I am......

75% Geek

Mesa Dating

What I have been trying recently....

As has probably become very apparent if you had visited my blog, I am a bit of a geek.

Nothing gives more satisfaction then to find a new extension for FireFox or a new way to waste some time on the Internet.

I have been aided in the past by my friends and colleagues (I do work in IT - it does tend to attract the upper strata of geeks) but more recently I have found a website that provides my choicest and most interesting new finds. It is called LifeHacker (LH).

Most recently, I have been steered to try 3 new things which I want to share with you now....

Firstly, I am really bad at organising my time - I find it hard to work out what to do and when to do it (the usually problem of just doing things as they come along (and not prioritising)).
I decided I needed to work smarter and, via LH, I found a site called Remember the Milk (RTM). It is a site for putting together a to-do list and setting priorities, time-frames and most importantly reminding me of when to do them!
It took a while to load my work tasks and personal to-dos into it and make sure I worked out which ones reoccurred and how long they would take me to do. The initial time spent has rewarded itself ten-fold, RTM will send me an email and/or a IM to my gtalk whenever a task is due and aiding new tasks is really simple!
It has made me more productive at work and I can now remember stuff - so its all good.
It has loads of kewl options, like tagging (a-la Gmail), adding locations, emailing tasks to people and a great search engine - it even allows me to postpone tasks!

Secondly, as a follow-on to remembering stuff I wanted a better way (or more fun) to look at my expenditure then just keeping a dull spreadsheet. Again LH came to my rescue with a piece on Buxfer. It allows me to make a note of all my expenses and see what I spend my cash on (always handy).
The reason why I like it is because I can tag all my expenses (as you can see I like the idea of tagging) and again it has a good search engine so I can find my entries. It has also got some obligatory expenditure analysis - very kewl (note: I know I'm sad - but I do work in MI).

Thirdly, I have found a really fun way to spend sometime on the internet and its called Twitter. Basically, this is a social-pseudo-blog. The premise is that you send msgs or Tweets (via IM, Txt or by the website) to all the world or just your friends with the answer to the question 'what are you doing?' - but you don't have to answer the question, instead you can post what you like when you like.
It is really addictive as I can send a quick Tweet (via Gtalk) in seconds and let poeple I know what I'm doing and how I'm feeling - and I have set it up to recieve all my tweets from my friends.
It is also quasi-voyeuristic as you can see all the msgs form people or all over the world (I'm not brave enough to have my tweets open to the public) and there are some very amusing people on like Darth Vader!

I have probably cemented my reputation as a geek but I have really got into using these sites and am having fun or being more productive as I result!

.....wanders of to read a book which is not at all geeky (even if it is a Fantasy book which I have archived here!).......

LiS

The Blog that goes like this...

This weekend I took my Papa LiS to see quite possibly the funniest musical I have ever been too!

We went to see Monty Python's Spamalot!

I have been a huge fan of the Python's since my dad allowed me to stay up late to watch the many re-runs that the BBC or C4 used to show. To a ten-year old some of the jokes went over my head but within a few tender years, I was a die hard fan!

The Holy Grail has always been a favourite of mine and when I heard that the musical version of it was finally coming to London, I thought it was time to pay my thanks to Papa LiS for getting me hooked on them!

The show really doesn't disappoint - it has all the comedic japes of the film with an excellent 'mickey-take' of the musical genre. As soon as King Arthur prances on to the stage to the sound of coconuts, the laughter begins and doesn't end til the curtain went down.

My favourite moment was the French Taunters: -

"Silly Engleesh Peepol" (Brilliant)


The only downside was that Papa LiS got a bit to carried away and I had to listen to his not so dulcet tones sing "Always Look on the Bright Side of Life"! - but still it was worth the temporary ear-pain.

I would definitely recommend to all fans of humour and tom-foolery to go and see this show....

.....Sir LiS bravely runs away.....


LiS

and it's Hallo from me!

Many thanks for Mr Ward for linking to my blog on his!

I found his excellent blog while searching the world-wide-web for help and advice on the piece of software that I use at work. Both of which I found in abundance - Thanks Mr Ward

I work for a Financial company in Nottingham. I work in the IT department on the MI team doing BI (I love acronyms - don't you ;) ).
The company is currently engaged in a multi-million pound project to update its IT system, using a product called Siebel.

