UnorthodoxY Archive It's wasn't what you thought

October 15, 2008

Plan B

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 11:08 am

I mentioned ‘Plan B’ a few posts back when I discovered my employment was less assured than it had been.

So what is it ? 

The truth is plan B isn’t really a plan to find a new job, it’s a plan I’ve had for a while to set my self up to either leave my job or take a sabbatical and sod off travelling for a bit. 

It revolves around finding out how I can rent out my flat while I’m not here, then sorting out my finances to accommodate that and powering through the inevitable list of things I’ll need to do to make it all possible.

So this morning a nice man from Broughton Property Management came round and provided me with details of the finances and that big list of things to do. 

Fortunately almost everything on the list was stuff I should really do anyway. So there’s no harm in doing it and then being prepared for the possibility of renting. 

This doesn’t mean that I’m definitely sodding off to foreign shores, either for employment or just for fun, I’m simply getting myself to the position where I could do so given, say, a few months notice. I could just take another job in Edinburgh, and I might. But from experience I know that after the initial challenge wears off I’ll just fall into the same old routine that I’ve been merrily following for eight years. 

It seems like this has come along at exactly the sort of time I was thinking of changing things up, it’d be foolish not to at least investigate the chance of moving abroad for a year or two. Maybe even junking telecoms, or even software, and doing something else. I googled ‘Poker Tournament Director Jobs’ this morning … 

There’s still lots to sort out, and lots of potential for things to change between now and then. So next year I may still be in Edinburgh, retiring to my couch after a hard day to watch whatever dross is on telly.

Or maybe I’ll be sitting on a balcony in Malta doing contract work on my laptop and sipping white wine. 

Yes, I know the reality isn’t going to match the dream, but I can still dream. 

And that Malta dream isn’t realistic.

I don’t sip wine. 

October 13, 2008

EU 2008: Copenhagen, Denmark

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 12:54 pm
First a little background, I got to Copenhagen late on a Saturday night having spent the previous two nights in Amsterdam. So I’m pretty exhausted, I’ve eaten very little and I’ve done next to no research on the place, all of this may have coloured my judgement of the city.
Kongens HaveOn the first night I decided to go for a wander, so I pick a random direction and head that way, later on I discover that I picked the worst direction to go, there’s nothing interesting at all in the direction. Not even any real restaurants, I’m forced to resort to a greasy burger when I realise that there’s no other options.
I head out the next day determined to find something interesting in Copenhagen, but the entire town feels sleepy. I’m not in the tourist season, but it’s only a week away and I would have thought there’d be more going on. It’s beautiful weather but even the parks and the shoreline are fairly quiet. Maybe everyone’s away for the weekend. 

I did find a crowd of people following some soldiers and a brass band, it was all a bit ‘big’ to be a regular changing of the guard but I’ve still no idea what it was. Still I followed them (top tip: always follow the crowd, they’re probably going somewhere interesting) and ended up in Kongens Have (‘Kings Gardens’). It’s a really nice open park area and there’re a few things to see here but none are terribly impressive. I looked into the Treasury that’s there but wasn’t terribly impressed, it’s OK if that’s your sort of thing, I guess 

Little Mermaid From there it’s a small walk to the grounds of the Kastellet, more lovely gardens and grounds but not much more than that. Various paths and parts were closed, I’m guessing to get them ready for the tourist season. If you walk round the grounds to the far end you arrive back at the shoreline and the statue of the Little Mermaid. It’s nice, and it was nice to finally find a decent amount of people but in reality it’s nothing that special. Coming back down the shoreline you can get to the Frihedsmuseet (Museum of the Danish Resistance Movement) which is very interesting but closes early so I only got ten minutes to dash round it. At least it’s free.

There are several boat and bus tours that go round Copenhagen but I could only find one boat tour that was actually running. It was pretty good as these sorts of tours go and covered a bigger area you might have got on a bus tour of the same length. If I’d been a week later I’d have had a lot more choice of tours, including night cruises with music and food.

