Ahhh thats better

Well the chair got worse and worse as I was using it, leaning further and further back in the seat as the washers bedded in, which is not good when you are in a forward facing typing position. After only a few minutes use I had massive pain and was disrtacted when working by the need to go walk it off every 20 mins or so..

The idea with the washers didn't work, or didn't work well enough to correct the base back tilt so a more dramatic reversing of the main fitting was called for, at 1st I feared this would not work as the chairs raise/lower/tilt/lock bar was directly in line with the recliner spring arm.. But after taking off the base and trying it, backward, it did just clear the spring arm, so they don't interfere.

Built up again and yes, the base of the chair now points a bit forward exactly as it should.. Its still not the most comfortable of chairs, there's just not enough padding in the seat really but at least its not killing my back just sitting it in, and the massage feature is still pretty cool.

I'll probably swap my main office chair into the office again and move this up to the vr/gamesystem in the attic.

But the chair is at least now usable for slightly longer than 20 mins at a time.


Ahthankyew

hmmm

In spite of the rather nice buzzy massage, my new chair isn't actually that comfy, it has a sit back rather than a sit level/forward feel to it, and that isn't terribly comfortable when I am typing at my computer..Also the seat itself isn't very well padded so when I try to perch on the end I am feeling the metal supports on my butt bones.

But I think a few washers at the back end of the chair's attachment to the base might be enough to fix that... I'll get to it when I have finished my colecovision project which finally is seeing its end.. a few more run throughs so find and fix bugs, and then I can send it for test.


Ahthankyew

new chair buzzes :D

Got another new chair, 2nd this year I think, for the office the other one is nice but now lives upstairs with the VR/Games system.

This one has a massage setting, and....its not bad, currently it leans back a little too much so I think I need to put a few washers on the back base, but it's cosey and the vibes do refresh the old butt tocks when you've been sat for a while. Wan't expensive, one of those ebay get rid of the stock sales for 70quid, and not really as sturdy as my upstairs proper office chair, but am happy with it for now...Anything to try to push me into getting on with some work and avoiding doing code by building chairs and writing blo.....oh...



Ahthankyew

Exit polls don't look good.

I can't stay up to watch this, but I may not sleep worrying about it. It is just incredible that one of the most incompetant and self serving governments in history looks like its going to be voted back in to implement one of the most damaging polticial acts in history and in the process risk the very foundations of a country that deserves much better..


Ranting won't change it, people don't vote for good reasons any more, they vote for causes, and for preferences regardless of the facts behind them. 
I will wake up tomorrow knowing that all hope for the UK is lost for at least 5 years...and all hope to stop brexit (though it will rumble much longer than Boris wants it to) is lost.

A collegue of mine posted this on FB, an astonishing list of this Tory goverments failures which somehow it claims its going to put right shaking a magic money tree, that if it does exist is going to be half dead after brexit..

The national debt has risen from £850bn to £2.25 trillion

The student nurse bursary was abolished and there are 43,000 unfilled NHS student nurses.
There are 21,000 fewer front-line police
There are 20,000 fewer prison officers
There are 10,000 fewer border officials
There are 10,000 fewer firefighters
36,000 teachers have left the profession

Food bank use is up 2,400%
Homelessness is up 1,000%
More than one in three children in the UK live in poverty – more than 4 million.

Student fees up 300%

780 libraries closed
25-30% cuts to all govt departments

50% increase in hate crimes
150% increase in knife crime to 22,000 per year

ZERO starter homes built, despite it being a Tory flagship programme.

The country really did deserve bettter, yet it opted for more of the same...its wrong to call people stupid, but I don't have another word that fits..

Time to become Dutch...



Ahthankyew

sniff, cough, ugghhh, eughhh

Been quite lucky with the colds this year, not had too many major ones.

How nice that it decided to pop up just before christmas.  On the plus side I have a gig on Sunday, and we now do a version of Johnny Cash's Hurt, so the croaky voice I am certain to have, will work well :D

Its the wee mans birthday today, the big 04, he's out of his toddler years :D Hope he likes the little pressie I got him, (and hope his mum won't go mad :D)


Ahthankyew

oops got date wrong, but adjustments made

Lets see how well the new gnashers perform after a bit of buzzing and filling down.. I do feel less pressure now when I bit, and if needed I can take a dremel to them myself and file them down a bit more, but we will have to see how this goes..


Ahthankyew

Start again.....

Well with all the personal shit going on, my diet went for a burton, no amount of dieting is going to survive a bottle of rum a week as well as the wine, and other things....oh and cake..lots of cake

I have to get back into it, it was working really well before I fell off the wagon and started comfort eating/drinking...Shocking how quickly you can put 5 kg back on.

So back to it, a variation on the 16:8 system with a sub 1500 cal intake cut back on the booze and more walking/cycling daily.

Also need to get back into coding again, its been really hard to focus my mind on what I have to do, as soon as I stop, my thoughts wander and the procrastination kicks in...like making a blog entry :D..Time to get my shit together and be a lean mean coding machine. I have things to finish and decks to clear so I can have a chance at balancing work/life again in 2020.



Ahthankyew

yeah, more than a few adjustments

Really bad jaw and tooth pain as a result of the falsies... took a day for that to subside, not putting them in again till they are adjusted to suit. They are slightly too far forward on one side, causing me to bite down on them at rest and in turn put pressure on the anchor teeth at the side, causing deep rooted pain in the tooth and the jaw...no really, fucking major neuralga type pain still feeling it on my chin now.... not putting up with that.. will make an appointment on Monday to see what they can be done.

Ahthankyew

hmm adjustments needed

I know I have to persevere with the new teeth but really I am having some major issues, giving me a lot of jaw pain, and impacting on my bite.. Going to have to go back for a few twiddles.


Ahthankyew

I have a smile

well more accurately I have new false teeth....odd....but it is nice not to see the gap when I'm talking/singing... I just hope they don't go flying out in the middle of a spirited argument or song.

I'm also lisping a bit as my tongue gets used to less space, but I'll take the lisp over the whistle I've been having since the last dentist visit took out an incisor.

Still they seem to fit, pretty well, so far, a little wobbly but I got a couple of complementary tubes of fixodent to take me on my geriatric path.


sigh....false teeth....oh well.

Ahthankyew

Very tired of people.

More specifically people on the internet. Its staggering how people become entrenched and sit in echo chambers to avoid their own cognative dissonance.

There's lots of good reasons to vote for or against a party, but rather than actually examine them they vote with their tribes. But not just that, conspiracy theories, false beliefs and lies are so easy to spread its almost painful to watch. When just once person posts a nonsense link to a psuedoscience website and gets another person to agree, the lie is spread...anti vaxxers are born, flat earthers find others who are as stupid as they are and the band wagon rolls.

A truely great example is the current crucificixon of Prince Andrew... who is clearly guilty of...everything, becuase he was called Randy Andy, and was friends with a paedo.

Well sorry but, regardless of the mans moral standards, or lack of them, or feelings for his old friend, there is 0 proof he has done anything wrong apart from hang out with another multi-millionaire friend, living a multi-millionaire lifestyle. But once that bandwagon starts the utterly crazy links like being called Randy, like being in New York, like being at a party getting photographed......its fucked up...but the harm is done. Guilty by association is all the proof people need.

