Monday 15 December 2008

6 days til Yule...

... and I've done sod all Pagan-wise pretty much all year.

This could also explain what's missing from my life. I know that I was a lot happier when I used to be with the other Pagans/Wiccans, doing meditations, practicing skills and even just generally hanging out with them!

I must vow to myself to be a "better Pagan" next year. I really do want to do more esoteric stuff, try to get more control over my mind and spirituality.

Fingers crossed, eh?

lolspeak; another way to celebrate stupidity...

Technically I think this should also go onto "screamingpan" as well because this will turn into a rant...

What the living FUCK is this "lolspeak" all about?

I did a search on Google images this morning for "mouse" and saw a picture from "icanhascheezburger.com"; one of these stupid effing "lolcat" pics...

Which got me researching (damn you Google!!) into the whole lolcat/lolspeak phenomenon.

And after reading through several posts and sites explaining what it all means, I'm still left with saying "What the FUCK is that all about?!".

Take this for example. These messages were left on icanhascheezburger.com against a picture of a ginger cat, not looking very impressed with a blue and white checked bow around its neck with the caption "DEATH... Wears a cute little bow".

And these are some of the messages;

"Lukk owt hyooman"

"We awl waitin foar new poastwif bayted bref!Toona bayted purrhaps?Happee nawt sekund to U!"

"Kittehz do nawt need eggstra dekurashun"

"an iz werrinGING HAM?? o yz, sumwun IZ gonna dii foar dis!!"

Is this what we get for living in a world where Teletubbies are allowed to exist? Several generations (I have checked some of the profiles and there are people in their THIRTIES typing like this) of society communicating in grammatically nightmarish ways?

And we wonder why kids these days are stupid? Try taking a look at yourselves...

Wednesday 10 December 2008

Schizoid







This game was suggested to be by Shiv, and I must say...

... it fucking rocks!!!!

Schizoid is a crazy, mad, brain-fuck cum motor-function fuckup of a game!!

The goal is simple; there's two ships on screen, one red and one blue. You have to "eat" the enemies of your colour whist avoiding enemies of the opposite colour. Sounds simple? Yes and no...

Admittedly I haven't played it that much, but what I have played I'm seriously impressed with. A very, very addictive game which will have you screaming in frustration, especially in Uberschizoid mode where you control both the blue and red ships.
If you enjoy games such as Rez, Every Extended Extra Extreme (E4), Feeding Frenzy and various others of that type, definitely download the demo and give it a go.

I think this is one that I will have to buy the full game of once I've got a bit of cash!

Monday 8 December 2008

*bend Vista over, insert Red Alert disc*

Really chuffed with myself. Managed to get Red Alert (the original version, non-XP or Vista compliant) running on a Vista machine!

Also managed to LAN up the Vista laptop and XP PC, did a bit of fiddling around and now got LAN multiplayer up and running! FUCK YEAH!!

Had my arse handed to me several times last night by Kaz (she's a RA player, I'm more Tiberian Sun), gotta get her back!

I'll update this post later when I'm back home and put links to the files and patches I used.

No more gChat for Mr Pan...

Just come in this morning to discover that the ports have been blocked again...

*sighs*

Getting bored of this...

Friday 5 December 2008

No more gChat for Mr Pan..?

... or maybe not!

I think... *looks over his shoulder, leans forwards and lowers his voice*

... I think they've opened the ports the chat channel uses... Shhh! Don't tell them!

*grins excitedly*

I'm finally gonna be able to interact with people outside of work within work!!!

:D

Monday 1 December 2008

Bowling, singing and pulling! (and "The Thrush")

Well it's been a funny ol' weekend.

Had le Fish over for the weekend (still there now!), been keeping him cheery and perky (attemptedly) after his breakup.

Been chatting, smoking, introduced him to Magic: The Gathering (and I think I've got him hooked) and went bowling as well on Sunday.

He said he doesn't bowl much because it's "boring". I think it's other people being pissed off at him being so good! His best round was:

Strike, Strike, 1 to half-strike, Strike, Strike, 9 and miss, Strike, Split 6 and 2, Split 8 and miss, 6 to half-strike and 3... Ended with 165 points (beat Kaz by 60 points and me by 100!!).

