My World

So what else did I get up to while I was in Jersey? I’m writing this a week after the event and frigging the posting date/time, but I think I still have most of it fairly fresh in my memory..

Swimming: We went swimming at the Aqua Splash leisure pool place.. and saw Pippa Le Cornu there both times.. Out of the 90,000 people on the rock, what are the chances of seeing the same person (or people - she had her son in tow both times too) in the same place as the same time that you’re there?!

Shopping: Far too many trips to town.. and not that much bought really.. I got some nice new tops from Next.. a couple of DVDs.. Strawberry Nesquik.. can’t think what else.. I got Matthew a Nintendo DS for Christmas, did I mention that already?

Bowling: We went bowling twice and had a good laugh both times.. I think I got 106 or 107 the first time, and 99 the second time (oooh SO close to the magic 100!). I gotta say, I really like 10 pin bowling.. I just wish the balls had better fitting finger holes..

Sight Seeing: A walk along St Brelades Bay. A drive down the Five Mile Road (which is actually 3.8 miles long - not that I measured it, but I know that from when I used to live in Jersey). A bacon roll at El Tico. A cheese burger from the Big J. A walk around Fort Regent (with Brian incredulous that there could ever have been fun fair type rides there). Being able to see the French coastline from St Catherine’s Breakwater but not walking far along it due to freezing cold mardy weather.

Absent Friends: For the second year running I didn’t manage to catch up with Craig. BZZZZT. I also didn’t manage to catch up with some people I used to work with, including Alison, Roz, and Josephine. I bumped in to Tessa in the street the day before she left for the UK and didn’t manage to catch up with her a week later when she was back. Oh well.. next time eh?

First off, I just realised - I never changed the date/time on my previous postings.. which means they’ve got PST date/time stamps whereas I’m in the UK and on GMT time.. oh well.. I’ll frig it on this one and maybe go back and change it on the previous ones.. which immediately makes this whole paragraph redundant.. Fuck!

So.. Christmas Day.. how was it for you? For me it was pretty good.. more or less what I expected.. the immediate family stuff was very nice.. the extended family + lunch thing was “entertaining” (as was expected).

My parents got us all stockings filled with bits and pieces, a bit of a family tradition. Brian got one too and was chuffed to bits! There was the obligatory satsuma (which usually gets returned to the bowl along with the others), the traditional chocolate coins, some cologne, some hair stuff, some knick-knack bits and pieces..

We did the family gift exchange and I think everyone did well. I got a bunch of new tops, some really good DVDs (new Little Britain, series 3 of Teachers (yay!)), a new winter coat (really nice, from Next!). I gave my brother a Nintendo DS plus a couple of games and the system seems cool - Brian’s been playing it more than Matthew has, so far! My parents got me and Brian tickets to go see The Lion King when we’re in London the week after next - I was totally chuffed to bits, that was a really nice present! :-)

The extended family turned up, we exchanged gifts, and sat down to Christmas lunch. During the process Matthew knocked over a glass of wine which went flying, all over one of Aunty Pauline’s chairs, which was kind of funny because she’d only just taken the protective plastic covering off them.. oh well, at least it was white wine..

Dinner over, we vegged and chilled a bit.. The rellies went home around 6ish, we all chilled and vegged some more. 7pm was the Doctor Who Christmas day special - result! That show is cheesy porn but so good with it! It’s the kind of thing that you see in a totally different light if you’re British and/or grew up with it versus if you’re not and you’re watching it for the first time or haven’t followed it much. The really cool thing came afterwards - Sky Interactive is a feature of Sky, the digital satellite system in the UK. While you’re watching a show or a commercial you’ll see a little icon or message on the screen telling you to press the red button on your remote control for more info. You press it, and it can do anything from popping up more detailed information, to capturing your details and getting a brochure sent to you in the mail, to launching a fully interactive application. Seriously, television in the UK is light years ahead of anything in North America!

After Doctor Who there was an interactive prompt on the screen. We pressed the red button and it launched in to this mini game where you had to be the Doctor’s assistant and solve puzzles and stuff.. We all sat round doing it, debating whether it was actually more entertaining the than the previous hour’s show itself..

I think that’s about it.. No major drama, just some regular, to-be-expected family banter along with a sigh of relief when everyone went home and we could chill and relax a bit more. All seemed to fly by rather quickly and here we are, Boxing day already..

