Cold Season begins

And what a start, got an immediate, wake and feel like shit cold, headache, ribs, running nose, sore throat, rattling lungs..the whole 9 yards.

wonderful...  Since I tend to get chest infections from these extreme colds I can look forward to a nice month or so of coughing before the doc gives me some AB's

Sigh..well there's worse things going on so I just need to take a few days off to get over the worst of it.
At least I can work from home, when not splattering the screen in sneeze snot...

And no the tissues are not for watching porn, before anyone asks

Ahthankyew

Sad and frustrating

I heard yesterday that my daughter has suffered a loss in her family, her older half brother passed away aged 41...no age at all. He was for a while also my step son, but we've not kept in touch since his mother and I split. Even so I feel a sense of loss too, but no where near what my baby is going through. There's nothing worse than losing a child or a sibling.

I wish I could do something to comfort her, she and her mother are going though hell at the moment, and there's really nothing I can do but send best wishes and be here if she needs me.

This is one of those situations where being away from the people I love is hard.



Ahthankyew

People you think you know are shits

I know a lot of people, I mostly, genuinly like all of them, a few I don't and generally I keep out of their way and they avoid me. the balance is maintained and everyone is happy. But its interesting how your view of the people you know can be radically changed when you discover what they say about you behind your back.

I had a bit of a facebook spat with an old collegue, nice enough chap, but got a bit of a bee in his bonnet over global warming (its all fake!!!) we've engaged a few times, its got heated but it was for the most part sound debate. But his comments on the recent Iceland rangtang ad which highlights the deforrestation and loss of habitat for Orangutangs was a final straw for me, he actually tried to posit the view that the deforistation is due to "green loons" use of palm oil as a bio fuel. Yes that happens, but its a tiny and now largely abandoned concept... The real issue is due to the use of Palm oil in cosmetic and food products....anyway.. I'd had enough, I stopped engaging and banned him from my FB.
It's only the internet after all, and while I don't really like the idea of avoiding a competing viewpoint,  and re-enforcing his echo chamber of denial, I can't deal with utter bullshit being pushed as fact over and over again, so I'm better off just cutting it out.

Of course he's pissed, and thats fine, he'll get over it, we probably arn't going to meet up more than a few times at some work events so its no great loss to my or his social life. But I got wind of a facebook conversation with him and a few other people I know, also who I've cut out of my FB for being nasty fuckers.....what a bunch of miserable hate filled misanthropic cunts, every single one of them. One even suggested writing a bad review of my book just for the fun of it....what the fuck is wrong with people that they seek to gloat in causing harm and discomfort of others, worse, that they  even try to promote it.

Anyway, moral of this tale, people you know are not your friends. they're seldom more than backstabbing sad fuckers who find pleasure in running or attempting to run others down. Life is much better without them.



Ahthankyew

Been a bit busy

And a little down, the passing of my friend Soeren, hit me much harder than it should, I have been taking note of how many friends I've lost in the last few year to different causes, and its been a little upsetting to note that as I get older my list of good friends I've spent time with in my youth dwindles.


hmmm sad, but its how it is I suppose, life goes on for some of us.

Also work is stressing, as we come to the end of the block and grading hell is here, we have to cope with new systems that don't work well and we're flapping about trying to make sure no one gets the wrong grade....the old systems worked just fine, but people are so intent to tinker they risk things breaking....



Ahthankyew

You Bastards

A painfully sad day today, can't explain in detail as his family are keeping things quiet, and I have to respect that. But I need to share...a dear friend passed away tonight, a genuinely lovely man, with whom I spent many evenings in far flung corners of the world, talking shite and getting drunk, and always expected there to be many more.

Getting old has many downsides, but the loss of such friends is easily the hardest to take... RIP mate. I'll have a few in your name.

Ahthankyew

still waiting for the bad one.

It will come, its the internet, it always comes. But I'm still waiting to see the 1st bad review of my book...in fact even the 1st middling review...until then I'll have to put up with things like this


"The Fundamentals of C/C++ Game Programming by Brian Beuken is an awesome book and one I personally have been looking for for some time. Back in the day I have read through other game development books but this is the first one that truly provides real world useful info to help one get started with cross development on a Single Board Computer such as the Raspberry Pi or Beaglebone Black. This is more than just a game development book, it is a great introduction to OpenGL ES development which can be applied to UI development for small devices that support OpenGL ES. The companion website is a very cool compliment to the book and a place where the author Brian is quite active. I would recommend this book to anyone interested in game development on small devices but also folks that are interested in creating User Interfaces for mobile and other hand held devices.

