But now that the book publishing project is finished bar promotion, the time is right to get back to my bread and butter IT work and the state of the market has taken me quite by surprise.  The contract market for my particular skill set has been down the pan for quite a while, but when I finished my last contract at the end of February things were looking a little rosier.

But I’ve been looking pretty much non stop for both contract and even permanent roles for the last three weeks and have been shocked at what I’ve found.  Essentially a wasteland, and what jobs there are tend to be paying veritable peanuts.

So imagine my surprise when a contract came up in Lymington of all places, five miles down the road and only ten minutes by car.  I had to double-take when I saw the details come into my RSS reader last week.  That had to be a wind up, right?
Fortunately, wrong.  Six months work, practically on my doorstep for an engineering firm.

Cutting to the chase, I interviewed twice for the contract this week, was offered it and I accepted this morning.  Starting a week on Monday, I can actually enjoy a proper holiday now before getting stuck in to six months of graft as well as looking after my other customers.

Switching from home working at my own pace and on my own clock back to a regimented 8:30-5:30 is going to be a very strange experience, and one that I expect will take a bit of getting used to again.
I haven’t worked a “full day” in the same place in years, so that alone will be an interesting challenge.  But I have never had a job that is so close to home, not since my very first job in 1994.  I’ve gotten so used to getting up at ridiculous times of the morning and driving for an hour or more to get to my job that it is going to be a very weird feeling knowing that I can wake up as late as 7:30 and be in the office an hour later.

In the meantime I will be doing as little as possible.  If its more strenuous that holding a controller in my hand, I’m not even going to attempt it.

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Before we get started this month I’m going to do a little bit of blatant advertising.  For the last few months I have been working on a book publishing project for my Mum.

For anyone interested in spirituality, spiritual mediums and proof of life after life the book is called Living With The Light.  It was written by my Mum and finished back in 2002.  At that time she and my Dad were unable to secure a publisher, and the manuscript has been dormant since then.  A few months ago after Dad passed away, I got to work getting the book that he compiled together, proof read, edited, etc.  I got the basic frame of the website up and running, and for the last couple of weeks a designer friend has been choosing and preparing the gorgeous images that are on the site.  I dealt with the technical side, and she made it softer and easier on the eyes.

The web site for the book can be found HERE, and it includes a sample of the book (the conversations in the second half of the book are incredible and some are included in this sample), a synopsis and links to purchase should you so feel inclined.  At the moment the physical book can only be ordered from Lulu, but in a few weeks it will also be available from Amazon.

Alright that’s the commercial over and done with, let’s move onto this months photos.

The 12th of April is my parents wedding anniversary, and the first one without Dad so it has been a tricky day but I hope you enjoy the photos as much as I’m sure he is enjoying them wherever he may be

Starting off with flowers this month, some tulips we bought as a small gift for Mum.

This is a new addition to our kitchen this month, self explanatory what it is but note the items on the menu.  This is Sally’s food menu for the week, because I am trying out a service called Diet Chef which sends you a months supply of food (three meals a day, plus snack) to assist in weight loss.  So far it’s going well (I’m on day five) and the food is shockingly tasty.  More on that later.

Proof positive that the life of a publisher/IT consultant is just one non stop party, my first job of the morning is take the lawnmower over to Brockenhurst for a service.  While over there I decided that at some point I need to go there and take some dedicated photos for a 12, as its a very nice village.

I have mentioned before (and photographed) the donkeys and ponies which wander the streets around New Forest villages, and this morning a group of donkeys were stood on a bridge that I was keen to try and snap.  Unfortunately Lady Luck wasn’t smiling on me today so all I got was this exciting tree.  I’ve included it because it’s quite a nice tree.

I know that photos around the villages and towns where I live always go down well, so this month I’ve been over to Hythe which is a town in the New Forest that is relatively close to Southampton in that it’s a short trip across the water to get there.  No prizes for spotting that this is the local church.

The window of the local bakers shop.  Fortunately I didn’t dribble too much over the cream cakes, literally or metaphorically.  I’ve sort of gotten used to the fact that I can’t eat this stuff for a while.

Outside an independant home shop we always visit when we are in Hythe, if only to stock up on Yankee Candles.

A view of the inside of the shop, covertly taken when the assistant wasn’t looking in case she decided to question why someone was taking a photo inside her shop.  Five years and still feel self conscious about taking photos in public places for this!

Giant traffic cone?  Modern art sculpture?  No it’s a seat that’s down on the waterfront.  If you squint you can see Southampton in the distance, and two cruise liners.

Final picture from Hythe, this is down by the waterfront.  Not sure what the building is (probably houses these days) but its quite imposing.

Earlier I mentioned the Diet Chef programme, here’s an example of the food.  Mild chicken tikka massala and I have to say it’s absolutely gorgeous.  I’ve been really surprised just how tasty the food is, and they aren’t paying me to say that either!

And finally because it wouldn’t be a 12 of 12 without him, I was trying to get Will to open his eyes and be all cute and he wasn’t having any of it.  He finally opened his eyes and I love the look of sheer annoyance in them.

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Once upon a Snickers ago I used to be extremely…chunky.  Alright chunky is being too polite, obese is a better and more abrupt word.  I used to weight about fifteen stone three pounds.  The correct weight for my height is just under thirteen stone, and way back in 2004 I lost almost three stone and weight around twelve and a half (which was a little too thin).  I did that primarily through exercise and a sensible diet, and wrote a post on here a few years back about sensible diets (which has remained one of the most popular posts on the site).

But since 2005 my weight has gone up and down but never back to what it should be.  A combination of bad eating, lack of exercise and not really any willpower drove me back up to over fourteen stone and I’m currently nestling bang on the fourteen mark.
Since starting to work from home my grazing nature has meant that I tend to pick even more between meals (which has always been my downfall), eat rubbish like microwave pizza for breakfast and thanks to combination of working long hours and the pitiful weather we’ve been experiencing, we can pretty much forget any form of exercise.

I can see why people go to groups such as Weight Watchers or Slimming World, as the group situation of everyone else willing each other on is a great motivator.  Indeed, when I lost all my weight I had a friend doing the same, and it helps to have a “Blubber Buddy”.

