On Sunday, a friend from work had us over to his flat for celebrate his and his wife's birthdays, as well as to watch the London Marathon pass by underneath us as they crossed the Tower Bridge.
He's American, his wife is Australian. So the brunch was full of ex-pats of various stripes as well as many locals.
One of the women that I chatted with was from Boston (okay, Winchester). I think the funniest thing was when we were commiserating about what we miss from home. We waxed poetic about Dunkies.
I also got to share some of the knowledge that I picked up about getting local credit cards as well as sending money home via PayPal. I guess I'm getting settled here.
April 24, 2007
April 16, 2007
Homeland Security Wants TRON
Just when I thought the Bush administration couldn't do anything more stupid, I'm surprised anew.
Homeland Security Classified The 1982 Movie Tron 'Sensitive'.
Homeland Security Classified The 1982 Movie Tron 'Sensitive'.
Reports are emerging from members of the movie industry that the Department of Homeland Security has designated the 1982 film TRON as "sensitive", and ordered Walt Disney Studios to turn over all copies of the film in its posession. Retailers are also receiving notices to remove all copies of the film from stock shelves and turn them over to Federal officials. The reports have industry insiders bewildered and outraged.What the hell?
April 11, 2007
WTF?!
For the second night in a row, I was awakened by a dream (I think) a couple of hours after I went to bed. And once again, I can't get back to sleep.
I vaguely remember someone shouting and then when I woke up, the flat was silent. Last night, may have been the same, but I'm not sure.
Oh well, I futzed around for an hour. Back to bed to try and wrestle Morpheus into submission.
I vaguely remember someone shouting and then when I woke up, the flat was silent. Last night, may have been the same, but I'm not sure.
Oh well, I futzed around for an hour. Back to bed to try and wrestle Morpheus into submission.
April 5, 2007
It's Started
Woo.
Update: That blurry image is Kevin Smith. Sorry for the quality from the upper deck. It was an irreverent, foul-mouthed blast. We learned far more than I really wanted to know about a variety of subjects. As always, Smith was entertaining and hilarious in a four-plus hour Q&A with his fans.
Bad Tech Week - Week Three Redux
As much as I hate doing it, I guess yelling at the poor sales person in India actually did some good. They sent me the part next day air. I got it this afternoon and six minutes later, I had a working laptop again. Go Dell.
Now I just need Palm to be working.
Now I just need Palm to be working.
Dans Le Noir — Post-Dinner
Last night, a couple of co-workers and I went to go to Dans Le Noir for dinner.To our left, you see one co-worker and her boyfriend and to the right, another.
The four of us settled in at a convenient pub for libations before dinner — it's London, they're on every corner. I, for one, am looking forward to July when London's smoking ban kicks in. Soon, the UK will be smoke free in public buildings.
In time for our reservations, we walked to the restaurant. We found a nearly empty lobby with a maitre de, a bar and a bank of lockers. We were asked to put any of our light creating devices in the lockers: cell phones, blackberries, etc... After a quick toddle to the loo, we were ready to head to our table.
First, we chose which surprise menu we wanted: Red - the full surprise; White - the meat surprise; Blue - the meatless surprise; Green - the vegetarian surprise. Then they asked if we had any allergies. Once that was sorted, a few minutes later we were introduced to our blind waiter. (All the servers at Dans Le Noir are all blind.) He had each of us put our right hand on the shoulder of the person in front of us and then led us down a dark hallway through thick curtains, under a blast of hot air, and into a dark room.
It was pitch black. The only light was a luminous watch face that one of us had forgotten. At this point, I felt more than a little silly wearing my glasses in the dark.
Our server was very solicitious to make sure that all of us weren't too badly discomfited by the transition. Then he led us to our table. The women on one side, the men on the other. It was a long table, though narrow and we sat close to one another. The table settings was utilitarian: a tall blocky glass, a shorter blocky glass, a heavy fork, a heavy knife, and a napkin.
