So I'm scribbling about it now for the purposes of tracking such things.

I fell over last night. No biggie in many cases, a trip over a loose bit of carpet, getting feet tangled in the cat, these things happen.

But last night I fell over because I couldn't decide which way to walk, the attendent muscle vibration just took my legs out fom under me.

The overall feeling was pretty familiar, huge great adrenanaline burn, a distinct appreciation of the exact speed of time and an utter clarity of vision which becomes almost euphoric.
I'm used to that.

What I'm not used to is getting hit with an utter inability to think coherently for more than a few milliseconds at a time leading to such a flood of contrary decisions that my muscles buzz back and forth without order or purpose.
Hence, bang, down like a sack of bricks.

Didn't last long. Doesn't seem to have left any damage. Blood pressure came down as ordered. arms and legs started doing as they were told only a few minutes later. hough Best Beloved said my eyes looked a little odd for a while.

Causes, no idea, no special trigger. After a long hard day at work. Immediately after watching an episode of heroes and feeding the fish in the fish tank. Just before heading to bed for sleepytime.
Aside from that, nothing.
I'm pretty sure I've not been exposed to any infopollen recently...

Gah, weekends, they come towards me faster than expected!

See how I pack my little spotted hanky and head towards the (hopefully) frozen north where StabCon will be perpetrated.

Nothing abnormal about that, we dfo it twice a year, but this time there are a couple of subtle differences.

1) Since Best Beloved has a shiny new car, she's driving (Rah!)
2) We're dragging lokeon along with us, since the poor chap is rather at a loose end at present.
3) We're packing "light"
4) The spanish inquisition

Fingers crossed we get out of London before the rush hour gets too evil.

I have, Gentle Reader, been a tad busy recently, and I make no apology for that fact.
I make even less apology for the lack of scribbling in these pages, for some months now I have simply had nothing to say. Nothing worth speaking of was happening in so many ways.
Or perhaps my perception of what is and is not worth speaking of has changed.

No matter, such self referential fluff is pointless and entirely inward looking.
Tis my chums I should be considering, and the joys and activities with which I have been spending my time in the company of said chums.

Party at the abode of smokingboot and larians, as briefly touched upon in previous entries. Somewhat miffed to have screwed up the timing well enough that caffeine_fairy had already left. Must try harder.

Milk shakes and burgers with downybearded1 and lokeon saw the creation of japanese foods and further milkshakes with downybearded1, lokeon, mapp and another chap who may be without LJ.

Followed by attending Pum's party, complete with irritating children of all sizes, lovely people of all shapes, and tasty food of all colours. Also a chance to take a brief peek at a couple of headless Basses and actually have a brief play on Pum's Yamaha BX1. Lovely piece of kit but I prefer the sound of mine.

Ugh, may write more later, since there seem to be things of import happening in the world. But for now.
Sleepytime.
Sweet dreams all.

It's true I have written code today, some of it was good code, some of it was just turning the handle to get things done.

I have spoken to my chums in various places and made at least one person smile a smile they might not have otherwise had.

I ate a fine and excellent burrito.

Then I came home re-fitted a single contact onto one of my zarky sparky toys, plugged it in and watched it go Pop.
Then, becasue I am a twit I plugged in the spare _before_ checking that the contact was on the correct capacitor lug.

Play me off keyboard cat, play me off...

Sunday morning saw me meeting Mr. Flay as he decended from his caridge and repairing to the workshop wherein we discussed the merits of various pieces of timber before constructing the marvelous edifice with you can see below.



Alas this endeavour consumed much of the morning and no little part of the afternoon, which meant that our arrival at the abode of the ever delectable smokingboot was somewhat delayed.
This was further complicated by our autonavigator insisiting upon a route which we subsequently discovered was far from optimal under the prevailing traffic conditions.

In the end it mattered little, a fine time was had by all. Many old aquantances renewwed, at least one new friend made, and a few tenuous links between peopel oncemore revealed the world to be a significantly smaller place than it at first appears.

With a deliebrate raised, questioning eyebrow at caffieine_fairy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_production_in_Iceland

Just because of This

Gentle Reader I am weary beyond imagining, filthy dirty, and sore in places I didn't even know I had places to be sore in.

I am however grinning like a ninny, Maelstrom was fun in a number of ways, and I shall definitly be doing that again. Possibly with a little less random crap in the car. Possibly with a little more.

Right now however it's time to snooze.