Willpower alone isn’t enough for me, and the time has come to get shot of this extra stone in weight which I believe to be an attainable goal before my 34th birthday on May 18th.
I don’t like books, videos, TV shows or any other of those faddy diet things but one of Sally’s work colleagues has been using a service called Diet Chef.  Her goal has been to lose a fair amount of weight before her sons wedding this weekend, and is a notorious snacker between meals.  So if this service can work for anyone, it would be here.  And it has done too.

Here is the blurb from the Diet Chef website:

We all know how hard it is to diet but imagine how easy it would be if you had your own personal chef who planned your meals, measured out the portions and did all the cooking for you. Well now you can!

At Diet Chef we’ll send you a hamper full of chef-prepared ready meals for dinner, soups for lunch, granola for breakfast and healthy snacks for those hungry moments. All you need to do is put the meals in your microwave, enjoy and watch the weight melt away!

We have carefully counted the calories of all the Diet Chef meals so you will be averaging less than 1200 calories a day which means that most people will be burning fat at a rate of 800 calories a day.

Now as I have already said, I don’t like fad diets or ideas that seem to be too good to be true.  Plus anyone with half a brain will tell you that 1200 calories a day for a man is plain daft.  Which is why there is a 1500 calorie a day plan designed for those of us.
I’m suspending my snobbishness and am giving it a try, so I’ve signed up for a couple of months worth of food (one week free for each month as well) and will have a go at documenting how its all going here.  It makes a change from videogame and HD stuff.

I ordered the hamper last night, and as it is a bank holiday weekend I won’t receive it until sometime next week.  So in the meantime I’m enjoying some more sinful treats until then.

Things haven’t quite gone to plan today.  Tomorrow I will be starting the Diet Chef regime for the next couple of months, and intended to wave goodbye to unhealhy eating in stellar fashion by enjoying a big burger.  Not the pathetic excuse for burgers you get at McDonald’s or Burger King, but a proper thick meaty half pounder at our favourite local cafe.

That was the plan, but unfortunately the Diet Chef food didn’t turn up this morning, and the one time I actually wanted a City Link delivery to arrive early it…well, didn’t.
So there you go, Diet Chef ALREADY saving pounds around my waistline and in my pocket.  Sorry.

The parcels were finally delivered just after half past four this afternoon, and they are certainly weighty.  Four packages representing all of my food for the next five weeks (bar fresh fruit and vegetables).  Here’s a quick look at what you get.

First up, breakfast.  A combination of porridge and granola.

Women go for the 1200 calorie a day plan, so the lunch choice is either soup or a protein shake.  As I’m a man (last time I checked) I’m on the higher calorie plan so I get a shake a day as an addition to the regular meals.

I’m not a big fan of soup, but from now on I’ll have to learn how to be, as it’s what I get for lunch.

And finally here’s dinner.

Doesn’t look particularly appetising I know, but I’ve already had a taste test.  I’m starting the diet proper tomorrow, but after going to see a customer earlier this evening I tried the chicken and mushroom in sauce and have to say it was far tastier than I was expecting.  Piled up with some vegetables it would do just fine as a main evening meal.

So tomorrow is D-Day.  It’s going to be interesting.

Two days (almost) down with Diet Chef so I thought I would record my experiences so far.  Apologies to the regular readers who are usually here for all the tech talk, I’m in a diversifying type of mood at present.

My first day started off badly, not through the fault of anyone, but I had an absolute kicker of headache when I woke up on Thursday morning.  Unfortunately it was muscular, I slept awkwardly and the back of my neck was tense and painful every time I moved.  Not exactly the best way to start but needs must..

So I made a fruit tea to begin with, left the Nespresso machine looking rather forlorn and had strawberry porridge for breakfast.  It was reasonably tasty and filled me up straight away.  By 8:30 I was caffeine free after usually having two espressos (at least) by that time.

We headed out into Bournemouth and at that point the “don’t drink coffee” mantra that Diet Chef kept saying went out the window. I thought it might help get rid of my kicking headache (it didn’t), but I had one strong cup in the M&S cafe before being brutally plied the new Coffee Republic Flat White (damn you Homer!).

When we got home I opted for my first mistake.  I have soup for lunch each day with this diet and I must confess I really dislike soup.  But I haven’t had that many so I am prepared to really make the effort, and these DC soups are thick and more meal-like.  My first attempt was with thai chicken soup and it was DISGUSTING.  It tasted like someone had tipped a pot of pepper into the container.  I managed three quarters of the bowl before having to admit defeat (and I’ve got four more of these little bleeders) and was then repeating the unpleasant taste for several hours afterwards. Apologies for the unpleasant image, but you get the idea.

By now the headache was getting steadily worse, so I took some strong tablets and had my milkshake.  I get this extra shake as I am on the 1500 calorie diet plan, and fortunately the chocolate shake was extremely tasty and helped to wash away the taste of the soup!

At this point I must reveal I had shot myself in the foot a little bit, not reading the rules properly I should have had a wholemeal brown roll or a slice of wholemeal bread with the soup.  Because come about five o’clock I was completely devoid of energy and feeling very unhappy.
Then dinner rolled around, I had sausage casserole with a big stack of vegetables and that was tasty (if not overwhelmingly delicious).  We went out for a reasonably lengthy walk and I had my snack for the day later in the evening (a crisp style substitute) which was alright.

The very helpful folks on the Diet Chef forums were very insistent that I must eat all of the allowed calories each day otherwise the body goes into starvation mode and the weight loss will stop.  Clearly I mad a bit of a rookie mistake on day one, but fortunately it got much better today.

I gave the “don’t drink coffee” rule the metaphorical middle finger and went back to my morning espresso today (my neck is still hurting but not enough to give me a headache today) and had Belgian chocolate granola for breakfast (very nice), pea and ham soup for lunch (I ate the bowl, it was pretty good) with a slice of wholemeal bread, a latte milkshake, snack bar and then chicken tikka with a small amount of rice for dinner.  The chicken tikka was an absolute revelation, it was amazingly tasty, creamy and to be perfectly honest tastier than shop bought ones I’ve had.

The other mistake I made yesterday was not having any fruit either, so I’m saving that up for when I get hungry later in the evening.
So far aside from the few early teething problems I have to say I’m pretty impressed.  I was a bit concerned after the bad start yesterday with the soup and was left thinking “this has cost me £200″ but today I’ve been much more impressed.
The biggest challenge has been to avoid the hunger pangs and cravings.  Usually in the evening I pick and food which is always my downfall, but not being able to now is quite a challenge.

