This post should of been entitled “I love RSS” really. It’s also something I’ve been meaning to write for ages. My TV watching habbits now fall into three situations:

1) “Normal” programmes that I watch week-in-week out. Shows like The Big Bang Theory, Chuck, Law & Order, Eureka etc. etc.

2) “Vidcasts” or Internet TV. So things like Diggnation, Totally Rad Show, Cranky Geeks, Car Tech, Tiki Bar TV etc. etc.

3) One off programmes that just happen to be on.

For the top two things for the past year or so I’ve been gradually moving everything to Miro. For the top item, “normal” TV, I’ve been using Miro in conjunction with TvRSS an excellent website that gives RSS feeds of many current and past TV shows with links to BitTorrent downloads. This is awesome for someone like me being a forgetful person as it means that all my downloads happen automagically behind the scenes and all I have to worry about is making sure I have enough time in the week to watch the show before the next episode is out. The best thing about it is that it’s completely free (if you avoid the obvious legal implications) and means that I can watch the TV I want to watch when I want to watch it. It’s also, due to the pure genius nature that is RSS, insanely easy.

First, You go to TvRSS.

You select Shows from the menu at the top.

You select the show that you want to watch, a quick search with Firefox’s CTRL+F is usually best as sometimes they’re not listed under the correct letter or the name is not fully correct to what it is. Remember, this does rely on humans to index and add shows :p

When there it will give you a list of the previous few episodes on the feed, then you can copy the link Search-based RSS feed to the clipboard.

Switch to the awesome Miro and click Channels > Add New Channel

It should of automatically grabbed the URL from the clipboard and just click OK. It’ll add it to the sidebar and start downloading the latest episode. When new episodes are available it will automatically start downloading them and you’ll see it appear in the “Downloading” tab.

Once they’ve downloaded and ready to watch it’ll pop a little green bubble by the programme with the amount of episodes that are ready to watch.

You can then just click on the video and sit back, crack open the popcorn and watch. It’ll also automatically delete the video 2 days after you’ve watched it so that it frees up your hard drive space, although you can set it to not do that with the “Keep” option.

One other cool feature of Miro is the Miro guide, a user edited and ever expanding list of videos available on the Internets. It’ll recommend you new stuff or let you search by category or title for something you might like.. Even something as mundane as knitting..

I love the Internets, I do.

making life easier since 1908
B

So, I feel it’s time for some new tees and not being at all influenced by online advertising (so it DOES work!) I’ve found another site that sells some awesome stuff. Here’s some cool tees and their pictures. Now if only they‘d give me some money for shouting about it, eh? :p

A classic Celebrity Jeopardy line. Which then, of course, leads on to….

In the words of Alex Albrecht… “This is AWESOME!” So true.

My favourite, MJF, from Family Ties.. he should run. I’d vote. Apart from the not being in the US part, but still..

Yes, so would I.

“Dust in the wind… all we are is dust in the wind”

Do you?

Because it’s true and I’m not just looking at things in the room and saying I love them. I LOVE lamp.

Where we’re going.. we don’t need roads!

And I will buy your beers.

And I have a beet farm.

Do you wear sex panther cologne?

Anyways, off for some shopping!

don’t take things to heart
B

Good evening. I think again I’ve left it ages since posting. Merely just because I haven’t particuarly got that much to post. Work is going okay. Lack of TianTian is going okay due to her leaving her 3 phone which gets insane amounts of foreign minutes for free, although having to work out the old 7 hour ahead rule works out pretty well due to me starting or finishing work around 6am England time lately. There is the possibility of getting us a new housemate soon which should be good as since Raj has left it’s been really quiet in the house as he was pretty much the glue that made us all socialise in the living room, we kinda just sit in our rooms now.

I have no proper internet and I’m typing this on my laptop which I’ve managed to tether to my mobile phone and I’m now thanking Vodafone for their recent move of my data plan to unlimited usage for me. The only problem is that the reception is that bad inside my house that I can’t use the full goodness of 3.5G that the n95 is capable of. So no BitTorrenting for me!

