After moving in the donated oven from next door and, with the help of the gas engineer, got it fitted and tested, I was looking forward to my first home-made stir fry in almost 1.5 years! There’s only so much you can do with a combination of a George Foreman, a microwave, a deep-fat fryer and some mini electric oven.
Got mate to drop me off at Farm Foods on the way home tonight so that I could stack up the freezer with the stuff I used to be able to enjoy when I lived in Birchwood. Chunky oven chips, beef mince, pre-cooked chicken chunks (both excellent in a stir fry!) and some of those pre-done Chinese stir-fry jobs for those nights when I can’t really be arsed cooking “properly”.
Next stop was Sainsburys to get the fresh stuff in - some champagne mushrooms, bamboo shoots and a (lazy!) pre-selection of stir-fry veg to go with the peppers I already had. Treated myself to a new wok as well - the old one needs a proper burial in the bin outside the flat as it’s not been used much!
Tonight’s extravaganza was panchetta coated in herbs, with peppers, champagne mushrooms, bamboo shoots and other bits and pieces chucked in. And, as is my desire, lashings of Worcestershire Sauce!
… only joking! Bet those few that read this and know me all too well are currently wiping drink off their monitor
All I’ve done is kick Newshosting into touch - they had a week to respond to my request to upgrade to their SSL service and ignored my email. So in a fit of pique, I’ve cancelled my account and subscribed to Giganews instead :) Gives me an extra 120 days retention compared to Newshosting and the SSL option too.
For those of you not in the know, the MMC Replay is an SD-card (and MMC) reader for the Commodore 64. No longer do you have to wait (and wait) for the game/demo to load from disk, it’s there in (almost) an instant. It can also play all the HVSC (High Voltage SID Collection) files, which is every (or almost every) tune there ever was on the C64 in a single file.
I’ve not had a great deal of time to play with it so far, but a quick inspection to check it all works and I’m more than happy with it.
It will transfer the .D64 files back onto a real floppy disk for those that force you to use a turbo-loader (which the MMC Replay can’t handle) but there are teams of people out there de-hacking the turbo loaders into .DFI files which run straight from the MMC Replay SD card.
The plugin options make it able to run T64, cartridge images and .PRG files straight from the memory card
The afore-mentioned ability to play any C64 piece of music straight off the card
A plugin to show you a multitude of olde worlde art package formats (inc. OCP Art Studio which is the one I remember using 20+ years ago!)
A couple of plugins to read in your disks into a .D64 file so you can use them as blanks etc.
And many other uses - more time for a proper play next week one night. Well worth the cash - which was a lot for the C64 - especially the one I’m using which I’m sure was peanuts to purchase many moons ago!
Got back home tonight to find a voucher for £20 off any Virgin Trains travel within the next 12 months. Not exactly the full taxi fare back after the debacle of the trip back from Italy but better than nowt I guess.
Pays for most of the train journey to Gaz’s in October before jetting off for my final (boo!) trip abroad this year to the Eurocon in Germania.
What a fun 24 hours! Hyperactive puppy, two nutter goats and a bunny rabbit all named after drinks, my mate Steve and his new missus Kathy and a huuuuge house.
Set off via CrapDonalds for some “breakfast” (not healthy, but filled a gap) and wandered down to get the 8:15am train to Nottingham where I’d change there for the Leicester service. Journey there went without any real hassle other than some woman and her kids demanding the seat I was in, regardless of the fact the pre-booked seat leaflet wasn’t present, but as her hen-pecked husband was sat in the seat next to me, I gave it up. Pity the poor nagged sod though .. truculent kids with headphones permanently plugged into a PSP and a beached whale for a wife .. you lucky, lucky man - going green with jealousy!
Got to Nottingham station (still weird that the train travels into Sheffield station and then reverses back out a few miles before it continues onto another track) and heard that the Leicester train was due in .. checked my watch and the train was a few minutes late coming in. Rang Steve to let him know I’d be getting off near his place @ Syston as this was the yokel service and it saved him travelling all the way into Leicester to pick me up and then all the way back out again.
