Well the first week at my new workplace has just passed, and it’s been a great week. I’ve felt a part of the team since day 1, participating in most of the support queries past our way save for some Windows stuff. All the people are very nice and have made me feel right at home.

It’s really a great place to be. On Friday we ran into some trouble on some live machines, so four of us headed to the conference room, set up the projector, and brainstormed for 3 hours until we figured out what the problem was and found a way to reproduce it. At every stage I was included in the discussion, my ideas fully heard out, and I genuinely felt as if I’d worked there for years.

I’m staying my last night at Jess’s parents before Jess leaves back to Huddersfield tomorrow, and I move into our house. We’ve stocked up the fridge, the broadband is working, and there’s even a bed, chair, and hifi! We’re also moving down next weekend instead of in two weeks’ time, since that’s the only time we could get the van. Great stuff!

While catching up on yesterday’s news, BoingBoing alerted me to the CRIA‘s alarming attempts to brainwash children into their ways of thinking: Captain Copyright. BoingBoing also managed to highlight some interesting facts like their mascot borrows features from all sorts of other underwear perverts (“superheroes”™), clearly breaking copyright themselves. Oh, and let’s not mention their ridiculous terms & conditions that include such gems as:

Permission is expressly granted to any person who wishes to place a link in his or her own website to www.accesscopyright.ca or any of its pages with the following exception: permission to link is explicitly withheld from any website the contents of which may, in the opinion of the Access Copyright, be damaging or cause harm to the reputation of, Access Copyright. In the event we contact you and request the link be removed, you agree to comply with that request promptly. If you link to or otherwise include www.captaincopyright.ca on your website, please let us know and create any link to our home page only.

Oops, I clearly broke that rule in two separate instances! OK, here’s another one I broke: “iv. You are not permitted to copy or cut from any page or its HTML source code to the Windowsâ„¢ clipboard (or equivalent on other platforms) onto any other website.” Let’s break it again shall we:

<p class="pageTitle">Welcome kids </p>

<p class="boldA1">Hi kids! </p>
<p>Captain Copyright is busy building this website to make it fun and exciting for
    you! Keep checking back here for
more activities for you to do, stuff that can help you with homework your teacher
    might give you, games you can play,
and much, much more.</p>

Man, I just love the record industry’s collective idiocy.

Last night, Dan and I went to see Zero 7 at Leeds Met. The auditorium was packed and the concert was incredible. They played songs from all of their albums, seven of the band were there, with ‘special guest’ José González who also contributed to their latest album. I was kicking myself for having forgotten both the camera and to charge my phone, so I have no pictures of the event at all.

The supporting act, Fink, were also very good although we missed the beginning of their set because nobody had announced anything at all in the waiting area outside the hall… The ‘doors at 7, start at 7’ information that Dan had been given was completely off: Fink didn’t start until 8:00 or so and Zero 7 not until about 9:15. Once Zero 7 were done the clapping just didn’t end and they ended up performing 2 encores before the 11pm curfew. During one of them the lead singer (Sia Furler) asked what sort of dance she should perform during the solo. After suggestions of caribbean and line dancing were turned down (oh we already did those) she settled on Morris Dancing! Well, it wasn’t quite morris dancing but it was a good laugh!

So all in all an excellent gig and I’d definitely recommend you go if you’re into their sort of music at all!

Not working yet and not going to Uni either can be so extremely boring! I’ve been sat in bed all day doing nowt but a little thinking about stuff like what I’m going to do with Piccolo and PicoDebian in the near future. I’ve finished Max Payne 2, Half-Life, Half-Life: Opposing Force, and Half-Life: Blueshift in the last couple of days so I’m all out of games to play too. Where’s the fairness in all of this?!

I suppose it has led to a little more activity than usual on this blog, but now I’ve written about the boredom I can’t write about it again! I even tried to do a minor redesign today, by changing a few fonts here and there, but didn’t like it in the end. Go figure.

We’ve been out for a couple of nights to a nice new bar in town called, strangely enough, Mymou. It’s a lovely little place that’s got room to seat maybe 35 people or so, decorated in a very modern sort-of-unfinished look with a mish-mash of nice furniture and a great atmosphere. The first time we went they were playing Kung Fu Hustle on their plasma screens, which freaked me out a little, and last time it was (we think) House of Flying Daggers, but I was facing away.

Of course, the sound was down and they were playing some good music. One particular track caught my attention, which has led to me buying Mind Elevation by Nightmares on Wax (not off iTMS but in town, was cheaper).