Work is an odd one. I like my job and I like what I’ve got to do, but I don’t like the fact that it all needs doing right now and I’m being pulled from pillar to post doing other stuff which isn’t really as important and could of been done by someone else. Two cases in point…

Last week I’d previously said to my boss that I *need* to spend that whole week purely on news because we’d got a visit coming up and I wanted to make sure we didn’t score another red measure. After the conversation where he’d said to me I need to be more “unstoppable” and “have tenacity” and “getting things done” I thought it’d get me some brownie points as I was ‘getting things done.’ To which it did. However, when that week rolled round, of the 39+ hours that I worked probably 5 were spent on news and that was on lugging news round - NOT going through the paperwork which is what I really need to concentrate on. I mean, I KNOW what I’m doing with news, I’ve worked with news since I was 16! And the “I’m new” can only last so long - till this Thursday when I’ve got Glenys visiting again and she’s said if we don’t hit 70% there will be serious problems. But anyways, that week was spent mostly doing inductions, helping on the shopfloor and chasing up references, getting passes applied for, picked up. And whilst you might think it can’t be hard to pick up a pass, it’s at least an hour job as the pass office is in the other terminal and you’re guranteed to at least wait between 20mins - 1hr30mins for them to actually get to you. It’s crazy.

The other crazy point is the fact that I had to do the nights this week. None of the other manager’s volunteered and yet they still expected me to do all my other work as well as work a 10 hour night shift. In total I’ve worked Mon : 1000-2000, Tue : 1000-1900, Wed : 1800-0700, Thur : 2000-1000, Fri : 2000-0900, Sat : 2000-0600. 68 hours, of which most were in the middle of the night! It can’t be right, eh?!

Anyways, enough moaning… at least I’m not working with Michelle!

Also, my mobile is up for a free upgrade soon and as much as I love my n95 there is the second revision of the all in one wonder phones out soon and I’m torn by which I want to go for, the Nokia n96 - the new n95 or the Samsung INNOV8 - the latest S60 phone from Samsung. Oh, life is so full of choices. (Links to AAS’s awesome (p)reviews)

just like you, i’m different
B

Bon soir, pop pickers!

I’ve had a day off, the sun is in the sky and the music being played is Barney Stinson awesome! Life is great, eh?

Not much to update with today, to be honest, more to just say… I ain’t dead.

Work is getting increasingly harder with every day I’m there which isn’t good. I seem to be finding more and more things which need to change everytime I look at something. I fear that the previous Ops Manager was hiding some of the things that he knew were wrong and BS-ing it. Either that, or he was way too trusting of the people doing the jobs who were BS-ing him.. I’m not sure which but it leaves me with some big problems to fix and most of them are ones which need to be fixed “…yesterday” Alas, I’m only one person so it’s not exactly going to be a quick turn around. And like I said to my auditor (who’s known me since I joined the company) that I can only play the “it was my previous” card for a short time before I need to start taking full accountability for the mistakes that are being made and the results that are coming out. Of course, not having someone at home to rant at and then console me and cook me some nice food isn’t helping :p

Thankfully, one of the problems that we’ve had is huge internal theft has been eroded a little as of last week when test purchasers caught two of the staff for theft, including one who’d slid some money in his sock. Awesome.

Anyways, till next time my Dr Pepper loving people..

What is the worst that could happen?
B

It looks like someone finally turned on the sun in the UK. Damn them, I hate summer.

Tonight I’m working a 4pm to 4am shift. Should be… fun. The landside / airside boundary is changing at midnight tonight so it should be interesting considering it currently looks like a building site and I don’t think they’ll get it ready in time. But hey-ho.

The job is going well so far, although it really is a shit ton of work and lots of it is ‘red’ as in needs completely urgently which is a bit of a bugger because I really do only have so many hours in a day and it’s not like at Liverpool where I could just nip in on my day off or go back for the evening if there something I hadn’t done or I’d just remembered that I’d forgotten. Obviously, living 30 miles way means that it costs a shit load in (the ever increasing) petrol. It was £60.18 to fill up my 206’s tank the other day. £1.16/litre is insane. The train is £14.40/return which isn’t any better and is at least two connections and doesn’t get me in till 7am earliest so pretty useless. So much for saving the planet and using public transport.