Same for politics, The whole Corbyn is an anti semite is blatently a smear campaign, because of his frequent condemnation of Israel, which allows a lot of right wing groups to push that bandwagon on its way...taking supposedly clever people along with them to push it along with no evidence but a shit load of coincidence and association, he once had dinner with a muslim.....clearly he hates all jews and wants them dead.....I genuinely have read that and worse from some people.

And then the whole get brexit done...people are actually willing to vote for one of the most corrupt, incompetant PM's the UK has ever seen, so that he will somehow, manage to force through a legislation that will cripple the UK's economy for decades, while lining his and his mates pockets....and thats a good thing?? Cos...we're all fed up with it? Lets just book flights to Jonestown and be done with it.

fucking hell, how can people be so gullable and unwilling to actully do any kind of rational research to realise they are being manipulated, lied to, coerced....
And lets not ever get started on the Religious nutters..

The internet has truely made the world a wide open place, but sadly people only want to live in their own little corners fueling their ignorance instead of expanding their minds..

I'm really considering dropping out of all social media, I don't think I can contain my anger at some of the shite I read.


Ahthankyew

And now for the cheesy bit.

I got his ashes back now, not sure I am totally happy with the bamboo container but...

Now when I walk in and say I'm home, I'm not quite so crazy as I was yesterday.

trying to close a chapter

I went to pick up Harveys ashes today, they were in a nice bamboo stick container.. quite sweet, I don't think he was that tall :D

but very annoyingly when I tried to pay with my credit card,  they couldn't accept it. I dont' have enough cash in the account with all the bills that have gone out this month, so the credit card was the best way to pay.
Anyway they suggested I go into the town (its just outside Breda) and got to a cash machine at the Jumbo or at a Rabobank and gave me the address.

Well I put it into my sat nav, and went to the bank address, only to find no bank....hmmm ok well the Jumbo then.. I went there, but no cash machine...argghhh

How irritating.. I just wanted to bring Harvey home, give him a little space in the cabinet to himself and move on..and circumstances screw it up...

I'll try again tomorrow, I'll go to my local cash point and get cash out on the credti card to pay for it.



Ahthankyew

fuck this is hard

Been keeping myself busy to avoid thinking about things, I clean when I'm upset...I'v done a lot of cleaning. Also went to school band practice which was nice and diverting but coming home an empty silent house.....boom.
Coming into the house, and no greeting, or snoring, or mess to clean....I really can't explain how much I miss that, it comes in waves of incredible sadness. Can't quite get my head around how much the grief is hitting me. I've lost a few human friends this year, and been deeply affected by that, I just didn't expect to have the same intense feelings for Harvey, but he was indeed my dearest and closest friend and I miss him.

Harvey's ashes will be available early next week....not sure exactly what I am going to do, keep them in an urn or scatter them around my backyard tree....can't decide, there's no rush.


Ahthankyew

He's at peace, I'm in bits

No miracles, the vet agreed he was shutting down, and he'd had an amazing long run, he went to sleep in my arms with a big yawn with the 1st dose, before the second dose, then I felt his heart stop, it was very quick, very peaceful....I lost my shit in front of the vet and her nurse, who left me alone for a few mins to bawl my eyes out.  They're arranging for his cremation and I'll get his ashes back. I want to keep him around.

Can't tell you how much I will miss that little puppy, he's been a constant in my life for nearly 20 years, through all the good and bad and shit and happy times, he was always there just looking for a cuddle.

The sense of emptiness in the house is palpable...I will need a while to process this.

Last pic of my lovely old man

but this is how I will always remember him cheeky, funny, smart and incredibly loving... yes everyone says that about their dogs. But Harvey really was a one off...irreplacable.

Ahthankyew

Its time

The spark has finally gone, he's not responding much to anything now, he's given up.

I've made the appointment for tomorrow...

I might not post for a few days, unless the vet can work a miracle.


Ahthankyew

Noodles today

yup, he's had a bowlfull of supernoodles...I slipped some shredded chicken in, but he managed to leave that in the bowl...oh well... its all calories if he keeps it down.

Better get some salmon and fois gras, see if it tickles his fancy.


Ahthankyew

oh Android... you really are a pain.

Having to do some Android stuff for work, getting myself fully up to speed with VR systems and learning Unity....

Basically 3 of the things I really hate most..  VR makes me sick, Unity makes me angry, and Android leaves me comatose

Anyway, have to do it I need to expand my abilities on these platforms so I can teach them a little better and be more in tune with students who are using them

I've been working on a VR project for a couple of months in Unity, it was a slow starter as I just didn't get some of the madness of the latest versions of Unity right, but it sped up and my project is basically over now. Leading to me doing more VR research on Oculus Go and Quest

Now I must admit, as much as I hate VR, I am finding those 2 wireless units much more fun to use... but much less fun to code, Android coding is still painful and on Unity its painfully slow. But the result is somehow much nicer, smaller fun games, my personal fav and once you get projects developed using a rift with far better debugging and build speeds, its got potential for some fun games.

Maybe when I clear the decks a little of other things I'll do something on them.

Pleased to say that my ColecVision project is finally(yes finally) nearing an end. I hit a total wall on it for various reasons, and was advised to bring someone in to help, I resisted for so long but finally I had to admit I just wasn't able to get it over the line, so welcomed Allard to the now 2 man team.. well, he helped, he fixed the thing I've been stuck on for over  year....over a bloody year... in 1 week.

Fresh eyes.... I shouldn't have been so stubborn to finish it myself, but I couldn't progress and my motivation levels crashed, added to personal upsets and stress I just couldn't get my head round how to finish it.. But now, happily Allard, has come in and like a white knight fixed all the stuff I broke, or couldn't get working  so I can finally put this little bitch of a project away in the next week. That then leaves me with time me to update my SBC software in the light of the new Pi4 issues..

Then...maybe, I'll have time to write a cool VR project for myself....or maybe have a bath...a long long bath.

Ahthankyew

and another few mouthfuls

yup, it seems every few days when I think he's giving up , he eats something, no where near enough, but something, its always sometime different, sometimes ham, sometimes chicken, sausages, pork pie even...but never the same thing twice, what he eats one day, he refuses the next, its like he's on a mission to try all human food before he dies..


So far so good I guess, but I am going to go to the vet next week and take advice on how much longer we should continue with this.. he's not in pain, but he's not himself...




Ahthankyew

Think thats it now.

I think thats it now, he's not eating much at all now, even bacon isn't going down...he's losing a lot of weight having accidents right in front of me, not even trying to get to the door.

It's not good... he's not in pain, (as far as I can tell), he still wants to be snuggled and stroked, still wags his tail, and has a bit of a spring in his step when we are coming back from his very short walks.
but his eyesight is almost totally gone now, he only notices big sweeping movments and food has to be right next to him to even get him to sniff...but sadly not to eat.

I don't want to see him starve to death. a slice of salami, or a bit of bacon isn't enough, he won't even touch steak or chicken or ham now..Time to call the vet and make an appointment.

I can honestly say this is horrible.


