Monday, February 27, 2006
You dirty little girl..
Pass the sponge please.
Sunday, February 26, 2006
Smell the coffee
We just got back from visiting Greenwich market.It's a cold, windy but dry day here in London, with glimpses of wan sunshine. We parked Zuki in the normal place and wandered around pretty much aimlessly, like we normally do, the only pre-designated stop being at the Coffee Guy in the main market. I collected my usual 3 parcels of coffee, which he ground for me there & then.
We rifled through anything that took our fancy in Ottakar's, and a couple of small mom-and-pop style bookshops on the way to the bakery, where we picked up a crusty French loaf to accompany the potato & leek soup the missus is busy preparing downstairs even as I type this.
From the bakery, we ducked through a narrow walkway, past the nautical antiques shop and the map gallery, zipped across a busy stretch of road and with gleeful smiles, pushed open the doors to George of Greenwich. One of my new favourite coffee shops, leagues above Starfucks.
As per my previous, erm, comments about what comprises a decent coffee shop, I'm going to give G o G a bit of a review:
1) Baristas who can understand english: Good! The girls behind the counter seemed to have been hired for the ability to do the job, not just as window dressing. Though foreign, they understood my order and got it right, albeit after checking 3 times.
2) Clean premises: Good! Tiled floors, mirror clean table tops. No dust-bunnies anywhere. I still need to check the loos, but 10/10 so far.
3) They serve plain black coffee: Yes!
4) They are reasonably priced: Absolutely! £1.25 for a large cappucino or a large hot chocolate.
5) They're easy to get to: Yup. 15 minutes tops, unless Holly Housewife is performing a 33 point turn in her SUV on Lewisham high street again.
6) No one to you: We sat and had a nice long chat, people watched through the floor-to-ceiling windows, sipped our coffees and were never once hassled. Plate removal (we had to have a wee pastry to ward off the chill) was accomplished with an alarming degree of stealth.
7) Comfy chairs. Well, mostly. It depends what table you sit at. After 30 odd minutes on a relatively high chair with a low back I didn't have NumBum, so I reckon it's good.
On top of all that coffee goodness, they have a restaurant on the back/ side of the shop, and it looks like it could be really good. Slightly upmarket prices (£11-£15 for a main course) but before I say anything we're going to try them out and see if its worth it. Watch this space.
Now, if only they'd open a sister branch near the office!
Monday, February 20, 2006
Looking Good...
This may well just cement your opinion that I need to get a 'real' life, but right now I am just so chuffed about having finally made some dinkum progress on Guild Wars.My two main characters, Manullos and Aileos, had been stuck in a bit of limbo in the Crystal Desert for some time now. I just couldn't find the right group of people to crack a couple of really tough missions with. But - at last- success! both my characters have Ascended to a purer state of being, and have been deemed worthy of the gods' scrutiny.
Which is all fine and dandy, but most importantly, Manullos has now been able to get himself a very cool new set of armour.
Yessir. The Rolls Royce of armour in the world of Tyria.
"It doesn't matter if you succeed or fail, as long as you look good doing it."
If only Sir Hand could see me now.
Oh wait, he can.
Aileos the mage unfortunately doesn't get funky new styles of armour. He has, however, forged ahead and completed the very long, very arduous, very nasty but so very pretty Tomb Of The Primeval Kings episode. So he deserves a mention too.
For the record, I have upgraded his armour, and although it cost less than Manullos' platemail, it still set me back just over 8000 gold.
Monday, February 13, 2006
She's aliiiiive! Again.
Cars.
Once you've had one, you can never go back to being without one.
Which is why, despite London's fairly good public transport, I felt marooned when the alternator in my Vitara died a few days ago. To be fair, she has done just under 120 000 miles, so a bit of wear & tear is to be expected.
But still!
I got a few fairly bruising quotes for new or 2nd hand ones.... but then! Inspiration! .....ebay to the rescue!! £13 and a bit of postage later, I had a slightly muddy replacement in my hands.
Its just a pity that I'm about as safe around car engines as Helen Keller is in a needle factory.
A bike I can just about handle; with enough silicone, zip ties and a good pliers you can just about fix anything on a XJ650.
