Sometimes you work damned hard and have nothing to show for it. This week was the opposite with lots achieved. I'm knackered. But where did the time go. Great, loads done, but it went in a flash. It feels more like hours than days.

Talking of hours, on average, we all have eight hours of sleep and eight of work, but where do the other eight disappear to? I can't remember much of it at all.

Actually, that's a bit of a misnomer, time stands still, or at least it doesn't go anywhere. It's us that travel through it. Sometimes quickly, sometimes slowly. sometimes aware of what we pass by and at others, oblivious to it all.

It's like reading a book on a train. We lose ourselves in the story, transported to another time and place, only to raise our head and find that we are in a different time and place. Not where we started, not where we were in our minds and not where we had consciously transported to.

Going back to my fruitful week; maybe the answer lies in that saying "If you want work well done, select a busy man - the other kind has no time".

There you go, sorted!

Pathetic!

If Ferrari think that this was a victory, they need to take a look at the footage again. The drivers were ashamed, the engineers were ashamed, the public were ashamed and nobody had anything to celebrate.

If Ferrari want to cheat, they should play somewhere else.

If Alonso thinks he won, think again mate, you were given the win by a teammate who has more honour in his little finger.

If this had been a horse race they would have been in serious shit
In the boxing ring, serious shit.

Ferrari cheated us all out of a clean contest between it's drivers.
THEY BROKE THE RULES
They need the win taken off them.
They should be excluded for the rest of the season.

END OF!

I have owned an iPhone for some time now and overall am very happy with it.
However, there have always been some issues with the strength of the signal, especially at home.
I have spoken with Vodafone about this an they told me that it was an issue with many iPhones, but nonetheless replaced the phone, (upgrading it to 32gb at the same time; they really are very nice people at Vodafone).
Meanwhile, I discovered that it had a lot to do with the way that you hold the phone.
Gripping near the top often results in a better signal, or simply putting on the table works.

Apple say that a software fault exaggerated the strength of the signal, indicating calls could be made when they could not. They said the software problem had been present since it released the first iPhone three years ago.
The iPhone illuminates five bars to indicate signal strength, with one being low and five high. Apple said that iPhones over-estimated the strength by up to two bars.
“We have discovered the cause of this dramatic drop in bars, and it is both simple and surprising... Upon investigation, we were stunned to find that the formula we use to calculate how many bars of signal strength to display is totally wrong. Our formula, in many instances, mistakenly displays 2 more bars than it should for a given signal strength. For example, we sometimes display 4 bars when we should be displaying as few as 2 bars.”
They also say “Users observing a drop of several bars when they grip their iPhone in a certain way are most likely in an area with very weak signal strength, but they don’t know it because we are erroneously displaying 4 or 5 bars. Their big drop in bars is because their high bars were never real in the first place.”

That's not true. That is simply managing expectation, NOT fixing the issue. And if you think it's me that's got it wrong; one, I studied management of expectation as my thesis for my MBA so I know it when I see it, two, I've talked enough bullshit in my time and can smell it a mile off, and three, look at this photo I took.

You might have to squint a bit to see it but the HTC on the left is showing 3 bars, the old Motorola in the middle has 4 bars and the iPhone on the right has 'No Service'.

Now by Apple's reckoning, the iPhone should be 'over compensating' and showing 5 bars.

Come on Apple fess up, you've been rumbled.

What a dilemma for the media.  On the one hand we have the farcical Copenhagen Climate Conference struggling to establish what to believe, who to believe, who to blame, what to charge, what capital can be made and who should take the credit.

On the other hand we have 'Extreme' weather conditions being experienced in the UK at the moment.  Extreme my arse!

Wikipedia defines Extreme weather as: "Extreme weather includes weather phenomena that are at the extremes of the historical distribution, especially severe or unseasonal weather."  The met office define it as: well nothing really.  It is a term they use when talking about the 'extreme' of any weather over a given period.  So, the extreme was 2" of rainfall in Manchester and 0" in Cardiff today.  It is not a measure to describe either good or bad weather.  The Met Office use the term 'Severe' for that.

The lowest recorded temperature in the UK was  -27.2C in 1895 Braemar (Aberdeenshire);  in England, -26.1C 1982, Newport (Shropshire).

So what have we?  It is 20th December, next week is the shortest day of the year, (does that make it an 'extreme' day?), The white stuff falling out of the sky is called 'snow' and there's a severe weather warning which says, "Heavy snow showers may give accumulations of 2 to 5cm and there is a risk of 10 to 15cm over hills."  For the sake of the BBC, ITV and Sky, that's NOT extreme.

Classic quote from the 'outside' weather girl as I write, "There has been 20cm of snow, that's 8 inches, and if you look behind me you can see just how deep that is!"  Actually you could. It was just about reaching the top of the kerb on the road.  Big Deal!

How do we react?  We close schools, we close airports, we cancel trains, close the channel tunnel and park up on motorways.