However, I did take advantage of my free parking to go to Manchester the other day (only £3/return on the train, awesome!) I noticed they’ve opened a new Hotel Chocolat in the extension of the Arndale Centre. Yum. It also reminded me to post off the chocolate I bought for Crishna when I went to Birmingham which had been sitting in my fridge for many, many weeks. It’s a good job it reminded me as the use by date was getting close Whilst in Manchester we also went round and had a look at all the expensive shops because Tian is a brand whore. She offered to buy me a £80 shirt and I was like… WTF? I can get one for £5 at ASDA! :p Anyways, she’s back in the motherland for 7 weeks now which most likely has something to do with why I volunteered for the insane overnight shift!

We also went to Chester to find the world’s best English breakfast… to which I’ve just searched my flickr and can’t find a picture of it. But anyways, when we went the lady behind the bar told me that they weren’t serving food as it was Chester Races day. Bollocks. Anyways, we found a little cafe called “Cafe at the Walls” which was, obviously, situated on the Chester Walls. We also walked round the walls, looked in the water tower that was open (and as the man assured me) completely free. Good job because there wasn’t really that much to look at, but I still gave a little donation because he seemed nice in a old-but-not-a-paedophile way. There was also some random medieval thing going on with old “we do amateur dramatics” dancers and some funky men in armor.

We also saw the first race of the afternoon at Chester Races and some horse won and the guy just down from us had obviously bet on him as he seemed pretty happy about it.

And that pretty much wraps up my last week! Just finished a slab of the Hotel Chocolate Honey Milk Chocolate and, boy, is that sweet!

far too late
B

Again, nothing exciting has been happening in my life lately but I felt the need to post because I’m bored this morning and can’t sleep.

Work is going really well so far, just a couple of quibbles. Such that the Staff West car park is almost back in Liverpool, it costs too much in petrol, there is one evil old woman who is out to get me (!) and the stocktake was shit so lots to work on. Other than that I’m slowly getting stuck into the work and resisting the urges to slip back to sales, usually helped by the fact that when I do I get the evils from the current sales manager We’re currently going through a relay along with also preparing for the security boundary move which (should) be happening on th 16th. So it’s pretty much all go at the minute, so when I’m done at work I’m usually coming home and collapsing in bed and watching TV.

Speaking of TV I’ve really got into the US version of The Office in the past two weeks. I’d always wore my hater pants on the US version before because… well, it wasn’t the original. And I think after seeing the pilot I’d kind of thought that as much as I love Steve Carrell I couldn’t watch him just being a carbon copy of Ricky Gervais. However, after watching some random second series episode the other week on normal TV I actually enjoyed it. So I downloaded S1, rewatched and found that it moved quite a way from the British version, in a good way. Whether I’m falling in love with it because I’ve fell in love with Pam Beesly, the squirrel haired cute receptionist, I’m not sure. But I’m sure it has something to do with it

Apart from that I’ve pretty much not done anything. I really need to go visit the family and sort out my room, but what’s new?

i work harder than yaou
B

I am not dead. I am at Manchester. I am enjoying it. I’m sure I’ll write something more substantial in the near future. However, have some songs…

Hedley - Never Too Late
its been too long and we’ve been down and out without laughter,
no smiling just tears
were tired of falling down and being such a disaster,
we’ve been here for years

According to Wikipedia a song about believing in yourself and the video is a parody of Rio by Duran, Duran. There you go.

3 Doors Down - It’s Not My Time
I look ahead to all the plans that we made
And the dreams that we had
I’m in a world that tries to take them away
Oh, but I’m taking them back

For some reason the crash at the beginning just keeps reminding me of the crash at the end of S3 of HIMYM. Yes, I’m bizarre. But again, more 3 Doors Down goodness.

