I am always staggered by the pace of technological development and the spread of technology over our everyday lives.

I am writing this post on my laptop, on which i have just watched an episode of battlestar galactica, on an 8gb hard drive the size of my thumbnail. I am connected to the internet at speeds which 5 years ago would have been unthinkable while travelling at 140mph on the East Coast Mainline (Thank you National Express for making wifi free now!). My laptop keeps it charge now for 3 hours not due to the advances in battery technology, but rather due to the miniturisation of the microprocessors and transistors inside of it and the improved software which turns things off if they aren’t needed. The new mobile phone I received yesterday has more processing power than the computer I owned 7 years ago.  It has a digital camera which has almost the same resolution as my fancy digital SLR which was bought barely three years ago. At my home I have a television whose size is nothing new, but its resolution is three times greater than anything previously devised, and this is mid-range. I will shortly have a computing device under this television which has 10000x more computing power than what was used to develop nuclear weapons and the space program (PS3).

And yet, this technology is pretty much only available to a small proportion of the human race. Some countries which are regarded as being not too bad development wise, Cuba, have only, this last month, been given access to this technology and embraced the information age. Countries elsewhere are only being connected thanks to the “Charity” of those in the developed world.

At the same time resources which are needed to produce these valuable devices are becoming increasingly scarce and we as a species are having to delve deeper into the unexplored realms of our planet and dig ever deeper to find more to fuel our need for information.

The thing is, do I as a person, actually need this?

The answer is, unfortunately, yes.

The raison d’etre of our species, if you believe darwinism is to breed, multiply and evolve into ever more efficient forms that can cope with our environment. In order to survive, i must be able to compete with those around me. I need to be computer literate so that I can shine out at work and promote myself a more suitable candidate for jobs over ahead of other people. Socially, I need to be connected so that I can (this sounds so Attenborough) attract a Mate. (Which is pretty much how i met Amy).

All that aside, I honestly doubt that I could live without this which I continue to take for granted. This technology invades every single facet of my live to a point where if something truly catastrophic happened (a Threads like nuclear strike) then I simply do not know how I would cope.

A few people I know have thus created a pact to kill each other should civilisation as-we-know-it come to an end. Although I may find this a bit extreme, it is the most sensible option. If you are dead, and advertise you are dead (signs on door) then you not only save time for those coming to rescue you, and thus help someone more needy, but you save on the anguish of your loved ones. Especially if they also know of this plan. Unfortunately this is not an option for me as I live on my own, and would like a child one day. But it is still perhaps the most intelligent solution to a scenario which still may occur.

In other news, work is utterly crap ATM. I have been put on a project which has no firm deadline, in a team with limited rappour and social structure, with work which I find generally uninteresting. This is a warning to all that I may be grumpy for some time because of this. I will do what I can to request changes, and heck, it probably will get better. But I am very short with many people at the moment, and I do not see how this is going to change in the short term.

I have figured out how to spend money though. Neat!

Its May. Woo…

For the last decade and a half I have associated this time of year with stress and sleepless nights. Every year since I was 9 I have had the dreaded “summer exam season” with the deadlines for end of year courseworks following in close pursit.

Fifteen damn years. I have not had a worry-free birthday without the threat of academic failure since the birthday party I had when I was 8.

So when I finally graduate from academia I look forward to a spring time which is much less stressful…

My arse!

Instead of periodic times of intense stress, working life produces continuous stress and this itself brings about what I like to call, Bad Bottom Days. These are days when the landscape which is my gut is less than calm and appears (in me) in the forms of either rapid uncontrollable (and fantastically unpredictable) dirrorhea (SP), intense constipation or fan-trumpeting-tastic flatulence.

A while ago I performed a study on myself to discover what causes these BBDs and the associated poorly tums that went with them. The results showed that, overall, I can eat almost anything. The expected foods give me troubles (Very red fruits like tomatoes, excessive coffee consumption, chillis, curry, too much beer, red meat etc) but the only reoccuring factor was how i felt. If i ever felt very stressed, anxious, worried, pressured, horny (yes, it happens when I am EXTREMELY horny…) or afraid, then the BBD would be just around the corner.

