family

Claire’s Birthday, and Preston

Well, Claire and I are in Preston. We travelled up here last night (after a few false starts, including getting to Mach before realising we’d left the Green Day tickets blu-tacked to the wall “so we don’t forget them” in Aber and having to turn back). Claire’s been made out to be a bookworm again, with a heap of new reading material to keep her occupied for the coming year.

Visited my mum’s house. My sisters are typically hilarious. They’ve got a new chicken (after the last ones were eaten by foxes) + chicks, and a new guinea pig (called Pork Chop, which I think is a fantastic name for a guinea pig), and the puppies have grown up so it’s complete mayhem of the excitable 3-month-old doggy variety. They’d decorated a cake for Claire’s birthday, which read “Happy Birfday [sic] Mini Melton” and had an (anatomically correct) picture of her, with an arrow and the word “You” pointing to it.

This evening, we’re off to see Feeder and R.E.M. at the Old Trafford Cricket Ground, which’ll be fab, and then tomorrow, we’re travelling down to Milton Keynes to see Green Day (& friends), then we’ll spend Sunday in London before returning to Aber. This puts Troma Night in the hands of those of you still in Aber. Bryn has a key to the flat, and I’ve changed my password on Duality to something you’ll be able to guess: to determine it, look at the large yellow sign in the kitchen – there is a mis-spelling on it, and there is a number on it. Type the mis-spelled word (in lowercase) as it appears on the sign, followed by the number. If you have any trouble, text me. And if somebody could record/download the Dr. Who episode (as Claire and I will miss it), that’d be great.

I mentioned to my family that the computer game that’s occupied me most of late is Microsoft Train Simulator. My dad seemed pleased, but the rest of my family seem to want to award me an anorak. Once she’d checked to see that I wasn’t joking, the dialogue with Becky went as follows:

Bex: Microsoft Train Simulator?
Dan: Yup.
Bex: Trains?
Dan: Uh-huh.
Bex: So… what? You plan train routes, manage finances, that kind of thing…
Dan: No, it’s not like Transport Tycoon. You drive trains.
Bex: You… drive trains.
Dan: Yeah; you drive different kinds of trains along real-world routes to a schedule.
Bex: So… do you like; earn money and you can buy better trains? Or unlock secret areas?
Dan: No.
Bex: Wh… bu… <disapproving silence>

Well; I’m guessing she won’t be wanting a copy, then.

Could Be A Lot Worse

At least my week’s getting better towards the end. Extracts from an e-mail from my mum:

…work – complete nightmare, back-to-back meetings most days with no time to implement the outcomes and so much work looming I don’t know where to start… …XXXXX is pregnant and leaving in a month or two (not to be replaced) and XXXXXXX’s contract is finishing soon which leaves….. er…. ME to do Banner support for the University (a task undertaken by teams of up to 20 at other Unis)… …One of the puppies is seriously ill with Juvenile Cellulitis and currently has a head twice the normal size and filled with pus… …antibiotics four times a day…. which means I have to go home every lunchtime… …we were raided by foxes and all the chickens have been taken… …to cap it all XXXXX is terminally ill (cancer) with only a few months to live…

My week seems just peachy by comparison. Hang in there, mum!

1000… 2000… 3000… Check Canopy! (Claire’s take)

This is a repost promoting content originally published elsewhere. See more things Dan's reposted.

This repost was published in hindsight, on 11 March 2019.

Claire wrote:

Yesterday I spent about 8 hours watching Dan and his Dad learn how to parachute. They did their first jump at about 6pm. It was a very comprehensive course, and I think that I could probably have jumped out with them, had I the money. They are jumping more today, I am joining them for lunch with the rest of his family and if they are good they will both get to do free fall (previously they did static line – the plane pulls out your parachute as you fall).

I didn’t realise quite how many safety procedures went into a parachute. Not only is there a reserve chute, but it can be released by
a) you cutting away the main chute (pull the red thing)
b) you pulling the reserve rip cord
c) your altimeter reaching a set height above a certain speed

So, even if you are unconscious, and your main parachute hasn’t opened, you will float gently to an area within 100m of the dropzone (They drop you such that if you use reserve you would land in the right place without even steering.)

With that in mind I am going to sign myself up for the university’s skydiving club in September. Dan seemed to enjoy it and thinks I would too.

Typically Busy

[this post was lost during a server failure on 11 July 2004; it was partially-recovered on 13 October 2018]

Another couple of weeks of academic nightmare coming up, followed by the Easter Break (during which I’ll be working, ho hum). I’ve got to do my second “poster session” presentation for my dissertation a week on Wednesday; next week I have all my pracs *and* I’m helping out backstage with the Student Skills competition. Oh; and I managed to get myself persuaded to go into the office at the weekend, forgetting that my mum’s visiting. D’oh.

Oh yeh; my mum’s visiting this weekend. She’s bringing Andy (the BF¹) and Puddles (the KCS²) along for Troma Night. Which is nice.

And, in other shiny happy news, I sold my old copy of The Sims: Party Pack for about the same value as it can be bought in shops. Yay, and, indeed, hey.