Ahthankyew

well some people don't change

Strangely had a run in with my ex wife on Facebook, didn't recognise her new surname and commented on a post she made on a mutual friends page...

Few minutes later I get pm'd with some right nasty shit, threats, abuse and basic bile. Thats when the penny dropped who she was.

Very very sad, very very pointless and very very fucked up. She has her own version of events, one in particular, with everything twisted to make me the devil incarnate....I have a very different recollection of the fear and stress living with a rapid cycling bipolar person brings....It really was a bad time, and I was relieved to get out of it... I hoped she'd find peace..maybe she has, but clearly still has a lot of hate in her baggage.
Anyway, after a few choice comments she blocked me... good, I don't really need her kind of hate in my life.
Dunno if she reads this, its not impossible... But if I never have any contact again with her I'll be more than happy.


Ahthankyew

a few mouthfuls

Took the whole day, but finally he's had a bit of roast beef and some ossenworst (kind of tartar steak slices)  not interested in the liver I cooked for him though he did have a few pieces... I'll try him on some chicken



he didn't want the chicken.
:(
Ahthankyew

hanging in there

Harvey picked up quite a bit later on Sunday, eating roast beef, roast chicken and bacon....as  much as he wanted.. And toward the end of the day he really was quite chipper.

But today again he's not eating and spending most of the day sleeping. Ill try and tempt him with some ham.


Ahthankyew

last meals?

Poor Harvey
he's very much on his last legs, if there was any sign he was in pain I'd take him (or rather call them to come as thats nicer) the the vet,  but so far he's still showing sings of responsivness and happiness at being fussed over. But he is barely eating anything now, he's gone off steak, and chicken and mince and sausages, but will nibble at some salami, streaky bacon and rare roast beef, but only nibbles.. I can't persuade him to eat much at all, and his weight is dropping..

The kitchen has a selection of dishes on the floor for him none of which he wants, but todays, roast beef from Jumbo was something at least, and a few strips of bacon.
I hate this...really its horrible, but lets just make the little man as cosy and loved as possible.


Ahthankyew

Back home to dentist

Trip home was quite long, lots of delays, but I was really impressed with the Budget car rental, no issues, in an out and quite cheap. (mind you I have to see if they deduct anything from the card)
There was some incredible turbulance on the plane but home safe and sound and reunited with my little man.. But he's not at all himself, he's really deteriorating. So slow now, but he's still eating and enjoying snuggles so I dont' detect any distress in him. But....its not long now, Steak and Chicken and bacon it is from now on, his last days will be filled with doggy joy.
I guess I'm going to have to eventually bite the bullet and take him to the vet, but I am so afraid that they will ask me to make a choice....as soon as I detect distress...but not before. He's old, just old, and as long as he's got some spark and eating, we'll keep going.


Speaking of old things.. mum (ha you thought I'd forgot you) is also looking old and frail, I suggested taking her to the vet but she seems reluctant still, next time I go I'll take a big sack with me.

She is rather poorly at the moment, and tired of all the small procedures and tests she's being put through, but she had a good natter an cheered up no end when I introduced her to the joys of spiced dark rum, sans coke, I'd like to think she was pleased to see me, but it was probably just her off her tits on rum :D

My grandkids are wonderful, D and K are doing a great job with them, Harvey2 is a little boisterous but thats fun to see, little 8 month Eva is the most content baby I have ever seen, 3 days I was there, never heard her skriking once...amazing..

Can't wait to see them all again, hope mum can indeed make one more trip to Breda, and maybe Danni can bring the family when she sorts out passports.

oh well, that was a nice holiday, time to get back into the swing of things.

Which brings me to the Dentist.

I always thought modern dentistry had an air of surgical precision to it, with swabs, isolation, clamps, small scalpels, special tools...etc.

Nope... a big pair of pliers and lots of twisting and pulling...

Wait till the anesthetic wears off.


Finally had the right uppper wisdom removed and wow, I can open my jaw quite a bit, I wonder if I'll be able to yawn again, it was always stopping the tendon after the surgery..

And sadly had to say goodbye to another front tooth whcih also lost its home due to bone degradation from the radiotherapy/reduced blood supply, but new falsies in a few weeks.




Ahthankyew

Finally off to see the sprogs and the auld bag

Well after a lot of last minute kerfuffle finding a dog sitter, I'm heading over to the UK for the last weekend of my autumn break to meet my new grandaughter, comment on how big my grandson is getting and also go see my grumpy auld bag, who's not been so well of late. Seeing me might cheer her up a bit, or finish her off...I'll keep you posted.

Only a flying weekend visit, but even so it will be nice to connect with my peeps again... as long as we don't talk about brexit..no one needs to die!



Ahthankyew

more on line dating fun

So aside from the crazies and the box tickers (if you're not perfect and tick all the boxes they don't want to know), another of the things to watch for are the scammers.
Man there are a lot of them, but you can really spot them pretty quickly, they tend to be too good to be true...young, stunning, age is only a number etc...Also they flatter you far too much.

And the good ones will lull you into a false sense of security before suddenly there's a crisis that has come up that they desperatly need cash for somehing.....

For the last week or 10 days, I've had one of these chatting to me, she(no gurantees she was even female, as I'm pretty sure the person whos pics she ripped off from Facebook has no idea), she. was actually very good, and showed great patience, but I smelled a rat right away, and was just waiting for the sting to arrive. There were little inconsitancies, like being Brazilan and only being in NL for a few months, (her facebook went back to 2016 all in dutch), forgetting some of my details, reasking the same question etc... but having established this was a scammer I let her think she had her mark.

After laying the ground work, single mum,  dealing with life, looking for a good man,  sick parent, own business bla bla, the set up comes, in the shape of having to go to Hamburg on business for a few days, and we'll meet up when she gets back...course we will.

A small ration of how was your day, things are going ok,  some hassles but I'm dealing with it...on whatsapp to keep the pot simmering was quite nice to see, I admired her patience, Most of these scammers go for the closer pretty quick, but she was making sure the hook was well in.

And then of course the closer has to come... shes there  in Hamburg to pick up goods and has to pay import taxes, she's paid most of them, but suddenly its more than she expected...oh dear.

Funny sort of importing business that the courier can't send goods direct to you and take payment online....like every shipping company everywhere!!

Well its all very "convincing" (well no not really but I can see how people might fall for it) except she sends me the worst, and I do mean the very worst fake waybill ever.... allegedly she's getting a diplomatic bundle of 1.2 tonnes of leather........wtf??

Note the null bar code, lack of sender and receiver address, fake company name, lack of comany addresses, no phone numbers. no tax codes, also the date...was only a few days ago, (bloody fast boat) diplomatic shipment lol... its just beyond terrible.  I've seen a lot of way bills when I buy things from states or japan/korea and this is the most pathetic I've ever seen.
I've removed the name becuase I'm pretty sure the name is a real person who's had it nicked.

But she's quite smart she just uses it to keep the hook baited...not asking for money yet, but making it clear to me she's having to pay out funds and soon as she has we can meet up, shes just taking care of business.....A few more days pass and she's got one last bill to pay (yeah....right)  only at the last minute does she come up with the, oh I'm 120 short, my sick dad can't help...... can you lend it me?