It does seem to be a family trait. My mother (who is perhaps the single most emotionally unpredictable individual I have yet encountered) gets the same issues, only worse. What I get occasionally, she gets nearly everytime we meet. Which leads me to believe that she has some kind of anxiety syndrome or something. I dunno, she does baffle me at times. Though she has been much better recently.

So why am I stressed at the moment? Fucked if I know. But I can make some educated guesses.

Firstly I am more than a little worried about my fitness. I have been working a lot recently, with last week breaking the big 45 hours and with the lack of sleep I keep finding myself enduring (even with early bedtimes) I still find myself knackered. Could be diet, I don’t know. Going to buy some multi-vitamins this weekend and see how I go (Theoretically I should be fine, eat plenty of fruit, fibre, carbs, proteins and the I cook most of my food, but chances are its one of the obscure vitamins that I lack).

Could be the apathetic state of mind which I continually find myself in nowadays. I find it increasingly hard to motivate myself once i get home. Again, something I need to work on.

Could be that work is a bitch at the moment. I have just rotated from an team which was very social (lots of conversations and like minded and nerdy people) to a team which seems also sterile personality wise. For starters this is a very masculine team with plenty of ego being thrown around. I like to get to know my colleagues and get them to know me (sometimes a mixed blessing) but in this team I am increasingly getting the vibe that I won’t be able to do this, and thusly i am outside my normal comfort zone.

 i could go on, but I won’t, for now. There are many things I need to work on. Especially the stuff which contibutes to the feeling of “Am I wasting my life”. But thats another day…

I’ll start here by saying how much i hate bloody internet explorer.

3rd damn time I have written this post!

The Trip Home

As you can imagine judging how things had gone previously, the intense planning put into the journey home meant very little when brought into practise. The journey which had taken us only one whole day to get to the house, took us two on the way back. A single long journey from the house to Calais, and another long trip back home to Manchester.

The trip to calais was a whole new level of fun in itself. In order to let L regain some of her sanity, I let her drive the big citroen back to Calais while i joined my dad in the fun bus. (Note: Citroen has soundproofing, is comfortable, and can comfortably do 90mph, Fun bus is a knackered old renault trafic converted into a minibus that finds it very hard to get above 60mph and is also extremely noisy!). My dad and I left the house first at 10:30, with the optimistic hope that we would arrive in calais by 6pm. L and the others would leave a bit later, after picking up the essential paperwork and locking up the houses. As this wouldn’t take very long, they passed us half an hour down the road at some absolutely stupid speed which only made me jealous.

We continued to trundle along, and an hour after they had passed us, and while Dad and I were getting up the stupidly large hill out of Rennes, I got a call…

“I’ve forgotten the passports.”

Yes, it happened again. After I had left my passport in Leeds on the way there, L had neglected to pick up the wallet containing hers and my dads from the house and she had only realised this 2 hours from the house. Cue whining, whinging and a little bit of crying from R in the back. After having a good laugh and checking the bags for the passports, my dad and I trundled on stopping for fuel and Mc Ds at Caen.

7 - 8 hours later we arrived in Calais, knackered and desperate for a shower. Despite the slowness of the van, the citroen had not managed to catch us up yet. So we showered, waited, and I finally got myself an internet fix as the B&B motel had wifi!

That night, after much continued whining, we dined at the lovely Tutti Quanti in the cite europe and had a late night. D took it upon himself to gorge himself on various chilli products (jalapenos, chilli oil and spicy meats) which gaurenteed us an unpleasant day following. I really, really, REALLY hate it when he does this (not the first time).

I didn’t sleep well that night, and, as it happens, neither did anyone else. I found it endlessly difficult to sleep and I felt extremely queasy. This therefore resulted in me not only falling out of bed (in such a noisy fashion that i woke everyone up, hit my head and managed to be awake enough to swear in russian) but I also had a nice fit which resulted in me being unable to breathe and vomiting a couple of hours later. After this escapade R managed to fall out of bed (impressive considering she was in the middle) and her crying kept us up the rest of the night.

lovely ¬_¬

 We got the ferry 11:30am the following day and hit good ol Blighty by 12:30pm UK time. We proceded north via a slightly deviated route (M20 was blocked and crashes on the M1). At 5 we got a txt from L and Dad saying they were at the Hilton Park services near birmingham (they arrived in the UK 2 hours ahead of us). So we sped ahead so we could meet them, and meet them we did! We said Hi, Goodbye, and See you Later as we refuelled and finished the last leg of the journey home.

