Mercedes Driving Day

K, J, S and I were invited to a Mercedes driving day experience by the local Mercedes garage. Basically, turn up and drive our entire range. K and I took out the Smart Brabus Roadster which was great fun and all below the speed limit. K and S then took out a CLS (which suited Bridget a lot). J and I then got our hands on a SL500 for 40 mins and had some *REAL* fun :) :) Finally all 4 of us went out in a new S-Class for a bit of luxury (and some brake smoking anticts). I also got to sit in the SLR and a Maybach (not sure I was meant to though as they were all roped off). I have uploaded some vids to youtube so click the title above or go here - http://www.youtube.com/user/rakh1 to find them.

This is VERY addictive!

Have a go at this - you have to simply count by putting the next in the sequence in the http address. For example - the first page shows the number 1 so you must enter 2.html at the end of the address to get to the second page ... and on it goes. They get a bit sneaky so be ready to look at the source or title bar for clues! I have got to the 22nd page and am now stuck :)

http://n.nfshost.com

Most crashes in one journey

On my way down to Yeovil this morning I think I saw the most number of car accidents ever in one journey. In total 4 incidents including a car/lorry sandwich that happened 5 mins before I passed it and a whole lorry load of straw bales shed on a roundabout. Also whitnessed a lady with a caravan proceed to block a service station and sliproad with lorries after parking her caravan in the worst possible place - idiot! Still, I made it in one piece :)

Police!

I had to call the police last night! We were in the pub and there were a very loud group behind us - celebrating a birthday we were told. Anyway, they were getting louder and louder until the staff decided to close half an hour early as they were starting to get out of hand. Well, this pushed them over the edge and what followed was a rampage of chairs through windows, bottles being thrown at people and general anarchy. Needless to say we left quickly via a back door. I called the Police and 11 mins later 2 cars came screeming in. Haven't had a chance to go back yet to see what has happened...

TyTN delivered :)

Got my new phone through today and I have to say I am very impressed. I have always been a fan of the XDA devices since the very first XDA was given to me at Unisys to trial prior to its release. Since then I have owned the XDA2 and XDA2s as well. I very nearly got the XDA2s-mini (HTC Wizard) but did not like the quality and feel of it opting for a very user un-friendly SE K750i instead. Now the latest version of the XDA has been released and this time I went to Vodafone and got their version - the v1605 VPA Compact-III (HTC TyTN to us in the know).

First impressions are great - the device has a solid feel missing in the 'wizard' and the keyboard feels a lot better to use. The colours used by Vodafone give a nice business look - I was afraid it was going to be too silver but the gun-metal finish is a nice surprise. Functionality is as you would expect of a WM device and using it simply reminds me of all the things the K750i never had.

So, to summarise - I am very happy. Here are some pics:

An evening with the Danish Air Force

Spent most of yesterday evening drinking beers at my hotel with a handfull of helicopter engineers and pilots from the Danish Air Force. They are over for a 6 week training course on one of Westland's helicopters (I am in Yeovil, where Westland is based). Other than swapping vodeos of helicopters tearing themselves apart and looking at many photos of various aircraft we amused ourselves with the toy helicopter pictured below. One of the engineers had bought it earlier that day and discovered he could fly it around the hotel. Needless to say the staff were not too impressed but it was a laugh!

New phone...

I *just* got off the phone from Vodafone having ordered a Qtek v1605 (also know as the HTC TyTN). It has a 2mp-camera, 3G, touch screen, qwerty-keyboard, etc etc. The best bit is that they currently have no price for the handset so did it for the same cost as the Nokia N90 (about £200 less than the v1605) - awesomeo!!! It should come though the post tomorrow - can't wait...

Kris and her paddling pool

So - whilst I am away on site - suffering in the heat and business dress - Kris is filling her paddling pool (despite hosepipe ban this is still legal - check theh water board's web site) at home and sipping ice-cold pear cider. Some things in life are just not fair!

The gadget monster....

I am having a very hard time resisting my latest list of 'must-have' gadgets. Currently these include a new mobile/pda, a new guitar and a new camcorder. Add that to the constant craving for a better computer and temptation is niggling at me constantly. Maybe I can sell the cats without K knowing ;)

Tiki Bar Party

We had the grand opening of the Tiki Bar on Sat night. Quite a few people turned up and everyone brought booze. The cocktails grew progressivly stonger and as the photos show my ability to see straight grew weaker. It was a great night right up to the point where I was ill :( It seems the saying of hot weather, elusively potent cocktails and no way to measure how much you have had are true - I was not a happy bunny on Sun morning.

More pics here at Al's blog: Al's Blog

M&C visit from Sweden

M&C came to visit this weekend from Sweden. C is looking very pregnant now but this proved very useful when it came to parking ;) I subjected them to too many bbqs and tiki bar parties (sorry guys) and provided the wrong sort of entertainment late on Sat evening (extra sorry guys). Other than that we had an excellent time - went to Cantabury for a day, did lots of shopping for maternity clothes and generally relaxed a little in the sun.

S's birthday

It was S's birthday on Friday and we threw a party at the Tiki Bar. K made a cake and we had a few cocktails along with a BBQ.

K750i - R1CA021 Firmware

Flashed my phone to its latest firmware today - main improvement is camera version 5.3 giving better image quality. I was quite impressed with the close-up (see pic of watch). Also included are some pics around my study :)

Sky updates...

Got a letter today showing that Sky are about to launch a new service allowing us to set our Sky+ to record from the internet when away from home. Awesome! Did some digging and found a few things out...

1 - At the moment you can ONLY use your mobile to do this - web access expected in August
2 - you have to register through your sky box (this is currently not working)
3 - you may need the new EPG software for your sky+ box

in order to force a software update you can enter the re-load mode by holding 'backup' on the front of the box whilst powering it off and on at the wall - you'll get a screen like below for 5 mins or so. The new EPG for our Thompson box is not out yet :(

Trader Vic's

We went to Trader Vic's for our wedding anniversary meal last night. Had LOTS of rum cocktails, a DIY table barbeque and some lovely fish. Came home afterwards and carried on at our own tiki bar :)

Flaming Tiki Bar

I bought some citronella oil on Wed and so last night we were able to light all the Tiki torches at the bar. The pic isn't great - but you get the idea!

TIKI BAR OPEN!

The TIKI BAR is complete after 3 hours of construction and looks great. Got a few candles and beers out last night to christen it :)

Tiki Bar arrives!

The TIKI BAR arrived - pictured here in its base form. We now have to buy the bamboo frontage and attach the flaming torches. Once finished it should be an excellent work of TIKI art :)

Tiki Bar preperation...

In preperation for today's Tiki-Bar arrival I made the bar sign. K bought a 'devil' which turned out to be the perfect sign-holder/bar mascot :) TIKI TIKI TIKI!!!

Comments are on!

OK - bit of a tekky muck up here. I have been wondering since the start of this blog why no one was commenting. Turns out that there is a setting that means I must moderate comments before they are published and I had left it checked. 7 were waiting for me! Anyway, it is now un-checked and you may comment to your heart's content. :)

MINI Nav OS V27.1

Updated my MINI sat-nav OS to V27.1 today. It is meant to make satellite aquisition quicker and fix a few other glitches. The update took about 5 mins and left my MINI boot-up screen and Female-GB voice unaltered.

Garden update...

The grass at the very back is starting to come through - and the strawberries continue to grow.

New neighbours....

We finally met our new neighbours on Friday night. We went over for a couple of civilised drinks...and eneded up staying until 3am dancing! Sat morning was not so good...