Boy oh Boy

Forgot to say that over the weekend and until Tuesday we all got a lovely sickness/stomach bug. I had the worst deal as I was up all night with Emma on Saturday, then I went to work Monday exhausted only to come down a bit odd at lunchtime, I only just made it to the sanctuary of my own bathroom at home by the skin of my teeth!!!

Here We Go Again... 2nd Car Order!

Right, as previously mentioned I have now ordered another new car!

Vauxhall let me down, mucking about with delivery dates.

Interestingly the lead time for the Ford Mondeo is not actually that much longer than what Vauxhall were potentially offering.

Anyway, I have ordered a Ford Mondeo Titanium X 2.0 TDCi with the following options

• Privacy Glass
• DVD Touch Screen Sat Nav & 6 CD Changer
• Parking Sensors
• Solar Reflective Windscreen
• Sports Pack
• Bluetooth
• Bi-Xenon headlights
• Keyless Entry

It's ordered in Sea Gray with leather seats

Oh I Forgot....

Bad news on Sunday evening my Xbox 360 (3rd replacement in 18 months) succum to the "3 Red Rings Of Death" syndrome!

It wasn't even powered on for more than about 5 minutes, the screen went blocky and then it was no more. So yet another 360 to add to the statistics of shafted ones, well done Microsoft for producing such a quality piece of kit. After all my Sony PS2 which is 6 years old has gone wrong loads of times, let me be precise, its 0 or ZERO times!!!!

So UPS have again another one to return to what must be an ever increasing EU mountain of crap magnolia dead Xbox 360's!

If it wasn't for the fact MS have set aside 2billion dollars to repair these things out of warranty I would not have bought a replacement! It gives you no faith at all in the console, as for their Elite, well they can stick that where the sun doesn't shine! The MS operative even boasted that there were no hardware failures with that console, great give me one then!!

On the upside they did mention compensation, so I asked for a working console...

I await the return of my "new" one.... to see how long this one lasts!

All Back To Square One...

After what seems like forever, I have now cancelled my order with Vauxhall for the new car. They just kept changing the dates, originally October, then Nov 5th, then late November.

When I telephoned Tuesday it was 7th December, at which point I have decided to cancel, and since then it was changed to 21st December! So well done Vauxhall for selling a car you cant actually supply, and wasting the last 4 months!


On a plus side the new Ford Mondeo has dropped on our car list in price, so I am now about to order the Titanium X model with all the whistles and bells.


Please dont let me down Ford!




Even Clarkson liked it, read the link below if your interested


http://driving.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/driving/jeremy_clarkson/article1971541.ece

Chris Garrett ... a genius and true friend....

Yesterday I made a nostalgic journey down towards the South Coast under difficult circumstances to attend the wake of a good friend and ex-colleague Chris Garrett.

I remember when I first met Chris, at Barclays in Trowbridge. I was there to cover for him at first, so never met him, but I then covered other ICL people at the time when they were not around. I thought he was stark raving mad when I met him!

He was always joking and making faces about people, it made me laugh. Even when he was being serious he used to burst out laughing at the end! I don't know what the customer thought of him, but they must have loved him, as he added so much fun into your day.

We shared a common interest in blagging swag from anywhere we could, mostly mp3 music and other bits of software. So we kept in touch about the sort of techie things in life.
We worked together at Westlands helicopters, at which point I found out more about his passion for music. I bought an electric guitar, and he gave me some lessons in the car park of Westlands.

During that time we spent time down at his studio in Sixpenny Handley listening to his music, and watching in amazement at his musical talents on so many instruments. He was a natural, and had a gift! I remember once, when he tried to get me stoned on "herbal" tea, which didnt work, although he said he'd put enough stuff in to knock out an elephant, he played Gary Moore's "Still Got The Blues For You", it was awesome, and better than the original!

Nothing will take away mucking about at HQ Land with him, he'd be doing his pretend pipe smoking Monty Python walk behind some officer as he walked towards me in the corridors, I'd find it so hard to keep a straight face. They were priceless moments, he had such a brilliant sense of humour. He loved to pretend to mince around as well, which was always fun to watch.