Then again, it did come as a complete surprise didn't it.  I mean, who ever heard of snow at Christmas, (sorry, Winterfest)?

My mate Richard, Karan and myself went to see Jools Holland at the Centaur, Cheltenham Racecourse last night. Jools Holland was brilliant, but unfortunately I was mugged in the bar. It wasn't by any of the people in the bar, indeed they too were being mugged. By the BAR! We all expect to pay premium prices as a captive audience.  But this was different. The prices were complete extortion, but it was more complex than that, (more of that in a moment). It was 6.45pm and the show was to start at 7:30pm; the doors had only been open a short while.  I should have got a warning bell when the chap in front of me was looking forlornly at a half full pint plastic [glass].  The barmaid was looking desperately for somebody to take responsibility for charging £3.20 for the orange squash. She was clearly embarrassed and was apologising profusely.  In the end, and because nobody else was taking responsibility, she charged him £1. It was my turn.  When I asked for a pint of lager, I was told that the barrel was off.  I said I'd wait.  I ordered a glass of Lime and Soda for Karan, (she was driving).  I then ordered a pint of cider for Richard.  The Cider was off because it was, "too frothy".  (What? Frothy Cider!).  The barmaid asked if a Magners would do.  Ok, I know it's a bit pricey but what the hell, we're having a treat night out. "Is the lager back on yet?"  "No sorry", she said, "Do you want a bottle of Beck?". It was about this point that Karan asked the barmaid if she could top the glass up.  "Sorry, it comes in cans".  I looked at the empty can on the back of the bar and realised that it was one of those tiny 150 ml cans you get on aircraft. I turned my eyes to the Magners in Richards plastic glass and realised it was less than half full.  He hadn't had a drink.  I looked at the bottle of Becks being offered and it was a tiny 250 ml bottle, the sort you get on offer at Tesco's in packs of 36. Bloody Nora!  I saw the prices.  Yes I had seen them before but had just accepted them as being a bit steep, but hadn't reckoned on the tiny sizes being offered. The 250 ml bottle of Magners was £3.80, the normal price you expect to pay for the normal 568 ml bottle in an up market wine bar, (£2.80 in our local).  That's over £8.00 a pint!!!!!

The Soda and Lime was £1.80,  £1.40 for the tiny can of soda and 40p for the dash of lime.  Even in top wine bars it's usually 20-40p for the Lime and the Soda is free out of the Coke pump.  That works out at about £5.40 a pint for soda water!!!  That's Tap Water with added gas. I didn't bother with the £3.40 bottle of Becks, the lager still wasn't on and remained off as far as I was concerned. And this is what I meant about more complex.  Let's be clear that this is not a small venue, it is a racecourse and probably turns over in one day what most pubs turn over in a year.  So how come the Lager was off right at the start of a major concert.  How come the Cider was off at the start of a major concert.  Might I offer the opinion that at £3.40 a pint, it didn't present the same level of extortion as the alternatives. There was an article in the local paper about how punters at the recent races had been victims of pickpockets.  Maybe they just forgot that last round they paid for.  I won't! For your information: Mini Mixer can                      150 ml/5 fl oz Small Euro Bottle                 250 ml/8.8 fl oz Standard Can (Coke type) 330 ml/11.6 fl oz European Bottle                   330 ml/11.6 fl oz Pint                                            563 ml/20 fl oz

A lot of people have been asking about the band, 'Krush', who played at my Birthday bash. So I have just posted an excellent video of Krush, courtesy of those nice people at 'Furry Feet'. Click here for the Krush Video.

Thank's Stef, for these photos of the Carnival. Stef, (a.k.a. 'that woman what took up with our Darryl'), was given very short notice for this shoot and has done a cracking job. Her Carnival photos can be seen on the gallery by clicking the 'Album' tab. Photographs You can also see Stef's excellent website by clicking here

Just published the first batch of photos from the 4th Annual Bishops Cleeve Carnival held last Sunday. As well as my own photos, there are more to come from Stef. Meanwhile enjoy these: Photographs

After quite a while in the planning, at last we can look forwards to a new Folk Club in the Cheltenham area.

The venue is the Royal Oak pub in Bishops Cleeve.

The dates and times are yet to be confirmed but will be monthly on a Tuesday commencing around the end of June.

The host will be yours truly although I am currently looking for two other resident artists to share the presentation.
Any volunteers please contact me.

Watch this space for more details.

At last I have managed to get a photography gallery working in WordPress the way that I want it. It took a fair bit of messing around with code but eventually I got it. Take a look at the ‘Photography’ page. Try loading it ‘Full Screen’ using the little blue icon on the right of the Gallery top bar.

I have just added a new ‘Live Music’ page in which I have added events in and around Cheltenham. If anybody wants me to include their event or band, let me know.

After years of deliberating, I have decided that the time is right for me to join the real world and start my Blog.

I’ll try and keep it general and targeted at my friends rather than try and be anything clever.  Just simple stuff I find interesting.