Buckcherry - Sorry
This time i think i’m to blame
It’s harder to get through the days
We get older and blame turns to shame
‘Cause everything inside it never comes out right

Awww, the video is so cute, especially with it’s mock old lines drawn on it. Probably a college project or something? Also, there’s an acoustic X-Factor want-to-be on Youtube too!

Relient K - Which to bury, Us or the hatchet?
No, I dont hate you
Dont want to fight you
Know I’ll always love you
But right now i just dont like you

Howie Day - She Says
and when she says she wants somebody else
i hope you know she doesn’t mean you
and when she breaks down and makes a sound
you’ll never hear her the way that i do

Again, love this song too.

Anyways, it’s late and I’ve got a stocktake response to complete. The joys of being an Ops Manager ;(

no, i do miss you
B

Wow, it’s been a hectic and bizarre last week or two. As I’m sure most of you will know I’m moving jobs. Basically EvilBoss and me have been “not getting along.” I’d kind of resigned myself to not being able to get on with her after just having some insane clashes previously and had started to just accept that was the case and merely start responding to most assaults with a *shrug* or a “I don’t know” just because it was much easier than arguing.

I think I’ve come to the conclusion that the majority of the conclusions that Crishna came up with are correct. I think she’s very insecure and a control freak. A point in case is that she took the news team off of news last week, got her supervisor to do it and did some herself. The fact that she had insane amounts of other jobs on that week and wasn’t able to actually dedicate enough time to it so ended up fucking it up and missing getting credits checked off and rang through in time is by the by. I think she’s also quite paranoid as she keeps thinking that we are intentionally sabotaging things, hiding details from her and “ganging” up on her. Which is just insane. Some of the things I’m supposed to of sabotaged would benefit me more than they would her. Apparently, I sabotaged recruitment. Nothing to do with the fact she didn’t give me a vacancy list till only two weeks ago? But why the hell would I sabotage recruitment? Why would I intentionally want us to be short staffed? It’s not her that goes on the till, or does the rota and has to struggle with the fact there’s no one to cover the shifts, it’s me. So, surely, my life would be a lot easier if the recruitment was spot on, no? The same with the hiding stuff. Why would I bother? It’s petty and I don’t have time to be that petty!

But anyways, that’s all by the by because I’ll be free from her in one more working day. It should of been the end of this week as I wanted to see through the completion of the new unit, help out with us being short staffed this week and generally tie up any loose ends. However, we had a huge barney this morning that went a little like this.

Brett comes in at 4.45am, 15 minutes late but still with enough time to open all units on time, notices that EvilBoss is still in
Me : “Morning, how come you’re still here?”
EB : “Because the shops were a shit hole. I couldn’t go, they were awful and needed sorting out. Why?”
Me : “Well, there was no manager on last night and the supervisor had to spend 3 hours covering breaks, at which point there was only 1 person in each unit, as there was no one to help out and when I was in in the morning I had literally 2 other staff and me to open all four units, so I’m not hugely surprised it was a mess as we traded nearly all weekend without a fill.”
EB : “Well, that’s not good enough”
Me : “…”
EB : “You were the manager on!”
Me : “Yes and we worked our arses off to get stuff done but, tbh, we just didn’t have the time or the resources”
EB : “You were the manager”
Me : “I realise this, but I am only human and did end up working over 10 hours on each day, 4 over what I should of done”
EB : “I did 75 hours last week!”
Me : “And that is great for you, EvilBoss, and totally *your* choice. I am not paid for anything above 8 hours. I did 10, which is above that so it’s not like I just went ‘Ah, fuck it!’ and went home.”

This went on for some time where she was basically saying I was a law to myself and just came in and out when I pleased and basically insinuating that before she got here that we just basically came in and did whatever suited us and then buggered off. This *really* pissed me off as firstly she doesn’t know what we did when she wasn’t here and, secondly, we worked our fricking arses off for no extra money, hardly any recognition and a shed load of sleepless nights trying to get everything up and running. So, at this point it was 5am the staff were fleeting around whilst she was laying into me and I’d still not took my bag off yet. So, to say I was a little enraged was an understatement!