It was very disconcerting. I couldn't tell what the others were doing, but myself, I was busy familiarizing myself with what was there. Almost as soon as I had explored my little area, the server was back with our glasses of champagne (again, in small blocky glasses), a bottle of water and two bottles of wine, as well as the bread. There was no butter, which I was kind of glad for because with the bottles and glasses that I, at least, was feeling a little overwhelmed.
The bread was fantastic. Crusty, warm and flavorful.
The others were talking about a musty smell in the room, but with my allergies I could barely smell the bread. We chatted to try to keep everyone relaxed in the dark. Those of us on the ends stretched our arms to see how far the table went. My side stretched at least two seats farther, but the gentleman on my right was at the corner of his part of the table. There was another couple (or group) in the dark with us — they weren't at our table, but often when we were chatting among ourselves we couldn't hear them.
The starters were interesting. Some of our party chose to eat with their fingers, trusting that things would be easier that way. I used my fork that often it would come to my mouth empty. Our table was punctuated by surprised exclamations of taste and texture. "Ooh, I had bits of sausage." "There's hummus in mine." "Rocket." (We call it arugula.)
Mine had a big piece of fish that I later found out was herring. (Proving that their definition of no meat is much like mine, as expected.)
Nerd that I am, I was careful to put my fork on the left and the knife on my right, so that I could find everything with a minimum of fumbling.
Our server came by to collect our starter plates, which I am proud to say I got mine to him without a problem. I was also able to pour my water without splashing it all over the table (granted, I only poured a couple of glug glugs into the glass and I had my finger in there to make sure I had a gap at the top of the glass).
Then came out entrees. Again, we played the I wonder what we're eating game. The food was fantastic. My meal had bits of prawn, potatoes and veg in a sauce. The chef was able to do something interesting with presentation, so that it was all small and bite sized. I would have loved to see what it looked like.
Around this point, I had my big faux pas of the evening. I poured myself some water and was surprised to find that I'd accidentally poured wine. I finished my glass and wasn't too thrilled about it. I explained what happened to the table to chuckles. This was quickly followed by the co-worker sitting across the table wondering where her wine glass was. Happily, I read enough mystery fiction to jump in and figure that one out by myself.
When the server came back, we all decided to add dessert. It was some sort of creamy, cold and warm dessert with bananas and a crispy shell. Very good.
For me, the main shock was when we got outside and found the price. For four people, a three-course meal, two bottles of wine, one bottle of still water, and four glasses of champagne was £240 (without gratuity). I thought that was a little excessive. I think the three course meal without drinks was £37 or so, so clearly the wine and champagne picked was better than a non-drinker is used to.
Even with price as a consideration, I definitely recommend it as an interesting dining option.
April 4, 2007
Celebrity Spotting In London
I saw about one a month when I was in New York.
In London, I've seen two:
Dexter Fletcher from a few of my favorite UK flicks: Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Layer Cake.
Last night, I saw Kevin Smith, who was in town for a couple of shows. He's shorter than I thought and personally, I think it was way too cold to be wearing shorts beneath his long "Silent Bob" coat.
In London, I've seen two:
Dexter Fletcher from a few of my favorite UK flicks: Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels and Layer Cake.
Last night, I saw Kevin Smith, who was in town for a couple of shows. He's shorter than I thought and personally, I think it was way too cold to be wearing shorts beneath his long "Silent Bob" coat.
Bad Tech - Week Three
April 2, 2007
Woo! Bank Holiday Weekend
I didn't realize it, but this weekend is a bank holiday weekend. We have both Friday and Monday off.
Not sure what I'm going to do, but I'm hoping to embrace one of the seven deadly sins and sloth out for at least one of the days.
Leading up to it should be a lot of fun: Tue, going to see 300 with a friend; Wed, going to Dans le Noir with some co-workers; and Thu, going to see Kevin Smith.
Fri, will probably be slugging out in a big way.
I'm all excited this week.
Not sure what I'm going to do, but I'm hoping to embrace one of the seven deadly sins and sloth out for at least one of the days.
Leading up to it should be a lot of fun: Tue, going to see 300 with a friend; Wed, going to Dans le Noir with some co-workers; and Thu, going to see Kevin Smith.
Fri, will probably be slugging out in a big way.
