Weight Check

At 19:30 on 30-07-2005 : 14st 1lb, 26.7% BF
At 19:30 on 29-08-2005 : 13st 3lb, 25.8% BF
At 17:30 on 26-09-2005 : 12st 12lb, 25.0% BF
At 17:30 on 24-10-2005 : 12st 8 lb, 24.9% BF
At 22:00 on 21-11-2005 : 12st 7 lb, 23.9% BF
At 16:00 on 02-01-2006 : 12st 4 lb, 22.5% BF
At 17:30 on 30-01-2006 : 12st 3 lb, 22.3% BF
At 19:30 on 27-02-2006 : 12st 1 lb, 22.3% BF
At 17:30 on 27-03-2006 : 11st 13lb, 21.9% BF
At 17:30 on 24-04-2006 : 11st 10lb, 21.4% BF
At 21:30 on 08-05-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.5% BF
At 18:00 on 22-05-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.9% BF
At 18:00 on 19-06-2006 : 12st 1lb, 22.6% BF

The big problem I had this month was a week long training course in Maidenhead, way too much 'Full English', Cooked Lunch, Bar Snacks and Liquid Refreshment!! I actually gained 5 lbs in just one week!!! I have also not been getting to the Gym as regularly as normal.

Since then, I have managed to go to the Gym a little more often - still not back at full weights etc., but getting stronger, and as a result have lost most of the 'Maidenhead' weight. I really need to work a bit harder over the next few weeks to get back on track, as it looks like I may have another week of training coming up next month :-(

Great Day Out

Man, I am getting old...

Today we went to the BBC Gardeners World show at the NEC, and had a really great day... The weather was hot and sunny (27C), and I managed to buy some interesting Princess Lillies, some Fuscias (Hanging and bush) and a bunch of british Strawberry plants. Then Alex won a pack of 15 Busy Lizzies, and three Petunia's during an B&Q demonstration...

Once we got back, we planted everything up (Except Alex's Lillies, we need a large container to plant them up in, so that is a job for tommorow)

Diet Coke explodes with, um, flavor?

You may have heard about the geysers that geeks are creating by dropping Mentos mints into 2-liter bottles of Diet Coke. But have you actually seen the videos? Do you have any idea how the experiment actually works?NPR's been all over this story in the past few days but no offense, guys hearing about it on the radio leaves something to be desired. Hop on over and see for yourself how far 101 Coke bottles can shoot.
Watch the video

Told you 1 GB RAM was not enough!

Not even running everthing I normally would!

Office 2007 Beta

Downloaded this yesterday, installed it last night, and so far I am really impressed! Nothing fantastic, just everything is "better"...

Little things, like the fact that you can subscribe to RSS feeds in Outlook, so the list of articles appears like a series of e-mails, complete with notification when the are unread entries... saves visiting 7 ot 8 sites daily only to find nothing new has been entered...

Happy Birthday Alex

Today is Alex's 8th Birthday, and he is SOOOOOOOO excited it's untrue. He want's to get up early, open his presents, and then go to Debenhams at Merry Hill for breakfast!!

EDIT:
Alex is now the proud owner of an iPod Nano, which - once I managed to work out iTunes - he kept glued to his head for most of the day, He finally got the folder he wanted to hold all his football cards, and fantastic Meccano (Motorised Funfair type) that I am really looking forward to helping him with, an Airfix kit (Subarru Imprezza) and a number of other items... He really is an happy bunny.
No doubt that list will increase over the weekend, his party is on Sunday afternoon...

And yes, he did get his bacon sandwich at Merry Hill

8 MB Broadband - Update

After a week or so of it generally feeling a little unstable, and slower!!, my broadband conection seems to have stabilised at last..

I am currently downloading Vista Beta 2 ISO file, along with beta installions of Office & OneNote 2007 at a combined speed of 800 KB/Sec. The ISO file on it's own was running at 690 KB/Sec...

I have struggled to find many downloads that exceed 250, but am starting to realise that it may well not be my end that is causing the bottleneck!

