25th May 2012

During the winter with perpetual darkness dampening my spirits i have been watching a little bit of tv! Not like me, usually doing constructive things, but with nothing on the go.......so whats on? well the usual rubish, plus I have had mtv on a bit, when did they grow up and get all responsible? 16 and pregnant, I used to be fat and various other related shows that are apealing AND educational. Im excercising a lot more and filling up on chicken and protien shakes to actually build up a bit, im not talking heavy weight boxer, more Jersey Shore...... hmm, I think I just gave away another show. Its about entertainment and motivation, right now, its all good. Im not going for the full on guido, juice head gorilla, just a slightly beefier me, in a tank top, sorry guinnie-T...... is that right? I live in tank tops now, ive got about  20, im in one right now, along with my post-workout / mc hammer fat face trousers. yeeeeeaahhhh buddy.

I got it in my head at the start of the year that I should frequent a club, yes this may well have been jersey shore filling my head with ideas, my friends were less enthusiastic, took me several months to persuade Mr.b to go with me. The venue? Oceana in MK, last time we went it was summer, the height of summer, it was 8pm, sun setting, 19 degrees, people walking about, pubs and clubs doors open, girls everywhere, awesome! got in early, got a seat, oh oh i just remembered, we didnt expect it to be so busy or loud, so were in the lower half or "holding area" (where the cattle is fed and watered before the parade) Mr. b goes to the bar and leaning over bellows into the blond bar girls ear "BOTTLE OF BUD and a LEMONADE" manners go right out the window when your shouting over run-d-mc at 11. Blond pauses for a second, and it was just a second, before rotating into action, he glances across at me with a " I think that went in" look on his face (im about 10 foot away) and a faint look of concern, turning back this concern was immediatley upgraded to all out worry as blond has got the tap running on a lemmonade and is poping 1, 2, 3, caps off a trio of budweisers. Its too late to shout across even if she would have heard anything over arman van heldon at full bananas. Im already feeling in my pockets for change, blond turns back and shouts the price, now its Mr. b's turn to pause and look baffled, followed closely by myself as he hands over a FIVE pound note and waits for change! Turns out this particular night was 3 for 1 on drinks, good grief, what the heck am i gonna do with 3 glasses of lemonade? someone didnt think this through, half hour later a group of 8 or so lads turn up and order drinks, it became quite obvious they were as ill informed as us, now it was the turn of the poor chap who ordered to look REALLY worried and 24 bottle of bud, breezers and becks got lined up. It was a very drunk very hot and very entertaining night, we had a blast, and I was driving. So with this in mind we went in November and it was dead, nothing but foreign creepy blokes, 5 guys with girlfriends, 2 hippos, and 3 school girls dressed as ..... well school girls. jebus it was bad, it was like a warzone, there were grenades everywhere. We made the best of a bad situation but with clubs shutting, no smoking and the cold weather it was a full blown fail.

Health

Ive not written anything for a while, to be honest I have been a bit ill. My anxiety has been bad since christmas time, been worrying over money and the future of everything, nothing major just trying to make the right desicions and not screw anything up. I like to plan everything down to the smallest detail but when your faced with choosing a mortgage a person can go nuts trying to calculate what the best thing to do is. Anxiety is a funny thing, you can focus so much on one negative thing that it becomes everything, consuming, everything you do to try and take your mind off it fails. This comes from me being able to focus on things very clearly, like the robot which required me to "make" every part in my head first, that worked great, but when I have a negative thing to worry about it gets tossed around in my brain forever. So this has caused my IBS to flare up, I was quite bad for about 6 weeks. Now im ok, concentrating on working out and doing things that take my mind off everyday life and relaxing, trying not to take anything to seriously or more importantly, not letting it get to me.

11th October 2011

Is it winter yet? should I hibernate now? I think so.

Work

Been doing various jobs for people, the leg pistons for Robocop suits is a favourite at the moment. You wouldn’t think so many people had life-sized Robocop suits but they apparently do. These are made as close to the ones in the film as possible.

Toys

Bought a Caanoo (as in the boat) it’s a handheld games console, not usually my type of thing but its open source, running linux. You  can download a multitude of things onto the SD card and run them, namely emulators of classic systems, all free of course and the games (roms) again all free (f you own the original of course). So after a great deal of faffing over 2 days and a lot of googling I have it up and running with snes, megadrive, nes, master system, neo-geo, CPS2, amiga, atari, playstation and a whole bunch of other stuff. Just about everything runs well, slowdown/framskip is to be expected in playstation emulator and occasionally on other systems in certain games, some of the Amiga stuff doesn’t run 100% but overall its very good! Also has features like video player and PDF reader etc, battery life is about 5 hours and charges from a usb port. They are on www.Play.com for about £123 or www.gameseek.co.uk for £99 with a 4gb SD card, you do need to be pretty familiar with emulators on the PC and rom’s etc else you’ll be on a steep learning curve, or email me and I’ll point you in the right direction.

