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This has been a very long week. Thankfully it had been a 4-day weekend, although coming off a 10-day week before, that was certainly needed too! Working through til 1a.m and starting again at 7.30a.m wasn’t fun. Things were so much simpler last year when I was building sewer lines, though the parallels are there (just dealing with a different kind of shit now ). At my heart, I’m a geek, I love to tinker with things, though know when to play grown up and manage day to day servers or design and implement new services too. I don’t like political crap, and like constant meetings even less. I’m not a perfectionist, though do set myself high standards, and when I get pulled in a number of directions and I can’t focus on each area sufficiently, I let myself down as I don’t do as good a job as I know I’m capable of and expect. Luckily I have a good support network. And the late nights and early mornings have been worth it in terms of the systems we have in place now and highlighted areas for further development. I have so much time to claim back though, that will start this week I hope.

Anyways, as a bit of relief, Suzi wanted to decorate the media center and TAI offices this afternoon. After masterminding the plan of sneaking the decorations out the cupboard and leaving empty boxes with my able sidekick Tim, we eventually returned them and got to work make things like purty. Aoody had decided to fly off to Anchorage for the weekend, so in his absence we brought a little festive spirit to his work area:

Serves him right for jetting off to enjoy himself…

This evening I got to try eggnog and Erin spent quite possibly the longest amount of time physically possible to bake a batch of cookies I was called around 7p.m, wandered over, and was closer to 11p.m before we got to sample the delights! Was good fun though, and apparently watched some classic Christmas animated movies. Good times all round.

I also got my new Ultimate Ears Super.fi 3 studio earphones which took about 5 minutes of figuring out how to insert, but are just fantastic. I figured the cost was worth it given all the traveling I’m doing over Christmas, and hopefully will help me zone out easier sat in airports or whilst in the air. I also bagged a nice $5 coupon for Amazon MP3, and this was having already used a $10 coupon to purchase the earphones in the first place! Amazon are getting good are little extras and I don’t mind one bit. And yes, I know it’s all an attempt to get people to spend more money, so well played them.

Took a couple of weeks, but my new Fender CD-220SCE electro-acoustic guitar arrived (in one piece!) today Very happy, it plays just beautifully, though after not playing a guitar for two years I don’t think my fingertips will appreciate it in the morning after playing for over two hours tonight!

I got creative with the post-processing as my Fuji S1000fd really doesn’t like indoor photos, but at least I’d had a shave this morning. Still could do with a hair cut. Really like the bubinga wood and overall finish of the guitar, and the rosewood fingerboard is very smooth to play. Action is really sweet, just my finger picking leaving a lot to be desired!

Today was fun hanging out with Jeff + Angel for Thanksgiving. I ate way too much food which is apparently what you’re meant to do, and then brought even more back with me. Means I shouldn’t have to cook for the rest of the weekend Three weeks today I’ll be flying out of Bethel back to England, and especially since this a very American holiday, I didn’t feel like I was missing out on being away from family like some people have been with not getting out of town for the weekend. The last week or so I have been feeling a little homesick for the first time though. Maybe it’s because I know I’ll be back in Durham soon, but then, this is home now, so feels weird. Could be dealing with everything else has left me needing a break more than ever. Will have been 2 years since I was back there, so a little nervous to see so many people again after so long and having gone through so much.

I picked a new album off iTunes last night which I’m really enjoying, though making me want my guitar more than ever (seriously hoping it arrives next week!). The album is “For Emma, Forever Ago” by Bon Iver and is well worth checking out. I’m keeping a little eye on the Apple store at the moment to see what their Black Friday sales are going to be too

The last week was pretty busy as we had two guys out the office on leave which made for a lot of extra work being spread around. But, it was payday yesterday which made it worthwhile! Next week there’s an Apple trainer in so I can get in on that quite a bit, and will hopefully help out the site techs so they’re a little more self-sufficient out in the villages. I’ve also been doing quite a bit with VMWare with the view to consolidate most of our physical Windows servers in the district office into virtual machines. Given the cost of energy and the struggle with cooling (yes, I understand the irony of complaining about keeping a server room cool when it will be down to -20F outside in another month or so…), it makes a lot of sense.

I ordered in an acoustic guitar yesterday – a Fender CD220SCE. I keep checking the order status like a little kid waiting until it ships It’s ‘being packed’ at the moment. Hopefully it will get here sometime around next weekend. That could become mid-December, of course, though the mail into Bethel is pretty quick as it doesn’t then sit waiting to head out the villages like when I was in Tunt.

