Feb 08

So, the postie comes this morning with two boxes for me. They’re both pretty heavy and I was a bit puzzled as though I order stuff all the time I didn’t remember ordering anything this week.

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On opening them I find they’re both full of photography books, all up to date stuff and all in absolutely mint condition. Wow! – still puzzled though until I read the note which said something like:

“Saw you’d been having a bit of a shit time of it recently … You’ve been a great mate to me over the years so please accept this little gift from me in the hope that it might cheer you up a bit.”

Bloody hell man, I was gobsmacked.

So anyway, I know I said it via PM already but Paul (Zoot) – what a completely mad bar steward you are! Such a kind thought and incredibly generous of you. Thank you! Suffice to say, you properly made my day.

There’s nothing like random acts of kindness to restore a bit of faith in people eh?

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Feb 08

Hmm yeah, I could post a cheesy fanboy review of the Rammstein gigs but that would never convey just how good they were, again (sorry Snake!).

Suffice to say I’m really glad we went two nights running as it meant the first night was full of OMFG!!! moments and then the second we could take in the music more and generally enjoy the most excellent party atmosphere up the front (yes, right at the front, only place to be :) )

Enjoy it? Oh no, not at all ;)

Rammstein-0919


Setlists for the nerds (I hope I’ve got them right, took me a good hour and much referring back to photos to piece them together!)

The numbers following the songs are links to pics taken during those songs. All up on Flickr in these sets: Combichrist, Rammstein.


combichrist-0394

Combichrist

All Pain Is Gone
Scarred
Get Your Body Beat
Fuck That Shit
Blut Royale
What The Fuck Is Wrong With You?

Got a feeling they might have played one other track but I’d never heard them before so I can’t be 100% sure!

Rammstein-0778

Rammstein

Rammlied
 (1 2 )
B********
Waidmanns Heil
 (1 2 )
Keine Lust
Weißes Fleisch

Feuer frei!
 (1 2)
Wiener Blut
 (1 2 Babies – with frickin’ laser beams!)
Frühling in Paris
 (1 2)
Ich tu dir weh (1 2 3)
Liebe ist für alle da

Benzin

Links 2-3-4

Du hast

Pussy

Encores
Sonne (1 2)
Haifisch (1)
Ich Will

Engel (1 2 3 4)

Listening to: All Pain Is Gone from the album “What the Fuck Is Wrong with You People?” by Combichrist

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Feb 03

Up in Manchester with Huw & Gabs. Me & Huw went to see Rammstein at the MEN Arena tonight, full report later but suffice to say we had a blast, Rammstein excelled themselves again. Expect lots of pics when I get back home on Thursday.

Being the loonies we are we were of course right up the front and yes, it was fucking mental :) The most pleasant surprise of the day (apart from the particularly lovely young ladies up the front who were properly up for bouncing around like idiots with us for three hours) had to the the support band. A bunch of industrial/techno/metal nutters from Norway called Combichrist.

They did play one song which I though particularly apt for my state of mind at the moment, and thankfully they’ve made a lovely cartoon to accompany it too :)

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Feb 02

Not the best start to my day being woken up by the stench of smoke from downstairs – again. I ended up wide awake at 7:30 which is a good 2 hours too early for me.

Having set off to a bad start wasn’t really helping the mental state at the mo. It’s all starting to transition from that surreal phase into the painful reality that no matter what I say, do or feel it’s not going to make a blind bit of difference to Kel as it seems that chapter is well and truly closed.

I’m finding it all a bit odd that after eight years she can just switch off and carry on as if nothing happened. That’s the bit that’s hurting the most at the mo, because it just makes it feel like I meant absolutely nothing to her and my brain just doesn’t want to compute that, it just doesn’t add up after everything she use to say to me. I dunno, I guess that’s just Kel’s way of dealing but it still feels like the most incredible slap in the face.

Anyway I did at least get to enjoy a nice little bubble of ‘me’ time tonight at the school because at least when I’ve got my belt on I tend to switch into ‘Black Belt mode’ automagically and at least then I get some of the old confident me back. Tonight was all about intensity and focus which meant I had to demonstrate those traits to a higher level than I’d expect my students too and that tends to rub off on them too and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy because the more energised they are the easier it is for me.

As we often do, in my ‘Masters’ training session we started out on one topic and a question from one student led me off on a tangent into a pretty deep discussion about the psychology of confrontation and dealing with real aggression etc. Bit of a shame that some of our students don’t make the effort to stay for that part of the class because it’s where all the ‘real’ training begins.