Then went back to Ruislip to pick up some of his stuff; had a nice journey there, lots of singing and catching the eyes of pretty ladies (sorry Kaz! lol [she already knows about this]), managed to get Gary to pull (with a bit of assistance ;-)), then went to his, he got his stuff, a bit of hanging around, and then the journey back - laughing all the way.

He asked me about whether I'd be a superhero or a supervillain.

Well it's obvious; supervillian. Far less responsibility. You don't see people going "Ooo Magneto! We're dying! Save us!" He'd meerly sneer at you before you die in your horrible epic-action way.

Which lead onto Superman; Superman is the world's bitch... Anyone's got any problems;
- "Superman! Superman! My cat's stuck up a tree!"
- "Don't worry citizen, I shall save it!"

And he has to do it. No callateral damage either.

Which lead on to Gary asking me what powers I would have as a supervillian. I first decided that I would be a god. Easiest thing to be, no complications. And how would I be a supervillian? Simple... I'd waste other superheros' times. Whilst they're trying to save a nuclear reactor from going critical, I'd give them a call (one of my powers is always being able to get in touch with the superhero I want to irritate) and say something like "Superman..... I've run out of milk... Go get some for me..." And my catchphrase? "No superpowers..." So Superman would have to WALK to Tescos, go and get some milk (obviously dressed as Superman) to only discover that because he's Superman and not Clarke Kent, he's left his wallet behind so he'll have to walk back to mine (or even better, beg!) to get some cash!

And this just went on and on and on, finding more ingenious excuses for wasting their times; "Batman........ I've run out of bog roll, can you get me one please?"
"Is it an emergency?"
"Yes! I'm sitting on the bog now!!! I neeeeed it!!"
"*sighs*"

And my supervillian name?


"The Thrush"...

lol...


-- EDIT --

I found a silly little Marvel Create-a-Superhero thing... Here's my first workings for "The Thrush"


Monday 24 November 2008

Love hurts

Been helping someone through a break-up.

Really fucking hurts.

Seeing them like that just reminded me so much of how I was hurt by love. I pray I'll NEVER be in that situation again; I really don't think I could handle feeling that much pain again.

Friday 21 November 2008

No more gChat for Mr Pan...

... and he's fucking brewing about it.

We switched over to a new proxy server at work... gChat is now blocked... permanantly...

I raised a ticket to get it released:

"This has been enabled in the past and is quite useful to quickly message a colleague (who also has gmail) to ask them a question if they're on the phone. (not everyone acknowledges their Outlook new mail popups).

I do not have a direct url or error message, simply gchat stating: "Your Internet connection is experiencing problems or your network administrator has blocked Google Mail chat.""

The response I got?

"Sorry - access to chat is blocked. The chat category has always been blocked however the new service is more up to date than the old hence the reason the feature has now been caught. You can submit a business justification for consideration but this needs to be based on a bussiness requirement rather than personal preference."

What a load of fucking bullshit...

Honestly; the service was avaiable before... Just because you're shitty crap proxy servers aren't smart enough to pick it up, doesn't mean you have the right to close it off now.

I'm really not fucking happy, this was my main contact to the outside world in this shitty place.

Monday 29 September 2008

Time to look again...

... at more than one thing!

House; need to get the hell out of the place we're staying in. Bloody building is a death-trap (had the electrician round a couple of nights ago, half of the wiring he described in his own words as "totally illegal"), having some issues with housemates, just want a bit more privacy.

Job; I am getting so f**king annoyed with waisting my sodding time coming in at 8am, probably doing 30-45mins work (very max) before I've cleared out the entire work queue. Then it's just a case of sitting here, waiting for an e-mail or phonecall to come in, raising a ticket, forwarding it on...

That is my job... Boring - MIND NUMBINGLY boring - as hell, don't really socialise with members of the staff here...

It's one of these "dream jobs" that lazy people always have a go at me for complaining about. I'm sorry, but if I'm going to work, then I expect to work, not sit around twiddling my thumbs asking every 10mins if there's something else to do!!!

So yeah, started applying (again) online, hopefully something good will come up.

Until then, it's back to sitting at my desk, yawning my head off and looking up random shit.

The joys of work...

Pan

Thursday 25 September 2008

Waiting for change

I'm still here, still raising tickets, answering the phone, still letting my mind rot into oblivion, still waiting for my consultant to get back to me (and get me the fuck out of here)...