At this point I’m still underwhelmed by Copenhagen and there’s only a couple more places in the guide book that sound interesting. Fortunately one of them, Christiania, is interesting enough to make up for it. From that wikipedia page:

Christiania, also known as Freetown Christiania (Danish: Fristaden Christiania) is a partially self-governing neighbourhood of about 850 residents, covering 34 hectares (85 acres) in the borough of Christianshavn in the Danish capital Copenhagen. Christiania has established semi-legal status as an independent community, but has been a source of controversy since its creation in a squatted military area in 1971. Its open cannabis trade was tolerated by authorities until 2004. Since then, measures for normalising the legal status of the community have led to conflicts, and negotiations are ongoing.

So, what’s it like? It definitely has a different ‘feel’ to the rest of Copenhagen, somewhere in the middle is Pusher Street which was once an open hash market. I didn’t see any being openly sold but there was certainly a lot being smoked. The whole place is just pre-fab buildings and sheds setup in an area of waste ground populated by hippies, dogs and wannabes. No photos — there’s a big sign saying not to take pictures — but a quick google finds some that will give you an idea. 

There are cafes, barbecues and pubs set up in the various makeshift buildings, catering to the locals rather than the tourists. I wandered into one of them which turned out to be a jazz club where people were just sauntering up to the stage and giving it a go. The whole relaxed unpretentious vibe was a nice change from the tourist targets places I normally end up. 

I also had a chance to visit the Radhus (City Hall), which has some great views from the bell tower (guided tours only) and also houses the Jens Olsen’s World Clock which is pretty cool if you’re a geek (and probably even if you’re not). 

I struggled to find anything remotely resembling traditional food, a staggering amount of places where shut or only open for lunch and what was left were higher-end tourist places. Edible, nice even, but nothing special. 

In the end I’m still underwhelmed by Copenhagen, I really see no reason to go there again. I guess there’s always Tivoli Gardens (which were shut when I was there) but that’s more of a family holiday destination. In fact the whole place, with the possible exception of Christiania, feels more like a place for a family holiday. It’s not cheap to get there, stay there or do things when you’re there and overall there are other places that are far nicer. 

Copenhagen Skyline

October 10, 2008

Quick Update

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 9:41 am

Hmmm, yesterdays post was surprisingly coherent given the state I was in when I wrote it.

First up this is all going to take a few months to shake out, possibly up to a year, so I have plenty of time to sort things out.

I was already diligently clearing up my finances, this was because I’d was assembling a war chest to take to Vegas in March but none of that is booked so I shouldn’t be in too bad a shape at the start of next year.

Secondly I’ve already been investigating changing my job, or taking an extended sabbatical. I’ve settled into a nice comfortable rut, doing my nice comfortable job and living my nice comfortable life. I would have continued to do that for next fifteen years and would have turned round when I’m fifty and wondered where my life had gone.

So, this is not the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. It was about time …

That’s the upbeat assessment of the situation, the downbeat view is

Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oww, I’m hungover. Oh Fuck. Fix it. Fix it. Fix it. Fuck.

I wonder if I could become a professional gambler …

October 9, 2008

Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt. II

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 8:29 pm

Just because you’re paranoid, it doesn’t mean everyone’s not out to get you …

Earlier this week there was a low key e-mail saying that our division boss would be ‘passing through’ Edinburgh and holding a meeting.

Today he arrived as advertised, along with the HR dude (locally known as ‘the reaper in a fat suit’*) and some other dude. All the managers where sucked into a meeting, the long faces did not bode well.

And the news is not good.

The Edinburgh office is scheduled for closure (well it’s a ‘proposal’ but it’s almost certainly a done deal).

I don’t think anyone in the office really expected that.

I responded to the news by getting hammered, as I do. I still am.

I’ve had a ‘Plan B’ that I’ve been working on since my last ‘Fear. Uncertainty. Doubt’ post, so I’m now swinging that into action. I’d have liked a few more months to settle into the plan, but a little push is never a bad thing …

I’ve no idea how the next month or three will pan out, hopefully I’ll be able to keep my loyal 😉 readers updated.

May you live in interesting times …

(*no-one really calls him that, yet)

EU 2008: Cardiff, Wales

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 1:30 pm
In my quest to visit everywhere in the EU I need to visit Britain, now I could be cheap and just claim Edinburgh as counting. Or I could write up one of the places I’ve visited in the past, somewhere in the highlands, London, or even Blackpool. But I figured I’d go somewhere new, and so I’m find myself on a tiny city hopper plane on a cheap flight to Cardiff.