Talking about that stuff and thinking back to some examples from my time on the door did me some good confidence-wise. Need to get out and hook up with some old training buddies I think and get a bit of the mojo back.

Anyway, best get some shut-eye. Off up to Manchester to see Rammstein with Huw tomorrow, then we’re coming back via Birmingham on weds to see them again :)

\m/ O \m/

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Jan 30

It seems to me a lot of people are whining about the iPad simply because they were hoping for the power of a full blown laptop in something the size of a paperback but I think the key thing is simply that Apple haven’t really designed the iPad for geeks like us with a higher than average technical knowledge, and hence demand from our devices. They’ve firmly pitched it at the casual sofa surfer who probably hasn’t even considered the potential for more advanced applications. They just want a bigger version of the iPod touch. Indeed, ever since the touch came out I’ve been saying I just wanted one with a screen the size of a DVD case and that’s pretty much what we’ve got coming with the iPad so they are delivering exactly what I asked for.

Sure, we can all think of super-geeky advanced applications that it could do *if* it had X/Y/Z additional features but just look back at what’s happened with the iPhone and iPod Touch. I don’t think anyone was really aware just how big a deal it would turn out to be a couple of year back. It’s easy to be critical at this stage when nobody has even touched one but I’m betting in a couple of months time when we do we’ll all be thinking very differently and this time next year when it’s begun to show it’s true potential then I’m sure we’ll all be chuckling as we buy the version 2 hardware and think “yeah ok Steve, you did it, again”.

There are however a couple of immediate things that did spring to mind..

No multi-tasking, well yeah, that sucks. No twitter at the same time as surfing? No chance to check email or open a browser whilst working on a doc in Pages? Yeah, that sucks but I’m betting the rumours of some form of multi-tasking in OS4 are true and they’ll be doing something with an update soon.. I wouldn’t mind betting they’re just holding off on mentioning it with the iPhone 4G announcement around the time it hits the streets with a “Hey, look, we’ve made it even betterer, aren’t we ace!”

Home screen – looks sparse with just the icons. Again, I’m *hoping* for something more here at a future date, but it’s already doing enough for me to want it.

GPS? Having realised that of course Apples A-GPS shares silicon with the 3G hardware that does mean that only the 3G model will have a GPS. Slightly leaning in that direction as a result now but that’s going to be entirely dependant on the data plan pricing. I’m definitely not going down the contract route but if there is a sensible PAYG or rolling plan I might go for it.

File synching – The SDK does mention the fact that apps now have access to a shared folder which mounts on your desktop when docked so no more fiddling around with different sync methods for each app. That’s going to make stuff like the new iWork and other productivity apps a whole lot better immediately.

Read one interesting take on the state of play earlier from Jo hewitt, developer of the iPhone Facebook App. Check out his blog here: http://joehewitt.com/post/ipad/

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Jan 29

Well it would seem that that, as they say, is that.

I went over to Kel’s last night (weds) and had a bit of a chat about stuff, some of it personal and a few bits to do with the school. All perfectly amicable, if not a little odd. It just seems so weird after 8 years to sit on a sofa with someone but feel like you might as well be in another country.

Could spend hours going over boring details and over-analysing stuff that is of no interest to anyone else but the simple fact of the matter is she doesn’t love me, and hence doesn’t want to be with me any more. Simple as that really.   

broken_heart.jpg

It’s all just a bit surreal now, especially given that it was only a month ago that Kel told me she did in fact still want to get married. (Bearing in mind this was after her finishing with me, telling me that getting engaged was the biggest mistake ever and then subsequently telling that after all she didn’t in fact want to throw away seven years so easily and would I please consider giving it another go etc.)

Anyway, when she said at christmas I was understandably well chuffed and had a proper little scheme hatching in my mind. I was planning to buy her a replacement for the engagement ring she’d lost last year and then take her away for a ‘finally out of debt’ celebration weekend where I could surprise her with a ‘proper’ proposal.   Having seen Ian’s awesome shots of an engagement celebration in Paris I was thinking about something like that to make it extra special. Hmm, that was literally only a few weeks ago and then WHAMMO - so long, and thanks for all the fish…

Still, like I said, I’m not blaming Kel or holding any animosity towards her. If it’s not right and it’s not making her happy then there’s no point in me getting arsey about it is there? Sure it’s hurting like hell at the moment but I’m doing my best to keep it together for everyones sake. I’m really hoping we’ll always stay close as friends if nothing else and I’m going to try and do the best I can from my side at least to make sure that happens.

