I am working 60-hour weeks at the moment (and have been for a while). Expect me when you see me. Normal service will be resumed whenever.

So, I have another 3 codes for DreamWidth. Additionally, once it goes into open beta on April 30th, I'll probably have more. If you want a code, comment and I'll distribute them as they come in.

Never heard of DreamWidth? The short story is, they got fed up with LJ treating its users like shit and decided to do something about it.

The long story is:

They appear to have put a lot of thought into how this is going to work, how they can be better than LJ, how they can be a sustainable business that values and works with and for its users. I'm willing to give them a go.

They're building on the LJ code base so what you'll see over there will not be drastically different in terms of user interface. They're also making transition pretty easy, with journal import tools as well as cross-posting tools coming soon for those who want to run LJ and DW in parallel for a while. They have pretty damn good OpenID support too.

They are currently in closed beta, scheduled to move to open beta on April 30th. While in closed beta, a few things are still a bit shaky. The one major outage for me is that the style system isn't there yet. The above mentioned journal import and cross-posting are still work in progress. By the time they hit open beta at the end of the month, I'm expecting all the big and the vast majority of the small stuff to work though.

So give them a go.

Adventure 4: February 22nd, 2009: from the village of Wall, to Brunton Turret, the remains of the Roman bridge, Planetrees, St. Oswald's Church, past Crag House and Fallowfield Farm, through the remains of a settlement and back into Wall. 9.5km in sunny weather.

We parked at what is labeled as a "scenic layby" just outside the village of Wall on the A6079. We did a couple of side quests off the main planned loop. The first one was to see Brunton Turret (aka Turret 26B) - our first actual chunk of wall outside Newcastle. Paul was rather taken by the mosses and lychen growing on top of it:





Our next detour was to the remains of the Roman bridge. On the south-east side of the river (where we were), this is freely accessible, while on the north-west side I think it's part of an English Heritage site. As it's off the beaten track, accessed by walking through a specially created path through some fields, which is not the easiest to find, the south-east side of the bridge is very peaceful. We sat on some moss-covered stones and had elevenses. Paul also rescued some moss which someone had pried off one of the stones, and that now lives in our garden.



From the bridge, we headed east along Hadrian's Wall Path, through a wooded patch with a field of snowdrops. Spring had definitely begun as far as I was concerned:



We headed past Planetrees - our third actually visible chunk of wall of the day - and up to the layby where we had parked the previous weekend at St. Oswald's Church. We had lunch in the area and the looped around to the south. We walked up a steep hill and around an alpaca farm which had me squeeing in delight:



Through a field with some footpath markers in the middle of nowhere:



And past a beautiful non-Roman settlement which was probably my favourite part of the day, peaceful and in the middle of nowhere, remains of human activity almost completely obscured by nature:



After that, it was down the hill and back into the village of Wall, time to head home.

Adventure 3 took us out to Hadrian's Wall for the first time. Paul was sleepy, and there was snow.

Adventure 3: February 14th, 2009; St. Oswald's Church (site of Battle of Heavenfield), along Hadrian's Wall Path to Turret 24B, then north to Cocklaw, and back past the quarry and Brady's Crag; approx. 8km, in overcast weather through the snow.

So it had snowed heavily the weekend before and through the week leading up to our third adventure. We'd had fun the previous weekend getting stuck at various airports because of the snow. Paul was sleepy that day, and we didn't have much of a plan other than to part at St. Oswald's Church off the B6318 and walk along the wall. Upon not finding much wall when we got there, Paul in his sleepiness put me in charge of our adventure. I decided to do a little 1km loop to see if that woke Paul or exhausted him completely, in which case we could turn around and head home.

We headed up to the church. The public footpath there leads straight across the graveyard, which I both liked and found a little creepy. There were snowdrops there, poking their heads out of the snow, which cheered me up no end. At the end of our little loop, Paul had perked up a bit, so we kept going.

Here's Paul knee-deep in a snow drift, with a look of delighted surprise on his face:



And here's me, grinning like a maniac:



Here's me being in charge of navigation:



This was also the adventure which featured the classic line "I think we're aiming slightly to the left of that sheep." Apparently I'm not to navigate using sheep, says Paul.

