Walking, walking… and.. more walking 16 June 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: grafham waters, haloumi bread, lakes, walking
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So yesterday, me, C and two of my friends E and A, went to have a picnic at Grafham Waters, (It’s up near Cambridge). The plan was to have a picnic and to go for short walk. The weather was a bit overcast when we got there, but we sat by the lake, 3 of us enjoying bread, humous and some really yummy bread that has haloumi inside of it. I shall have to see if I can find somewhere that makes that near me, it was damned tasty! My friend A is on something called a Cambridge diet, and so couldn’t eat what the rest of us were eating, although he did steal a few bits of bread.
After lunch we decided to go on a walk, E said that the lake was only 7km in circumference, that’s just under 4 and a 1/2 miles, it shouldn’t take us too long to walk all the way around it. So we started out in high spirits, the sun had come out by now and it was pretty warm, and the butterflies, dragonflies and flies were now out in force. About a 1/3 of the way around we made a pit stop for Ice Cream (or at least some of us did) , this was about an hour or so from when we had started out. So we headed on again, we got another 1/3 of the way around before the trouble began. The path began to diverge away from the lake, (well should call it Waters really?) the ordinance survey map E had wasn’t much use as it looked like the bike track we were following diverged quite far away from the lake, nor were the ANY helpful signs to indicate how far it was now to well.. anywhere. So we wondered along, knowing WHERE the lake was but not seeing it, and being very unsure as just how far we had to go. Time passed, we’d set out at 2ish, and it was now around 5ish. From E’s map it looked like the walkers path deviated from the cycle path at one point to go directly towards where we wanted to go (namely the car park where the car was), so we followed one path hopefully. We saw a rabbit, a deer (which looked quite small, possibly a Muntjac, maybe a Chinese water deer but.. honestly I’ve no idea) and then we turned a corner and there was, what was propably a birdwatchers hut in the way. Great. So we turned around, took a side path and hit the cycle path again.
After a couple of short cuts we eventually managed to SEE the lake again, and wonder of wonders walk beside it, also amazingly we saw other walkers (and not just cyclists). Thank goodness! We were no longer semi lost, but still we were still a mile or so from the car, at least we knew how to get there now though. We eventually made it back to the car by 6.15pm. And promptly took a good long swig of water from the bottle E had left in the car. (We’d all finished the actual bottles of water we’d taken with us quite a while ago.)
So we managed to survive that adventure, and we figure that we walked about 10 miles in total, having a look at the map later, we worked out that the circumference of the lake is at least 9km, and we did have to walk wide of it at some points. Also a 4 hour walk isn’t a terrible thing, BUT when your not prepared for it, and aren’t sure just how much longer the walk back to the car will be, then.. well its *sigh* I can’t think of an appropriate word, but I’m sure you get my drift.
Anyway have just found a recipe for Haloumi bread, I may well have to try it out at somepoint! 
Eurovision 25 May 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: eurovision, political voting
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Ahh Eurovision, a night of pure cheese maybe but I do enjoy it (most of it at least). Watching some of the silly songs and crazy lyrics is always good for a laugh. And actually, despite what I think I said in a previous post, when I listened to the UK entry compared to some of the others *cough* Latvia, Spain, Russia *cough* to name but a few, we had an all right entry. So Latvia had some pirates singing about how they are going to take Eurovision, Spain had the most bizzare song about a dance called the ChikiChiki, Russia had some awful ‘power’ ballad type thing, Germany’s entry sounded off key, France had some guy singing in English about Chivers (??), and Bosnia Herzegovina had some wired song where the backing singers pulled out large knitting needles near the end and pretended to knit. There were a couple of songs I thought were quite good, Azerbaijan had a pretty decent song for their first ever Eurovision, Finland going with power metal again, I enjoyed Turkey’s too.
Still, as per usual, the worst bit of the night was the political voting, its got even worse in the last few years I think. It used to be that only the countries competing on the night voted,which was usually around 20-25 countries, then whoever came last got relegated and wouldn’t be allowed to compete next year, giving someone else a chance. Except for when the UK came last, they couldn’t relegate us because along with Spain, France and Germany we put the most money into the event. Now however, there are two semi finals before the final everyone (43 countries this year), except the UK, France, Germany, Spain and the winner of last years contest (I think that’s it) competes and then on the night of the final 25 countries compete. But all 43 countries get to vote at the end, it just means that the political voting has much more of an affect than it used to.
