Back in the States and Heroes...

Let's see — made it to the States without a problem.

Well, I was a little late, an hour or so, but not the end of the world and I was able to spend the evening with my friends. The perfect response to a long and arduous day of travel.

The hotel that we stayed at has high speed broadband access. Which means, I can watch the episodes of Heroes online.

Everyone that said that I would love the show wasn't kidding. This is friggin' incredible. AIGH! And I'm in the UK.

Still Foggy

It's still foggy today.

I'm hopeful, but still have no idea whether I'll fly out on time.

Update: Made it out — relatively on time. We were about an hour late after sitting on the tarmac for close to two hours at Heathrow.

Worries About My Holiday Plans...

BBC News story: Fog causes more UK flight delays

Thick fog has forced British Airways to cancel all domestic flights from Heathrow and many European ones.

I'm hoping that this will be sorted before Saturday at 4pm, but to be honest, I have no idea.

Worst case, I'll see about having myself a holly jolly London Christmas and see what it'll take to mail presents from Western Mass. (I really hope that doesn't happen.)

Update: I forgot to add how bad it was this morning. I walked by the Putney Heath on my way to the doctor's office . The fog was so thick that from across the street, I could barely see the shapes of the trees bordering the roadway. If Heathrow was half that bad, I can understand the delays and cancellations.

Foggy Morning in London

As I walked to work this morning, I wanted to take a picture of the dark and foggy street. It's nowhere near the horrible pea soup days of Jack the Ripper, but then again, there's less coal and gas smoke in the air now.

I also learned an important lesson about taking pictures in fog with a flash. They were horrible, but they did look kind of cool, though. The invisible water in the air is reflective:

Damp Room Redux

Thank you to all the people that offered ideas or recommendations on how to fight the damned mold and mildew.

I spent last night, after work, scrubbing the walls with a bleach solution. Unfortunately, I found that the corner of the room is only the tip of the iceberg, the black yuck has spread behind the headboard and also all over the window behind the curtain. I got the walls last night. The window will be tonight.

Yuck.

An evening of scrubbing. And I don't even have a DVD of Battlestar Galactica to distract myself afterwards.

Just When I Can Be More Appalled...

Saw this article in the Times this morning.


Former US Detainee in Iraq Recalls Torment

While that's appalling enough, this is from a US citizen. A US citizen that called the Embassy about what he thought was not on the up in up with the company that he was working for.

Karaoke—Japanese for delusional drunken singers

Last night was supposed to be the office triathalon: snooker, darts, and karaoke. It was for team buiding, morale building and a spot of fun.

The pub didn't have a dart board.
The other pub didn't have an open pool table (though they call them billiards tables here).
But the karaoke bar was open.

It was a mad house with a bar full of drunks, a miserable sound system, and a forgetful staff. Nonetheless, it was a blast. All of us sang. And I even got the others to enjoy it.

We chatted up some of the regulars, sang over the really bad ones, which is probably why it was a good idea that they had a lousy sound system.

The Joy of a Damp Room

I knew my room was damp. Which is why I started taking my clothes to the laundrette rather than letting it hang dry. (Well, that and the line of mold or mildew that crawl the corner.)

I hadn't realized how bad it was until this morning. Yesterday, my shirt had a spot in it. I thought it was from something I'd bumped into. Today, I noticed that this dress shirt had a spot on it as well, in about the same location. I tried to wash it off and realized that it wasn't dirt. It was mold or mildew and it doesn't wash off.

Sonuva... And the more I hear about this — the better it friggin' sounds. Yay.

Update: Added the photo. Initially, it started as a small mark by the headboard, that I assumed was from the wood scrapping the wall. Then it started climbing. Now it's all over.

You know when a technology has arrived...

It begins with a crackly connection from a mobile phone in the rain, moves to the local cell tower, is shunted to routers, where depending on the load and the end result, the call is routed over satellite, cables or radio where a network of repeaters carry my words across the Atlantic, ending when my friend hears my voice as "Is your refrigerator running? You better catch it."

Intercontinental ballistic prank phone calls. Is there a better use for technology?

Flat mate back

My brief foray into living alone is over, my flatmate is back from his ski holiday for another few days before he heads to the States.
It's funny, I missed having someone else in the flat. I'm kind of glad that he's back.

Documents to Go v9.0

I just upgraded to DataViz's Documents To Go 9.0, this is really kind of slick.

One thing that I like is that it's a got a great data entry tool, TextPlus &tm; from Smart Cell. which basically works like the text entry tools for your cell phone, where a letter or two will kick up a handful of possible words, so that you can click on it and save more keystrokes as you try to write the longer words.