And it's eating me alive, it really is. I can't carry on working here. I had a guy shadow working me the past two days to learn how to do the job just in case we need him in in an emergency; he had learnt everything he needed by lunchtime on the first day.

Having him sitting with me only highlighted how much I fucking hate this place. I'm sitting here doing sweet fuck all. I shouldn't even have time to update my blog, let alone learn about binaural beats or how to look after a Malamute.

I should be busy, my mind should be engaged with work, but it's all so fucking brainless...

As for moving over onto Problem Management; I'm really, really not interested. It's boring. It's analysing problems and finding out ways to prevent... I don't give a shit about that. Business Management bullshit. Give me a broken computer, I'll fix it, don't ask me to fix your fucking company...

Had a reply back from the agents who are letting the property to us; she's trying to play hardball but she's gonna loose. Stupid cow doesn't realise that although we've signed a contract with her, it's completely void as her company is now operating under a different name with a different business address, different bank details etc.

She's saying that she's also not going to repair several things which are broken in the house either because it's not her responsibility or because it was broken before we moved in (and therefore - according to her - doesn't need to be fixed/replaced).

I've really had enough of that bitch. I want to look for somewhere else to live.

Someone, please just pull me out of this crap..!

Friday 19 September 2008

Binaural Beats

Been doing lots of reading in my weakened state (that and having a very quiet day at work).

Read up more about Binaural Beats (frequency modulations which have an effect on brainwaves). Really interesting subject, actually. I borrowed a CD from someone, the artist being "Michael Mantra", the album called "Sonic Altar".

It was a sort of background noise feel to it with sounds of the sea, rainfall, there was a section with a thunderstorm, and all throughout was a sort of chanting (I think that the voices were used to create the beat frequency).

Anyway, I'll put a bit of blurb up here followed by a link to the Wiki article. Worth a read if you're interested in how the brain works.

-------------------------
Perceived human hearing is limited to the range of frequencies from 20 Hz to 20,000 Hz, though Infrasound - sound below 20Hz - still have scientifically observable effects on humans, however, it is not readily audible, especially at low volume levels.

When the perceived beat frequency corresponds to the delta, theta, alpha, beta, or gamma range of brainwave frequencies, the brainwaves entrain to or move towards the beat frequency.

For example, if a 315 Hz sine wave is played into the right ear and a 325 Hz one into the left ear, the brain is entrained towards the beat frequency (10 Hz, in the alpha range). Since alpha range is associated with relaxation, this has a relaxing effect or if in the beta range, more alertness. An experiment with binaural sound stimulation using beat frequencies in the Beta range on some participants and Delta/Theta range in other participants, found better vigilance performance and mood in those on the awake alert state of Beta range stimulation.

Binaural beat stimulation has been used fairly extensively to induce a variety of states of consciousness, there has been some work done in regards to the effects of these stimuli on relaxation, focus, attention, and states of consciousness. Studies have shown that with repeated training to close frequency sounds that a plastic reorganization of the brain occurs for the trained frequencies and is capable of asymmetric hemispheric balancing.

{{Why the hell is it so bloody hard to insert a table into this sodding blog?!?}}

Frequency RangeNameUsually associated with:
> 40 HzGamma wavesHigher mental activity, including perception, problem solving, fear and consciousness
13-40 HzBeta wavesActive, busy or anxious thinking and active concentration, arousal, cognition
7-13 HzAlpha wavesRelaxation (while awake), pre-sleep and pre-wake drowsiness
4-7 HzTheta wavesDreams, deep meditation, REM sleep
< 4 HzDelta wavesDeep dreamless sleep, loss of body awareness


{{it took me over half an hour to try and insert this sodding table. NOTE FOR PEOPLE WHO WANT TO PUT HTML TABLES INTO THEIR BLOGS: Make sure the code for your table has NO LINE BREAKS in them (in notepad with Word Wrap off, should be one long line of coding)}}

Man flu

I've got a cold...

Been fucking ages since I've had a cold...

Can't actually remember the last time I had a cold... Must've been over a year ago...

My throat hurts...

Fucking hate having colds...