I mean Iceland and Denmark trading 12 points, Spain and Portugal, pretty much all the Baltic & Scandinavian states giving Russia 12, and I’m pretty sure that, these days, even if the UK sent a truly awesome song that could be number one for weeks, we would still get f-all points. (Thou thanks to San Marino and Ireland for at least giving us some points so we didn’t have nil. We still came last though, along with Germany and Poland. Yes that’s right Spain’s truly dire song got a hell of a lot more points than us, I’m sort of of the opinion that Spain and quite probably France and Germany just don’t really care any more (because of the political voting)? I’m pretty sure Spain had a really odd entry 2 years ago too. (I missed last years Eurovision).)
Do I sound like a sore loser? Maybe. But you know it’s tiring and BORING watching the same thing happen every year. Oh look every one is giving all the high points to the countries they are nearest to. There’s no tension, no excitment over who might win, there were occasions a few years ago where the voting used to be tight, it would go down to the last few votes.. but not these days. Russia made a killing with the points this year.
Its just depressing. Why do I keep watching it then? Year after year?
Oh yeah.. cause you get a right laugh at some of the crazy/stupid songs that are there! I should learn to turn it off when the voting starts.
Moving & other things 23 May 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Computer, University.Tags: keyboards, exams, moving, ruby on rails, oxford street, shopping, Gaming, logitech G15
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I’d forgotten how exhausting moving, even just a small move, can be. Wednesday I helped C move what small amount of stuff out of the place he was renting to my house. It was no where near an epic move, hell I did that EVERY time I went back to uni, that was epic, I had so much stuff that I filled my dad’s Peugeot Estate! I mean everything I had was kind of ‘necessary’ I had my PC, base unit, monitor, speakers, printer, then my tv, game cube, and of course a bag of dvd’s/game cube games. A suitcase with clothes, another with sheets, pillows etc. A bag with text books and folders of notes, a bag of living essentials, washing up liquid, washing machine powder, extension cords, a mirror.. etc. And of course my 2 potted plants and bags of food… Gods that was a lot, somehow my friend, who had almost as much stuff as me, managed to fit everything in his mum’s car, which was a fair bit smaller than mine, it was most impressive.
But anyway I digress. C was renting somewhere which was only about a 5 min walk from where I live, its amazing how long that can feel when your weighed down with bags, it didn’t take that many trips though. A part of me thinks it would have been so much easier and quicker if my mum had brought her car around, it would have taken one trip, and she did offer. But then.. its ONLY 5 mins, and I’m hardly helping the environment if I use the car for such a short trip. Ah well.
As of today I have now completed 4 of my 5 exams, and last exam is next Thursday. It can’t come soon enough, I have decided to treat myself to a rather large shopping trip afterwards. (The benefit (or is a a curse?) of having a university near Oxford street.) There are some things I want to get from Marks and Spencers, and I need to get a book to teach me about Ruby on Rails. Its basically an open source frame work that allows you to develop database backed web applications. And from what I’ve seen of the tutorials and such it is supposed to be really easy to do as there is minimal coding involved, and is supposed to be easy to learn. So I’ve decided to learn. I just hope that one of the book shops on Oxford street has the book I want.
I have also finally decided on what keyboard I want. I think I mentioned ages ago in another blog post that I would invest in a new keyboard in the summer, well I am going to get one soon. I have to say it was a tough choice. Originally I was torn between the Logitech LX 710 Laser and the Logitech Cordless Desktop Wave. Both are cordless, and both came with mice, the former has more buttons functionality than the other, but the latter has that curvy look which is supposed to be better for people who get RSI, which I do occasionally.