We'll see how it works as I go back to writing on the Palm.

Socialized Medicine

Okay, I'm sure a big part of this is that it's working in my favor, but to be honest, I have to say that some of the nationalized health care is a good thing.

1. Certain medical conditions allow you to get your medicine for free. One of them is hypothyroidism, which is what I have.


2. Your GP (General Practitioner, I think) is always in your neighborhood, so you don't have to schlep all the way into the city itself when you're sick.


3. They actually put you at ease and take a moment to chat with you when you come in, rather than giving you the precise four and a half minutes of face time, followed by a few minutes with a nurse.

The not so good, the waiting, etc... I haven't really had to deal with yet. We'll see what happens next. I'm just happy that I have a 3 month supply of my meds.

You can't make this stuff up...

Culture Shock on Capitol Hill: House to Work 5 Days a Week - washingtonpost.com

Culture Shock on Capitol Hill: House to Work 5 Days a Week - washingtonpost.com

Scariest Swiss Army Knife...

I saw this article online and just had to share it. Who would want something like that in their backpack or back pocket?

Going to Harrods

After work today, I'll be girding my loins for retail and going to Harrods. I shudder at what I'm going to find. But hopefully, I can find some Belleek or Waterford tree-toppers for my sister.

Here's hoping I find something nice and get out of there quickly.

Update: Well, I survived. I found something nice for my sister and it wasn't anywhere near as crowded as I feared. I could have come back on Saturday and gotten a Waterford engraver to personalize whatever I got for my sister, but just the thoughts of Harrods on a December Saturday brought out a cold sweat. *Shudder*

Christmas in Covent Garden

I can't wait to see what this looks like at night. It does kind of look like stage dressing for a West End show, though, doesn't it?

Why I love Dork Tower

Unfortunately, this is more accurate than I'd like to think:



Now I have to find Leisure Games, now that I know about it.

Thanksgiving in London

Thanksgiving here was really a lot of fun.

Daniel and Zeke (friends from NYC) and I went out to dinner at the Texas Embassy and then went to see "Avenue Queue" on Thursday. It was absolutely a blast.

Then on Saturday, Zeke invited me and others over to his place for a potluck Thanksgiving dinner with his friends. It was an absolute blast: good food, good conversation, and board games.

It wasn't my family, but it was a lot of fun, cat and all.

Update: Added the picture of Daniel and Zeke. (Normally, Daniel's head isn't that big unless he's just won a board game and done the happy dance.)

Thanksgiving Week

I'm kind of bummin' this week.

I miss turkey, cornbread stuffing, a day off and getting to torment my family.

The good news is that I get to see them next week. I just wish it was sooner.

Here's something I saw that made my morning:

Praise the Lord and Pass the Laptop...

Broadband at home is FINALLY turned on today. Hopefully, this weekend, we can get the damned wifi portion of it working.

I'm not holding my breath.

Update: We have access to the Internet at home.

YES!

Mark Fiore's DemoGlad from 11/15/06

OMG. I normally, look forward to Mark Fiore's new cartoon every week, but this one really made my day:
DemoGlad 11/15/06

There's Nothing For Free

Well, I learned an important lesson.

When your mobile phone company says, "no, it's included in your plan; don't worry."

When you check your first bill and don't see any charges.

They don't mean it.

My charges for three weeks of using my mobile phone to dial up to the Internet was absolutely astronomical.

Suffice to say, I'm very very happy that we'll be getting broadband wireless in the flat on Thursday. I'll be able to go online again.

I'm also going to chat with O2 to find out just WTF is going on.

A New Look

Unfortunately, it seems more George Michael in the bathhouse than anything else. As such it probably won't last the day.

Update: It didn't.

Best Morning In Years

Went to bed nervously reading the Talking Points Memo and Salon's War Room; both had been reporting some sleazy behavior going on in and around the polls. (My personal favorite was in Maryland. Busing in homeless from Philly to misinform voters—that's in a class all by itself.)

Very very glad to get up at 5am and to read/listen to the returns, as I got into the office early.

Can't wait to see how it falls out in the senate.

Update: Texas politics at their best.

It's All Down To Today!

If you haven't already voted, get out and vote today.

It couldn't matter more.

*Head shaking moment of the day* You just have to love the GOP last minute stuff. Nice to see the lessons learned from the New Hampshire phone-jamming case.

