It another day in paradise :)

It been a little while and still I'm no further forward on getting our piccies up to a good site just yet, still umming and arring about how I should do it.

I havea little site up and running now and all that left is to post some piccies - you know I may get it done this weekend - Sunday supposed to pee down with rain and if that the case then I might as well get it done.

It only small, the web site that is but it will be a starter and I can then work on refreshing the piccies every now and again - now that should be fun and may take me a while in the old addage of Scott of the Antartic!

It's Friday, it's sunny and about time to go home and get a beer or 3 and chill out on the deck and watch the sun go down, that is after I do a few chores outside - di d I say it might rain again :)

Time... ain't on my side :)

This will shock a few i'm sure!!

It's been a busy start to the year and work is taking most of that, I work for a big software company and the are working thru a new version of an operating system - there shouldn't take to long to figure out who..... 1, 2, 3.... have ya got it yet :)

So what been happening the last few weeks... you may ask, well I have been out biking (once) was a 32 miler to a local brewery where one had to partake in the local brew :p was great except the return 16 mile ride kept creeping back into my head - ah well another bear will help dull the pain.

Have started to get to the gym with a couple of work buddies, lifting weights of all things and at my age it tough I can tell ya, especially as I have never done that sort of thing, running yes, weights uh uh!

We have also been dogsitting for the past 10 days, we now have 3 greyhounds and 1 wippet, so it a damn madhouse right now - dogs everywhere, and greyhounds just like cats.... just a little bigger :)

And to keep the dogs in, we had to get one side of the hill (we live in an old quarry area) fenced in, so we bought the stuff and did this ourselves. Hard work but afterwards it looked pretty good, not bad considering this is a 110ft long and on an angle of about 35-38degrees so it steep too - many a time was had sliding down the hill while trying to ram in metal posts and wire up a mesh fence.

Anyway - hopefully next time I won't be so lax on updating the old blog - toodle pip for now...

Phew...

It has been a while, must admit I had nearly forgot I had the blog until I had a little free time and thought hmm maybe I should write this down and then went duh!! you got a blog.

So apologies for those that keep reading and for everyone else - hey it tough sometimes and other priorities get in the way.

So me Julie is back on friday, and we gonna spend the weekend... come on now keep it clean :) getting our digital piccies organised onto the new 'puter and get some eventually uploaded and linked, this will satisfy many people ;) you know who you are.

...and speaking of time, it now February and before you know it, it will be the summer with nice long hot days, drinkies and BBQ's soon followed up by christmas, doesn't it make you think that every year is the same - hee hee - think about it... gotcha!

We gonna be snowboarding next Monday, so will have another week of aches 'n pains to nurse - ooh that might be fun :) oops... sorry, I digressed there... I want to see what I retained from my lesson at the beginning of the month, I'll let you know how we get on.

toodle pip till next time.....

We're in Texas

We are in Texas for a few days, I go back to Seattle on the 14th and Julie is here till the end of the month.

We arrived yesterday and the sun was shining and you could feel the warmth in the air, very different to Seattle which was chilly and damp...

We woke this morning to find, you guessed it, it was raining (hee hee) we traveled all this way to get away from the rain and what happens - it finds us!

We are here visiting Julie's Brother and Sister-in-law and the new baby - they have a 2 year old and a new born, so Julie is doing the old ga-ga thing - nice. :)

We have the camera and wil be taking piccies and some time sooner or later I will post them, just not enough hours in the day to get stuff done, now where have I heard that one before?

Another week over....

It has been another long week full of stressing work things and a fun day in the snow :)

Yesterday went up to Stevens Pass (http://www.stevenspass.com) and we had a skiing/snowbaord day on our boss.

I can ski so thought 'hey, you've wanted to try snowboarding so why not' and snowboard I did. We had a lesson in the morning where one unlucky individual was stretchered off the hill - hmm bad omen I here ya say but luckily the poor lass was the only casualty (not including bruised ego's, bumped heads, aching limbs etc) - I know ache from head to toe literally - snowboarding all day long when it your first time, all good fun.

I'm thinking now I may invest in package deal for a board, boots and bindings and take a few more lessons - I think once I get usedto it I will like this as much as skiing.

