For the past 4 or 5 months, I have been driving around on a old 1994 Fiesta Van … I bought it at the beginning of the year as a carrier for all my RC gear.

While it works great, the fiesta was a bit old, it had a great engine, but the rest left some to be desired .. and above all, it had no power steering.

Still, I was happy, for what I need, it was fine. But then I started to use it more and more, and my RC addition grew as well, to the point the fiesta became too small for all my gear.

I was also worried with long trips, as I now will do more traveling between Sandbach and Blackpool, time was to get a newer and bigger Van.

Well, here it is, it’s a 2002 Citroen Berlingo

Plenty of space for all my stuff, it’s a nice reliable modern van, next .. get rid of those hideous tires and rims and put some 16″ alloys.

Popularity: 31% [?]

Wow .. just the other day I was posting the fact it was 666 .. now it’s 777 … how time flies.

Technorati Tags: 777

Popularity: 11% [?]

it’s 8 minutes past midnight, on July 4th ..

I was doing some late night work when i got this e-mail

Hello NullMind,

We at GOT NITRO would like to wish you a happy birthday today!

Its one of those stupid e-mails automatically sent out by a message board, such as Vbulletin .. anyway, I looked at the message and was a bit baffled.

“what do they mean, happy b-day ?” … I was thinking the date on my profile is probably wrong .. when it hit me … “it IS my b-day!!”

I had completely forgot … and I dont mean like you forget the day before or the day of thats it’s your b-day, i mean, it just snuck up on me, I haven’t tough of it since .. well … last year.

Later today, I would have been reminded when the cards and presents from the wife and the girls show up, but still … I just .. forgot ..

Is it a sign of aging ? a few years back I always looked forward to the date .. it was a stamp of merit to be one year older .. but then you hit 30, and before you know it .. your no longer seen as a young professional .. your just one of the “old and experienced” people around the office … (the uncool ones)

Bummer … I want to go back to be the young “know-it-all with an attitude to match” that made the old guys cringe and scared of loosing their jobs for the young generation… Now I am just the “know-it-all with a bad attitude that can fire you himself” .. well, I guess it’s close enough ..

So how old am I ? .. I actually had to think about it .. and ashamed to say … count the years also … I am 33 !!

Yes .. I’m not that old .. but why do I feel 53 ?

Popularity: 11% [?]

I was browsing thru our latest picture batch, and I saw these ones we took of Kojack not long ago, he is sporting some shirts the wife bought him :).

Love the pictures, he is a great cat, but sometimes I wonder if he thinks he is a dog … most cats shy away from people hugging them, this one just wants to be cuddled and hugged by the wife and kids al the time, except my youngest daughter, he runs when he sees her, she is a little “rough” with him, hehe

Im too sexy for my Hair

Technorati Tags: Cat, Kojack, Sphynx

Popularity: 23% [?]

Ok, so what does a 33 year old Managing Director (Thats Chief Executive for the US folks) of 2 very tech companies gets for XMAS ?

A nice briefcase ? a laptop ? a silk tie ?, one of those “how to become a better manager” over priced books ?

Naah .. Santa (AKA the wife) got me not what I needed, but exactly what I wanted this year .. a Nitro Powered, 1/10th dual gear automatic RC Car

Look at that engine .. cant wait to power it up this weekend and go play…

I was impressed .. every year she tries to impress me with tech gizmos, the kind of stuff the Executive in me should have, this year she decided it was the inner-child on myself that really loved XMAS and it was time to please that child instead .. and pleased I am
So now it’s time to buy some nice alloy’s for it…

Technorati Tags: Nitro, Present, RC, XMAS

Popularity: 30% [?]

For 5-6 days now my top eyelid of my right eye keeps twitching.

Initially I was not a bit worried, even so I was not sure what it meant, I assumed it was probably due to a few bad nights of sleep I had (hey, I am a parent with young children) and it was going away real soon, but after a few more days, no sign of going away (and the kids have been sleeping thru the night fine), so .. new research into the anomaly was required with good ol’ Google.

The good news is that I am not in the first stages of a stroke, neither the twitching is my imagination (wife actually sees my eyelid contract) .. apparently this is something called “Eyelid Myokymia“.