The book is not without its blemishes, but Brian covers much of that on the companion site.

I'm looking forward to any follow up book that Brian creates."

Backo'theNet.....
Chuffed :D


Ahthankyew

Selling like a hot cake

My book's had a bit of a surge on amazon.co.uk breaking the top 50 for a couple of coding sub-sections..which on the face of it impressive, but in reality, I think it just sold 2 more copies last week.

Its surprising how few copies it takes to push it up the charts.

The US chart positions are less impressive, but I at least broke the top 1400..just

That said, my statement recently showed 223 sales in a period of around 4 months, if it does that again by the christmas statement I will get some moola...not much but enough for dinner maybe.


I am quite pleased though, getting good feedback from users, and some of my own students have been reading the library copies and commented on enjoying it.

I'm going to start giving a class next block using it as the main text book, sadly I can't force them all to buy it, but it will be nice if a few turn up with a copy.


Ahthankyew

that better not be the start

of the end.

Been noticing a distinct stiffness and pain in my index finger joint....its starting to mess with my guitar playing, I do hope this isn't arthitis or something similar, I don't want to lose my guitar playing just as I'm in a band thats actually doing lots of guitar playing...

Asprin seems to take edge off but I'm going to see the doc, even if its not a big deal to him and just one of those age things.....its a big deal to me


Ahthankyew

Ah well

You gotta give love a chance I suppose, but when it continually demonstrates a lack of commitment or interest in your life, its time to say stop.

Crazy idea to find love- experiment #3 over.
Result...failure

Conclusion....stop trying so hard, its not really something that should require effort.

Ahthankyew

Sad to report the tragic death of a beloved son, brother, entertainer, boyfriend, father, and all round good guy.

We've heard from a certain Mrs Guild, that her son Brian has not been posting on his blog for some time, After an extensive investigation we discovered that Brian sadly passed away after a tragic electrical accident while performing with his musical trio, The Famous Belcrum Recordings.
The Image above shows the popular band just before the tragic accident where Brian was reduced to a smouldering lump of charcol due to him dribbling on what was found to be an electically live mic causing 25000v to be dumped into his body.

According to audience members at the event, Brian had just hit a perfect note, for the 1st time during the gig after which there was a bang and they were pleased only to be able to hear lead singer Rosemarie's vocals.
"The band certainly sounded a lot better once they had that nice little fire at the side of the stage and the screaming stopped, there was also a lovely smell of roast pork, which made the atmosphere so much more cosy.", mentioned one attendee.

We reached out to FBR for a comment but so far none has been recieved, an ad for a new guitar player has been posted on their facebook page.




Ahthankyew

Change is hard

As I finish off the last of the MagPi lessons and wrap up the Book projects, along with the last few days of debugging on the Coleco project.

I start to think about the next project which if it comes off will be something very sweet on a Nintendo Switch, I can't say any more than that at the moment but I'm excited about it.

So its office clean up time....and finally fitting my triple monitor stand...which turns out the gas units on it are shit and can't take the weight of my side monitors...hmmm well I'll make do. But I don't like it, its not the way it was, change is uncomfortable...

operation tidy begins.

Ahthankyew

Oh the irony!

Benta is a fussy eater, theres no other way to say it, she likes plain simple home cooked food. Isn't keen at all on dairy, (hence hates my mac and cheese) and can't stand meat that isn't burnt to a crisp...

ok well, as a self confessed foodie, its my duty to expose Benta to  the joy of food. Which is why I had a couple of tickets for a surprise taster menu at a very nice restaurant here in Breda.

She was up for it and actually quite looking forward to it, as was I, I love fine dining and surprise menus.

Well....the restaurant is a lovely cozy place, with attentive staff and an interested chef who was keen to make sure we had no specific dislikes he would avoid. Dairy was mentioned and avoided

And on we go to a couple of small amuse bouche and appetizers . Really lovely.. But then comes a mackerel tartar...nope, she's not having that... awww, no problem I had double...it was stunning.

Then a small eggplant and carrot and raisin salad...just a mouthful, actually quite silly portion size, but its an appetizer. She tries it, almost gags :D  The courses that follow are a bit hit and miss for her but she did like the cooked Red mullet mini, mini fillet, and the wild pork terrine with a scraping of sweet potato and onion puree. It was really nice... overall she enjoyed 50% of the food, so I was feeling quite pleased, but yeah the portions were tiny.