I'm all excited this week.
March 28, 2007
Bad Tech - Week Two
I love tech companies. Not.
I bought my replacement internal keyboard from Dell instead of getting it from the States, because I had been told by the tech support people that they had it on site. The woman in Sales swore up and down she'd expedite things.
Then I get an email saying that my order is delayed and I should get it on April 2.
Woo!
Last night, the stylus on my Palm LifeDrive disappeared somewhere on the tube home. One of the unusual features of these styli is that they have a spring and pop up when pressed down. Esthetically, it looks neat. (There is a downside when stuffing your hand in your pocket on the train, though.)
So I went to the Palm site this morning. Unfortunately, they no longer sell LifeDrive accessories on their site. They were able to bounce me to a couple of sites that still sold accessories. I tried the first one. They sold me the product. Later, I found out that they didn't have the product and would have to order it. It won't arrive until next Friday — April 6 or so.
On the other hand, the Sales guy was pleasant and local rather than being in a call center, so I was willing to stay with a local business and keep my order.
Still going to whine about it, though.
Update: AIGH! Dell just delayed my keyboard again. Now they don't have it in stock and I have to wait another three or four days. I called them and they said they have to order the keyboards special. And if I get a UK keyboard. That'll take three to five days. (Because obviously, they don't have one of those keyboards as well. I guess.)
I bought my replacement internal keyboard from Dell instead of getting it from the States, because I had been told by the tech support people that they had it on site. The woman in Sales swore up and down she'd expedite things.
Then I get an email saying that my order is delayed and I should get it on April 2.
Woo!
Last night, the stylus on my Palm LifeDrive disappeared somewhere on the tube home. One of the unusual features of these styli is that they have a spring and pop up when pressed down. Esthetically, it looks neat. (There is a downside when stuffing your hand in your pocket on the train, though.)
So I went to the Palm site this morning. Unfortunately, they no longer sell LifeDrive accessories on their site. They were able to bounce me to a couple of sites that still sold accessories. I tried the first one. They sold me the product. Later, I found out that they didn't have the product and would have to order it. It won't arrive until next Friday — April 6 or so.
On the other hand, the Sales guy was pleasant and local rather than being in a call center, so I was willing to stay with a local business and keep my order.
Still going to whine about it, though.
Update: AIGH! Dell just delayed my keyboard again. Now they don't have it in stock and I have to wait another three or four days. I called them and they said they have to order the keyboards special. And if I get a UK keyboard. That'll take three to five days. (Because obviously, they don't have one of those keyboards as well. I guess.)
March 23, 2007
Andy Barker, PI
If anyone's seen this show, please let me know what you think.
I'm a big fan of Andy Richter and heard lots of good things about "Andy Barker, PI". The mix of hard boiled accounting and slapstick detective stories is enough to make me giggle. It was even better, when I heard an interview on WHYY's Fresh Air with Andy Richter about the show. He considers the show a Quinn Martin comedy.
Sadly, that sounds right up my alley.
I'm a big fan of Andy Richter and heard lots of good things about "Andy Barker, PI". The mix of hard boiled accounting and slapstick detective stories is enough to make me giggle. It was even better, when I heard an interview on WHYY's Fresh Air with Andy Richter about the show. He considers the show a Quinn Martin comedy.
Sadly, that sounds right up my alley.
March 21, 2007
Bad Tech Week
Okay, what the hell happened this week?
I come into work on Monday and find that my mouse — brought here from the States died. It would click, but not move. No amount of cleaning the ball or loading the driver would help. It was a wonderful mouse: thumb roll bar, three buttons and a scroll wheel. My carpal-tunnel loved the damned thing.
Even better, I can't find one here. I'll look in other stories over the weekend, but I ran around to four places on Monday at lunch and couldn't find one. I have to make do with something less useful, proving again that The Man is out to get me.
My laptop's keyboard went nuts. The ';/:' key didn't work when I pressed it, but would randomly spray them throughout anything I was typing — usernames, passwords, text — clearly nothing that a few extra semi-colons would affect adversely. I tried the can o' air and prying the key up to clean out the goop. Didn't help. I tried reloading the driver. Didn't help. I checked the other keys and found that the '[/{' key was odd, too. The [ would come out, but the { wouldn't: which implied that it wasn't physical.