Back at Steve’s place and there’s a massive van parked on his driveway - it looks like one of those prison vans you see reporters trying to get photos of the recently convicted as they’re driven away but it’s an ex-BT van. Steve’s well into his go kart racing and this is what he takes when he goes to the local track to race on. These aren’t the speed-limited ones you get at the seaside, these are the proper beasties. One of which Steve crashed in around 60mph the other month and has only just had repaired!
Wandered through the gate and Steve wasn’t joking when he said there was a lot of adjoining land to the property! When he & his missus moved in, the grounds were over-grown with (approx) 20+ wrecks of cars in and around, a caravan where his missus used to have her doll’s house, bee-hives and all manner of stuff. It’s taken them about a year to get the place ‘livable’. Apparently Steve’s missus Kathy’s Dad had let the place get like this - if you’ve ever watched ‘A Life Of Grime’ then you’ll be familiar with one of the characters, Mr Trebus - Kathy’s Dad was like this when he was alive in his later years, never throwing anything away etc.
There’s lots and lots of work left to do on the house - a kitchen would be a major start as they’re currently making do with a mini-kitchen upstairs and all manner of gadgets (no oven - just like me!) to prepare and cook their food. I can see that in a year’s time, this place will be amazing.
I mentioned the small menagerie that also lives at this house well let me introduce them. Stella is a King Charles Spaniel puppy and is as mad and boisterous as all puppies are. Spent a fair whack of my time playing around with her, trying to make sure my hands weren’t bitten too much but a lovable bundle of fluff. Especially enjoys the ‘thrown apple, pick up apple, bring back apple .. repeat’ game! She also likes eating the Syston plums that are in abundance on the floor - probably gives her more than her daily vitamin intake
There are also two young goats - Guinness & Poitín (the Irish potato moonshine for those not in the know) - are both ‘weathered’ (ie. sans goolies) and enjoy nothing more than hoovering their food out of your hands like a natural Dyson. Weird sensation indeed to have a handful of feed disappear in seconds! They also like ivy - but they know which one is the poisonous one (to them) and avoid it. However, if you pick up the right type, they’re your bestest best friend because it’s like catnip is to a cat!
Finally there was Baileys the rabbit. Living in a hutch in the goat holding pen means it has to put up with both the goats nibbling away at the bedding but, from what Steve & Kathy say, the goats are scared of it when Bailey is let out. Didn’t see that whilst I was there though did see a lot of butting between both goats. There’s a clump sound as they both practice their ‘you what? what you looking at?’ type of confrontation.
The bonfire was ready with the raw materials and all Steve had to get prepared was the grub. I’ve never eaten venison before so this would be a foody experience for me. Venison, silverside of beef steaks and chicken a la Steve (his own creation) all on the BBQ. Once the food was being cooked, Steve prepared the bonfire. No firestarters, bits of crumpled up newspaper here .. just throw on a selection of go kart fuel and stand back once the flame ignites! Any closer and he’d been sans eyebrows!
Venison steak was nice .. mental note to not faint when I see the price of it in Asda next time I’m shopping as want to try some more now! Wonder if it’d work as well on my George Foreman or not …
The evening was spent mostly on Channel Fiver with the NCIS, Law & Order & CSI shows. Never watched a full NCIS episode but it fits into that genre particularly well.
Hit the sack (well, the air bed) around midnight or thereabouts. Steve had fixed the door to the room earlier on that day but it hadn’t gone quite to plan when one of the panes of glass broke so he spent the next hour or so (with my help) removing the glass and then putting masking tape over the gap. If it kept my snoring at bay from the rest of the house, it would have been all worthwhile
Sunday
I slept in until around 10am (alarm had gone off around 7:45am but I’d switched it off and turned over) and dragged myself downstairs. Stella was happy to see me and bounded around the room - apparently I’m a bad influence as she’d been told to stay in her basket :) Kathy went upstairs and knocked up a smashing full English breakfast and a few hours later, I was being dropped off by Steve at Leicester station.