Line mode	G.dmt	Line state:	Show Time
Line up time:	3:10:31:24	System up time	3:10:32:03
Downstream speed:	8128 Kbps	Upstream speed	448 Kbps
Downstream latency:	Fast	Upstream latency	Fast
Trellis coding:	Enabled	Loss of signal	0
Line attenuation:	19 dB	Loss of frame	0
Noise margin:	11.5 dB	CRC error	24
Line up count:	1	Total error duration	22 seconds

New Toys

Nothing too exciting, but I have been getting a little miffed recently by my PC's performance... OK it's running a Linux PC in a VMWare session using 512MB RAM and Photoshop CS2 and Dreamweaver 8, and that's not including the Firewall, AV software, Outlook, Firefox, Messenger, PGP etc etc etc... swapping from one application to the next is taking a VERY long time... so I have decided that as I can't afford to buy a new PC at the moment, I will upgrade the memory... So today I have ordered 2 x 1GB DDR3200's from crucial.co.uk. Unfortunately, I only have two memory slots and they both have 512MB's in at the moment, so if anyone knows a good home for some DDR2700???

The other new toy is a replacement for the Intuos 2 graphics tablet, I am now the proud owner of a Graphire 4 XL A5 tablet. The working area is double my previous one, so that should make it a bit easier to do what I need to do in Photoshop. The Intuos tablet looks like it will be traded for a Fuji Finepix 3 Megapixel camera tomorrow - should do the job for Amy?

Weight Check

At 19:30 on 30-07-2005 : 14st 1lb, 26.7% BF
At 19:30 on 29-08-2005 : 13st 3lb, 25.8% BF
At 17:30 on 26-09-2005 : 12st 12lb, 25.0% BF
At 17:30 on 24-10-2005 : 12st 8 lb, 24.9% BF
At 22:00 on 21-11-2005 : 12st 7 lb, 23.9% BF
At 16:00 on 02-01-2006 : 12st 4 lb, 22.5% BF
At 17:30 on 30-01-2006 : 12st 3 lb, 22.3% BF
At 19:30 on 27-02-2006 : 12st 1 lb, 22.3% BF
At 17:30 on 27-03-2006 : 11st 13lb, 21.9% BF
At 17:30 on 24-04-2006 : 11st 10lb, 21.4% BF
At 21:30 on 08-05-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.5% BF
At 18:00 on 22-05-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.9% BF

Still pleased... That's almost three weeks now that I have been pretty well unable to do any exercise.

Started back to the gym today, and managed to cover 2KM on the treadmill in about 12 minutes, I need to get that improved over the next few weeks!

Great Day

No kids today, they are spending the weekend with the Mother-in-law...

Out at lunchtime, bus into Birmingham, Coffee & a Muffin at Costa, Stroll around town (without having to visit 'Bear Factory' or 'Claires') before eating at the Mailbox (Red Peppers).
From there, a quick visit downstairs to Castle Galleries to have a look at one of the new Mark Spains they have in there...

damn, that would look Sooooooo good in the living room :(

Finally, cross the road to the Alex Theatre to see 'The Rock Horror SHow' - man that was a real hoot, it was the funiest, most entertaing piece of theatre I have ever seen - and that was only the audience!

Faster Broadband

Yesterday, bang on time, BT upgraded my service from 2 to 8 MB. Has it made any difference? well the simple answer is - not really sure, yes some things do seem to be really quick, but nothing significant yet.

I ran the broadband speed test at http://www.dslreports.com/stest?loc=3 and that is telling me that I am currently able to download at 274KB per sec, and upload at 41KB per sec... OK not too shabby, but nothing close to the claimed figures... Ah well it's still early days yet, so leys give it a week or so to settle, and try again then.

