A Potted Weekend

In summary. I’ll fill in some details as time allows…

London Zoo
On Friday night we hooked up with M, J. and J. for drinks in Camden followed by a night visit to London Zoo. Topping up our glasses with Rose, we sauntered through the Gorilla Kingdom and the new Rain Forest enclosure before being kicked out around 10.30pm and hitting a nearby pub in Primrose Hill.
Photos.

National Portrait Gallery
On Saturday afternoon H. and I scootered into town to check out the 2007 BP Portrait Award at the National Portrait Gallery. Overall, well worth a visit - there’s some excellent stuff; the photo-realistic paintings in particular were quite stunning. I think I was most touched by a painting of an old man: the story beside it explains how as a young man, following being passed fit for the armed forces, he had been made to work in the mines in compliance with The Bevin Boys rule, something I’d never heard of before. I thought the painting that won third prize was cack, and still do. The painting that won the Young Artist Award is also well worth seeing.

Simpsons Movie
On Saturday evening we went to see the new Simpson’s Movie. General consensus: just like a loooong episode of The Simpson’s, and not even one of the better ones…

The Carnival Of Chariots
Sunday afternoon we scootered into town to catch the Hindu ‘Carnival Of Chariots‘ , in which a 40′ statue of Lord Jagannatha was carried from Hyde Park to Trafalgar Square amid much celebration. There were dances, stalls, and free vegetarian food. I took a bunch of photos, which can be seen here.

BBQ with J and B.
Late Sunday afternoon, H. and I cycled over to J. and B.’s place inIslington for beer, BBQ, and Wii bowling until late in the evening.

Sys Admin day

Today is National System Administrator’s Day, which means that although I am not a sysadmin myself, the office is absolutely full of grapes, bananas, strawberries, muffins, doritos, cookies, jaffa cakes and other goodies. It’s Friday, and everyone seems altogether perkier. Certainly in my experience, many of the tasks traditionally the work of sysadmins get farmed out to Developers too - so I will be filling my face with a clear conscience…

http://www.sysadminday.com

Up The Empire

Another great night out at The Hackney Empire last night, this time as part of the local ‘Spice Festival’ (nothing to do with Geri, Victoria et al.) Dirty Pretty Things were headlining, with a range of support including The Paddingtons, Glass Vegas, Lisa Moorish, and two truly, truly, dreadful “comedians” from Canada who were both booed off the stage, narrowingly avoiding a full scale riot, and, I would like to think, are now bound and ball-gagged ‘Pulp Fiction’ style in some Hackney crack den.
We had seats in the fifth row, got very, very drunk, had a great night out, and walked home afterwards. Top.
Photos here and a couple of short videos here.

Whatever.

Great headline story in today’s Metro which made me (unintentionally) laugh out loud on the tube… Essential it’s about two sixteen year old London girls (aka Vicky Pollard and Lauren Copper) who’ve been caught trying to smuggle 6.5kg of marching powder (worth £300K) out of Ghana in return for £3K each. According to the Metro, the girls told their families they were going on a school trip to France, but actually headed to Ghana where their living expenses were paid for them and they were offered £3K each to take the bags to London. Whether they’re guilty or not, I don’t know - make your own mind up; but these quotes don’t suggest the girls are the sharpest tools in the toolbox:

It was basically like a set-up. they didn’t tell us nuffink, we didn’t think nuffink, because basically, we are innocent. We didn’t know nuffink about this drugs and stuff. We don’t know nuffink. (actually the girls used the word ‘nothing’ as opposed to ’nuffink’, but you can imagine…)

Two boys gave us bags in Ghana to bring to London [in return for £6K]. We never thought anything bad was inside.

The girls face at least ten years in prison if convicted.

Bully For You.

In the run up to our Office party we have been reminded not only of the need to have fun and enjoy ourselves, but also of the Company’s “Inappropriate Behaviour Policy”.
Bearing in mind the atmosphere at my last place of work, the section on ‘Bullying’ gave me pause for thought:

4.1 Examples of Bullying

Examples of bullying may include but are not restricted to:

· Shouting or swearing at an individual

· Spreading malicious rumours or insulting someone (particularly on the grounds of age,race, sex, disability, sexual orientation and religion or belief.

· Persistent, excessive, unfair or unjustified criticism

· Public humiliation and/or insults

· Persistent undervaluing of a persons effort

· Constant ignoring of opinions

· Withholding information without justification so as to cause difficulty or embarrassment toan individual

· Unjustified, excessive monitoring and/or supervision

· Setting  someone up to fail – for example, setting a target/objective that cannot beachieved

· Constantchanging of targets for no justifiable reason

· Unreasonably blocking requests for leave

· Aggressive communications

· Intimidating or threatening behaviour.

