your point. The only thing left inside that was there 18 months ago is the processor and 32mb of memory (of 98).
It's quite lucky that my brothers new computer came with a full Windows 98 install set (including boot-disk, well done Simply) which is something they soon won't be allowed to do.
Windows installed (eventually) and I plugged in my old Data drive in order to copy across the junk I need...
Junk... Stuff we throw away.
Stuff... Junk we keep.
...and then my old 4 gig system disk for my application settings. After playing with Outlook, IE, and other stuff, not installing Office 97 again, I started to actually use the thing.
And was shocked.
My 'pooter now goes from "Windows will now reset your computer" to my home network login in just over 30 seconds, well over the 3 minutes it took before. I should do this more often :-)
New Stuff! If you take a gander to your left, you will see a...
New Stuff!If you take a gander to your left, you will see a new "Search" box, to search Aquarionics for whatever you are looking at. Also new is the autogenerated Site Map, which suffers from the >Title< tags on each page being "Aquarionics". So you can't tell which page is which :-(
TheSpark.com Un-telligence Test says: You have a knack for...
TheSpark.com Un-telligence Test says:You have a knack for greatness. For the record,you are:Which is nice :-)72% Un-telligent!
which is significantly higher than the current average of 60%
Here is the custom report of your personality that led our team of geeks to conclude (with confidence) that you are resourceful, sly, and guaranteed to get away with everything:
Oops. Screwed up the HTML in my last post. Fixed now :-) Oh...
Oops. Screwed up the HTML in my last post. Fixed now :-)
Oh well, it seems like Aquarion Designs is Back in the Loop! I have a job designing a website for a local company. This puts the redesign of Aquarionics on indefinate hold until I get this finished. Shame :-)
Ok, Things to do today (That's you, not me): Click on one of...
Ok, Things to do today (That's you, not me): Click on one of the links to the left, under "Rings & Causes" or "Weblogs" (Not the graphic ones for the time being). Follow the link to *another* weblog, read it, and click on one of that persons favorite blogs. Or links. This is the way I get most of my Cool sites. But anyway. For the past few days, me and my brother have spent nights stress testing our network. This consists of playing Halflife, Tiberian Sun, and Age of Empires until 3am. This is good. My brother borrowed my TV arial for his computers TV card. And broke it. This is not good, since he bought a replacement for his, and now I am arialless. Which means I miss things on TV. This is less good.Three days? It was Three days ago I last posted? Gosh. Doesn't...
Three days? It was Three days ago I last posted? Gosh. Doesn't time fly?
The last few days have been sligtly busy, so posting was not possible. Firstly, on a whim, I tried BT's "Check your Bill" service, only to discover that my "Free" 24/7 Freeserve connection is not quite as free as all that. Mainly in that I have spent lots on calls in the last two weeks, most of which is Internet, which should have been free. /me is not happy about this, for reasons that should be obvious :-)
Secondly, PC Gamer came though with the 10 games. Due to nasty computer type stuff (My new HDD is suffering from Crosslinked Clusters, a nasty ailment which means that my computer crashes when it tries to access some bits of the HDD like, for example, by installing games) which is going to take MSScandisk many hours to complete (I left it for two hours only to return at it being 10%) but only if my computer doesn't crash while scandisk is scanning. Bah.
Then comes yesterday. Yesterday goes down in history as "interesting". Yesterday, as ever, I awoke at 13:00 (I'm running my days slightly screwy at the moment, sleeping 04:00-13:00, working the rest) with a phone call from work to say that the other consulting technition was around, and would I like to come down? I said yes, threw on some clothes, and wandered in the direction of my local combination print-shop, mailing-house, and place of employment.
