Damn...

...so there we all were yesterday (us commuters) moaning and groaning, finding (packed out) alternative services etc. - turns out the delays were (at least partially) caused by some poor 15 year old kid falling (completely accidentally) onto the track at Horley station and receiving a fatal electric shock...may have waited a bit more patiently if I'd known the circumstances...my thoughts are with the family... :(

Poorly Mouth & Southern Trains *SUCK* :(

Had a really pants time of it during the last week-Wednesday last, my normal spicy (free range-home roasted) chicken dinner caused me an unbelievable amount of pain, taking me about fourty minutes to consume (normally fully nommed in about 5), which I thought was odd (taking into account the fact that I am perfectly happy *drinking* raw tabasco sauce under normal circumstances), but just shrugged it off, however, over the next few days my tonsils, tongue and lips gradually became more and more painful and swollen...

Sunday, I spent a couple of hours cooking a lovely roast, and for all the amount of it I actually managed to taste, I may as well have just gone up to the bathroom and stuffed a load of toilet paper into my mouth and eaten that... :(

Anyway, here we are a week later and I'm still no better, I can just about manage to sip a tiny bit of a cold cup of tea, or cold water and I can just about cope with an extremely floppy plain white bread sandwich (even the thought of the pain a tiny spot of branston pickle would cause sends me reeling) or some cold noodles...so, today, thinking enough was certainly enough, I went to the doctors and got diagnosed with an oral fungal bacterial infection...nice...and given a prescription, apparently the bugs that cause it live in the mouth of all humans all the time anyway (before you get any ideas) and only occasionally manage to dominate enough to cause a problem, usually when you are run down or suffering from something else...meh...

So, already made extremely late by doctors appointment (even though I was on the phone half an hour before they opened, and Flyingpops was assured yesterday that there were plenty of appointments earlier, the first momement they could see me was 1030hrs), got to the station to see an announcement that all trains in and out of London Bridge and London Victoria (pretty much my only options) were subject to delay, alteration or cancellation (face+palm)...

Sat waiting for ten minutes then got kicked out into the freezing cold when the Station Mistress finished her shift and had to lock the waiting room, sat for a further half an hour with stinging lips and shivering body until a train finally arrived (supposed to be for London Bridge but now bound for London Victoria)...it got cancelled at East Croydon, waited ten minutes and got on another train bound for London Bridge, it got cancelled at Norwood Junction...sat for a minute panicking, then noticed that the Overground trains (although they stop at about 20 stations on the way) go to Canada Water, hopped on that (and waited and waited and waited), then got to Canada Water, hopped on the Jubilee line, got to Canary Wharf, went to all three chemists with my prescription and *none* of them had the medicine I so desperately needed...best offer, the Boots near Waitrose said "it should be in stock by tomorrow", so I left the prescription there...

Just checked train running back home...everything is delayed by at least an hour, the 8 and 12 carriage trains that always end up full and standing before they leave London, mostly now *TWO* carriages...there is going to be a riot...wish me luck getting home...

What a f******g day... >:(

Save our Forests!

Okay, time to do some do-gooding again, this time, please sign this petition to ask the Con-Dem government to NOT sell off all our forests to the highest bidder...short sighted idiots... >:(

Facebook isn't secure - again?

...this time it's private pictures from the looks of things...(forewarned is forearmed and all that)...

Here is exactly how to hack into private facebook pictures using only your web browser...

Well done (again) Facebook, especially as CEO Mark Zuckerberg's own account got hacked overnight...it's all going so well! :(

Hope you don't have anything "sensitive" on your facebook profile (but then you knew that already, right)...? :S

I'll check it out properly later...

Update - it's not as bad as it first appeared, it only works if you have access to pictures from an album you *are* allowed to see from a mutual friend, and also it doesn't work on all of those pictures, just ones with "n" (which appear to be generally older albums), and it doesn't work on profile pictures either - it's still not very clever though...!

Stephen Neary - Please help...

All you need to do is go ahead and read this well written blog post regarding the very sad case of Stephen Neary, an autistic guy who just wants to get home to his dad...then please sign the petition, and perhaps help spread the word too (if you like)...

Update - there is a facebook group to join also...

Twitter & Facebook over Wifi broken - Firesheep

Thought I had better pass this on (until they implement a fix) it's potentially simple for anyone on a Windows laptop or Apple Mac to hack into your Facebook or Twitter account if you are accessing it via public wifi (this has always been true) but now someone has written an application (FireSheep) that lets any idiot do it automatically with a click of the mouse...better not use either of those services in a public place unless you want to risk someone else taking control of your account...

Please pass on the warning...

Back in the world of the living...

...promise I'll do some posting soon, just got to catch up with everything... ;)

Remembering 7/7...