(date/time frigged so this shows up in the right place)

It’s kind of tradition back home that on Christmas Eve you go to the pub with your mates and have a few drinks. It’s a nice sort of round up to the end of all the Christmas preparations, before you do the whole family Christmas Day thing the next day. So, in true traditional fashion, we went out drinking on Christmas Eve!

Me and Brian hit The Original Wine Bar and waited for the others to turn up (being late is also a great tradition, apparently?). Rob’s girlfriend Sam turned up with her friend Katie who I vaguely know from ages ago - she was feeling a bit worse for wear having been drinking since lunchtime. Rob turned up with Glen, then we found Martin and Nick Collins (that’s “Martin” and “Nick Collins”, not “Martin and Nick Collins”, which makes me wonder why I use some people’s full name but not others).

We had a few drinks, chatted up a storm, then moved on.. There was a queue for Chambers, so we hit the Lamplighter, had a drink there, hung around for a bit.. Martin had gone off to meet Anitha at The Bar so we headed over there, via The Wharf for a quick one (rude not to). A quick drink at The Bar because they were closing at 11 and we’d arrived there at 10:50.. then we went to Mint which used to be Babylon, next to Folies, which is now Platinum (are you following this?). It was a bit loud and rowdy in there (or am I just showing my age?). Saw my brother in there, he managed to con a drink out of me.. Andy gave me and Brian a much appreciated lift home just after midnight, and that was that - traditional drinking on Christmas Eve complete, mission accomplished.

Brian was a bit boozed up, and felt a bit worse for wear the next morning.. which he couldn’t understand as he hadn’t had that much to drink.. 4 and a half beers I think? Must be the strength eh - English beer is “proper” beer compared to North American beer? *shrugs* I dunno - I’m more of a vodka’n'7 kinda guy, but that said I did have a few beers on Saturday night - go figure!

So here we are.. Christmas eve.. already! Wow! Am I all set for Christmas? Yeah, pretty much.. I think I’ve got all my presents sorted.. well, mostly.. heading to town shortly to pick up something last minute for my brother, and praying I can get what I want because some stuff I ordered for him from England is in the island but unavailable because the freight place is closed today (typical Jersey style!) and no one was home when they tried to deliver stuff yesterday.. ho hum, I guess he’ll get that belatedly on Tuesday or Wednesday then..

What else have we been up to? Hmm.. We went swimming the other day at the Aqua Splash place, which was really good fun.. wasn’t very busy, not too many screaming kids.. just me screaming on one of the water slides.. allegedly.. not that I’d ever admit to it.. oh wait, I just did..

Saw Glen and Rebecca the other night too.. we met up and went to the movies to see The Family Stone. Not bad, not great.. it wasn’t quite as the trailers make it out to be.. I’d probably give it a 6 (and IMDB currently rates it 5.8 out of 10, so I’m in good company).

Went shopping yesterday, got a new winter coat.. and a mobile phone magazine - I’m debating getting a new phone while I’m over here (or in the UK) but don’t know if I want/need one. My current phone (Nokia 6610) is 3 years old (I got it last time I was home for Christmas!). It works well, I’m happy with it, but Brian reckon’s maybe the time’s come for something new. There’s a nice Sony Ericsson (K750i or W800i aka Walkman Phone) that seems quite cool, but I’d be abandoning my life-long allegience to the house of Nokia. The alternatives are a Nokia N70, or a 6680 maybe, I just don’t know. The other alternative is something like the HP iPAQ 6515 which is a PDA with in-built GSM phone. My dad’s got one, it seems pretty neat, you can sort your contacts, tasks/to-do list, notes, email on the go (if you don’t mind getting shafted for GPRS charges). It’s got a GPS thing built in (for when you get lost and/or need directions). No Wi-Fi but you can add it with a little plug in adaptor thing.. but the question is: would I actually use it? And isn’t it a bit big/bulky for a phone?

Ugh, who knows?! Maybe I’ll stick with my 6610 - better the devil you know and all that.. after all, it works, it’s small/pocket sized, the battery’s decent.. Hmm.. Jared - got any comments? *bows to he who knows all about phones*.

Right.. blog done (well, partially updated).. Brian’s finished his wrapping.. we’re off to town! (”town” - how quaint!)