We got home around 6pm ish, and K, D and R came home to the surprise that their house had been cleaned and decorated by K’s parents. They did a damn fine job too. Nice surprise for when you came home, i personally returned home to find a stack of bills, a bin that needed emptying and stank, and an electric meter which had just ran out. Lovely.

There, finally, France all written up!

(Not much left now!)

Family

This “holiday” has taught me something which I had’nt noticed before, mostly because on the previous trips with everyone I had Amy with me. My family pick fights. Seriously! Even though these squabbles make everyone grumpy, hate (or making it seem like hating) one another and generally very fatigued, everyone does it.

D and K, and to a lesser extent R, fight or try to attack one another almost constantly. If it isn’t D playing with his PSP all day and calling K “Fatty” from time to time while striving to irritate everyone in the room, its K with continuous moaning and nagging at D. Its like they are already married! R has mastered the art of taming her mother. On one particular occasion we travelled to the Buffalo Grill for dinner. On the way back R asked D to sit in the back with her, and seemed quite happy. She then started to say “Mummy” as D strapped her in and K asked her what she wanted. It was at this moment that R began screaming, forcing K to sit in the back and D in the front of the car (much against his will as he wanted to spend some time with his little girl). And so the fight begun.

As for my dad (C) and L, their attacks are quite a lot more obvious. Dad takes pride in being able to irritate her and frequently takes great measure to do so. In the process of doing this he regularly irritates the fuck out of the rest of us as well. Metal against floor tiles does NOT sound good, and he made sure he scratched the two surfaces together as often as he could, as loud as he could. Starting many fights in the process. L isn’t innocent in the least either. She has some medical issues which mean that she has good days and bad days. Catch her on a bad day and she will constantly snap at you, and anyone around her. I am not sure how often these occur in the UK but it was honestly every bloody day in France. She snapped at everyone for the smallest possible thing.

 There is a heck of a lot of competition in the family too. I find myself regularly competing with my Dad, D and L in mostly everything. Who can eat the quickest/most. Who gets to the ferry port first (haha!). And that gets on my tits pretty quickly.

Yet…

 Would I trade them in? Would i bugger! Thing is, I can see so many of my personality traits in my dad, it kind of scares me. L and D have definately picked a load of these up from him, and K picked them up from D while adding her traits into the pot. The only problem that we have that I can see, other than the continuous in-fighting, is the dis-organisation. All this Drama and competitive nature means that we all think we are right, all of the time. Things are rarely organised satisfactorily, and if they are, you can be assured that something will kick off at some point.

What this means is that I am much more relaxed being in my busy work environment, than i was around them. Its very stressful!

We do have our good moments though cause we are all fond of each other, and in the good moments it is simply familial bliss. Ill share a couple of the good times here.

Its like being in a sitcom…

The House

The house (or houses as it should be) is old. The date above the door says 1808, which means that the left hand house is 200 years old. The right hand house was constructed later (we reakon around 40 years later).

The eventual aim is to turn these two separate houses into a single three bedroom property. Currently there are two makeshift rooms, no dining room, a tiny kitchen, two toilets and a large family room. But in order to pass between rooms in each of the houses you need to walk outside.

The houses come with a barn and a large amount of adjacent land which will be extremely nice come summer.

This holiday was all about making the house comfortable to live in while the loft space was renovated. We needed to improve the kitchen, the bathrooms, the living spaces and the do some maintainance on the overall grounds. Thanks to this trip i can now…

1. Install shelves - using brackets and compression installation. Basically i had to mess about with drilling through hollow bricks, inserting expanding steel plugs, and adding the brackets on.
2. Install a toilet - <insert shuddering here>
3. Lay a path and remove turf - christ my bloody back hurt after that.
4. Install sink fittings - <yet more shuddering>
5. Trim bushes and hedges - Yeah, so i could do this before, but it was fun!
6. Wiring

Fun!