Running around like a loony doing "things" for maelstrom.
The mound of stuff is growing and the car is stayintg the same size.
This is going to be interesting...

In news of tiny weeny frogs.
Time to go out and buy water fleas for them to nosh upon and drop a few into the water.

Then grab some more guy line and scome clips.

Then unpack all the crap we got from Best Beloved's aunt

Then pack all the crap into the car

Then drive to Derby (a mere 2 hours)

Then set up the huge tent

Then eat tea.

Then set up the airbed

Then sleep the sleep of the dead.

Then maelstrom begins...

Gentle Reader, you may be aware of Tadpole Cam. In which a webcam displays the contents of my tiny tadpole tank. Then again you may not...

About two days ago I noticed that some of the larger tadpoles were sporting rather natty pairs of back legs in styles ranging from the tiny and barely formed through to the full on Extreme Frog.
Last night, with smescrater firmly installed on the sofa, weighted down with a glass of fine whiskey and malteaser having regretfully retired to bed on the grounds of having to be sane and awake for work the next morning, I finally got around to checking the tadpole tank, examining the filter and preparing to feed the wee beasties.

Not only had some of them sprouted front legs, there were now proper bona-fide tiny frogs hopping about from plant front to tank side, to floaty wood plank and back again.



Yay for frogs

Gentle Reader I am Hot*

The sun is shining, the breeze is soft, the scent of apple blossom drifts lightly in the clear air, and I am stuck in an office.
Worse, an office with the windows nailed shut and the temperature gradualy rising even with the air-conditioning turned up to 11. It's starting to get a little unpleasant in here.

So far I've managed to stay awake, mainly via the consumption of Far Too Much^TM coffee followed by pints and pints of chilled water. Alas I've now reacehd the point where I can't physically drink another drop without risking some horrible internal detonation, or possibly some of my major organs dissolving entirely.
So I sit here gently roasting, watching the needle on the temperature guage rising and counting the minutes until it's time to head home.

Fortuantely Home will be a rather pleasant place compared to this hell hole, it has pussycats whose ears need to be fussed. It has tadpoles who, though showing no signs of having legs, are now large and quite boistrous. If I get my act together it will even have bits of wood that will be turned into a flagpole.

What it doesn't have is space, specifically space for a lorry load of furniture, even more specifially there's a lack of space for the lorry load of furniture that Best beloved's aunt seems to be rather insisting that we take off her hands after lunch tomorrow. Here's hoping that we can get the idea accross without having to be rude about it.

*Yes Yes, thankyou. Now go back go giggleing at turtles.

Gentle Reader I have, as is my wont, been an insanely busy bunny over teh last month or three.
One might even go so far as to consider that I have been busily insane.

The crystalising of a decision resurrected an old hobby and the astonishing outlay of both time and money that's required to partake even passably well, never mind do the job properly, has oddly enough astonished me. That along with tacking an entirely new hobby onto my already vastly over-hectic life has left me little time for my more usual pursuits.
In addition there are builders doing all kinds of drastic things to the pile of rubble and broken stone I once laughingly called my workshop. Damaged and tumbledown no longer. We have the technology, we can rebuild it.

With that the period of acceleration is almost over, and once cruising speed and altitude are reached there will be a minor change of focus. Away from the creation of vaguely oriental LRP props and back to the mad science...

Projects currently on hold:-
Servo driven laser cat excersiser.
50cm whimshurst machine
Final casing for the twin coil Jacob's ladder
Appropriate reading lamp for mad science
Agatha's Gun
Flame shooting Maverick 6
Crumb clearing mircobot
Sound triggered autohammer
Steel Monowheel
Trebuchet

I cannot concentrate on work, We're at that distressing stage of the project where we have so many things to do that attempting any of them would make so little difference to the total as to seem futile. I have a pair of tweezers, two years to move a ton of sand and no motivation to even look at the pile.

Instead my mind drifts to other things, memories of things that happened as they should* and the patterns of things that did not go quite as expected.
Plans for the immediate, near, and far future, where to be, how to get there and who or what I shall have to destroy in order to make space to stand when I arrive.
Plans for creation of things, alteration of mind states and the placement of people. All the intricate chessboard of who needs to be placed at what distance from whom before the stars align.
Transportation issues become highlighted, moving from here to there requires moving from now to then, time and space cannot be seperated but must mesh one into the other like the warp and weft of and intricately detailed but not entirely flexible fabric.
The mind drifts from topic to idea, to random musing on the four dimensional shape of a kiss as seen by a time irrelevent observer. Fragile as a bubble, and with the same power to create penetrating shafts of cosmic radiation.