Got to admit I’m pretty gutted about the whole situation for Callum though. He’s never had a particularly good relationship with his Dad and ever since he was about 5 I’ve been around. I did ask Kel to be sure to explain to him that this was her decision because I’d hate for him to hold any resentment towards me about it all because I know how he feels about his dad. We’ve been pretty close over the past few years (hey, I was even planning to have him be my best man..) and there have even been times when he’d said to Kel he wished I was his dad because his real one was crap. The feeling was mutual and it hurts doubly so to lose him too.

Soo, anyway, I’m making no apologies for having a bit of a rant on here though as it’s one little way of maintaining a bit of sanity at an otherwise weird-as-fuck time. I am also taking a bit of consolation from the fact that having talked this over with some of my mates (including a couple who are mutual friends with Kel too) and they’re all pretty much in agreement that this just seems a bit (lot) weird and Kel wants her head read! That at least makes me feel marginally better!   

According to my friend Bev, Kel’s officially a ‘bloody nutjob’ and should read this but I’m not sure I want to be anybodies ’second best’ thanks! Perhaps I should buy her the book though eh?

Ahh fuck it… Man I was so looking forward to this month and this year as a whole, planning to have a big celebration for finally being out of debt after so many years.   I don’t regret getting out of the rat race for a moment but the financial mess it left me in was something of a challenge to say the least. I ended up with about £45k in debt and it’s taken nearly seven years to pay that off so you can imagine what an ace feeling it is to finally get there. Well, it would have been an ace feeling if I’d not just had the rug pulled out from under me like this. It would have been really nice to have been able to feel good about something, even if just for at least a few days eh?

Still, I suppose it does at least mean that instead of spending it on expensive jewellery for someone to lose I can spend it on new tech for me instead, and now I don’t have to turn down those requests to take naughty pictures of good looking girls any more either!

See, I knew there had to be a silver lining somewhere!

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Jan 28

So, finally, Apple have unveiled their new tablet device, the iPad. And whilst I can already see several glaring omissions, it has basically delivered exactly what I said I wanted when I first got an iPod. i.e. it’s basically an uber-iPod Touch with a 10″ screen.

ipad455.jpg

All i every really wanted from a tablet device is something I can view PDFs on (particularly all my software manuals and ref books etc.) and do a bit of sofa surfing. Add in the iWork apps too and it’s already looking pretty tasty. Having thought about it a bit this evening I can see all sorts of other areas where it would be useful.

They’ve been clever enough to maintain the compatibility with the existing iPhone apps via scaling, and I’m betting a fair few of them will be updated to run at native res before it’s released too. Omnigroup have already announced they are updating Omnifocus, and also planning to make iPad versions of some of their other apps such as OmniGraffle.

The price point starting at $499 was a very pleasant surprise, I guess that will translate to £400 for the 16Gb model, and to be honest that will probably do me for starters. Apple tend to hit their stride on v2.0 products really so I’m inclined to see how it pans out initially, especially as I’m planning on spending most of my disposable cash on camera kit at the mo. I’m not sure I need the 3G version (I think, though I’ll probably change my mind in the next couple of months) so I’ll see how I get on with wifi only (could always invest in a mifi or similar if needed on the go). Maybe I’ll wait until the inevitable 128Gb 3G version 2 with camera built in. :)

Talking of cameras, I can see this being a photographer’s dream. Imagine having something with a screen like this to view images live in the field. A proper chance to spot and correct any glaring errors before you head home and realise it’s too late.

OnOne already do a nifty little app for the iPhone/Touch which acts as a camera remote/live view for Canon and Nikon cameras. The existing version relies on a wifi connection to a host PC – presumably due to the lack of a USB connection to the phone, but now that there is a USB adaptor for the iPad I’d imagine they’ll soon have a version to take advantage of the direct connection and full resolution of the screen. There are going to be loads of photography related apps when this thing hits the streets, the possibilities are endless.

Then of course, there’s the potential for this to act as a temporary archive/backup for photos when you’re out on the road. I’d been considering one of the dedicated archive devices for weekends away but can easily see this doing the job nicely.