I rebuilt an RC8BE earlier in the year, which was good but not great, running on 4s with the mamba monster 2650kv. Got very hot, didn’t last all that long, I got it cheap so split it up and sold it off for a profit. Since then picked up a bargain, brand new in the box Xray 808 2009 spec, not current I know but the 2011 model retail about £420, I got this 2009 model for £160…. Yes 160. For that I can do an electric conversion and work on getting 6s in it, which is really what you need to get 1/8th stuff really moving. I’ll probably do this over Christmas, I plan on taking a 2/3 week break this year.

29th June 2011

Is it summer yet? can I come out now?..................... woo hoo!

Bought 4 of these Tamiya lunchbox 's for myself and friends, good fun bashing these round all at once, videos:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f3Vn4pfulns

Been saving a lot recently, really watching the pennies saving for house deposit etc. The only 2 expenses recently are constant repairs to my helicopter (4G6S) what a good idea that was to learn with that! 5 Months in and im finally starting to get the hang of it.

Besides this I reluctantly decided to scratch an itch and buy another laptop, one I can play command and conquer on, so one with a decent graphics card. I say another because I have no intension of getting rid of my thin and light Sharp MV1214 (top right) that little fellow has served me well for 6 years and still works like new. Only issue I have had with it is the newer WIFI security standards, WPA and WPA2 require a 802.11g wireless adapter and the sharp didnt have one. I initially bought a PCMCIA wireless card that was compatible and used WIFI this way but you cant get one that sits flush with the laptop and this is anoying so after a bit of googling and opening a trap door in the bottom of the laptop I found the wifi card in a "mini pci" slot, then found another "mini pci" wifi card of around the same year of manufacture but supporting the newer G standard (£4 off ebay) banged it in, found the driver ont he web and away we go! This was going to be my reason for a new laptop "oh yeh the wifi doesnt work anymore, too old" but about a week after that i though sod it im going to get another one anyway!

I love a bargain, so Dell Outlet is the website to scour. After a week I had pushed the button on a 15.6" i3 with most importantly an ATI HD5650 for £300. This is a good card! runs 3dmark nearly as good as my 8800gt, the only other laptops I have found with this sort of graphcs power are £500+. Checking the dell website after ordering showed I was to wait about 2 weeks for delivery! hmm, ok fine, then 3 days before its marked as dispatched to the courier, but which courier? tnt? dhl? oh no no, Walsh Western................. yeh, I pulled that face as well, who? never heard of them. 24 hours later I receive no less than 3 identical emails form WW informing me the original date told to me by Dell (20th) was out and to expect my order on the 21st. This was followed up 55 minutes later by another email appologising for "unexpected dealys" and that I should now expect delivery on the 20th....... hmm, 20th you say? right. Maybe I should book the whole week off just to be safe. I forgot to say this is one of those "must be sent to the card holders address only" type deals.

It arrived on the 21st of course, fourtunatly late afternoon, all good. Tip top infact only the slightest of marks on te back that I could see, spec as stated, just trying to negotiate 7 now.

1st January 2011

Its finished, took about 14 months and 600 hours build time.

I will welcome all serious offers to purchase him, my email is at the top of this page. All the finished pictures and video of the head can be found here www.ukmonsters.co.uk/robocain

Been rather ill this christmas, spent most of xmas day in bed with a fever. On the mend now, nice to have some time off work to relax and have a tidy up.

20th October 2010

Bless me father for I have sinned, it has been many month since my last update.

Anyway I’m still here! Been on this robot for something in the region of 10 months, all the photos are here, a snapshot of what I’ve done below.

This will all be done by Christmas, although I’m not officially building it to sell I have had a lot of interest so far. I can assure everyone there wont be any quick sale, your not going to miss the chance. I will listen to all offers when its finished, however if you think its going cheap your very much mistaken. If you have to ask, you probably cant afford it! My email is at the top of this page in the middle.

I normally have a reason for posting but alas nothing amazing has happened, very much business as usual since the holiday. The onset of winter isn’t holding the fear for me that it usually does, I did good this year with regular trips to the park to run RC vehicles in the evenings. As the wet weather starts the ground never dries out enough to run them really, everything gets muddy, where’s the fun in that. I have a small co-axial helicopter with a gyro, £30-40 or so. Pretty good indoor fun, I have flown in briefly outside but it’s a bit of a handful. I’m looking into something collective pitch (where the angle of the blades changes) this lets you fly upside down or 3D, if its capable. I wanted to keep the micro size if possible and there are surprisingly a few options. You can, like anything, spend a small fortune (£400+) but I’m looking at something £200 ish, walkera 3G6S seems fav at the mo. This has proper 6 channel radio and 3 channel gyro albeit a cheap one, its new and I cant find a UK seller, I think ebay might come to the rescue.