But despite that, the food is filling and the weather is so good here at the moment I’m able to get out and about rather than be stuck in looking at the rain.
So far so good, it may only be two days but after getting over the usual “3 Day Hump” of making a change I think things will work out fine.

Would I recommend Diet Chef to other people?  Not just yet, I need to sample a fuller range of the food before giving it the thumbs up.  But so far they are looking good.

Alright so strictly speaking it has only been six days and this is day seven or being on Diet Chef but I’ve already done my first week weigh in, and I have a busy day planned for tomorrow.

This is also the last time I will write about my diet and will soon return to the usual round of tech gubbins.  Promise.  Until I reach my goal weight.
So after a slightly shaky start I must say I wholehartedly recommend Diet Chef IF you can afford it!  At £210 for a months worth of food it isn’t cheap but it certainly is working for me.
When most people go on diets they usually find a ton of weight flies off in the first week which is primarily fluid weight (so I’m told) and getting on the scales this morning I found half a stone (that’s seven pounds) gone already.  I’m told this is quite normal, and in the next couple of weeks it should drop to the proper rate of a couple of pounds a week.  So if everything pans out as it should I should be done in about a months time.

The food has continued to surprise me, and the only bad soup so far has been the first thai chicken one I had.  Mushoom, spicy beef and tomato, parsnip and chilli, all very tasty and I’ve still got new ones to try.
Main meals are the same, the only one so far I haven’t been overly impressed with has been the tortelinni but only because the sauce was mildly unpleasant.  One of the things you learn very quickly is it these meals are the correct portion sizes an adult should be eating to stay healthy, it’s no wonder we are all so overweight!  And these aren’t paltry amounts either, after a portion of chicken tikka I’m full and that lasts for the rest of the evening.

So long story short, it’s great, it works and I’m slimmer already.  Looking for a hackneyed and cliched sign off?  It’s taken pounds out of my wallet AND OFF MY WAISTLINE!!!!!  I’ll leave now.

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• Going mad
• Playing games all day
• Eating enough to go up a jeans size
• Procrastinating for eight hours a day
• Buying an iMac

So all things considered, pretty good.
Homeworking is a slightly odd experience, and I’m sure anyone who does it or has done so in the past may be able to relate to my first few days.

Initially things seem absolutely brilliant, you wake up without an alarm for the first time in months.  A leisurely routine of getting up and ready for the day rather than the normal mad dash to get showered and out the door (in the dark and cold).  I opted to take Sally into work for her two days, it helped her and meant I was up at a reasonable time and ready to go.

The first problem I had was a motivational one, and as I’m homeworking for myself and not for a company there isn’t any pressure to really get things done.  So my first couple of days were less than productive but then all of a sudden things really clicked into place.

It doesn’t take long for the novelty of “I can watch 24 at 8:30 while having breakfast” to wear off and I started to impose a few office style restrictions on myself.
As I am primarily working on getting everything relating to my Mum’s book finished, I set myself a deadline whereby everything to do with it must be finished by the end of next week.  It was always my intention when I finished my primary contract at the end of February to take a month to enjoy some time off and get the book finished.  So when that schedule was enforced then things started to slot into place.

It’s been very interesting for me to be working on something that involves actually using (several) computers as opposed to fixing, configuring, installing or maintaining them.  There has been some severe frustration with WordPress at times, but that is more down to my own knowledge of the system rather than the system itself being at fault.  This partially sighted craftsman isn’t going to blame his tools this time.

But I’m very fortunate that everything I have been working on has a great community behind it, whether it be the support folks at Solostream who make them themes my sites run or the superb Kevin Partner who wrote the book “How to Set Up An Online Business” that has been my bible for this project.

The one key aspect though that everyone talks about when you switch from an office to a home environment (aside from regular income each month) is the human aspect.  Working alone can be simply that…lonely.  And while people are always either at the end of a phone, or on Twitter, Facebook, Messenger, etc it’s not the same as being able to walk a few steps and have a face to face conversation.
Although this aspect is quite frankly easily outweighed by the fact that I can work without shaving, not requiring smart clothing and I have a ready supply of espresso twelve steps away (yes I counted).

Of course everything in the universe has to balance out so while the bullet point list at the top of this post was celebrating the things I have managed to avoid doing, I have started to talk to myself and Will but fortunately neither of us answers.  Oh and I have developed a penchant for microwave pizza and espresso.  For breakfast.  Don’t believe me?

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It is true what a dozen life coaches/efficiency experts/self help book authors say though.  When you strip away the meaningless and unproductive parts of your life you get a good opportunity to focus on what is really important.
Fear not though gentle readers, I’m not about to start wearing sandals, grow my hair and go on a tour in the back of a VW camper van/Mystery Machine.  Just providing a little bit of balanced insight.  Life isn’t all shooting people in the head.  Or playing videogames (ahem).

I’m now dangerously close to having all of the media related stuff in the house under control as well.  I spent all of yesterday afternoon ripping dozens of CDs into MP3 format to store on the Windows Home Server (making them available to each computer in the house thanks to Libraries in Windows 7) while catching up with half a dozen episodes from this season of 24.  That show really needs to bow out gracefully too.  If I had continued watching one episode a week, I would have given up at around episode six.  At least when watching the episodes in a batch it’s background noise while I can do something more productive at the same time.

Having completed all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer last weekend we have now moved to the Angel box set.  Three and a half seasons of that to go and then we are done.  And I’m not starting another series with multiple seasons and hundreds of episodes either!  The warmer weather is gradually getting here, and I want Angel completed by the summer so we can do something more fulfilling with our evenings than watch TV.

For those of you who are following the progress of my Mum’s book and have been asking about it, the latest is this.  Everything is now complete.  I have locked down the final master copy and things are ready to go.  The cover has been designed by my ever awesome designer Anto (who designed the header for this site and the Cullen IT logo) and I have just received the high resolution photograph from the superb photographer Alex Nail who has licensed the image to us for a run of 1,000 copies.

As soon as Ant sends me the final front cover then the digital DRM free version of the book will be available on the site.
This week I will also be sorting out the physical book details with Lulu.  It is my aim to have absolutely everything completed on that project by the end of March.  After that I should be heading back into the IT arena (provided people want to give me work that is).

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As I have previously mentioned, I have just parted company with my primary customer after two years.  Right now I’m taking a break, before finishing up my book publishing project.
But when you take someone who is so used to doing something each day, and then change it up completely, strange things happen.

