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Andrew's diary

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Tuesday, 31 August 2004

Quiet day at work with the Extreme Blue off for a day of watersports at Calshot. After work, was watching Channel 4 News heard the wonderful word "sanguinary" quoted from a 19th Century copy of The Times. Unfortunately, the reporter then followed up with so-and-so "was then hung". Later, we saw part of a program giving modern secondary school kids a 60s education. The lack of knowledge on when the Second World War ended, the location of India and other such facts was astounding. Of course, that was the effect the programme makers wanted: I'm sure there are plenty of smart kids who'd never get on a programme like that.

Monday, 30 August 2004

Allen & Carol left. Did nothing of any notable value whatsoever (big surprise).

Sunday, 29 August 2004

Squeezed and cajoled the new light fitting in to place (funny how aluminium doesn't squeeze like it used to...). Allen and Carol arrived and so we went in to town for a pleasant, albeit lukewarm, meal at Wetherspoons.

Saturday, 28 August 2004

Some sorting of the house, and bought a new light fitting for the kitchen. Hopefully it should be a fairly relaxing weekend (upto the in-laws coming ;-))

Friday, 27 August 2004

A not very productive day, until 5pm when I pointed out to the team they had less than 10 working days left. Some panicked planning has left us with a whiteboard titled "The (Bl)Argh Board"... and a plan.

Thursday, 26 August 2004

Megan and the team arrived fairly late: it must've been a good night.

Got home to the refitted hall carpet which looks a bit good, so feeling swish, watched the ever impressive Crocodile Dundee 2. Fun.

Also, as Mel finished the honeymoon diary, the last 5 months are finally complete, so uploaded one very large block.


Wednesday, 25 August 2004

Got in at exactly the same time as Megan and the team and had a quick check of mail before heading off to see our high-level US executives at their SWG "winning on-demand" roadshow.

After lunch, the team gave a fantastic presentation to them - unfortunately they were a lottle jetlagged and, pressed for time, it was a little rushed. Still, it went well and useful contacts to have.

Megan and the team went off to the pub to celebrate but, fortunately (considering the problems it generated last time), I had to head home for our night out at the cinema.

Raising Helen was incredibly formulaic and ponderous - with only good casting and acting being its only redeeming features. A couple of good jokes only emphasised the fact the rest were so poor.

Dinner at the Down Grange was typical Brewer's Fayre, but Mel driving meant I could have a beer in honour of the excellent students & project we've got.


Tuesday, 24 August 2004

Stayed late and helped the team with the finishing touches for the presentation tomorrow, also got the office tidied.

On the way home realised I didn't want to just go home, have dinner, watch a bit of telly and then go to bed (as usual). So, in a fit of dare-devilery, we watched Enemy of the State on DVD. Sometimes I suspect we're very boring, and I don't care (that much).


Monday, 23 August 2004

A very busy day, mostly spent on the day job - but fortunately dropping back into the Extreme Blue office at half four meant I didn't totally miss the planning for the big, important, potentially career-changing, presentation on Wednesday.

Sunday, 22 August 2004

EXciting day out in Newbury, followed by one of Melanie's beautiful roast dinners.

Also - shockingly - managed to get the diary up-to-date, albeit with some fairly large gaps still to fill in.


Friday, 20 August 2004

A phrase involving the words "piss-up" and "brewery" spring to mind over the handling of this design hole.

Thursday, 19 August 2004

Really bad head. Yesterday's news is going ahead though - not telling the team specifics yet though ;-)

Wednesday, 18 August 2004

Busy day: looks like the massive design hole that Andrew would have to deal with, is something I'm going to have to code as he's on holiday next week. Clubhouse committee meeting after work - which was as exciting, fast-paced and organised as ever.

However, I was slightly late to the meeting due to Megan needing to tell me some news. If it works out, it'd be very exciting.


Tuesday, 17 August 2004

Turns out there's only one organised evening event so I'll go anyway and, in the worst case, just work from IBM Amsterdam on those days.

Monday, 16 August 2004

Very pissed off that word has come back from Amsterdam: despite Gill having the money, there's still a limit of one mentor per team: no proposers, no second mentors, no nothing. Organised events in the evening also mean it won'be any fun if I just turned up on spec.

Sunday, 15 August 2004

Walk round Lille's citadel, followed by lunch at Ypres and a trip to the Menin Gate.