As I figured the spare room was a little bare, I ordered a bunch of photos in from Snapfish who I’ve used before, and got about 80 6×4 prints for a little over $10 including shipping. Got here within a week, so made a start on a photo wall. Not sure if I’ve seen it done elsewhere or just figured it seemed like a good idea in my head. I dunno, the Alaska area above works okay, but that’s probably because I’ve been to all the places so know it makes sense. I also did one of the lower 48 road-trip from the summer of ‘07:

Since I know where the places, it makes sense to me… The idea is to place photos onto the wall as they would appear on a map. Sometimes the best ideas are those that arrive at midnight after a few beers. Or not. Anyway, is better than just a bare white wall! I’m calling this a work in progress too.

Last night I had dinner at Ted’s as his wife is out of town so he could have some guys over to play Not going to mention who brought their wife along either… There were valid reasons I guess (think out til 3a.m the previous week where the wife wasn’t taken along…), and it was a good meal and bit craic. I then swung to another party for Angel’s birthday which was nice, though I was probably one of only two or three people that wasn’t doing a Praxis test at 8a.m Saturday morning! It was a good evening though, and the guys + gals doing their tests seemed to have done them without problems

As I’ve been doing quite a bit of coding with the new K300 website, it’s given me a chance to listen to some of the new albums I’ve got recently. ‘Dig Out Your Soul’ by Oasis is obviously fantastic, and was pleasantly surprised when iTunes suggested ‘Forth’ by The Verve. Figured I had all their albums, didn’t even realise they’d got back together! Think I need another couple of listens to make my mind up on that one. Ray La Montagne’s latest, ‘Gossip in the Grain’ is a little bit of a change from ‘Trouble’ but there’s some real standout tracks. Finally, Snow Patrol with ‘A Hundred Million Suns’ is nice, simply as the deluxe version on iTunes included a couple of feature videos (one about 35 mins. long), which really add a bit to things. Musically, it’s almost an extension of ‘Eyes Open’, which is fine as I loved that album too.

Anyways, I’m eyeing up an acoustic guitar next weekend when I get paid… I think two years without one is enough.

I finally managed to get to listen to Radiohead’s latest album, In Rainbows, today after I left it downloading painfully slowly yesterday. I’d pre-ordered it a week or two ago and it’s got a lot of attention as they’re free from a record company and so have released the entire album on the internet and let people name their price. Technically, you could give them nothing (though would still pay a 45p handling charge…), but it’s a great show of how meaningless record labels are becoming. Another of my favorite bands, Nine Inch Nails, also recently announced the same kinda thing after years of recommending people grab their music illegally off P2P networks to screw their label I’ve been a fan of Radiohead for years, and still class their 2003 gig at Newcastle Arena as one of the best I’ve been to (only matched by front row pressed against the barriers right in front of Noel Gallagher watching Oasis in 2002) and thankfully In Rainbows isn’t quite as weird as Kid A, but a nice progression from Amnesiac and Hail to the Thief. Not quite as electronic, which is nice being able to pick out actual instruments, and understand Thom Yorke’s lyrics about as much as any Radiohead song! Definately worth dropping the guys a few quid and getting In Rainbows, just make sure you do actually buy their other albums (or at least OK Computer if nothing else!).

The last week or so has been different working outside. It’s moved from rain to a couple of snow showers on Friday and a 1/4 to 1/2 inch of ice across puddles this morning. Has been very frosty every morning this week making working first thing a bit dicey carrying a skillsaw or jigsaw! There’s a shade under 300 feet of 16″ square wooden sections (each 8ft long) raised anywhere between 1 to 4 feet off the ground, with 2 inches of insulating foam in the bottom and plywood sides all round. Has taken six weeks, and there’s no pipes in yet! But, the rest of the pipework and connectors should be here next week so we can start laying the sewer pipe, hot water feed (meaning each house can simply open a valve to fill their water tank up,) and a glycol heat loop.

I also found out that the stack of pre-insulated metal pipe sections that have been sat by the school for months are to connect our houses up in the same manner. The two duplexes over here will have the sewer tanks ran straight back to the school along with a hot water feed linked into the water tanks. Will certainly be easier than hauling water once a week during winter with our ickle 180 gallon tanks! It’s nice there’s going to be work for at least another 6 weeks realistically even though our duplexes shouldn’t be anywhere near as much work without the need for wooden sections to hold all the pipes, but the idea of digging snow out the way to run the lines over here in the middle of November isn’t as appealing

Still, should have a pay check from September tomorrow – can see if it’s all been worth it!