I guess the most memorable of all occasions was staying at his and Allison's place for the Blandford music festival. Round 2 on the herbal front from Chris involved some rather nice chocolate (if I remember correctly) cookies, with "oats and seeds" in 'em.

I remember sitting at their kitchen table, and then all of sudden after 2 of these things I started getting the giggles. Man I laughed my way out of their house, down the steps, passed Wazzak the 3 legged cat (yes it's true!) and into Allison's Astra.

It was at this point paranoia set in, I began to focus on different parts of my body, my arms, my legs, my heart... what had I done, I became very frightened, believing I might wet myself or worse! They could see I was worried, but kept telling me it will be ok.

When we arrived I refused to leave the car, I felt safe in Alli's car, and didn't want to get out. After about 20 minutes they convinced me to get out, and I joined them at the festival. I don't remember a great deal other than being taken into the hall of mirrors which was unreal! OH and sitting in a tent listening to drum and bass type music and watching some laser pointer pen whizzing around. I refused to move from my spot thinking i couldn't get into any trouble if I did.

I don't remember driving home at all, just waking up feeling sick, and i was. I remember there was a huge black spider next to my head in the toilet, Chris said "Are you sure, or was it your imagination?". To this day, I don't know if it was or wasn't.

The next day just flew by, I lost track of time completely, as I was still feeling the effects of the cookies.

Chris helped me out a lot when i split from my ex-wife Michelle, he talked me through things on the telephone, he was a real rock at that time, along with Mark Willis.

Chris and Alli decided to move to Portugal in April 2002 so that Chris could earn money doing something he liked (music), it was at this point I lost contact with Chris and Alli sadly, as there email address changed, I moved house, got a new mobile number etc.

So it came as a massive shock to me to find out the Chris had died, and to find out that he had been back in the UK for about 18 months. I would have dearly loved to have seen him, and would have made the effort, no matter what, given the chance.

Chris leaves behind a ton of friends who adored him and thought he was a genius, family, Allison and his two children.

Chris I know you are a techie and a music man, but if you are reading blogs wherever you are then I'd like to say to you that every minute spent with you, were some of the best moments of my life. You were a true friend, and were loved by all, who could ever beat your Mick Jagger impressions when doing Angie!

I'll miss you forever, and look forward to meeting up with you when my time comes be it upstairs or downstairs! Maybe I will have learned to play Sweet Home Alabama by then!!

Rest easy mate, love your friend Duncan.

Chicken Vindaloo

That's my dinner for this evening, and is it me is it getting cold??

3:10 to Yuma

I actually enjoyed it, good to watch a western from time to time, they should make more Hollywood films about 'em.

Halo 3 Finished

Whoopee how exciting I finished Halo 3 today (with a little help in co-op mode)

Would I buy it again, errrm frankly no!

3:10 To Yuma

It's a strange named film, I am about to watch it though.

Will update you all with my views..........

Game Of The Moment

Halo 3 in co-op mode

PGR4 Demo looks really good

Simpsons game looks outstanding

Industrial Strength Clasp

What are bra clasps made from? Because I'm sure that its the strongest material known to mankind!!

A Little Update About The Car!

Firstly I rang up about my car today, and guess what, Vauxhall haven't even started to build it yet! So for a car ordered in July, I may be lucky to get it by November (mid)! My hat is taken off to you Vauxhall, I just can't wait to receive my hand built carbon fibre sports car... or sorry I didn't order one, it was just a fookin Zafira!!!!!!

Super exciting update

Nothing of any great interest occurred during last week or two, well nothing that I could put on here without someone knowing who they were.

Been busy installing openSuse 10.3 on my work laptop.

Looking to get a replacement for the broken PC, not sure whether to get a PC or to get a powerful laptop and let Catherine keep this one for her use.

Emma's been doing well at school, eating her dinners (the marvelous invention of the sticker charts!!).

I will put some pictures up here, as it is looking a bit sparse... back later with some pictures....