22nd May 2010

So I did make it to Orlando, sitting here right now in fact by the pool, its still early so quite cool. Car parked ok at Gatwick, stayed at the Hilton overnight and then on the plane the next morning. As expected I was in a state or stress that wasn’t really needed, the 8 hour flight was quicker than expected but the 1 hour and 30 mins in immigration wasn’t, not what you need after a long flight. After bags it was down to the Alamo desk which fortunately was deserted, after the obligatory no, no, no I don’t want a bigger car, SUV or sat nav we were across to the garage to pick our "compact". After the journey the last thing you want to do is wander the isles of a hot multi-storey sifting through the eco-boxes so I took the 3rd car in the row which was both white and a Toyota. I would at least be slightly familiar with the control layout and white would keep it cooler than any other colour. Sitting in an unfamiliar car, on the wrong side and driving on the right seemed more than a little foreign for the first hour or so but a week on and driving here is a lot easier than in the UK. The automatic helps and is the only option for these long straight roads with traffic lights on. The 2 things that most shocked me is the lack of driving skills, changing lanes seems to be done at any point your lane is slowing and changing 2 or 3 lanes at a time with no indication is common place. This along with talking on the cell phone does create a scary road user, I saw a driver eating a pot of what looked like ice-cream with a spoon whilst driving and another talking on the phone whilst the passenger was talking on theirs! Probably talking to each other. I would say that 1 in 5 Floridians is on a phone, be it driving, shopping, or whatever. We sat at an intersection waiting for a green light and a dozen or so cars went across us, 6 of which were on phones!

Anyway enough of that, if I can get past the ash cloud nonsense I should be in the UK Friday morning leaving me a nice long weekend to get back to normal before work on Monday. Did I enjoy my holiday? I don’t know really, I didn’t enjoy the stress of it all, or should I say the amount I get stressed over things, I had a lot to arrange and a lot of things to remember and deal with that were new to me and this is what worries me. I miss my routine, working on the robot and my family. When I’m back in England I will no doubt miss the cheap shopping and vast choice, I have bought a lot of stuff, all of which was planned. The weather, always warm but the heat can be a bit much if you actually want to DO anything outside. I miss the general friendliness of people, obviously there are foreigners in both countries and good and bad areas etc, but one story on the news here shocked me. There was an issue with the local equivalent of council tax in an area, they had all paid too much (totalled something like $200,000) for whatever reason and the local council had a big meeting thing in a hall and the residents could attend and all had a chance to speak on the issue (this in its self is amazing, but it gets better) the counties idea was to give all the residents a $250 (£160) rebate..... each. Now think of the reaction in your home town of this news.... ok?  got it? hold that thought. All the residents that spoke at the meeting said they didn’t want the money, they all had good ideas on how it should be spent. One woman said the street lighting was inadequate in her area and more was needed, another said they would like to see a stronger police presence in the area and so on. This sense of "community", of wanting to preserve the place they live in and keep it nice is something that is quickly dying, if not dead already where I live. Every person I have spoken too has been friendly, every staff member in shops/ restaurants has been happy to chat away or just smile and ask how I was. This is all with me using my best American accent which gets me under the tourist radar. It is rare people in the UK smile, I know we don’t have much to smile about when it’s raining but I will miss it when I return. Its evident in litter also, not only is letter abundant in the UK but I frequently witness people littering, kids and adults alike, dropping in the street or out of car windows. Not only have I not seen anyone litter here but I have not seen any litter! Outside every shopping area there are trash cans and these font type things with sand in that you put your cigarette out in, and people use them. Ok enough now, have I enjoyed my holiday? I still don’t know, half and half, it has been nice but it has been hard work. One thing I have enjoyed is visiting here and experiencing what the UK can never be.

27th March 2010

Its been a while! I have been flat out trying to get as much of Cain done as possible, this is a huge undertaking and when im not actually making it im studying pictures and working out dimentions and the like. If your reading this you should be following my progress here:

www.ukmonsters.co.uk/robocain

I u pdate every 2/3 days with fresh pictures of my progress, some of you have asked if you can follow me on a forum as I tend to explain the processes I go through etc yes you can, I am posting on:

Robocop archieve

One Sixth Warrior

Overclockers (although updates are sporadic)

23rd December 2009

SNOW! there I said it. Gave me some time to play in the garden and try out my new onboard camera!

My office looking festive, and very sippy.

There is a problem in the UK with fake pound coins, I was aware of it but have never before come across one that was obvious enough for me to notice it. People will tell you this and that, how to spot it, the fronts 90 degress to the back and it shouldnt be etc etc. However I got this in a pub a few weeks back, it came to my attention when I nearly cut myself when sorting through my change! On closer inspection this has to be one of the worst, pressed, monkey metal pieces of rubish I have seen.

As of yet there is no compensation for picking up such a coin, so needless to say I gave it back to the pub the following week, no doubt i'll end up with it again soon, it'll probably turn up like a ...... well....... like a bad pound coin.

Project time! will be making the Cain robot, I will have a dedicated page with the updates and progress pictures on just as soon as I get off my ars and do it.

1st November 2009

Well summer was full of massive amounts of RC car driving which is a good thing, I certainly got my moneys worth out of them this year! Some HD video clips if your interested

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SsyVrGZ7DDA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kDlRc6oKtVA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zj_WP3YGjdE

Winter closing in, christmas nearly upon us and I am getting a bit bored of making stuff for other people so its just about time for a new project, drum roll please! I will ..... 95% sure I will be making Robocain form Robocop 2. I dont think Hottoys will do it and even if they do it wont be as good as if I do it..... well you know what I mean. Anyone not sure what it looks like or the enormity of the task in hand? Take a look:

Big scary fellow isnt he, if your not familiar with him get on youtube and do a search, he's very scary. The guns took around 200 hours each, they were no where near as complex as this, that said I will be making him to stand about 40-50cm high so a lot of the parts will be small and less time consuming. The real model pictured is approx 30cm high but I think for the amount of time it's going to take me slightly bigger will be more impressive but still be small enough to look detailed and complex. Im estimating this will take about 1000 hours or 14-16 months of work. It will be a challenge, but hey, I like a challenge.