(FYI, women; I'm still at work, I'm not shirking off of my duties, I'm just moaning)

Bloody "man flu" bollocks...

Thursday 18 September 2008

The Cost of Health

This is rediculous...

We discovered how much Kaz's meds are going to cost her (they've told her that they're not going to give her any more free medication):

The steroids are £7.10 a box. One box will last Kaz a day and a half.

So take the number of days in a year and divide it by how many days a box lasts her (365 /1.5) which gives us 243.33(rec) prescription renewals.

Times that by the cost of a box (243.33 x 7.10) gives us a yearly outgoing for her steroids of £1,727.66.

Anyone else think thats f**king rediculously expensive?

Monday 15 September 2008

Hit me with your rhythm sticks!

Hit me! Hit me!
Je t'adore, ich liebe dich,
Hit me! hit me! hit me!

*shakes his head to clear the embolism*

Sorry... Blame my father...

Aaaaanyway, played in the Thames Festival yesterday (Sun 14th Sept), was a good laugh actually (apart from all of the crowds [fucking hate pedestrians...]), the parade was a bit long to start off and we had a couple of minor problems with the sound system, but apart from that was quite enjoyable!

Got photos uploaded already, check them out here:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/misterpan/72157607302387601/

Well done to everyone who took part.

(1hr 48mins remaining)

Pan

Friday 12 September 2008

Anonymous Users

This is a message singularly for the user who has been posting on my blog under the name "Anonymous".

Listen (or read, if you want to be anal about it), if you'd read my latest post then you would see that I have admitted my mistake (even though I still believe that the person who created that hoax had far too much time on their hands).

The one thing I do object to is anyone leaving anonymous posts. Obviously your amazing intellect has allowed you to come up with the idea of creating a user account with the name of anonymous therefore making yourself void to the anonymous posting rule (I applaud you, congratulations).

What I'm starting to wonder now is why you have to post as an anonymous user instead of having the guts (or decency, whichever walk of life you're from) to actually say who you are?

The only thing that I can think of is that you don't want to put yourself under target to a barrage of insults and abuse (which personally I don't actually have the time or energy for).

Anyway, to my point:

Anonymous posts = deletion (no matter how smart you think you're being)

If you want to point the finger and laugh, feel free, all of my mates would tell you that I'm the first person to admit if I've made a mistake (which I already have if you'd read my latest post [kind of ironic when you think about it, considering you were ripping into me for not reading an entire post correctly]), but if you're gonna do it, don't cower behind an anonymous name.

Pan

Kill me...

You know things are bad when you're sitting at your desk, whistling the Windows XP start-up tune...

I admit that I'm wrong...

OK, ok, ok...

So I've been - what's the expression - RickRoll'd?

Basically I've been made a fool of by some little tosser who's got far too much time and money on his hands (and obviously quite a few issues with religion to actually imitate someone with such strong opinions).

I am of course talking about this Antispore site.

One thing that did make me chuckle was that a couple of people left posts on my blog, one being anonymous (removed because of that fact), the other having a closed profile, no doubt to try and protect himself from any abuse!

Now I admit that I was wrong, but surely leaving posts saying "AHHHH!!! YOU GOT RICKROLL'D!!!" or whatever bollocks they've said, is lowering yourself not just to my standards, but below it? The fact that you have to make yourselves feel big, good and clever by slating someone for being sucked in to a hoax.

You two people (Anonymous [should you ever read this] and DisGamer) would maybe find more enjoyment by watching me possibly post more messages onto the Antispore blog, you may even find some of it amusing.

Anyway, once more, YES, I WAS WRONG.

Thursday 11 September 2008

Antispore

This woman has just put up another fantastic post which I've taken much enjoyment out of ripping it apart and examining each statement. See if you agree...

She said:

I think part of the problem that is going on here is that the bulk of you are ignorant as to the word of God. I don’t have these beliefs just because I want to, I have them because they are the beliefs that I was raised in. I understand that everyone didn’t have the chance to be taught these things, and learn about God as my family did so if I am going to have this kind of attention I should use it to help teach others about the words of God that helped to shape me into the woman I am today.

Everyone I am sure knows the passage that in the beginning God created heaven and earth. But there is more then just this one that people remember.

