Stray Dog Strut

So what a shit day I had today. I arrived at work to find two nice emails from my manager in my inbox- one ranting about why my team had stopped completing this stupid checklist for endowment policies, the exact wording being along the lines of “who decided you could stop using it?” and “there’s no if’s and buts, you have to use it”. Quite ironic seeing as we’d had so many teething problems with it months ago and my other manager had told us we didn’t really need to use it.

The second, again from the first manager, was a bashing for not answering the phones enough. Apparently the administration side of the team are taking as many calls as we are – personally I find that impossible seeing as the three of us in my team take an average of fifty calls each a day, the only ones we don’t get are when we’re on the phone/busy – say up to about ten.

It just makes you appreciate how much people in offices love to bitch. I hate the goddamn place but I’m not going to waste my time replying to these emails, if they have a problem they should come and see me.

The second shit part of my day was having one of my problem cases come back to haunt me. This thing has been going on since last October and it’s driving me nuts. I can’t talk specifics due to data protection but it involved refunding the customer. I think I’ve got it sorted now (by going above my manager basically) and I just have a few loose ends to tie off tomorrow morning. I’m just kicking myself for getting dragged into it in the first place – another down side to the customer service team: you get landed with all the shit whether it’s your job or not.

Anyway, after leaving work half an hour late I met up with Fe, Soul & Roman and had a nice meal in Bella Italia. I had some pepperoni pizza washed down with a nice rose wine. Afterwards we went to see “The Pursuit of Happyness” which is a really good film – the “y” is intentional by the way – and i’d recommend you see it. I thought it was quite an apt title for today’s post considering the day i’ve had. I’m seriously hoping this uni thing works out…

Just one more day in the office and then i’ve got my younger sister’s wedding on saturday. I got my kilt etc on tuesday – thankfully it fits – so I can’t wait to dress up. I’ll probably try to get up early tomorrow to get my hair cut before work but I might leave it ’til early saturday morning if I don’t manage it.

I ordered a couple of games from the www.game.uk.com website on tuesday as a kind of pick-me-up after being broke for the last couple of weeks. I never really buy anything for myself so I think I deserved it – I ‘do stuff’ but I don’t really buy anything. I got a good deal – All three Prince of Persia Games and Resident Evil 4 for PS2 for �25.00 in total. They arrived today but I haven’t had a chance to play them yet – i’m so tired – so I might plead with Falling to let me try them out tomorrow night.

My back is still aching from the MRI scan I had this week for a research thing – my mum has bi-polar depression so the hospital is investigating the links between family members etc. I had to lie in the machine for 45 mins so I’m still pretty stiff in my arms and back. They also took blood (it was really dark red) and gave me questionnaires and an IQ test. I shouldn’t expect to hear from them for another two years when they check how my brain has developed.

I’m sure i’m just your average mental pessimistic person anyway, so nothing to worry about=)

Adios amigos…

I’ve just had the pleasure of watching Apple CEO Steve Jobs’ keynote address at San Francisco’s Mascone West in Quicktime.

He introduced Apple TV – a box that let’s you wirelessly stream (or download) movies, tv shows, music and photos that you get through iTunes to your widescreen tv. It’s very cool.

Then he introduced the iPhone.

Oh my god!

This phone will blow your mind!

* A huge 3.5″ screen – no keypad!! – a multi-touch screen!!
* Scrolling through your music and movies using your fingers
* A real web-browser (Safari) and operating system (OS X)
* Text messaging with multiple on-going convos and you can see texts in a chat-style window
* Scroll through albums
* Accelerometer – Turn the phone on it’s side and the display flips too – better for webpages
* ‘Pinch’ your fingers to zoom in and out on pictures, maps and webpages
* Widgets like weather and stocks
* Google Maps – find a restaurant and call them up – plus satelite imaging
* Visual voicemail – see what voicemails you have and pick which one you want to listen to rather than having to listen to them all in a row
* Proper email – see your folders and do everything you do on your computer at home
* Built in 2.0 pixel camera
* Proximity sensor to turn the touch-screen off when it’s near your face
* Ambient light sensor to dim the display when required to save power
* Loads of other nifty features…

It has to be seen to be believed – it’s so cool! Those guys at Apple have really produced a labour of love. Out in the US in June and hopefully Europe in Q4. Retailing from $499 (~£250).

Watch the speech now! No subtitles, but it’s very visual and there’s summary points on the OHP. It’s 2 hours long though!

Now I want to join the Apple family more than ever!!

Life,

So I applied to university. This whole thing has been a big emotional rollercoaster!

I was very methodical in my searches – I started at the UCAS website and copied down the list of every university with courses relating to game design. There were 43 of them, only 3 of which are in Scotland, 2 in Wales and 38 in England alone!

I then checked every university website – some of them didn’t have courses on game design (or atleast not ones easy to find!). I then ordered prospectuses for most of them (I’m feeling very guilty at the waste of paper now) and as they arrived I read them all. I filtered my choices by, firstly, courses I was interested in, then location (near myself or Falling), then by entry requirements – this is where the requirement of a portfolio meant alot of them were discarded.

I was left with about 5 or 6, mostly near York where Falling will be doing her Masters. We discussed it, but she will only be there for another year and the more I looked into it the more it didn’t seem right for me.

I had almost completely resigned myself to studying a HND or something instead when I stumbled across a course in London. The course sounds perfect and I beleive I meet all the entry requirements. So finally, i’ve applied to university. Now the agonising wait for an offer or an interview begins.

The Universe,

I’ve been playing around in Eve Online again. I’m still relatively poor since I bought my mining barge, the Procurer, but I’ve trained up the anchoring skill and now i’m mining asteroid belts in 0.7 space, filling secure containers that i’ve anchored nearby and periodically hauling everything back to a nearby station for selling. It’s slow going because i’m doing it alone, but atleast my profits are my own. I’ll think about joining a corporation once I own a few larger ships.

The lastest talk in the Eve developer forums is about allowing ‘capsuleers’ to walk around stations while docked. This would be an interesting new feature as up until now you always meet people ‘in person’ through your encounters in open space. I just hope that this is a minor addition and doesn’t change the whole feel of the game.

and Everything…

I’ve finally got my kilt organised for my sister’s wedding this month. My brother and I will be wearing the Modern Douglas tartan with Prince Charlie jacket etc. Unfortunately I had to settle for a tartan that I like the look of as it wasn’t possible to find a tartan, or indeed even hire one, that would mean something to my family. It’s a blue/green tartan similar to the Black Watch tartan but with white lines.

My only remaining worry is that it will fit! I’m a very slim person despite the junk food I eat, so I was given the smallest adult size when I went for fitting. The ‘dress rehearsal’ is on the 23rd so I’ve been stuffing my face to make sure I’m not going to be any smaller!lol

I’ll leave you with another game-related article. An email from HMV today advertised the release of a PS2 (and PSP) game – Sega Mega Drive Collection – and guess what? My eternal favourite Gain Ground is included!! I’ll need to check if this is much different from the Master System version that I still have and love, but it would be good to play this again. There’s a whole load of other titles on there that I recognise, like Alex Kidd and Echo the Dolphin, as well as interviews with the creators and ‘making of’ sections too. It’s looking good!