Its known as a 419 scam, very common with Nigerians, they try to get you to pay for some shipping taxes or something and lay a guilt trip down on you if you don't help them to get the goods they need, or that they promise you is worth more than what you will give them.

I let her ask a few times but of course, she still thinks she has her mark hooked, but I'm not playing ball and quite enjoy letting her struggle. I know this scam and I'm not paying anything...a few key questions about who she was paying and had she does business with them before, didn't get a very sensible answer,  so she twigged in the end and logged off....

Its amazing.... Con artists like this are the worst... its not like the classy scam artists you see in the movies, where they prey on the rich and greedy, this kind of chancer has no care who they screw over... shocking.. anyway I spotted it instantly and let it carry on for a bit to keep her occupied, while (s)he was working on me,  she wasn't working on someone else.

Feeling quite pleased with myself :D



Ahthankyew

Autumn break

Not that its going to be much of a break, got some work to do and will have to spend a few days at a clients location,  and also going to squeeze in a visit to see the sprogs and grumpy gran, who's not very well at the moment.

Biggest issue is Harvey 1, he needs to be looked after and isn't quite himself at the moment, age is very much catching up with him and his eyesight is getting progressivly worse. He now habitually runs into doors he cant see when I bring him in from his walk...it was funny at first but a couple of times he's ran at speed and hurt himself, so I need to take special precautions to make sure the door is open before he charges in.

Also he's developed a nasty bump below his eye, which at first caused half his face to swell up.. Before I went to the vet though it calmed down and seemed to fade but its come back. I dunno if this is a bite or a bruse cause by his crashing into things, its not tender to the touch so I suspect not, but it does not seem to be an infection or anything else...can't be a tumour, it came up too fast and came down after..
I'll wait till Monday, since he's in no distress, if its not gone down again, its vet time....something I fear a lot considering his great age....

Ahthankyew

I got a new bike

The old warhorse is nearing its end, its costing more to repair it every year than it would to get a new bike...

So I got a new bike :D

yup.. a real bike, with gears and thick tyres... and bend down bum up seating...

well ok, its not my usual thing but I will get used to it. One of my neighbours put all his old bikes out on the lawn to sale and I asked what he wanted for it..50euros....it had a flat back tyre but that was an easy fix...

so I now have a proper bike. Need to get a lock though as the cable with it has long since lost its key. and I need to fit a pannier rack and a kick stand, but these are easy to get.

After fixing the back tyre, while doing my back in (yup, not even exerting myself I spazzed my back) I took it for a spin, and its certainly odd but smooth fast and something new, something hard to explain...stopping things....quick stopp..oh yeah brakes...it has awesome brakes.. very cool.

The warhorse will be allowed one last repair, but at some point I might forget to take the key out the lock and let it go to the a new owner..or theif.


Ahthankyew

People are strange part 6504

Well once again I get confirmation that online dating is filled with odd people (well I'm there). I hooked up with a very nice lady, just over the Belgium border and we've been chatting for a few days.. in the run up to meeting up. A very good start, very interesting and smart lady, really cool communication, intelligent, observent and even a dry sense of humour which is always a plus.  American so no language issues, and a swearer, perfect....

But then she sends me a good morning sunshine gif at 7am on a Sunday, which I reply to at 10am, when I wake, oh god you're a morning person barf.... a comical one liner...nothing extreme...

That results in a fantastic angy response that she just sent something cheerful and I will never hear from her again. And it seems thats true as she rage quit me from facebook and whatsapp and blocked my phone.....so..yeah... that happend...

red flags flying high there I think....lucky escape. Wow..just wow..


Ahthankyew

ow, croak, sniff, ow, croak, sniff

The cold is almost over, bit wheezy and coughy but so far (touch wood) no chest infection ...yet..
my arm though, oh fuck that is painful

am doing the physio excercises but it seems to be making things worse rather than better, am trying my best not to play guirar which for sure makes it worse but its very hard not to play guitar at the moment as I am running some of the jam nights for students and we're going to start rehearsing again soon for both bands after a summer break.

Also at the moment I seem to be really in a zone with my playing, lots of new things starting to appear from my fingers and I just "feel" more in tune with the guitar, and want so much to play......ah well...a bit of pain is worth it, we all suffer for our art I guess.

Not much more to report at the moment, the new 1st years are a challenge but they are soaking things up like a sponge and I have high hopes.



Ahthankyew

croak croak

Well its a bit of a self diagnosis but pretty sure its accurate, my voice is literally gone, only croaks and wheezes coming out... and it feels like I've been gargling razor blades for breakfast, lunch and dinner.All classic symptoms of laryngitis.  Lucky I don't actually have to say anything to anyone today, but I did want do a bit of recording with a nice cold deep voice (I actually sound a little better when I've just had a cold).... maybe tomorrow. but if I'm still croaking tomorrow I'll consider going to the docs...not that there's much they can do for cold related laryngitis.

Ironic really as over all this cold hasn't been too severe, just a bit of a runny nose and a slight sore throat, until last night when the razor gargling started.

Voice rest and a lot of paracetamol today, will hopefully pay dividends.




Ahthankyew

Cold time

always the same, new group of students, new bunch of colds to catch.... ah well


Ahthankyew

ow ow ow

Still in pain with my arm, its seriously impacting on my guitar playing and also my diet.... I'm miserable when I can't play, and I eat....damn, undoing weeks of good work with a chilli dog, or 3

...its ok, I'll get back into the mood soon. Had some more massage therapy today, hurt like hell and leaft me feeling all wiped out and sore, but hopefully the treatment will help and I can get back to my scales and my scales (see what I did there?? no... oh ok)



Ahthankyew

Appeal accepted

Got 2 letters today, one in Dutch, one in English (nice touch) to confirm that my appeal against the traffic fine for running a red light has been accepted and is being processd.

Of course its a formality of sorts, but at least there were no issues with my formatting of the appeal, which I sometimes get caught out on, Dutch letters in relationship to rules and regs are very formal and require specific things, like reference numbers, date of birth, etc...its can be quite a challenge to make sure you put everything done.

But its in, its accepted it will be reviewed, I dont hold a lot of hope that it will pass, even though i am certain the police made an error, its ultimatly my word against his and the courts usually go with the police, but I gave multiple reasons to cast doubt on the officers view, and I will just have to wait and see.
It will take up to 3 months to get a decision, during which time I don't have to pay the 250euro fine...

fingers crossed.

Ahthankyew

Tearing down a wall

Diet news folks, I know you've been waiting with bated breath

Been really struggling to get below 92kg, for over a week, no movment staying on our around 92.3 but never getting to see a magic 91.. A few cheat days saw it bump back to 93 on a couple of weigh ins... But finally today I hit 91.7 an important wall.

Next wall is the 90kg mark....then the 89...then ...oh it never really ends does it.



Ahthankyew

Not a total loss then

I heard through the grapevine that Benta graduated from her Masters course...So no November retakes, I assume she managed to do a summer block E for her one retake either way it means she's done it and she can move on now.

I am pleased for her, she did work hard at it, and also for me personally knowing that the effort is not wasted is good, there was a lot of financial hardship and personal confict to deal with which would be a sad waste of all kinds of effort if she had not finished the course

I doubt my contribution will ever be recognised, it's telling, that she has not let me know herself as she basks in the congratulations of her friends!.

