Andy Ramblings

I don't watch, 'who wants to be a millionaire'  as I can't stand Chris Tarrent. But sometimes I do get to watch it as it's the better of all evils. You some times get the silly players who can't answer their names without having to phone a friend.

But when you get asked the following question, one would expect you to know the answer.

What  rotates around the earth? A the Moon, B The Sun C Mars D Venus.

I will leave you to watch the video.

Launch in external player

Yep, there are quite a few things that annoy me, but #1685 is an upgrade on #1364 which is loud people on mobile phones, there is nothing worse for an evesdropping person when you can only hear one side of a conversation.

It's people with mobile phones anywhere. People who maybe deaf, or more likely haven't found the volume button on their new phone. It's likely to be that one that has a big + and - on it, it may have the added Vol text over it. Yep, that one, you have you finger on it.... Anyway, it's those people who tend to have to yell down the phone in an over excitable way.

Your asking, so what's new for #1685 that #1364 doesn't have? It's when the user of the phone decides to use the 'activate loudspeaker' function, not only do you now have to put up with the loud and exiteble user, you now have to put up with the person at the other end...

Had to put up with this while I was in the supermarket queue this afternoon waiting for the cashier to speed up. The thing was, I would hear the whole conversation even above my MP3 player. Now I really feel sorry for all those who can hear correctly and will not be using an MP3 player to muffle the sound. It was awfull.

Some people should just not be allowed a mobile phone, if they do, then they should have to go through some mobilephone etiquette.

There that's my rant of the day over...

I've never been a fan of the red tops, the way in which they seem to be very happy to come up with claims that so and so went out with so and so and Oh it is such an important story that the 'Nation Needs To know'
What got me to write this entry, is the way in which they go around to sort of legitimise their methods, Yes, they will try and contact you, they will send you a car to collect you for a photo shoot.

The tactics they use, in particular a certain Nicholas Hellen to are downright despicable, they way he outed 'Abbey Lee'  the blogger behind Girl with a one-track mind One just has to look at the e-mail Nicholas Hellen set to Abbey. To quote some lines:

We have matched up the dates of films you have worked on - Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, Batman Begins and Lara Croft Tomb Raider - and it is clear that they correlate to your blog. We have obtained your birth certificate, and details about where you went to school and college.

We propose to publish the fact that you are 33 and live in [my address] -London, and that your mother, [her name], is a [her address] -based [her profession]. The article includes extracts from your book and blog, relevant to your career in the film industry. We also have a picture of you, taken outside your flat.

The fact that they have been getting hold of her birth certificate and I can assume, trying to contact her old school friends to get some 'quotes' about her when she was at school. It's the way the gutter press work and for me, another reason why we need better laws protecting the personal  privacy of everyone.
There was no way Abbey could have prevented the Sunday Times from publishing the story.
So, to Nicholas Hellen and the 'investigative/stalker journalist like you are not worth anything, you don't provide news, you don't even know what it is. You sit in your office, getting it off seeing who's life you can piss off now.

Anyway, that's my rant over for today.

Not being a fan of Tagging and have normally ignored many, but as it's Christmas The New Year and as it was Davide Simonetti's  Birthday, I thought well  Ok, this once, I'll do it. They will be brief as I'm not at home, am in Brussels and may have a few beers as I type....

"What are the seven best things you did this past year?"

Well, 7 of the best things? Not too hard then.. Here goes.

1: Finally getting of the steroids that I've been on for the past 29 years,  They were beginning to cause, well, not beginning, they had been for a few years, causing a lot of havoc with everything else but what they were been taken for. Good riddance to them!

2: Very recently, seeing England loose the Ashes so spectacularly that it but a full stop on all this cricket stuff  and that the English team of 2005 didn't actually win because they played well, but that they had had a pact with the weather.

3: Seeing Bush loose power in such a democratic way! Now too see him go back to his old job of Village idiot, hopefully he will bring along his pet dog with him.

4: Building up new commercial websites, and well, this is still ongoing, but hopefully to make something more with it.

[After a pause of a few days Internet techie problem, parties and evenings out]

5:Seeing Bush get a serious bashing in the US Mid-terms, Not that I think that much is going to change, at least it' gotten rid of that smog look of his face, oh and a certain Rummy has gone. Hoping to see him ride into the sunset with his poodle and a huge boot out the backside.

6: Seeing Blair the Magnificent start his slow, ( wish it was faster) decline, and seeing him dig his political grave live on TV. I don't think many people believe a word he says any more. Just wish the guy would not keep trying to save himself, but his party.

7: Well, it has been a long year, many events have happened, many people have gone, so good riddance, some, well you would have liked them to have stayed a little longer, but you know in yourself, that time moves on, and we are all left with the good memories of those. For me, as this is about me, I'm glad to have to have made it to the end of this year in one piece. Ok, I have plenty of spare parts, but that's different.

