One Enormous Update
Apr. 14th, 2004 01:58 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
same_differenceRight in an effort to finally put up everything I wanted on to my LJ I'm going to write one massive LJ entry and then hide the bulk of it behind cut tags. Though I'll stick the most recent and relevant stuff at the top.
Currently I'm in Oxford enjoying myself. I took four days off on holiday to spend the last week and a bit of P's Easter with her. So far it’s been great, I think this will have been the largest continuous block of time we've spent with each other since we met. She has unfortunately had course work to do so I've spent the time pampering her (cooking for her, doing all the cleaning, etc, etc) and I've been really enjoying. Provided my parents don't find out about it I'll be fine.
We spent Easter Sunday doing an Easter Egg hunt, which basically involved taking it in turns to hide small Lindt chocolate things around the house, and letting the other person go looking for them. It was good fun, though either I'm completely useless at seeing things or P is a master of hiding things in plain sight.
Went shopping in Oxford yesterday and picked up a couple of new T-shirts, though one of them did take a bit of gentle persuasion from P to get me to buy it. It has a vague design on the front, and I needed help getting past my 'must buy only plain undistinguishing clothes' block. It has no labels so that’s the main thing.
I also am the proud owner of a DVD collection to go with my DVD player, well the start of one anyway. I've managed to get the first two series of Black Books as a box set (and made the vaguely important discovery that Virgin do Student discounts), and the whole of Futurama. I had only intended to buy Black Books, but they had Futurama on buy on get one free, so I got the lot. I don't really spend money very often but occasionally I go on impulse spending things, though in general I try and follow some good advice from my Dad, which is approximately 'If you see something you want, and it’s cheaper than you could normally get it, try and get even more money off and buy it because you might not get a chance again'. So yes I bought £100 of DVD's. Ho hum. Actually it's more than covered by the Christmas money I got from various family members last year, and it’s probably the best way to spend it.
I wonder vaguely who I borrowed 'Ho Hum' from I have a general tendency to assimilate other people speech thingies into my speech so I will have gotten it from somewhere. To give you an example I have Paul to blame for 'heckie-heckie' and 'may..be'.
I also bought a load of cheap factory clearance chocolate from Thornton’s which I’ve sorted out into fairly even bags which I’m going to give my family for Easter, it’s a mix of the chocolates they normally sell in boxes. I’m guessing it consists mostly of extras or chocolates where the decoration isn’t quite up to scratch. Meh, my family won’t mind they get chocolate and I save about £20. I also took P in to buy her whatever she wanted, seeing as the Easter horrible mark up would have gone. In the end she chose a couple of bags of the same assorted chocolates I’d bought my family, she likes them which is the main thing.
Episode 8 - Aboard the Chize
We started the episode travelling by shuttle to the Chize (sp?). An enormous weapon converted so that it can hold the collected heroes from fantasy. The Chize's avatar is a little school girl with a tendency to break down into tears a lot, this apparently unsettles people (well it would considering it's an immensely powerful weapon sobbing uncontrollably in front of you).
After a rather pointless conversation with both Chize, and Ruri (Martian Successor Nadiesco, the film), the same person we talked to in the pub in Iron Town, in which we were told nothing we hadn't already known, had none of our actual important questions answered, and were given the most wonderful helpful statement of 'We're only going to tell you things that will make you want to join our cause. We have as much reason to manipulate you as your own side does.'. It was suggested we gather intel as our command will almost certainly have questions for us when we get back.
We were informed that Akito (male lead in Nadesico) wanted to kill us and that several other people were not happy with our presence here but that the Chize would provide us an escape route if we needed it.
We spent the rest of the session wandering around, being indecisive about where we wanted to go. We weren't willing to walk into the cafeteria full of heroes, weren't happy about being effectively trapped in a ship with somebody who wanted to kill us, and would have continued to wander aimlessly had we not bumped into a certain dog/cat thing trying to escape being dinner. It wasn't long before we met Excel (Excel Saga) hunting for her 'dinner' and on Gin Peng's advice of "she's like Guu but manic" we kept well out of her way.
Until of course we bumped into one of the Giavas(sp?) from some old series of anime who, after some discussion, attacked us. Chize did not come to our aid so we fought back ineffectively; Gin Peng and Hyashi were laid out unconscious, and Rio and Hitomi fled towards the hangars before bumping into Akito. He told them to leave and the Giava turned up with Gin Peng and Hyashi's unconscious bodies, and we were dumped in a shuttle and sent away from the Chize. The Chize hadn't helped us because she'd been informed that one of our missions was to kill Akito's wife (we were supposed to destroy the device that allowed them to teleport their forces - it turned out of course that was his wife) and so the episode ended with us floating in space, wondering where to go next.