Maybe in 10 years or so when she matures a bit, but for me I am pleased it wasn't all for nothing in the end. I hope she makes good use of this and has a good life because of it.

Time to close that chapter, and not look back.

Ahthankyew

owwwwww fuck owww shit

Im in pain, serious fucking ow ow ow pain.

Tendonitis in my elbow from guitarrerring too much, it is fucking agony

got a gig on Saturday, then nothing till Oct, so going to try to not touch a guitar for a few weeks to see if it calms down.

Also have to have some physio and lots of paracetamol as an anti infmamitory.

grr


Ahthankyew

Back to school

I didn't want to go, but I had to...its my job..

But the 1st 2 weeks are always deadly boring, dull, full of meetings, panic planning and reviews... I'm not overly worried though ,we know what we are trying to deliver and I just have to make sure my lesson plans are in order.

Students arrive on the 2nd Sept, and things get a bit more regular and routine then as we get to know them and settle into a familiar routine, of screaming, crying, bewlierment and frustration.. for me at least, not sure about the students.

I've been doing a unity gig for a few months now, in anger, ..and that is well ment, god I hate this.. I loathe engines and their obession with doing things their way.. Im trying to write a simulator for a veehicle systm, thats not a typical vehicle, and the physics needs to be stomped on so much... But the project is coming along and at least I can say I now understand the latest version of Unity much better than I did before. It has been quite a few years since I did much with Unity, probably version 2 or 3 and it has moved up a lot. We only really use Unity for a few school projects these days, we seem to prefer UE4, but 1st years do some Unity, and I suppose I'll get assigned to help them..ugg..

House is still clean and tidy I am happy to report, didn't get time to decorate though, and still have to squeeze in a weekend to the UK while I can..waiting to see if I win an appeal against a fine for running a red light, which I am sure I didn't... If I do, then I can afford a flight, if not.. have to postpone.




Ahthankyew

hmmmm

21st century geek issue... can't get the new PC to drive the projector, and 3 monitors and an oculus

I guess it was asking too much.. but maybe if I can hook up the 1050's spare display port, rather than the onboards 2nd DVI,  to the projector it might work...adapter ordered... We'll see.

Its not really an issue though, I am unlikely to want to play games on the projector, or make presentations up there, and I am genuinly delighted with the new PC. Never thought I'd be this happy with a new system; there is always a lot of, where is that app gone or why wont this work now when I change work laptops.
Sure, I am only using it for 1 specific thing at the moment, even then I am still using my dev PC for most other things...but I find myself quite enjoying working up stairs.. I may indeed make the full move..we'll see.

Weight loss progresses well, I've now lost 7.2 kg, which is more than a stone... At least 20kg to go though, I checked my BMI and as expected I am considered very overweight. A short skinny runt like me should be around 70kg, not 99.2kg as I was. Still sticking well to the 1 (or 2 very) low cal meal a day. The odd cheat if I am out, but the loss is continuing at a steady 200-400g a day.  I'm looking forward to seeing 89.99kg in a week or so.. The dog's less keen on the long late night walks, but they are part of it.




Ahthankyew

Well this is better than I expected

The new PC is amazing and has a feature I honestly never noticed.. It has on board graphics, pretty shitty low level on board Intel, graphics but still.. They were naturally disabled in favour of the (now medium level) graphic card a GTX1050ti I had asked for.

The 1050 is a great card and more than meets my general needs and VR requirements, but  it does mean I have to dedicate the HDMI slot to the VR and that leaves only a Display port and DVI for monitors, so 2... I like 3. I hated having to sacrafice a monitor on my dev PC to a VR unit.
So I decided to try and go into the BIOS and activate the onboard graphics as well, fully expecting them not to... but they did.. And now I can drive up to 6 monitors, 3, dvi, 2 display ports and 1 hdmi

I still have to dedicate the hdmi to my Oculus, as it does not really play well with switches. but that leaves 5 ports open to use for editing and coding, just the way I like it. :D

I only want 3 though, a centre monitor, a side portrait monitor, and a side landscape monitor.  I will put 1 more of the dvi's to use to drive an image to the projector should I want to play games. :D

I don't quite know how the gpu's are working, it may be, I need to drive a fast game to a monitor hooked up to the 1050ti, but thats easy to arrange.

I am really pleased with this arrangment... now if I just had a decent chair upstairs, I might move all my work to the studio... but for now I'll keep this as a summer place to work.

Ahthankyew

New PC day... so soon?

DPD finally delivered the PC to the pickupshop, again after 2 attempts it seems, when they were not officially open, so it is here now, on Saturday, not Monday as they stated...terrible company..but at last I have a budget upgraded PC.

I mean it has to be 9 or 10 years since my last one?

As I've noted before, I am not someone who has to have the very latest PC's, I get the most powerful one I can afford at the time, and keep it uptodate with occasional drive and graphic card updates as long as possible.

Pretty sure I have had the current one for at least 9 years, and it itself was a refurb several new graphic cards and SSD drives have kept it working but its started to show its age recently and had a couple of unexplained crashes that scared me.... So Ive splashed out on a new refurb. This isn't going to be my main PC though, just a back up for use upstairs when the heat gets too much. The Main PC does indeed still need to be replaced in the next year or so, but it still servicable for the moment, for much of my work. Though it does chug a bit on VR projects. I will do a major upgrade on that around Christmas bonus time when I should have recovered my finances after the year of paying out.

The new PC is an off the shelf refub gamer PC from ebay, with the same 1050ti graphic card I've found works well in my current PC, but this has a later gen faster I7 CPU, 2600 @3.4ghz compared to the i7 860 2.8ghz on my main PC, its quite a bit faster. Also 16GB of new RAM compared to 8GB and.... though the benefits of this are less obvious to me, Windows 10.. not 8.1 they also sent me a pretty naff wired keyboard and mouse, and a refurbed Del monitor which is quite useful.. so overall not bad for £392 . Im pretty sure the old one cost a lot more than that. Its not  very exandable though, only 1 slot for a graphic card, and one IDE for any extra cxards I might want to add, but it will do the job.

I've turned off all the horrible flash LED fan lights and got it set into a more sedate, quiet fan update in the background mode and its all good.

Just starting the process of setting up the 100's of dev tools I like to have available, all of which take forerver to download. The supplied mini dongle for wifi didn't really cut it, but lucky I had another dongle that has an antenna that gives a good solid signal and the PC is busy doing its thing for the next few days of downloads.

I'll leave it in peace to get on with it.



Ahthankyew

DPD are the worst.

I really don't like DPD as a courier service, I make a point never to use them, after seeing how the throw parcels around, marked fragile, and how they spectacularly messup up deliveries.

Once again I see their incompetance in action,  I didn't choose to use them of course, but a new PC I bought on Ebay is being delivered by them.

They tried to deliver on Thursday, when admitidly I was in bed, and didn't hear any buzzers, ok, well thats a bummer.. But at least they redirect to a local store.