They are also one of the few places in town that serves Hoegaarden on tap, which is particularly nice but does tend to lead to some particularly nasty hangovers. I was lucky enough to escape this morning, but some people were not (no not Jess)! They also have a lovely cider called Olde English and plenty of other bevvies for a reasonable price.

OK, enough of that, it’s starting to sound like they’ve paid me to write all this… Shame we can’t take this place down South with us tho.

Pending firm confirmation—and paying the deposit!—we have a nice place to live in Barnstaple. Jess’s parents were kind enough to visit a couple of places that we flagged up and it sounds good. It’s a 2 bedroom terraced house behind a church (we seem to be making a habit of this…) that’s been recently refurbished. It’s unfurnished so we’ll have to get all our own stuff, nice and personal like, except a sofabed that’s been given to us.

As you might expect, while Jess has been looking at furniture and other things on IKEA’s web site, I’ve been busy trying to scout out the ideal broadband ISP! Even with the help of ADSLguide, there’s just a huge number of ISPs to choose from and even more differing opinion about them all. And that’s not to mention the ISPs that resell connectivity to other ISPs, with different packages and prices. Where does one even start?! Having gone through the incredible palaver of getting a phone and ADSL set up two years ago in Reading, we’re going to try and get it mostly all done before we move in. Ha!

Everyone important has been told now (unless we’ve forgotten someone), so I might as well brag about my new job online! I’ve been employed as a Linux Systems Administrator at Abacus Tree, in charge of a farm of Linux servers in a couple of locations. I don’t know all the details of the job yet, but I obviously can’t speak about it all anyway!

The job description is nigh-on perfect for me, especially since it’s a medium-sized company where I may be roped in to help out in a few other areas as well. For some reason I quite like the idea of that. Add to the mix that we’ll be down in North Devon, a positively beautiful area of the country, and it’s an offer I couldn’t possibly refuse. Lots of seaside activities and generally much better weather than up north usually means lots more fun! I’ll have to give that whole surfing thing a shot.

I start on the 5^th of June, so I’ve got about 2.5 weeks left up in Huddersfield before I have to say my bye-byes. Jess and I will go down the weekend before I start, but Jess will come back up here to finish up a few things in York. Once we’ve found a nice place to rent I’ll use one of my long weekends (two and a half days! yesss!) to move all our stuff down.

So here begins step 2 of my life.

I only just got out of my last exam, and boy does it feel strange. I don’t think I’ve ever quite felt like this actually, it’s like moving on to another stage in life, my education basically being over and done with. Of course there’s still results day and graduation (that I most likely won’t go to), but that’s that: all that’s left is a lifetime of work. My not quite 22 years of preparation for the rest of my life is over, and I can now look forward to 43 years (probably gonna change!) of work. What a strange, peculiar feeling. I’ve been through a lot of changes over the years, including finishing school, leaving home, going to Uni, and more recently meeting my true love Jess, but none has felt quite like this. It seems as though every time the feeling gets weirder and more intense as I move along.

I’ll be the first one to say meeting Jess was probably one of the biggest events of my life, and this has definitely moulded and shaped my life into what I am now, and for this I will be ever grateful. As you all know Jess and I will be formally tying the knot, as it were, just a little under a year from now. I am looking forward to this day more than anything in my life at the moment, even more so than starting work.

And as for graduation, it’s all a big farce! We’ve got Patrick Stewart as our Vice Chancellor, so going to the ceremony would maybe (if it’s on the right day) let me shake hands with a Trekkie God, but it’s not as if I’m a Trekkie in any way and I’m not one to name-drop. What else happens there? You parade about in a crummy graduation gown and get handed a rolled-up piece of card that isn’t even your diploma, that gets sent in the post… Oh, and anyone who goes is sat so far away they can hardly see you without binoculars. It’s really rather crap. So I won’t be going.

Now one reason we’re getting married on the 5^th of May 2007 is that it’s the closest Saturday to the 7^th of May, which happens to be our anniversary! Today marks the 3^rd year we’ve been ‘going together’ as some may say.

Jess and I were going to have a nice romantic picnic up on Castle Hill since the weather has been so nice the last few days, but just to spite us today is really cloudy and dingy. Apparently, the rest of next week is going to be really lovely as well, so we’re really disappointed in the weather. Instead we’re cooking a nice pissaladière, one of our favourite dishes.

In case you don’t read Jess’s blog, or haven’t spoken to us for a while, we have a bit of an announcement. Jess and I will be getting married in May 2007, most likely on Saturday the 5^th. Everyone keep your calendar clear that weekend!