Did 2006 fly past for you?
Well, it’s that time again. Time to reflect back on yet another year. I’m quite shocked at how fast the year has progressed. Mind you, I guess you all hear the same thing being said every single year. I still remember everything I did this same time last year, in minute detail too.
This time last year, I wrote down my New Years Resolutions on this blog. Now looking at those 6 ‘resolutions’ if you could even call them that, I’ve managed to do all but two. I still haven’t worked out how cows make milk (what state of mind was I in when I came up with that?!), and lastly I’ve failed to make any use of me camera. I was really hoping to take scenic shots of areas around London, and Scotland especially but I can’t find the time to get away from work.
I’ve not given much thought to my resolutions for 2007. Is there even any need to I ask? Well here are five of mine.
- Get myself my dream Toyota Celica and stop using public transport
- Ease up on my mad spending sprees
- Consider moving out of London or the Uk
- Make sure my mad cousin Ayesha (sitting with me) passes her uni course. It’s important to me!
- See my family over in San Francisco. I’ve not met hardly any of them.
I’ve spent some time today just reflecting back on everything that has happened in 2006. I’ve had a lovely year for the most part. Work wise things have been great, and I couldn’t be happier. I’ve got a solid circle of friends who always keep my spirits high at work and I’ll miss them horribly as I move to a new section at work mid Jan 2007. I’ve no idea how long I’ll remain at work because the lease for my workplace expires towards the end of 2007, and there’s strong rumours that my lab may be moved to Canada, Toronto. I first mentioned this last
December when I first heard about it.
On another note, I’ve seen more close friends leave the Uk, I only have about 4-5 friends left residing here now. I’ve seen two friends, close to my heart move away from my life, which saddens me whenever I think about them 
They know who they are, and they’re probably reading right now. If you are, I miss you and I wish you all the best for 2007. As for everyone else reading this, what are your resolutions?
I’m being pestered by Ayesha to take her to London tomorrow for the New Years celebrations however I’m not sure, over the past years they keep clamping down on areas you can celebrate in over there, so its less enjoyable then the past years, also drinks cost a ton of cash. I’m also worried about security given the media events of today (30th Dec).
So that’s all I have to say. I hope everyone has had a lovely Christmas, and have a joyous 2007. I know I am I’m looking forward to it 
Too much food
Just a quick update! I’ve just uploaded two more game reviews to the Reviews section, Full Auto and WWE Smackdown 2007.
How was Christmas for everyone? Did the Xmas dinner go according to plan? I celebrated slightly early this year, and spent it with my parents and annoying Ayesha who came to stay. Christmas Eve was spent with some close friends of mine. I’d not seen them in absolutely ages, so I spent some much needed time with them and their gorgeous little baby Arianna, man she is cute! So far I’ve spent these holidays getting much needed R&R. I’ve badly needed this after a hectic end of year at work. Now I’ve got to get in shape for 2007, right now I feel like the Stay Puft Marshmallow man from Ghostbusters…
I finish work this week!
At work right now at present, I find myself just counting the hours, and days that go by. I’m constantly staring at the calendar sitting on my desk. Lately I’ve been very reserved and quiet at work. I’m sick of working, travelling etc and I just want to get away from it all. Don’t get me wrong here, I love my job and have one of the most enjoyable jobs anyone could have but lately as the year comes to a close, I just want out. I’m not alone either from my scant observations of my colleagues. Everyone seems to be taking extended breaks, extended loo breaks, and just generally walking around wasting time, just to make the day progress that little bit quicker. Sadly we have another week of work left and break up on the 22nd Dec, so they’ve got another 4 days of boredom to kill. It doesn’t help by the fact that my mates up North in Manchester and Coventry all broke up from work on the 8th of December. It’s my favourite time of the year though, Winter and Christmas is here so there’s nothing that can get me down.
Anyway, the second of four parties was this week. I didn’t want to go to this one, which was at the Royal Spice in London, but went anyway. It was dull, and the moment the drinks started flowing, everyone was kicking back the wine, champers, beer, cider and wotnot like there was no tomorrow. Not too sure what else happened at the party because I was totally wasted like everyone else. I am, however unclear about a few things though:
- How the hell did I manage to bus it all the way home? I looked at the London Bus map earlier and apparently it would take 9 bus changes to reach home from the restaurant we were at. I do recall switching buses on more then a few occasions but how? I was totally wasted after leaving my colleagues.