I accidently went to the store yesterday after 4 only to have it noted the not entierly clear tick box on the note said it woudl be there Friday after 4.


oh ok, so this morning, I notice another DPD note through my door, with no actual info on it this time.. So it looks like they tried again...and again the buzzers failed to wake me, it turns up in fact the batteries on the upstairs one are dead, but the downstairs one is fine and more than loud enough to wake me....so we can assume he only pressed one.

tits... but nevermind I will go to the bicyle store and get it...at 4-30 and no its not there...they have no clue where it is.

after managing to work out the tracking code I get this

02.08.2019	10:21	Etten-Leur (NL)	Unfortunately we have not been able to deliver your parcel. Consignee not located for second time. The parcel will therefore be stored for 7 days and then automatically returned to consignor. Please contact DPD.
01.08.2019	18:15	Etten-Leur (NL)	We're sorry but your parcel couldn't be delivered as arranged. Pickup parcelshop delivery after first delivery attempt.
01.08.2019	10:11	DPD data centre	Redirected to the following Pickup parcelshop: SCHIETECAT TWEEWIELERS
01.08.2019	10:11	Etten-Leur (NL)	Unfortunately we have not been able to deliver your parcel. Pickup parcelshop delivery after first delivery attempt.
01.08.2019	07:29	Etten-Leur (NL)	Out for delivery.
01.08.2019	02:15	Etten-Leur (NL)	At parcel delivery centre.
31.07.2019	01:18	Heywood (GB)	In transit.
30.07.2019	18:38	DPD data centre	Order information has been transmitted to DPD.

So did they even try to take it to the Tweewielers store??  who knows  It looks like they tried to deliver at 18-15, the shop closes at 18-00

I have pinged them on facebook...and put new batteries in the upstairs ringer...they better try again tomorrow or give me info on how and where I can pick it up.

I really don't like DPD..

Ahthankyew

Studio almost ready :D

Another on the todo list ticked off, my upstairs studio has been in disarray for many months, I just wasn't that bothered when the house wasn't my own.  But I've been cleaning, sorting, throwing things out and properly storing shit all week, and it actually is starting to feel comfy again. The big old, no longer used Pedal boards, have been stripped and stored, and the pedals put away. I may sell some on ebay.

Work desk is tidy and set up with mixer units and Mac Mini's updated (I have 2, the old one can't quite hack it any more, but all its apps are transferred to a more recent, but still old 2014 model), and guitars are no longer littering the floor, they are in their cases or on the wall out of the way. Still some sorting out to clear the "bookcase" where all kinds of crud is stuffed but that can wait till next week.

I set up the new (sat doing nothing for a year) humax freesat unit so I now have a working TV/Movie system up there on LCD and on projector. I don't have cable TV anymore, but I might set up another NLEx streaming box up there for catchup TV (it won't stream unless it has direct cable network access).  Tidied up the wiring and DVD/s too, so I can find movies I've not got round to watching yet.

That now gives me, full media access, and netflix on TV or Projector with sound routing out the cinema system.. happy :D

A new (refurbed) Gamer PC is heading its way to me, mainly for gaming, but also for occasional work when my office is too hot.  Its a slightly higher spec than my office PC, but I won't swap it out just yet, I will save up for a mega machine sometime around Xmas bonus time. The Gamer PC will also be able to route its output to its Monitor, or the Projector or a VR headset. I havn't made up my mind if I want a console in there, probably not considering I actually seldom play games these days...hmm maybe.

All that once again makes the studio into a man cave with all my toys, interests and stupid shit in one place.

And finally, all the old useless sky boxes, cable boxes and assorted dead junk are in the car to take to the tip for recycling or dumping.

I can't say its exactly "sparking joy"(I've never watched the show, I just keep hearing people say it)  getting rid of crap, but I am starting to feel a bit happier that the house has less, better clean this up, rooms to deal with.

Ahthankyew

5KG lost...:D 20 to go

I havn't mentioned the diet in a while have I... well its been a bit up and down, I've had a lot of trouble dealing with the hunger part of a diet, which is always the issue with diets I suppose :D I tried all manner of things to avoid hunger, eating small meals often, etc.. but the hunger could claim me and I'd go nibble on a few carrots, or a cake or a curry....it wasn't good.

I was still working on the diet, I was cutting back on my intake and weight is dropping, but slowly, and each cake/curry/pizza relapse would set me back to the start again and undo a lot of the good work in a week. I needed to take a more drastic action.

And that happened because recently I was rather inspired by an old friend John Pickford who has been doing a keto diet and lost a massive amount of weight.. good for him.

I didn't really want to do the Keto thing though I did it years ago and it did work, but for me it never really made me feel good.. But I noted one thing in his comments that was interesting, he only has 1 meal a day.. and its a stunner.. lots of protein, fat as per the keto concept, and minimal carbs,  it all looked good, but there was a key point he mentioned, he also said hunger pangs fade after a while.

Now that got me thinking, instead of fearing and ultimatly trying to quench the hunger pangs , just embrace them, treat them as a withdrawal symptom and try to do one low calorie meal a day.

And yup, it is true, after a few days of genuinely uncomfortable hunger, the pangs do indeed get less and as long as the meal is fairly filling with some protein in it, hunger pangs fade. I'm not saying they go, I could easily nip to KFC right now and demolish a bucket, but the pangs are not overpowering me to do that. I can keep them in check now.

I now focus on trying to have only 1 meal a day, and even then its a very light one, something like noodles and chicken, or rice and beef. And importantly its not a massive portion. So I'm only eating 500-800 kcal a day.. often less.  I can make one chicken breast into 4 or 5 portions of noodle topping. its really not a lot, but having it in there does wonders for the hunger. As does making sure the noodle broth does not boil away, having it as a soupy food makes it last longer, and adding water does nothing to the calorie count.

A packet of noodles is 100kcal and I'm using only a small amount of protein (beef/chicken/pork) to suppliment it and some veg for vits.
Some days I might have  bit more, like a steak, or chicken leg, but I keep the carbs to a minimum, so a small amount of rice or couscous, and the lucky dog gets to have the fat/skin.

Also I'm doing a lot of cleaning and tidying and moving stuff around in the house as I complete my spring/summer clean so I'm being as active as possible

This has seen my weight drop much faster, from 50-100g a week (when not cheating), to 100g or more a day... not suprising as its basically starvation level, but its not uncomfortable.

I'll keep this up, but today I had a little whoo moment as I hit a 5Kg lost target, I hope to lose another 5 before going back to work. Watch this space.



Ahthankyew

I was hoping the bills would drop.

With summer you can usually expect a drop in the bills, no heating means no boiler.. But now we are in the midst of a heatwave with a record 39+ deg expected today.. and I've got my airco, evapcooler and every fan in the house on with all windows and blinds closed... in an effort to drop the temps.

It is hot as hell, and I am trying to do some work in the midst of it, mostly though I find its best to just work at night, as the computer fans themselves kick out a lot of heat and nothing really gets done as you are seeking a non sweaty shirt or trying to keep my bollox cool....its awful.

Time to start doing rain dances in the hope of the thunder that will come to cool us all down..


Ahthankyew

oh this is not normal

Its easy to blame global warming  for the current heatwave...but it is.. global warming

jeeze its hot, it hit 38 today, I have to stop work at 11/12 and hide in the attic for hours till things cool, down, the air con is amazing but very loud. 