· Exclusion or victimisation

· Deliberately undermining a competent worker by overloading and constant criticism

· Preventing individuals progressing by intentionally blocking promotion or trainingopportunities

eleven out of sixteen aint bad going…

Any Way That You Want Me

Totally lovin’ my new Evie Sands CD right now…

Buy it.

A-Z meme

A-Z Meme via Jack:

[A] - AVAILABLE: No
[B] - BIRTHDAY: MYOB
[C] - CONFUSED: Not really. I know where I stand.
[D] - LAST DRINK YOU HAD: A swig of Evian
[E] - EASIEST THING TO DO: nothing.
[F] - FAVORITE MUSIC GROUP/BAND: Heard the new Datarock yesterday, that’s quite good.
[G] - GUMMY BEARS OR GUMMY WORMS: Worms; less likely to get stuck in yr. teeth
[H] - HOMETOWN: Don’t really have one
[I] - INSTRUMENTS: Didj, Guitar, Tabla. All strictly amateur, all languishing in corners of my flat.
[J] - JUICE: Acai
[K] - KILLED SOMEONE: No.
[L] - LONGEST CAR RIDE: Probably the relatively frequent London - Carlisle (311 miles)
[M] - MILKSHAKE FLAVOUR: Chocolate, but I always feel ill afterwards.
[N] - NUMBER OF PETS: One cat.
[O] - ONE WISH: probably lottery related
[P] - PEOPLE WHO YOU HUNG OUT WITH LAST: H. M. and C in the ORL.
[Q] - QUIET OR LOUD: quiet.
[R] - REASONS TO SMILE: Not enough
[S] - SURGERIES YOU’VE HAD: None.
[T] - TIME YOU WAKE UP: About 7am
[U] - UNDERWEAR: Boxers.
[V] - VIOLENT: Not really, no. If I am, it tends to be verbal while on the road.
[W] - WORST HABIT: Short attention span.
[X] - X-RAYS YOU’VE HAD: Chest, jaw.
[Y] - YOUR FAVOURITE ANIMAL: Too many to choose from. it’s not that simple.
[Z] - ZODIAC SIGN: Pisces.

Art Car Boot Fair

At home this afternoon, having a lazy Sunday making my own bread and planning to spend most of the rest of the afternoon in the Gym, I suddenly remembered the Art Car Boot Fair was on - the bread was left to rise for the afternoon, the gym kit abandoned; I grabbed my camera and off I shot on my scooter.
The weather was gorgeous and Brick Lane was packed to bursting with the weird and the wonderful, the grim and the gorgeous. Two english pounds gained me access to the Car Boot and I went in just in time to catch The Teasemaids on stage. As this was essentially a strip show, the front row was full of middle aged snappers, I left my camera by my side; painfully aware that I would look like a perv if I started taking too many photos. Outside, the sun was shining and there were many, many more opportunities to take photos, so that’s what I did. I also saw Gavin Turk (taking money hand over fist), Sir Peter Blake (who was signing anything put in front of him), and Uri Geller - who I was sorely tempted to ask to bend my sunglasses into a tighter fit, but thought better of it.
I made a conscious effort not to take any money with me - knowing I have no self-restraint and a holiday to pay for (not to mention the rent!), but saw a few pieces I liked: some nice A4 signed Peter Blake playing cards for £75 a pop, ‘Make Your Own Art’ brass rubbings, some nice jewellry pieces sold out of the back of a customised Rolls Royce, and some eye-catching prints by Ben Westwood. The Gavin Turk stickers and (actual) car boots were quite nice too, but as his stickers were going for £75, I didn’t fancy my chances.
Anyway, an afternoon well spent I think - check out my photos here.

Virtual Festival

What better to do on a rainy sunday with a belly full of roast dinner than go to an (online) festival organised by The Guardian ?
‘SecondFest‘ lasted most of the weekend and featured such acts as New Young Pony Club, Hot Chip, Simian Mobile Disco, and The Knife. Here’s me dancing to Wiredaisies and letching at the cute avatar to my left…

A short while later I was given a free festival hat and I danced off (ie teleported) in the direction of the main arena for An Adventures In The Beetroot Field set. I had a new job to start in the morning, so couldn’t stay up for the Pet Shop Boys headliners…

H. spent the best part of the afternoon refining her avatar so that it ended up slim, with long legs and big tits; a bit like a ‘Girls World’ for the 21st Century really…

There’s some more great pics from the fest here (not mine).