3rd August 2009

Why do I never update this? I have a feeling there is an update missing here........ anyway let us not dwell on who did what, and why.

Yes yes yes it has been several months since my last update, forgive me. Hate to say it as an excuse but I have been busy, and real busy not “oh ive been busy and im so tired, I need a break” amount of people say that. So hows the credit crunch effecting you? Good ? indifferent? Yeh I bet, I bought a car so obviously not bothering me much. Although I do still have a job and some people are not so fortunate. I believe a lot of companies are using this situation to streamline and get rid of bloated work forces. A lot of companies (in my experience) that have say 10 people in a department, if someone isnt actually sitting in a watch tower with an AK47 there will be a certain amount of piss taking and slacking off. Will an office with 10 people in it be able to function just as well with 8? you bet your arse it will just means everyone has to work a bit harder, and they will and they wont complain because they don’t want to be the 3rd person that looses their job.

A friend told me a good theory the other day, if your awful at your job you get fired because your so bad, if your very good at your job you end up staying their as you do the job well. However if your neither good nor bad you get promoted, reason being if your not doing anything wrong enough to be fired but your not doing the job well there is no other choice but to promote to another department. This is why you often end up with a manager who knows sod all about what he’s doing and couldn’t do any of the work “below” them.

Things are tight in my office, I ran out of endorsing ink to stamp envelopes the other day and after a good rumage round in my draws I came up with only one option, use what was left in a bottle of black boot polish. This isnt a joke by the way, I really am using boot polish to stamp envelopes, its one of those squeezy bottles with the sponge dude on the top.

So ive made this:

I was going to say email me if you want it but i just sold it..... so there.

Anyone out there been through US immigration in the last year? Sanford/ Miami or Orlando last time I went they checked my phone laptop and shoes for explosives, I don’t know if they are still this hot on it or they just didn’t like the look of me.

I have stated in the past that Myface, Spacebook and all these other “social networking” sites are rather dull, they serve a purpose, however I fail to see how interesting thousands upon thousands of pictures of  4+ people in a darkened room with there arms round each other, cackling (probably) and sloshing half a glass of dry white down their friends shoulder, can be.

Am I on arseface? Yes, it’s a business thing, people want to find me and see my work so its just another means of locating me. I don’t ok “friends” willy nilly, they are normally fans of my work anyway I’ve no use for the site other than that, if you must add me at least include a note of why you want to be my “friend” ive “ignored” about 100 so far. Mainly because I don’t know who the fuck you are and you offer no explanation! I can only conclude that if you have more “friends” on the “internet” this somehow makes you a better, more interesting person in real life, of course!

My god im rambling. Right back on track! One site that HAS got a good idea going on is Zoosk. If you know it good, if not bash it in with a dot com on the end. Its basically a knocking shop for chaps, not unlike myself to “surf“ the shelves looking for an easy girl. The site designers have obviously geared it for this and the 2 main search criteria are “age” and “distance form me” and why am I putting “bunny rabbit ears” around everything? “ “ “ ” ” “ I digress. The site is good for a giggle, mainly populated by girls taking photos of them selves in the bathroom mirror on a camera phone with “the goods” on show.
The reason I say it is a good idea is they let you thumb through the profiles till you’ve filled your boots but you need to subscribe to message any of them, not cheap either, to you sir, £20 a month!

I still think forums are the saving grace of the internet, sometimes just one comment can keep me chuckling all day, god bless the internet.

So how is everyones summer weather going? if its anything like mine not good, look out the window and see..............

.......end up thinking yeh thanks for that. The weather people are no help, why cant they just stick a wet finger in the air and say, fuck it, I dont know, Its plainly obvious to me that the British summer is as unpredictable as a marshmallow life raft, yet the MET office still thought they would have a go, millions of £’s of equipment and 100’s of people  working there all flip a coin but sadly get it wrong, again. What other job can you be consistantly wrong all the time and get away with it?

Despite all this if you turn on the tv or a radio and its “climate change” oh oh oh save the planet everythings going to heat up , ice melt, flooding, bla bla bla, yeh yeh pull the other one mate. I have yet to see any evidence that a significant temperature rise will occur in less than a 1000 yerars, this will be a natural change, obviously. So be green, by all means, save power, waste is bad, I hate waste, I don’t waste anything power, food, money, time or effort but one thing I don’t do and that’s spend money to save the planet. All the idea’s seem to involve spending cash (read wasting cash) get a more efficient car, energy saving light bulbs, bla bla. This is not SAVING the planet, this is WASTING money.

30th March 2009

Things are on the up, after the snow hilarity of a few weeks back. Im fortunate in that if it snows I can just stay at home in the warm. Don’t get me wrong, im not scared of the snow, but anything over an inch of the stuff and it suddenly becomes quicker to walk than drive. Having said that I could probably get to work fine if I was the only perosn on the road, but the sheer amount of cars makes a 15 minutes journey 2 hours or for at least 2 days totally impossible without a land rover or snowmobile.