So now to tag a few other people to see what they have to say about their 2006 seven best moments, So, in no particular order.
Keith, Zoe at MBIAT,Karelian Blonde, Guyana Gyal, Anna at That's the way life is, and anyone who would like to share

So reader(s) as 2006 comes to a close, how was it for you? I hope that you like the new theme, it's still being worked on, but I'm sure you will agree with me, that it is a lot faster.
Happy New year, Bonne année, ? ????? ?????, Feliz Año Nuevo, Gelukkig Nieuw Jaar, Nuovo anno felice Lyckligt nytt år and for everyone have a great Hogmanay!! Drink lots and be safe.( I can't vouch for the correctness of the translations)

As quite a few of you may know, the education system in the UK isn't the best in the world. You can basically get through all the way till your 16 and get your GCSC, and not have the ability to Read, Write or do your Arithmetic (yep that's the 3 R's!). This is becoming rather worrisome for the people responsible for educating the country. What do they do instead, they go and do some research on where the problem could show it's self up. Yep, they found that it can show it's self up in the karaoke bars!

So, if you're one of those souls who goes to the Karaoke bars and can't read the prompts, it could be that you can't read?!

The lyrics of the 10 most popular karaoke songs have been assessed and rated by government literacy experts.

Those tackling Robbie Williams' Angels needed the reading skills required to pass five good GCSEs (Level 2).

Experts from the Get On literacy campaign said 17.8 million adults would not be able to follow the song.

Ok, Angels (Lyrics here) is a hard song to get right, I don't mean in the lyrics area, but in getting it to sound right. Most folk who do tend to 'try' and sing it tend to have had a few pints to many? Or did these experts test the folks make sure they didn't have a drop to drink or a splif to smoke?
Some other notable songs that suffer the same fate are:

• Gloria Gaynor: I will survive
• Queen: Don't Stop Me Now
• The Commitments: Mustang Sally
• Grease: Summer nights
• Elvis Presley: Suspicious Minds
• Abba: Dancing Queen (not only is that hard, but like Angels, hard to get right!)

So, as the report says, get yer readin' up ta scratch before ya embarrass yerself on the Karaoke!
I'm not saying that you would ever, ever find me on a Karaoke Stage, Drunk or Sober! This was just a comment on that BBC news report...

More info on English GSCS here.

Well, I've been rebuilding my PC yet again. It's a chore that I don't enjoy as I have hundreds of programs to re-install, some need configuring and well, some just don't get put back on. So it's a chance to do some early spring cleaning of a PC.
During this task, and over the years, I have found methods of making this chore a tad easier, being a computer 'geek' to some people, to me, I just like the things, and am constantly amazed at the speed of change. I used to be able to keep up, but I can't now, the turnaround cycle of upgrades and new technologies has gone from 18 months down to almost 3 months. I can't see any sane mortal keeping apace of that, unless they are Ubergeeks. Not me then

So, those tips?
Well, having a good backup is always a good idea, when I say backup, I don't just mean your e-mails, programs files and the likes, I mean total backup nothing less. My tool of choice for this is Acronis True Image. What True Image does, is take a snapshot of your harddrive, so that you have a full copy of all the contents of what you had safely stored away.
So, with that, I rebuild windows XP, the true image comes in use only to recover all the documents & settings files, these hold all the setting of all the files I have to re-install... (I'm going geeky aren't I?)
Anyway, as I said, it helps, but you still need to re-install all the apps, so that windows knows that they are there.
If you are using Open Source apps, Firefox and the likes, these don't need to be re-installed !!

Anyway, I'm still at it, installing, rebooting, installing rebooting.... Hopefully I should be finished soon......

So, the date has been announced and is England leading from the front? Of course not, we never do! We wait, like a master, to see if the food taster dies, before we'll start to eat a meal.
What brings this up? Well it's the smoking ban, don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, in fact, I'm rejoicing! So way all the baa humbug and all that? Well it's because, England will be banning smoking last, and in my view, not the best time either.
Here's the banning list, in order of who's going to ban first in the UK.

• Irish Republic: March 2004 (ok not in the UK)
• Scotland: March 2006
• Northern Ireland: April 2007
• Wales: April 2007
•  England: July 2007

Read more about the time table here

OK, the Irish Republic (Eire) banned it and the pub industry didn't die! In the Summer I can imagine the pubs being empty inside and all the smokers falling over themselves outside in the pavement. If it's raining, well, they'll all be huddled in a corner under some ledge getting rain down their necks.

All I can say is this, I'll be glad, I just don't like going to pubs in general, you go in, you leave smelling like a big pile of poo. And yes you, if you smoke you smell like that too, especially when you have just come back from your fag break..

Yep, So 1st of July 2007 can't come quick enough!  But why can't England start at the same times as everyone else? Scared? Vote loser? (May Local elections?)