On Monday morning I woke up at around 7:30 with the sun streaming in through the curtains.  My first thought was along the lines of “usually I’ve been in the car for half an hour by now”.  But after the initial novelty of making a cup of tea and sitting in bed thinking how everything was nice and jolly it all got a bit…odd.

I literally did not know what to do with myself on Monday morning.  With all this free time I really couldn’t grasp that I literally had the entire day to do whatever I wanted.  Well actually that isn’t strictly true, we were taking Mum out for lunch but you know what I mean.
The weekend was fine, just like any other.  I spent all day Sunday playing Heavy Rain through to completion and then we made a final push and completed watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer.  Top tip, seven episodes in one evening is a touch excessive.

But when Monday morning came around I had this kind of twitchy “I should be doing something more productive right now”.  I can see why people become workaholics and burn out in spectacular fashion.  But I’ve already done that once in my twenties and don’t want to be replicating that behaviour as I hurtle towards my mid-thirties.

Fortunately as the day progressed things started to click and I realised the only person I had to answer to was Sally (and Will when he wanted feeding), nobody in the village wanted their computer fixing and it was perfectly fine for me to do relaxing things.  I even sat and read a book, something my short attention span couldn’t possibly comprehend this time last week.

But once I really got into the swing of things I found myself really enjoying stupildly mundane things.  Like going food shopping.  Typically we either order food online from Waitrose or race around the supermarket at speed.  Get in, grab stuff, get out.
But when you go shopping at midday on a Tuesday you get the run of the shop.  We spent AGES in there looking at all the stuff and picking up a few things we hadn’t tried before.
Of course there is a downside to this course of action, ending up with a larger shopping bill.  But I never said the system of discovery was cheap.

I even went on a bus today.  Hampshire’s most impatient man waited out in the cold for a bus so we could go shopping in Ringwood (they were free day passes).  It was fun too, I got to see places I wouldn’t normally do and with the added bonus nobody needed their computer looking at.

The moral of the story?  If you get the chance to for just one solitary day stop everything and just marvel at the mundane.  It may prove to be something of a challenge, but it’s worth it.

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Perhaps it could be something to do with the fact that I know have four domains and sites/blogs to take care of, and two of those need building from scratch.
Yes it is fair to say that things are a little hectic right now, but in a good way.  I think.  Ask me in a few weeks time for an answer to that one.

The primary reason for my tardiness in blog post writing is that I have spent almost every spare moment I have over the last month or so trying to launch a new business.  Not that I thought it was going to turn into a fully fledged company.
Around eight years ago my Mum wrote a book and tried to get it published.  The book is the story of her life and the development of her gift as a spiritual medium, spanning a weighty 250ish pages of A4 sized text at present.
But despite their best efforts no publishers were interested at the time, and it has taken until now with the advent of self publishing through sites such as Lulu.com that the book has been resurrected and finished off.

Mum wrote the book, Dad edited and put it into book format and now I’m finishing the whole thing off and getting it “out there” at long last.
This has proved to be a much larger task then I had originally anticipated.  Sally read the book through and proofed it herself initially.  I made her corrections and then had to read through it again myself, and there were a lot of changes that had to be made.  Not so much with mistakes (these were few and far between, and the spelling and grammar checker in Word made short work of them) but more with formatting and general sentence structure.

Fortunately what at times seemed like a never ending task was completed on Monday this week, so we have finally entered the home stretch for getting the finished product out the (virtual) door.
The book is entitled Living With The Light, and will be made available as a DRM-free digital download from the official site (currently under construction), and as a physical book which will can be purchased online from Lulu and through Amazon.  A free sample PDF containing a couple of chapters will be coming soon to the site, as well as the possibility of an eBook via Lulu that can be read on the Amazon Kindle/Apple iPad, etc.
We also have enough material for probably another two books, so if this one proves to be popular there is plenty more where it came from!

This new venture has also meant that we have had to form a new company to deal with it, so in a rather surreal way I am now the director of Cullen IT Consultancy and the newly formed Lightbringer Enterprises.  Five years ago I wouldn’t have imagined I would run one company, let alone two!
For the last month I have been IT Consultant Man(TM) during the day, and Wanna Publishing Tycoon at night, which is a rather tiring double act to be playing.  My primary IT contract will be coming to an end in a weeks time, and then we are taking a couple of weeks off before heading onto the next venture.

I might even get a chance to watch some movies or play some games!

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Thanks to the excessively cold temperatures this past week we went without any post until yesterday when this bumper crop arrived.  To be honest I’m amazed it all came at once

Planet Terror and Crank 2 were from the Play.com sale (£9.99 each, the only non-digital sale items I bought this..no wait..last year) and Bayonetta was released yesterday.  I need to reiterate what all of the gaming sites are saying which is that the PS3 version is incredibly broken.  360 version for anyone who wants to play it (and has both consoles, of course).

It is something of a rarity to actually have physical media these days.  As I mentioned in my Life Laundry post at the end of 2009, the idea of having a physical disc containing anything be it a movie, game or bit of computer software is starting to seem somewhat alien to me.

This was further enhanced by the incredible Steam sale that took place over the Christmas and new year period.  I have just recently started to get back into PC gaming mainly through the addition of an Xbox 360 wireless controller kit.  Buying action titles such as Silent Hill: Homecoming that can be played with a controller was a no brainer especially as the entertainment PC I use in my office is still relatively beefy despite being behind the times a little with graphics power.  Plus it is still quieter than the Xbox 360.

Like many others I’m sure, I did get a little bit click-happy with my Steam purchases with the £1.50 “gateway” bargains leading to some slightly pricier impulse purchases.  But as I have already struck Dark Void and Army of Two: The Fortieth Day from my console purchase list after underwhelming demos, I have plenty to keep me entertained for a good long while.

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Yes, England isn’t particularly good when it comes to handling snow.  Winter tyres on cars?  Nope because we roughly seem to get two or three snow days a year and that is usually a very optimistic estimate.  I have known an entire decade to go by without a flake.
But here we are with severe weather warnings and much of the country grinding to a halt.  Still, least the sun’s out!

I live in Hampshire and work across the border in Dorset.  It’s about a 35 mile trip each way and I head across country roads to get there.  This particular part of Dorset seems to be fortunate that snow nearly always passes by, whereas the small village I live in tends to get the brunt of it.  This is fine if you are a schoolchild, or even a salaried employee but being self employed not being able to get out of the drive/road without skating several streets before even seeing a sniff of a gritter truck can cause some issues.