So I thought it was a tough choice, and both were about the same price on Amazon so there wasn’t much in it.. until I stumbled on Logitech’s Gaming keyboards. Well that did it.. I wasn’t aiming to spend more than £40 maybe £50 on a keyboard. But then I saw these two. Logitech G11 Keyboard and the Logitech G15 Keyboard. Now.. granted the G11 is JUST below £50, but it’s the G15 that is the neat one, and after reading a review that compared the new G15 with the old G15, it just sounds really neat, plus my friend has the old G15, and he says its pretty damn good. However unfortunately neither of these are wireless, nor do they come with mice, now to be far I wasn’t really looking for a new mouse, my basic Microsoft Optical one serves me fine. Plus my current basic keyboard is also wired, so it’s not going to make a huge difference to me, although the size might. For some silly reason the Logitech site doesn’t give you the dimensions of the keyboards, the G15 is 19.5″ long and 10.5″ wide, my current keyboard is 18″ by 7″ so its pretty big! At the moment I can push my keyboard up next to the monitor if I want to write note on to paper and such. I don’t think I’m quite going to have that luxury with this new keyboard, I’m also going to have fun when I want to break out my graphics tablet. I really wont’ have much room at all! But, I’m a gamer geek and well, it’s a gaming keyboard. I’ll figure something out!
I want to move 3 May 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: london mayor
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Boris won.. Boris freaking Johnson bloody won the London Mayor election. I just.. I don’t feel I have the words to describe how I feel.. well.. I do but most of them will be swear words of some description or other.
The conservatives winning is one thing, I don’t like them but if it’d been another candidate who’d one, fine I’d be disappointedly but whatever. But it wasn’t another candidate it was Mr Boris foot-in-mouth-buffoon Johnson. This is they guy who insults entire cities multiple times and hell even entire countries. So this then is the man now in charge of London?
We’re so screwed.
Alan Tudyk you are funny! 2 April 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: alan tudyk, firefly, serenity, wash
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Ahh this is funny, although in some ways a rather big spoiler if you haven’t seen Serenity! (and you are a Firefly fan)
Eurovision 1 March 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: eurovision
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Generally I enjoy watching Eurovision, its soo cheesy that it’s almost funny at times, and as long as you don’t take it seriously and turn it off before the ‘voting’ starts it’s usually ok. (Although I will admit to watching the voting, I’ve watched the show enough times that you KNOW who will give who 10 points.) Anyway today is the day that the UK decide on our entry, and I’ve just listened to the samples on the BBC page.. and.. I’m not sure I can take it this year. I’m not sure I want to watch Eurovision this year.
Oh don’t get me wrong, I have NO expectations of us doing well whatever we enter, way to much political voting going on. But you know it’d be nice to maybe enter something DIFFERENT. Something that is NOT pure S**T pop. Something that might at least get a few votes? Maybe?
Yes I realise I am probably asking too much from a Eurovision entry, but geeze if Finland can WIN with Lordi, there is no reason we can’t try some different music. I mean hell’s Ireland’s entry is stupid but at least its funny and as such memorable. Bah. If you want to suffer the potential awfulness of our entries then the link is here. Although I don’t know how long all the samples will stay there. The competition is tonight. Hmm Simona’s song maybe the only one I can stand to listen to… just… Ugh.
Tatting & Earthquakes 27 February 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: creative, earthquake, tatting
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So I’ve started reading Marnie MacLean’s blog, specifically because some of the pattern’s she has created are really really pretty! And there are several must knits for me. Recently she’s been talking about tatting, and here is her blog post on it. Doesn’t it look pretty? Really really pretty? And it made me think, I’m pretty sure it’s something that I can use to make this dress prettier, (I posted about this here)
Potentially I could make something and sew it on there.. somewhere. The only problem is I don’t have the time or the resources to learn this at the moment. Maybe I could by something to sew on..some kind of pattern or something, or buy some material and add it somewhere. The dress is STILL hanging up on the outside of my wardrobe, 1) so that I don’t forget about it, and 2) to try and inspire me to come up with SOMETHING to pretty it up. But so far nothing. Oh well. Maybe I’ll get more inspired after my exams. :/
In other news we had an earthquake over here (5.3), well epicentre was in Lincolnshire, heh watching BBC news at the moment, and it’s been referred to as a “Very British Earthquake” because everybody is talking about it. (Whoops aren’t I original 
) But we don’t really get these things very often, so of course we’re going to talk about it. Must confess I didn’t feel anything, but people have felt aftershocks all the way over in Holland. But it’s the biggest Earthquake in a long time, there was one that was 6.1 in 1931. (Heh I didn’t mean that to rhyme.) Ahh I’m sure there are those of you out there laughing at me for the patheticness of British Earthquakes?