So projects on the go, Hot bodies lightning pro 2 brushless conversion, making the whole chassis here, moving the centre diff back and changing the layout of the whole thing. All good fun:

...and now the sun is coming out I might actually get a chance to run it!

Politics - Been pretty mellow of late, except for tv, is it me or are adverts getting more bloody annoying by the minute. We seem to have got over the "carbon foot print" and "recycling" epidemic. Probably because we cant sell anymore of our recycling to china (for them to "recycle" it back into next years xmas toy and then recycle it back over to us again). So were left with everyone offering me cheaper car insurance, but what would I insure? surely not the three ohh whatever VERVE, cos im looking for something drive fucking sexy, oh yeh, its got front fogs dont you know, or, as we call them round my way, wanker lights. We take a regular 308 and pour on the goodies........you do what sorry? pour.... on ..... the goodies? thats just great, you give us 12 and a half K and we give you change..... ooook, how about i just give you 12k? no? its £12,499 isnt it? go on admit it! Only availible in black.... why? ok i tell you what i'll have a "regular" 308, add the optional extras and get to choose my own ******** colour you smarmy, greasy ****! on 2nd thoughts **** this , you can shove your poxy french piece of **** up your fat **** you ****.

I dont watch a great deal of tv anymore, I tend to find it winds me up more than anything. Except for top gear re-runs on dave and documentry type stuff on natgeo or discovery. Most of the time these are acceptable unless they touch on the climate issue, then I switch off.

I found this about 6 months ago, keep forgetting to post it:

http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html

The meat and potatoes of this being how much of the "Greenhouse Effect" is caused by human activity? well Its about 0.28%.

Fun - Went on ebay, as you do, I tend to get obsessed with internet based research, whats the very best........ camcorder, weigh it all up, features, price etc until you arrive at the very best! then find it as cheap as possible for a bargain! So the most recent acquisition being an LX90 10" telescope, I used to have a little etx70, but it just didnt do it on planets. So looking for overkill I bought a biggie, problem is its so fudging massive im having a job to find room for it. Below is the LX90 and a shot of it next to my old telescope.

8th January 2009

Last day: Never happier than christmas time when work is finished for 2 weeks or there abouts and the rest of the family are home as well. Managed to get a few jobs done that there just doesn’t seem time for normally. Made some knobs and got to grips with my airbrush! All good fun.

First day back: Uuuururrrrg, snow, funny, car battery is as flat as a pancake, have to jump it off a spare that thankfully had something in it! Slid to work avoiding a guy in a corsa van going way too fast that jumped on the brakes, put it sideways and nearly took me out, I was waiting for 2 guys to jump out with brooms and start sweeping as he curled towards me. I had to pass him on the right, on the grass between him and a tree! By the time im leaving to go home the clock in my car is 7 hours fast………. Ok, must be power related, it did start but only just fingers crossed I wouldn’t run out of electricity before I get home.

Whhhhooaaa new battery time, much better, my clock is no longer a prop worthy of back to the future and has returned to normal speed after running twice as fast as it should for the last 3 days.

Im hoping to start a new build soon, still got the robocain in mind but im put off by the shear amount of work involved, could be as long as a year or even 18 months to do it right.

28th August 2008

Me - My infrequency of updates is in direct correlation to my business. Uuuuurrgggg where to start, if you are considering a new LCD TV, on the face of it the Vistron 26" may look like a bit of a bargain but if you want blacks to be black, don't get one! Despite the huge number of favourable reviews on ebuyer.com, trust me spend the extra £120 and get a Samsung. At least you can see what's going on when there's a night time seen and all the people don't look like umpa lumpas.

Woman - So with that little fiasco out the way, the sending of huge boxes back and forth, my girlfriend has decided to buy a new (well not new, different then) car, as a typical women she wants a blue one……… ok, easily pleased I guess. Oh yeh and a convertible, hmmm in England? Are you serious? Im still waiting for our "summer" like the yeti I haven't seen any evidence of it. Not to be swayed from her idea we are sticking to our guns! After a lot of googling we have chosen a Peugeot 206 cc, French but fair enough. After some research while were waiting for the money to arrive (inheritance) I have narrowed it down to the smaller of the two engines 1.6 rather than the 2.0l, she wont notice the difference and it'll be cheaper on insurance, tax, petrol and running costs, low mileage, something under 40k would be good and the leather interior, essential in our climate for a soft top. If you're driving along and the heavens open its going to take a few minutes to pull over and get the lid on. During this time a cloth interior will have soaked up the water and a few weeks down the line you have mold.

So the money is in and its all systems go, autotrader, ebay and the papers have been scoured with not a lot of success. Not to worry, I say, these things can take time, I say, after all your going to be driving round in it at least twice a day, everyday, its important to get it perfect, its not like buying a lawnmower. The very next day I get an messenger message, "ive bought a car" good grief. Yup you've guessed it wrong engine, wrong interior, squeaky brakes, and a judering clutch, but its blue so its ok. What is it with girls and no patience?