The Toilets… the drainage… and the goddamn plumbing

This is the toilet that proved to be an eternal frustration. Not only did it take an age to remove the old toilet (which was blocked and sat directly over the pipe), but I had to drill the fittings for the damn thing twice due to the screw plugs not working; we had to visit the DIY store 5 separate times as the pipes either didnt fit, or fitted wrong. It was a farce… yet oddly fun. Only bad thing is that it still doesnt work perfectly. Last time it was used (after L had a rather bad morning and had to flush three times ) it backed up due to the volume of water and sprayed all kinds of truly nasty things everywhere.

The kitchen sink was fun too. Previously it worked, but drained very badly. So we removed the sump fittings and replaced the plumbing into the drain.

Hang on a minute, both the toilet and the sink not draining well? Wonder what this could mean? As it happens, the houses rely on septic tanks to drain the water from the toilet and the sinks. And at the time of our visit, it had rained quite consistantly for a week (and would continue raining until the day we left). This meant that the water could not drain from the tanks, and that they were backing up. This means more fun in the future as we look to replumb the septic tank.

With the rain and the poor drainage, the grass outside the houses was getting trodden, muddy and in overall poor condition due to us walking on it. To stop us from getting mud in the house the decision was made to build a path from the right house to the barn through the really muddy bit. As i discovered when i was digging up the turf, the reason why the grass was sodden was because the septic tank’s impermeable membrane was just three inches below the surface and was ponding water. Great. Several hours and a good soaking later the path was laid.

After all this, I am still faced with plenty of work back at home in the UK. I have to prepare several engineering drawings so that the planning authorities will approve our plans for the loft conversion. Lots of AutoCAD drawing and planning for me… woo!

(Drama in France)

As with most holidays to this green and pleasant land avec mes parents, drama ensues. At almost every possible moment someone, somewhere, will be being dramatic in some way, shape, or form. It’s our nature, it’s genetic, and by god is it annoying at times!

The Long Drive – Part 1.
It’s not a short journey to the little commune of Poulhibet in the Cotes du Armor area of Brittany. In fact it’s almost 800 miles. Click here for route

I left work on the Wednesday early, about half one. Cycled home, and finished packing. I gave into a few rounds of AudioSurf – www.audiosurf.com before i left just to chill me out a little. I had much drama with my computer before I left with the stupid thing refusing to make an audio CD and with my electric meter being a swine, meh. I checked my list, it was complete (or so i thought) and i departed for france, via my step brothers house, his workplace and my dad’s house. I left Leeds in a bright mood, getting comfy, enjoying a Mountain Dew and a nice quick CD. Pulled over on my way and filled up the tank of diesel (£1.21 a litre! Thieving bastards!). I arrived at my step-brothers house in Radcliffe around 4:30pm to a fanfare of “Seb!!!” from my 2 yr old niece. We packed the car, setup the in-car-child-entertainment system, namely a system of electrical goods which when combined together would keep the little bugger quiet for the extraordinarily long journey. (As it happens, we didn’t need them as she slept pretty much all of the time. You just have to love behavioural conditioning.)

It soon became apparent while packing the car that I had forgotten two things key to our journey. The ferry tickets and my passport. I left both of them back at my flat in Leeds. Ironically enough neither were on my list either, not entirely sure why, but i blame the laptop and its dodgy backspace key. This meant that we would have to add a minimum of an hour to our journey so that I could pick these up.

We picked my step-brother up from his work at the mental institution and ferried him to my dads house so he could grab his Xbox. We all had a laugh and mock at my selective memory and we began the journey.