Trip home was slightly less bouncy than the one over :-)


Saturday, 14 August 2004

Up and breakfast. Carol looked bemused when the receptionist asked for our room numbers - in French. The receptionist looked bemused when both Carol and Allen said "good morning" and "thank you",. I wonder why they don't try "bonjour" and "merci" - interesting to ponder.

After a trip to the local Auchan, we headed off... somewhere. I'm still not entirely sure where we went, but it did involve a lot of country lanes. We had a late lunch on a village (dunno which one!) green and as we were packing up a wedding reception descended on the village hall. Briefly considered wangling an invite, but we had to get off to the brewery.

Had a drink before the tour, which between us the guide and I managed to get mostly into English. Then the tastings: a 125ml glass each of their 3 beers. The first, a "light" beer at "only" 7.5%; the second was 10% and the third 12.5%! Carol had surprisingly a lot of hers, but Mel's was shared between myself and Allen. Fortunately Mel drove back!

Into Lille for dinner (again, with Mel driving) and, after a pleasant enough walk, finally found a place with a table free. It was nice, if a little pricey for what we got. Lille itself was pretty boring, lots of bland architecture trying too hard to be pretentious and hide the hideously pedestrian city behind.


Friday, 13 August 2004

Left work at noon and, after a quick lunch, headed off to Folkestone for our summer "holiday".

Weather was bad, and the little SeaCat was bobbing (thrashing?) across the waves in every direction. Tried to concentrate on our egg and bacon butties rather than the retching sounds surrounding us.

Got to the hotel - a typical low-end chain in the middle of nowhere. Allen, Mel and I went for a walk to try and find a bar or something, but got about 20m before being turned back by torrential rain.


Wednesday, 11 August 2004

Had dinner with Megan and put the world to rights. Went to "The Bridge" in Shawford, a Chef & Brewer. It was good, even if it has the dubious honour of being on the road upon which Victor Meldrew was killed ;-)

Tuesday, 10 August 2004

Got home to the new carpet - which looks good. Only problem is that the measurements they took for the hall were too small, and there's a dark defect in the study.

Monday, 09 August 2004

A busy day of moving furniture, taking up carpets and underlay, and then delivering them to the tip. In the pouring rain. Fun.

Saturday, 07 August 2004

My lucky day: didn't have to go to Ikea as we managed to get some nice storage b-skets from Dunelm in Cov. So got to have lunch out in the garden with a beer :-)

Set off with plenty of time to Ragley Hall for the concert which turned out to be very good. A jazz quartet preceded the classical/proms stuff and was, if nothing else, a good time filler. Unfortunately we had a fairly rowdy group in front of us who didn't appreciate any of the music until it got to Rule Brittainia etc. Oiks.

Exiting the car park afterwards was fun as well: none of the BMW or Mercedes drivers wanted to let anyone out, so we nipped down the outside of the field ;-)


Friday, 06 August 2004

Ben and Jules got their feedback and then, after my lunch, they had lunch. This, of course, meant that Philipp and James were postponed. To be fair, part of the reason for the delay may have been MEgan taking Ben home, ill. Later in the afternoon, caught up with Megan and sorted things out.

Up to Stockton for dinner for our weekend away :-)


Thursday, 05 August 2004

Day with no Extreme Blue work at all, until I had a brief (and reassuring) Sametime chat with Megan. Tomorrow we give the generally positive handover feedback to the team.

Wednesday, 04 August 2004

Got up, not feeling well - some kind of stomach bug, perhaps from the food last night? It's not as if I'd drunk anything. Had to go into work though as Jules left his laptop in my car.

Left early, though, and worked from home.

UX50 arrived.


Tuesday, 03 August 2004

CIO presentation went really well, however I then had theit-seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time-but-turned-out-not-to-be idea of going to the pub to celebrate.

Monday, 02 August 2004

Another nice day - but a nice thunderstorm would be good. Took the car to a local body shop and the boot now opens - they'll stick a quote in the post, and the neighbours have been round. Mel said they seemed nice, which was good :-)

Team were doing preparation for the Bob Greenberg (CIO) visit tomorrow. They seem to have a decent presentation and, with a bit of work, an effective demo.


Sunday, 01 August 2004

What a cracking start to the month with me reversing the car into another one. Not a lot of damage, but perhaps "cracking" was an unfortunate word to use :-(

Too hot to really do any of the other jobs, so welched around the house looking at exhorbitant PalmOS apps which their authors want to charge $5-10 for.


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