And a continuation on the bacon butties - I found some irish back bacon in the freezer (I know it not English or Scottish but it close enough) - I forgot 'er indoors got some and we froze it - it was very tasty and with the remaining pack I made a quiche which was surprisingly good too :)

The weekends coming up and I can feel a nice, lazy, couple of days being in order so with that I'll say toodle pip for now and catch you next week.

Hmmmm Bacon Baps

My buddy Roger the dodger (http://spaces.msn.com/duttonr/) has been chatting with me all week about bacon baps n butties, and for you foreign types that's a bread roll or two bread slices filled with mouth watering english back bacon... the thought just makes you droool.

Tomorrow, I'm gonna try and find some nice looking thick cut bacon and I do mean TRY, over here.. over here is in Seattle, USA it aint like back home I can tell ya.

I have seen some real streaky looking stuff great for wrapping around some nice bangers (finding great bangers here is another story similiar in vein to great bacon) but not the stuff for a great bacon buttie.

So the hunt is on to find the elusive taste and smell of frying bacon and get a taste of home - I'll let you know how I get on.

Seattle comes alive!!

Chillin' this past weekend, doing some decorating which is always a great time to sit back and reflect on how good paint dries or wether you have sanded the same piece of cabinetry enough times.

Also this weekend it was the NFC championship game with Seattle Seahawks v Carolina Panthers, and the Hawks won!

It was a victory in a couple of ways as this win gave them the championship for the NFC but also entry into Superbowl XL (40 if you can't work it out) for the first time for Seattle in 30yrs basically ever since they have been around... the whole place has gone Superbowl crazy now, ticket prices are going up... they did start at about $1200-$1500 but now you won't get much change out of $2000+ and then flights and hotels - it gonna be a very expensive weekend when the Superbowl is on for some people.

Me, I have a 42" plasma so will quite happily sit here with a beer or three and watch it at home... Go Hawks.

p.s. Can't wait for the World Cup coverage... real foottie at last :)

OMG - there is Sun...

I have taken it easy the last few days and have not updated the blog, occasionally the old job and other chores that need doing get in the way - I guess that is life....

So we have had sun, in fact we have had a couple of days of it - not all day but least a showing. Sunday was nice, so we took the ferry across to Kingston and drove round the coast to Fort Worden.

Not a real Fort but an old military establishment called a Fort, in fact on the Olympic Peninsula there are a lot of them :)

It was a good drive and it gaves us a bit of an airing and blow away the cobwebs and allowed things to dry out a little.

Hopefully sometime this week I will get some piccies posted - I haver tons but just have not had the time to go thru them. I have been busy building a couple of web sites;

http://www.countrycarpenter.net is one for a local carpenter we know that has done some work for us.

http://www.thewaynehowardtrust.co.uk is my brothers website that is now a UK charity for brain injury patients and families.

Have a look and feel free to comment.

What a week...

It has been a loooong week this week, and I have not had much chance to update the blog till now.

So some quickies for now...

Rats, they are damn clever buggers, so far I have had two attempts by them but no takers, I have now resorted to screwing (figuratively speaking) the trap just outside the hole that one I have seen visits, maybe this time I'll get a hit and enjoy the spoils of war!!

Rain..
Well we are into day 27 now and heading on for number 28, it been raining off and on but each day we get something. The flooding has started in some areas and tomorrow we'll be going out to take some photos n stuff - I'll be looking to get some of those posted.

Dinners up and I have been summoned :) will be off for now and will continue later.....

I took a bus..

As I mentioned, I'm at a conference in Seattle this week and rather than use the car and get stuck in traffic, pay for parking {after trying to find parking} I thought I would use the bus.

Now I'm not your usual bus user I'm afraid and have been tainted by bus services in the UK, you know the what I mean... your waiting for a number 3 bus and the arrival timeslots come and go - then before you leave 3 turn up together - why do they do that?

So I have used the bus this week and so far - I can say - it has been rather pleasant, no sitting in rush hour traffic, not having to think about driving {I drive an automatic anyway so not much thinking when I am driving ;) } I can even have a snooze on the way in and back - hmmm I could get to like this.

Conference time

This week finds me at a conference in Seattle, called TechReady2 - so far it's been fun and from the agenda looks like more to come.

