After a hard day working…
Apr 26 2007
A Civil Campaign
A Civil Campaign – Lois McMaster Bujold
Here we find Lois dipping heavily into clan politics, and the issues surrounding gender-based hereditary titles. It is actually a lot more interesting than I’ve made it sound, I promise :>
Once more, the Ceragandans re-appear, and serve as a plot device to finally lay Miles’ alter-ego – Admiral Naismith – to rest. Though nothing ever seems to be certain in the universe Lois’ has spun over all these years.
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Apr 24 2007
Cats & Their Music Tastes…
Ira sent me the following piccies last week, and they are spot on…
Click the link below to see them…
Continue reading “Cats & Their Music Tastes…”
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Apr 22 2007
Alex Over Here in 9 Weeks
Spoke to Alex on the phone, and she has her plane tickets, and is in the process of filling our her Kazakhstan visa application form.
Both Ira and I are really looking forward to her visit, and showing her around Astana. Hopefully the weather will be OK, and not too hot.
If anybody has any tips for first-time visitors to Kazakhstan, please do leave a comment, and I’ll make sure Alex reads them…
Oh, and hopefully ChrisD will be back over again this year, which would be amazing as well.
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Apr 21 2007
The TV
As you may have noticed from previous posts, I’ve been quite busy researching TVs this week.
Well, we went to a few shops, and finally found the model we wanted, in stock.
We then went and chose a stand for it, which weighed about three times as much as the telly itself!
Once we had taken it home, I checked out all the connections, made sure there weren’t any major faults, and used what leads I had to connect it to the PC.
I still need to get a DVI-HDMI lead, and fine tune all the screen settings for each input, but it is great to have something decent to watch movies and satellite on.
We’ve now put the stand together, and tidied most of the cables up so Ira is happy as well :>
Apr 20 2007
Had A Brilliant Day
It was my 28th birthday today.
We got a TV. Eventually. More details to follow.
Had a great meal with Ira, in-laws & Walton. Went back to the Chelsea ‘pub’. Where we originally met up with Walton last summer.
I had garlic bread as a starter, chips & cheeseburger for main and a chocolate mousse for dessert.
A little vodka and Baileys kept me even happier. Good food, good company.
Hope everyone else is happy with their life right now, or at least on the up.
Thanks to everyone who passed on their congratulations…
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Apr 07 2007
Other Videos That Got Uploaded To YouTube Today
This is the video from our first (and last :< ) visit to Tom‘s flat. We went round with Walton and had a nice meal, and spoke with one of his student’s.
This is a video of a Kazakh drinking game, recorded at Ira’s Dad’s birthday celebration, in 2003, I think.
You have two teams, two bottles of vodka, and have to serve a shot, drink it, tidy up, and repeat, in a relay team.
It will make (a bit) more sense if you just watch it, I promise…
Again from the same party, here we have some Romanys(?) singing for us
From last year, we have Irina and I shooting shotguns at a salt water lake near by
Dubai dune driving is next, from 2005, when Ira, myself and the in-laws all went to UAE
This one is to check whether or not AlexC actually reads the blog properly. It was filmed back in Bourton On The Water, which seems like a long, long, long time ago now
Almost done :-)… This is from a party back in the UK, where someone bought their Dad’s Land Rover to a party. Not too unusual around Cirencester, except this one had a couple of cool hidden extras…
Finally we have a clip from a Russian news channel. There had been an accident in a mine, and there were rumours of an alcohol problem with the miners there. Just as a responsible looking representative came on air (live!) to dispel such scandalous thoughts, someone pops into the background. (This is from a while ago, there were apparently no serious injuries reported)
And yes, I’m well aware all these YouTube videos are making the front page of my blog untidy and excessively long.
Tough, I kept forgetting to sort out and upload some videos, and it was now or never.
Also, astute readers may notice a temporary bug or two since the re-installation of WordPress and the new theme was chosen. I’m not sure whether the problem with advert code not being processed when you click on a category is a problem with the theme, or the plugin I use to display the ads, but I’ll try and find out.
Apr 06 2007
Snow Mobile Pictures + Video
Took a bit longer than expected to put them up, but here are 3 videos from when we went on a snow mobile, click the link after the videos to see the pictures…
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Apr 06 2007
One Year And A Day In Kazakhstan
Irina is on her way back from Moscow as I type, and there is a huge pile of washing up to be done, but I just wanted to make a quick post to let people know I’ve now been over here 12 (and a bit) months.
Do I want to return to the UK? No, for now, I’m happy to carry on living here, and seeing what happens. There have been times I’ve felt differently, when the different way things are done over here has got to me, or just general home-sickness has pervaded, but Ira spent around 8 years with me in Britain, so I’m more than happy to keep on ‘trying out’ Kazakhstan. We agreed at the beginning we’d see how we both felt after two years, so come back in another 12 months time, and ask me then…
Mar 16 2007
The End Is Nigh…
Unfortunately, since I ended up re-installing XP just prior to getting my ADSL connection working & therefore downloading a lot of updates, I’ve used up my 700 meg quota this month, so I’m back to dial up for the rest of the month 🙁
Not many UK friends seem to be reading this blog right now anyway, judging from the IP addresses of visitors, so you’ll probably only end up asking my why I disappeared the next time I’m on-line in Messenger, but it was worth a shot.
Before I forget, if anyone knows :
a) Where Windows Update downloads are stored, and if you can simply copy them across from one install of XP to another, to save downloading them all over again
and/or
b) Why I’m unable to remember a simple list of two things whilst typing out the first
then PLEASE leave a comment below….
Finally, thank you to the random blokes from Britain who kept me & Ira entertained last night on Skype – I’d just used the ‘Skype-Me’ mode for the first time, and they were looking for people on-line from strange countries to talk to. I’m apparently 46% chav & 31% emo, according to the questionnaires they sent links for!
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