The definition as per emedicine.com is:

Background: Myokymia is the spontaneous, fine fascicular contractions of muscle without muscular atrophy or weakness. Eyelid myokymia typically involves the orbicularis oculi muscle of one of the lower eyelids; occasionally, the upper eyelids also can be affected. In most cases, eyelid myokymia is benign, self-limited, and not associated with any disease. Intervention is seldom necessary. Rarely, eyelid myokymia may occur as a precursor of blepharospasm, Meige syndrome, hemifacial spasm, and spastic-paretic facial contracture.

Pathophysiology: The pathophysiology of typical eyelid myokymia is not well understood. The focus of irritation is most likely the nerve fibers within the muscle. However, pontine dysfunction in the region of the facial nerve nucleus also has been implicated. Possible precipitating factors include stress, fatigue, and excessive caffeine or alcohol intake.

So, I am either Stressed, Tired or Drunk … or all of them combined
Upon further research it seems it’s common to have the bottom eyelid to twitch .. for me is the top one, which is rare, but not uncommon .. the story of my life
Luckily I do not have any major meetings to attend to this week, otherwise it would be quite embracing to be speaking with clients or techs and constantly have your eye twitching at them, somebody might take is as you making a pass on them, and worst, try to collect on it
A few more good nights sleep, is what the doctor would have prescribed .. so I’ll do my best to oblige.

Technorati Tags: Eyelid Twitching, Myokymia, Overworked, Stress, Tired

Popularity: 65% [?]

I just bought a used paid (yes, used, I am cheap, long live ebay) of Sony MDR-DS5100 Cordless Headphones with Surround Sound.

These headphones costed upwards of £350 when new, so when I managed to grab them for less than £80 .. I was happy.

Back on Ebay

But my happiness was short lived, I received them on Saturday, proceeded to plug them to my XBOX 360 via the Optical connection, sited on my comfy leather chair, ready for a round of Oblivion … when this crackling noise started to appear.

After much investigating, I find out that Plasma TV’s, like the sun, give light in the infrared spectrum, it’s not visible to the human eye, but interfere major time with IR receivers.

Now, if we talking about a remote control, it’s no big deal, but for wireless sound, a major problem, you get cracking noise all over, and depending on the colors on the screen, the noise gets louder or goes away for moments, this is not a problem with CRT or LCD TV’s .. only Plasma.

So, now I have to sell them again, just 2 days after I receive them, and go search for a “Radio” wireless set instead.

Who would have tough my TV had so much in common with the SUN, every day you learn something new

Technorati Tags: 42PD6600, MDR-DS5100, Plasma TV, TV

Popularity: 16% [?]

This thread realy shows how small most hosts are on WHT.

You need to understand what Aussie-Bob means, this industry is indeed set to vanish within a decade, not that hosting itself will die, but how hosting is sold and provided is seriously under threat.

We are seeing a rise in specialized hosting sites, say photobucket for people who only need image hosting, NING for application deployment, and who knows, tomorrow Google and Microsoft ?.

Somebody there said “your family, friends and their friends will want to host with you” .. true .. but then you have no ambition, thats no different than selling hot dogs on a trolley, but thinking your a restaurant.

Somebody else pointed the obvious rise in Broadband speeds … nice isn’t it ?, I wonder how long before you can host your own “myspace” kind of site on your XBOX.

And of course, today’s photobucket and myspace are tomorrow’s Google’s Bucket-of-Picures and MSN Spaces … the big keep on buying and growing .. and the small keep on being left behind.

The mid-sized hosts today are on a frantic quest to buy each others, and tomorrow they themselves are set to be bought, consolidation is the only way to fight the giants who will show up in the next few years, to think anything less is to bury your head in the sand and hope for the best.

Web Hosting will become easier to signup for, easier to use, and a part of everyday live, the digital generation shares online photo-albums as once before people sent postcards, emails is to be the only way to contact others, and this is to become even bigger and greater .. but make no mistaque, this is not “web hosting” as one knows it, people will not be loging in to a Cpanel/Plesk/H-sphere accoutn to do it so, or bothering with browsing the web foo fony hosting directories to tell them with who they should host (AKA, who paid them the most), they will be logging to streamlined, dull and idiot-proof versions of it created by the “giants”, with specialized “hosting” sections for whatever your need is, the bill ?, most likely bundled with their electric bill or something blase like that (or free).