On my way to tonights evening event I was listening to the radio and the DJ announced that today is the 22nd day in succession that it has rained, measurable that is. Now I know Seattle is a grey and wet place but this is getting ridiculous : ah well roll on the summer.....

Nothing else for today so lets see what tomorrow brings.

TGIF!! & Rats....

Woohoo!! another week over - gee soon it will be Christmas ha ha :)

This one was way busy, lots of things happening and one will hopefully see the work pay off over the weekend. Next week I'm on a conference here in Seattle {did I mention it's still raining ;) }, so I will do my posts when a get a moment, but maybe the change of scenery from my office to downtown Seattle will get me thinking of other things I should write about.

Rats... we have them, house rats that is :( running around the attic space - damn things make a right racket I can tell you. So a few weeks ago I put down some bait and had no takers, so much for what the package instructions say.

This week I get a phone call from Julie {t'other half} saying her car was in the garage for some work, she told me the mice {we didn't know they rats at this time} had cost her $500 for a wee wire that cost $5. Further explitives later and they whole story is that part of the engine needs to be dropped to get to the wire - the wire caused a few lights, like engine management to light up.

Tonights task was to get to our local DIY store - Lowes, where I bought 3 huge monster traps for rats and now have them strategically placed around our garage, and am waiting patiently for the klaccck sound of them firing :)

I just inspected them {you know it's like fishing - you gotta keep checking}, and nothing as yet - but I did see one of the blighters - including tail about 12-15" long. Put it this way it a damn big mouse :)

I must dig out my recordings of 'DangerMouse' that was a fine cartoon, the music for it would be very fitting right now - hee hee!!

Anyway, I'll keep you posted {'scuse the pun} on the escapades of our little visitors and hope the eventual outcome is pleasent, well for us anyway.

Chuffed...

I have been reading lots of books and material to be a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), one of the coveted credentials one needs to move around in the security circles per say.

This morning while eating mybreakfast cereal I checked email - well actually - I was sat at the 'ol computer and as I use GMail I had the taskbar app installed to let me know when an email comes in...

Well, you know that real odd feeling, that you get when your boss says can I have a word and it late on a Friday night - what do they call that ... anticipation ... or some other @$&* puckering bodily function. Oh yes, that is what I did when I saw the title of the email and not the rest of the text.

I saw the title blinking at me like a belisha beacon and thought should I... shouldn't I... I'll let you know on my first attempt at this exam, I missed the pass mark by 10points, that's close for a 6hr 250question hand written answer exam.

I opened the email and scanned the mail for 'you have failed..' and saw 'Congratulations..' woohoo!! I went, and it still raining outside but you know I feel way better for passing :)

Congestion!! Have you ever parked on the M25.

So travelling home tonight in rainy Seattle, oh yes, it does rain here (so far we are into a 10 day stretch of rain at some point within a 24hr period - oops digressing here).

I remembered when I used to travel home from London and having to use the M25 - 4 lanes one direction bumper to bumper and that was when everyone is doing 80mph+ :) wow that was fun.

Over here, well it can still be fun as the locals get a little crazy when the weather comes in, take I405 for example which is 3 lanes one direction, when the rain hits everyone sloooowwwwssss riggghhhhhttttt down!! It's as if they have bever seen rain before....

....my usual 25mile drive home becomes a 1hour trip in a sea of red brake lights, with the oncoming wave of white headlights from the passing traffic, talk about hypnotic :) but I can at least look online to see how congested it will be (check out http://www.wsdot.wa.gov/traffic/seattle ~ remember the 8hr time difference ~ I'm in PST.)

So while driving along, a thought crossed my mind, if teleportation becomes a reality will we still have congestion - I mean there is only so much air up there or will the TTC (pun on ATC, I'm sure you can work it out) have you circling around the top of your house waiting for a clear path.

Hello, Good Day and Welcome...

Happy Hogmanay 2006!!

Ok, ok I know it a little late but you know the saying 'Better late than never!'. Anyway I hope you all had a great New Year and 2006 brings you everything you wish for.

So this is the start, maybe of something new and exciting, Hey! maybe this can become a bestseller (I'm sure that will be commented on :) ).

I'm going to do my utmost to get a little ditty, an interesting piece or some really big news on this blog at least once a day maybe even more and for that you have to stay tuned and keep reading and watching.....