Rob's Blog

Arthur Dent, Barbarella, and a very small planet
Oct 30th 2006 13:10

On Saturday evening I ticked something of my “10 things to do before you die” list. On Friday morning I got up at silly AM so I could get to London for a reasonable hour to start work. I honestly don't know how people commute. I really think the walk from my bedroom to the office via a cup of coffee is about as long as I could handle these days. Friday night I met up with Ari and Rachel in Oxford street for an evening of general catching up, and excessive drinking. After getting lost in a maze of streets we eventually, passing many other bars, found our way to the Piano and Pitcher in Dean Street. I was very upset to find out that not only was there no piano but that they didn't do pitchers of beer. Pushing an irksome sense of disappointment to one side beer was poured, bottles of wine were purchased, and the banter was flowing. (We did, however, neglect to eat any dinner. It really didn't take much to get me very drunk!). In the Piano and Pitcher a strange thing happened... so far away from the streets of Brighton I bumped into not one, but two people I knew. Both were called Ben. And no, I wasn't seeing double (yet). One was walking past outside, one was working in the bar. What are the chances? I spent the majority of Saturday shopping in Ealing, feeling mildly hungover, and reading 'The wind-up bird chronicles' on a range of public transport as I made my way towards Archway. I was in a good mood. A very good mood. Saturday night is when the magic happened. On Saturday night, I went to a random fancy dress party in Islington. I, it was only fitting, went dressed as Arthur Dent. Towel and everything. It was perfect. Big tick next to that one. My attempts to explain the costume became easier when someone exclaimed “Oh! Right - you've come as Tim from the Office! I get it now, that's really good!”. Philistines. In between Dave pouring me glasses of 'Red Wine and Coke' (he might be a good estate agent, but nobody should ever let that man work in a cocktail bar) I met Barbarella, a parole officer. The Grim Reaper, a cocoa negotiator for a major biscuit manufacturer. The Wardrobe from Narnia, who could open the wardrobe doors with her cleavage. Teen Wolf, James Bond, and a never ending assortment of witches. Zaphod never showed. If the world ends now at least I've ticked something off that list. Actually... it's lunch time now. I think I'm going to nip out for 6 pints of biter and a few packets of peanuts....

Arachnophobia
Oct 22nd 2006 17:10

Every time I want to have a shower in the evening here's what I have to do: I walk down the corridor and step through a hole in the wall, not a door, a hole. On the other side I cross a rather spooky room, an unlit corridor, descend some creaky wooden steps, go down a stone floored passageway, and open the door of the cupboard under the stairs. The position of the light switch is such that you need to fully enter the dark room and close the door behind you before having to fumble around in the dark for the previously unreachable light pull. Only then can you do an initial scan of the room and shower cubicle for the mother-spider from Arachnophobia. Contrary to common belief Jeff Daniels never actually killed that spider 16 years ago and it is now biding its time before launching a cheap sequel in Somerset relying solely on our quaint English accents to pack out the American box office in order to make enough money to retire back in South America. The walk to the shower room next door is just long enough to build an unhealthy fear of spiders yet not quite long enough to justify an unwashed existence. On my walk to the shower this evening I had a though. Those who aren't of a normal arachnophobic persuasion often try to persuade us that “the spider's much more scared of you”. Now, I've just been pondering why that's never carried much weight for me, and I've just hit the flaming nail gun on the head:

If our fear of them is irrational, why should their fear of us be rational?

It's just not an inductively sound argument to believe that all spiders are scared of people. A rather more logical speculation is that something like 37% of all spiders irrationally despise humans and believe that regardless of size difference they happily kill a fully grown adult male. I've never actually come across a homicidal and irrational spider... and for that I count myself lucky.

The Vagrant life of a Web Developer
Oct 19th 2006 19:10

This week I have mostly been working from Brighton, London, Somerset and my car. It's been a funny sort of a nomadic week like that.

I spent Monday night at Sam&Lisa's, and Tuesday night and Julian&Margaretta's. Both excellent choices of accommodation. The Sam&Lisa branch of Hotel Brighton provided reading material, and a remarkably comfortable double bed. The Julian&Margaretta branch of Hotel Brighton provided a camp bed shared with an excitable kitten, however the food was truly excellent and the morning espresso was a stunning touch of class. Both venues provided free WiFi connection, however only at hotel Julian&Margaretta was there Karaoke in the evening.