Hmm, the potential as a portable portfolio too. Who’s not been wowed by the photo viewer on the iPhone with the pinch and swipe gestures. Stick that on a 10in screen and it’s going to look awesome.

With the little dock/stand and the Apple Bluetooth keyboard it’ll do pretty much all I’d need for office stuff on the move too. The netbook has been great but with 10hrs of battery life this thing is made of win and I’m sure Callum would be happy to inherit the netbook :)

Gnnf… got to wait at least two months, three for the 3G. Ooh dear, I’m getting the proper tech horn for this now…. Hurry up Steve!

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Jan 25

Sky News

See that. That’s me on Sky News. My 0.5s of fame which appeared about 5 seconds into this video and here’s a pic of the Sky cameraman filming me :)


mpg_london-2631The general concensus on the news sites is that there were over 2000 photographers there and it all went off pretty smoothly. The entire police presence consisted of four blokes who were apparently the ‘usual number’ for Trafalgar Square.

Stuck a few of my pics up on Flickr, and there are loads from the event in this group and a few comedy shots I noticed other people posted of me too.

it was a bit of a shame that a few odd individuals sought to hijack what was otherwise a completely chilled out affair to promote their own cause. There were a couple of Islamic types wandering through the crowds flag waving etc. but apart from them it was generally just a bloody good laugh.

Met up with Steve (PVB from YakYak) for the event itself and then with Matt (Matt303) and Jacqueline (TheGoodbyeGirl) afterwards for drinks and general geekery down the Tottenham Court Road. Deffo fancy another trip down there in a couple of months when I’ve cleared all my debts!

In other news. Hmm, well yeah, meh. I’m putting a brave face on it, trying to keep busy to distract myself and generally in need of a bit of TLC. Offers of distraction all gladly accepted!

written by RiK

Jan 21

D’you know, I started out with a really good feeling about 2010. This was going to be the year when I could finally start moving forward and crack on with all the things I’d been held back from because of debts left over from when I gave up the day job. Woohoo – here we f**cking go!

But hey – don’t go getting too comfortable or actually having something to look forward to eh! Suffice to say, déjà vu has reared it’s ugly head in an almost spectacular carbon copy of this time last year. I appear to be single again.

Piss.

As I said, it’s all pretty much about the same stuff as I wrote about before so it would be far simpler to just refer back to those posts again ( here and here) as they are a pretty fair summary.

So yeah. Arse.

Fact is, since all that happened last year things never really changed, not for want of trying on my part but I’m afraid it’s all been a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy.

The biggest problem for years has been that because we were both properly skint, after I left my old day job I ended up massively in debt and it’s taken the best part of 7 years to pay all that off. Having such a restricted budget meant there was sod all chance of getting our own place or actually being able to move forward with any plans and so Kel’s pretty much reached the point of just giving up because she just couldn’t see anything changing and I guess she just figured that was my fault and therefore down to me to sort out.

Frustrating then isn’t it that within a matter of weeks I’ll be out of debt. Yup, zip, zero, zilch, nada. Finally able to actually start making some plans and move forward. How ace is that!

Well, you’d think so wouldn’t you? Trouble is, whilst I’ve always had confidence in my future-vision for how things would work out, unfortunately Kel doesn’t share that confidence and no matter what I try, say or do, she’ll always default to what shes got now or had in the past. The reality of the here-and-now will always overrule any potential future benefits.

That’s massively frustrating for me when in the past i’ve always been super-positive and had tons of confidence in things working out ok in the end. Can’t do it all on my own though can I? isn’t a relationship is supposed to be about two people complementing each other, a synergy where you balance out one another’s strengths and weaknesses for the good of the whole (relationship).

After all that stuff last year, once again, Kel readily admitted she’d been digging her heels in and letting me make all the effort. She knows she does it and yet can’t explain why. It’s very much a case of “I’m not happy because I can’t see anything changing so I’m not going to take any kind of action that might actually help change it”. The doubly frustrating part is that she readily admits the fact but that still doesn’t make any difference. Thing is, I can’t feel bad towards Kel for that, as I know it’s all a matter of self-belief and you’ve either got it or you haven’t.

Again, I know I’m venting a bit but I’m really not blaming her. I think it’s just a case of some deep-rooted protection mechanism where she’s convinced herself that for years all she had to worry about was her and Callum and whenever things are a bit tough the huge brick wall goes up with them on the inside and me locked out. It seems that no matter what I’ll do, I’ll just can’t get past that.