In Genesis 1:2 there is more talk about God’s work. “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”

So it’s clear that Earth was made by God’s hand, not science. From this God moved to creating all the creatures, notice there is never talk of creatures ‘evolving’ into other creatures, instead God is able to make the creatures as he will including man.

In Genesis 1:25-27 “25. God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good. 26. Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground.” 27. So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them.”
People of science claim that the Earth is the way it is because of millions of years of time and science effecting it. But we are taught and believe that our world is this way and has the aged look because of the flood of Noah. It was the waters covering the Earth on such a grand scale that caused the aging that people of science claim as proof.


But in the Bible we are told in Genesis 6:7 “So the LORD said, “I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth–men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air–for I am grieved that I have made them.””

But the Bible teaches us that God was not done with man. For we were His creation and He then spoke to Noah in Genesis 8:21-27 after the flood. “21. The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood. And never gonna give you up. 22. “Never gonna let you down.” 23.”Never gonna run around and desert you.” 24. “Never gonna make you cry.” 25. “Never gonna say goodbye.” 26. “Never gonna tell a lie and hurt you.” 27.”Never truly believe anything you read on the Internet. There will always be cases of Poe’s Law.”

It’s these teachings that I’ve spent my life learning, believing and becoming, that have made me the woman that I am today.

I say:

Mr Pan on 11 Sep 2008 at 10:16 am 167

You really have left me with no choice… Brace yourself.

I will now point out some vital huge errors in your latest post:

Genesis 1:2 “And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters.”
- The earth had a name, and it had a face. It existed, god just meerly gave it a more humbled appearance

Genesis 1:25 “God made the wild animals according to their kinds, the livestock according to their kinds, and all the creatures that move along the ground according to their kinds.”
- By using the words “according to their kinds”, that indicates that they already had existed or had been conceived to have existed and had preset behavioural patterns that god could not influence

Genesis 1:25 “…And God saw that it was good”
- If he saw that it was good then why did he have to destroy everything with the great flood?

Genesis 1:26 “Then God said, “Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth
- Man to rule over the earth, not god (and god said that so it must be true…)

Genesis 1:27 “So God created man in his own image”
- So I was right about god being a horrible, cruel person. After all, look at what humanity has done to itself and the world we live in. Surely this isn’t the work of a god, more of a devil… Is god really Satan?

Genesis 6:7 “So the LORD said, “I will wipe mankind, whom I have created, from the face of the earth–men and animals, and creatures that move along the ground, and birds of the air–for I am grieved that I have made them.””
- So he really must’ve been wrong when he said in Genesis 1:25 “And God saw that it was good” I thought god was never wrong..? Also, if as the bible states “God created man in his own image”, he must hate himself seeing that he essencially destoyed himself, as we were an image of god?

Genesis 8:21 “The LORD smelled the pleasing aroma and said in his heart: “Never again will I curse the ground because of man, even though every inclination of his heart is evil from childhood.”
- But if we were made in god’s image, surely it is god himself who’s heart is evil and not our own?

I think I’m starting to work out a lot more how this god bloke works…

Spore is "the work of the devil" (apparently)

OK, I don't normally do this, but I really need to rip into this site (and welcome you to do likewise).

EA recently released an absolutely genius idea for a game called "Spore" where you start off as a single celled organism and evolve your way through to the space age and beyond.

One of my mates sent me a link to this site, and it really does sadden/scare me how extreme religious people can be...

http://antispore.com/

***UPDATE***

I posted something on antispore.com; I really hope it gets accepted.

"Mr Pan on 11 Sep 2008 at 5:50 am 323
(Your comment is awaiting moderation.)

I can't help but be amused at the Google Ads which are on this blog; any one else noticed that they're advertising Spore to buy online?

Owner of this blog: Do you now believe that Google are in line with Beelzebub and all of his hellish minions in trying to corrupt the world?

Tell me; were you also one of the people who protested about the Harry Potter movies and novels because it "promotes witchcraft" (and if you think *that's* witchcraft then you're in for a shock…)?

I'm also assuming that you're one of those types who thinks that "The DaVinci Code" is "an act that is repulsive to god and man, [and] it shows how the church has compromised with their world system and abandoned the simple truth of the Gospel of Jesus Christ" (or some other pious nonsense like that)?