Weight Check

At 19:30 on 30-07-2005 : 14st 1lb, 26.7% BF
At 19:30 on 29-08-2005 : 13st 3lb, 25.8% BF
At 17:30 on 26-09-2005 : 12st 12lb, 25.0% BF
At 17:30 on 24-10-2005 : 12st 8 lb, 24.9% BF
At 22:00 on 21-11-2005 : 12st 7 lb, 23.9% BF
At 16:00 on 02-01-2006 : 12st 4 lb, 22.5% BF
At 17:30 on 30-01-2006 : 12st 3 lb, 22.3% BF
At 19:30 on 27-02-2006 : 12st 1 lb, 22.3% BF
At 17:30 on 27-03-2006 : 11st 13lb, 21.9% BF
At 17:30 on 24-04-2006 : 11st 10lb, 21.4% BF
At 21:30 on 08-05-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.5% BF

Now, that I am pleased with... For over a week now, I have been pretty well unable to do any exercise, and the upshot is only 1lb gain..... W00t!!

Increased Broadband speed

some weeks ago, BT announced that all BB users would be eligable for a free upgrade to 8Meg.

At that time, I attempted to register for the upgrade and out intranet failed me dismally... I have been trying since - without much success - to get the upgrade, but seem to keep going around in circles.

Finally, yesterday I called the BT.COM website support number and explained the situation... I now have an order number, and am due to be upgraded on the 12th May. Initial estimates suggest that 6MB will be the maximum speed download that I can actually get, but that's still 3 times quicker than my current 2Meg connection - and should give me faster upload speed :-)

No Pain Killers...

Today seems to be a significant step forward in my recovery from surgery. I got out of bed at 07:00 and did not go straight for the pain killers... In fact I have been sat up at the computer - leaning forwards! - for almost two hours with no noticible pain at all.

I will, of course, continue to take it easy today, and at the first sign of discomfort I am heading back to bed!

Eventfull Week

Not had too much spare time on the PC recently...
I have been working on a website for 'Rockbox Themes' : http://rockbox-themes.redbreva.com/, which has taken up a fair amount of time to date, and is still a *looong* way from being finished.
For the Bank Holiday weekend we had house guests - Arthur & Margaret Finikin, so no PC time to speak of there.
On Wednesday, I took a trip to Russells Hall Hospital and had surgery on my abdominal hernia, and since then sitting up for more than a few minutes at a time has been a little uncomfortable. Much better this afternoon, so hopefully I will be able to get about a little more easily by the start of next week.
Finally on Thursday, my iPod Nano 4GB arrived..!! It was taken out of the box, plugged into the PC and wiped, within 30 minutes it was wrapped in a pale blue 'iPod Nano Tube' and running Rockbox :-) I have managed to take a little time out and reworked my iRiver theme :

to work with some colour on the slightly larger iPod Nano screen

and again larger still for the H300 / iPod Color

So far I am really pleased with the Nano, I have 34 albums on there and a folder of 170 'Misc Singles' altogether some 42 hours worth of music. Battery life is quite poor at present: about 8 hours (The Apple firmware is good for about 14 hours) - Rockbox is still in the very early stages for iPod - but is adequate for it's intended use - in the Gym. Charging is via the USB connection, so I have ordered a 'Travel Kit'... It's a Mains Plug and a Car Cigarette Lighter adaptor that take a usb connection.

Concerts

I have been to two events recently...

Jeff Wayne's War of the Worlds at the NEC last week - Verdict: UTERLEY FANTASTIC
Micheal Flattley's Celtic Tiger at the NIA last night - Verdict: Very Good, not as good as Lord of the Dance, but the wife actually prefered it.. It's got more 'Dancing' and less 'Foot Stamping' than the older show - but I like the group tap numbers the best, so you pay your money and take your choice.

And I now have tickets for the Rock Horror show on the 13th May... Man I am so looking forward to that one, the only concern is that it's only 10 days after hernia surgery... hope I will be fit enough to go
Finally we have booked to see Katherine Jenkins again at Symphony Hall in November, 3rd row centre - W00T!

More experimentation with linux

I have now successfully installed SuSE 10 on my laptop, having first taken a Ghost image of the working XP installation. It installed really easily, and did not need a lot of work to make it a happy place to live. Getting the Rockbox development environment up and running took a little longer, but once I had learnt enough for the instructions to make sense, it was pretty straitforward. I still think I have a minor issue with missing folders in the $PATH statment, but it's getting there.