I put the car saga to the back of my mind until the inevitable head unit swap. Fair enough, after much fun and games with wanky multiplex Peugeot wiring we have it working minus the aerial connection, no big deal I say, just need an adapter, I say. I'll get one…….. what now?…… well yes we could…… yes halfrauds might sell one. So off we go. Now Halfords has a use on occasion, I mean where else would you buy a bicycle from nowadays, or get a spark plug at 5pm on a Sunday? On entering the store (gypsy lane, luton - Saturday approx. 11am) its deserted save for 2 customers and a cluster of 6 employees huddled around car shampoo's and polish deep in discussion. Honestly, im surprised the halfords uniform doesn't come with a hoody. I locate said ariel adapter behind an inch of bullet proof glass displaying a price tag of £3.99! I turn to stare at the group of chavs only to be given cursory glances in return. Just as I open my mouth to ball at them my girlie sets off to get one. The smallest and greasiest of the group is elected to assist and collects a huge bundle of keys…….. I can see where this is going. After selecting the correct key he tries 3 times to open the case with no success, checks the key again, no definitely right, and tries again 3 more times. No, checks again……… at this point I started to have an out of body experience, I could see myself grabbing the back of his head and ramming it through the glass, all in slow motion John Woo style, keys and grease flying in all directions and the camera pans back to show my snarling face through a mist of shattered glass and blood……. as I came back to reality and felt my limbs start to twitch I thought this a good time to walk out leaving him to it. Needless to say the adapter was found and ordered in under a minute off the internet for £1.49 delivered, why people still use these shops I don't know.

Work - After all that I have been more than happy to return to the security of my garage, put classic FM on which is relaxing and get on with some work. While not actually making anything for myself I have been commissioned to make one of these:

Well only the little grenade launcher called a "tishina" for an AK47, my effort:

on completion of the first the orders started coming in and I now have a list of 6 people to make them for. I was subbing out the lathe work but that was a pain in the arse so I am now the proud owner of a new piece of equipment!

Awesome, not bad for £300 from axminster.co.uk very good people down there, can't fault them. I am now making everything "in house" So any jobs that need quoting let me know!

Funny - this is my type of humor http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/shropshire/7585098.stm

25th May 2008

Me - Finally an update! Never seem to be in the mood to type now. Overall mood is good despite everything, my gorgeous pudy cat has gone, she was 18 and just got old bless her, I do miss her terribly but I wont think about that too much now. Thing of it is I can think about it and get upset and be sad as I was for a few days but it doesn't change anything, same with any loss. No matter how much you grieve or think about them its not going to bring them back. No one else knows how you feel so my way of dealing with it is to not think about it and stay as cheerful as I can, I do feel guilty sometimes but me feeling bad isn't going to change the fact she's gone for ever. Time for cat pics!

A good friend of mine is moving down to Cornwall for the time being, not sure if its forever or for a while, not even he knows, but that's Tony for you! Here we are doing what we do best, loafing around drinking tea.

Aside for that it's summer! Well sort of, any time I don't wear a coat I consider summer, I feel far more alive when it's warm, able to go up the garage and work away without having the heater on and freezing my arse off. At the moment im working on this:

That would be the big weapon she's waving. Mine wont be an exact replica but based on, this is to get me back in the engineering mood. It's a target pistol that was also used by Bridget Fonda in "The Assassin"( point of no return in the USA). Website should all be up now, I switched to a new host as I kept going over the bandwidth limit on the last one.

Politics - Thing with switching your website over, you sign up with a new "host" and pay your yearly fee for an amount of space and bandwidth limit etc. Now you'd think that's it? Oh no, attached to my website (www.ukmonsters.co.uk) is the IPS TAG, this is a little thing that says the name of my host. All I need is that changing from ukhost to speedyhost or whatever. Now all web URLs with a .co.uk on the end are owned by Nominet, (a government owned body) and you have to lease it of them. So even www.imwritingmyblog.co.uk , no no no they own it and you have to lease it off them, even your own name.co.uk bit cheeky really. After all it's hardly a physical thing, fair enough if someone already has it, but not to just say we own eeeeeeeverything! Like that wally in America that layed claim to the moon and now sells achres of it off on ebay.

2nd February 2008

Me - Im crap with updates at the moment, I think I have lost my way. Have been busy though, saving money as best I can and building what I can. Finished the DSR-1, behold...

more pictures on the dedicated site (link on the left).

Car is back together, that man Dan and his DA sander have managed to repair and paint the bumper. Leaving me to modify the wing and prep for paint.

Getting back in the turbo after that wanky Mitsubishi was amazing, I didn't realize that I had started to get used to the little colt. This is a car with 94bhp that weighs nearly a ton, my nova weighs less that that and has 3 times the power. The worst thing was the noise, it sounded like every other little anonymous box on the road, that tiny sort of whine as you rev it, like it was disapproving of me being spontaneous and driving erratically. It needed a flashing "Mr Brown wont like this!" on the dashboard to remind me to fit in and not make a fuss. Anyway, back in the Nova now and back to being an individual!

Been a bit off since finishing the gun but I have had a lot of you emailing about jobs that need doing parts that need making and this has been good as it keeps me busy and adds a bit of extra income. Lord knows I need as much as I can get, although the way house prices are I think i'll need a miracle.

