In light of current events, it strikes me that the government has basically given up on sorting out a proper modern rail service for this country and instead is turning back to cars. Now this really upsets me, not only as a closet greenie but also because it seems to be more about politicians not tackling difficult issues than doing what is right for the country.
Recently a load of money was just promised for road widening projects, the largest the country has seen for years. And now, they're saying that all rail services may be cut back by as much as 10% next year! Targets for expanding rail users dramatically dropped too of course. Yet the Beeb quotes Richard Bawker from the Strategic Rail Authority as saying 'There is still absolute total commitment to the railways'. My fucking arse!
Yet clearly what is wrong with our railways is arse all to do with the cost to the taxpayer, it's the rampant mismanagement and the incredibly inefficient and shoddy way in which fundamental work is undertaken on the railways. No accountability from the top to the bottom has resulted in a substandard service not to mention an increasingly unsafe one. So the solution is to build more roads?!
No, it's to fucking fix the cunting railways so they're worth using again!
Monday, 16 December 2002
Karaoke for the housebound [shedir]
Wifey's midlife arrives this weekend. 35 on Monday, she loves the old karaoke so got her one for the house.
Getting the CDs is a bit hit n miss tho, so decided to compile my own!
Grabbing some mp3's and cdg files is easy with the newsgroups. Getting this onto CD a bit harder. Finally found an easy solution, mp3g toolz!
Sews the mp3 and lyrics together into bin files, which you had as tracks in cdrwin. Easy peasy.
Gonna burn one off and test pre Sunday party. Argos sell an Arbiter karaoke machine with scart to telly for £100, good if y
For those saddos with PC's under their TV, there's a winamp plugin just for you!
f6 if you tell it to delete files removes orig zip as well as working mp3 + CDG. careful usage required.
Saturday, 7 December 2002
The Legend [spiro]
Bored at work this morning (6:12am start) I came across the following text and just had to put it up. Its from the old EED webbie and written by Lurker.
The legend of Electric Sunday
It was a cold, wet and rainy night across the old world of Great Brittain. Huddled in dimly lit lairs backdropped by the ethereal glow of computer monitors, members of Clan Eat Electric Death huddled over keyboards ominous. Phosphor lit faces concentrated, brows furrowed and keyboards conversed in broken staccato taps.
Clan EED lurked in a communal IRC channel on the eve of the second match of the UKOFFL. Tension hung tangible across the electronic ether with fresh memory of the crushing defeat a week prior. The Lords of ruin, members of the exclusive High Voltage sect, gazed down at the Low Voltage minions in effort to select one worthy of making up the team. Knowledge weighed heavy that the wrong choice could cost the melee dear - the outcome was far from certain.
The electronic battlefield lay prepared as 4 members from clan Cows with Fluff and the ukccl div 1 Quake Gods UK Firm readied themselves to take on the Electic Ones. Suddenly a miracle was granted. The Doover did exclaim, 'DanDanger is online'. Information extracted from the most reliable source, that of the ubiquitous ICQ itself.
Bare minutes before the battle was due to commence, DanDanger did enter the IRC channel. It was almost too much to hope for. With DanDanger, Eat Electric Death could field it's three best warriors in the upcoming war. Minutes ticked down. DanDanger did not own the map of dm3. The Lurker shifted instantly to action and utilised ICQ to transfer the map to DanDanger with his ISDN. The EED rank and file cried, 'Come on Dan, get the map!' and 'Come on Dan, get the skins!'. Windows file requestors were urgently navigated, bytes transferred as the seconds counted down to the outbreak of war.
Then it was on. Mass joining of the server, members selected their skins - EED an appropriately charged ethereal green. Players test firing blasters in mock at opponents as the timer counted down to Armageddon.
With a blast of respawn whoosh, EED members were teleported into the fray. Honed Quake Gods warred, enhanced neurons firing efficiently to direct death at targets as left and right brain hemisphere's pre-calculated body and weapon trajectories with frightening accuracy. Hours of hard experience forging the axiom pathways into biological equivalents of pipelined branch prediction processors. Blood chemistry coursed with stimulants and neurochemical enhancers shaving off yet further microseconds from reaction times.
