29 October 2006

Chester Return

Got back from a well deserved break to Chester. After a little annoyance of the roof (that we resently had repaired) leaking, we had a fantastic time. A quick repair was made using a tarpauline which seemed to do the trick for the rest of the week.

We went to the zoo - one of the best ones I've been to, the kids loved it. Loads of really good enclosures. We also did the blue planet aquarium which was the first time I've been to one of the walk-through tunnels. Cheshire Oaks (and the credit card) took a bit of a hammering, but we got some good buys - and managed to start the Christmas shopping. We also decided to take the short trip into North Wales and go to Llandudno (and we got our fix of fish & chips on the beach!)

Used the time to sort my GTD out a bit and caught up on some missed Podcasts - generally quite productive.

20 October 2006

I want a Mac!

Forget all the fancy advertising that apple pumps out, just listening to a few episodes of MacBreak weekly has me hungry for all kinds of apple products. In fact I need them all - and would sPC tomorrow.

Looking forward the holiday big time now - the long hours have really caught up with me.

Meant to ring Mark tonight, but ended up leaving work early and its been a whirl since I got home. Hopefully catch you online, but if not have yourselves a great holiday too.

17 October 2006

Hot Spot

Blogging from a T-mobile hot spot at the airport - nothing much doing, because our line is running sweet. Had far to many beers last night. Require sleep badly.

Hard Day......Hard Night

Hard day on site, followed by a hard day in the bar at the hotel! Generally a good was had today, very sucessful - but boring because nothing was happening. Finished shift at 2130 and found a couple of colleagues in the bar. 6 bottles of Corona, 1 Thai Green curry and a bloody mary later I'm in my room trying to but together a post!

14 October 2006

MOO cards


After receiving our FREE moo cards, we decided to order a couple of boxes. The first was for me, the second was just cakes, and Tasha is going to use them to promote tashascakes.com. Also spotted this from Cory D.
When on site I tried blogging by just writing to a text file when I can, then copying it into Blogger dashboard. Picked up a good tip though, if the first line of a text file is .LOG - whenever the file is opened, the date/time information is written as the next line.

16:32 10/10/2006
Just started shift again. Managed to get some lunch (breakfast for me) at the local Beefeater - and was very surprised at the fantastic food and service. After lunch thought it would be a great idea to try and get a power-nap before heading off for the airport. BAD IDEA - I now feel even worse. I'm hoping that this will wear off (especially after some caffine - which so far today I've avoided). I'm definitelty not going to do caffine (in any form) after midnight tonight, to see if that aids my sleep.

00:30 11/10/2006
It always amazes me how many conveyors they get into a baggage hall. Its a real labarinth and is reminicent of the scene from Toy Story 2! Still a construction site, where I'm working so very noisy, dirty and hot & sweaty. I think that the heat is coming from the huge ammount of temporary lighting that has been installed and the general lack of air circulation.

03:20 11/10/2006
On the home stretch of the shift now. Just started the lines back up and running, first bag due about 4am. Can't do any intrusive works now.


21:58 11/10/2006
Had a great night (well mornings) sleep and felt really quite refreshed, we had a good lunch again and a wee swim/suana session. I think that the good night was down to the 2 stage attack I made during the evening
1. No caffine (in any form) after midnight
2. Ordering a beer when I got back to the hotel (at 5:30am), which I received a very dirty look from the night porter for

Did some "tax-free" shopping airside today and got hold of some new earphones. Had the Shure ones in my hand, but when I reviewed the technical information (which didin't mean much to me). The far cheaper Senheisser ones were better. Got some discount as well as the tax-free thing too!

Spent a lot of time humping bags about for trials, which gave me a bit of a work-out. Back home Friday.

10 October 2006

Ghoster

Worked a ghoster shift last night` should really ahave been a late shift, but we were on a roll so ended up doing nearly 18 hours!!! Thats a good thing about working here, there is an abundance of good coffee at unusual times!

Managed to change to the Copthorne Hotel as well, which is far more comfortable. Will try the gym out later. As with all the night shifts I've worked, I get home and I'm buzzing, so never sleep properly - managed about 5 hours of restless slepp, but fell OK at the mo (maybe get some more later before heading in to site).

Plenty of productivity last night - hopefully the testing tonight (with ATKINS) will be as good.

Using my mobile phone as a modem again, will have to see if it is as cheap as I hope, or whether I get stung big style.

It was Mark who inspired me into writing posts again, he gave me the heads up on MacBreak podcast, which I listened to on the way down. Great stuff and the geek chats through the headphones, might keep me ticking along.

08 October 2006

Its been a while...

I've been working away the last few weeks. I started by being in Epsom, which proved not to be the easy visit that it was billed to be. I needed to spend a few extra days down there but got the issues resolved. From there I went straight to Gatwick, which is where I should be now, but they were slightly behind too, so I've been home this weekend (probably have to work next though). It seems very strange being at the airport again, as though I'd never been away - but its been about 10 years. It was also weird being away from home, as its really been the first stint since starting at ALSTEC.

Made the most of the weekend, got back in plenty of time to go pick up the kids from school which was great. Generally had the busy weekend of ferrying around to parties, ballet etc, but managed to get some time down at Fradley this morning. Had the afternoon to myself on Saturday, so did the PC deed that I've been meaning to do for a while, and upgraded. Added another 512MB RAM, 250GB HDD and gave it a good clean. Found out why its been stopping too (finally!) - might be useful for Mark. The processor fan unclips to reveal the heatsync. This was clogged full of dust at the core (it looked fine when looking at the fins from the outside). Cleaned out all the crud and rebuilt the PC, with a clean install. Seems a much better beast now.

Waiting for a call from work to confirm that I'm on nights next week. Think I'll drive down in the morning, and try and get some rest and chill out before starting work at 7 ish.

Glad to be back on line - even for a brief time.