Another Manic Monday

Thrilled to be at work today. Fighting with Visual C++ and the joy of complilation issues. My day is going to be the best day ever! (Okay, probably not.)

This weekend was nice, saw my old flatmate from Dublin, her cousin, his wife and friends on Saturday. Had a lot of fun. Saw her again on Sunday morning. And then crashed in the afternoon.

Felt bad that I didn't make it to the gym over the weekend and didn't have time this morning before work. Have to go tomorrow. (Feel free to pile on the guilt—any further push to go will help.

Talk to you guys later.

Trying the Whole Gym Thing Again...

I've been on a spending spree since I got my check last week. (Picking up essentials like non-flattened by time and countless heads pillows, new pants for work, and extravagences like an electric shaver, replacement batteries for my laptop and paying off major chunks of credit card bills or paying for rent and utilities.) When you only get paid once a month, you budget or die. (Or don't budget and float.)

The other thing that I've wanted to do was to join a gym and try to get into a non-oval shape. Not that there's anything wrong with oval—I'm familiar with it—but I'd still like something a little more greyhound than basset hound.

Found one that I like in Soho Gyms. Knowing my usual slug-ness, I got a weekly membership, so that I could check it out, find out how difficult or not-difficult it would be to get to. This morning was the first day of the week. Getting to the gym at 6:30 wasn't a problem, but the train to work was much more crowded 45 minutes later than I usually take it.

I also found out—when I got to work this morning—that the new building that we'll be moving to in Blackfriars has a gym in the building. It might make more sense to get something on a month to month basis for the couple of months until we move—if we ever do. After all, free is better than cheap.

Fireworks...

Guy Fawkes day is still a few days off, but the explosions have already started. Boom, baby; boom.

Another Fun Weekend in River City

The weekend was fairly low-key: laundry, checking out gyms, wandering along the Thames and looking at the sites, before meeting with two people from my fledgling GURPS group for dinner and cards at a local Starbucks in the West End.

We had a lot of fun, which is always a good thing, and I got home in time to watch "Torchwood".

Here's some pix of things that I saw over the weekend: an escape artist (or amateur bondage monkey) by the London Eye. I was only able to see a little bit due to the huge crowd, but he was actually pretty good. When I went back later, there was another fellow that escaped from a strait jacket.

And here's a picture of someone blowing massive bubbles. There was a gaggle of children clustered nearby charging back and forth so that they could try to capture or pop the bubbles floating through the air.



And lastly, the student march on Parliment to argue for less money spent on Iraq or nukes, and more money spent on education.



Can't argue with that sentiment.

The Lovely Lori

My first visitor from home. Lori's here with her bf for a few days before heading to Barcelona. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to meet her for more than a quick lunch.

My Bedroom

This is my bedroom. You don't get to see the window overlooking the garden, the desk or the closet. Trust me, I have it pretty cushy.

It's Enough to Restore Your Faith in Mankind...

I got home from work last night and found that I had a letter from the Lost Property office of the London Underground. They thought they might have found my Palm LifeDrive. I headed over this morning and found that they did indeed have it. (Unlike in the States, you have to pay to get your lost property back here; £10 later, I had my old Palm in hand and headed back to the office.)

The person that returned it didn't leave a name/number or anything. As far as I can tell, the only thing that the faceless person (or the Tube staff) did was diddle with the Palm enough to see the menu of programs.

Now I've got two of the damned things to schlep around. It could be far worse. (I did make sure that I set up both of them to secure themselves and need a password to log back in. I thought about using the data encryption office on the LifeDrive, but the damned thing is just way too slow to encrypt due to the hard drive (versus the flash drive on the other Palm, the T|X.

Getting everything up and running while trying to get some work done this afternoon.

Gaming!

Went to the London Gamers group last night for their usual Monday night gaming. I know that I said this last time I was here, but damn... I do like the way they do things here.

We meet at the Black Horse pub, where we're ensconced at the upstairs bar/events room. It's quiet, well lit, pleasant, and the staff is fantastic. Want something to eat? Pop downstairs to the pub and order your dinner or something to drink. Either carry up your drinks or wait for them to be sent up in the dumb waiter with the food orders.

Periodically, the staff will come upstairs to take away empties, plates and the like. You can't complain about that sort of service.

When you have a room full of gamers, at times, it can get loud, but for the most part things are much quieter here than they are in the States.

I joined a new game recently and last night was the first table top game. The GM is an Italian web designer/programmer/writer (he writes cyberpunk stuff) and the other players are his girlfriend and a German that works for Yahoo! in marketing. We're playing Star Wars, which was a lot of fun.