Of course, once we'd gone sufficiently downhill, the snow had melted:



But then we had to go back uphill again:



So no visible wall, but snow and navigation by sheep instead. :-)

Adventure the Second: January 25th, 2009; from Letah Wood along West Dipton Burn and back

For Adventure 2, we parked up by Letah Wood and stroked a pony's nose:



Having said goodbye to the pony, we headed up the West Dipton Burn. At first, we walked along the river through some fields, and found trees with some really pretty lychen on them:



The weather was again beautiful, as you can see in this picture:



After a while, we headed into a forest, continuing to follow the river. Paul found some tiny pretty plants (here with his camera case for scale) covering a dry stone wall:



Going through the forest got a little tricky. It had rained the day before I think, and there was snow in places which was melting, so it was quite muddy, and we had to ford some quite exciting streams along the way. Here's me pointed proudly at one we had just forded:



Eventually, the path we were following led through West Dipton Burn, but with the river as full as it was, we decided we didn't fancy getting quite that soggy and turned back. We walked up a bridleway which was masquerading as a stream/waterfall out of the river valley and had lunch sitting in a clearing in the sunshine. Which is where I discovered that I was muddy up to above my knees, and my arse was getting damp from sitting on the damp grass:



I was getting a little tired after lunch, so Paul suggested that instead of going back the same way, with fording the two streams again, we should walk down a little country lane for a bit. There was a little snow as we climbed out of the valley, but we soon got past that.



Walking back along the country lane took rather less time than walking out along the river path had, and as we approached the car park, we decided to take a little detour through Letah Wood to extend our adventure. This is where I found the first snow drops of the year, and fell on my arse, so I was now muddy up to my arse - for the first time in my life.



When we got back to Mr. Brum I decided that I too wanted to stroke the pony's nose:



We finished the tea in the car and headed home. We'd walked around 9km.

So, since the start of the year, Paul and I have been walking in the countryside a lot. Generally, if we're in Newcastle for the weekend, we'll go out for a walk on at least one of the days. It all started with Paul getting me nice walking boots about a year ago, and then a lovely wind- and waterproof jacket for Christmas. We got ourselves and OS map (OL43 - Hadrian's Wall, Haltwhistle & Hexham), and a bit after that we got a compass. We dug up some of Paul's old equipment - most notably the thermos - and I put some creativity into sandwiches, and off we went.

So here's out first adventure: January 17th, from a car park just on the outside of Hexham on the A695, through Park Wood and Dukeshouse Wood.

Well, I guess first of all, here's me making sandwiches:





This was a fairly short adventure (the planned route was 4.5km) which was fair enough as we really didn't know how good we were at this, and days were short in January. The weather was crisp and cool, with bright sunshine, though quite a lot of wind. We were walking through the forest though, so the wind wasn't too much of a problem.

Here's me emerging from a little side quest out of the woods into a sunny field where we had elevenses.



We found a beautiful sunny clearing which was covered in moss and some lovely lychen.





Look at the red tips on the lychen!



We got lost then, and when we found ourselves again, we'd doubled back on ourselves. So we decided to go around again, particularly as we'd liked the mossy clearing so much!

Paul found a pond.





I found a dormant anthill. Paul had never seen one.



Paul did not fall into the river.



And the Duke's house was bit silly:



It was early afternoon when we got back to the car, having eaten most of our sandwiches and drank the tea from our thermos. Clouds were beginning to come in, and we drove home happy.

I have one invite code for DreamWidth. Shout if you're interested. This will probably go on a first come first served basis, unless I decide otherwise. ;-)

Gone to sinclair_furie

I have material in my head for a number of proper content posts. Once I figure out how to get 48 hours into a day, I might write them all. In the meantime, here's a meme with a bit of content.

Abortion? Every woman should have the right and access to safe and legal abortion, with proper medical supervision and assistance. It's better for women, it's better for society, it's better for the economy.

Death Penalty? No, though my reasons for that tend to vary depending on how cynical I'm feeling. Generally, I don't believe it works either deterrent or punishment.

Drugs and prostitution? You know what? I can see both sides of both of these and I'd like more data before I make my mind up.

Economics? I have a degree in this and the one thing I learned in three years is that I have no f*cking clue. And neither does anyone else. I guess the other thing I learned was that the economy is entirely made up and relies on you believing in it. Like with the death penalty opinions tend to vary depending on current levels of cynicism. Some days I'm a communist, some days I'm a technocrat. I would really like to think that a social market economy can work, but I don't think it does. The market is only a good system if you value efficiency above all else, and even then it has some quite spectacular failure modes.