Ok, so it wasn’t quite the flight from hell, but it was pretty bad…

It all starts when we get to the check in desk at Vancouver International Airport.. ah, YVR, how I love thee.. The woman tip tip types away and prints our boarding passes.. then realises that they’re not adjacent.. in fact, they’re nowhere near each other! Now I can see how that might be beneficial if you’re a family of 4, at each others throats, and feeling more frantic than festive.. But this was not the case here - we actually wanted to sit together!

She umms and ahhs and types the same thing in to the computer a whole bunch of times.. I ask if there’s a problem.. apparently, seat 2H is showing as reserved and she can’t change it. Relevance? It’s meant to be my seat - along with 2G.. We end up getting moved to row 41, which isn’t the biggest deal in the world, but the point was we’d paid extra for assigned seating and now we’re sitting somewhere else.. oh well, something else to add to the refund they’ve already said they’re giving us for having changed the aircraft and not having premium class available on the flight any more.

Finally we’re sorted, boarding passes in hand.. we hang out with Josh for a bit (he took us to the airport - star!) then say our goodbyes and head through security.. I feel I should tangent here briefly to talk about security and what a joke it is.. like, seriously.. if “those people” are determined enough, they’re gonna do what they’re gonna do, right? Checking belt buckles with a metal detector and getting me to take my shoes off are more hassle and inconvenience than major leaps and improvements in security.. I’m sure my laptop security cable (twisted metal strands type thing) or even a decent length of dental floss would prove more risky (can you say “garotte”?).

Anyway.. flying economy sucks generally, but when the seat pitch is 30 inches (30 fucking inches! - Fuck, I’ve seen battery hens with more bloody leg room!), the drinks aren’t complimentary (not even soft drinks), the flight is over an hour late leaving, and the screaming kids just won’t stop screaming.. yeah, that pretty much makes for “the flight from hell” in my books!

The change of aircraft on the route meant the flight left late. It was going to be a tight squeeze in London to get the connecting flight on to Jersey. Leaving Vancouver late meant that we were probably going to miss our connecting flight. And we did. No biggy, we’ll upgrade to the next flight in 3 hours time right? Sure, for a £25 per person “change fee” coupled with a £87.50 “upgrade charge”. Holy fuck, did I just get bent over and shafted with a traffic cone?! Isn’t that price pretty close to the full fare ticket price? Apparently not, that would be closer to £140 each I’m told.. Yeah right!

But.. whatever.. point was, we got here. In one piece. Knackered and a bit out of sorts, sure, but we got here. The big questions right now are how do we sort out an insurance claim for the extra cash I’ve had to fork out, and is it worth switching to a regular airline for the return flight, not some cheapy charter with shite service and crap seats? I’m thinking it is.. just have to see how it works with refunds from the original place + insurance coverage etc.. gotta love long haul flights.. NOT!

On one hand, I’m totally excited - I’m going home tomorrow for Christmas! On the other hand, I’m stressing out over bits and pieces that I still need to buy, and the realisation that now they’ve the flight time, we may be cutting it fine in London to catch our connecting flight out to Jersey. Small beer in the big scheme of things I guess, there are other flights later in the afternoon/evening, we have insurance, so it should all be cool.. but I’d just rather know that it’s gonna be plain sailing, no hassles, no worries etc..

Already fucked off with them for having changed the aircraft on our route thus robbing me of my premium upgrade seat.. yeah, 30″ seat pitch is what I’m allll about.. fuckers!

Still.. ho hum.. tis the season and all that.. off to the work Christmas party for a bit (in my suit, which really doesn’t fit as well as it used to) then home to pack and stuff.. Joy to the world!

Link: podcast19.mp3 (45:52, 21.0Mb)

It started off with me thinking that I had absolutely nothing to talk about tonight.. so how the hell it turned in to a 45 minute long episode is anyone’s guess! Here’s how the show looks this week:

00:00 - Intro
01:00 - Promo: www.audihertz.net/radio/
03:00 - Feedback from Carl Millar
05:30 - Followup on last week’s sex talk
09:15 - Rave: Sony PSP
10:30 - Shawn pulls me on being pissed off
14:45 - Hot or Not randomness
15:45 - Chris’s Birthday (and his flakey friends)
19:15 - Rant: Going home for Christmas + flight changes
21:45 - It’s a small world
23:45 - Rent: The movie
25:00 - Movie: Syriana
26:45 - Promo: www.podmusiccountdown.com
27:45 - Saddos on Craigslist
29:30 - The world’s tallest residential tower: www.q1.com.au
30:30 - Christmas comes early!
31:30 - Rave: Laserpod
36:00 - Kevin got engaged!
37:45 - Parody: Stanta
44:15 - Wrapup
45:52 - DONE! :-)

Holiday Schedule: I leave on Saturday for 3 weeks away, so the next scheduled edition of the My World Podcast will most likely be on Monday 9th January, 2006!