The Doover waded into action, laying the enemy low with a barrage of grenades around the densely populated and highly prized Rocket Launcher. DanDanger chopped through bodies in slow motion as his chain gun barrel hummed and spat dozens of molten lead death-giving bullets every second. VenusXL's deftly dropped in front of enemy clanners, wide grizzly maw grinning, stunning the victim as they come to realise their belly full of twin barrels of super shotgun pellets.
Then there was the Lurker. The Shrike of death, hissing electrodes from temple to ISDN adaptor directing uncanny carnage in wave after wave of weaponry discharges. One moment his Hyperblaster sang a whining song of destruction, leading underwater swimming player with near-psychic prediction leaving their sizzling sinking bodies for the catfish and crabs. Grenades, Rockets, Shotguns called out time after time to cut down the enemies with groans, exclamations of pain and yet another frag piling up on the scoreboard for Eat Electric Death.
15 minutes passed like an hour. In the brief recess, clans UKF and CwF surveyed their slaughter and breathed a fearsome sigh of horror at their casualties. All too soon the respite was over and the second wave of EED's withering assault was visited on the hapless clanners. The blaze of furious battle continued to the duration as UKF clawed back to a score saving grace while CwF crumpled under the barrage.
The match was over. The silence abrupt. The scoreboard appeared with nonchalant afront. It read; EED-213 UKF-171 CWF-110. It was a battle that had turned the tide of war. Whispers and rumours crept from modem to modem as the infamy of EED spreads to this day. None will forget the legend of Electric Sunday and now all Quake in fear of the clan known as Eat Electric Death.
The legend of Electric Sunday
It was a cold, wet and rainy night across the old world of Great Brittain. Huddled in dimly lit lairs backdropped by the ethereal glow of computer monitors, members of Clan Eat Electric Death huddled over keyboards ominous. Phosphor lit faces concentrated, brows furrowed and keyboards conversed in broken staccato taps.
Clan EED lurked in a communal IRC channel on the eve of the second match of the UKOFFL. Tension hung tangible across the electronic ether with fresh memory of the crushing defeat a week prior. The Lords of ruin, members of the exclusive High Voltage sect, gazed down at the Low Voltage minions in effort to select one worthy of making up the team. Knowledge weighed heavy that the wrong choice could cost the melee dear - the outcome was far from certain.
The electronic battlefield lay prepared as 4 members from clan Cows with Fluff and the ukccl div 1 Quake Gods UK Firm readied themselves to take on the Electic Ones. Suddenly a miracle was granted. The Doover did exclaim, 'DanDanger is online'. Information extracted from the most reliable source, that of the ubiquitous ICQ itself.
Bare minutes before the battle was due to commence, DanDanger did enter the IRC channel. It was almost too much to hope for. With DanDanger, Eat Electric Death could field it's three best warriors in the upcoming war. Minutes ticked down. DanDanger did not own the map of dm3. The Lurker shifted instantly to action and utilised ICQ to transfer the map to DanDanger with his ISDN. The EED rank and file cried, 'Come on Dan, get the map!' and 'Come on Dan, get the skins!'. Windows file requestors were urgently navigated, bytes transferred as the seconds counted down to the outbreak of war.
Then it was on. Mass joining of the server, members selected their skins - EED an appropriately charged ethereal green. Players test firing blasters in mock at opponents as the timer counted down to Armageddon.
With a blast of respawn whoosh, EED members were teleported into the fray. Honed Quake Gods warred, enhanced neurons firing efficiently to direct death at targets as left and right brain hemisphere's pre-calculated body and weapon trajectories with frightening accuracy. Hours of hard experience forging the axiom pathways into biological equivalents of pipelined branch prediction processors. Blood chemistry coursed with stimulants and neurochemical enhancers shaving off yet further microseconds from reaction times.
The Doover waded into action, laying the enemy low with a barrage of grenades around the densely populated and highly prized Rocket Launcher. DanDanger chopped through bodies in slow motion as his chain gun barrel hummed and spat dozens of molten lead death-giving bullets every second. VenusXL's deftly dropped in front of enemy clanners, wide grizzly maw grinning, stunning the victim as they come to realise their belly full of twin barrels of super shotgun pellets.
