Monthly Archives: August 2003

Wonderful Weekend

What a beautiful weekend it has been here in London. It’s been unseasonably hot which makes working in an office with no air-conditioning uncomfortable but, really, it’s the most fantastic weather. We may not be conditioned for it – nor used to it here in the UK – and it’s certainly very difficult to sleep while you sweat, but I wouldn’t change it: and I am one who burns in the slightest bit of sun. Yesterday I spent the most relaxing afternoon on the roof of a friend’s house boat up near Little Venice. Then we wandered through Regent’s Park to see the Fruitstock Festival for nice people. Sitting on the grass listening to music is an ideal way to spend a Sunday afternoon and, of course, in a London park all the hot men wear as little as they can get away with. So, please stop moaning about the weather and go and enjoy the sunshine.

On this day…

2005: 7 Million Londoners, 1 London
2004: Viva Owen?
2002: State Of The Town

More Gay Marriage

Yet again Maggie Gallagher is off on a mission to tie same-sex partnership recognition to the end of the human race (if a few gay men have equal partnership rights then nobody is going to make babies anymore).

Eric, on the other hand, posts some interesting comments about equality.

After reading an article that stated Bush’s intention to sponsor a legislation that seeks to permanently bar same-sex marriage I am quite frustrated. We live in a country that claims to be the land of the free, yet not all of its citizens are not allowed to marry who they love.

EQUALITY & THE HYPOCRISY OF A NATION, http://eric.everydaylies.com/archives/002918.php

On this day…

2006: Changes At Red Bull Racing
2005: Swiss Re Tower, London
2004: Back Ache
2002: Water, Water Everywhere

RSS Feeds

I just wanted to comment once again on the excellent Bloglines service – which I thought was one of the best finds of 2003. If you’re not familiar with he concept of an RSS Aggregator then it’s worth looking a Bloglines and subscribing to some feeds. I find this is by far the fastest way to actually read why I want to read on the web. Bloglines has a clean interface and I can now read my subscriptions from anywhere on the web – which is handy if I am sat somewhere wanting to catch up on the world according to my web. It’s such a shame not quite all the blogs I want to read offer an RSS feed, although I note Blogger now offer atom feeds and I really must work on getting Listen To Musak’s atom feed sorted.

Moreover, it’s now available as a mobile channel for reading on small screens and making it far too easy to spend a lot of money on mobile bandwidth.

I have to RSS feeds available of Listen To Musak, RSS . I present full posts in my RSS feeds – I know some people only offer an excerpt of their sites but I’d rather read the whole thing and, ultimately, it saves bandwidth. If you’re only providing a highlight of an entry please think about giving us the full feed! Anyway, Happy reading.

On this day…

2006: Button Is A Winner!
2005: London’s Living Room
2004: Saturday News
2003: No More Clause 28
2003: July 2003 And All That
2002: Where Are You Now, Miss Boo?

No More Clause 28

Section 28 will now be repealed two months after the Local Government Bill comes into law over the summer.

Stonewall

I was reading the Stonewall site earlier and came across a piece of news that I either missed or hasn’t been widely reported: Section 28 is no more. Isn’t that fantastic news and about time. But why has it been so widely under-reported?

On this day…

2006: Button Is A Winner!
2005: London’s Living Room
2004: Saturday News
2003: RSS Feeds
2003: July 2003 And All That
2002: Where Are You Now, Miss Boo?

July 2003 And All That

Looking back of July’s figures, I see that the success of the comments on Man of the Moment means my stats keep creeping upwards – which is nice. Man of the Moment was a little side-project (originally an experiment with multiple Movable Type blogs for one content site/set) that I quite liked playing with. I will, hopefully, continue because it’s also a fascinating insight into the trends of the world. At the start of last month I would have sworn that Dermot O’Leary would make the top slot on the stats – Big Brother was popular and he was getting by far the most hits. Little Mark Owen’s single release, however, has eclipsed all that. I wonder where latest Man, Josh Hartnett, will be by the end of next month? What I love about maintaining my blog is that I get to observe these trends at first hand.

Talking of Movable Type, I see they’ve just released the hosted version which is known as TypePad. Personally, I really enjoy maintaining my own web space but if you want a blogging tool and don’t want the hassle of installing it yourself, then TypePad looks like a great solution. Movable Type is great so I suspect TypePad will also be a quality tool. I just hope Six Apart get to add some of the great features they’ve put into TypePad into Movable Type – I for one would pay for them!

Perhaps I should also use Google’s new synonym feature to look for an alternative word to ‘great’ – but it’s far too late in the day for that sort of thing.

On this day…

2006: Button Is A Winner!
2005: London’s Living Room
2004: Saturday News
2003: RSS Feeds
2003: No More Clause 28
2002: Where Are You Now, Miss Boo?

Things To Say

There is a great deal to talk about which I want to get round to at some point. At least to acknowledge there is much to say:

And probably much, much more. Oh for a day off to enjoy the sunshine.

On this day…

2006: Dropped at 0815
2006: A Glass Pyramid
2004: Doesn’t Time Fly?
2003: Five Live and Weblogs
2002: To Some People Enola Gay is Just a Pop Song

Five Live and Weblogs

Well, Tom’s just been on BBC Radio Five Live (and he has something of a sexy tone to his voice) talking about weblogs. It’s interesting to see weblogs being discussed by more and more media which will hopefully bring them to the attention of more and more people and that can only be a good thing for personal publishing.

On this day…

2006: Dropped at 0815
2006: A Glass Pyramid
2004: Doesn’t Time Fly?
2003: Things To Say
2002: To Some People Enola Gay is Just a Pop Song

Ciao Is The New Hi

Howdy,

Of course language is constantly changing. I do like the survey from MSN which suggests that the words hello and goodbye may be obsolete in a generation. This is the wonderful power of language – it can’t be controlled and it’s constantly being reinvented. I am waiting for the backlash that talks about standards falling for lo, it is sure to come.

So, hello, hello, hello. Goodbye.

Laters

On this day…

2006: Thinking About Time
2002: Baby News

Seven Inches of Joy

And lo it came to pass that after years and years of waiting, Mark Owen’s new single Four Minute Warning was released this morning. And, as I’ve said elsewhere, I like it. In fact, I like it so much I went and bought the single – which at £1.99 seems to me to be the right price for a single. While I was stood in Tower Records handing over my two pound coins, it struck me that it has been a very, very long time since I bought a single at all and I can’t even remember what it was.

I can, however, remember the first single I bought. I was around eight years old (back in 1978 which just shows what an old duffer I am) and I desperately wanted a copy of the theme tune to Southern Television’s Famous Five TV series. I had saved all my money (I don’t remember how much it was) and raced around the shops of Wigan for it. Eventually, I found it and must have played it 1000 times that night. I can still remember the magic and joy of that moment.

I wonder if an mp3 of that exists? I still have the vinyl but nothing to play it on!

On this day…

2006: Who Will Be Mayor