Energy/Environment? For get the economic crisis, forget terrorism, forget poverty and development. Forget all the short-term, short-sighted crap that we get so excited about. This is the biggest challenge the human race has ever faced - and if we don't figure out how to overcome it, it may be the last. Take a look at this map. Let's face it, humanity will probably survive this as a species, but as a civilisation we have no chance.

Having established that, I guess the next question is what do we do about it. When I first saw the map my first reaction was to check if the place where I want to live will still be okay (yes, it will; yes, I am ashamed that that was my first thought). My second reaction was to feel physically sick. And my third reaction was a very strong desire to scrub this out of my mind and never think about it again. Not an option.

We have got to transition to a carbon-neutral economy. How we do that is an interesting question but not one we have too much time to ponder. Unlike autopope I really would not rely on technology magicking this away. Carbon sequestration might work. But it might not. Fusion may or may not be 50 years away. And even if we get these technologies to work, the transition may be painful. We cannot afford to put all our eggs into the basket labelled "Sufficiently advances technology indistinguishable from magic". Nor can we afford to put them in the other one, with the helpful note of "Repent and stop consuming!" attached to it. We have got to pursue both, and we have got to start asking ourselves some very difficult questions about what the population level and living standard is that this planet can sustainably support.

Let's face it. Most people reading this are unlikely to starve to death, or die of thirst, or become the victims of genocide as the result of climate change. The impact on us will be - relatively - minor. But can you cope with being responsible for the death of 90% of the human population? And from a purely selfish point of view, even if the impact on northern Europe is relatively minor compared to that on anything below the 40th parallel, in absolute terms it is still the end of the world as we know it.

If you're my age, there's a fair chance you might live to see the bulk of the transition to the world pictured on that map. And your children sure as hell will. Is that what you want for them? Thought not. So what are you going to do about it? Yes, you. You personally. Because if you don't, who will?

Right, sermon over. I might pull this out as a separate post later on.

Central government's role? Let's start with the basics: monopoly on legitimate use of force. I fundamentally disagree with citizens being allowed to carry arms for their own protection - if the government doesn't feel it can sufficiently protect its citizens, then that's a failed state. I also strongly believe in social democracy (as much as I believe in any kind of democracy), and the welfare state.

Freedom of speech, press, etc.? Should be absolute and sacrosanct and enshrined in the EU constitution. Yes, there should be an EU constitution.

Healthcare? I love the NHS. I think healthcare should be available to everyone free at the point of delivery. I think a hell of a lot more of it should be preventive. And I like having private health insurance. No, I am not particularly consistent.

Immigration? I'm a filthy foreigner stealing all your jobs and women. I'm a higher rate tax payer. For all my tax, I have no say in how this country is run at the national level. I'll let you draw your own conclusions.

Minority rights? Can we first establish that women are not a minority? Next, I'm really passionate about diversity. I love living in a diverse, plural society. This (and not income tax, contrary to popular perception) is why I choose to live in the UK and not Germany or Austria. Equally, living in a diverse, plural society can cause friction. How do we strike the right balance? I don't know. And if by minority rights you mean gay marriage, then hell yeah.

Progressivism? "The concept of progress acts as a protective mechanism to shield us from the terrors of the future." (Frank Herbert, Dune) If progress == more consumption, then no. If progress == figuring out how we live on this planet sustainably and treat each other with dignity and respect, then yes.

Local government's role? Recycling. ;-)

Taxes? Despite my above comments, I strongly believe in progressive taxation and redistribution. See other above comments on social democracy and the welfare state.

War? No. For the cost of the Iraq war we could have established a colony on Mars. (Freakonomics courtesy of autopope again.)

I have three days' spare holiday that I need to take before the end of April. I also have this overwhelming desire to be a recluse for a bit, and the Easter weekend seems like a good time for that kind of thing.

So, wanted:

Hiding place, available between April 8th and 14th.
Easy to get to from the North East, ideally by car.
Far away from civilisation.
Self-catering.
With access to outdoor activities such as walking - I have recently found out I like moors.
Cheap-ish.

Any recommendations?

( Baaaah )

This has been the worst week to date on this project. I suspect the only reasons I've not been sectioned yet are that Paul was here until Wednesday morning so I had motivation to leave the office on time, and the Metallica gig.

So, in preparation for going on holiday I have

- dealt with the two burning crises as best I can
- got my inbox down to just over one page, actionable items only
- set my out office message
- handed over the various crises to other people to handle while I'm away

And now I am going to pack up and go home and forget all about shampoo and hair dye for 10 days. Oh, and take some cough syrup.

