Media frenzy

Had a great weekend - d_ph4ze hopped down for a break. We went for a walk on Saturday afternoon, which was really cool. Probably about seven miles, and just like a summer evening. Except really cold :P

Then we sat around and watched crap TV and nattered and ate pizza. Doesn't get much better :)

Had a good lie-in on Sunday, too. Then d_ph4ze kindly drilled some holes for me, and I hung up my new blind. Got some nice food, and just hung out until it was time for him to get the dodgy clean and reliable train home.

Watched Shooting the Past with 0ct0pus. I love Timothy Spall :)

And yesterday was a bitch of a day. I felt really groggy and cranky, and had pointless meetings all day. But I got to knock off early and see "Walk the Line" with a friend from work, which was actually really good. I didn't realise Johnny Cash was so troubled. And it was pretty well acted too.

And if that wasn't busy enough, I'm off to Rome with teh 0ct0pus on Friday.

*excited*

So much for cycling home tonight...

It's snowing. Brr. I'm glad I'm off somewhere warm for the weekend...

In other news, I signed up for the BTEC in Web Development. Chose the following modules:

Web Page Style (30 credits)
Web Accessibility (30 credits)
Databases on the Web (30 credits)
Database Design (30 credits)
Exploring XML (30 credits)
Web Development Project Brief (30 credits)

In updated weather conditions, it turned from slow to small blizzard in the time it took me to write this.

The Selfish Gene - a review based on bicycles, and the healthy, wealthy and wise

I've nearly finished the Selfish Gene, which I've been meaning to read for years.

The theory is as follows. Wessex Trains are a bit shit, and only have room for two bikes on board. That's not the only reason they are crap, but it's the relevant reason.

They generally run commuter services to and from large connubations.

The further from such a place of work you live, the more likely you are to be highly paid. It has to be worth your while to travel in that far on expensive trains.

Also, the more likely you are to be able to get your goddam bike on the train. So the more likely you are to be pursuing a healthy lifestyle.

Live too near to work, and you're likely to be less well off, and less likely to be able to get your bike on the train. Assuming you can get it through the poky little door. Which is less likely than for posh people, as you'll have a bulky mountain bike that probably fell off the back of a lorry.

If you are already healthier and wealthier than average by the above two rules, you are more likely to propagate your genes. Your genetic stock will start to prevail.

Sooner or later, however, the pendulum will swing the other way, as normal folk will remove your genes from the pool by bludgeoning you to death with the bikes that they can never fit on the train due to your monopolisation of the little bike space, then dragging your carcass along like a trophy to deter other inbred, round-vowelled miscreants.

And so the cycle will continue. This is what I learned from my book today, while freezing at the station.

What I learned today that wasn't in my book was that sometimes you can come home, and somebody will have dug a random hole in your front garden.

Note to reader: posh people are very rarely wise. That doesn't come into the equation, unless you count genetic wins as inherent intelligence. It just sounded good.