On the other hand, I installed Debian 3.1 (Sarge) into a spare partition on my desktop PC. Simply working out how to get KDE to start rather than the Gnome default took some time (It's actually a menu option on the logon screen!), and configuring the video display to better that 800x600 was a major job for "Google Man". It is just about sorted now, although I do need to get the Wacom drivers sorted so that my graphics tablet works correctly. Once that's done, I will start doing the Rockbox development install.

I have about 30 to 40 GB disk space for both installions, so space should not be a problem...

Weight Check

At 19:30 on 30-07-2005 : 14st 1lb, 26.7% BF
At 16:30 on 14-08-2005 : 13st 5lb, 26.3% BF
At 19:30 on 29-08-2005 : 13st 3lb, 25.8% BF
At 17:30 on 12-09-2005 : 13st 0lb, 25.7% BF
At 17:30 on 26-09-2005 : 12st 12lb, 25.0% BF
At 19:30 on 10-10-2005 : 12st 10lb, 24.5% BF
At 17:30 on 24-10-2005 : 12st 8 lb, 24.9% BF
At 18:30 on 07-11-2005 : 12st 7 lb, 23.9% BF
At 22:00 on 21-11-2005 : 12st 7 lb, 23.9% BF
At 22:00 on 05-12-2005 : 12st 6 lb, 23.1% BF
At 22:00 on 19-12-2005 : 12st 4 lb, 22.9% BF
At 16:00 on 02-01-2006 : 12st 4 lb, 22.5% BF
At 21:00 on 16-01-2006 : 12st 4 lb, 22.9% BF
At 17:30 on 30-01-2006 : 12st 3 lb, 22.3% BF
At 17:30 on 13-02-2006 : 12st 3 lb, 22.2% BF
At 19:30 on 27-02-2006 : 12st 1 lb, 22.3% BF
At 19:30 on 13-03-2006 : 12st 0 lb, 22.5% BF
At 17:30 on 27-03-2006 : 11st 13lb, 21.9% BF
At 17:30 on 11-04-2006 : 11st 11lb, 21.5% BF
At 17:30 on 24-04-2006 : 11st 10lb, 21.4% BF

Pretty well holding station, which is good... I am happy with my weight, so have no great desire to loose any more, on top of which I can't afford to keep buying new trousers! On top of that, I have changed my diet. No longer is there a great emphasis on keeping the carbs down, although I am not going mad!!, but there is a considerable emphasis on reducing the fat content, whilst increasing my fibre volume... so more fruit & cereals and less red meat and dairy.

Basically 6 months of a strict lo-carb diet has left me underperforming in the toilet department, I now need to rectify this for the good of my health in general, and because in just over a weeks time I will have abdominal stitches to worry about!! Have a look at Audrey Eyton's F2 diet... There is a telling quote in there, you have to walk at a brisk pace for 50 miles to lose 1lb in weight if you do not reduce your intake...

Windows Vista - a fantastic new feature

From Paul Thurrott's SuperSite

There are other non-application-related improvements in build 5342. Now, the system respects resolution changes between users. So you might set up the display for 1024 x 768 for one user, but 1600 x 1200 for the next. As you move back and forth between user accounts, either via Fast User Switching or logging off and logging on, the system will switch resolutions as needed as you move into each account. Eureka.

Want to play with Linux?

Recently VMWARE has released it's 'player' application onto the general public as a freebie...

Run any virtual machine

VMware Player lets you evaluate new or pre-release software contained in virtual machines, without any installation or configuration hassles. You can also share existing virtual machines with colleagues or friends—just use VMware Player to run any virtual machine.
What is a virtual machine?

A virtual machine is a computer defined in software. It's like running a PC on your PC. VMware Player runs any virtual machine created by VMware Workstation, GSX Server or ESX Server. VMware Player also supports Microsoft virtual machines and Symantec LiveState Recovery disk formats.

There are several 'Official' images available from the VMware site, that you can download and try : Ubuntu Linux, Red Hat, SUSE Linux... Totally no destructive - give it a go!