- I seem to have two packets of cigarettes and a lighter in my coat pocket - I don’t smoke!
- My inner coat pocket seems to contain the restaurant’s menu
- My black shirt is heavily ripped near the lower buttons?!
So if anyone saw a seriously drunk asian guy, with spikey hair, wearing a long black coat on the 140, 282, H14 (that’s all I can remember) buses on Friday night, then I apologise for my actions if I’d done anything stupid! This weekend I really wanted to upload two more reviews, but have drastically run out of time. Instead I ended up fixing some broken parts of the blog after trying to customise the comments forms. Ended up wasting two hours on that, so my reviews on WWE Smackdown and Full Auto have been delayed by a bit. In addition I’ve also been tidying up some existing reviews because of some new fixes I did to the Lightbox plugin that handles the way images are displayed - if anyone spots anything weird, please get in touch using the Contact form on this blog. Ta muchly!
I’ve written a quick Creative Xmod review that has recently been released on to the market. It’s a small audio enhancement device that claims to improve your audio. Does it work? Take a look at the review to find out. Also added today is the review of Kameo: Elements of Power for the Xbox 360.
She cannae take anymore!
While I’ve been beavering away in the background of this blog fixing errors and minor bugs here and there, after upgrading the K2 theme, I can’t help but notice a colossal increase in traffic heading my way. These hits are definitely not coming from search engine bots as I’ve blocked most of the more annoying spider bots out there. Most of it seems to be coming from the Xbox 360 Reviews that I’ve been doing lately and I’m quite frankly stunned at the responses some of these reviews have had. I’d just like to say thank you.
The monthly hit rates for November hit 17,891, while October was 5,452. The previous record was 9,991 set in February 2006. The Gears of War review has attracted just over 3000 hits, and the 360 Wireless Headset write up has had 2800. Due to such a large increase in traffic (and I’ve not even started churning out the reviews yet) I can predict things will get a lot busier as I add more reviews. Guess I need to contact my good hosts JSW Freelance and upgrade my current package over the coming weeks. 17k of visitors may not sound much compared to most blogs out there, but for an average blog like this one it’s a lot in my opinion
I’ve also had a lot of emails from readers asking why they can’t comment on my reviews. Well here’s the answer to that - I’m not exactly sure. The K2 theme as I understand it supports Page Comments, and I have ‘Allow Comments’ ticked on the pages I write my reviews on, so I don’t understand why commenting just doesn’t work. I’ve looked at the code and it seems fine too. I am looking into this though but I doubt I can fix it, as it is well beyond me. For now, your best bet is to post a comment on the main review related snippet I’ll post whenever I upload a couple of games reviews.
What celebrating will you be doing this year hmmm?
I think I’ve scared away my frequent visitors with all the Xbox 360 chat I’ve been doing recently of late! So to bring the people back, I ask you readers - What will you be up to this Xmas? Christmas is here once again, my favourite time of the year!
Everyone is happy, joyous and all that crap and…no wait. Everyone is still flippin miserable, not one damn shop out there in London has got a Baby Jesus in a manger display in their shop windows. It’s Sale this, and Sale that. Has everyone actually forgotten the meaning of Christmas and what it represents? Now I’m not a religious person, actually I’m not religious one bit but Christmas still means a lot to me, so it just gets to me when I don’t see stuff like that.
I always get chirpy around this time of the month, although I’m still amazed at how fast the year has progressed by. I mean, I still remember in detail exactly what I did last Xmas…drunk and sickly for the most part. This year I’ve been hoping to go to Hannover, Germany to visit my pals over there but I think I’ve left it a bit late to get my ticket, let alone make quick preparations to leave.
I just don’t know what to do this Xmas. Most people spend it with friends and family. All my friends have more or less immigrated out of the Uk, so that’s one idea gone down the pan. I don’t really have any proper family here, so that’s another thing out the way. I could spend it with my parents but then again I did that last year! I might call some work colleagues over for Xmas instead and have a get together dinner party or something. Right now given the situation, it doesn’t seem so bad.
So dear readers, what will you be up to this Crimbo?