Dell tech support was very helpful. They sent instructions on how to replace the keyboard and told me the part number that I need. (And if I was in the States, it would be especially useful to me.)
Dell's parts number was less helpful. Before you could get a quote, you had to open a new sales account and they couldn't use your old sales account to do this. AIGH! Then they couldn't send me a US keyboard, because I was in the UK. Happily, I only needed to be indignant for a little while to get that one sorted.
End result I should have my new keyboard soon. I just hope that it takes care of the damned problem.
Update: Followed the instructions to remove the laptop's internal keyboard, blew out the dust and checked the connections, before reconnecting it — no difference.
I come into work on Monday and find that my mouse — brought here from the States died. It would click, but not move. No amount of cleaning the ball or loading the driver would help. It was a wonderful mouse: thumb roll bar, three buttons and a scroll wheel. My carpal-tunnel loved the damned thing.
Even better, I can't find one here. I'll look in other stories over the weekend, but I ran around to four places on Monday at lunch and couldn't find one. I have to make do with something less useful, proving again that The Man is out to get me.
My laptop's keyboard went nuts. The ';/:' key didn't work when I pressed it, but would randomly spray them throughout anything I was typing — usernames, passwords, text — clearly nothing that a few extra semi-colons would affect adversely. I tried the can o' air and prying the key up to clean out the goop. Didn't help. I tried reloading the driver. Didn't help. I checked the other keys and found that the '[/{' key was odd, too. The [ would come out, but the { wouldn't: which implied that it wasn't physical.
Dell tech support was very helpful. They sent instructions on how to replace the keyboard and told me the part number that I need. (And if I was in the States, it would be especially useful to me.)
Dell's parts number was less helpful. Before you could get a quote, you had to open a new sales account and they couldn't use your old sales account to do this. AIGH! Then they couldn't send me a US keyboard, because I was in the UK. Happily, I only needed to be indignant for a little while to get that one sorted.
End result I should have my new keyboard soon. I just hope that it takes care of the damned problem.
Update: Followed the instructions to remove the laptop's internal keyboard, blew out the dust and checked the connections, before reconnecting it — no difference.
March 19, 2007
TMNT - Review
Was wandering through Leicester Square on Saturday, trying to avoid the roving bands of Drunken Idiots wearing their best Guinness hats, and I spotted a theater that was showing a preview the new TMNT movie before it opens officially next week.
It was certainly cute and a movie built for kids. The computer animation was reminiscent of Pixar's "The Incredibles". I hadn't seen the trailers, but I had thought that it would be darker based more on the original Eastman and Laird work than the cartoons and previous movies. They played it fairly straight with cartoon violence and martial arts mayhem, but it was of the bloodless kid friendly sort.
That's not to say that there were characters and situations that could scare the hell out of children. Some of the secondary villains, etc... were serious SOBs.
The jokes ranged from adult to childish, but as usual in today's animated fare, nothing that reached to the peaks of the best of Chuck Jones or Jay Ward.
It was a pleasant romp, largely kid-safe and certainly worth the price of a matinee showing. (I don't think it was worth the price of the additional popcorn, but I'm a harsh judge, I guess.)
It was certainly cute and a movie built for kids. The computer animation was reminiscent of Pixar's "The Incredibles". I hadn't seen the trailers, but I had thought that it would be darker based more on the original Eastman and Laird work than the cartoons and previous movies. They played it fairly straight with cartoon violence and martial arts mayhem, but it was of the bloodless kid friendly sort.
That's not to say that there were characters and situations that could scare the hell out of children. Some of the secondary villains, etc... were serious SOBs.
The jokes ranged from adult to childish, but as usual in today's animated fare, nothing that reached to the peaks of the best of Chuck Jones or Jay Ward.
It was a pleasant romp, largely kid-safe and certainly worth the price of a matinee showing. (I don't think it was worth the price of the additional popcorn, but I'm a harsh judge, I guess.)