My Office PC has died on me once due to overheating, and right now has its fans on full blow, so its going to pop again any second. There's not much I can do about it in the office, the air is too warm, in too small a space, and there's no way to cool it even with an evap cooler and fan blowing in chilled air.

As a stop gap, I've cleared my desk upstairs and now have my laptop and a monitor/keyboard set up so I can work up there, its not ideal, my laptop is more powerful than my PC but it can't run my oculus until I get a decent USB bus on it, but at least I can escape the heat and do a bit of work on some things.

I will probably buy a 2nd gaming spec PC and set it up there, if nothing else I can play games on my big screen but it will also be a decent 2nd workstation. Cost is a factor though I don't play many games at all, but need a min spec, will have to see what I can find on ebay.

I don't really want to work up there though, its very much a play room, so any work done is only because the air con allows progress.

Its a good job I've been clearing the attic out, making space for me to watch movies and play in the cool, even if it is noisy.

The heatwave will hopefully break soon...just waiting to hear the thunder.


Ahthankyew

one room at a time....well half, mabye a quarter.

Its a bit late for a spring clean, but I'm having one, time to spark some joy, or whatever that shit is...  and clear up.. I'm going through each room in turn, and finally throwing old shit out, cleaning up and getting myself ready to do a bit of decorating later in the holiday.

The Spare room wasn't untidy, but it needed to be cleared out ready for guests..the kitchen has been stripped, My Bedroom has been declutered and dusted, the studio is getting rid of a lot of old electronic/move/tv crap that is no longer used..I sold some of it..and will junk the rest.

Aside from making more space in the studio to allow for movie and music nights, I'm also setting up a 2nd workstation up there, using my laptop as a working PC (its actually more powerful than my desktop). This is for 2 reasons... one..music and video and two, Air con... its going to get stupid hot in the next month or so, and I have projects I need to finish, so I want to avoid working in my underwear with my back sticking to the leather chair this year.

I'm going to give the kitchen and lounge a nice coat of paint as well as finally wallpaper (just woodchip) the walls of the studio which have been plasterboard exposed since they were made 10 years ago...its time.

And the back yard, starting to clear that up too, getting rid of the old wood and other crap,  (literally, since Harvey has used it as an emergency toilet a bit too often)

This time next week, I hope to have a nice sparkly clean house.... now if I can just induce some pretty young ladies to come in and inspect my new 20ft well in the basement.


Ahthankyew

And I have the house to myself again. Which is actually good.

So for the last year or so I have had a house guest, my failed attempt to start a relationship with Benta resulted in a situation where for better or worse she had to stay here to complete her Masters degree.

I felt it was up to me to allow her to do that and let her stay in my spare room and allowing her some funding to be able to commute and socialise while she was here...in short, I was paying for her to live here...

It wasn't easy, in fact it was at times quite a struggle, but I did feel it was the right and honest thing to do, since I had brought her here, leaving her life in Kenya behind. I had a sense of responsibility and duty of care. Even though many people said it was crazy, I felt it was the right thing to do.

But, I only agreed to a year... and once that year was over, I was expecting her to make plans to move on, or return to Kenya, her preferred option.

She made no plans, and indeed as a result of failing one course had to do a resit... the problem is she was expecting me to fund that, and to fund her continued stay. That wasn't something I was willing to do, but she avoided that issue for almost 9 months until it was raised and made clear.
Added to that she made arrangments with her university to delay her submissions and internship, not exactly an unusal occurance, but that delay or costs, was not discussed with me.. it was assumed I would "continue to help"!

Over the last 9 months or so, since our attempt at a relationship fizzled out, Benta grew more and more distant, staying in her room, or going out with friends, often staying overnight.. as such communication ceased, and what there was, was mostly via whatsapp, or with passing remarks.. I got a growing sense of resentment from her that was both rude and frankly ungrateful, her selfishness grew as she started to cook and eat her own meals, insisting I buy produce I wouldn't normally get... but she had to eat so I did..

There were several straws, but a few final ones where she demonstrated a total disregard for what was being done for her and a massive sense of entitlement and hate for me, to ignore the simple thigns that I had done for her, that made it clear that my honest care and concern for her was wasted.
There was simply no appreciation for what I had done for her and 6 weeks ago I asked her to leave at the pre agreed time of July 12. A few on line tantrums (blocking communication when she didn't like the answers) followed, but I stuck to my point, She had to leave at the end of her term and make her own way from then on.

As you might expect, she left it late, and a week before the deadline she still argued that she had no where to go, and didn't want to deal with that, and school...

At this point though, I just don't care...my care has been used and abused against me, and it was time for her to deal with the reality of her situation..

Today, a day later than agreed, she packed her things and  I took her to the train station, she said she was going back to Kenya, so thats probably for the best, I don't know where she will get the ticket from but again, I don't care any more. I wished her luck and put the entire painful year behind me.
I do indeed wish her luck, if she's reading this, she had an opportunity to have a totally new life, with or without me, but she choose instead to ignore my efforts, and take advantage of my care and good nature until such a point as I finally had enough.
I feel no shame for ending things and forcing her to move on.. she needs to get a handle on life as it actually is. The irony is if she had just made even the smallest effort to be nice, just be nice, ask me how my day had been, show any interest at all in the person who was making all her opportunities possible, I probably would have funded 3 more months.  But there's only so much entitlement, selfishness, immaturity,  rudeness and disrespect a person can take.

Life isn't that hard to work out... Just don't be a dick to the people who make life better.

I've learned a lot from this too.....I went into it thinking, whats the worst that can happen...... now that I know, I'm never risking it again.

Ahthankyew

Ups and downs.

Today was a good day, after losing my expensive photochromatic prescription glasses a few weeks ago, Robbie at work spotted them on the floor near my chair... yeahhh no need to spend money on a new pair.

I say was...becuase coming home from work I get pulled over by a police car, who tells me I ran a red light... now, this is awkward cos I honestly don't think I did.. but there's nothing I can do or say to convince the very police young man, who was adamant the light was red for over 3 seconds... despite the fact I saw him in theleft turn lane as I slowed to a stop in the forward centre lane behind a van, and on a green light followed behind the van to go through.... I am sure it was green.

But he's having none of it, all the cars on the right were waiting at a red light....which is something I really should have picked up on, had I not been quite flustered at beign stopped.. .yes indeed the cars in the right lane were indeed stopped at a red light.. They don't change at the same time as the forward centre lane...where I was.. and I moved when the van ahead of me moved, on green.

I honestly think he made a mistake and mistook the right red light as a stop forward light...but..what can you do.. I got a ticket and will be fined 240 euros... I'm going to appeal, but...its ultimatly his word against mine. I'm not happyl

grrr


Ahthankyew

what do you mean it won't work?

It turns out my new tv system won't work with the wifi systems, (including the one they supplied)

wt actual f ...it only works with a powerline system, and I've had nothing but trouble with those but decided to give it a go..

managed after hours of fucking about to get the downstairs tv box to work...upstairs though is still in progress... either I buy another extender box and hope for the best or I try to hook up my other powerline system on the same socket...probably not a good idea.