Finally a dessert of coconut  rice cream and ...well bits, this I didn't actually like much, but dutifully ate... Benta had a small taste, said she liked it but didn't finish.

So overall, she wasn't terribly impressed by her 1st fine dining experience so we will have to work up to it, starting and McD's and moving up through KFC before braving a kebab place...

The irony though, is that as soon as I got home, something very very bad stirred in my bowels, and I then spent a good hour on the loo, followed by a rather disturbed night trying hard to avoid throwing something up, which I just managed to do...oh dear...a touch of Mumtaz tum kicked in.(Mumtaz is a great indian restaurant I used to visit a lot in Bradford, but every time I would get a bad tummy, so some kind of allergy).

So whatever I am allergic to was in one the of dishes...and I am feeling rough as a bears arse this morning.
Benta was unimpressed by my Frasier like desire to introduce her to a bit of culture, and I have been duly humbled.

Ahthankyew

Getting quite popular

Very very proud of Famous Belcrum Recordings, we're getting better and better and people are really starting to like what we do, we've acquired a few fans, and our sound and confidence grows with every gig.

Ironically this weekends gig was the smallest we ever had, we were booked for an open air market event, which should have attracted a few hundred, but the heavens decided to open and people stayed away, we moved indoors to a cafe but only a dozen or so people braved the rains, but even so they loved it and we did too. The small audience let us play around a bit and make a few mistakes of course. But it was so much fun.  Rose gets more and more confident with the ballads, it's wonderful to hear.

We also for the 1st time used our own sound set up, which was brilliant to do, I've had my DL1608 unit for a few years and never really got the chance to use it. It performed brilliantly. Though it turns out I can't save the set up, which is frustrating.
But not to worry, I'll keep it exclusive for FBR, which means the settings we used will remain


Ahthankyew

fucked if I know

this is work related.......not going into detail, but sooooo many changes, so much tinkering with processs...need to vent...can we please just focus on making good coders out of beginners.
christ...its not fucking rocket science...whatever the process, thats what I am going to focus on


can't say more, might get read by da' managment



Ahthankyew

diet slow but steady

So the new, don't shove as much in your pie hole diet is slowly taking effect, 3 kilos down so far
Also I've taken the chance to cycle into work a bit more even though our new and currently very disorganized campus is 20-25mins away. Its still a nice cycle while the weather is good. So I'm getting 45 mins of light exercise as well as the reduction in cake and booze.

Work is all very strange at the moment, the new place is not quite where we need it, I don't have a permanent desk for all my gear, which is indeed a pain. Though I've decided to camp at one today with dual monitors which lets me hook things up.

Benta is struggling a bit with getting used to things, its a bit frustrating for me, not being able to help her in some places, especially when I'm at work and she's over in Utrecht trying to figure out buses, but I'm sure she'll get used to it.. When they work they are great, when they don't,......well its stressful




Ahthankyew

Well.... here we go

Benta is settling in, she's a bit overwhelmed by some things and needs to learn that sushi, mac and cheese and various other European foods are good :D an

Its nice having someone to cook for and chat to, I missed that.. things are certainly looking up,

But I have to go back to work on Monday...booooooo
She also starts summer school for her masters on Monday too, so who gets home 1st will be interesting.



Ahthankyew

flights booked, countdown begins

Cheapflights.com is a great site for getting a good deal on flights, even if you go to the sites it recommends you can find the same flights costing double what it costs to book through them.

But finally we got the stamped Visa which allowed us to get the flight booked, and now Benta will be arriving in a very very sunny, but soon to be very rainy Netherlands on Thursday.

Counting down the hours :D

Also to the rain, this heat can go bugger off, I don't want to have to book a trip to Iceland to recover from this holiday period.

Ahthankyew

Its not a tap, its my pits

Every day for the last couple of week's (when not in Scotland) I've come up to the office, sat down,  started to get into some work, and then had to listen to the drip drip drip of sweat from my armpits landing on the floor before slowly starting to realise I am utterly befuddled by the heat.

This is no exaggeration, even with evaporator coolers and fans on full blow, my office is an oven, and heat exhaustion quickly takes over, getting any work done is near impossible.

I'm starting to panic, since I was close to getting a few key things done and dusted to let me enjoy my break. But managing less than 30 mins in every 2 hours, as I scurry for some cool water or cold part of the house (there's aircon in the attic) has meant a total loss of productivity.

