Month: July 2005

bookmark_borderB.P.M.

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How to raise your heart rate

Whilst clearing out the garage, including brushing out the corners and ridding the place of cobwebs and numerous spiders, spot a sheet of wood that was once part of what is now your fireplace, grab it from the stack, and spin round, holding it up for your wife to see whilst asking her “can you guess where this came from?”.

When she spots the VERY LARGE SPIDER* on the far side of the wood, the side you’ve just thrust at her in your glee at finding this reminder of your handiwork, she’ll scream. Loudly.

This will prompt you to jump, dropping the piece of wood to the floor, and your heart rate will soar. Simple really.

* You know the type, the ones that don’t run away from you because they reckon, in a tight spot, they could always chew your leg off..

bookmark_borderHappy Anniversary

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35 years ago my parents stood before friends and family and said “I do”.

35 years on and if you ask either one if they still love each other, they’ll say the same thing.

Now, apparently:

traditional 35th wedding anniversary gifts have a theme of Coral, whereas a contemporary or modern 35th anniversary gift has a theme of Jade. This Wedding Anniversary does not have any Flowers or Gemstones associated with it.
via anniversary.co.uk

So, the reason it’s been so quiet here is because I’ve had to nip off to the Great Barrier Reef in Australia to get some coral…

Still, it’s a thought ain’t it. 35 years. I only lasted 20 or so at my parents house, not sure how they’ve put up with each other for that long… guess they must love each other or something… 😉

bookmark_borderExtras

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Two episodes in and I’m just not convinced. Not sure whether it’s the addition of “stars”, the acting style of Ricky Gervais (although I think calling it acting is stretching things a bit), or some other factor but whilst there are some very funny moments it doesn’t feel complete. Of course that may be by choice, mirroring the bit parts the characters have, but I’m not sure it helps.

bookmark_borderWaiting

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Like Lyle, I’m working at home, waiting for the presence of a Transco van to make itself known. Yes, the gasman is coming. I’m not holding my breath, which is just as well as it’s now 1.30pm and he’s yet to appear.

Of course the coming of the gasman means one thing, yes that’s right, my brain gets stuck on an endless loop of the “Gasman” sketch in Bottom.

(loudly) “Hello Mr. Gasman!” (Richie)
“Er, yes, hello again. I wonder if I could just read your me–” (Gasman)
“Mr. who?” (Eddie)
(shouting) “GASMAN! GASMAN! GASMAN!” (R)
“Do you have someone who looks after you? Could I see them, because I need
to read your meter!” — Gasman

It’s just me then, right you are…

Update. 5.30pm. Still waiting. Have spent time trying to figure out who Flanders and Swann are (were? is?)..

bookmark_borderImpact

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There is a call centre near my office and every evening as I walk to the train station I partake in the “I’ll go left” waltz with many of the people heading to the call centre for the back shift. Last night, however, was a little bit different.

As I turned the corner at the top of the road I spotted a young Asian lady walking towards me. She had a lovely embroidered purple headscarf on, which I glanced at as I walked past. In one of those split second things, she looked at me at the exactly same instance, it was then I released that I’d been looking at her for the last few seconds.

I wonder what she was thinking. Was she thinking, typical man ogling a woman, or perhaps leering letch? Had she noticed at all? Or was it something else?

The current news, the horrible events in London and with ongoing investigations bringing Muslims to the forefront of our minds, I wonder if she thought I was judging her, assessing her.

Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to stop people in the street and assure them that you’re not as small minded as that. Wouldn’t it be nice to be able to share a differing point of view, and discuss it with another human being.

Yes, pipe dreams I know, but I’m not going to pander to the caresses of maudlin. Just for one day, can’t we assume the BEST of people? Unfortunately not.

bookmark_borderGrayscale this

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One for the Lazyweb methinks.

Is there an EASY (non-coder) way to make all images that appear in a DIV, grayscale? PHP is the preferred langauge and you can presume access to the GD Library is available on the server.

Note: I’m aware that IE users can utilise CSS for this but that’s not what I’m looking for so please don’t suggest it.