Kind: Articles
Traditional long form content: a post with an explicit title and body.
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A Winemaking Idea
For centuries - and particularly in Wales - people have made silver birch wine from the sap of the silver birch tree. We have loads of them around here, and this is apparently the perfect time of year to collect their sap. If enough people feel like helping me harvest sap and making wine, we'll …
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Spring Is Here: The Gulls Say So
Well, Spring's finally coming around: the tell tale sign for me is that the black-headed gulls are back. One flew over my head as I crossed the bridge on the way to work this morning; for your reference, they're the ones that look like this:
Their reappearance is a good sign that the weather's taking a … -
Dark Side Active Listening
Disclaimer: we don't endorse any of this.
Following my post about active listening a few weeks back, JTA and I have been discussing the potential of what we're calling Dark Side Active Listening - that is; the use (misuse?) of the skills taught by practitioners of active listening for the purpose of upsetting, infuriating, disorienting, or … -
Aberystwyth Webcams Widget
There's a reason that people shouldn't show me new programming languages and development platforms: I try them out. Even when I've got other things I should be doing. Ah well.
And so I'd like to present: the Aberystwyth Webcams Widget [update: link dead], which collates the images of the three Ceredigion Country Council webcams into … -
Another Weekend In Norfolk
Right - Claire and I will be out of town this weekend: this, combined with Pagan Wanderer Lu's upcoming gig in the Cooper's Arms, Aberystwyth (which I'm sorry to be missing!) on Saturday, means there'll be no Troma Night this week. Sorry, guys, but hey - you should be at the Cooper's Arms anyway.
We'll be … -
Claire, “Friends Only” Weblogs, And Employment
As Jon said, people like Alec and Suz have made their weblogs friends-only for the purpose of attempting to hide what goes in in their lives from employers, prospective employers, or the world in general. On the purpose of hiding such things from employers, I think that Claire's most recent blog post (which talks about …
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Grr! Money!
After getting myself all pleased that the first of the month was coming and I'd have some money to pay the rent, the bills (phone/ADSL got disconnected this morning; BT are unreasonable cunts), etc., guess what - I'm exactly as poor as I was yesterday.
Fucking shitty wank arse buggery. I'm owed £300 by a client, … -
Vespers
Some time ago, I recommended Photopia as a great text-based adventure for both beginners and veterans: with a great, sweet story (with a slightly depressing ending) and a short play time, it's just great to show people why text-based adventures are fun.
Here's my latest recommendation: Vespers. It's dark, cold, and disturbing - insanity, bubonic plague, … -
Features UNIX Has That Life Needs
It's come to my attention that there are a lot of things that computers in general - and, in particular, UN*X-flavoured operating systems - offer that are sadly lacking in Real Life. I'm hoping that Life 2.0 will include a number of these features. (Life 2.0, of course, will not be like Web 2.0 - …
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Active Listening
I just thought I'd take the time to share with you all some things I've learned about active listening over the last few years: techniques to benefit more fluid communication with less scope for conflicts - and with the capability to help de-fuse arguments before they get out of control. I know that I've spoken …
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Microsoft Visual Studio 2005
What is a "setup experience"? And why do Microsoft want to share it with me, anyway?
I can't actually find a definition of the word "performant" - can anybody help? -
IRC Doesn’t Kill People - People Do!
There's just been an interesting debate on the RockMonkey ChatRoom (#RockMonkey on Freenode) about where the channel is going, where power should lie, and all that jazz. It's pretty much inevitable that this kind of discussion takes place on a channel, but this is the first time I've seen it happen on such a small …
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Open Mic Night
As I'd promised, I went along to the Ground Zero open mic night at The Angel tonight - and it was a most spectacular night. Matt was MC, and did a wonderful series of gags and skits to liven up the crowd and fill the gaps between the performers. Unusually, all the acts were of …
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A Change Of Plan
Okay, contrary to what was advertised earlier, there won't be a Geek Night this week (unless Claire or somebody else wants to run one), as I'll be going to the open mic night at The Angel, where Matt'll be doing his stuff. If you were going to be coming to Geek Night but now (obviously) …
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What’re You Doing This Week?
For the benefit of the Abnibbers (and the other folks that hang around The Place), here's a roundup of some of the events of the rest of the week:
Thursday
Naruto Night from 8pm, as usual. Proposed anime for the night includes Bleach and Excel Saga, with the possibility of Full Metal Alchemist if the appropriate episodes …