And, while I’m on the ball – other shiny happy news – I’ve managed to grovel to the bank and secure myself a dramatically increased overdraft, interest free, until September. Which means I can afford to pay for my ADSL subscription. Oh; and the …

Christmas Is Coming, The Exams Are Getting Written

[this post was lost during a server failure on Sunday 11th July 2004; it was partially recovered on 21st March 2012]

I haven’t done any yet.

I’ll start tommorow. Better call my mum and get some tips on what my sisters are into this year. Becky’s typically quite easy – she usually just wants the most violent computer game released in the last three months – but Sarah, who’s desires are driven by the fluctuations of what is and what is-not fashionable at any particular time (“That is so last week! Nobody listens to clip-hop any more!”)

Claire and I are going to be spending Christmas (and a couple of days before) with Claire’s dad. Then we’ll travel all the way up the country – with her dad in tow – on Boxing Day to spend the weekend with my family. We’ll be back in Aberystwyth in time for New Year. And then I suppose I’d better start revising.

For the benefit mostly of myself (this is a convenient look-up point), but also just to show you all, my exam timetable for this semester appears at the bottom of this post…

Only three exams! Woo. I feel moderately confident enough about them – although I’ll need to knuckle down and read up a lot of formal notation stuff for the SE33010 exam. I’ve also got an assignment to do for my Professional … [the rest of this post, and one comment, are lost]

Yo-Ho-Ho And A Bottle Of Caern ‘O’ Moor

My mum and my sisters came down for the weekend. I’d not quite gotten around to recovering from my illness these past few days, so I was probably at least slightly grotty company, but nonetheless we all had a good time.

We visited Little Amsterdam, Aberystwyth’s first sex shop, shortly after they opened on Monday morning. They’ve got a huge selection of smoking goodies on display, and magic mushrooms for sale, but the sex toys won’t be arriving until Friday, I’m told. Aww. I play with myself a lot more often than I smoke. Ah well; I’ll return when they have some. At any rate, I got the chance to congratulate the store on making it to Aber after it’s months of legal efforts. Great work!

I’ve just bought a lifetime subscription to Yohoho! Puzzle Pirates!, perhaps the best MMORPG I’ve ever seen. It’s very, very impressive. If you haven’t seen it yet, give it a go.

When my family left, Paul, Claire and I lounged, drank a couple of bottles of red wine, and played You Don’t Know Jack, a hilarious quiz game, on our TV. Paul won by a mile, and only a few times did I manage to finish with a score above zero (although I did improve as I got more drunk). Claire puked.

I need to catch up on all the lecture notes I’ve missed this last week. And apologise to my personal tutor for not having been at the tutorial meeting. And get to the office tomorrow and catch up on some *real* work. And harrass the Student Loans Company into getting me money faster.

Andy’s Party And Other Happenings Up North

This is my third and final attempt to write this journal entry without something terrible happing that causes me to lose it in it’s entirety.

Spent a long weekend (Friday to Tuesday) in the North-West of England, firstly at Andy’s party, then later visiting my folks in Preston, with Claire. Details follow…

ANDY’S PARTY
The weekend started at Andy’s 21st birthday party, in Bury/Bolton/somewhere-in-that-whole-Northern-Greater-Manchester-area. It was an absolutely fantastic party, with beer flowing freely down our chins and onto the floor, interspersed only with drinking other things, including but not limited to helium from a great quantity of balloons we shouldn’t have been left near. Now that other people I know are passing the great 21-barrier, I don’t feel quite so old (at 22).

Andy’s speech was beautiful and heartbreaking. The food was great. The company was even better. It was great to see folks who I’d not seen since the end of term (and, in some cases, who I won’t see again for some time). Later, we retired to Andy’s house and lounged around drinking and talking until approaching 5am (I, sadly, fell asleep at about 3:30, as Claire had some hours before).

You can read other accounts of Andy’s party here, and here, and here too. And yes, I know it’s bad practice to make a list of links like this, but I don’t care: this is my third attempt at this entry, okay?

The following morning, we played Mario Party 4, and Claire won!!! With a hangover, no less. This is her first time as the ‘Party Star’, and she seemed glad of it: as my entries on 30th June and 7th July, among others, show, I have a bad case of winning whenever I play. This was, I believe, the first time I’ve ever not won. I came second. Barely. ;-)

MY FAMILY
After this, Claire and I continued to Preston to meet my mum, my sisters, and my gran, who’s visiting from Hartlepool. I hadn’t seen my gran in about a year, and it was good to see her again… although she still insists – most strangely, somewhat favouritistically, and at least slightly tactlessly, that of her two children and five grandchildren, I am the ‘favourite’ – the ‘special one’, as she puts it – old people, eh? [photo removed]

Played lots of Super Monkey Ball 2 and Mario Party 4. Sarah, the elder of my two younger sisters, and the self-dubbed ‘white sheep of the family’, is getting to be really good at the former. Spent a great deal of time at the pub. Watched “Sinbad: Legend Of The Seven Seas”, a very well animated and clever cartoon feature film from Dreamworks, with an all-star voice cast. Apart from some confusion over the motivation of the evil goddess Erin, and a little over-frequency of ‘saw it coming’ (probably less of an issue for the children at whom the film is targeted), this is a very good film.