The journey back was as uneventful as the journey there - couple of strange sitings en route were the crane hire place called ‘ J. C. Balls Grab Hire’ (well, I thought it was amusing!) and a twisted spire on top of Chesterfield’s cathedral. Other than the lack of a 3G signal over the Pennines, so no Facebook updates possible, it was a trouble-free trip back to Warrington after the change over at Sheffield.
Got back home, after checking my Euro Lotto tickets and getting £10 winnings, and just crashed out. Long journeys on the train always seem to take it out of me .. must be the age I’m at
All in all, a damn good 36 hours and I’ll make sure I’ve got another invite in a year or so’s time to see how much has changed etc.
.. and about time too! Had the same version (2.1.2) for an age now (about 18 months!) so since Ste fixed my internet connection the other week, he also unblocked port 21 so that I can now re-FTP back into my blog. Was an easy fix and one I should have been able to do myself .. if I understood one iota about networks
So I’ve backed it up tonight, and will have a go at the upgrade to v2.61 (only a small jump in version numbers!) and hopefully it will all be tickety-boo by tomorrow night.
Can’t get into the gallery though .. get an error message: “Error: Your Userfile is not writeable” which sounds like something Link’s got to fix at his end before I can upgrade Gallery to something a bit more recent too.
Think my internet access started behaving itself on Thursday evening .. hasn’t gone off since
Still no email with this label to print off for UPS to pick up my 360 .. will chase them up in work tomorrow. Not missing the games that much (only one more baddie to do on Assassin’s Creed before the big boss) but am missing the HD-DVD movies!
Was at Bowlers yesterday and couldn’t pick up my new Windows Vista-based media centre PC … as the guy building it forgot to take the bits home the previous weekend! Ah well, will pick it up and settle the remaining cost when I’m back there in 3 weekend’s time (going to Leicester next weekend, and Wales the weekend after that).
What else has been happening? Oh, bought a 19″ flat-screen TV from Asda about 2 weeks ago .. had to take it back last night as I couldn’t find the remote! Damn thing says “press Enter” when you switch it on but without a remote I couldn’t go much further! Swapped it for another one and got them to check the remote was in there before I took it out of the store!
With the kitchen table a lot cleaner (i.e. I can see the table!), I’ve now got a test bed area for all these olde worlde retro computers stashed about the house - they look quite odd sat in front of a new TV! Spent a lot of time last night wading through some Commodore 64 disks I bought from a guy in Norway over 2 years ago! I’d forgotten how slow a C64 disk drive is to read in the files - so went for another rummage and found a QuickDisc+ cartridge which speeds up the loading a helluva lot! Still want to get a MMC Replay cart though .. shove all my C64 stuff onto the one SD card
Been using my (what seems to be) alloted 15 minutes of internet time that my modem seems to give me, to update this blog.
Last Thursday Slick came around to see what he could do with my ADSL modem, flashed the firmware, did some checks etc. but I still can’t seem to stay online for more than 10-15 minutes after each reboot of the modem.
Spent some time in the queue to BeUnlimited, who did all kinds of tests etc and they were stumped too. Swapped their ADSL filter for a spare one that mate in work had - same problem, when the modem works, it gives me 10-15 minutes online and then goes into a sulk
And to top it all off, my Xbox Elite has got the three red rings of doom :( So that’s got to get sent back to Microsoft - will do that on Monday as at least the ‘net connection there works!
The day started early, really early.Alarm went off at 5:30am to make sure I was up, ready and out the door before 6:30am.The train wasn’t due until 7:15am but I wanted to get something to eat between my house and the train station - i.e. something not very healthy, but enough to fill the void until lunchtime.
Walking through Warrington at 6:15am is an eye-opener - well, that was the only thing that was open at that time in the morning.McDonalds - closed.Subway - closed (although there was someone preparing the meals but it wasn’t due to open until 8am!) - so I headed towards the station as there’s a little newspaper shop opposite where I could get a newspaper, have a brew and pick up a sandwich.All a damn sight cheaper than what I’d have to pay on Virgin trains … except that it was closed too!