My full working day in Brighton went a little like this (I know you're all terribly interested in what I actually do for a living).

• Started the day with a business meeting in Starbuck's
• Picked up some Sushi from M&S and sat on the beach
• Sent a few emails courtesy of the free Pier2Pier network
• It started to rain, so I retreated to the Fortune of War. The WiFi still worked there, worked on a website for a while. No coffee, so I had a lunchtime pint.
• Got a lot of work done, but it got a bit cold.
• Retreated the Great Eastern. Had a coffee there, but it was truly poor. So followed it with a pint of HSB.
• Wrote some very technical stuff and pondered some ideas
• My laptop battery was low, and the Great Eastern had no WiFi so on I went.
• The Hare and Hound provided both free WiFi and a charging socket
• Had a couple of cokes there, and another bad coffee.

My conclusions are:

• Pubs do crap coffee
• Free wireless Internet is brilliant

In truly sad news, I only heard yesterday that Arif Khan who I used to work with at Babel has tragically died. We started at the same time, and shared a hotel room in Aber on my first ever hit squad for a couple of weeks.  My heartfelt sympathy goes to Arif's friends and family. Whatever went wrong, he was a good egg.

My identical voice twin
Oct 8th 2006 00:10

Earlier tonight I received a unexpected phone call from Julia. Now as a general rule I'm a big fan of any phone conversation that doesn't start with “I need to ask a technical question...”. Unfortunately, 9 times out 10 there's at the very least a technical query appended to the end of a casual inquiry after my health. I suppose it's the price I pay for being 'such a useful friend'. One of these days I really am going to get myself a premium rate number and insist people call back on it. Julia: “I've just met a guy at a party” I immediately start wondering quite how drunk Julia might be. It's only half past eight, but it is a Saturday night after all. The decision as to whether this is a work call or a social call isn't yet determined, but I'm rather the pessimist when it comes to things like this. It's okay though, Julia's company is on a retainer so I can just effortlessly tick this off the time sheet if it's work related. Julia: “His names Rick” By this juncture I've worked out that Julia actually sound remarkably sober. I this is going to be a work call after all. I bet Rick needs me to make him a website. Julia: “I want you to talk to him” It's definitely a work related call. That was a rather forceful introduction but I figure 'what the heck' I suppose I've got nothing else to do while I sit around the house continuing to nurse my horrendous post-Friday hangover with the aid of a lovely Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon. Julia: “The thing is, I think he's your identical voice twin, and I just wondered if you thought so to!” Did she say what I think she said? Or does this Rick fellow want some sort of website made about identical twins? I mentally play back the conversation and try to decide if there was more drunkenness in her tone that I originally thought. Julia starts playing a recording of my voice back to me down the phone. I introduce myself as Rob. The tape recording of my voice introduces itself as Rick. There's some serious hi-tech trickery going on here. I continue to converse with the tape recording of my voice, and after exchanging pleasantries amidst the birth locations of both of our parents and a brief discussion about where we went to school I conclude that this is in actual fact not a recording. I'm speaking to my identical voice twin. I'm shocked in an entirely pleasant although outright dumbfounded manner. But then something Rick said scared me. Rick: “I bet I could cause havoc if I called your friends and pretended to be you!” That puts the fear of God into me. The Swan Empire is at such a potentially weak stage in its incubatory period that malicious meddling on this level could destroy me. Maybe I've been watching too much Neighbors but I'm convinced the threat from identical twins is substantial regardless of their specific sub genre. Perhaps I should invest in some kind of voice scrambler to go with that premium rate line. Obviously, it's hard to judge your own voice and Julia's sobriety was still at question. Rick suggested finding a mutual friend to call, but I was dubious about trying to explain the scenario to someone. Especially with a hangover, a glass of red, and a nagging fear that giving Rick the phone numbers of any of my acquaintances was tantamount to corporate suicide. Instead the chosen test was to both leave the same message on Julia's voicemail. Sadly they were clearly having a lot more fun at the party than I was having with my glass of Chilean hair-of-the-dog and the general level of background chatter somewhat biased the test. Perhaps it's best that identical voice twins are left out of the realms of scientific comparison, I should hate for us to end up caged in a zoo!