Me : “WHAT?! That’s Bullshit, EvilBoss, you weren’t here before you came here, obviously, so how the hell do you know what I was or wasn’t doing? Eh? How dare you say that we didn’t work our asses off? You’ve got absolutely no clue on what you’re talking about and you’re very close to having me just fuck off back home today because seriously I don’t need to deal with this first thing in the morning when I’ve worked my arse off to get the shops actually open for you everyday of the weekend so, please, don’t tell me that I’m a law unto myself who doesn’t do above and beyond the call of duty. If you want to work 75 hours a week, whoop-de-do, that’s fantastic for you but I’m no longer doing them hours for you because you just don’t appreciate it.”
EB : “…”
Me : “Now, what do you want me to do this morning, because we’ve wasted 20 minutes doing this when we could of been recovering the units!”

So, anyways, later in the day she rings up NewBoss and AreaBoss and says that she can no longer work with me and can he take me early, which he says yes to and the rest as they say is all history. So, tomorrow is my last day at Liverpool. At the end of the day EvilBoss came up to me and says that she’s doing this because she doesn’t want us to part on evil terms. I say to her that we’re not parting on bad terms, it’s all water off a ducks back to me. I’d be pissed off if the stores looked the way they did but she needs to learn not to jump down people’s throats before asking what went wrong. I doubt she’ll change, but I’m really not fussed because it’s not my problem anymore. Went to the managers meeting at Manchester and it all seemed to go well and, to be honest, things are looking pretty exciting over the next three months there with the landside/airside boundary moving and refits/relays/books unit coming up. So I’m a happy bunny!

Anyways, my little blue smurfs. Apologies about the post being all about work, but I needed to get it off the chest I’ll return to regular crap again soon.

not angry, just pissed.
B

Okay, so only one person gets that. Nevermind. I spent yesterday whizzing around London sat on the tube. I also met Jo, which was nice. So, slowly and surely I’m ticking off people that I’ve known forever on the internet and now know in real life. We walked around Harrow, up the damn hill and what not.

I haven’t really got much else to put as I’m kinda in a state of flux at the moment as I’m wondering what the fuck is going to happen when I return back to work on Monday. Well, technically I am back on Saturday but it is not until Monday when Michelle is back in and whatever it is that I’ve done that is bad will be communicated to me. Maybe I’ll have another performance review - because let’s face it, they are fun (!) I do wonder why she finds it so hard to manage me, it’s not like I haven’t made it clear how easy it would be. I am, after all, a simple man who just needs his ego stroked every now and then and the freedom to do his job well and to at least believe he’s being listened to even if he’s not. It’s not that hard is it? After all I thought the mark of being a good manager was that you can adapt to how each of your staff needs treating and react in that way to get the most out of them. I mean, surely it’s easier to actually get along with people as trying to purposefully work at cross angles all the time?

Anyways, here is some photos of underground signs and what not…

And that’s pretty much it… Off to watch Indiana Jones 4 tonight

looking good at 25
B

I feel sad. I feel tired. I feel lonely. I feel pissed off.

Work is going not great. We lose three really good guys at the end of this week. Which means next week is going to be extremely thin on the ground and very tight but thankfully I’m off on holiday so it’ll be interesting to see how new boss copes with the stress of our store when she doesn’t have the backup of a full team of staff.

I’m not sure whether it’s her intention to make all the current staff (with opinions) miserable as can be and force them into leaving so that she can recruit her own staff or whether that’s just a nice little side effect she’s been left with?

As for other stuff in my life? Well, I just don’t have anything else. Answers on a postcard to “Where is Brett’s life?”

Anyways, here’s some nice photos.

I am into taking pictures of food at the minute. Is it because I love eating food? Or is it because it’s something I can take a close up photo of and it’s handy because my camera sits on my desk where I eat? I’ll leave the decision up to you!

Crishna actually took some photos of me that aren’t insanely horrible when I was in London a few weekends a go. But I’m still refusing to put up the photo of me in Portsmouth, I look more miserable than I do now!

Anyways, till next time… I’m going to ponder why I feel so alone and whether I like it or not.

witty comment in italics
B