Just a few facts and figures and cast to add detail to a complicated backstory. My Dad “C” is married to my step mum “L”. Her son, “D” my step-brother is engaged to my step-sister to be “K” and they have a 2 yr old (going on 3 this holiday) daughter “R”. The planned trip isn’t exactly easy. We were due to depart Manchester at around 6pm to catch the 11:55pm ferry to Calais which would get us in France for 2am. From there we would sleep, and then drive to Poulhibet the next day. The return journey would be spread over two days and would be much easier and more relaxed, again, with the Calais crossing.
We left Manchester just after 5pm. Making our way North to Leeds on the windy and windy (yes, both meanings!) M62 in the rush hour traffic. Moving is an optimistic word to use. We were steadily stationary for most of it. On my way to Manchester i noticed an accident between J23 and J24 on the M62 summit. A lorry had jack-knifed and backed up the motorway for 10 miles. I didn’t think much of it as I was not planning to return this way. Drat. In the stop-start traffic we quickly discovered that K was travel sick and that D had a weak bladder. I played the “Only 10 more minutes to go” game with them for about an hour until we reached my flat. We parked up, they relieved themselves, we had a bit of toast, a quick drink, and chilled for a short while. We were still against the clock. We left the flat after 7 and headed south on the M1.

After a fun little stint with the UK motorway network and a lead right foot we managed to make it to Dover for 11:20pm. Unfortunately for us, we didn’t get on the earlier ferry (apparently this didn’t exist even though it was right in front of us) and we had to wait an hour and a half for the next ferry, which would get us into Calais for just past 4am French time. So we waited, i had a chat with the barista at the Cafe Nero and had myself a nice pint of Mocha with cream. I did my usual thing of chatting to everyone else while I waited and discovered that the two lads adjacent to me in the queue (one German, the other French) have just come back from a month of visiting the UK.

We got onto the ferry without drama and settled in for a long boring trip across the Channel. We arrived slightly late into Calais and thankfully, without drama, got off the other side, onto the motorway and towards our hotel. This is where the otherwise almost perfect trip took a turn for the worse. While trying to check into the hotel I rapidly discovered that the reservation I had made had expired at 4am. This was after 20 minutes of fecking about with K, D and R getting increasingly cranky in the cold wetness of Calais. I then made the bold step of trying the hotel next door, finding out that it was perfectly available, and getting us somewhere warm to sleep (if only for four hours).

We then continued on our journey to the house.
The Long Drive – Part 2
For once, the trip was without drama. Least, anything out of the ordinary. The only problem with travelling with a 2 yr old is the noise. They are generally quite noisy creatures, with this being multiplied exponentially the more of them you have. Thankfully we discovered that a Mc Donalds happy meal puts them right to sleep. I had my usual artery-hardening Big Tasty which was, as expected, both BIG and TASTY.

The trip to Poulhibet would take us through Calais > Honfleur > Caen (Mc Donalds) > St Lo > Dol De Bretagne > St Brieuc > Mur De Bretagne, in that order. Overall not an unpleasant journey. We stopped for ten minutes at the Dol De Bretagne in order to procure a memorable photo for R (I have one with me, aged 7, in front of the menhir at Dol De Bretagne, with my motorcycle helmet).

We arrived at the house around 6pm. It was unfortunately raining, and as we would shortly discover, it would continue raining for quite some time. We were welcomed with hugs, coffee and snacks in the usual family way.

(It occurs to me that I have already forgotten a lot of the details as I am writing this several days later. Needless to say, not a lot happened for a while, but we got here safe and sound!).

I have just seen a cyclist do perhaps the most stupidest thing (not exactly the most stupid, but its high up there!).

Location: City Centre Leeds, outside the Cornish Pasty Shop and the bus station near the train station. You have a layby with a large shelter for passengers. You have a set of traffic signals just down the road from the layby, and two lanes of traffic. One of which is ALWAYS full of taxis. Bus waiting to go straight, and a bus in the layby. 1m width between them. So what does this stupid idiot do? CYCLES IN BETWEEN THEM!

And it gets worse. The bus in the layby begins to pull out.

Now, imagine your handlebars on an average bike. 0.7 to 0.8m in width. You can guess what happened. He got stuck. So, these two buses are stuck. The drivers both see the cyclist, now stuck between the buses(admittedly the driver of the bus in the layby must not have correctly looked where he was pulling out and I imagine he pulled out so that he could get his front wheels in the right orientation to pull out when the traffic signal changed).

Does the cyclist stop? Nope. He gets off. And moves forward between the buses, where the gap is narrower rather than cutting his losses and moving backwards to where the gap is bigger.