Drugs are bad, M'kay ?


*caffiene_fairy will understand better than most the way of the Squirrel Sinewave and smokingboot will remember the way that stones breathe.

One for thalanoviel and Pythagoras.

A cowboy rides through an Indian village.
He see's an indian squaw sitting on a deer hide with her son.
Then he see's another squaw on a buffalo hide with her son.
Then he see's a squaw on a hippopotamus hide with 2 son's.
Hmmmmmm, he thinks........
The squaw on the hippopotamus is equal to the sons of the squaws on the other two hides.

My these little chaps grow fast!


In a day or two it wil be time for some timelapse movie fun I think...

Tadpole Cam

With many thanks to bibliogirl and rotwang for their much valued assistance.

Puttin' the band back together man...

I've been Doing Things Gentle Reader, Things* I tells ya!

I'll just summaraise here, and perhspe write a little more at some other point.
There are good reasons for not writing more extensively now, but the best one is the most obvious.
I'm drunk. I've had beer, no shortage thereof, and thoroghly enjoyed the experience.

Had a rather pleasant birthday involving chinese food and certain entertainments best kept betewen myself and Best Beloved.

I've stabbed more goblins, orcs, and koiolds thatn a man usually has to deal with in a lifetime and discovered that, as with so many things going back the second time is _so_ much easier.

I've met up for coffee with someone who I hope will be a new chum, even if she is heading back to australia in 8 days time. Fingers crossed she says yes to my dinner invitation.

I've been to chomper99's birthday bash, eatevn very good food and left his birthday present on the tube. I am _so_ clever...

I've played my bass, just as badly as usual but instead of failing to play simple things I'm now failing to play complex ones.

I've contacted some builders to get quotes for repairing the workshop and upgrading it to a usable state.
At least one of them appears to be dangerously competent...

I've re-potted one of the water lillies and planted some plants from their pots into the actual ground.

I've set up a fishtank and put some of the shrimp like creatures from the pond into it in preperation for some new arrivals tomorrow.

But tonight, tonight saw the inaugural beerfest to celebrate the arival of maviscruet in the big smoke with the addendance of a number of people who should know better, and the interuption of a** lass from middlesborogoh who seemed rather intent that we should know where the place was.
Possibly a nice girl but ye gods her accent would have etched glass...

A good evening, hopefully to be followed by a good night. I certainly intend to do the sleeping.

Tomorrow comes visiting The Mouse in hospital and glaring at her doctors if they try to pretend she's not asmhatic, the traising down to bibliogirl and rotwang's place for reasons that will become apparent.

*But not stuff this time
** Full breasted, but ulitimately toxic blonde

It's my Birthday! I am doddery and aged!

I have book tokens and strange glowwy magnetic marbles of strangeness.
extra thankyous to bibliogirl and rotwang

Also very silly ideas regarding the use of auto-rotation as a parachute.
in a steampunk styl-E of course...

Ladies and gentlemen. I am, as of this moment, lightly miffed. Possibly even mildly irritated...
There is a cause for this, and one which I feed justifies a certain degree of snarling and growling.

Some naughty wee scuggan broke into our house last night and pinched things in a petty thief kind of manner.
By petty, I mean _really_ petty.
He stole the change out of my wallet, down to the last penny.
He stole Best Beloved's handbag, taking only the cash and scattering the rest of the contents all over the nearby alleyway. He stole the bottle of scent I got from Penhaligons not one month ago, the only item of monetary value in there, and smashed it against a wall in the same alleyway.

Alas, he stole my phone, and this is where the irritation comes in.
I now have very few phone numbers for my chums and can't even call Jingles When Walking to see if we're still on for dinner this evening.

So, time for one of those secret polls that only I can see the results of...

Poll #1355255 The great phone number gathering Poll
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: None

Can I have your phone number please ?

Here's my home number

Here's my mobile number.

Ooh! a Tickybox!

I appear to have eaten posion of some kind...
( TMI perhaps )

In Other News, having spoken to the chaps at the Bass Center and taken a peek into the hideous mes of wiring at the back my guitar, it seems I may have some soldering to do. Firstly to reduce the rats nest of random wires to a somewhat neater bundle and secondly to actually earth the bridge and pickups to the same 0v reference rather than connecting each one to a random potentiometer case.
I think I may be sending a sharp note to these chaps saying "quality control, lads. Ever heard of it ?"