Wow...here we are, five years on...I was very new to blogging (and regular writing in general) at the time, and found myself stumbling around in the middle of a massive terrorist atrocity (based, as I was at that time in Kings Cross - where the most devastating attack would take place - killing 26 people deep underground) and reacting to the whole affair by documenting it (oddly being picked up by several global media entities and linked to as I was learning what it meant to be a citizen journalist)...

This is just a re-post of what I wrote at the time - all the way back in 2005 - as details were starting to emerge (my first reaction - strangely, as most people were rooted to the spot - had been to grab my camera and run from my desk down to see what was happening)...my other posts from later that day (and subsequently) are around here and here...

"Latest reports say there have been at least 2 explosions across the capital, one in Kings Cross where I am...

Walking around there are police and fire brigade everywhere, as I was taking these shots a police officer said "You really don't want to be anywhere near that station, fella"...(he didn't have to tell me twice)...

I didn't take any pictures of them but lots of people had soot all over their faces...there are two helicopters overhead and sirens and flashing lights everywhere...

Everything was locked off behind the police line (I had missed it by coming up the side of the station, so kind of ended up in the middle of the closed bit...

The sheer number of people just standing around in the road was unbelievable...everyone is calm though, there is more an air of excitement than panic, which is quite strange..."

Worn out Headphones

I actually think this is a first...not quite sure what this actually says about me, but this, in all my long life (thus far) is the first pair of headphones that I have managed to wear out...

I've seen many, many pairs of headphones come to a premature end *violently*...I've *lost* plenty of them, I've even killed a few pairs trying to re-purpose them (the last set that went in the bin were going to be soldered to phono plugs so I could play my xbox without disturbing Flyingpops), but this is the first pair that has lasted long enough to, through continual use, (they are the pair that have lived with my PSP since I discarded the pair that came with it back in 2006) I have actually worn out...

They have served me so faithfully and for so many years that (oddly) I can't quite bring myself to throw them away...

Off the Grid...

...just to bring you up to date, someone has trodden on our tubes (or something) and our internets have got all clogged up at home...naughty cable provider (Virgin) can't get an engineer out to us until *Thursday* (bleugh!!!), so updates (especially by Flyingpops) to all the various social media services we are hopelessly addicted to may be rather limited...

A few things I miss...

*Proper* crunchy Buffalo chicken wings (New York Style) - with insane American Hot Sauce and salty creamy blue cheese dip...no-one in England can get it quite right (apart from Chillis - which was killed by the credit crunch)...


Waking up in Colin the Camper...


Cheeky lunchtime burgers at Smithy's...


Chilli Pepper Pete turning up to Laughton...


The view down the Thames on a summer day when stranded at Blackfriars station by First Capital Connect...


The route of the number 17 bus...


New Harry Potter books...


Being able to stand in the shed at the end of the strip at Santa Pod (and be almost choked to death by toxic fume - much better than it sounds)...


My Mavica MVC-CD500 (effortless quality)...


Our front garden, that one year (with the throw-and-grow) although it did take a lot of watering...


Widemouth Bay...


Living in the penthouse...


Breakfast in Mexico...


Wondering what would be in the window of the Porcupine Book Shop...


Holidaying in the Canary Islands...


Cheesesteak...


"All new" episodes of Star Trek...


My C500 running Windows Mobile (Smartphones didn't start with the iphone, here's to full internet, movies and apps way back in 2004, I wasn't even blogging back then)... ;)


My Nyko Airflow...


New Years Day at Hedley Wood...


All the evening papers except the Evening Standard (it's far too grown up)...


Fillet steak at the Arkle Manor (or anywhere else for that matter) I think my most recent one was before the wedding...!


James May's Lego House...

So I'm obviously in desperate need of a holiday and something nice to eat (just to start with)... ;)

Thomas Talking - "Dada"

Just over this last weekend Thomas has *really* started "talking"...had we thought he was being vocal before, oh boy were we mistaken...We've now (a couple of times) suddenly found ourselves turning around because we *haven't* heard him saying anything for 60 seconds, wondering what on earth can be the matter...yep, he's noisy... ;)

Sunday we started off with (after fussing in his cot enough to drive me out of bed - he's got rather good at that game now) an equal number of "Ah Goo"'s and raspberries (for about ten minutes), by the time I had finished my quick "Daddy Bath" and made our way downstairs, the favorite was "Ag" (the duck was an "Ag", the ball was an "Ag" etc.)...just as I finished making his Shredded Wheat(tm) and went to put him into his high chair it transformed to (perfectly pronounced) "Egg" (giving me a shocked moments pause) after breakfast (which was largely silent apart from "ARGH!!!" - which we have established means "More please Daddy") we proceeded to a dribbly "Ffffff", while I changed his nappy (which involved two nappy bag fulls of wipes, both of us going back upstairs to have *another* bath, a load of washing going on and then me disinfecting the entire play mat) we had moved onto "Ba" and "Da" followed finally by "Dadadadada"...which, while not (demonstrably) directed solely at me, did make me very proud of him indeed...and also, interestingly, it gave me my very first distant flicker of panic at the thought of him (one day) leaving home (no idea why, perhaps it's a "rite of passage" of sorts)...of course by that stage I may very well be packing his stuff for him and helping him pay his deposit just for a bit of peace and quiet, but at this stage it's definitely - Miss you, baby boy - whenever I can't be there... :(