So last night Paul and I went out for dinner and then to a gig.

Dinner was at Starters and Puds which a colleague of mine had mentioned to me a while ago and I'd found intriguing. Basically, the idea's in the name - they only do starters and desserts and you can have as many of each as you like. Which all sounded good in theory.

In practice, the service was god-awful. When two people come in and the female is looking at you expectantly, looking at the male who has his back to you instead of greeting and paying attention to the female (who might, just might, be the one wielding the credit card) really is not on. When three of you do this within a minute of us entering the restaurant, you'd better be serving exceptional food if you're hoping for a tip.

The food, however, was far from exceptional. At best it was average, and some of it was down-right disappointing. The antipasti misti had clearly been taken out of the Sainsbury's (or other supermarket of your choice) packaging and dumped on a plate without even bothering to separate the individual slices of cured meats. The pure soy sauce served with the Thai fishcakes completely overpowered them. And the tiramisu was simply awful. Paul's chocolate and hazelnut pot was nice, and so was my side of roast sweet potato wedges, but that's about as good as it gets. Wouldn't go again, and no tip was given.

We then walked across town in the rain, following the crowd of people dressed in black, to the Arena to see... Metallica!! When I originally found out they were playing Newcastle, I didn't even bother checking what day of the week it was - I just booked the tickets. And hell, was it worth it!

We deliberately gave the first support band a miss but did go in to see Machine Head. I think Paul enjoyed them rather more than I did, but that's allowed. I might actually want to hear them recorded - I suspect they sound better then when playing the Arena as someone else's support band.

Metallica came on at 9 and ROCKED!! The Metro Radio Arena, compared to the last two big gigs I went to at the O2 (Stones) and at one of the stadiums in Sheffield (Chili Peppers), is a cozy venue. We were maybe 10 meters from the stage, if that. I really liked the set-up of the stage: in the centre of the arena, with microphones all round, so the band could wander about and interact with people on all sides. And Metallica did this really well. They were clearly enjoying themselves.

I really liked their lighting rig, which was in the shape of eight coffins - 4 directly over the stage and another 4, one in each corner of the ceiling. The four over the stage moved up and down and sideways and what not, creating a very different feel for different songs.

They played a mix of old and new stuff. I'm told by other people who were there that there were actually a couple of fights between old and new fans that had to be broken up, though I didn't notice any of that. I did, however, find myself on the edge of a mosh pit. How do I always end up on the edge of the mosh pit?

The final encore was Seek and Destroy, and they dropped giant black Metallica labeled beach balls from the ceiling which the crowd played with and which were enormous fun. I didn't manage to get my hands on one - I would have loved one!!

Overall, really really enjoyed the gig. My ears are still ringing 24 hours later, and my throat is sore from screaming my lungs out. I have something like 200 blurry photos and half an hour's worth of wobbly video including Nothing Else Matter and Enter Sandman, which I shall be posting on Flickr some time soon.

I guess the other thing that struck me was the abundance of recording equipment - phones and cameras everywhere. Here's hoping Metallica have gotten over their temporary copyright insanity... ;-)

But yeah. They ROCKED. Highly recommended, would go see them again.

ETA: I knew I'd forgotten something. They pyrotechnics were very cool too! And quite warm, when you're only 10 meters from the stage. :-)

Go on, lynch me.

We went to see Othello at the weekend. The RSC production, not the Northern Broadsides one with Lenny Henry that's been in the news. It appears to have put Paul off Shakespeare for life. I, on the other hand, enjoyed it greatly.

This was my first true Shakespeare experience. I've read plays, I've seen film productions, I've seen stage productions in German and Bulgarian, but this was the first play that I have both read and seen on stage in English.

There were things about the production I really liked: the music was brilliant; Desdemona and Iago were very good; they had cut a couple of the more obscure passages; Othello was fit(!) and in the second half very good. Things I wasn't so keen on included the racism angle of the production, complete with gollywogs (and I'll talk more about that in a minute) and Othello in the first half (still struggling to put into words why I found that jarring).

Things I took away from the experience:

- Shakespeare plays were really and truly written to be performed and listened to, not read. I had heard this on a number of occasions but this really brought it home. My English these days is good enough that I get Shakespeare when I read him, but I found it so much easier to follow when spoken! I think some of this is a reflection on the production and aforementioned cutting of some of the truly obscure bits, but some of it is also the difference between the same text being spoken or written.