I have spent the last year working with lots of people from my company and their strategic partners implementing this new system. Specifically, I have been working on producing the Management Information to the business (to tell them all the things they need to know and even some stuff they didn't know they needed to know!).

As this is my first major project - it's been a challenging time! I have learnt a lot about how things get done and how to get things done.

The new tool that we are using is called Siebel Analytics - now know as Oracle Analytics or Oracle BI or something. Coming from a background in Business Objects, it was quite an experience to learn a new system.
I can now say I'm an 'expert' (of 1 and 1/2 years) in my new tool of choice and we are getting close to delivering the final part of the project to the business.

That's enough about me and what I do - sure it will be dull for many people - sorry

....wanders off to plan a more random post....


LiS

Doodles....from a galaxy far, far away......

..... I tend to be a bit of a manic doodler when I'm a pondering the questions of the universe (or work) and while usually I end up with non-recognisable shapes on my pad (amongst actual notes that maybe useful) when I looked at my pad this week I found that my sub-conscious had been hard at work!

I think I have discovered a new art form move over Stick-men, I have developed Stick-Starwars-Vehicles!!!

I have managed using the medium of sticks and circles to depict some well-known ships:

X-Wing

B-Wing

The Death Star

Star Destroyer

Tie-Fighter

And Darth-Vader Advanced Tie!

Mrs LiS thinks that I need to work harder to ensure that I can afford all the therapy I need!

.....wanders off to see if my doodles can be interpreted.....

LiS

Dearly Beloved....

....you are gathered here to celebrate the times and lives affected by Star Wars...

....it is almost a year since I hung up my bowcaster and had my last forlorn walk around my riverside home and said good-bye to StarWars Galaxies (SWG).

It ended a two year romp in the universe of Star Wars - the universe that has made a large part of my life; the films all came out during my formative years and I grew up with a figure of be-mudded Luke in one hand and a battered Darth Vader in the other (obviously making the obligatorily 'whoshing' sounds).

When I heard that a game was coming along that allowed me to 'live' in a Star Wars world - I thought there could be no better game concept and for a while there wasn't.

I met friends and enemies, explored all the familiar worlds and scenes of the films. I battled StormTroppers, met Luke and Leia, worked for 'Jabba the Hut' and became an exotic Dancer!

Saddly for many reasons I said goodbye to SWG and my life has been a shade more dull.

Fortunately, I still had all the films on DVD and I had the various LucasArts Star Wars games to play! AND I had my collection of Star Wars Lego!!!

But now in a new home, my Star Wars Lego is now under threat (cos I aint got no room to display them all) and with the anniversary of leaving SWG it has made ebaying (gulp) some of my sets that much easier to bear (I'm sure psychotherapists will read alot into this!).

So before I wonder off I will leave you with this - check out ebay if you want some Star Wars goodies!
And here is me in the SWG with some of my online (but also real-life) friends!


....LiS wanders off thinking of earning lots and about SWG2

I Can See My House From Here!

A New Year and I have decided to kick start 'There and Back Again' for 2007!

Unfortunately I'm going to subject you all to some more ramblings and I will get more codes out there for you to crack (still upset no-one managed to decode my last one !).

It has been a busy few months in the LiS household - we have moved said household and have just about got sorted things out.

Basking in the satisfaction that things are all in relatively good order (thanks to Mrs LiS - as everyone knows ordering stuff isn't my forte) - I decided to scope out the new house on the Internet thanks to the trusty Google Maps.
As usual, it found my postcode and showed me in satellitey goodness a picture of my house and its surroundings. Admittedly, not in high-res satellitey goodness as we seem to be in satellite black spot - but who cares as I could see my house-ish!

I tend to be a massive Google fan - think the products they produce are fun and simple to use and in my opinion the best out there!
While I was waxing lyrical at work about seeing my house on Google maps and how good the detail was - one of my colleagues said what about 'Live'.

'Pah! I'm not using some 2-bit Google copy-cat!' I said.

But my interest was aroused (I'm aware how sad this sounds) and so I took a deep breathe and tried it.

This is Microsoft Live's picture of my 'old' house and this is Googlemaps.

As you can see the images are much better in Live than Google, they have obviously done a better deal with a company that offers better images - however Google still has the superior search abilities linked to the maps.

So while for high-res satellitey goodness Live is far nice (in most cases), Google still redeems it self in finding stuff goodness!

As you can see, new year - same random ramblings!

...wanders off muttering about whether I can get away with 'satellitey' as a word...

LiS