Well, I’m writing this on my iPaq. So apologies for any random spelling mistakes (grafitti typos can be quite random!). I did, of course, buy myself a keyboard for this but the connection seems a bit dodgy so I guess it’s going back in the New Year.

Being away from my pooters this week (I’m up north visiting my folks) I am really appreciating my funky little iPaq. So very cool! Roll on a wireless network, I say ;-)

So this is Christmas. For some reason, and I really can’t put my finger on it, I don’t feel at all festive at the moment. That’s not to say that I feel miserable or depressed, just that Christmas seems to have passed me by. OK, it hasn’t actually happened yet but you get the idea. Perhaps it’s just that I missed out on the preparation through working and such. Still, I’m sure tomorrow will be fun.

Perhaps I should design myself a proper antigeek Christmas for next year – some themed Quake, a festive hardware build and a turkey and stuffing pizza ;-)

Anyway, despite my lack of festive feelings, a happy Christmas to everyone!

Oh, and a special hello to any deconstruct.me.uk readers who have ventured over here. You are most welcome.

That story lead-in line made me laugh. As did the picture caption of “Ho, ho, ho” he whispered.

Not the norm, but if anyone knows when Season 6 of Buffy will be coming out on DVD then I’d love to know.  Our marathon has taken us nearly to the end of Season 4, but it’s always reassuring to know that we have plenty more to watch…

Wow. Every time I get the chance to look at the current status of computer technology I am amazed. Really. It always seems that there have been amazing leaps, interesting new devices, everything is faster and cheaper. Yesterday was one of those “catch up” days where I read lots of hardware reviews, found out what Serial ATA was capable of, compared lots of prices and, most excitingly, splashed out on a new computer. Well, pretty much a new computer.

For a while we have wanted to get a video server in our flat for easy digital recording and playback of programmes. My solution is to devote Rivron (my current main desktop machine) to this and buy myself a shiny (literally – check out the steel case!) new one. Naming is tbc but I think Edmonds is a strong contender.

So I have the second week of my holiday figured out – building and installing three machines. To me this is quite an exciting prospect. I’m even considering trying a different linux distributon to my faithful Mandrake for one of the machines.

Meanwhile, I’m heading north for a family Christmas (TM). Should be good though I’m taking a little light reading. With time available and now that I have whizzy GPRS and bluetooth I shall try and write some more this week. Goodness, I almost feel I should adorn the site with some flash Christmas lights or something. But that would be wrong.

From Monday 23rd at 7pm, Demolition, on “five”. So here’s “five” reasons to watch:

1) It’s a weeknightly gameshow about “demolishing objects using an assortment of destructive tools”. That’s a good enough reason in itself (unless you’re talking about Robot Wars, which you should avoid).

2) It hosted by Emily Booth, who I think is one of the presenters of that ITV late night computer games programme, the name of which I’ve forgotten. But if it is her, then imho, she’s gorgeous.

3) It’s on “five”, weeknights at 7pm. That means that Live With Chris Moyles ISN’T on!

4) erm…..

5) and thats your “five” reasons to watch “five”

Well, after a bit of luckless trawling I found this site which seems to have a reasonably selection of calendars and some very bizarre ones. I can’t place my finger on why, but the Will Smith calendar just doesn’t look very official. And I’m not sure that Gary Lucy deserves his own calendar. Still, good to see that the Hollyoaks Babes calendar is still going strong. But there aren’t any calendars that stick out as must-haves this year (perhaps you think that this is the case every year but, no, calendars can be mighty items of desire!). Perhaps it will have to be the ultra-geeky O’Reilly calendar after all.

Oh dear. Big gaps like this tend to mean that things are busy at work for me (or that I’m feeling particularly lazy). Well, work is slowly ramping up to what might become a very busy December (not so sure where “holiday” fits into this plan yet, but we shall see). Perhaps it might be more profitable to work through the Christmas period (as things are busy at the moment) and take some holiday in the new year… Anyway, didn’t want to (Dermot O’Leary style) leave you hangin’ so a quick update is in order.

I went to Coventry again last weekend (Mr. Hardman kindly gave me a lift on the way there) and my train journey back actually went according to schedule (I had to stand up for half of it but, well, it was an improvement on the previous week). It was fun to do another show (one of those things that passes in a blur though, I really can’t remember what Mark and I discussed other than, uh, Christina Aguilera’s piercings… hmm) and to see quite a few people that I hadn’t seen for a while.

Gadget-wise, I now have a “jacket” for my iPaq. It’s MASSIVE! Well, I’m not sure what I expected from something that provides the ability to attach two PCMCIA cards but, anyway, it’s very cool. Particularly the “shotgun reloading” sound effect that the iPaq makes (somewhat unnecessarily) when it is slotted into the jacket. Now all I need to do is think about getting a network card (oooh, should we go wireless?) that will work with it and I can start having a lot of fun with it round the flat… I have a keyboard on order too which I am hoping will help me pass those hotel-bound evenings (should I actually have any time in the evenings after work) instant messaging without getting “grafitti thumb”.

I’m off to look for a calendar for our flat. I’ll keep you updated.

…yeah, I know I’m nicking things from Slashdot, but hey.

“The BBC announced that the Digital Domesday project which had become unusable has now been revived thanks to the successful emulation of a 1980’s era Acorn computer”

The reason I blog this, is because I was just thinking about the Digital Domesday project last week. I remember spending AGES stood at the machine in the basement of The Science Museum, aged 12, looking at maps and photos of my home-town and being blown-away. Now theres the internet, but at the time this was awesome, and I wondered what had happened to it. Now I know.