Baby Thomas has a chest infection

Poor Thomas...you know, I've been rinsing and repeating the same little joke about this for a while now (to knowing nods and chuckles from some, and shocked exclaimations from others non-parents) - "Thomas doesn't 'come down' with anything as such, he just seems to have the occasional week off being poorly" - and I'm not exaggerating, if it's not a few days with an upset tummy (with unwanted ejections from one end or the other), it's going to be the opposite issue - huge effort getting anything to come out with a lot of huffing, puffing and pouting, or it's some sort of respiratory issue - a nasty cough, or bouts of sneezing/a runny nose, maybe a bit of a temperature - the point is, despite all the great work Flyingpops has done and is continuing to do priming his system with all those antibodies from the breast milk the simple fact remains - babies get poorly - they are new to the world, and every single bug out there understandably wants it's shot (which of course it deserves) especially as babies spend a large amount of time sharing largely unwashed suckable objects (which includes pretty much everything) in communal spaces (usually with lots of other babies)...

Unfortunately, this (discovered) inevitability, twinned with my own conscious wish *never* to become/or even be seen as one of "those parents" who fret and worry and pamper, then whisk their fragile bundle off (wrapped in cotton wool) to the doctors at the slightest spot or wheeze has probably meant that poor Thomas has been struggling bravely on with a nasty chest infection for over a week (maybe even longer)...Flyingpops finally gave up on my insistence that he was *fine* and took him to the doctors on Monday where he got his diagnosis and his first tiny prescription of liquid antibiotics (which he greatly dislikes and thus has to be smuggled into his mouth mixed with food)...the doctor did actually say, had we taken him in much beforehand we would probably have been sent away to try him on a bit of baby nurofen to see if he got over it, but you can't help feeling a little guilty for assuming he had only "got another little cough" only to find it was something slightly more serious... :S

Xbox 360 Red Ring of Death

Wah... :(

It's been happening for a while now, slump down onto my bean bag and poke the power button anticipating a nice bit of batarang action around Gotham City or perhaps throwing a few chain lightning bolts around Stonehelm and instead of the boot up routine three of the little lights around the power button flash annoyingly at me in a dismal red...I tut and hit it twice again to turn it off and back on and after a heartbeat the greens merrily cycle and the Xbox starts up normally (happy mayhem and evil cackling then commencing)...but Saturday last saw the end of my goon bashing and the suspension of my channeling the awesome power of mother nature...after at least twenty attempts, my pout getting bigger and bigger as my crest fell I was finally forced to accept that my Xbox had finally and fatally succombed to the infamous "Red Ring of Death"...

After an uncomfortable half an hour (trying to keep Thomas happy while) struggling to remember what ancient email account I twinned to my gamertag (and what the password was), I finally managed to register my xbox (about 4 years late), and wincing as I submitted my repair request (on a screen showing in a familiar red colour the words "Warranty Expired") to Microsoft in anticipation of a large bill...What popped up on the receipt page was both a shock and a very pleasant surprise - the amount they were going to charge me for the repair was (*gasp*) 0.00 GBP.

From there on, things only continued to improve (yes, odd I know, considering this post is about a broken gaming console) the email that arrived shortly afterwards told me to box up the Xbox not in it's original packaging (for some reason probably to do with dishonest appropriation with the intent to permanently deprive the original owner) slap on a return label (also sent on an email) and call UPS to arrange for (wait for it) FREE SHIPPING to the Xbox hospital for poorly consoles (which is in Frankfurt, just in case you were wondering)!

It turns out that Microsoft has taken this issue so seriously that in 2006 they put aside One Beeeeeeeeelion Dollars to combat the problem (or just enough for either $100 worth of shipping and repairs for every single Xbox 360 ever made, or to completely replace 1 in 3)...

Cherry on the top? My next door neighbour is going to stay with his Gran for half term and she has a Wii, so he's not using his Xbox... ;)

Lego House Demolished

James May Lego House Demolition 5
Originally uploaded by Cybermyth13.

Lego House Demolition 4
Originally uploaded by Cybermyth13.