I went into work yesterday morning extra early, we had snow the night before so I slid around for a couple of roads before hitting the gritted ones and was away.  Then discovered that there was absolutely nothing in Dorset.  Not a flake, not even a frost on the road!  I got into work an hour earlier than usual.

But then I got a phone call from home around ten o’clock telling me to get home sharpish, the snow was coming down hard and drifting and all the while there was still nothing in Poole.
But then once I started making my way home the heavens opened and it was a race against time before things got a little….interesting.

By the time I rounded the corner just from home it was like this.  Captain Stupid stopped the car to take this, then wondered why it was a skid-fest to get going again.  The less said about trying to reverse the car onto the drive the better.  Non four wheel drive car reversing in snow is rather daft to say the least.
Needless to say, it was the first time in eighteen months that the A3 was left out of the garage overnight.

Heavy snow continued over the course of the next few hours so I just got online, connected to the work VPN and made sure everything was behaving as it should.
Overnight the temperatures plummeted to -8 centigrade (that’s about 18 for my fahrenheit friends) and this morning the village was an ice rink.  I steered clear of venturing out after inspecting the driveway and the road which was a solid sheet of ice.  But fortunately it did make for some nice photos when the sun came up.

After lunch we had much “hilarity” trying to defrost the car and the drive so I could get the car put away in the garage.  As soon as we poured hot water onto the snow and ice to defrost it, it would start to freeze again (particularly because we are on the shaded side of the street).  But fortunately after about an hour of back and forth I managed to get the car put away so hopefully unless we have another blizzard tonight I will be back to the office in the morning.

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Typically for me my own personal life laundry revolves around discs of movies, videogames, software, etc.  The photo above is of my disc storage flight case.  I’ve had this for a few years now and this beast can store 2000 discs.  At one stage this thing was almost full!  I even had way too much time on my hands one year and created a spreadsheet listing the entire contents.  Movies alone ran at over 1,000 discs (and yes they are all legit) and trying to shift this thing required a professional weightlifter to help me drag it across the carpet.

For the last two or three years just after Christmas I have had a life laundry day of sorting all of these discs out, and in previous years I have been pretty ruthless in what I get rid of.  But this year I’ve been the most heartless of all.  While watching one of my unwatched DVDs (Look Around You – Series 2) I have removed pretty much everything I own that I have watched but will never watch again.  I’m almost ashamed to think of how much money I’ve spent on digital media over the last fifteen years but the time had come to get things sorted out.

The net result is I now have less than ten unwatched DVDs that I actually want to view.  The British Heart Foundation will have plenty to pick up tomorrow when they collect their charity bag, and I have one less thing to think about.  It also reminds me of how little I actually use physical disc media any more for day to day watching.  I’ve had a review Blu-ray to watch this week, and it is the first time in quite a while I have actually switched on the Blu-ray player to watch a disc.  So much of my media viewing is now via the HTPC (Home Theatre PC) either on local storage or streamed across the network that I barely ever have to dig a disc out.

The only readily accessible DVD or Blu-ray media that are easily accessible now are either TV box sets or my favourite movies that are frequently watched.  But a post about the death of the disc is for another time.

I find something immensely liberating about lightening the load of at least one aspect of my life.  I’ve gotten to the point now where I don’t need “stuff” to make me happy.  The rampant consumerism I enjoyed so much in my twenties and very early thirties now seems completely immaterial to me.
This doesn’t mean I’m going to abandon my tech loving lifestyle and go and live in the mountains, far from it.  But every once in a while we need to get a little perspective on things, and for me this is as good a place to start as any.

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A lot of them are multiple duplicate shots, but I’ve put comments on a few and there are some great ones of Will

The set can be found HERE.

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The truth is, I haven’t really got anything to write about at the moment.  Or rather, nothing particularly that I would write on here.
Since the business blog launched a couple of weeks ago I have written a few posts on there, and have what could be a lengthy one in my mind right now.  There may be some form of crossover between the two sites as well.  Even though all of the IT related stuff goes on there, the influx of Apple kit into the house could be of interest to folks on here.

But here is a quick info-dump of a few things to appease the blogging Gods:

Watchmen is incredible on Blu-ray.  Buy the US import though, as the UK version is the theatrical version ONLY of the movie.  The US release is the full Director’s Cut with 24 minutes of extra footage.  Or hold off as Warner Brothers gouge even more cash with an “ULTIMATE!!!1111!!!!1″ version coming in December.  They may as well have included a flyer reading “Bend over and brace yourselves” in the box.

Also on a Blu-ray tip, the first season of Joss Whedon’s sublimely superb Dollhouse is now available on DVD and Blu-ray in the US.  For once all of the BD discs are region free, so you can import the set and play it on any UK player.  I received mine yesterday from Movietyme (at a rather wallet troubling £40), the picture quality is gorgeous.  A very noticable step up from the HD transmissions, and comes complete with a very punchy DTS HD Master Audio soundtrack.  I have only watched the first episode so far, but remember this set includes the unaired Epitaph One, as well as the original pilot Whedon shot and Fox rejected.  Good job too, as while the original is very entertaining, it lacks the pacing of the finished article.

I shall never leave the sofa, having just bought the complete five season box set of Angel.  We reached the end of season 3 of Buffy a week ago, which is where Angel clears off to LA (and fortunately says farewell to all the whiney, emo moodiness) and his show starts.  It’s a darker, more “blokey” series that we are enjoying watching in parallel with Buffy season 4.  aka Buffy Goes To College (and needs a damn good meal).

That’s about it for now.  Oh except the Ghostbusters videogame on PS3 isn’t very good, IMHO.  I was bored after halfway through the first level.  “Bustin makes me feel good”.  Not in this game it doesn’t.

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You can click that link, or the advertising banner above this very post if you wish.  That is the place where all computing talk will be written about.  This site will stay as the personal/gaming/HD hub, with Windows and other enterprise IT related musings on the business site.

The site itself is around 95% complete, there are a few imaging issues here and there and the text isn’t perfect on some of the pages but it is a start and I’m happy for it to be finally described as being live.

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It's been a funny day...

For the last couple of weeks I have been studying for the Microsoft Small Business Server 2008, Configuring (70-653)  exam.  It has been over a year since I ploughed through a mammoth pile of them to gain my MCSE, MCSA, MCTS and MCITP qualifications, and I decided the time was right to start again.