Next project might well be a gun to sell and keep me going for now then onto something bigger, was considering the terminator 2 endoskeleton, big job but no one has made one out of metal that I know off.

14th November 2007

Me - Forgive me for I have neglected thee, it has been 4 months since my last update........... the hell have I been playing at!??!? To be honest busy as a busy thing building this latest gun in-between this I have had rather a lot of custom jobs to do for people, making parts out of metal for people. Engineering places/people are reluctant to do one off custom jobs with out a high price tag and very precise plans, where as I tend to do the work and send it back before I agree a price, and as for plans, one piece I made had dimensions written on the back of a paper towel.

I bent the car too, some arse didn't want to wait in the traffic and so decided to do a U-turn onto myside of the road....... before a bend...... in the wet...... on a 60mph bit of road. I just couldn't stop it, not too bad. It was a big impact and my first thought was that I had lost the car, turned the engine off straight away and got out to ball at the wally now standing sheepishly in the middle of the road. My "look what you've done to my beautiful car you asshole" must have scared him as he looked about ready to get back in his Fiesta. eeerrrrrgg what fun, still damage not that bad, car started and drove...... and drove well. A call to the insurance set the wheels in motion and I was furnished with the most awful rent-a-box. Albeit brand new (30 miles on it) Misterbushi Colt, good grief, I likened it to eating a digestive biscuit, if you were to eat said biscuit and then someone ask you "so, what was that like?" thats the face I pulled when anyone asked me what the car was like. You feel like your a passenger even though you are driving. I know my car is a bit basic but must new cars have insanely big brake servo's and no feel through this thing they call "power" steering. Anyway my hope was they would bash my car in somewhere and fix it. Oh no, 2 weeks on and no progress to speak of, they have established that none of they're approved places will touch it, its too custom and the parts would require too much fabrication and time. So sick was I of driving the bushi that I told them I could fix it for what my excess is so forget it! Patched it up myself and im now driving it again! yipeeeee, just a bit more battered than before, I have the bits just waiting for my mate to set a date then we can convert my garage into a makeshift spray booth! that'll be fun.

Then just when I started to get back to normality my bloody wisdom tooth starts hurting like you wouldn't believe, still getting the bugger out in 4 days, my dentist seemed a little flippant with his "yes we'll just whip that out no problem" a vision poped into my head of his demur assistant tying a piece of string to my tooth while he ties the other end to the door handle and then slams the door. Its ok, he's a nice guy and the sooner its out the better.

Politics - It seems that even hiding in my little bubble doing my own shit, fingers in ears to the propaganda of the radio and tv, I am still not immune to the "government". It seems now that airsoft is to be illegal after a fashion, that is to say if you want to buy an airsoft gun now you must be a registered skirmisher. If you already own them, fine no problem. This is all in the name of the new VCR bill (violent crime reduction bill) that is clamping down heavily on the sale of imitation fire arms (amongst other things). You may (or probably not) have noticed no replica/toy guns will be for sale in toy shops now unless they are bright pink/blue/green etc. This, the government hopes, in light of the recent shootings among your people, will reduce the amount of gun crime on our streets.................... hmm. They seem to have missed the point that replica guns dont actually kill people. They can be used to hold up banks and post offices, but that wasn't the problem or was it? A recent bank robbery gone wrong ended up with one of the robbers shot dead by police, the robber never fired a shot, this only happened in September but received very little press. Im not saying robbing banks is right and im not entirely sure as to the motives behind this one yet.

6th July 2007

Me - Had a bit of a complicated month what with one thing and another, dramatic one could say. First thing I take the car for an mot, the chap doing it feels the brake pedal creeping down a bit so stands on it and front pipe bursts and the pedal hits the floor! If that had happened when I was on the road, well it could have been the end of me….. and the car, check it out.

My grandfather passed away recently, it was very sudden and a big shock to us all, im trying not to think on it too much because its not going to help, there is nothing I can do about it. Worrying about it is not going to help anyone and only hurt me in the long run by depressing me. If anything it makes me think about making the most of what time I have left, its not good to be complacent and expect a long life. After all it could end quite suddenly.

Again for those of you who enjoy my projects, the dedicated site will be here, book mark it if you like, I will be starting in 3-4 weeks hopefully. Sorry for the delay but I have to be in the correct frame of mind to give it my full attention.

I spoke before about bumping into my ex after 6 years. I saw her again a couple of months after that and again a month or so after that. The last time we spoke she said she had split up with her boyfriend of 3 years, obviously very tough and I felt bad for her. I expressed my sympathies but we have only spoken a handful of words in the times we have met, so it was difficult, to show that I was genuine. We have quite a complicated past and neither of us really know what the other is really thinking despite the smiles and how are you's. So me being who I am now and always willing to help people out I contacted her and offered my support. This was tough, although im a different person now, it did still feel like opening a can of worms. She text me soon enough and once established that I wasn't gloating she Apologised for the things she said and did all those years ago. I had to sit down and I don't mind admitting I shed a tear. So long this had been a thorn in my side, something I had just pushed to the back of my mind and decided I would have to live with. To finally be on talking terms again and to know she felt bad about it too, that she still cared after all this time overcame me. I also got to say my sorrys for the way I was and it released me from the guilt I have felt for so long. I still need to say it to her face to face and it seems I may get my chance as we have agreed to go for a drink to catch up when she gets back from holiday. Who knows what that will be like.