Then there was the Lurker. The Shrike of death, hissing electrodes from temple to ISDN adaptor directing uncanny carnage in wave after wave of weaponry discharges. One moment his Hyperblaster sang a whining song of destruction, leading underwater swimming player with near-psychic prediction leaving their sizzling sinking bodies for the catfish and crabs. Grenades, Rockets, Shotguns called out time after time to cut down the enemies with groans, exclamations of pain and yet another frag piling up on the scoreboard for Eat Electric Death.
15 minutes passed like an hour. In the brief recess, clans UKF and CwF surveyed their slaughter and breathed a fearsome sigh of horror at their casualties. All too soon the respite was over and the second wave of EED's withering assault was visited on the hapless clanners. The blaze of furious battle continued to the duration as UKF clawed back to a score saving grace while CwF crumpled under the barrage.
The match was over. The silence abrupt. The scoreboard appeared with nonchalant afront. It read; EED-213 UKF-171 CWF-110. It was a battle that had turned the tide of war. Whispers and rumours crept from modem to modem as the infamy of EED spreads to this day. None will forget the legend of Electric Sunday and now all Quake in fear of the clan known as Eat Electric Death.
Friday, 6 December 2002
One For Beej [muz]
As you may or may not have heard, I've recently joined Birmingham University Royal Naval Unit. Every Thursday I attend 'drill nights' at HMS Forward, which usually consist of 1.5 hours of lectures followed by an evening of getting pissed out in Birmingham.
Being a Royal Naval Reserve base, there is no shortage of instances of pisstaking at the expense of other services. I found a flyer being distributed there that I thought was particularly funny. Even though it is a little late, I thought I'd share this gem with my clanmates. :)
WE'RE LOOKING FOR BLOKES WHO WANT TO SPEND 9 MONTHS A YEAR AWAY FROM HOME ON CRAP PAY THEN PROVIDE STRIKE COVER FOR TOSSERS WHO ONLY WORK 6 MONTHS A YEAR FOR BETTER MONEY!!
You have to feel sorry for the firefighters. Two day shifts followed by two night shifts and then having to endure four days off!! Bless them. And for having to work this hard for effectively 6 months of the year they only get a miserable £17,000 basic wage + whatever they get from their second incomes.
Because of these appalling working conditions, only around 50 people apply for every vacancy the fire service have. So if you don't fancy competing with 49 other people for this kind of slave labour, why not join the Army and compete with yourself for 1 of the 50 posts available to you and all of that for even less than the firefighters basic wage. BARGAIN!
Sign below if you want to work for 12 months of the year, have you personal liberties removed from you for anywhere up to 6 months at a time and train for the possibility of dying for a country full of greedy, selfish pathetic individuals who cannot see past the end of their narrow minds (or fire engines).
Just to recap, if you want to work for crap money in all the god-forsaken shitholes of the world, or provide strike cover, with no recognition, then apply to: The Army, Political Arse House, Seen Off Street, London FuCK, FBU.
Name: _________________ Preferred Shitholes: _______________ Preferred area for strike cover: ________________
Army. Be Depressed.
Muz sucks a bit tbh m8 [slim]
Muz can't get blogging working. This is clearly a skills related issue. His brain is currently state funded, and I think it needs to be highlighted what a clear waste of public money this is. Thanks.
Electric Comics [shedir]
Well Direct Connect just gets better and better. Stumbled across a public hub with 11TB, yes terabytes, of comics being shared. Spent 2 days leeching from a bloke with a t1 connection so got about 7gb off him. Reading is a bit of a pain. Then I found this proggy http://www.geocities.com/davidayton/CDisplay.html Displays them 2 pages on screen at once and full screen. SOOOOPERB so head along to megaman.gotdns.co
oh and if bobby ever comes back into that hub I can get all the thor stuff I've got queued!
DCHUB - megaman.gotdns.com loads of stuff available in there. be patient, like a convent not many available slots
Wednesday, 4 December 2002
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