Classic example, a few weeks ago she arranged to go on holiday with a friend from work, just her and Callum with her friend and her kids. It’ didn’t actually matter that I pointed out that if she went with them that would probably put a spanner in the works for us being able to go away somewhere, both in financial terms (well unless I paid for everything of course) and also in terms of Kel using up holiday entitlement which she then wouldn’t have if we wanted to go somewhere. She didn’t even acknowledge that, it was just like I was irrelevant because the next thing I heard was it was all booked anyway. Boy, did that make me feel special!   I’ve still not managed to get my head around that one at all.

Still, in spite of all that, I’d still been firmly focused on the fact that this was going to be the year when things turned around. Finally debt-free and able to start cranking handles and moving forward. I’ve been looking forward to this point for such a long time now, literally the past 7 or 8 years and psychologically it’s massive.   I’d even decided that the first thing I wanted to do when I’d paid off that last payment was to go and buy Kel a replacement ring for the one she lost and then take her away somewhere nice so I could surprise her with it ‘properly’ this time. Bloody good job I didn’t buy it eh! The only reason I didn’t was because I couldn’t find the receipt for when we had it sized to be able to order the right one…

Anyway, thankfully we’ve not fallen out, and I really hope we never will. I’m not holding any kid of ill-feelings towards Kel at all, I just thing that the circumstances sucked, big time. I still feel exactly how I always did about her and Callum, but I really don’t think there’s anything I could say or do right now that would make any difference. The ball is well and truly in Kel’s court.

Not really sure what i’m doing from day to day at the moment. It’s all a bit surreal. Kel’s still teaching and training at the school which is ace but she did specifically say she needed to be alone at the moment so apart from the school stuff I’m having to bite my lip and let her get on with things in her own and way an on her terms. It’s absolutely killing me each night when it comes to the sort of time I’d be phoning her up to say goodnight but to be honest, Kel’s happiness is more important than mine right now and I’m not about to try and force this issue and spoil that. Especially as ongoing her friendship, and her and Callum’s happiness is really important to me.

So, what am I going to do? Well, I dunno!

To be honest, this past couple of years has just knocked all the wind out of my sails and I’ve got to figure a way to get the old mojo back. I hate the fact that all this crap has eroded a huge part of what I suspect attracted Kel to me in the first place – unfortunately yet another self-fulfilling prophecy.

At the moment I don’t have a massive plan but it has to be said the old self-belief batteries are definitely in need of recharging at the moment so I’m trying to get back into a few of the things I used to be into such as making music and working on some creative projects. I’m making some plans to make more of my photography, which should hopefully involve a bit more travel too.

I really need to get off my lazy arse, sort out my diet and get back in the gym. For me, training and confidence are totally inter-twined and I find it hard to train if I’m not feeling good about myself and vice-versa. Over the past year I’ve been feeling pretty crap for a lot of the time and so I’ve just let the training slip. Pretty much undone all the good work I did a couple of years ago and I’m feeling a bit like Mr Blobby’s stunt double again. Hoping that a few steps in the right direction with the other stuff will help inspire me to crack on in the gym again too.

Next step after that is to really sort my school out. I want to expand, but I don’t want to be doing that all myself so I need to figure a plan to either get someone else involved or how I can work the finances to be able to pay an assistant instructor to coach some extra classes for me. In the past those plans had all been reliant on Kel’s support so I guess I’ll need to make them a slightly longer, different approach but it’s still all do-able.

So, yeah, stuff. It sucks, but I suppose it could be worse. There’s plenty of people out there who are a million times worse off than I am at the moment so I’ll just be grateful I’m not one of them eh?

“Both abundance and lack exist simultaneously in our lives, as parallel realities. It is always our conscious choice which secret garden we will tend… when we choose not to focus on what is missing from our lives but are grateful for the abundance that’s present — love, health, family, friends, work, the joys of nature and personal pursuits that bring us pleasure — the wasteland of illusion falls away and we experience Heaven on earth.” –Sarah Ban Breathnach


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Jan 16

trsq-poster.pngAnyone up for some fun and frolics in London next saturday then?

I’m heading up for the “I’m a Photographer, not a Terrorist” demo thing in Trafalgar Square, but obviously that’s not going to take all day so it would be nice to hook up with some chums and have a laugh in town while I’m there.

Listening to: Driving All Night from the album “Curious Things” by Tinyfish

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