I gets up at the normal time on a Monday, around 08:30 there abouts. I goes of and get a nice steaming hot black coffee with one sugar, you know, coffee that's stronger than pure coffee. Sitting down and relaxing, getting myself upto date on the world events. On the climate change we're all doomed! Unless we spend some £1trillian or something like that and all will be OK.
Then my mobile rings, at 8:45 (yes, coffee was quick),
Good morning says I,
Is this <my full name>
Yes, speaking,
This is <My bank> can I do a security check,
Sure ok says I,
What age are you going to be at your next birthday..
Oh, 41 says I,
Thanks, says nice person from my Bank, Can you confirm or not that you tried to spend £200 on a casino site?
Err Nope, says I, wondering what's going on..
Ok, are you the only person to use this card?
Yes, Only myself.
OK, it appears that your card has been compromised,
Oh! says I under my breath, thinking to myself, now where could it have happened?!
So, to cut a long story short, Some bastard has skimmed my card or has managed to get hold of the card number and security number at the back!
I'm a pretty cardwise, and make sure that I don't leave my card lying around, haven't used it recently to pay for something, except one place, When I had to phone to get my Eurostar ticket, I'm not saying anything, other than that's the last place where I gave the card details over the phone. The phone being the least secure place to give your details as your are relying on a human to:

• Not write the info down
• Not remember it
• Dispose of it correctly

Where as, over the internet, if your pretty sure, as long as the site is secure and is a regular one that  you use and not a fly-by-night site, that the security is very good and you don't have to worry about the info being destroyed correctly etc.

Nice way to start a week, sir, you've been robbed!  I think I'll go back to bed and wake up on Friday!

Well well weelll, Yesterday in my area of London, near the MI5/6 building, Ok, I'm about a 20min walk from it. All power just went! Now, I know my PC has a habit of just going wooops, lets reboot while I'm on Skype. This was a tad different as I didn't see that familiar, your using the DVI connector message pop up on my flat screen. Then I saw all my other electric devices just going wooops no power, off I go. Now that's not too much of a problem, what does one do when there is No power.

This got me thinking a bit, I was thinking of ways to find out what happened, I though, Oh I'll google it, easy, Duh Andy, there is NO power, your 'puter is no use... use your imagination... so I turned on my radio, But hey, that works on mains, so I was stuck there. Luckily, I had radio in my mobile. So on that went to listen to BBC London. No news on there, I had obviously missed the update.. I also hazard the guess that it had to be Local, as the radio was on air, but then they would be, it's the BBC! But it also had to be local, if it was affecting a wider area, the BBC would be having more important things to say about how not to panic, and that everything is being done to fix the problem as soon as possible,

What I did hear though, was on the traffic news, All traffic lights in the area around the MI5/6 building, OK , ok, they said Vauxhall.were out. kaput, not working, so there were huge traffic jams. nothing else, no further news.
So, I went for a walk around the block, it was a big walk as I never quiet got around a block when another one diverted me. But I did manged to ask a local Police man as to what all the commotion was about, he gave me the answer.
There was a power failure at the local Vauxhall sub-station and the local electric guys were doing their very best to fix the problem as soon a possible. I thanked him for his time and continued to get a bit lost...
Finally got home, Still no power, what can I do, I listen to more radio that bored me silly... then important things like, how am I going to feed myself this evening? I only have an electric cooker and combo-microwave. I though about cutting branches of the trees, to make a campfire... I now how to light them, after all I do have Ray Mears book on how to survive on a desert island.

Blip, PC kicks back into action.... Power failure over,  Ray Mear's  tips on how to have a campfire in your kitchen, and not burn the house down, will have to wait for another power outage.

In the past, road sweepers used to use a rather efficient device called a brush, or a broom, something that had a rather nice rhythm to it, wiish wisshhh  tock tock. It didn't make much noise. Oh but these days, when the price of petrol is high, the need for machines, the need for noise to make it appear that you are doing something. Like teenagers with motorbikes, taking the silencer out of the exhaust just so you can hear them coming 20 miles off Yep, I'm on a big bike, lots a noise! It's crap as we know, the engine is just a small wee 50cc engine that is just a noise maker.
You'll be wondering what the hell is this writer on about? Yep, there is some logic to the madness that lies beneath this crazed mind.
It's a nice sunny morning, it's neither too cold, nor too hot, just right, you hear the birds in the trees (ok the bleeding pigeons cooing away) then along comes some motorised sound! It's the new engine powered leaf cleaner, Wrrrrrrrrrrrr wrrrrrrrrr wrrrrrrrrr You know the ones.

Yep, those things, those machines that kill silence, of a nice morning. Why are they needed? They are noisy, generate pollution, and I can't say they offer any benefits to the user except broken ears and an extra long arm?
What's wrong with the good 'ol brush? you remember, the Broom and brush that would do the job effectively and not wake up the whole neighbourhood!
I would like the guy who uses this machine at 8am in the morning to be woken up at 1am with one of those machines. It felt like 1am to be till I looked at my clock...
What's wrong with this?

well tell me ?