Dear D&A 26 February 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: annoyed, D&A, glasses
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Dear D&A,
I am writing because I feel you need to take a serious look at your customer service abilities, and also at the training of your opticians. I feel that it is rather outrageous to throw away someone’s contacts (when they are very very short sighted), provide them with insufficient daily disposable contacts to last until their insanely expensive glasses turn up. Now I realise that it is not really your practice to give away daily disposables like that to tide someone over, but lets face it you did destroy the original contacts with the claim that the person was going to go blind. Also not only did you suggest that the person was going blind, (not to mention that they also had an ulcer) but the suggestion that we had to go to A&E immediately would imply that it was incredibly urgent. You also recommended us to a hospital that was not equipped to deal with eye emergencies, which therefore wasted about 4 hours of our life. Additionally the referral letter (which took an hour or more instead of the 20mins you said it would take to write) did not really mention WHAT you thought was wrong because the doctors kept asking us.
I would like to point out several things here, 1) as we were told by the nice doctors/nursers at Moorfields, ulcer’s are painful, do not tell someone they have one if they are clearly not in any pain, 2) it is surely better to make the suggestion that someone should think about going to A&E, and think about using glasses for a while and NOT that it is urgent said person goes to A&E, just so you can make a sale of horribly expensive glasses. Also if you say you’re going to put a rush on getting the glasses done, so that they are done in 7 days (instead of the usual 7-10) don’t say this if you DON’T GET DELIVERIES at the weekend. That is clearly a downright lie.
Don’t get me started on the fact that even though you suggested Monday for the glasses they are still not ready, and might not possibly be ready till Wed. Where I shall point out you REALLY DID NOT supply enough daily disposables in that case as a pair WILL need to be reused for a day because said person cannot SEE otherwise.
Yours sincerely,
Annoyed
————-
*sigh* Aren’t D&A wonderful? Or am I making too much of this?
(I’d like to add that I have worked in retail, and I know that getting things ordered over from the warehouse isn’t always as instantaneous as we’d like, but I know that I was always honest about the fact that things ordered at the weekend that were in the warehouse, wouldn’t be likely to come in till Tues/Wed because the warehouse was closed at the weekend and I wouldn’t be able to check for stock till Monday. It’s NOT that hard to at least be honest and communicative.)
Edit to add: I wasn’t there at the initial meeting with D&A where they mentioned blindness, however this was the impression they did seem to give to Caleb. And I feel that such an impression was quite unnecessary and they could have thought of a better way to say things WITHOUT giving said impression.
A&E 17 February 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: a&e, D&A, eyes, moorfields, NHS, north middlesex hospital, opticians, optomertrists
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I think if Demonic Soul Eaters really existed, then they would probably feed very well in some A&E departments, those places are such a drain on a person, especially when you effectively spend 3 hours in a freezing cold waiting room, for effectively no reason. So I hope you got a good feeding Mr Demonic Soul Eater, perhaps your little’uns got a good feed to? I hope they grow up big and strong… (!)
So I suppose I should probably explain exactly WHY I spent 3 hours in A&E? Well Caleb went for an eye test, a NORMAL ROUTINE everyday eye test for new contacts/glasses. He went to D&A, where the optician determined that he had to go to A&E ASAP, because he apparently had an ulcer and was going to go blind, due to his contacts. So obviously it took them an hour to write a referall letter *rolls eyes*, and they told him to go to North Middlesex A&E dept. (I was at home while this was happening.)
So not being sure quite HOW to get to the North Mid, my mum kindly gave us both a lift there. Although she did mention that the Whittington is probably a better hospital than the North Mid. But I digress. We get to the North Mid at.. hmm 2.30pm I think, register at reception, and wait. (The sign on the electronic screen says its a 3 hour wait.) Caleb get’s seen by the triage nurse/doctor(?) who says that because their eye clinic is closed they are sure if he can be seen today. Hmmm… ok. So we wait… and wait.. and wait.. (you know the drill surely?)