I have been using SBS 2008 in a virtual lab at home for months, and it now runs my company server so I have been getting very hands on with it.  Plus the Microsoft Small Business Specialist accreditation that my company holds needs to be updated every couple of years, so I decided to strike before the renewal came round.
I always take my exams at the same testing centre in Poole, who have just recently moved to brand new offices so I was already a little wary of this because anyone who takes these exams will tell you that familiarity with your surroundings always helps to keep the exam jitters at bay.

The exam was booked for last Friday (the 3rd), and that is where the fun and games started.
I was all set to take the exam on Friday, fully prepared and ready for it.  I knew my facts, figures and features and felt good about getting back into the exam groove.  Then on Thursday I got a phone call from Prometric, telling me the testing centre was going to be closed and they needed to reschedule the exam for the following week.  This was a sizeable blow, as we were going down to Somerset for most of the weekend and my rescheduled last minute revision would take a big hit.

So I rescheduled the exam for today, starting to feel a little nervous already.  I had also broken one of my golden rules and told a few people I was taking the exam.  I have never told anyone (sometimes not even Sally)  when I am taking exams, just that they are “coming up” so as to alleviate the pressure a little.  But this time I had no choice.
So fast forward to this morning, once again I was prepared for the exam at two o’clock this afternoon.  I had a final quick glance through my notes when I got into the office whilst drinking my wake up coffee and concluded that I was ready.  All I needed now was a hopefully IT problem free day.  Which is pretty much what I got, a few user queries but nothing life threateningly bad.  I then started another of my pre-exam rituals by listening to the album 76:14 by Global Communication.
This is a classic ambient electro album that I have been listening too before exams since the year 2000.  When I was working at Bournemouth Council I would listen to the album on the drive in to Poole before the exam, the relaxing beats always do a great job of calming me down.  Exam or otherwise.

But given that I only had to drive for around ten minutes to get to the testing centre from the office, that wouldn’t be necessary, so I listened to it in the office.
One o’clock came, I left the office and then the party really got started.

When I got to the end of the road leading out of the industrial estate where my office is based, there was a big train to traffic heading off to the left.  I broke past and drove round the roundabout to head left towards Poole.  To find a Police car blocking the road, and “ROAD CLOSED” signs.  I sat there for a moment, looked at the non moving traffic heading AWAY from Poole and drove back to the office.
After checking the local radio stations web sites I found that a “serious accident” had caused the road to be closed and it wasn’t expected to reopen before two o’clock (the time of the exam).  At first I was exceedingly angry and irritated by the inconvenience, before realising that “serious accident” can often mean “fatality” and me being delayed getting to an examination probably isn’t really all that important in the grand scheme of things.

After half an hour there wasn’t any sign of the road reopening, so I got back in the car and tried again.  All of the traffic had cleared by then heading away from Poole, so I was able to get up to the second batch of Police and move past the blocked off road and onto the side streets that would get me back on track.  Three cheers for having satnav, which recalculated me a route.  Fortunately when I finally managed to get back onto the dual carriageway (thanks to an absolute saint who stopped and let several cars pull out onto the busy road) I managed to get to the testing centre at exactly two o’clock.

I fell in through the front door, fired up with adrenaline and ready to take the exam.  Then phase 2 of the fun started.
For the Prometric testing system was down at the testing centre.  Nobody could take any exams until the problem had been resolved, and one poor guy had been waiting since ten o’clock to try and take his exam!  That’s four hours time fans.  Coincidentally he had previously worked at Merlin Entertainments, where I contracted some time ago.  Small world.

By this point I had Victor Meldrew in my head screaming “I DON’T BELIEVE IT!” and the phone calls to the Prometric support line the in-house techie was having were getting longer and leading to much irritation.  For once it was nice to be on the other side of the support curtain, as I knew exactly how the poor guy felt.
Time ticked by, and soon I had been there for an hour and the strong vending machine lattes and my lack of a decent lunch caused by nerves were causing me some serious focus issues.

By now we had moved into the testing room and had struck up a like-minded techie friendship with the in-house guys, and the administration staff were nervously waiting for one of us to explode like Vesuveus and start yelling in the foyer.  Both of us were past the anger stage by then, we just wanted to take our exams and go.  I was also all over the shop by this point, hepped up on caffeine but also starving hungry, I seriously doubted I could actually focus and take the exam.  My usual pre-exam calmness rituals had been replaced with anxiety and chaos!

If you have managed to stick with me this far (God love you if you have, I’m primarily writing this post for my parents) you may be wondering what the cause of the problem was?  Well yes, the problem did get resolved.  Yes, as always it was something sickeningly simple.  No, I’m not going to say what it was to save the embarrassment of various parties.  But suffice to say that around 3:30(ish) I finally sat down to take the exam.
I passed, and from the looks of things I only got one question wrong.  When I was taking the exam I felt confident I was going to pass it, but thought my score could have been far closer to the pass mark due to my overally fogginess.

But despite a series of obstacles I am now a Small Business Server 2008, Configuration Technology Specialist.  I think it will be a little while before I think about taking another exam, though.

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This time around I didn’t take so many photos, but I have uploaded what I did to the Flickr page.

Will wasn’t particularly looking forward to around round of interruptions, and made his opinions clear before we got started.

Oh Ikea.  I learnt a valuable lesson from this endeavour, don’t say “how difficult could putting a desk up be?”.  You see, the desk is almost the entire width of the wall that it will be positioned on, and trying to turn it round after assembly caused…one or two issues.

Fortunately, no blood was shed and we managed to get the desk into position.  By this time we were both thoroughly fed up.  I’ve had a rather challenging week at work, and faced with the prospect of several hours getting this lot sorted I wasn’t a particularly happy camper.
Plus I then spent a couple of hours putting the drawer unit together, and also discovered I had bought a different colour one to the desk!  Fortunately it doesn’t look too bad, and there are other pieces in the room of a similar colour to avoid it going out the window.

I’m going to keep this post short as there is a place of the sofa that has my name on it, and provide a few finished article photos.  We won’t be doing anything like this again in a hurry!

Unfortunately these pictures aren’t particularly good, the weather has been particularly overcast for the last few days so the images look rather washed out.  In reality, it is far nicer than the photos.