I mean why the hell does it not work on a wifi extender??? stupid


Ahthankyew

21st Century problems

Wires

I hate wires, with a passion, I hate them when playing guitar, I hate them when connecting PC's and devices around the home I much prefer wireless.

So I was a tad pissed off to find my new cheaper internet provider, gives me a very different and more limited cable box, which.....has no wifi
I don't mind the limited cable, I rarely watch much dutch tv so the recording unit wasn't much use to me..and costing me 52euros a month for the all in one package, instead of 33 for this. But that was a cable based system so it came in and hooked into the home wiring, so easy enough to plug a box into a tv socket.

But the 2 new TV boxes need to be plugged into the DSL Modem, with good old fashioned wires
grrr

There is a wireless booster with the pack too, which took ages to get set up, only for it to not provide enough of a bandwidth for the Bedroom tv box to function in real time..it does strangly pick up the stored (on cloud) stuff and some of the general local chanels, .... so it might be an issue of my contract not being active yet.. I'll report it when my package officially goes live in early July

I've spent the best part of the evening phaffing about with a pair of wireless senders, one is working now, and my office is once again wire free. I finally got rid of the long blue cable training downstairs to the power cupboard. I lose some of the lovely 100mb bandwidht, it drops to 20mb/s but thats fine for me.

The 2nd is in the bed room trying to drive the tv box, which as I say limited success, we will see.

A 3rd wireless router is coming tomorrow, which will then be the base unit for the TV/TVBox and Sat box, Blu/ray all of which can connect to the internet for different reasons.. I'll be wire free again soon...




Ahthankyew

the collecting continues

https://www.raspberrypi.org/products/raspberry-pi-4-model-b/

I know, I know, another one....but its a Raspberry :D and its cool and cheap.. though I couldn't wait to throw my money at the top range 4GB version.

This is amazing, might have to write another book just to fully appreciate it.

Its nice to get excited about something, though I worry at the things I get excited about.

Ahthankyew

Maybe I took the collecting a bit too far?

I decided to lay out the contents of the drawer of shame... I have a lot of toys....
No. in all seriousness they are there for a reason, I need to be sure my book projects work on as many SBC's as possible so that someone buying the book with a particular SBC can (or can't if thats the case I can let them know) run all the projects and get a good experience rather than  frustration of getting something to work that won't play nice.

58 of them here, theres a few others dotted around the house or office though, all mine except for the Nvidia Nano, top next to the pinebook, which is the schools, and I'm experimenting with its GPU.
Impressive and sad at the same time eh :D
I didn't buy ALL of them though, many were donated by the makers for review and test and I am very grateful to them for saving my wallet a little bit of damage. Even at an average of $30-50 its adds up when you buy too many of them.

Generally I love my Raspberry's they are reliable and dependable no matter what I do with them, even if not the fastest. The Odroids are beasts, the new RockPi4 is A. M. zing.. The Nano is out of this world and the Nano Pi's are generally really cool systems. Orange and Banana Pi's are a bit of a let down generally due to their shocking software, but for the most part they work..just.
The new range of Rockchip boards, Tinkerboard, Rock 64 and Nano Pi's are stunning and will be an interesting point of progression for the SBC concept.

Some of the more exotic (listen to me trying to make this sound interesting..exotic) ones like the VIM2 and Libre boards are all a bit dissapointing but can be made to work in emulation modes.
The Intel based Up!'s are by far the fastest but also among the most expensive, I only got them due to discounts on kickstarter, but even so only the base models. In practice they are not very mainstream. but certainly great to work on.

The Nvidia is very cool but needs careful coding to get the best out of it, got a 128core GPU, compered to the rest which average 4 (the Up's have 12-16) and can do incredible things when you are careful to really use the GPU.

Its all fun, the only downside is trying to work out what goes wrong with them sometimes when the software is crap and the makers have not put graphic drivers with them....fun fun fun.

Ahthankyew

lost a few

Well I cheated a bit but am still managing to maintain a much lower calorie intake over the week, and keeping myself hungry

But it is working, I've shed a few kilos so far, not quite the 5 kg a week I need  to get my bikini bod ready in a month, but if I can keep it up, I should be looking ripped sometime in August....2022.

The band are engaged in making a video, so we have had 1 outdoor location shoot, which was fun, no playing yet, just lots of chat shots and looking windswept and interesting..
3 more location shoots to go and a studio shoot where we will record 3 of our best songs..thats coming up on Thursday.

Work progresses apace. been doing the freelance project at weekends and evenings, not too many hiccups, its been a while since I used Unity and its updated features threw me a bit sometimes but I'm finally getting into a flow. Though my Oculus headset seems to be a bit unpredictable sometimes...I'm trying to not use it until I really need to.

Not much else to report, waiting for summer hols and hoping the freelance gig's boost to my finances will be felt.




Ahthankyew

first weekend done.

The "new" diet and health plan, is pretty simple, lots of salad, including celery, we'll test the theory you use more calories chewing it than it provides. But also lettuce, grated carrots,  small cherry tomatoes, shallots, spring onion and the secret ingrediant, a small portion of pearl couscous (cooked in stock) with....some kind of meat, or veggie soya chopped up and mixed. A considerably smaller portion than I usually have, ie, 1 burger, 2 small sausages, half a chicken breast, half a steak etc. I could also use cheese or nuts if I'm on a meat free day.
I will try to avoid too many carbs,  so chips, mash and rice need to be rationed.
(I tend to have 1 meat free day a week, I'm going to up that to 3, but not rigidly)

Add some fruit in the shape of a chopped apple, or segmentated tangerine and thats the bulk of my salad.

The salad is tossed in cider and balsamic vinegar with a little seseme oil and seseme seeds.. and  served. on top of the hot coucouse mix...

When all added up, its a carrot, 3 sticks of celery, a quarter of a lettuce, a shallot or half an onion,  and 6 cherry tomatoes, with 100g of couscous and a burger, or some crispy bacon, chicken or whatever, only a small amount of meat, the rest is all veg and very crunchy tasty and filling.


I can certainly live on this for a few weeks..

Far too early for it to have an impact of coruse, but at least I'm not feeling like I'm starving to death. That and the morning 4 spoons of  Musli with semi skimmed milk, and a very light lunch of an ommlette or 1 pack of noodles.. and I'm waaaay und 1500cals a day, as opposed to my usual ,...well more than 2,500.

I can have a bit of fruit as a snack, but thats pretty much it. As long as I don't feel constantly hungry and I'm eating much less the weight should drop off.
I've found sipping ice cold diet cola keeps the evening hunger pangs at bay...so far.

Oh and longer dog walks. as well as excuses to take them, Harvey is not at all impressed though. He's now very old and quite grumpy so hates being lead around, for him a trip out to the grass to be savoured by 20 mins of sniffing before deciding on which blade of grass he pees on. A brisk walk isn' tthis idea of fun at all. Especially it has been noted during the day time when the sun is shining, he's pretty blind now but can see bright lights and finds the transition from shadow to sunshine a bit uncomfortable, causing him to shudder an stop in his tracks.

Anyway... thats the plan, I'll do a weigh in on Monday mornings rather than daily, and we'll see if the trend is down..


Ahthankyew