Since this is pretty much just my personal blog, it doesn’t get all that much attention apart from some of the computing stuff I’ve written. So, was pretty surprised to see around 300-400 hits per day recently. Driving up to Gateshead to get some more tattoo work done (pictures in a few days when it starts to heal…), I was listening to Radio 1 and now it makes sense why I’ve suddenly been getting so many hits.

I don’t have anything on Noel Gallagher back in the Live Lounge in 2003, though I did get bruised ribs from being right at the front of an Oasis gig in front of Noel in 2003 if that counts! Sorry folks, can’t help you with the competition on Radio 1, but rest assured I’ll be entering anyways to get him to play in my living room :p

But, rather than leaving you to go home empty handed, check out this post I wrote about some live acoustic sets did for ‘The Interface’ podcast a couple of weeks back. And, of course, for more awesome rock music, check out TPN Rock – one of the biggest + best music podcasts out there (which I just happen to co-host!).

First up, got the police check back a couple of days ago which was all clean so have sent notification to the US embassy in London to request a final interview date. Got all the forms I need now, have heard nothing back about the medical which means I’ve got no problems there, so that gives 6 weeks for the embassy to arrange an interview and fly out. Fingers crossed – am hoping to hear back some time next week on an interview date, and so long as it’s before middle of December, shouldn’t be a problem with flight availability or costs to fly out before Christmas

Secondly, expect to see ‘Now Playing in iTunes’ on the right-hande side to show Damien Rice’s latest album, 9, a lot. I’m loving it – is a bit more powerful at times than ‘O’, and was a bit surprised to see the parental advisory sticker on the front of the album cover! Need a few more listens over the coming days, but not sure how many tracks I’ll pick up to play on the guitar myself, as there’s often strings and backing vocals, which work really well. Live sets are planned on Later with Jools Holland this Friday, and with Jo Wiley in the Live Lounge in a couple of weeks, so will see if any acoustic versions of the new tracks are played. Shame there’s no booklet containing some more artwork and lyrics, but the fold out sleeve is nice – I like the way it’s made from recycled paper + card rather than a plastic case which usually break anyways!

Following the excitement of live tracks from Noel Gallagher, the Q-Review podcast popped up in iTunes today kicking off with Damien Rice’s latest album, 9. I loved ‘O’ and ‘B-sides’ and play a lot of the tracks on the guitar, so had really been looking forward to the new album.

It’s out in Ireland today and the UK on Monday, so guess what I’ll be scraping the piggy-bank for?! Damien is also performing on Later with Jools Holland (yey, back on TV tonight!) on 10th November and with Jo Wiley in the live lounge on 24th November, so again, keeps me happy as his live tracks are usually excellent too! I’ve also got a copy of the Live Lounge CD on order too, which is very weird for me since I rarely purchase big-name CD’s with doing so much with unsigned bands, but when I really like a band or artist it’s time to grab the wallet!

And thanks for those that have been in touch supporting my move over to The Podcast Network. I’ve really enjoyed producing TPN Rock this week – reckon it’s pushed me on a bit and feel a lot more comfortable + natural on the mic. Never had problems before with the Unsigned Rock Podcast, but now what I’m doing is getting heard by a pretty big audience, it’s certainly spurred me on

Oasis still knock out some awesome tracks, and have long been one of my favourite bands. Noel Gallagher, especially, has been a major influence in my own guitar stuff. Live stuff from Noel is always top quality, and even though it’s hosted by AOL they’ve just brought out The Interface podcast with him doing three acoustic tracks and an interview – ‘It’s Good (To Be Free)’, ‘Whatever’ and ‘Slide Away’ in what they call a “Live and Un-Liamed” performance! Grab the enhanced version if you’re running iTunes to check out some of the photos as well. His interview is cool too and worth listening to.

Alongside Radiohead live in 2003, best gig I’ve been to was Oasis back in 2002 – plastered against the barriers right at the front of the arena in front of Noel and his stack of amps, regularly getting soaked by the hoses the arena staff + security kept rolling out since it was middle of the summer and just a tad warm! One of the loudest gigs I’ve been to, as it happens…