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Regular readers will be aware that I am in the midst of expanding my business, and I’m very pleased to say that everything is going well so far.  I’m busy every day, and money is coming in and you can’t ask for much more than that!
I have had two major projects on the go for the last few months, one to get the business web site fully operational (this is currently in a state of flux as I’ve been so busy with work that I haven’t been able to update it), and the other is redecorating and refitting the office at home.

As you can see from this photo, there is an awful lot of equipment crammed into a very confined space.  When it’s just me working on my own it isn’t too bad, but when I have equipment coming in for customers to be configured before going out again it is a little like being in a crowded lift and you can’t move until someone gets out.

Hardly ideal.  So a few weeks ago we made serious preparations for the rather massive task of getting the room sorted out.  Like many fellow geeks I have a lot of stuff.  An awful lot of stuff, and when the room is cleared out everything literally fills up the entire house.  There are cupboards and shelves crammed full of computer media, DVDs and games.  If it can be pressed onto a disc, chances are I have dozens, if not hundreds of them.

The key factor in reclaiming space that would mean I could actually work would be to get rid of one of the desks.  I’ve had the current ones for many years, but they are just too wide and bulky, and trying to squeeze in multiple PCs, a Mac and the games consoles has simply become unworkable.

We took a trip to Ikea and decided on a single, large desk that will be placed under the window.  This would be large enough to house the 2 24″ Samsung TFT monitors, and if we are really lucky the iMac as well.  If the Mac can’t be fitted in, it will be offered up for sale.  Where that sits in the pantheon of things at the moment is unknown.

The games consoles would then move to their own dedicated TV stand, separating the room for work and pleasure. I did toy with the idea of moving the consoles up into the loft with the retro kit, and having a couple of Velux windows installed up there.  As with all loft/attic spaces it gets unbelievably hot up there during the roughly five minutes of summer we get each year.  The failing with that plan was it would cost several hundred pounds to do this.  So that was an obvious no.
I wanted to create an environment that I would be happy to do both work and rest in.  At the moment the green walls feel like they are coming in on me, and I don’t feel at all happy or creative when I am in there.

We decided on Caramel Cream paint from Homebase, got the supplies in and ordered the furniture from Ikea.  This is due to be delivered next Wednesday, so it was time to leap, or perhaps gently saunter into action.

On Thursday evening we stripped the room entirely.  All told it took just under three hours, and by the time we were done the entire house was filled with clutter.  There was so much stuff that we couldn’t even sit down on a sofa.  The picture above is how the lounge looked halfway through.

By the end of the evening, Cullen IT was running off this lonely Sonicwall and Netgear wireless access point!  With only my laptop propped on the window ledge as I gave e-mail support to a customer with internet connectivity problems!

Fortunately by the time I got home from work on Friday afternoon, Sally being the gem that she is had already done all the prep work and cutting in.  All I had to do was bust out the paint roller and get cracking.  Thanks to it being such a warm day as soon as one wall was finished, it was already dry.  Good job as well because covering green with cream doesn’t work too well, even for a supposedly one coat paint.  But I had two coats of paint on the walls by five o’clock!  Then all that was left was for us both to cut in a second time and stop for dinner.

Then the really difficult task began.  The one of trying to fit everything back in, or at least some of it on a temporary basis.  Due to new furniture being delivered in under a weeks time, I needed a temporary “lash up” with at least one PC, the NAS box and a couple of screens.  Not being a massive fan is spending out a lot of money, Sally hit upon a brainwave for the entertainment unit, rather than buy a new one from Ikea we had one in the loft that was hardly ever used with all the old consoles on it.  It was bought for when we had a widescreen CRT TV (the bad old days – pre-HD!) but was perfect for what I wanted.  There is enough shelf space for the Denon amp, PS3 and Xbox 360 and it was sat a few feet above us.

Very wearily we dismantled the stand and brought it down, and did a temporary placement check to make sure everything worked.  This is the net result (this photo was taken the day after).  Everything works just fine, but my rear speaker cables weren’t long enough.
That was it for Friday, we collapsed in an exhausted heap at this point.

On Saturday morning we were up bright and early (well perhaps not so bright) and after bacon sandwiches, headed out to Boscombe and our nearest branch of Richer Sounds.  These guys are great, quality merchandise at great prices.  They can’t always beat the online pricing but if you need something AV related in a hurry they are always my go to guys.  Richer is also one of the busiest shops you will ever see.  At 10am when we walked in seconds after the shop opened they already had perhaps half a dozen customers, and the phone was ringing off the hook.

We swiftly exited with 25 metres of Cambridge Audio cable and I soon had the rear speakers sat on the floor, cabled up and tested just right.  Really we need new stands for the front and rear speakers, how that will play out this week I don’t quite know.  But for now they are sat here like this!

The last thing we did on Saturday was to get the main desktop PC up and running once again.  I had to image my old SBS 2008 server which is being sold next week, do a little customer tech support and then find a home for all my stuff.  Fortunately we managed to clear 40% of the trouble right away, relocating a storage cupboard into the hallway so several hundred DVDs didn’t have to find a new home!

And this is where part 1 of the office story ends.  Next Wednesday we will take delivery of the new furniture and when everything is finished, I will report back.  There is also a set of Flickr photos available showing the whole nightmare in far more depth that is right and proper.

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While I was impatiently waiting for Windows Easy Transfer to copy 2Gb of family information over to an external USB drive (which took an awfully long time thanks to the old machine having USB 1 ports) I watched my cousins Annabel and Mollie playing on their Wii.

Like tens of thousands of families across the UK (and the world for that matter) they got a Wii for Christmas. They love it too, playing Wii Sports and Harry Potter. It was at that point I realised that the likes of me, the so called “hardcore” gaming set can be mind numbingly small minded at times.

The Wii is the console we thumb our noses at. Two Gamecubes stuck together, Instant Waggle, mini-game collections. Rubbish third party support, blah blah blah de blah.
But you know what? The games may not look like the finest that the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 can produce, but they really don’t have to. Nor should they for that matter.

Call it a fad, or a toy or whatever you want but the Wii succeeds in doing exactly what it was designed for. It’s cheap, is compatible with everyone’s TV, and it’s easy to play. Dear lord, people even have FUN playing on it, can you imagine? There are no forum wars between ten year old girls and grandparents over who has the madder skillz in Wii Bowling, just folks having a good time.

Which brings me to the point of this post. We bought a Wii again last weekend. I say again because we bought one when they first launched a couple of years ago, but after it sat gathering dust under the TV for six months it went. Fortunately the stock shortages were still in full effect back then, and I sold the machine for what I paid for it.