Finally pretty much 3 hours after we got there we’re seen by a nurse, who after a quick description of why we’re there goes. “Oh.. well the eye clinic is closed, there isn’t really anything I can do. You’ll need to go to Moorfields, or maybe Weston, as they have emergency eye clinics.” (In fact Moorfields IS the SPECIALIST EYE Hospital….)
Right… So, we’ve just wasted 3-4 hours of our life in A&E, and you can’t even do anything. Now its not the fact that they coulnd’t do anything that really ticks me off, it’s the fact that the Opticians SENT us to North Mid, its the fact that the Triage nurse/doctor didn’t think to say that because the eye clinic was closed that we should go to say Moorfields! It just boggles me that if an Opticians says you need to go to A&E IMMEDIATELY that they wouldn’t tell you to go to the A&E department in a SPECIALIST EYE Hospital(!!!!) GRRRRR!!!!!!!!
Not only was it 3 hours wasted, but it was 3 hours wasted sitting in a blood COLD waiting room!!
So, I phone home, because I can’t remember where Moorfields is but I had heard of it, it’s at Old Street, which duh I should have remembered because I used to work at Old Street. So, my dad drive’s out to North Mid to pick us up (cause I can’t figure out where the sodding bus stop is to get away from there) and drives us to Moorfields. Now THAT is a nice hospital, the waiting room had comfy chairs and it was WARM! Triage was quick, then 10-15 mins later a nurse saw Caleb to do a quick check, and ask some questions, and even she mentioned then that he probably did NOT have an ulcer because if he did he would have been in INCREDIBLE PAIN. Which he wasn’t.
Then, maybe 20-30 mins after that we got seen by a doctor. (We’d been moved to a second waiting room after the nurse, and you actually felt like things were moving in there, because you saw people go in, come out, and leave) And what did the doctor say? After doing a quick check? That there was NOTHING wrong. Oh his eye’s were a bit oxygen starved because of prolonged wearing of contacts, and that there is a point where this is irreversible and can make you blind. BUT that he wasn’t at that stage yet.
So… SO, there was NOTHING WRONG. Now I wouldn’t have minded spending 1-2 hours at Moorfields to be told this. What really irks us both is the fact that we had to waste our time at the North Mid first!! It’s just utterly INSANE. GRRRR.
Anyway I will leave this post here, because otherwise I shall just repeat most of what I’ve already said. But yes, long story short, if EVER your optician tells you to go to some general A&E department (and you live in London), DO NOT listen to them!! GO TO MOORFIELDS. It IS a SPECIALIST EYE Hospital. (Have I made my point..?)
Gota get creative! 12 February 2008
Posted by kaitharshayr in Uncategorized.Tags: boring, dress, sewing
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Ok so for the last few months I’ve been having some wardrobe issues, a lot of my clothes are simply too big. At some point I realyl need to sit down and alter the waist lines on many of my skirts. (Thats going to be an awkward/big task..) Anyway, while I was at the shops today, trying to find something to wear to a friends wedding, I have yet to find anything good, I saw THE perfectest perfect suit! I am currently debating with myself as to whether I should spalsh out and get it. I don’t really have a suit at the moment, as my current one.. well I’m pretty sure I just look like I’m drowning in it!! Anyway this prompted me to actually try on said suit clothes at home, and indeed most of them are too big, but I also found this hidden in my wardrobe:
Its something that has been sitting in my wardrobe for a looooong time (serveral years? from before I went to uni I’m sure!!) and I don’t think I have ever worn it. Not once. Ever.
So I looked at it, I tried it on, and yes it does fit, but… it’s boring! Oh so boring.
So I need to find a way to revamp this dress, a way to add colour to make it more interesting so that I actually wear the thing!! Cause it does fit and has a decent shape. My dilemma is what? What can I add/do to it? I’m not really a seamstress. Hmmm… this one might take some thought?
Maybe I could knit some kind of lacy skirt thing and sew it on to the waist? Maybe? but if so what colour?! Gah. Will come up with something one day.