I continued to watch, as the cyclist continued, got out in front of the bus in the layby, and the bus waiting, mounted the kerb at the lights, and continued going at full whack on the road.

No wonder drivers hate me so much, they must all think that I am this pillock! Never in my life had I wanted to apologise so much for being associated with such a person (not associated directly, but I too am a cyclist). It really made me sick.

Tomorrow I leave for France. Its going to be a “holiday”. Specifically, its going to be a “working holiday”. In my bag i have been instructed to bring:

• Jeans I don’t mind getting ruined
• Laptop with 2D modelling and planning software (AutoCAD)
• My Big Book of British Standards (read: Smiles)
• T-shirts (lots)
• Warm socks (stone floors and no central heating means cold toesies)
• Sleeping bag (did i mention i am sleeping on a futon)
• CHOCOLATE COVERED COFFEE BEANS - For the extremely long drive from Leeds > Mur De Bretagne (908 miles) in 24 hours. 5pm Wednesday > 5pm Thursday.
• Nintendo DS (for my sanity)

My task this “holiday”is to assist my father in renovating his 150 year old pair of French farm houses, turning them from two separate single floor domiciles into a single, 2 floor French Chateau!

Should be amusing at least. I do get to have fun with 1m long drill bits and a sledgehammer!

This weekend has been rather unusual, specifically Sunday. After all the drama that occured in the 4 hours after seeing Amy (my Nintendo DS works again btw, now that it has successfully dried out) and after the 10 hours of blissful sleep I was recruited into assisting my mum in phase 1 of the “RENOVATE THE FAMILY HOME” project.

Phase 1 involves the relocating of my mother from her room (and subsequently all of her belongings and various other crap) into my old room. Not only did this involve dismantling her 100 year old cast iron/hard wood bed (absolute son-of-a-bitch that was!) but also clearing out the crap from around it. I wish I had a camera… . The dust was simply spectacular. I think that bed had not been moved in the 28 years they have lived in the house. Even when they decorated, they decorated around, and under, the bed. I found £2.65 in loose change (which according to bylaw 16 clause 3a: all money on the floor belongs to Sebastian) as well as a watch, couple earrings, necklace, some unmentionable items and cat pooh. We dismantled the bed, and arranged for the various parts to be moved downstairs.

This is where it got fun. The bed consisted of several key parts. The headboard and footboard were connected to each other by a cast iron I-beam, which was bolted in at either end. Resting on top of this was a hardwood spring-box. This basically consists of a wooden frame, 6ft wide by 6ft 6 long, with cross members, steel wire and steel coils filling in the insides. The mattress would then rest on this spring box. Of course with older mattresses, which werent sprung, the bed provided all the support needed. The headboard, footboard and bedstead supports all came off easily enough, and were transported downstairs very easily. But when it came to the spring box, we couldn’t manage at all to get it down the stairs and into the lounge. (The house is a 2bed terrace, the stairs enter into the lounge at a right angle, which isn’t exactly spacious). We tried for 2 hours, trying every single angle, approach, dimension and we couldn’t manage to get it in. So unfortunately, we had to destructively dismantled the spring box. However, all is not bad, the bedstead is still in good condition, and if we put some slats across it, we have a proper bed! So after all this, its been decided that the bed will live again with the family at my Dad’s house in France. Might even end up being my bed… won’t that be weird!

So yeah, moving my mum into my “lair” was unbelievably weird. The room has ceased to be “Seb’s Room/Lair/Cave/Rock” and now is mum’s “Guest Room/Study”. I moved her mattress onto my bed and she has now set herself up to sleep in there.

Its all rather weird as the whole “no going back” thing finally set in the second I saw mum setting up my old/her new bed. No longer will that room be mine. My home for the last 23 years is now just another room. Makes me sad in a way. When i left the house, I did utter a little goodbye room under my breath before we pulled away. I am a right sentimental git at times!