Back in Aber now, and have loads of work to do before a deadline on Friday. Better get on with it.

The Return From Lancashire

Spent the last four days in Lancashire and elsewhere in the North of England, visiting my folks (among other things). Details follow…

Sunday 29th June 2003
Dan’s Mum’s House, Preston
Helped fix my mum’s fence, and enjoyed the challenge of removing a pigeon from her gutter. This stupid bird, it seems, on a collision course for the house (shitting on the window as it came), struck the roof with sufficient force to kill itself, and then rolled gracefully into the gutter, where it became lodged.

Using a clever combination of metal rods and string, Claire and I were able to lasso it’s foot from one of the upstairs windows and, a few pokes later, lob it’s rotting corpse down to my sister, waiting below.

My dad kindly let me take one of his bikes – Silver Machine – back to Aber with me, which’ll make getting to and from work a lot nicer. Must buy a lock for it.

Got back at about midnight. Claire spent most of the night tied to the bed, which was fun. Enough said.

Back From Lancashire, Continued

Spent the last four days in Lancashire and elsewhere in the North of England, visiting my folks (among other things). Details follow…

Saturday 28th June 2003
Dan’s Mum’s House, Preston
More video games. Yet again I won at Mario Party 4. Claire is starting to get really pissed-off with always coming second-place. I don’t think she’d mind being last or second-to-last all the time, but coming second-place time and time again really seems to annoy her. Particularly when I proceed to dance around the room chanting “I am the Party Star!” at the top of my voice. Ah well.

Horton Tower, Horton
Went with Claire and my family to see the annual symphony orchestra at Horton Tower. It wasn’t as good as last year, but it was still fun. Taught Claire to waltz.

More to follow…

Back From Lancashire, Continued

Spent the last four days in Lancashire and elsewhere in the North of England, visiting my folks (among other things). Details follow…

Friday 27th June 2003
Dan’s Mum’s House, Preston
Played on Claire’s Nintendo GameCube with Claire, my mum, and sisters. I won at Mario Party 4.
Went to meet the managing director who’ll be taking over from my dad upon his retirement. He didn’t seem remotely scared enough by the idea that if my dad fell under a bus (oh; the irony of a transport consultant being run over by a public transport vehicle), I’d be his majority shareholder, nor did he seem to believe all the stories the rest of the staff told about me. He’ll be taught to fear me, yet… <evil grin>

Later, met up with Andy, Dan’s AvAngel.com co-webmaster, and played more video games, before going out for KFC and to see Bruce Almighty at the cinema, which was a pretty damn cool film.

Finally, retired to my mum’s house for yet more video games. I won at Mario Party 4. Again.

More to follow…

Postcards to Grandma

The postcards pictured below, among others, were given to me by my grandmother, pre-stamped, when I started university in September 1999, to encourage me to let me know how I was getting along. Originally privately posted to my gran, I posted pictures on them online elsewhere in 2006, having recovered them from her house after her death. The place they were posted is long-gone, so on 25 May 2019 I retroactively posted them here, back-dated to their original authorship.

Transcription:

Gran,

Hi! I didn’t know that you didn’t have my address down here in Wales until my mum sent me an e-mail and told me, so I thought I’d send you a card and tell you what it is, so that when the money runs out and I end up in the eating-cold-baked-beans-straight-from-the-tin stage, I can phone you and you can send a food parcel… Only kidding. Course is great; freedom is better; ladies are gorgeous. Lovely place here.

All my love, Dan

Transcription:

Gran,

No money. No time. Suicidally depressed. Knife-wound isn’t healing…

Only joking! Having a great time, really! All the fun of the fair! Aberystwyth remains typically rainy, but spirits are high and beer prices are low, so that doesn’t matter!

Having a Christmas Dinner with the Computer Society on Wednesday, and coming back to Preston on Saturday (18th Dec). Been a busy week, between Final Deadlines, Getting Stood Up, Living A Party Life and Sleeping. Think I’ll have a long lie-in, tomorrow, and Honey Loops for breakfast! Yeh!

Fond regards; Dan

Cool Thing Of The Day

Cool And Interesting Thing Of The Day To Do At The University Of Wales, Aberystwyth, #44:

Phone your father… That’s right – until today, I hadn’t spoken to him since he ‘deposited’ me in Aberystwyth. I have now. Well: there’s a first for everything.

The ‘cool and interesting things’ were originally published to a location at which my “friends back home” could read them, during the first few months of my time at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, which I started in September 1999. It proved to be particularly popular, and so now it is immortalised through the medium of my weblog.

Avatar Diary

Got up late, and had lunch with my mum before returning to my dad’s house. Made a chicken stir-fry for tea (one of my few culinary skills) while my dad repaired his bike… I wasn’t actually being considerate of others needs: I was just hungry. Watched “Gattaca” on video in the evening, followed by Channel 5’s late film, “The Demolitionist”. Neither was particually good.