My Blog Posts

Recent posts to this blog have tended more towards the humourous than informative so I thought it was about time for an update. We moved into our new flat at the beginning of November. Yes, the address in on the usual page. This prompted some interesting purchasing dilemmas. These were caused by a number of factors; We packed up our house in Sydney and consequently have a couple of garages full of belongings that we don’t really wish to duplicate. We travelled light to the UK because we didn’t know if we were going to be here for three months or three years. We have rented a furnished flat. So, we didn’t want to buy anything that we already owned, but there were certain things in the flat either lacking or just not up to spec. So I came up with a “valid replacement” theory. This goes something like; we only buy things that we do not already own and they have to be of a sufficient quality that we will ship them back to Sydney when we make our way back to sunnier climes. Which will be nearer two years than five minutes for those who have been asking. I fully expect to be back in Gods own beach country before the end of 2004, if not sooner.

Check out Baby’s named a bad thing. Absolutely hilarious. I am now determined to call my first born child “Dakota Bear”. [Courtesy of Ben Hammersley].

Inspired by Jonathon Delacour I took a quick Myers-Briggs test this morning. The result? I am apparently an INTJ, which means; introverted, intuitive, thinking and judging. I’ve taken these kind of tests on a number of occasions but always forget my “type” within a couple of days. Hopefully posting it up here will aid my memory. For the curious, according to this classification I am a mastermind. I’ve known it for years of course, I’m just glad to have some justification for my self glorification.

Did you know that my wife has a blog? It may come as a surprise to you that she hasn’t updated it since the 11th of January this year though. To shame her into using this here intarweb thingummy I’ve put a link to it on the sidebar. If you are one of the many people she regularly fails to telephone or email you can join me in persuading her of the joys of more frequent communication. I’d suggest a saturation campaign using the communication channel of your choice.

Here is one for Bobo; Springer Opera gets London World Premiere. Cultural capital of the bleeding world, mate. Of the world, and don’t you people overseas forget it!

Too busy, in fact, to write anything interesting here. Unless you would like to know how to install Oracle 9i release 2 onto the same machine as Oracle 8i? No, didn’t think so. Let me point you in the direction of some humour instead. There are a new set of get your war on strips up on this here intarweb. Watch out for the rude words if you are a little sensitive though. My favourite line? “When Dick Cheney weeps, is the oil coming out of his eyes leaded or unleaded?” [courtesy of Boing Boing].

“the marmite is not too strong for us. it is we who are too weak for the marmite.”. Taken from a MeFi discussion on the best thing you can ever spread on toast, Marmite.

Apologies for the dearth of posts here in the past week. It has been mainly due to the fact that I have been working at a customer site. They have an outrageous proxy server policy which considers that this web site (and the software I use to craft it) are not essential for business purposes and were therefore not available when I was connected to their network. Imagine thinking that http://www.andrew-todd.com/ is not business critical, I rather beg to differ.

For those who are thinking of buying me a christmas present (that means you, dear), I have updated the wish list page on this web site. What a wild way to spend your Friday night.

This last week has been a feast of comedy for the Todd household. Last Friday night I managed to acquire tickets to see Michael Moore live at the Roundhouse in Chalk Farm. A fun time was had by all and much merriment ensued. The only fly in the ointment was transport as, due to the firefighters strike, Chalk Farm tube station was closed. Luckily for us the driver announced this in plenty of time and we managed to jump off at Camden Town and walk the rest of the way.

I had a need to quickly get a screen print from my computer this morning. Thanks to the folks at Download.com I got my sticky mits on Screen Print 32. I must say I’m quite impressed. It is free for personal use, gives me full control over the whole process, including which parts of the screen to capture, the format of the resulting file (including png - the graphics file format of all right on software dudes) and uses about a micron of memory. Well done folks.

In more Christmas shopping related news, I’ve found an absolute corker of a present. This t-shirt was designed with Molly in mind. They even do it in XXL, which I believe is his size of choice. Its just a shame that I don’t buy him presents, otherwise this would be perfect.

Huh? Consulting. Do you think they might be hiring? Because I can do a job like that. [Courtesy of Boing Boing] Whilst I was cruising Boing Boing I noticed this piece on the “turducken”. This has to be a joke.

Look, Google zeitgeist. Another part of this wibbly wobbly web that displays car crash like qualities. You know you shouldn’t look but you can’t help taking a peek. I have a sneaky suspicion that this will make it on to my daily list of sites to visit. Which is more of a comment on me than anything else. [Courtesy of Accordion Guy].

I have been spending money again. I bought a Christmas present over at Amazon. Not such a big thing you would think, except that it was the first thing I had ever bought there. At Amazon they operate a customer segmentation and classification system where the front page of the web site changes to suggest products that they think you would like to buy. They currently think that I would like to buy “S Club Juniors, Together”, “Carmen Sandiego Treasures of Knowledge” and the DVD of the Britney Spears flick “Crossroads” (not the sad tv soap opera, mum).

Tell me its not true. Celebrity Big Brother is back. Still, it will keep a bunch of talentless no-hopers off the streets for a while. Plus, if we all turn our backs (metaphorically speaking) it should go away and never bother us again.

Who was it who said that the internet was just a load of pr0n? Oh yes, that would be me then. Just in time to save its sad and sullied soul comes Project Gutenberg a selfless effort to make available as many books as possible to as many people as possible. Those of you who have been using this here intarweb for a while will doubtless have heard of it. Visit, download an e-text and wonder at the marvelousness of it all.

Welcome back to an old favourite on this blog. I couldn’t resist; “Of course he stood alone as wickets tumbled, not unlike Horatio on the bridge, though not quite as cheerful and much better paid.” Thanks to Peter Roebuck for those magical words.

The gadget duly arrived, as did another hole in the wall. The Sky+ box has two satellite decoders so that you can watch one channel whilst recording another. What I didn’t realise is that to achieve this they simply run two cables from the satellite dish to your living room. Hence another hole in the wall to pass the cable through. This is unremarkable, until I mention that the drill bit the engineer used to create this whole was about a metre and a half long (well over four foot to you imperialists). Blimey, what a large one.

Our new gadget turns up tomorrow. Armed with the remote control and suitable quantities of comestibles I don’t see me leaving the couch until Monday morning when I have to go to work. Add a rugby match tomorrow afternoon I think I’m going to have a good weekend. Oh, and this afternoon I have mostly been … listening to Del Amitri. As a wise man once said, marvellous.