- What Shakespeare wrote is only half the story. There is so much that comes out in the production that's not necessarily there in the original text. One of things, for instance, that I hadn't picked up on reading the play was quite how much of a gibbering wreck Othello is by the end of it. That really came through in the production for me, and made it make so much more sense. It almost gave completely new meaning to the whole thing for me.

- I really don't think Othello is a play about racism. Not as we understand it in the 21st century anyway. I can see how a modern production can make it be about racism, but I strongly doubt there's any authorial intent behind that. See, from what Shakespeare I've read, he struggles to write a play about women (and by this I mean one that passes the Bechdel test), and he sure as hell had a lot more experience with women than he did with non-white people.

- For me, what Othello is about - and I'm not necessarily alleging authorial intent here either, this may be purely down to the production, or in the eye of the beholder - is mental illness. As I said above, by Act IV, Othello is a gibbering wreck. He is isolating himself from the people who care about him - Cassio and Desdemona - he is pretty much delusional. He is in no way acting rationally, not checking his facts, just acting on a single source of information with the complete and unshakable conviction that Desdemona has been unfaithful. In Paul's mind this translated to "Othello is being irrational entirely for plot reasons and I can't cope with the stupidity of this." In my mind it translated to mental illness and really made sense.

- I would love to see another production of this to see different takes, different interpretations. As I said above, I believe the original Shakespearean text is only half of it, and I wonder what things I would pick up from a different director's interpretation. I'm half-tempted to travel down to Leeds to see the Northern Broadsides production and the West Yorkshire Playhouse, if only I could find the time in the next two weeks.

- The Roderigo sub-plot is entirely superfluous.

Ultimately, I think I'm a convert to this Shakespeare thing, at least on the basis of this one experience. Which is a problem, as Paul is really not convinced. I'm hoping to go see all three of the RSC's productions coming to Newcastle later this year (Julius Caesar, A Winter's Tale and A Comedy of Errors), as well as A Tender Thing which is billed as a modern reworking of Romeo and Juliet for an older couple. Should be interesting, but I may need someone to go to the theatre with if Paul decides he doesn't fancy it after he reads the plays.

(Thieved from autopope)

0. Wrist watch: age 5 or 6. It was digital, too!

1. Record player: This is where the lines between "There was one in the family" and "I personally owned one" start getting blurred. The family record player was in the room I slept in between my birth and age 10. Age 10, my Dad gave me a compact stereo which included a record player for my birthday.

2. Cassette recorder (mono): Inherited my mother's old one maybe around age 4?

3. Typewriter: Heh. Never had one of those.

4. Stereo radio-cassette recorder (ghetto blaster): Never had one of those. The closest I came was the aforementioned compact stereo I got for my 10th birthday or the ghetto blaster I borrowed from my flat mate in my first year at uni.

5. Computer: We had one in the family when I was about 7 or 8, one of the first Bulgarian households to have a PC in the home. I inherited my Dad's 486 when I was 16 or so. The first new PC I bought for myself was three or so years ago, when I moved to Leeds.

6. Hi-Fi separates: Christmas present when I was 15 or so...

7. Cassette Walkman: My Dad brought me one from one of his business trips to the West when I was 8 or 9.

8. Colour TV: The first one in the family was when I was maybe 4 or 5. My very own first one when I moved into my first own flat in Woking, aged 23.

9: Real computer: By whose definition?

10. Compact Disk player: Part of Hi-Fi separates mentioned above.

11. Car: May 2005, aged 24. Still have it.

12. VCR: We had one in the family from when I was about 12. In fact I think my parents either still have it or had it until very recently. I myself skipped that particular piece of technology in favour of BitTorrent.

13. Laptop: Still don't have one, other than my work one. They're a pain in the arse to travel with in the current security climate, and I wouldn't need one around the house. Being able to watch telly and be on the Internet at the same time is a recipe for getting nothing done ever again.

14. Modem: Age 16.

15. PDA: Briefly had a work one when I started here 5 years ago. Never used it. It's in a drawer somewhere...

16. Mobile Phone: I was 21 when I finally gave in, in my Masters year at uni. My granddad has it now.

17. MP3 player: Birthday present for my 23rd. iPod.

18. eBook reader: Not yet.

19. Brand new car: Not yet.

Okay, how the hell do I get Opera on this thing? (Posting from phone in case you hadn't guessed.)