Users wont know whats “bandwidth” and “disk space” .. yes, Unlimited is the future, but of course, provided by companies who really mean it, not some pimpled face on a VPS offering what he doesn’t have.

It is evident that a certain percentage of the business is still to be run by the small entrepreneur, there is always space for small biz to make a buck, but the day that you can go to .. say “google” .. and click on “my site”, alongside “my pictures, my mail, my calendar, my maps … etc” is the day that huge chunk of less than tech savy, or that other chuck of clients that simply do not have the time or the patience to deal with a fantastico or easyapps script cancel their web hosting subscription.

The fact of the matter is .. will “web hosting” as we know it survive ? or will it evolve into something else .. I am willing to bet it will evolve.

Technorati Tags: WebHosting

Popularity: 19% [?]

I have been reading for the past few days about the fiasco of the Pope in quoting some old text that said the prophet Muhammad was evil and inhuman.

And sure enough, Muslim leaders got mad, he apologized and they didn’t accept.

So whats next, bombing of churches ? an all out attach on christians ? .. is it me or some muslim leaders just cant deny themselves the opportunity to launch some Jihad .. funny, this story is starting to remind me of other Western man who is never in touch with reason, Mr Bush and the American Military machine.

Maybe those same Muslim leaders and Bush have allot more in common than they care to admit, the allure of war and suffering of their soldiers doesn’t seem to deter them, put them in the front-lines fighting with the foot soldiers, like back in mediaeval times, and lets see how quick the tune changes.

Is Islam merely 1000 years behind christianity ?, back then Popes could not wait to launch their own Jihad(Crusade) against the Muslins .. is this just pay back 10 centuries in the making ?

whatever the reason is, it’s getting old, we turn on TV and it’s the Muslims against the Jews in Israel, the Catholics vs the Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan, and a pope in Rome who lacks it’s pre-cessor’s finesse and carefulness on what he says (not that the previous pope was afraid to say anything, but his timing was never off) …

I now see Hamas is still defiant in not recognizing Israel, for F***** Sakes people, get over it.

I for once dont care about religion, I was raised catholic, but early on my teens fell off grace with the institution when I started to learn more about science .. and the two simply dont mix.

It just appears that in this new century, we are back to the late 10th century, where all evils are caused by religion, and man seek to alienate each other based on their gods and religious believes …

At the expense of sounding like a 12 years old, Religion Sucks …

Technorati Tags: Religion

Popularity: 14% [?]

Today I started a new chapter on what I hope to be a healthier lifestyle.

Since I got married for the second time in 2000, and shortly after gave up smoking, that I started to put on weight, eventually I stopped “enlarging” around 2003, but now that my kids are growing, I don’t want them to see me as a fat blob and think it’s ok, so I decided to get on a routine, more healthy eating habits and to bike the 1.7 miles to work and back every day.

Now, of course this is England, so it means .. I got a short window of time of when I can do it, but hopefully I can make the most of it.

Amazingly enough, it took me just 13 minutes this morning to bike the distance to work, I arrived with my legs feeling like bricks and my lungs were feeling as if I had smoke a pack of cigarettes one one go, but still, it was quite easier than I tough.

The bike I bought is called a “Skedaddle Montana Cruiser” .. funny story there also, I had seen a bike like this for sale used on ebay, but was missing the rear rack, so I decided to look who the manufacturer was and try to get a new one, after searching for a week and calling every major bike shop in the UK I finally found out the manufacturer of these bikes was called “Cycle Citi” and their warehouse and offices went up in flames last year.

yeah, it’s funky looking, thats why I love it

Decided to dig a bit more and eventually I was able to find their new site and phone, after a bit of sweet talking on the phone, I managed to convince them to sell me one of the bikes they had salvage from the fire (they put some of their stock that didn’t burn on a warehouse in Wales).

I drove tot he warehouse and was quite shocked, allot of the boxes were pitch black from the ashes of the fire, but luckily the bike I wanted was on a separate section that was undamaged.

So long story short, I now no longer need to drive 45-60 minutes to Manchester every day, I can just take a leisurely stroll on a fairly flat route to work, and try t get a little bit in shape in the process .. I dont know what I will do in the winter, I will try a raincoat .. see how it works

Technorati Tags: biking, cruiser, diet, skedaddle, Work

Popularity: 27% [?]