Due to scheduling conflicts, we won't be playing again until November. I did hear about a GURPS player over the weekend. Hopefully, I can find a game for my GURPS fix, soon.

National Insurance Number Interview

Had fun with the NHS bureaucracy today. Woo. Get there early, find paperwork is lost, fill out the paperwork again, smile, nod, correct things, smile, nod, correct things again, smile, nod, sign the paperwork (initially all corrections), and head back to work two hours later.
Rah.

My coworkers

The first post on my week in the life of Jp in London series of blog posts. This is a picture of two of my co-workers as they discuss a problem. Unfortunately, it's not the best picture but that's more me than them.

Test of my New Phone's 'Blog This' Functionality

Ceiling in my bedroom. What can I say, it's a test. (My new mobile phone allows me to take pictures and send them to my blog. Ta da! It works. Expect to see more of London, as I do in the future.)

What a Difference a Night's Sleep Makes

I woke up at a few minutes before 5 again this morning. Happily, for the first time since I got here, I was able to roll over and go back to sleep.

Rolling out of bed an hour later when my alarm went off was absolutely fantastic. Today, I felt like a million bucks (about £539K), when I rolled into the shower. Yesterday, I barely made it to 16.00; I was so tired.

The weekend is here and hopefully, I'll have some fun. Maybe a long hike through the Putney Heath, some people gawking in Trafalgar Square? We'll see...

Insomnia

There's nothing like waking up at 2am and spending the rest of the night staring at the ceiling. Even worse, when you go to bed at 11.

I don't even know why. Is it stress? (I don't feel stressed. I've got a project, my boss wants answers that I don't have, but we're moving along on that front. I have money in the bank, a job, a place to live. *Shrug*

We'll see, I guess.

At some point, I'll be able to sleep through the night again. In the mean time, I can read, play mindless games of solitaire, etc... until I fall back to sleep during the night and then go to work when the alarm goes off.

Ex-Gays

I'm listening to yesterday's Fresh Air with Terry Gross. It was about the ex-Gay ministries.

I swear, every time I hear about these people, I just shake my head. Part of it is having dealt with the whole coming out thing and realizing that I had to be who I am, rather than wallowing in the shame and all of the things that these ministries prey on.

All I can think of is how lucky I am to have had the people in my life (both family and friends) to help me when I needed it so that I could become who I am today.

Keeping Homesickness At Bay — One NPR Show at a Time...

It's really funny, thanks to the Internet and listening to my favorite radio station no matter where I am, it doesn't feel like I'm as far away from people as I am.

When I come into work, I listen to the previous weekday's Talk of the Nation and Fresh Air, before turning on WBUR and listening to the live broadcast from Boston. The time zone difference does make for some discomforting things: everyone at work is asking about lunch, but because the radio is talking about the drive into work, I don't even think of food at the moment. Then at the end of the day, the radio is talking about lunch time.

*Shrug* Anything that makes missing home a little easier is a good thing, I guess.

You Know You're Settling In When You Get Sick

I think it was a one day cold or flu or something. Fever, rampant ooginess, and a burst of whining. (Though, I think the British call it whinging.)

Happily, it wasn't anything that a 14 hour coma couldn't take care of. I woke up this morning, feeling refreshed, happier and once I did my laundry and hung it out over the mud flat in the back (I couldn't help but thing that this was a disaster waiting to happen, but it's got to be better than the smell of wet clothes for four days that I'd get otherwise), I was ready to face the day.

A quick shower, a run down to the village centre to the library to check my email and I'm ready to see if I can do anything else today.

BTW, new writers that I have to share with people: Mark Billingham - I just read a couple of his books on the way back and forth to work this week. He's really good. Gritty crime dramas that take place in London.

Things to do to Polish friends that visit...

Last night, my flatmate and I went to the Polish Social & Cultural Association in Hammersmith for dinner with a friend of his. I had been to a Polish restaurant in Dorchester, back in Boston, with friends and figured I'd get some potato pancakes and maybe some borscht or something.

Big mistake.

The menu was only in Polish. I think the only word that I recognize was pierogi. (Not speaking Polish, we had to defer to my flatmate's friend.) He ordered what he told us the women behind the counter said was good.

Pierogies, pork loin with potatoes, sauerkraut, and pig's knuckles. *Shudder*

The pork loin, potatoes, and the bread were very good. The pierogies were all okay. I really only needed one taste of the pig's knuckle to decide that the others would like it more than I would.

