Tragic. Appalling. On the face of it so easy to do as well. Plenty of news and proper content elsewhere – visit Binary Bonsai for links to good news sources. While the mobile network was down in London and news reports sketchy, blogs were the most up to date and quickest way of finding out what was happening, and from my point of view conveyed the fear that had gripped people far better than any other news site.
Category: Personal
Meow
Great news – we’ve got a new cat. When I say we’ve got, we don’t pick her up for another 3 weeks and when I say cat I really mean kitten. She’s only 4 weeks old and the Cat Protection League keep the young kittens for a period of time to make sure they are healthy and OK to be housed.
I snapped a picture as she played with another kitten – she’s going to be a handful but it will be nice to have a wee pet around the house again.
Getting Organised
I’ve found myself getting more and more disorganised. Maybe it’s an age thing, maybe it’s getting lazy and letting things pile up, maybe it’s something else entirely. Whatever the reason action is required.
First step – e-mail. I’ve always struggled to get an organised inbox at home and especially at work due to the volume of mail. Home is easier as there’s less of it and I can keep as much as I like – no nasty disk quota’s. Work is a different beast. 25 Meg inbox, 2 gig archive and still running NT. I find mail gets ‘lost’ as I flit from one task to the next. I used to run rules to push mail into folders but this took time to keep up to date and some mail didn’t have a rule so defeating the purpose. I struggle to find mail thats somewhere between my inbox and archive. I’ve now followed some advice from the guy that runs 43 Folders and made over my Inbox. This now forces me to manage mail and act accordingly. At home it works a treat with Outlook 2003 as I can add a count to each folder and see exactly what’s still to do. I’ve installed MSN Desktop Search as I’ve found that to be the best desktop search tool – it suits my needs and allows me to find what I need quickly and accurately. I would do the same at work but I’m 4 weeks away from an XP upgrade – until then I’m stuck on NT.
Task management was next on the list. I’ve standardised a list of categories for home and work and I’m managing to make use of my Tungsten again using Keysuite which keeps Outlook talking to the Palm nicely. This has not been going to well so a bit more discipline is required. Once work upgrade takes place I can get a cheap usb sync cable for the Palm. Joy.
Finally I’ve ordered the Getting Things Done book from good old Amazon. I don’t intend to follow everything it recommends religiously but I’m sure it will give me good pointers that I can adapt for myself. Hopefully this time next year I’ll have remembered Lewis birthday before the day rather than after.
Royal Mail
In the last few years I’ve never really had a problem with the Royal Mail. Sure some things took a while to deliver and it was a pain having to pick up parcels from the depot (the joys of Amazon) but I can live with that. Even one delivery a day didn’t bother me – leaving at 7AM for work meant I never get morning mail – it was always a 5PM event for me.
However the last few days have been….frustrating.
It’s been one year…
…since I picked up the keys for the new house. This has been the quickest year of my life so far but also one of the most enjoyable. The move has been a real change of life for us and looking back I wish I had done it sooner.
Since moving I’ve done some gardening, some more DIY and also become far more relaxed at home as we no longer need to worry about neighbours, drunks and people being sick over the car. Looking ahead I’ve got some goals I want to achieve by end of year 2…decorate hall (it’s massive, well for me anyway), fill in some cracks on the outside walls, organize garage, develop garden some more and at the tail end of this year or start of next year it will be double glazing time hopefully. Can’t wait 🙂
Shocked
Just had The Sun and The Mirror reporters visiting our house. It turns out the family that is missing in Benbecula used to stay in our house (5 years ago). It brings the tragedy even closer to home and makes the small damage the house got last night seem meaningless. It also makes you wonder how the press got this address as it wasn’t the previous owners but the ones before that are missing – irrelevant but annoying all the same. My thoughts go out to the family and their relatives tonight.
The Storm
Last nights wind’s were strong. Very strong. Our house suffered a bit of damage but thankfully not too much. Those were some of the strongest and most consistent winds I’ve felt in a long time. Thankfully a friendly roofer came and fixed the damage so we shouldn’t let in too much more water! I say friendly – he was all out to fleece us for as much as he could get but that’s tradesmen for you.
Now the weather’s changed to hail and snow. Joy.
Best of 2004
As seen elsewhere I’d thought I’d do my own round up of the best and worst of 2004. So here it is….
Tsunami
Words fail when trying to describe what has happened in the far East. Better to point you to the South East Asia Earthquake & Tsunami blog which gives advice on how to donate and what help is really required. If in the UK donate via the Disasters Emergency Committee or Oxfam. Why does it take something like this to bring nations together?
White Christmas
Merry Christmas everyone – hope you all had a good time. We had a White Christmas for our first Christmas in the new house. If I’m being honest though there was very little snow, but it made the day a bit more special. Christmas TV was awful though – hardly anything to watch so I ended up viewing my new Spider-Man 2 dvd – quality film.
For the rest of the holiday I’m off to Peterborough – just an excuse for an extended gaming session really but it will be good to catch up with friends whom I’ve not seen for ages. Anyway – must go and pack – nice 6 hour drive tomorrow although I’ve prepared a best off the year CD for the car – must get the iPod wired up for car use.