Not the most interesting episode and I'm sure there were lots of things Joe had planned for that we completely avoided, but an important step in the story. I think we're currently in what can be though of as the characters feel worthless and pawn-like stage in the story.
Right well I put my car through its MOT a couple weeks ago, it didn’t pass but it didn’t need too much work, just a bit of welding, replacing part of the front suspension, and all the tires needed changing. It was strange the rear drivers side tire was actually so badly worn it was deformed but when I was driving it didn’t feel like it, even Paul who was in the car at the time as we were making armour afterwards didn’t notice it so it wasn’t just me having not noticed the slow change. There also fixed the rattle that I’d almost stopped hearing at the MOT it was due to a piece of metal on the exhaust they just cut off. I’m glad that sounds gone even if I’d stopped really noticing it. Anyway the car is all sorted and it’s certainly driving better with all new tires.
A couple of weeks before the MOT I had the change the break pads on my car. That was a really easy repair literally take off the tires undo two bolts and you could remove the pads. I even bumped into someone from my tutor group in secondary school working in APD where I bought the parts. I couldn’t remember his name at all though. I also took the opportunity to replace the oil filter and change the oil, just give the car a general service (I had to take time off work to get the brakes done, because I couldn’t drive anywhere with my brakes gone obviously).
That was annoying. The car seems to consist of a random mix of really easy to service and almost impossible to service designs. The brake pads, and even the drums are really easy to get to work on or replace, but the oil filter, which you’ll probably have to change 10 to 15 times as frequently is nigh on impossible to get to. It doesn’t matter which angle you try or which area to approach it from you can only get your hand in one way and there only just enough room for a hand in the area around the filter anyway. Its one of those cylindrical filters that sticks out from the engine block, the kind that you screw in by hand but requires a lot more effort to undo due to the act of been next to a hot engine for about 6000 miles.
After the last time we tried to change it we went and bought a new oil filter changing tool (yes tools exist purely to change this kind of filter). In the end it broke, after doing a very good job of crushing the filter not undoing it. It consisted of a bicycle chain through a special socket so that you could turn the socket to tighten the chain around the filter and then somehow proceed to undo it. In hindsight I have no idea how it’s actually supposed to work. In the end we took the carburettor off to remove the filter. You don’t normally need to do anything to the carburettor when working on the car, sigh, its just so badly designed.
Since then I’ve decided to try and design a better oil filter removing tool. Currently available are the chain type and a second type consisting of a loop of flat metal which can also be tightened (neither design will stay tightened of course unless you continue to hold them in place). Seeing as both have proved to be completely useless I’m going to try and invent a better way of doing it, all you need is some way to grip something around the filter that preferably stays in place once its been tightened and a socket in the centre so you can use a ratchet to undo it. I’ll keep you updated if I get it designed and patented.
Spent some time last week making armour with Paul. We went back to the rolling machine and experimented with buts of aluminium to see what we could do. It turns out we can bend metal.
Actually it was quick and easy to make a curve in the aluminium. We spent an evening cutting the sheets of aluminium to correct size using the highly scientific method of carefully tearing a sheet of newspaper to get the right shape pattern and cutting it out of the aluminium. We went back and managed to nearly complete a back piece (two edges to bend down) and slightly less complete a front piece (a few more edges to bend down) in approximately an hour and a half. The rolling machine also helps make really good rounded edges, so if you've seen some of Paul's current armour you don't have to worry about as many sharp edges with the breast plates.
The one problem we had was caused by brains spatial awareness. The front breast plates are bent down the front for a variety of reasons and we were trying to work out how to bend the straps at the tops so they didn’t curve inwards to where our necks should be, however our brains were telling us that we should bend them in the opposite direction to the one we should. It’s really weird when you know what you have to do but your brains telling you it should be the other way. I’m not if that makes sense its hard to describe.
The armour we've made looks really good. I'm hoping to get mine done one evening/afternoon in the next two weeks. I think next time we'd like to play around with steel instead.
It was really good seeing P after those 10 days apart, I have to say since I’ve met her I really understand what Shakespeare meant when he said ‘parting is such sweet sorrow’ it's amazing having someone you care for so much. The best part was she is so much more attractive than I remembered and that’s to say she was gorgeous in my memory. She really is absolutely stunning, yay, I’m so happy to be with her its just wonderful. *bounces happily off to hug her*
Few all done, I'll try and keep my updates a bit more frequent from now on.