Grumbling and dragging suitcase across to the station, I (lazily) got the lift up to the platform and a train heading to London was just pulling in.Thinking that it was my 7:15am train turning up early, I boarded and headed for the shop car.
It was only when they announced that this service was going via Wolverhamption, Birmingham, Coventry and then heading down to London that I realised I was on an earlier - but longer - service.D’oh!
To pass the elongated journey time, I’d brought my laptop with me and plugged in the R5 version of Wanted (Angelina Jolie & James McAvoy) - sometime R5 versions are the film but with Russian subs (or audio tracks) and the dodgy internet underworld (as they’d like to be known) just strip these out and hey presto you have the original film in English but in DVD quality … so you don’t have to squint at a crappy cam job.
In this one, however, they’d done some extra bits with the film - any major text on screen was now in Russian (with English subs), from the intro text, to the adverts placed on the boxes in the shop and the text on the ATM screens.Where they went O.T.T. (but a good thing) was the scene where James McAvoy’s character hits his best mate with the keyboard.In the English one, the letters that hurtle towards the screen have the usual f-word on them - in this version, the letters are in Russian and the word ‘Fuck’ appears as part of the subtitles
Not bad film, but some obvious script jumps and some obvious plot-twists but hey ho, it’s aimed at the usual people who wouldn’t see a bus coming until the last minute!
Unfortunately, the film only lasted me until we got to Birmingham New Street - where the train just sits idling for 20 minutes.You can get off and stretch your legs, or get a brew from the shop - so long as you’re back on board when it leaves.Been a while since I’d gone to London via Birmingham - think the last time was by coach!
Eventually set off and plugged in my headphones and listened to some classic Iron Maiden to pass the next 45 minutes or so. And dozed off - awaking just before Milton Keynes station.Completely missed Watford Junction due to another doze and awoke to find the train at a standstill and lots of workmen around upgrading the lines.I could see the dates scratched onto the old rails that were piled up: ‘Tested ‘72’ or ‘Tested ‘74’ and other such markings.Can see why the upgrade is necessary - not only to allow for better speeds with the more modern trains but to get rid of these 30+ year old pieces of rail.
Scanning the horizon I spotted a bus number that used to travel around Wandsworth (my youthful stamping ground) - a serious case of nerditis!But this meant I was at Willesden Junction - which is where most of the trains from London will stop overnight (the trainspotting nerdness continues!) and that it wouldn’t be long before the train was in Euston station.
I was, according to my schedule, 45 minutes late getting in than if I’d got the 7:15am train, so I checked the timetables for all trains from Charing Cross to Tunbridge c/o my N95 and headed down into the bowels of London via the Tube system.
It’s been a while since I’d been on the Tube in the summer and it was hot. Even with the fresh air being pumped through the tunnels by each train passing, it was still hot.Got to Charing Cross and just stood on the platform to cool down.I’d missed the 10:45 train so luckily there was a 10:53 train leaving from a platform directly in front of where I’d come out from.Grabbed a bottle of (overpriced, naturally!) water and headed onto this train.
The journey was fairly uneventful with the exception of two women who’s chat ranged from what kind of hair do they were going to get done when they arrived (one of them it seemed was getting married soon) through to some of the most inane comments about selling items on eBay I’d heard in a long while.I bit my lip for the journey as I doubt they would have enjoyed me putting them right - so I left them to their stupidity
It took about 15 minutes for the bus to arrive at the stop in Tonbridge that was heading towards Southborough but once on it, I had plenty of time to relax as the main road between to the two towns was having major water works done to it, so there was a nice long queue to sit and wait in.
I got off (as directed) in Southborough by the Victoria Hall and phoned Nigel (my contact) for directions. A short walk up the hill and there was Nigel standing on the pavement waving at me.Not that there was any chance of it being someone else dragging a suitcase
The Shed of Dreams
When High Street Micro in Crewe closed down, the entire stock was sold off and Nigel was (along with some other investors) the new owners of (approx) 10,000 items of retro computing heaven.Everything from the 8-bit micros through to the ‘modern’ era of the 16 & 32-bit consoles was here.I duly unpacked my suitcase of Commodore 64 cassettes which was my offering to this high temple of retro-gaming to make room for the Atari ST games I’d be bringing back.
However, one slight problem with this theory … there were 10+ bread trays full of games.OK, some of them I’ll already have bought / swapped in the past but a quick scan down the side of the trays and I was already asking Nigel where the post office was so that I could send off a parcel of extras in addition to what I’d be able to pack into the suitcase!
Luckily Nigel also recognised this problem as I piled up the games on top of the games … on top of the games!
In the end, I’d filled the suitcase with all the budget titles and a few of the smaller boxed titles - approx 60-70 titles in all were crammed in there plus 2 extras in the rucksack with the laptop.
Then there was the pile of stuff that wouldn’t fit in there - with Nigel’s help, 2 large boxes and one small box were filled to the brim with the remaining games.I can forsee this being a lot more expensive to post back than I imagined - oh well, it’s all part of the preservation! Plus it’ll get some odd looks from people in work as it’s easier to send large parcels like this to work than chasing up delivery drivers from courier firms who expect everyone to be at home when they call around!
Heading back
After the formalities were over and work address scribbled onto one of the boxes, I made my way back to Tonbridge via the bus.Luckily I was in time for another express service back to Charing Cross and the tube link to Euston went smoothly enough.I did, however pack/compress my coat into the suitcase as it was still stifling hot and sweaty on the Tube.
By now it was 15:15 or so and a quick look on the boards for the next train heading to Warrington showed me that there was the 16:00 …. going through Birmingham.At least this time I know it’s going to be a longer journey - oh well!
To kill time, I decamped to the restaurant area in Euston and ordered a double Angus from Burger King.I felt hungry and thought this would fill me up so that I didn’t snack on the train journey back - well, that was the plan but the damn thing beat me!The shame on me & my stomach … being beaten by a bit of fast food! What is my world coming to!
After my shameful BK experience, I waited around the platform for the call to the 16:00 train and, along with everyone else rushed towards platform 13 when the location of it was announced - Euston station always keeps it a secret which platform the train is due to depart from for some reason.
I boarded as near to the shop as possible in case I wanted a brew later on and settled down.Opposite me was a white Rastafarian bloke and next to me was a “posh” speaking woman - I’d only know about the ‘posh’ bit when she got a phone call on her mobile.The journey went smoothly enough - I slept through Watford Junction and Milton Keynes and only really realised where I was when I went past Leamington Spa station - somewhere I’d been less than three weeks earlier for the Retro Fusion event!
We, for some reason, stopped outside the station and an apologetic tannoy announcement was made by the train conductor / manager / chief whipping boy (or whatever they’re called these days by Virgin) to say that we’d be here for about 10 minutes.
I took this break to my advantage and went for a ‘nature break’ - I got there just as the door was opening by the previous occupant who slunk off as the smell of cigarette smoke filled the space.Tsk tsk ..
Did what I needed to do but before I could leave the cubicle there was a knocking on the door, so I unlocked it to find two members of Virgin’s train staff waiting outside. They were after the person who’d been smoking in the cubicle!
I described the previous occupant based on my 2-second glance as he’d left and passed on this information.Got myself a brew from the shop and sat back down.However, 5 minutes later and one of the two staff was prowling up and down the carriage where I was sat and, once he’d noticed me, asked if I could go and have a word with the Train Manager now.Off I went, back to the shop area and, once again, handed over the details of what I thought the bloke looked like.They were deadly serious about finding him and getting him thrown off the train - so explained that, in case they thought I was telling porkies, that I’m a non-smoker and emptied my pockets to show a distinct lack of any cancer-sticks and lighting-up paraphenalia!People in uniform with a small brain and an even smaller bit of power really shouldn’t try and throw their weight around with next to no evidence!
This small event aside, the journey went by - including the now standard 20 minutes standing around at Birmingham station - and I was eventually back in Warrington and started the walk back to the flat dragging the heavy suitcase behind me.
Once back in the flat, I unpacked the suitcase and piled up all the games - all I can say is “what a haul” and it was all free!A trip well worth making and there’s even more to come when the parcel(s) arrive in work! The collection is around the 975 mark and when the boxes arrive, it’ll be well into the 1000+
Well, nearby anyway but that’s where the train is stopping! Why am I going? Mainly because a nice guy on Atari Forum has got 1000’s of Atari ST games that he’s giving away - all I’m giving him in return is a suitcase full of C64 games on tape! Perfect swap and the only cost to me is the £60 train fare. Taking laptop & camera - laptop to keep me sane whilst on the train and camera for the pics of all the other stock this guy bought from a shop in Crewe - approx 10000 items
Here’s what Atarimania & his missus (also on Atari Forum) took from his place a few weekends ago after travelling across from France:
Doubt I’ll be bringing back as much, but hoping to fill the suitcase with enough gap fillers to make the trip worthwhile!
Forgot to post this earlier but was visiting Rhyl over the weekend just gone after a busy day @ Bowlers - got there around 10pm with every intention of getting to see people I hadn’t seen in ages.
That kind of didn’t go to plan very well, but I did get to see my mate Graham who hosts my website and he installed a couple of extra Joomla! plugins to allow me to start hosting my files again. There was also a cooked breakfast on the go
Later on, near dinner time, I got a lift of Graham to pop & see my brother and the tribe. A quick wander into town via Bargain Booze where his missus/my sister-in-law works to get his orders for what he was cooking for tea that day. Found out my eldest niece had been ticked off by the guard on MerseyRail for putting her feet on the seat .. so I made a note to refer to her as ‘chav scum’ along with the usual ‘vulture’ comments throughout the day.
A quick wander further on down the main road into Rhyl, there is an ‘eBay shop’ - yes, people who are too dumb to use the Internet / eBay can take their goods into this shop and they will then put these items on eBay and, somewhere, take a cut for doing so. These people would probably find ‘The Dummies Guide to eBay” a taxing read?
Next stop (after Gamestation) was KFC and a bargain bucket was bought - with ice cream to help my youngest niece eat faster than the normal tortoise plod she does.
Best ever comment out of my eldest niece’s mouth has to be this gem: “I’m not a goth, nor an emo .. I’m a punk” - to which, myself & my brother took the piss something rotten :) This phase will probably be as short-lived as the real punk phase was in ‘77!
En route back to brother’s house, I picked up yet another 4-drawer CD unit from Wilkinsons in Rhyl. This one seemed to ‘come apart’ a lot easier than the other units I’d bought in Warrington but this probably wasn’t helped by both nieces offering to transport said unit down the main street and over the bridge. Lost count of how many times I saw it split apart, the drawers fall out along with the filthy looks from other people at this lard-arse forcing these kids to carry this drawer unit! Got to brother’s house in the end and waited for him to arrive as he was running an errand to get his missus something from KFC.
He arrived, and promptly burst out laughing whilst telling me that the girl behind the counter at Bargain Booze who was on the same shift, had thought that I was my brother’s Dad! Great - add 30 years onto me, why don’t you!
Needless to say, when Dad came around to pick me and the CD box up to go to Warrington, he was also laughing at my expense … grumble… grumble …
Dad was looking for a new laptop to replace his current (steam-driven) one that he’s had for ages and whilst he was browsing, this box of tricks caught my eye. Then I read the blurb next to it, with the lovely smelling pistake!
‘Wirlesly’ - such a lovely word but not one I’ve come across before :) The best part is that this is on their internal website (look at the address at the bottom of their page), so I’m guessing that if you visit any PC World stall that is selling this item, a LinkSys DMA2200, it’ll have the same error :) Let me know if it does!