I have considered moving my dev systems up to the attic, but it would take 2 days minimum to remove all the music gear on that desk, and re-set up my coding stuff and that assumed I can keep up the pace of going up and down stairs.. Also I don't have good internet upstairs...the walls in my house are too thick and the signal drops off on the 2nd floor, it just fails to get to the 3rd. (I really need to fix that, but have no idea how)

As much as I enjoy sunshine, I'd like it to stay in my preferred location of the Canaries...and not here so I can get on with having a nice quiet refreshed life in my own home

ok well I've wasted 10 mins typing this, and already I'm dripping, sat as I am in sweatpants with no top.

I bet you just as it starts to cool down, I get a cold!


Ahthankyew

Its all about to get very mental

So, lots o... (don't you hate when people start a sentence with so..) f changes about to happen.
Any day now Benta gets her passport back with the visa that lets her get on a flight to start a new life here, mostly dealing with the masters she's doing, but even so, it'll be start of a new life of us.

Of course it also means having a major clear out, so the house is being stripped back and scrubbed, regardless of Benta's arrival , this needs to be done, I've not actually had a proper house clean in a long time, I may also get some paint and touch up the kitchen a bit since the new kitchen is going to have to wait a bit.

Also my new diet/lifestyle choices are in place, I hate it, I really do but I am strong this time.. I can't stand to see any more photo's of me at friends and in this case weddings where I am just a fat beach-ball in a suit.
So since coming back from my cousin Roy's lovely wedding to Katie,  I've been on a very strict 1000Kcal a day diet.
I've bought in shit loads of food, but separated out for individual portions of chicken, steak, pork and burgers. Its all in the freezer, so I have food for a month, Costing about 150euro's,  which is 10 takeaways...hmmm also saving money.

There's nothing wrong with food I eat, when I cook myself, its just that I seem to eat enough for 3.. thats over. Sticking to 1000k is  basically less than half my recommended intake, but it should give very fast results. Its too early to have any real impact but I won't cheat. Every hunger pang is a gramme lost.

Also I'm making a point of cycling every day, even if only for a short 2km warm up around Belcrum, getting my heart beating a bit for a few weeksm,  and then back to the gym again. No point paying for it and not using it, but I do want to drop 5kg before I start that, so I can focus on some toning up rather than worry about fat burning.

Its very hard to do all this in the current heat, its been consistently over 30degs peaking one day at 41.4 outdoors. Ironic that Benta is currently shivering in 19 degree temps in Nairobi, lol, wait till winter.


Ahthankyew

i'm neglecting you both

Sorry readers, not been keeping this updated, doing lots of stuff, some of it actually quite good fun, but also still getting on top of a list of things on my todo list that never seem to end.

But back I am, starting to unwind as the holidays are here, a lovely week so far, only had to get up once, for no reason as it turned out. Its also been astonishing weather, so hot and sweaty making anything more than going up and down stairs a bit of an effort...and yes we know what that means, more promises about losing weight I probably won't keep, but I need to. I've got to fill my time with more than being sat at a computer screen.

I can't deny its had a very direct and serious impact on my mental health, having nothing but work to focus me, means I can't escape from things that bother/worry me, and there's been a lot of that in recent months. Thankfully things are about to change.

I do have a lot to do, in 2 weeks or so Benta will be moving in, getting herself ready to start her masters at Utrecht, so need to get a few things cleaned up and looking respectable...removing that large pile of laundry from the spare room(her office) for one.

The house has suffered quite a bit from nearly 4 years of single male syndrome so its best I have a proper clean out..there's stuff in the fridge I'm sure is 8 years old...time for a full declutter.

I am even...thinking...only thinking...its time to thin the guitar herd down. I am enjoying my playing more and more, especially with Roos and Ed in the Famous Belcrum Recordings, but I realise I am just not playing a lot of my babies...keeping them on the walls as decorations where they don't get played as much as I used to is clearly bad...I might just put them in their cases and hide them away....or sell them....hmmmm not sure..


I've no idea how well the book is selling but I suspect not that well, as I am not seeing a lot of people on the website forums. Plenty of visitors, dropping by though, so maybe they are downloading the files and not signing up...but I suspect my dreams of millionaire author living on a tropical island with a typewriter are about to be smashed.

Anyway, off to do a bit of a bike ride, and get myself some coffee


Ahthankyew