Remember how it was unbearably hot a month or so back? I was sweltering in my home office (spare room) during that, and realised that the curtains were really not up to the task. This weekend, I finally got round to putting up some blackout curtains.
I just took a photo, with no flash, but all I can see is glowing laptop screens. So that's working as intended. Now I get to repeat the whole process for the living room, because I want to use the projector in there.
As soon as I moved in, I decided the lamp in the front room was revolting and it had to go. There have been various events delaying me in finding a replacement, and I've been procrastinating on top of those. I'd looked in the lighting shop on the corner of St Aldates and Speedwell St, and found nothing appropriate. Today, as I had a day in lift^Wlieu for working at the weekend, I decided to go further afield.
I looked at the weather and decided I'd rather go to the train station than Homebase. On arriving at the station, the first scheduled non-express service was going north, so I got a ticket to Banbury. I think I've only ever been to Banbury before for a beer festival in 2001, which took place after shop-closing time.
It may just be the novelty, but wandering round the centre of Banbury looking at shops was far less irritating than doing so in Oxford. As well as there being no sodding tourists, Banbury hasn't had as much of a chain store invasion. I wouldn't have even noticed that they have a McDonalds if I hadn't happened to glance through the window as I was walking right in front of it.
OK, it's a standard little town, with a pedestrianised centre, friendly-looking pubs and dodgy-looking nightclubs. The HMV is politely tucked away in a shopping centre with all the other boring shops you find everywhere. However, I found (and made purchases at) *two* independent music shops. There is a Proper Comic Shop, tucked away on a first floor down a narrow alleyway, staffed by blokes having a Proper Comic Shop Staff argument (something about "Routine 66" in one of the Star Wars prequels).
Walking slightly away from my two reference points (the station and the town hall), I found exactly what I'd been looking for: Classical Lighting, Banbury. I now have a new lampshade, and I just have to buy the bits to fit it (the ceiling's a bit high for the standard 6" rose+pendant that's readily available).
That was the extent of my "trying new stuff", though. All my other purchases were sticking with what I know - Paradise Lost and Fear Factory from the music shops, a Neal Stephenson paperback from Oxfam, and another volume of Sandman from the comic shop.
I broke my conduct of indie snobbery by buying a new pair of headphones from HMV for the journey back. ( Collapse )
In response to a pub conversation of a couple of hours ago, regarding the way in which the internet has always thought of the great pun before you did: Google currently gives seven hits for "mortarboarding" and ten for "mortar boarding".
The decorators have finished, and moved all their clobber out of the flat. The smell of paint is fading away slowly, but it looks like I'm going to have to get some professional cleaners in anyway: they left behind a copy of The Sun.
UPS. Having been given the correct delivery address, they ignored the name of the block of flats, and have been attempting to deliver my shiny new laptop to a house down the road.
Carr Greenwood Smith (loss adjusters) / The Revival Company / EW Beard (builders). They never ring back, preferring to wait for the other party to ring back. When I finally tracked down someone who might give me an estimated date for starting work, he suggested I call him back next year.
A coworker in the US. He included the abominations "may not of" and "may of" in an email to a customer. What kind of signals is that sending about our competence, eh? He should be grateful that there's an ocean in the way to prevent me from wringing his neck.
One cold October morning, I saw a procession of figures striding through the mist - the leader, in a hooded cloak, towered above the rest, and peered solemnly at the weighty tome before her. Imagine my disappointment when this scene resolved into a normal-sized woman with a coat, bobble hat and clipboard, followed by a lot of children.
DocSoc Fresher's Drinks saw more than twenty new people (more than the previous two years combined) turning up for Girl in the Fireplace. Some of them may even come back next week, when we plan to inflict a black-and-white (The Time Meddler) on them.
I have three potential things to go out and do - the beer festival at the Town Hall, the Headcount gig at the Wheatsheaf or a colleague's gig at the Old Tom - but I've only just finished my dinner, I've got a sore throat, and I have to go into work tomorrow. So I think I'll stay in and do nothing productive on the internet.
Speaking of dinner: you know you've cooked Too Much Pasta when ( Collapse ).
I have now seen two local bands performing a cover of the song that goes "I'm just a love machine" (TV Baby, Quadrophobe), and still never heard the original.
I have sorted my alternative accommodation, thanks to W Lucy properties, and no thanks to the loss adjusters who keep going on holiday. invisiblechoir warned about the spiders, but didn't mention anything about the snails.
I went to a coworker's BBQ yesterday, and at around 11pm we piled into a couple of cars and found a place from which to observe the Perseids (yes, tonight would be better, but we all have to be at work tomorrow). The chosen location was The Ridgeway - one of those hillsides with a car park and a wonderful view of the town below, where you might expect young couples to be attacked by masked maniacs in horror films.
The cloudless sky, lack of moonlight and the heavily reduced (compared with what I'm used to) glow of streetlights meant that not only could we spot the odd meteor (6 or 7 over about an hour, one of them distinctly fiery), but I could actually see the Milky Way - probably for the first time since those orange streetlamps appeared in front of my home in the late 80s.
Between the BBQ and the stargazing, I also experienced the wonder that is Wii. I tried Ten Pin Bowling (inconsistent, though it was fun trying to get the ball to knock down pins on the next lane), Golf (incredibly frustrating, as it appeared that the physical swing taken with the controller had very little effect on the "power" gauge on the screen) and Tennis (repetitive, but it did at least appear that the people who practised more did better). Maybe I'd have enjoyed it more if it hadn't all been sports.
I'm in the lucky position of having two equally convenient homes till the end of the month: The spacious, uncluttered one with no water under the floorboards, vs. the one that has a bed and is within walking distance of the drinking establishments that stay open after the buses have stopped for the night. I've split my catering facilities between them (there's a fork, a saucepan and a bag of pasta in each) and I now have difficulty deciding which one would be best to stay in.
Tonight, for example, I made my decision, then upon getting there with the laptop, found I had no network cables, leading to another 1-hour round trip. At least the balance will be tipped slightly in a couple of weeks, when the broadband in the old place gets cut off.
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