The aim of the exercise was to remove Lantastic from the network, install the Zip 250 drive as a backup, and stop the accountacy machine from crashing. Lantastic had to go because it was non-standard and our new digital photo-copier/printer only worked on standard networks, The only computers that were crashing were the two that were still running Lantastic after the last visit, so the logical assumption was that Lantastic was the cause of the crashes. Step one was to get to a point where we didn't *need* lantastic. This involved copying the contents of an old server to a new one (over our network, 2 hours) Copying the accounts system (Never trust an accounts system which betrays it's origins by the executable being called "mail.exe") and kludgeing the network into letting that work like it wanted to (2 hours), all whilst awaiting an email from Xerox to install the copier onto the network (4 hours) and installing that on all machines without it crashing (didn't happen, mainly becuase the instructions were wrong) and, to use a euphamism from the building trade, "Making Good" (Many Hours)
Which meant that my final departure from The Marketing Solution was midnight. Anyone need a Win95 network admin?
According to the Keirsey Test, I am: My Temperament is Idealist : NF My variant temperament is Healer : I
According to the Keirsey Test, I am:My Temperament is Idealist : NF
My variant temperament is Healer : INFP
This puts me the same as the person I got the link from (Yana), I think I might collate all these results and finally do an "about me" page :-)
Eeek. Bad weekend. Things Happened. I managed to *totally...
Eeek. Bad weekend. Things Happened. I managed to *totally wipe* my C: Drive, having backed up most of my documents 10 minutes before on a whim. Lucky. Sadly I've lost 18months of E-Mail, 4 hours of Planetscape:Torment saves, and All of my Quotes file. I am not a Happy Bunny.
I eventually had to type the dreaded phrase "Format c:". And *that* was fun.
Updated the Chat FAQ
Dull day. Lost a Tiberian Sun game (or didn't win, anyhue)...
Dull day. Lost a Tiberian Sun game (or didn't win, anyhue) against my brothers, worked briefly on TMS Online mk3, and Aquarionics Mk4, as well as designing a "thingy" that generates codes for Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com's Affiliates program (As used to great effect in the box to the left). A bookshop is coming soon. Promise. (The thing is 40% complete, I just have to review and link to a few more books)
Wandered around my hometown for a bit (piccies coming soonish) and noted something amusing. Nothing has changed. It's odd. Having spent the last 9 months over 300 miles from my home, you'd have thought that it would have changed even slightly. A few houses have been built on fields, The Town Council have renovated the town centre, making it even *more* difficult to navigate... but nothing has really changed.
Pity really
Spent an entertaining day Designing the new TMS Website (The...
Spent an entertaining day Designing the new TMS Website (The Marketing Solution, where I am Tech Support, Computer Bloke and Person To Blame) (And I'm *still* freelance :-) in an entertaining series of events, I am now at a scheme not a million miles away from the old one. But since I designed (and like) the old one, that's not a problem. In fact, I might use Blogger to power it. Hmm. I've got it working with Tables, and am contemplating Framing it. I avoid frames on Linking princibles (Linking to them sucks killer whales though sieves).
In other news, My aunt my cousins came around to collect a laptop I was checking out for my Uncle's school. The kids are about 3ish, toddler age, and I am always suprised about how well I seem to get on with kids that age. 10 year olds are all, with very few exceptions, Bastards. Bias? Me? Never. But we played with a Brio railway set, and gave my aunt a rest from them for a while. So it was all worthwhile :-)
Today was the night of the Mascalls School (my Ex-secondary schoool) Performing Arts exam. And I was totally blown away by the entire group. Although it has been said it was not *quite* as smooth as last years effort (which I co-wrote, co-directed, co-performed etc..) I was asounded by the quality of the acting. The writing was of a high standard, but the *acting* was fantastic.
In more other news, my friend Barry has, as far as I have heard on the Grapevine, managed to pass an audition in the US! Woo Hoo! The fact that he is currently living the high-life in Ibiza *and* will spend 5 weeks in the US in the not-to-distant future does not make me absurdly jelous at all. Not one green eye anywhere. At all.
Bastard
Tomorrow sees my family go out on our first Family Trip since...
Tomorrow sees my family go out on our first Family Trip since I went to Univeristy. We are heading to Goodwood to watch some Cars go round and round in circles.
Fun.
I am not a tidy person. People don't believe this, so I will now prove it to you. Click the picture for the full horror:
And, for the animal lovers out there, Our dog, Jasper:
