My New Addiction

I've now been a fully fledged Twitter for about 24 hours, and to my great surprise and wonderment, so has Terry Pratchett.  We both started to use Twitter at almost exactly the same time.  How weird is that?

Anyhow, from personal experience, I have found two little applications that make Twittering more fun; for the desktop I have found TweetDeck by Adobe. it's free and it works like a dream.  It allows you to see all your friends Tweets, replies and messages at the same time, plus it has some handy features like automatically minimising url's and group functions etc, well worth a look if you haven't already got it.

For my iPhone I have finally settled on TwitterFon, I have found it the least convoluted and stable application to use.  Its simplicity is a joy and it's quite intuitive to use.  I tried about five different applications for the iPhone, but they all stumbled on reliability and one of them was just plain ugly to look at, and the one thing you don't want the prettiest phone on the planet to be is ugly looking.  Call me fickle, I care not.. hehehe

The strangest thing so far I have found is that many of the old peeps from Modblog and Efx are on there, so I'm sort of catching up with those whose blogs I used to follow but was forced one way or another to vacate. It's been really nice to see them again, I have missed their witty writings.  They all know who they are but I doubt very much they come here though as most of them still reside at that horribly 'unstable place' that I never bother visiting anymore.

As a little experiment, I'm going to put blog updates on Twitter to see if anyone actually gives a shit and comes over to read, if you do, just leave a comment that you did, otherwise I wont bother.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

I’m a Twit

Yup, I've jumped upon the gravy train, like many others before me, I'm now on Twitter.  I suppose this is the end of my individuality, I might as well conform to the expectations of the cyber world.  Look at all those links to the side there, I'm everywhere, like a virus penetrating into the epidermal layers of humanity.

The thing is, my life is rather dull, so whoever feels the need to follow me on this Twitter malarkey will be bored to death by my tweets.  Today I managed to reply to a few messages and leave a couple of status tweets, one of which was 'KingOfAnkh does not think that the powdered custard and the five year old prunes taste quite right…'

I don't want to be overly pessimistic here, but who the hell really wants to know these things?  The banality of being Mr Williams isn't really worthy of other peoples attention in my opinion.

So why am I doing it?

If I am honest with myself, it's because I have heard good things about it, people seem to be enjoying the experience, and I hate to lose out on a bit of fun.  Plus I'm bored shitless.

Do I really need to know what Stephen Fry is doing at this particular moment? Or can I live without knowing which comic book Jonathan Ross is reading?

I used to live quite happily in my ignorance, now I'm finding myself being dragged, kicking and screaming into the horrible depths of the Twitter universe and I'm checking it as often as I'm checking my Facebook page!  The sad thing is, I've only started using it a few hours ago.

If you want to follow my Twitterings, there is a link on the sidebar, or just find me at @KingOfAnkh.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

Name That Tune

I've agreed to do something which I wished I never did.

Some of you might remember that I won an internet competition between bloggers in regard to singing. Yes I can hold a note, but I'm not a performer, although speaking in front of hundreds of people doesn't worry me in the slightest, singing in front of ten people does.

A good friend has asked me to sing for her birthday, I can't refuse, and I'm lucky enough to have someone who can sing publicly who is willing to sing with me, although she is a hundred times better than I.

I need a good duet song, I was thinking…..Cruisin'

Please, please give me some options… 

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

New Safari

My browser of choice is Safari, which in a way is quite predictable knowing that I'm an Apple Fanboy™.  I have tried many of the others, Firefox, Opera, Camino, Netscape, even IE and to be honest, none really compare to Safari in my opinion.  It's stable, it's simple and it displays the web pages correctly, what more could you ask?

Well, Apple have brought out a newer version, Safari 4 Beta, so as a dutiful Apple Fanboy™ I downloaded it to try it out.

I thought that it being a beta version it wouldn't override my older version of Safari, but Apple having the balls of steel that they have, have decided in their infinate wisdom that the new version is what everybody wants.

So I play along and start using it.

Apparently there are over 150 new features, I'll be damned if I can find them, but there are some good things and some very bad things with this new version.

I like the Top Sites page, it's a simple coverflow of the pages you visit most, a graphic representation of your favourite sites if you will.  Very handy when you switch from one to the other a lot, like I do.  The downside is that you can't add the sites you want there, it automatically goes through your history to find out which pages to display.  Bit of a ball ache if you like to visit such sites as Transvestite Bitches With Stilettos, as it will be right on up there next to Facebook.  Might be embarrassing if you happen to start browsing and your mother was in the room for instance.  It would be nice to have the option to add whichever sites you see fit.

Otherwise the rest of the browsing experience is rather the same as the old version, apart from the Bookmarks Menu.  This now looks like Apples iTunes Store.  Makes life slightly harder to sort out your bookmarks, especially if you are like me, adding webpages to my bookmarks menu for later reading, especially if I'm somewhere where I don't have access to Wi-Fi.  I don't really need to see each page as a graphic, I just want to see the links, quick and easy.  I haven't found a way of turning this option off, so I'll assume it's hotwired into Safari. Me no likey!

I suppose this is a beta version and it will get tweaked a little before the real version is let loose on the world, so I mustn't complain too much

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

University Challenged

I don't have a TV, so most of my knowledge of what happens on the box comes from reading the newspapers or from the net.  But saying that, when I did watch TV, one of my favourite shows was University Challenge.

For those of you who have not seen or even heard of it, it's a quiz program that has been running for decades which pits the best of the best from the top universities in the UK.

The questions are demanding to say the least, personally I'm quite happy if I answer ten or so questions throughout the whole program, and this is coming from someone who answers most of the questions in our Pub Quiz team which has had a five week winning streak.

So it's with great sadness I read this article today.

Apparently Gail Trimble, the team captain for Oxford's Corpus Christi Collage, managed to answer two thirds of all questions thrown at the team over the four qualifying rounds before presiding over their win in the final.  I'd say that was an amazing performance.

But the truly sad part of the story lies in the reaction from the public and the media.

She's been ridiculed on blogs and social networking sites because she's too clever and stories have been published about her appearance.

Which makes me wonder what is so wrong about being well educated?  And I hate to say it, well educated and female, because I really don't think any of this would have been newsworthy if Gail was a man.

The thing is, I don't really see what people are going on about.  I find her quite attractive and the fact that she's intelligent makes her even more desirable in my opinion.

I suppose what it all boils down to is jealousy.  It's a sad world we live in when people who work hard and try their best are derided by society.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

My Stats

As of the time of posting, these statistics about me were correct, quite fascinating I feel, but you could say that I have far too much time on my hands.

Age: 34

Day I was born: Thursday

Days lived: 12,531

Months lived: 411

Exact age: 34 years, 3 months, 19 days

Time alive: 300,734:04:09

Hours lived: 300,734

Minutes lived: 180,44,044

Seconds lived: 1,082,642,649

Approx hours slept: 100,245

Days sleeping: 4,177

% of life asleep: 33%

Approx number of heartbeats: 1,299,171,179

Zodiac sign: Scorpio

Chinese star sign: Tiger

Years to retirement: 30

Days to retirement: 11,209

Approx number of workdays: 8,007

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

You Can’t Choose

I had a message from my sister this evening, professing that the images I have put up on Bookface were porn, she was disgusted with me and said that I shouldn't dare put pictures like that up again because people in my hometown talk!

Well fuck me pink, I don't live there anymore, and every time I go home, no fucker wants to talk to me. So why the shit should I care?  My life is what it is.  Anyone who has a problem should come talk to me about it, and if they disrespect my family because I have a more interesting life than they do, they need to take a chill-pill and have a look at their own existence, perhaps to look deeply into their own repression.

I have run a nightclub that involved prostitution and strippers, am I ashamed of it? No!  It is in my past, but I'd happily go back into it tomorrow, it was the best time of my life.  

I found the reality of life there, I understand the meaning of hardship and elation.  Tomorrow, I have to go out hunting for rabbits because I need to eat, and there is my sister, as comfortable as a royal, with no idea how hard life can be on the other side.

Nudity is not something to be ashamed of, it's something that should be celebrated.  Sex is GOOD! In fact I'd go as far as to say that sex is GOD!  When you submerge your instincts in the mire of false hope and religion, you lose the basics of life in my opinion.  My only goal in life is to have more sex and more sex before I die, and if you all look deeply within yourselves, I don't think you would disagree.

I will not reply to her message, she obviously doesn't understand me, nor my life.

Read and post comments

Fight Night (Live)

By popular demand, I'm almost forced to write about an incident that happened down the pub last Saturday.  I was going to make an update about it on Sunday, but I didn't feel it was blogworthy fodder, but several people want to hear my take on what happened, so without further ado…..

You know those evenings you sometimes get, when all around you is exuding an air of violence, Saturday was like that.  I'd been in the pub since 2pm, I wanted to watch the Six Nations Rugby and without a TV at home the best place to view it is at the local pub.

It was probably the best match of the tournament that was about to take place, Wales v England, always a hard match, always a grudge match. So believe me when I say, when there are only two Welshmen amongst fifty or so English supporters, you should feel a bit intimidated, but this is rugby, all the fighting happens on the pitch, never amongst the supporters.

We have a good banter, throwing insults and cheering at the other teams mistakes, but it is all taken in jest and we're all friends before, during and after the match.

It was during this match that the first chords of disquiet were thrown.