Currently I'm in Oxford enjoying myself. I took four days off on holiday to spend the last week and a bit of P's Easter with her. So far it’s been great, I think this will have been the largest continuous block of time we've spent with each other since we met. She has unfortunately had course work to do so I've spent the time pampering her (cooking for her, doing all the cleaning, etc, etc) and I've been really enjoying. Provided my parents don't find out about it I'll be fine.
We spent Easter Sunday doing an Easter Egg hunt, which basically involved taking it in turns to hide small Lindt chocolate things around the house, and letting the other person go looking for them. It was good fun, though either I'm completely useless at seeing things or P is a master of hiding things in plain sight.
Went shopping in Oxford yesterday and picked up a couple of new T-shirts, though one of them did take a bit of gentle persuasion from P to get me to buy it. It has a vague design on the front, and I needed help getting past my 'must buy only plain undistinguishing clothes' block. It has no labels so that’s the main thing.
I also am the proud owner of a DVD collection to go with my DVD player, well the start of one anyway. I've managed to get the first two series of Black Books as a box set (and made the vaguely important discovery that Virgin do Student discounts), and the whole of Futurama. I had only intended to buy Black Books, but they had Futurama on buy on get one free, so I got the lot. I don't really spend money very often but occasionally I go on impulse spending things, though in general I try and follow some good advice from my Dad, which is approximately 'If you see something you want, and it’s cheaper than you could normally get it, try and get even more money off and buy it because you might not get a chance again'. So yes I bought £100 of DVD's. Ho hum. Actually it's more than covered by the Christmas money I got from various family members last year, and it’s probably the best way to spend it.
I wonder vaguely who I borrowed 'Ho Hum' from I have a general tendency to assimilate other people speech thingies into my speech so I will have gotten it from somewhere. To give you an example I have Paul to blame for 'heckie-heckie' and 'may..be'.
I also bought a load of cheap factory clearance chocolate from Thornton’s which I’ve sorted out into fairly even bags which I’m going to give my family for Easter, it’s a mix of the chocolates they normally sell in boxes. I’m guessing it consists mostly of extras or chocolates where the decoration isn’t quite up to scratch. Meh, my family won’t mind they get chocolate and I save about £20. I also took P in to buy her whatever she wanted, seeing as the Easter horrible mark up would have gone. In the end she chose a couple of bags of the same assorted chocolates I’d bought my family, she likes them which is the main thing.
Episode 8 - Aboard the Chize
We started the episode travelling by shuttle to the Chize (sp?). An enormous weapon converted so that it can hold the collected heroes from fantasy. The Chize's avatar is a little school girl with a tendency to break down into tears a lot, this apparently unsettles people (well it would considering it's an immensely powerful weapon sobbing uncontrollably in front of you).
After a rather pointless conversation with both Chize, and Ruri (Martian Successor Nadiesco, the film), the same person we talked to in the pub in Iron Town, in which we were told nothing we hadn't already known, had none of our actual important questions answered, and were given the most wonderful helpful statement of 'We're only going to tell you things that will make you want to join our cause. We have as much reason to manipulate you as your own side does.'. It was suggested we gather intel as our command will almost certainly have questions for us when we get back.
We were informed that Akito (male lead in Nadesico) wanted to kill us and that several other people were not happy with our presence here but that the Chize would provide us an escape route if we needed it.
We spent the rest of the session wandering around, being indecisive about where we wanted to go. We weren't willing to walk into the cafeteria full of heroes, weren't happy about being effectively trapped in a ship with somebody who wanted to kill us, and would have continued to wander aimlessly had we not bumped into a certain dog/cat thing trying to escape being dinner. It wasn't long before we met Excel (Excel Saga) hunting for her 'dinner' and on Gin Peng's advice of "she's like Guu but manic" we kept well out of her way.
Until of course we bumped into one of the Giavas(sp?) from some old series of anime who, after some discussion, attacked us. Chize did not come to our aid so we fought back ineffectively; Gin Peng and Hyashi were laid out unconscious, and Rio and Hitomi fled towards the hangars before bumping into Akito. He told them to leave and the Giava turned up with Gin Peng and Hyashi's unconscious bodies, and we were dumped in a shuttle and sent away from the Chize. The Chize hadn't helped us because she'd been informed that one of our missions was to kill Akito's wife (we were supposed to destroy the device that allowed them to teleport their forces - it turned out of course that was his wife) and so the episode ended with us floating in space, wondering where to go next.