Am I sad? Not really. The bonus of the situation is that I can’t go back. I am going to be living under my own roof from now on. Freedom! <Insert kilt raising image here>

After all, If i was living at home still, I wouldn’t have this awesome job, a HUGE television, the opportunity to sit in my underpants in my lounge whenever I want, my comfy chairs and the ability to cook whatever I want, whenever I want. Its for the best, and I am definitely sure I made the right decision back in September 07.

Edit: Note to self, get a mobile phone with a half decent camera so I can document these things better!

This week is not one to remember. Its been, quite frankly, shit.

As a whole, its actually been very positive in places. I have seen herself today,
which was utterly fantastic (we watched Stardust which was pretty damn awesome and very satisfying). Went on a rather entertaining training course (both a positive and a negative) and had a moderately successful week at work. Problem with all of these events is that they have been tarnished by a big black splodge of discomfort, financial pain and irritation.

Lets begin from the top:

• To begin with, its not been the best week for my bike (The newer one). Not only has it been a week of general frustrations with various parts of it (grr @ front derilleur); but it has been targeted by vandals, not once but twice; and to top it off, its been pretty damn awful on the roads. Ill go over the vandalising, as it belongs to the fun that has been the trip home from Cambridge.
• Travelling to Altringham from Leeds in the morning peak was simply ghastly. The train to and from Manchester Piccadilly was actually fine. Not too busy (mostly as I travel outside the busy times of day) and actually pleasant.These trains were on time, and rather punctual. The Metrolink, the tram serving Greater Manchester, was bloody awful. Not only overpriced, but it was consistently late and crowded. I arrived late to my training course, after leaving 2 hours previously. Total trip distance is only 46 miles! GRR.
• Today. The trip to Cambridge was lovely. Quiet trains, punctual and pleasant all round. Locked my bike up at Leeds station early in the morning in my usual paranoid way (2 Trelock BS540 locks with my bike helmet arranged to prevent thievery). My current cycle lights aren’t removable, and so they were left on. I took my cycle computer with me. Went to Cambridge, had lots of fun and snuggles, and the drama began the second i rounded the corner from herself’s house. First and foremostly, my waterbottle leaked in my bag. This had impact on two critical items in my bag. #1 My book. It got soaked. I have managed to dry it off suitably, and I finished reading it on the way home. #2 My Nintendo DS. Cock. Now, I have dried it out a bit. Turned it on when I got home to assess the damage (if any). It turned on, and worked. Only issue is that the top screen went all weird, and now only lights up without showing any data. Needless to say, its on top of my computer extractor fan, drying out some more.
  This was, alas, only the start of my fun. I left her house a bit late, so I was already rushing to Cambridge station. Because of the bag drama, I found myself running to catch the elusive “Last train of the day”. Was a bit miffed to find out, that after expending all of that effort, the train was delayed by 20 minutes. I chilled out, coffee’d myself and waited. Trains home were consistently late, and busy, and cramped. GRRR. Not the worst though. I came back and found my bike vandalised at Leeds train station. Not just mine either! Every fucking bike parked there had been hit. Cycle lights removed from bikes, saddles stripped, tyres let down. I escaped quite lightly with only my cycle lights (which were screwed on!) being stolen. My tyres and saddle and luggage rack escaped unscathed. So, lucky I suppose. I do have spare lights at home.

So yeah, even after such a nice day, I am going to go to sleep angry. Slightly less now that I have written this. But it is a frustration I could have done without this week. There are some more aggravations to add above, but I gaurentee they will kick into next week as well. So if they still annoy me next week… you will be hearing about them.

Once again, my life is now defined by a pretty much standard routine. Its the same for almost every day, and away from the daily routine i have a weekly routine.

The daily routine (as it stands currently);