Does it not say in the bible "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." We are all human and not one of us is free from having sinned in life (not even you); regardless of whether we have been forgiven or not. The only true one who can cast that stone would be god (should he exist).

I'd also like to highlight the lack of capitalisation in the words "god, him, one" etc; this is because I do not believe in your god, and if he did exist, it's a very sad outlook on life that this petty maniacal bastard would punish souls to a lifetime of hellfire and torment simply because they didn't believe in him…"

I'm sorry, but people like that really piss me off...

Anal Cleavage Decent

Yes, it's exactly as it sounds...

Crackdown; one of the most fun and pointless games I've played on the 360 to date.

Take GTA4, pump a shit-load of steroids into your character, add a rediculous amount of carnage, then add the ability to play the entire game Co-op, Live.

I cannot believe that I missed this game when it came out; apparently it was one of the first few games released onto the 360!

Official Crackdown site

From Wiki:

"Crackdown was conceived by Realtime Worlds' founder, David Jones, who also created Grand Theft Auto and Lemmings.

Set in the fictional Pacific City, the player controls a cybernetically-enhanced Agent, tasked with defeating three crime lords and their organized crime syndicates. The Agent's abilities improve by defeating both crime lords and their supporters, as well as by completing optional activities, such as street races and scavenger hunts. The gameplay is nonlinear: instead of following a rigid mission sequence, players are free to select the approach to completing their missions and activities.

Crackdown, initially planned for release on the original Xbox console, was envisioned as a vast world in which players could experiment and explore freely. Even though this concept was implemented for the Xbox 360 version, playtesters were largely critical of the game, leading Microsoft Game Studios to fear that it would not be well received. To boost sales, Microsoft Game Studios bundled Crackdown with an access code to the multiplayer test version of the much-anticipated Halo 3. At least partially as a result, the game sold 1.5 million copies in its first six months of release. Despite initial concerns, Crackdown received positive reviews and has garnered several awards for its innovative gameplay."

I would seriously recommend everyone tries this game, highly addictive and equally pointless but fun!

Monday 8 September 2008

Zzzzzzz...

4 hrs sleep...

One can of Red Bull...

Early shift at work...

*weeps*

Roll on 4pm!

Friday 5 September 2008

Sodding alarms...

If it weren't for Kaz, I would've done it again.

I need to move my alarm clock again.

Anyone else get the problem of your body learning the location of your alarm clock and then managing to turn it off without conciously awakening?

Or am I simply a freak..?!

Pan

Thursday 4 September 2008

Kaz and the morning

Went to see Kaz last night, had a very long talk, a bit of a cry and things seem to be ok now.

Worked out that we're obviously both very stressed at the moment, and unfortunately when we're stressed we're not very good at communicating with each other.

But yeah, left her in a good mood which I'm pleased with.

As for this morning... *shakes head*

Missed all of my sodding alarms, slept right through them and didn't get into the office until 11:30am... So fucking embarrassed (and pissed off) with myself.

Fun, fun, fun...

Wednesday 3 September 2008

Can't handle it

She says that the steroids are giving her really dark thoughts and feelings and that she can't stay in the hospital any more...

I can't do this any more, I really can't.

I'm spent.

Help

By the skin...

Kaz is back in again, more blood tests, more biopsies...

I dunno what to do... Everyone's telling me to look after myself, which I'm trying to do, but work doesn't really seem that keen to help me.

I've been taking the odd day off every couple of weeks or so simply because I'm pushing myself to the point of physical and mental exhaustion. It's getting so bad now that I'm going to speak to the doctors to see if they can advise me of anything to help me calm down/sleep during the night.

Had yesterday off and came in today. It was mentioned that the IT boss is a bit worried about me taking this time off. They haven't been talking about finding a replacement for me, but if this goes on for much longer then they will have to. Obviously I don't wanna loose my job.

I put up some questions on Yahoo Answers about Kaz's situation; here's the links to them.

Question about Hepatitis testing
Question about Malaria testing

Fortunately this has helped calm my mind a bit, but obviously with things still being unknown, I'm grasping at straws to try and find a solution.

Fingers crossed we'll know something in a couple of weeks...

Tuesday 26 August 2008

More on Kaz

So, Kaz is back home now, has been since Mon 11th August.