Just found these pictures on Flickr and thought it only fair to share...so there we go, full circle...it's funny to think it was only there for such a tiny amount of time and now gone forever!

Anyway, if you want to see some of my pictures and read about it being built (and our other adventures around Denbies), head in this direction...

Los Gigantes - landslide death

Bit scary...the place where the recent fatal accident took place is the *exact* same place Flyingpops and I enjoyed a little (after breakfast) walk during our last holiday to Tenerife...that tiny, peaceful beach and 300 meters of splintered rock suddenly crashing down upon dozing sunbathers just doesn't bear thinking about...I mean, the beach wasn't exactly packed when we were there (as you can see), but thank goodness more didn't die...

Sunset time Redhill

Oh well, that's it...over the weekend local sunset time crept (it moves by 2-3 minutes per day) sufficiently backwards that I now conclude my bus journey through Redstone Hollow in almost total darkness, so Autumn is definitely upon us (even though British Summer time doesn't officially finish until the 25th October - when the clocks go back I'll be sat at my *desk* in the pitch black)...I don't normally mind this too much at all (as, of course, there is Christmas to look forward to), but this year I'm really loath to wave goodbye to the summer sunshine (probably because we've only had a couple of very short breaks to actually enjoy it)...

Anyway, we're going to have a go at getting out to show Thomas the trees starting to change colour on the weekend (and probably take some pictures too)... ;)

Chilis Canary Wharf in Administration!

Disaster! My favourite crappy American eatery has gone into administration and closed it's doors forever! Curse my penchant for places where I can hear myself think! :(

The credit crunch has well and truly done it now! >:(

A sad day - Colin the Camper's new home

A lovely lady and her son from Brighton fell in love with Colin last night and has left a deposit, coming back Mon/Tue to collect him.

As always, things always happen at once... Fink had taken the day off work to start on the nursery and with some help from his mum they managed to strip a wall of nasty wood chip paper (am sure he'll blog about that!) , the ad was published in the Friday ad paper edition and I had a busy day full of meetings....

All I can think is that people are looking forward to next bank holiday weekend, as my mobile was ringing continually with people wanting to come and view the camper (both responding to the exchange and mart and friday ad advertisements) ...  Thankfully, Fink managed the first viewing, two very keen young lads definitely into the VW scene and then I arranged a second viewing for 7 - when I got back from work.  The lady was VERY keen on the phone and had clearly fell in love before even viewing him as it later transpired she had a lot of cash in her bag to leave as a deposit!  

I've been convincing myself for the last month that I was unable to drive Colin, as my belly is quite large and the steering quite heavy, however when the new owner asked for a test drive (they have never driven a camper before in their life), I couldn't refuse and off we trundled for a 10 minute drive.  Did this make it harder to sell, YES... he behaved perfectly and I can't believe I won't be driving him again.  Colin has given us so many happy holidays and memories, we are both really sad to see him go.  Practically, it's the right time to sell, we won't be camping for a year and there is no room MJs car seat, however even when passed a handful of cash, it doesn't soften the blow.  Colin has been a real family project, from when Tim first bought him and made the modifications, to grandad making the fridge, my cousins husband doing the MOTs, Unckie Scammel doing countless repairs, Brenda making the cushion covers and everyone enjoying a cup of tea at a steam fair or on the beach... so maybe I'm right to feel sad... so much love has gone into keeping him on the road.. and we would like to a say a BIG Thank you to everyone who has kept our dream alive for the last 2 years.   

I've got the horrible task of calling people to put off viewings today and am now sat, watching Colin for the last few times out the window, before he sets off down the A23 to his new owners by the sea on Monday.  Whilst my heart is sad, my head knows it's the right decision and we will be owners of a camper again... after all, I've kept all the camper cups/plates and crockery and will need somewhere to make tea when taking MJ to the beach!

Colin the Camper - For sale... :(

So another big change, and a very sad one this time - in part to help finance the bathroom rebuild and in part because it's really not going to be practical with a tiny baby, Colin the Camper is officially up for sale...he has been part of the family since early November 2006 (I was actually shocked when I checked back on the blog and discovered it's been quite such a long time!), our adventures have been numerous, most of which I have detailed on this blog - it will be *very* tough to wave goodbye, but needs must, and this particular need Colin is not quite suitable for...his advert asking for some new guardians appeared in the Friday ad over the weekend, and an excited (potential) buyer rang up Flyingpops yesterday - they are coming over to have a look on Saturday morning... :(

Still, it can feel cramped enough in there even with just the two of us and all our stuff, so it really is time to think about either getting a bigger motor home (that I can drive without being extremely squashed), or perhaps a little caravan...

In the meantime, we should celebrate the time we have spent together by re-living all the fantastic experiences we have shared!

Thanks Colin, we'll make sure you go to a good home...!