Not only was Friday Brian’s birthday but it was also the first day of Christmas for me - I got my first Christmas card (from him) and we did a gift exchange. We’re both going to be in the UK for Christmas and there’s no point lugging stuff all the way there only to have to bring it all the way back, right?

So what did I get? Ooh lots! I got a big crate full of Crayola products (for the big kid in me) that’s SO cool.. It’s got EVERYTHING! There’s crayons (of course!), some fat chalk, glitter glue, modelling clay, a pack of spider writers (never seen those before!), some fat chubby markers, safe scissors, paint, and a big sketch pad. RESULT!

As if that wasn’t enough, I also got a book (which will be great for my trip home/flight/etc), a Joyn Mayer CD, and the piece de resistance was this wicked cool thing called a LaserPod! Check out pictures of it here. It’s like a silver cylinder thing that is open at one end. It has some blue LEDs and a red laser in it, as well as a crystal that rotates. You stick it on the floor or a table, turn it on, turn all other lights off, and it projects an ever changing pattern of ethereal blue light and sparkling red “stars” on to the ceiling. It’s awesome!

It also comes with a couple of domed covers you can put on it which turns it in to a crystal ball type effect thing (the docs that come with it call it “meditative”.. uh, ok..) that looks like something out of a Harry Potter movie - like a smokey crystal ball with points of red light that dance around inside. Totally cool!

As they say back home: “Didn’t he do well?” - I DID I DID! Chuffed to bits :-)

So there I am, all chuffed and excited to be going home for Christmas, tickets booked for a few months now, the big day getting ever closer.. then I get a phone call.. it’s Canadian Affair.. calling to advise me that the airline operating my flight home has changed the aircraft they’re using for the flight, and as a result there’s no more premium class, it’s all one class (ie cattle class) and they’ll be refunding the premium part of my ticket price, sorry for the inconvenience. There’s no extra legroom seats available either, and apparently the plan has a 30 inch seat pitch.. fuck..

It’s a bit of a disappointment, but no biggy.. until they call back a week later and say that the same thing’s happening on the return flight.. BZZZT that’s just shite.. no emergency exit seats available, but we have been confirmed in an extra legroom row apparently, so we’ll see how that goes..

It’s not the biggest deal, and sure I probably sound like some kind of posh twat, flying premium class ooh la la etc etc.. but believe me, if you’d done it once, you’d want to do it again.. if only for the fact that you get priority check in at the airport so don’t have to queue for 2 hours along with those families of 4 (including the obligatory screaming 2 year old). Here’s hoping I’m worrying needlessly and all my air travel over the holiday period is worry and stress free..

Wow.. the weekend flew by almost as fast as the last week did.. or was it faster? not sure.. here’s what I got up to anyway:

Friday: Went out for Brian’s birthday. A bunch of people were invited, all turned up, and a good time was had by all. We started off at the Frog and Firkin on West Broadway. Booze, food, chat, good times. Then we ordered a bunch of taxis and headed down to Granville Island for some Theatre Sports. More booze, great entertainment - good times!

Saturday: Got up, mooched around.. Brian went to work, I vegged out, tidied my desk (which SO needed doing).. I want to get my whole place pretty tidy by the end of the week so I’ve got a nice clean tidy place to come back to after being away for xmas. Went over to Chris’s as we were going out for his birthday. Went to Moxies, drinks, food, good times (are you noticing a theme here?). Back to his for some cake, then back to mine while he went out clubbing it. Met up with Brian, Josh came downtown and we hit the movies to see Syriana. Bzzzt - lame film. It’s had rave reviews but it just didn’t do it for me. Back to mine afterwards to watch The Office and Weeds - I love those shows!

Sunday: Got up late.. went to Dennys for brunch.. Brian went to work, I came home, did some bits and pieces. Popped in to work for an hour to sort out some stuff I need for Monday and didn’t manage to finish on Friday.. Came home, started sorting out my xmas news letter to the rellies overseas.. Tim came over, we grabbed a movie, pizza, hung out for a bit.. and here I am, updating my blog.. for the first time in ages..