It was almost no flight to Cardiff, as I only just managed to make the check-in time due to a combination of traffic, complex bus routes and the delays due to all of Edinburgh being dug up at the same time. It’s only a matter of time until I miss a flight on one of my jaunts. But not this time.

Millennium StadiumThe airport is almost an hours bus drive away from the city, the buses are regular and pleasant enough but it’s interesting how remote British airports tend to feel compared to the ones I’ve seen on the continent where you’re generally no more than a twenty minute train connection away. I don’t know if those airports are just closer or if they just have better connections. As soon as you get to the city itself you find it’s dominated by the new Millennium Stadium, it’s massive and right in the centre of the city, which is pretty handy as my hotel is across the river from it. It’s impressive but I don’t think it’s exactly pretty, I really wonder what the skyline looked like before it was there.

There’s a fair amount to do and see in Cardiff during the day. To start off I headed to Cardiff Bay. The Bay has been redeveloped and turned into a ‘destination’, the sort of thing I suspect they’d like to do the area around the Ocean Terminal in Edinburgh. The problem is that the whole thing feels a bit like a giant open air shopping mall, with the shops, cafes, bars, and gallerias dotted around. There are a few things to see in the Bay, like the Norwegian Church and the Light Boat but all of them have a cafe and a gallery crammed in and very little information about their history. It’s a nice place to spend a few hours but it’s a bit soulless and it’s lost some of the character that I imagine it had when it was just a bay.

Cardiff Bay

The Welsh Assembly is there, it’s a impressively grand modern looking building that managed to resist looking too modern or odd (unlike the Scottish Parliament, which I quite like but you can’t argue that it fits in with the area,) Alongside is the Millennium Centre, which is just a big venue / conference centre and slightly further along is the Red Dragon centre which is a ‘entertainment complex’ as if they whole bay wasn’t already.

The Red Dragon centre also has the Dr. Who exhibition which, as a Sci Fi geek, I couldn’t pass up. Meh, just Meh. It’s all ‘new Who’ stuff, apart from some video of the previous doctors. The most annoying thing is that you get video and blurb about all the previous doctors regenerations (some of which I’ve never seen before) but not the current ones — I’m assuming they couldn’t get the rights to show those bits. The only other item that produced a flicker of interest was Kylie’s costume from the Christmas Special (she must be tiny.)

In the centre of Cardiff there are a few museums which were mostly free but didn’t have anything that really grabbed me. It was also stupidly hot the weekend I was there so I opted to spend time outdoors at the other big sight, Cardiff Castle. Keep I was lucky because there was a medieval theme ‘thing’ going on with events like sword demonstrations and such. Otherwise the place would be just a castle, the inside (guided tours only) is interesting but castles tend to look the same after you’ve seen a few. I did like the brief history of Cardiff that the guide gave us. Wandering around the grounds gives some excellent views of the city and shows you just how massive the Millennium Stadium is in comparison to everything else.

I tried to search out Welsh food but the first restaurant I was directed to (Mimosa) uses Welsh ingredients but doesn’t really do ‘Welsh food’. It was still excellent. The next day I found what I was looking for, with a heavily touristed slant, at a Welsh banquet at the castle. Full of tourists (mostly Australians on a 21 day tour of Britain, all very friendly), and completely over-the-top with singing, dancing and audience participation. Still it was an excellent night out, surprisingly good value for money and great fun. Despite being made to bark like a dog on stage. To be fair it generally doesn’t take much to encourage me to do that. 

The nightlife is pretty similar to Edinburgh, a selection of pubs and clubs with assorted people wandering between them. There’s a comedy club in Cardiff Bay that put on a decent the night I was there, and an assortment of other bars to keep people happy and boozed up. 

The only place that stood out was Minsky’s — a drag revue bar. It was interesting, I’ve not seen a lot of drag shows so I’ve nothing really to compare it too but it was entertaining and a decent way to pass a couple of hours. Apart from being cajoled into doing the timewarp with the rest of the audience. God, I hate that song.

Wales Millennium Centre

I can’t really say I’d not go back to Cardiff, it’s so close and so easy to get to. I imagine you could have a really good day and night out there if a group of you headed down over a weekend. There’s nothing in particular that would draw me back, but the city as a whole just about wins me over.