I can't wait until my Polish friends come to visit, so that I can inflict this on them.

Jp Live at the Barbican

I work near the Barbican Centre. (All I had known about it was that Billy Bragg had played there.) The other day, I went out for a walk at lunch with a couple of my co-workers and we explored. From what I was told, originally it was an idea for community housing. There are high-rise flats, above ground walkways, gardens, etc... all above the street level below. There is one spectacular place where you can see the hanging garden of ivy, etc... reaching down to the man-made water garden below.

I hope to put up some pictures of it soon.

Still getting up to speed with things at work. Other than than that, things are going well. Met with some friends, saw my ex, meeting new people. Life is proceeding and the homesickness is decreasing.

Gaming

Went to the London Gamers group last night at the Black Horse Pub by Tottenham Court Road. Saw some familiar places and apologized to the people that I thought I had said good-bye to when I was here a couple of years ago, but hadn't. The tables were full, so I figure I might need to start my own GURPS game.

*Shrug*

I'd rather play, but with my books, I can definitely run something.

More as events warrant them.

Sunday Debrief

I had an absolutely fantastic day on Sunday visiting with a friend from Boston's cousin. We ate, wandered the City's market's, went to a pub for the traditional Sunday roasts, and in general had a lot of fun, chatting, laughing and walking around.

Outside of friends of friends from grad school that I met in New York, I don't think I've ever met such open and welcoming people.

London Gamers

Off to the London Gamers meeting tonight. Probably just for a few minutes to look for familiar faces, but I'm really looking forward to getting plugged back into gaming groups again.

Woo!

The Long Wait for Wireless

*SIGH*

It looks like it's going to be even longer until I have wireless in the flat. My flatmate and I spent the morning backing up his computer before getting ready to start the installation of the new wireless router.

Today's the last day for his broadband access and he's going to be on dial-up for a week or two until the new broadband starts. Then we'll install the wireless modem/router.

Such is my life.

On the other hand, my package from my brother came, so I have GURPS books, games, hiking boots, and more clothes. I'm pretty settled and worst case, I can schlep over to the library like I have been doing and go online there.

Not what I want to be doing, but not the end of the world.

More when I have something to report (and can get online to report it).

Landed and Settling

Well, I'm doing better now.

I found a place to live in Putney (the London neighborhood near Wimbledon) with an expat American.

I spent the latter part of last week exploring Putney and getting my Oyster pass (London's T or subway).

I started work this Monday. The people seem nice. This week has been slow, as I get used to things. Trying to get my machine up, looking at various projects, etc...

Tuesday, I got a UK bank account. I started the bureaucratic chaos to get the money to my account from the US.

Wednesday, I gave up. It was just easier to take out money via the cash machine every day and hand deposit it into my account. Three days later, I had the money I needed and today I was able to pay my long suffering flatmate.

The low point of the week was over the weekend when I lost my damned Palm LifeDrive on the tube. I had to buy a new Palm. (Yes, I realize that this is a luxury and not a need -- sue me.) The new one works much better and works with all of my peripherals.

I had thought of switching platforms, but had too much invested in Palm.

The new Palm T|X is really good. No where near as clunky as my LifeDrive had been. With the flash memory, it's as fast as any of the older ones and doesn't have that same lag as the LifeDrive did. So far, I'm very happy. I even have all of my alarms again. (We'll see how that goes.)

More updates, hopefully, this weekend, when wireless is set up at home.

Landed and Lost

Welcome to my first post here.

I wish I had something pithy or clever to say, but no. I arrived at Heathrow yesterday morning and took a cab to my hotel. Calling ahead helped, because there was a room on the third floor for me. (Carting my belongings up to it was a joy as I stumbled along in terminal sleep deprivation — I wish I was the type of person that could sleep on a plane, but other than an hour or so, I was up for the entire flight.)

After a couple of hours of a nap, I was up and ready to try to find housing. Unfortunately, there was nothing available at the letting agent that I knew. I spent the afternoon checking web sites and making calls. I saw a nice place that was looking for roommates, but haven't heard back yet.

*crossing fingers and toes*

Today, I was an absolutely beautiful place that cost more than the gross national product of Peru. It was an incredible place though: 24 hour concierge service, on-site gym with a sauna. It came furnished with a huge plasma TV. Pity, I couldn't afford it.

This afternoon, more running around and talking to letting agents to see about getting a roomshare or an apartment. I have hope. (I sort of have to, I need a place to live.)

-J

Look!

A blog. I'll probably start babbling about my writing, my favorite writers, and other things that annoy me.