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Aug. 16th, 2006
Unpacking progress...
Aug. 16th, 2006 12:18 pmMany thanks to the wonderful company (and l33t organisational skills) of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
skorpionuk yesterday evening, I now have a study which not only contains a fully assembled computer desk (ooh, shiny), but also has some small amount of clear floor space in front of it. I also don't appear to have that much more crap piled up in my bedroom, which is confusing but good.
This evening I shall mostly be conducting open-heart surgery on my new and old PCs, swapping a PCI graphics card from old to new to run the third screen... then I can plug everything back together and I'll have a proper home PC again, yay! After that I just have to figure out the hideous X config required to tie nVidia twinview on one card and a third screen on a second card all together into one display - I've done two screen set-ups using either twinview or two cards, but I've never tried them both at once before. Should be 'interesting'.
I've also found my digicam, and started taking photos of all the things that are wrong with the flat... I need to write it all up in letter form and send it to the agents, as they've done nothing at all about the stuff I went in and discussed with them a couple of weeks ago. I doubt they will do anything about some of it, but having it documented will be useful when it comes to the deposit argument at the end of my 12 months there.
skorpionuk yesterday evening, I now have a study which not only contains a fully assembled computer desk (ooh, shiny), but also has some small amount of clear floor space in front of it. I also don't appear to have that much more crap piled up in my bedroom, which is confusing but good.This evening I shall mostly be conducting open-heart surgery on my new and old PCs, swapping a PCI graphics card from old to new to run the third screen... then I can plug everything back together and I'll have a proper home PC again, yay! After that I just have to figure out the hideous X config required to tie nVidia twinview on one card and a third screen on a second card all together into one display - I've done two screen set-ups using either twinview or two cards, but I've never tried them both at once before. Should be 'interesting'.
I've also found my digicam, and started taking photos of all the things that are wrong with the flat... I need to write it all up in letter form and send it to the agents, as they've done nothing at all about the stuff I went in and discussed with them a couple of weeks ago. I doubt they will do anything about some of it, but having it documented will be useful when it comes to the deposit argument at the end of my 12 months there.
Found on my friends page:
Aug. 16th, 2006 01:54 pmhttp://adjectivemarcus.livejournal.com/389299.html - some wise words on the subject of size/weight.
I've been thinking about this subject quite a bit lately, because unlike Marcus, my weight and shape have changed dramatically over the last three years. The initial immobility and then reduced mobility from the accident started the process, and changing my diet at the start of this year has accelerated it considerably.
Also unlike Marcus, I'm not entirely happy about my current shape - I imagine that's a function of change. A stable body is clearly one that's happy where it is and messing with it seems foolish... a body that's shifting around seems a bit more arbitrary, especially if it's been pretty much the same size and weight for the ten years preceding the changes. I've put on around 2 stone* in the last couple of years, and I've lost a lot of muscle tone. The latter I'm slowly rebuilding by going to the gym (hence the change in diet this year, to fuel this rebuilding), but the muscle seems to be rebuilding under the layer of flabbiness that the immobility engendered. From reading around, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to shift the flab with the amount of effort that I'm willing to put in to my exercise/diet/etc, and that does bother me - I'm used to being scrawny but toned. However, I'm aware that I'm probably healthier at the new weight, flabby or not, so I try not to let it bug me too much.
Anyway, I've lost my thread, but I think that was most of what I started out wanting to say. Um, discuss amongst yourselves :)
Ah yes, Kaz has reminded me of another train of thought that was tied in with this one, which is the way people (particularly online, but also in real life) will hasten to point out that your body (or art/work/dancing/whatever) is 'fine' when you talk about your problems with it, rather than actually addressing your point - which often has little to do with reality, and much more to do with your own perceptions of yourself. I don't think that just pointing out ones own perception of reality is going to achieve much to resolve someone else's false perception. Even less so when the perception isn't necessarily false - in this case, I'm talking about (a) having gained a signficant amount of weight in a fairly short period, and (b) how that makes me feel - that's not false, because (a) it has happened, and (b) it's about how I feel, not about whether I'm right or not. Finally, I'm aware there are worse shapes to be than the one I've currently got, but this is the worst one I've ever been, so to me it's quite a big (sorry) issue.