Not the most interesting episode and I'm sure there were lots of things Joe had planned for that we completely avoided, but an important step in the story. I think we're currently in what can be though of as the characters feel worthless and pawn-like stage in the story.
Right well I put my car through its MOT a couple weeks ago, it didn’t pass but it didn’t need too much work, just a bit of welding, replacing part of the front suspension, and all the tires needed changing. It was strange the rear drivers side tire was actually so badly worn it was deformed but when I was driving it didn’t feel like it, even Paul who was in the car at the time as we were making armour afterwards didn’t notice it so it wasn’t just me having not noticed the slow change. There also fixed the rattle that I’d almost stopped hearing at the MOT it was due to a piece of metal on the exhaust they just cut off. I’m glad that sounds gone even if I’d stopped really noticing it. Anyway the car is all sorted and it’s certainly driving better with all new tires.
A couple of weeks before the MOT I had the change the break pads on my car. That was a really easy repair literally take off the tires undo two bolts and you could remove the pads. I even bumped into someone from my tutor group in secondary school working in APD where I bought the parts. I couldn’t remember his name at all though. I also took the opportunity to replace the oil filter and change the oil, just give the car a general service (I had to take time off work to get the brakes done, because I couldn’t drive anywhere with my brakes gone obviously).
That was annoying. The car seems to consist of a random mix of really easy to service and almost impossible to service designs. The brake pads, and even the drums are really easy to get to work on or replace, but the oil filter, which you’ll probably have to change 10 to 15 times as frequently is nigh on impossible to get to. It doesn’t matter which angle you try or which area to approach it from you can only get your hand in one way and there only just enough room for a hand in the area around the filter anyway. Its one of those cylindrical filters that sticks out from the engine block, the kind that you screw in by hand but requires a lot more effort to undo due to the act of been next to a hot engine for about 6000 miles.
After the last time we tried to change it we went and bought a new oil filter changing tool (yes tools exist purely to change this kind of filter). In the end it broke, after doing a very good job of crushing the filter not undoing it. It consisted of a bicycle chain through a special socket so that you could turn the socket to tighten the chain around the filter and then somehow proceed to undo it. In hindsight I have no idea how it’s actually supposed to work. In the end we took the carburettor off to remove the filter. You don’t normally need to do anything to the carburettor when working on the car, sigh, its just so badly designed.
Since then I’ve decided to try and design a better oil filter removing tool. Currently available are the chain type and a second type consisting of a loop of flat metal which can also be tightened (neither design will stay tightened of course unless you continue to hold them in place). Seeing as both have proved to be completely useless I’m going to try and invent a better way of doing it, all you need is some way to grip something around the filter that preferably stays in place once its been tightened and a socket in the centre so you can use a ratchet to undo it. I’ll keep you updated if I get it designed and patented.
Spent some time last week making armour with Paul. We went back to the rolling machine and experimented with buts of aluminium to see what we could do. It turns out we can bend metal.
Actually it was quick and easy to make a curve in the aluminium. We spent an evening cutting the sheets of aluminium to correct size using the highly scientific method of carefully tearing a sheet of newspaper to get the right shape pattern and cutting it out of the aluminium. We went back and managed to nearly complete a back piece (two edges to bend down) and slightly less complete a front piece (a few more edges to bend down) in approximately an hour and a half. The rolling machine also helps make really good rounded edges, so if you've seen some of Paul's current armour you don't have to worry about as many sharp edges with the breast plates.
The one problem we had was caused by brains spatial awareness. The front breast plates are bent down the front for a variety of reasons and we were trying to work out how to bend the straps at the tops so they didn’t curve inwards to where our necks should be, however our brains were telling us that we should bend them in the opposite direction to the one we should. It’s really weird when you know what you have to do but your brains telling you it should be the other way. I’m not if that makes sense its hard to describe.
The armour we've made looks really good. I'm hoping to get mine done one evening/afternoon in the next two weeks. I think next time we'd like to play around with steel instead.
It was really good seeing P after those 10 days apart, I have to say since I’ve met her I really understand what Shakespeare meant when he said ‘parting is such sweet sorrow’ it's amazing having someone you care for so much. The best part was she is so much more attractive than I remembered and that’s to say she was gorgeous in my memory. She really is absolutely stunning, yay, I’m so happy to be with her its just wonderful. *bounces happily off to hug her*
Few all done, I'll try and keep my updates a bit more frequent from now on.