We still don't know what's going on, she's still yellow, still itching. On a good note, she has started to go back to work again, starting her 2nd week back today, still eating/drinking with no problems, it's just the damned itching.

She's been trying to get hold of the Royal Free Hospital since she got out to arrange a time and date for a blood test and a chat with her doctor, only to be told time after time that they were "fully booked" (like they're a fucking hotel or something...). Over half a dozen times she's called them, leaving a message for them to get back with her with a confirmed time with her doctor, and sweet FA is being done about it.

This week we're hoping to get her an appointment with a Hospital of Tropical Infectious Diseases, see if they can tell us anything more. We were told at both Newham General and Royal Free that she was definitely clear of Hepatitis A, B, C and Malaria. Upon doing research and posting items up on different medical forums, we've recently discovered that it takes up to two months, sometimes longer, for the cultures to properly grow and come back with conclusive evidence, so how Newham General cleared them out within a week is beyond me.

In other news, it was our 11 month anniversary yesterday, went to the cinema to watch "Wall-E". Surprisingly good! Won't give anything away, save that a little robot actually manages to save the human race (long story but worth it!).

Work's been going ok, been busy with updating the intranet site. That's nearly done now, so gods know what I'll be doing next!

Anyway, back to the fun of the office.

Peace!

Pan

Monday 4 August 2008

Update on the Update on the Kaz...

Hey all,

Just found out it's all a load of bollocks, she hasn't got Auto-Immune Hepatitis, they don't know what's wrong with her, and it doesn't look like she will be going home on Wednesday...

Joy, joy, effing joy...

A very tiredPan

Update on the Kaz!

Hey all,

It's been an absolutely shattering couple of weeks, but it looks as if Kaz is finally starting to get better!

She has now officially been diagnosed with Auto-Immune Hepatitis. As the name implies, this means that her own body (for whatever reason) is rejecting her liver.

However, she's now on steroids, her eating is back to normal, her skin is going back to its normal colour; hopefully I may have her back home by this weekend (Sat 9th Aug)!

I just want to say a massively huge thanks to everyone who has helped me/us out. I really don't know what we would've done without you guys, you all rock!

Anyway, I'm now back at work (falling asleep at my desk!) and trying to get back into a normal rhythm of things. I won't be able to see Kaz much now that she's been moved into a different hospital, so if any of you feel like giving her a call or text, I know it would be greately appreciated!

The Pan

Monday 21 July 2008

A PROPER update!

ok... So people want an update...

What can I say? Quite a lot has happened recently.

No longer working at RW Communications, now working as a sub-contractor for Plan Net, currently being employed by CLS in Exchange Harbour; just south of Canary Wharf in the financial district. Doing helpdesk analyst work, and I must admit it's not all that enthralling.

Almost the complete opposite of what I was doing at RW Comms; a call would come in, I'd remote onto their computer, find the problem, fix it, update my call ticket and close it off. Nice and simple.

Here, I don't actually do anything technical at all! A call will come through, I will raise a ticket for it, finding out as much info as I can about what's going on with their system (this is all without remoting on to have a look myself). I then read through my notes, find out which section the ticket needs to be forwarded to (be it IT Admin, IT Tech Support, IT Infrastructure etc. etc. etc.), pass it to them, let them do their bit on it. Once they're done it gets passed back to me. I ask the user if their problem has been sorted. If not, it goes back to whoever, they have to go through it again, try their fix, pass it back to me, I check with user, then hopefully possibly I get to close off the call.

So yeah, a real change to what I was doing!

What else?

Moved into East Ham, into a shared house with Kaz, really enjoying that at the moment! It's nice to be living away from the parents, and the house we're in is so much nicer than the one Kaz was in before! No more cockroaches, no more house smelling of cat pee, no more suspicious bottles of "water" left anywhere; it's such a relaxed atmosphere, it's fantastic! The garden hasn't got any grass, but not too worried about that. Got nice friendly neighbours (did some cat-sitting this weekend which was nice), the only problem is the permanent smell of curry!

Apart from that, there isn't really much else major that's been going on. No holidays, no exciting other stories, just surviving as best as I/we can!

Friday 18 July 2008

Busy times in the office...

I'll do a proper blog later on, for now, here's something to put a smile on your faces...

This is what my team gets up to at work (when there's not a lot going on...):