October 7, 2008

Creaky

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 11:37 pm

I’ve uploaded some new banners, they look like they’re working but there’s always a chance than you’ll get a broken image instead of a header. Feel free to leave a comment pointing out I’m an idiot if that happens. There are thirteen different countries in the rotation now (fourteen banners as Belgium got two) so I’m seven posts behind the banners.

In addition the site may go a bit ‘creaky’ without warning as I’m on the list to be upgraded to the new Dreamhost server system (there’s some info on their slightly over the top blog.)

Nothing to do with being carbon neutral and more to do with them bribing people with unlimited storage and bandwidth for offering to make the switch first.

October 2, 2008

Where’s the tumbleweed?

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 11:25 am

Hmmm, there’s a gaping hole in my post history, what should I do? 

Ignore it? Retro-post some stuff in the gap? Pretend I’ve been abucted by aliens? Pretend I’ve been busy with ‘life’? 

It’s a tough call, and the truth is I mostly post from work, and sadly work has been taken up with quite a lot of real work at the moment and it’s hamperred my posting. 

I’d could make up the gap from home but between the Edinburgh Festival and my continuing quest to visit the whole EU it’s been a bit hectic. 

I’d promise to do better if future, but anyone that’s followed my web presence over the years knows that it’s been intermittant at best and it’ll probably continue that way. 

Still if I’m to complete this years resolution than I’m due 19 EU country posts before the end of the year, which is almost two a week. 

That’s if I manage to visit them all … 

June 13, 2008

Fail

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 12:32 pm

Just a quick check on edfringe.com …

Despite all of our efforts this week we are unable to open our box office.

We are determined to have box office services operational as soon as possible and we will post a further update on Monday 16 June at 10am.

In the meantime there are some venues that are able to sell tickets for shows at the Fringe. Please click HERE for a list of venues and contact details.

We recognise that the service we have provided over the last week has not been acceptable. We will continue to work over the weekend and we apologise for the inconvenience this has caused.

FAIL!

To be honest I’m not going to gloat, these things happen and I can imagine the utter chaos going on behind the scenes.

I am amused that they said on Thursday that the problem was resolved and the box office would be open today.

Clearly they were wrong, that sounds to me like they’ve no idea what’s going on. I wonder if they have a back-up plan to revert to last years system …

June 12, 2008

Indiana Jones and the Covering of Bees …

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 2:19 pm

I was mooching around the Internet reading outraged fan reaction to things like a factually incorrect Star Trek cake, Indy IV (more on that in a sec) and Dr. Who when I stumbled across this fantastic phrase:

… and it’s almost literally like I’m covered in bees.

(from here)

I think everyone should try and use that phrase whenever they can to express their outrage, particularly that classic fanboy outrage that can only be provoked by something completely insignificant.

Help me make this turn of phrase mainstream, start slipping into normal conversation. You may want to practise a bit until you can say it with a straight face.

Talking of outrage, I saw Indy IV last night, and I know a lot of fans are almost literally covered in bees about it but I really can’t see why, I liked it.

In the end it’s a good fun action romp, that uses the Indiana characters in the Indiana universe without ever quite making it to the level of true greatness. Still it’s better than a lot of junk out there.

In particular a few of the complaints against it are really stupid, the reason (and spoilers) after the jump.

(more…)

June 11, 2008

Tired and Cranky (plus why edfringe sucks again)

Filed under: General — SpaceDog @ 10:48 am

So I’m back from my latest trip, visiting the Baltic and Nordic states.

My feet and legs hurt from too much walking, and I opted to go straight into work from the airport this morning*. Ugh.

Still I enjoyed the trip, it’s been blues skies and sunshine all they way (apart from today when it rained this morning on my way to the airport). I’ll try and post some brief thoughts soon and full posts for countries when I can. This might take a while because I’ve checked my diary and it’s looking like I might only have one free night in the next two weeks.

And finally, it’s that time again, has edfringe.com pulled its socks up this year ?

No, they haven’t:

All website, telephone and counter sales have been suspended until we are able to resolve the problems we are having with our computer system.

Worse they seem to have pulled the entire listings offline, so you can’t even browse and note stuff to buy later. I guess I’ll have to resort to an old-fashioned paper copy for the third year in a row.

I can’t wait to see how the screw it up next year.

*I was so tired and cranky I even screwed up this post so it was in the sidebar yesterday instead of in the main page so that’s actually yesterday.

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