Just recently I have been listening to John Davison’s What They Play podcast, and it’s heartening to hear about so many families who are getting into videogames and having fun playing together.
I spent nearly six and a half hours playing through Wanted: Weapons of Fate on Saturday afternoon, and while it wasn’t a completely unpleasant experience I couldn’t help feeling being locked away in my home office probably wasn’t the best use of my time. After two weekends of third person action games it would be nice to play something fun and daft for a few hours. I have also been looking for an activity that both of us can enjoy together, as the time Sally and I have spent together over the last few weeks has been rather scant due to my business expansion endeavours.

It was Wii Fit that really sealed the deal. A couple of Sally’s friends have it, and given that I keep losing and then gaining weight with distressing regularity we thought at least I would exercise if I was playing a videogame!
Fortunately Game is currently selling a Wii and Wii Fit bundle, so I struggled back to the West Quay car park on Sunday morning laden down with an assortment of goodies. I have to say that I really love it.

There is no way in this world or the next that I would ever go jogging, but I will quite happily jog on the spot in Wii Fit as various Mii’s wave and run past. Twee perhaps, but anything that makes me laugh and gets me moving must be doing something right.
I was spared the indignity of being told I was obese, just, when I first weighed myself on the Balance Board. The bar stopped just below obese, and my Mii suddenly grew something of a pot belly. This coming just after Sally had been told she was perfect just as she is (which is something I don’t need a games console to tell me) I felt rather ashamed.

Pete & Sally Cullen, yesterday

But after three days I’m still going, only fifteen minutes a day so far this week but at least its fifteen minutes that I haven’t been sat on my backside eating chocolate. I even managed to do the jogging without keeling over today, and got a 100% in the abs workout.

But it’s not time to call me Casual Cullen just yet, I spent my birthday money ordering Animal Crossing (yes I know it’s the same game again but I’m not keeping my Gamecube wired up just to play one game any more) and Madworld today. Resident Evil: Umbrella Chronicles will be next, and no doubt Super Mario Galaxy will also appear on the GAME rentals queue.

Next up from the rental service should be X-Men Origins: Wolverine, so I can keep a good balance of happy fun and mindless slaughter. It’s what every thirty three year old needs.

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So things aren’t quite as they should be at present.  I’m working through ironing out the kinks, I need a new title bar and to get the advertisements all set up (don’t worry, the advertisements will only be for my own company).
I also know that the formatting on some of the older posts is very messed up, especially the AV Setup 3.0 page, but as that is now extremely out of date I will be updating it at some point in the future with an all new one.

Please stand by.  Normal service will be resumed shortly.

UPDATE! Everything is nearly back to normal again now.  I need to sort the title bar out, but that is just minor window dressing.
The Featured article images are now a uniform size, making everything a little more pleasing on the eye.  I’ve also removed the old morphing banner advert for the company site which my nephew so kindly designed for me last year.  I feel the banner ad above each post is a far better way to go, it displays all the information that is needed and doesn’t assult your eyes when you view it.

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That is why this is going to be a very dull one this month.  I’ve been sick since the weekend and my germs are unwanted in the office so I’ve been keeping well away.  Here is my stash of wonder medicines.  I woke up with a voice like Barry White today which is still hanging around despite the Strepsils and copious amounts of tea.

Bauer time!  Tuesday is 24 day and it’s the first thing I do after hauling myself out of bed and getting showered (the three day beard came off today, woohoo!).  You even get a reflection of me in the TV, you lucky folks.

It is often said that the English enjoy a nice cup of tea.  Here you can see we are going to enjoy 1100 of them before June 2010!  Photo desparation now starts to set in.

The obligatory photo of Will, here displaying a look that says “Oh how tiresome, is it really time to take my picture for that internet thing AGAIN?”.  At the time of writing this, some seven hours after the photo was taken, he is still in the same spot.

Time for some nourishment.  I’ve been off my food for the last couple of days so time for a cup of coffee in this retro Batman mug we picked up a few weeks ago….

And a bacon sandwich!  Waitrose pepper cured bacon to be precise and it was far nicer than the photo does justice.  Delicious.

Today also sees the release of the second piece of downloadable content for one of my favourite games from last year: Fable II.  Playing games is the new watching movies for me when I’m ill.  I can sit here, in the comfy chair, wrapped up warm and exercising only my thumbs.  Here I await its download.

And there it is!  This will keep me occupied for the next four-ish hours.

After a lot of game time I take a look at the wall cupboard.  All of this stuff has to be re-homed as we are redecorating the home office shortly and this cabinet is gone.  I looked at it for a few minutes and decided it can wait until another day.  I was also grumpy by this point after I had to turn down some work today.  Hopefully it will still be available when I’m back to “normal”.

Don’t worry folks, the nightmare is nearly over   I wanted to include this pic, I got one of these for my buddy Anto for his 40th (complete with jet pack) and I keep mine by the screen.  At least you are saved from seeing a photo of me walking around in my dressing gown over the top of my clothes to keep warm, Arthur Dent style!

Another one of those “need to sort these out” shots.  These are all the videogames I’m selling at present, or would be if I actually advertised them.

To finish off the set I’ve included another photo from our Caribbean holiday.  Last months shot proved to be quite popular, so here is another one.  This is Oprah’s vacation home on Antigua.  Chat obviously pays well!  Oh and we weren’t that close to it, the photo was taken from a catameran with the zoom cranked to full.  Honestly!

See you next month!

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The truth is, I’m unbelievable busy at present.  There is an awful lot going on in the wonderful world of IT and I am spending more and more time in the afternoons and evenings looking at new software and hardware, configuring things left and right.  It’s a rather trying time right now, things are happening which I have no control over that are making a huge impact on those closest to me.  Ergo trying to grow a business, keep up a blog and enjoy leisure time is proving something of a challenge.  It also doesn’t help that my mind is in so many different places that editing even a simple post like this is taking forever because I’m repeating myself constantly!

Perhaps the most ironic thing of all is that all of the things that I am wanting to write about now are all things that would appear on the business blog.  The web site now has its lovely Solostream premium theme, I just need a proper header and some content for it.  As soon as that is ready to roll I will post here of course.

For now, I’m going to test out the new virtual Windows XP add-on for the Windows 7 Release Candidate.  Hey, one day I may even write about it!

Don’t hold your breath.

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