My normal mechanic, who's very, very good and does a damn fine job for the money he charges, was going to be my next port of call. Fortunately I checked my bank balance before making the appointment. Blegh. Alas, Mr Mechanic won't work on the basis of an IOU, nor will he barter his services for a chicken and a basket of fruit.
So, I did the sensible thing. I rang Big D.
Big D is an old friend of the family and a dab hand at fixing things that suck in petrol and make any type of whirring or vroom noise. He's also the man who once snapped a Gedore spanner with his bare hands. True as bob (yes, I know, bob's dead) he was up for it, and a couple of days later (this Friday just past, actually) he arrived, toolbox in hand.
The short version is that my Vitara is healthy again, no more funny warning lights and electrics that spontaneously die on the way home at night. (You'd be shocked to know how many times people will flash their lights at you if you drive through London without your headlights on. Obviously no one here pays heed to urban legends..)
Anyway, the jeep is fixed. Took her for a nice spin on Saturday to charge the battery and so far all is sweet like a banana.
The long version is this: Big D was actually quite busy this weekend, so he had to come over on Friday night. After work. When its very, very dark. And very, very cold.
I believe the temperature dipped to around 0 celsius on Friday night. And what were we doing? Sprawling on the road, headfirst under the engine because the goddamn Japanese engineers who designed the (admittedly sweet) bloody engine left enough space for a starving four year old to get a spanner onto the bolts to loosen the alternator cradle. Jeeziz, what a mission. We froze our asses off, skinned several knuckles and got soaked in engine coolant... did i mention it was cold?
Anyway, we survived, thanks to the trays of coffee the missus brought out to us and the fine folk at Domino's, who provided essential nourishment.
Result!
Thursday, February 09, 2006
'Nuff said
Monday, February 06, 2006
Codswallop
What a load of crap.Next time these rabid dogs decide to go on a rampage, the army should move in behind them and open fire.
Seriously, what point is there to leaving them alive? Do you think they'll ever make anything resembling a positive contribution to society? Why the hell should we put up with their crap?
They're incapable of sitting down and engaging in dialogue about whatever's pissing them off today. I mean, have you seen the cartoons? They're pathetic really. I've seen more dramatic stuff in old copies of Punch.
Bleat on about human rights all you want, but in my world they're about as welcome as a septic ulcer. They're the dregs of humanity, parasites and a walking ,talking advertisement for why genocide should be discussed as a viable option at the U.N.
Thursday, February 02, 2006
Doh!
This morning I had the fun task of collecting some files from the safe in the basement of my office. Boring but hardly physically or mentally taxing by any stretch of the imagination.However.
About 2/3 the way through collecting my batch of files, my innards decided that this would be the perfect time to kickstart the latter half of the digestion process -the part that had steadfastly refused to work as it should for the last week or so.
However, as much as I wanted to mosey on down to ye olde garderobe and send my little brown fish off to the atlantic, I couldn't exactly do it with two armloads of security documents and the only set of keys to the safe in the building. So..I grabbed the last of the files (in record time, I might add) and hopped into the lift, my only plan for the next few minutes being to drop off the files at my desk, give boss-lady her keys back and scoot to the loo, post-haste.
I'm halfway there when he spots me.
I'll call him Wesley, since he looks like a Wesley to me. Wesley is a director of the company. Of the species Grandus Fromageus.
(Aside from looking like a Wesley, he also sports a fine moustache. Its the kind of 'tache that, in a previous life, was attached to the top lip of a Spitfire pilot during the blitz... the kind of 'tache that should belong to a mouth that can shout "Tally Ho, chaps!" without coming off as a prat)
Anyway. Wesley introduces himself, and starts the New Chap speech. You know, how's it going so far, do you like it, who's your team (squadron) leader and so forth.
And through all this, I'm just standing there with a reddening face, clutching my files with sweating hands, toes pointing inwards and images of an Anal Incident flashing through my mind.
He must of sensed something was wrong when he foolishy tried to shake my hand:
a) it was sweatier than that of a paedophile at kindergarten swimming gala and
b) my arm involuntaily took this as a sign to release some tension and I think I might of popped one of his knuckles.
Soon afterwards we made our respective excuses and I shuffled away to what can only be described as wall clawing bliss.
No doubt he went off to the boardroom to spread the word of the decidedly odd, sweaty handed South African who's just joined the company.
Aaargh!!
Hey..
Got a light?
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