* or to look at it another way, my weight has increased by more than a fifth.
I've been thinking about this subject quite a bit lately, because unlike Marcus, my weight and shape have changed dramatically over the last three years. The initial immobility and then reduced mobility from the accident started the process, and changing my diet at the start of this year has accelerated it considerably.
Also unlike Marcus, I'm not entirely happy about my current shape - I imagine that's a function of change. A stable body is clearly one that's happy where it is and messing with it seems foolish... a body that's shifting around seems a bit more arbitrary, especially if it's been pretty much the same size and weight for the ten years preceding the changes. I've put on around 2 stone* in the last couple of years, and I've lost a lot of muscle tone. The latter I'm slowly rebuilding by going to the gym (hence the change in diet this year, to fuel this rebuilding), but the muscle seems to be rebuilding under the layer of flabbiness that the immobility engendered. From reading around, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to shift the flab with the amount of effort that I'm willing to put in to my exercise/diet/etc, and that does bother me - I'm used to being scrawny but toned. However, I'm aware that I'm probably healthier at the new weight, flabby or not, so I try not to let it bug me too much.
Anyway, I've lost my thread, but I think that was most of what I started out wanting to say. Um, discuss amongst yourselves :)
Ah yes, Kaz has reminded me of another train of thought that was tied in with this one, which is the way people (particularly online, but also in real life) will hasten to point out that your body (or art/work/dancing/whatever) is 'fine' when you talk about your problems with it, rather than actually addressing your point - which often has little to do with reality, and much more to do with your own perceptions of yourself. I don't think that just pointing out ones own perception of reality is going to achieve much to resolve someone else's false perception. Even less so when the perception isn't necessarily false - in this case, I'm talking about (a) having gained a signficant amount of weight in a fairly short period, and (b) how that makes me feel - that's not false, because (a) it has happened, and (b) it's about how I feel, not about whether I'm right or not. Finally, I'm aware there are worse shapes to be than the one I've currently got, but this is the worst one I've ever been, so to me it's quite a big (sorry) issue.
* or to look at it another way, my weight has increased by more than a fifth.
Stuff On A Plane!
Aug. 16th, 2006 04:19 pmhttp://www.craigmurray.co.uk/archives/2006/08/the_uk_terror_p.html
"None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time."
http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200608/msg00087.html
"If you choke from fumes, or if your explosives go off before you've got enough made to take out the airplane -- say if you only have enough to shatter the mirror in the bathroom and spray yourself with one of the most evil oxidizers around -- you aren't going to be famous as the martyr who killed hundreds of westerners. Your determination and willingness to die doesn't matter -- you still need to get the job done."
And less seriously:
http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/snakes/
"NO SNAKES OF ANY KIND WILL BE PERMITTED ON A PLANE. SNAKES ARE NO LONGER ALLOWED IN CHECKED BAGGAGE. This includes all pythons, boas, rattlesnakes, vipers, mambas, adders, and other known species of snakes. Exception: some limited amounts of snakes may be allowed if Samuel L. Jackson is traveling;"
"None of the alleged terrorists had made a bomb. None had bought a plane ticket. Many did not even have passports, which given the efficiency of the UK Passport Agency would mean they couldn't be a plane bomber for quite some time."
http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/200608/msg00087.html
"If you choke from fumes, or if your explosives go off before you've got enough made to take out the airplane -- say if you only have enough to shatter the mirror in the bathroom and spray yourself with one of the most evil oxidizers around -- you aren't going to be famous as the martyr who killed hundreds of westerners. Your determination and willingness to die doesn't matter -- you still need to get the job done."
And less seriously:
http://www.terminally-incoherent.com/snakes/
"NO SNAKES OF ANY KIND WILL BE PERMITTED ON A PLANE. SNAKES ARE NO LONGER ALLOWED IN CHECKED BAGGAGE. This includes all pythons, boas, rattlesnakes, vipers, mambas, adders, and other known species of snakes. Exception: some limited amounts of snakes may be allowed if Samuel L. Jackson is traveling;"