1. Wake up. This is currently quite a bloody process which involves streams of mind bullets as i fight the urge to remain asleep. Currently i aim to wake up at 07:20, to depart from under the covers by 07:30. Waking up includes a nice healthy dose of the Radio 4 ’s Today programme where i get a small fill of current events. Thankfully i have setup my central heating so this is not too difficult anymore.
2. Un-Dress/Pee/Dress. The battle against the pee urges sometimes wins and the undress/pee event order will occasionally be transposed. It is important to note that i do not dress into work clothes. Oh no, cycling clothes. So comfy tracksuit bottoms/shorts, t-shirt, socks and underpants.
3. Gather. I gather my work clothes.
4. Turn on the television - BBC1 Breakfast News. It is usually 08:00 by this time. I have inevitably taken much longer to do the above actions, and i am still feeling groggy.
5. Food. Generally one of four things. Porridge (with stewed fruit/honey), Cereal (Crunchy nut <3 ), Toast or yoghurt. Sometimes i even have juice.
6. More Food. I have to eat at lunch so preparation and packaging ensues.
7. Chill. After all that effort i chill while eating in front of the TV and/or the PC. I may even consider getting today’s newest torrent releases.
8. Departure. Departure time for work varies between 08:00 (today) to 08:45 (if i am feeling tired). As my commute is only 15 mins including the messing about at both ends, i can be very flexible here.
9. Arrive at work and stop sweating. When i say 15 mins, its actually a 15 min cycle ride if i am taking it easy. I am to get everything done in 15 minutes so that i can exert myself. I got 28.9mph this morning on my hybrid cycle! Because of this exertion, i need some time to stop sweating, and i do this by checking e-mail, getting the days workload briefing, and chilling at work for about 15 - 25 minutes.
10. Dress. I now run into the disabled toilet, usually forgetting my door pass, and get into work clothes.
11. Work. It is at this point where i do some work. Surprisingly enough.
12. Lunch. I like to take my lunch between 12 and 12:30. I have my mid morning snack of fruit, but i am usually quite hungry by now. Sandwiches/Pot Noodle/Pasta ahoy!
13. Work. More entertainment in the form of work.
14. Hometime. Now, this is tricky. I work a 7.5 hour standard day with 1 hour allotment for lunch. Depending on work load, and at the moment it varies between going home at 16:30 and 18:30. A nice 7.5 to 9.0 hour work day.
15. Commute. Usually very simple. All i have to do is survive the Leeds City Centre Loop around the train station, and i am home free.
16. Chill/Shower. First thing i do when i get in is take 5 minutes to stop and think. I usually e-mail home a to-do list (if anything needs doing) and i quickly run through it. Most nights i usually forget something. Ie, weights. If the weather is crappy, or i am very very sweaty, i use the opportunity to shower.
17. Cook/Clean. Pretty self explanatory. I do this after i have had my 5 minutes. Rarely takes long. While i wait for stuff to cook i indulge in more TV/Computer.
18. Eat - usually in front of TV/Computer.
19. Enjoy. At the moment my main evening pastimes are EVE-Online (of which i have gotten back into it now my schedule is more predictable), TV, Reading (yes, i actually read!).
20. *Call herself. Read: (MSN/Email/Call) - This is starred as this is the part of my routine which varies. At the current time, this doesnt happen every night. But it will happen again soon. One part of my routine i do miss on a regular basis.
21. More Enjoy. See above.
22. Hand Shandy. Partially for medical purposes, partially to help me sleep after a long day/night. If you dont know what it is, enjoy www.urbandictionary.com.
23. Shower/Shit/Shave/Teeth.
24. Sleep! I normally aim for 23:15, but this varies between 22:30 and 00:30 at the moment.  

*Fingers crossed that the new telephone amplfier works, so we can speak more regularly. I do miss our regular  phone calls/settlers matches. The time away has been good though, having to think a lot more about what to say as i don’t like to waste the precious time we have. Also makes me cherish the time we have on the phone a lot more, even if it is only a little bit each night. Unfortunately i STILL have yet to get over the uncomfortable feeling i get when i call her though, i am getting an understanding why. If i don’t have much to say of importance, then perhaps its worth holding back so that it doesnt turn into a breathing contest? This is one to go on the “continued analysis” pile.  

To be honest, i am now entirely sure if i enjoy it. Its much more predictable than my old student routine, but…. i dunno. Keep wondering if this is all i’ll do for the next 42 years.  I hope to include a nice bi-weekly cycle ride in here somewhere. 10 - 15 miles after work to help in keeping my fitness up, especially with time being precious at the weekend. We shall see though.

BTW, one last thing. If you have a lot of sites like this, seriously, try google reader. Its bloody excellent!