March 16, 2007
Odd Sights That Make You Pause
I saw this last week, but I had to put up the picture. It certainly made me do a double take on the way to work.
March 7, 2007
You Miss Everything Good, When You Sleep...
I got to work this morning and found that Kevin Smith will be in London next month.
This was posted at 7:58p EST (2:58am here). I got the message at 8am GMT (5 hours later) or so and tried to buy a ticket. They were all sold out.
Damn rabid fans.
Update: Woo! They added another show and I scored a ticket to the next one. I'm going on 5-Apr. Will post more after the event.
This was posted at 7:58p EST (2:58am here). I got the message at 8am GMT (5 hours later) or so and tried to buy a ticket. They were all sold out.
Damn rabid fans.
Update: Woo! They added another show and I scored a ticket to the next one. I'm going on 5-Apr. Will post more after the event.
March 2, 2007
Note to Self... Amish Beards Don't Look Good On Me...
I wanted to see how I looked with an Lincolnesque Amish beard.
Not a good look.
I think it's a cry for help.
March 1, 2007
Dexter
I loved Michael C. Hall on "Six Feet Under", so when I saw that he was on "Dexter", I was intrigued. I read a couple of the books: Darkly Dreaming Dexter and Dearly Devoted Dexter. (The new one Dexter in the Dark isn't out yet, but I'm looking forward to reading the next installment.)
A couple of my friends had told me how good it was, but it wasn't until I was able to see a few of the episodes that I fell in love. The producers, writers and directors had a difficult act with this show. They had to show a psychopath as sympathetic and managed to pull it off. They took the characters and plots from two books and both stayed close to the cannon and expanded it for dramatic purposes thanks to a stellar cast.
The first thing that they did was throw out the standard view of compacting things down. They took the story of the first book and stretched it. They kept the wonderful scenes and inventions from the book and gave us more of the day to day in between scenes from the book. Secondly, they decided to fluff up the secondary characters that were given short shrift in the books where the main attention is rightfully on Dexter himself. With flashbacks to Dexter's foster-father, Harry, and his interactions with the younger Dexter (with his horrible haircuts), they have given even more depth to young Dexter, so that we can see how he came to be what he is today and how the lessons have strengthened him.
While this isn't an ensemble series, such as "Lost" or "Six Feet Under", the juicier secondary roles have gotten a handful of good actors that bring the series up to be something special.
I just wish that broadcast TV would learn that lesson. Personally, I'm getting sick and tired of all the best shows being on cable.
That said, I recommend this show highly.
A couple of my friends had told me how good it was, but it wasn't until I was able to see a few of the episodes that I fell in love. The producers, writers and directors had a difficult act with this show. They had to show a psychopath as sympathetic and managed to pull it off. They took the characters and plots from two books and both stayed close to the cannon and expanded it for dramatic purposes thanks to a stellar cast.
The first thing that they did was throw out the standard view of compacting things down. They took the story of the first book and stretched it. They kept the wonderful scenes and inventions from the book and gave us more of the day to day in between scenes from the book. Secondly, they decided to fluff up the secondary characters that were given short shrift in the books where the main attention is rightfully on Dexter himself. With flashbacks to Dexter's foster-father, Harry, and his interactions with the younger Dexter (with his horrible haircuts), they have given even more depth to young Dexter, so that we can see how he came to be what he is today and how the lessons have strengthened him.
While this isn't an ensemble series, such as "Lost" or "Six Feet Under", the juicier secondary roles have gotten a handful of good actors that bring the series up to be something special.
I just wish that broadcast TV would learn that lesson. Personally, I'm getting sick and tired of all the best shows being on cable.
That said, I recommend this show highly.
February 27, 2007
Update On My Life...
Other than that, not much to report: Still plugging away at work. Went to volleyball over the weekend, which was a lot of fun. I may end up on a BBC documentary that was filming at an exhibit I went to with some of the guys from the group. Reading Woodward's "State of Denial" and getting more and more depressed. I have some work from my writing group in New York to read and comment on. And this week, I've got a GURPS game coming and and then tickets to go see Equus on Friday.
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