One idiot, who I'll describe as a soccer supporter, misunderstood how rugby players enjoy their game. His comments and remarks were becoming more and more personal and even the English supporters were telling him to shut up, unfortunately he couldn't keep his drunken tirades to himself and my good Welsh friend took upon him to wind him up a little, which he deserved.  But the incident went without further note and we continued with the evening.

Enter a crown of lads who don't normally drink at our establishment, the air of oppression hung deep.

You know how it is, you are sitting there, not really listening to what your friends are talking about, it goes into your ears as noise and you answer them without really taking on board what is being said.  It's a good marker with me, you should know that when I'm not paying attention to you I'm getting ready to haul you out of the way for your own good, usually before a bottle or a body flies across your head.

So the evening was very much like that. It wasn't a matter if it was going to kick off, it was a matter of when.

It surprised me when it did, I didn't expect this guy to bite. He's usually the calmest most personable guy to be around, but I suppose someone hitting you in the head and threatening to kill you might put things in a different perspective.

So I jump in, along with the new manager and a guy we'll call Big D, we hold back the aggressors whilst poor guy who got punched is moved away. I had to laugh because the idiot that started it all took his top off and his shoe and wanted to carry on, he just looked bloody stupid.  His mate was trying to fill his sock with pool balls and his girlfriend was going ballistic with a pool cue.

We eventually calmed them down enough to take them out, so manager takes out the first, the guy who started it and as I was following with my errant ward, I saw a fist fly in from the side that totally caught this guy square on the middle of his face.

With a noise similar to a car crashing into a herd of cows, this lad went flying about six feet and landed on his arse, didn't even know what happened.  I suppose he shouldn't have come to a strange pub and start fighting.

So it started to kick off again, I got fed up with the girlfriend, marched her out, Big D got the other guy who I was marching out, and comatose guy was led out wondering why his face hurt so much.

All's well that ends well you might think…. No.

Outside the guy who was still awake punched a girl who was coming into the pub and about twenty guys rushed out and tried to kill him for his efforts.  Police arrived, batons drawn, pepper spray used, all quite hilarious when you are stood on the door refusing access to anyone I thought looked like they didn't fit.

I'd say that five or six people were arrested, the strangers were well known to the police as they had dealings with them in the past for exactly the same thing.  Makes me wonder sometimes, why do people come out looking for trouble?  Life is too short for all this rubbish.

I did however have a slight giggle to myself when the girlfriend tried to gain access after I threw her out, she was kicking and screaming at the door, quite amazing the amount of damage she caused herself doing so.  Eventually a policewoman kindly helped her to the police car for her stay at the station.

So all in all, not much of a hoohah, just enough to cause the instigators a lot of pain and trouble.  I expect they will think twice about coming back to our hometown again, but you never know with idiots like them.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

Update

I know, I've been a bad blogger, it's been five days since I have written anything.

What has been happening? Well, the main news in my life at the moment is that I have officially lost my job, again. It seems that this will be an ongoing thing for me, twice now around the same time of year.

I'm not that bothered about losing this particular job though, I didn't like it, but it did pay the rent.  My only worry i that I might be out of work for a long time, it seems that everyone is losing their jobs and each week I look for work in the papers, the jobs section is getting more and more threadbare.

I'm sure something will come along eventually, but it does mean that I'll be skint for the foreseeable future and that my car will be off-roaded once again, making little jobs like going to the laundrette and food shopping ever so much harder seeing that I live a mile away from the town.

In my previous post I mentioned I was going to volunteer as a poster maker for a local charity, although I initially had some responses by e-mail from the charity they have since failed to contact me, so I think I'll have to find something else. I know that there are quite a few charities locally that could do with some help and seeing that I have a lot of time on my hands I might as well make myself useful.  I think it's very important not to stagnate when you're out of work, it's easy to slip into a rut and I've been there, it wasn't pleasant.

Onwards and upwards they say.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend

Volunteering

In an effort to get my arse into gear, a friend of mine helped me to get a grip and find myself this evening.  The conclusion reached was I need something that inspires me and gives me something to work for.

So I joined an online site that helps people find voluntary work.

I'm not going to be helping out with people who need care, although I can lend a sympathetic ear, I don't think I have the aptitude for such things. Nor am I going to help out with animals, I think I might lose my temper with people who abuse them. So I filled in the form stating my skills and what I can offer, it seems there might be an opening for someone who can make posters for a local charity.

Not a huge help to the world, but every little helps.  If my Pshopping skills can be of use to anyone, then they are more than welcome to use my talents, however meek they may be.

I do hope they phone me, even if it's just a one off thing, I don't mind.  I just need something to get my mind to focus on the bigger picture rather than my own little space.

Now I just need to sort out the rest of my life.

Read and post comments | Send to a friend