23rd May 2007

Me - Been out a bit more recently, all fairly local. On one occasion a friend of mine billed this Friday evening as a night in a club in watford, with a revolving dance floor....... ok I thought, could be good actually. Straight away I have a picture in my head of a packed club, dark, smoke, music, people, etc. Then I see myself, few drinks down the road at the bar collecting drinks and making my way slowly across said dance floor only to find myself getting off it exactly where I got on looking baffled. Never the less it'll be fun. So, off we went, after enduring the tragic and very dangerous watford one way system and (rather stupidly I felt) braving the subway we finally find the dive that is "reflex". An 80's disco with a "revolving dance floor" the gaff was empty, bros and bananarama assaulted my ears as I fixed my gaze on an 8 foot circle in the middle of the room, sitting a full 3 inches off the ground it was a step up to get on top of the slowly moving disk of 5 bar. Perhaps more at home with an LP on it I was looking round for the speed control to at least provide some fun later on. Shows how far off a description can be.

My relationship has taken a rather abrupt turn recently, not through any great wrong doing of my own for once. To be honest its just nice not to be in the wrong! However im not the sort of person to be taken the piss out off, in the same respect I find it hard to "let things go". I have to tie up loose ends, I like closure on things so I can tidy each thing away in to its own little box and pack it away in my head.

I will soon be filling my head with a new project, another gun, the German DSR-1, some design aspects of this make it quite hard to build but never the less I shall attempt it. A lot of you have suggested it as my next project and I quite like the look of it too. Im still thinking it through so the build should start in 4-6 weeks, ish.

Politics - I heard about a documentry on Scientology, you know the one im talking about, it got a lot of press due to another bbc reporter loosing his rag. What interested me was the Scientologists filming the bbc, filming them, to avoid trickery by the bbc, just made me laugh. Needless to say youtube is full of clips and im not surprised after watching the docu. It was the most bias "documentry" I have ever seen. At no point did they say what the scientologists were all about, what their religion teaches or anything about it. I thought the job of a "reporter" was to report and let the people make up their own minds. In this case it seems he (more likely the bbc) have decided for us, so we dont need to worry about their policies, all we need to know are that they are wierd. Especially when you concider all that silly business with aliens and the like, I mean surely no other religion has silly storys in it. Nothing like turning water into wine, or parting the red sea or building an arc and filling it with 2 of every animal. This is obviously just a move by the bbc and/or government to nip this in the bud as they are just starting out in the UK and try to stop it before it becomes to big. If nothing else its seems to have totally back fired and the bbc ended up with egg on there face looking thoroughly un professional, you can bet that if the scientology people were not doing there own recording, that little incident with sweeney loosing his cool would never have been aired.

Im off to ebay now to purchase a copy of dianetics and read for myself what its all about, then I can make a judgement on it.

6th May 2007

Me - The weathers good, which pretty much means im good. Been doing a few custom metal work jobs for people, things like this:

So feel free to email me if you need anything like this that needs making.

I converted a Hot bodies Lightning Pro 2 to brushless Video of it HERE and HERE. Makes about 44mph top speed, should be fun this summer. Now taking a few weeks break before starting a new project, probably another gun, not decided for sure yet though.

8th April 2007

Me - Well it has been a while, since the last post I have had a birthday, been to a wedding, took a week off and finished the gun!

Quite happy with it, all done, had afew enquiries about purchasing it but I dont think I can bring myself to part with it. Even for a few thousand I think in years to come I would regret it.

I finally upgraded my aging Athlon 2400+ to a core 2 duo E4300 @ 2.4, nice and quiet still, just ahell of a lot quicker. Im fairly mellow at the moment so everything else is rolling off me like water off a ducks back, girls and politics, the two things most likey to irritate me are but mere voices in the distance...... muffled, like ive locked them in a car with the windows up.

This wont last long of course, this is why its imperative I keep busy, fourtunatly my new found airsoft fame has led me to do a lot of odd jobs for people, custom metal work mainly, this will tide me over (and provide some money) till I decide what to make next, any ideas, shoot me an email.

6th February 2007

Interesting - Found this on the net, it is amazing, im sure up close it lacks some detail but bloody hell it looks impressive, cheapest I could find one for was £3000. A bit excessive, besides where would I put it!

Me - Working hard on the gun, 8 weeks in, not long to go now before its finished.

Politics - I dont watch "tv" anymore, not in the broad sense I mean main stream tv. I watch eurosport almost exclusively now, only if the tennis or kickboxing is on. Aside from that I don't have it on, the stream of propaganda from the media that I used to be able to avoid seems to have spilled over into the adverts so there really is no escaping it. The powers that be seem to be able to manipulate the "people" into doing and thinking things and this is something I don't want to be influenced by. The internet has some advantages, for the most part forums seem to be government free for now and the only place it seems you can get an honest opinion on things as delicate as war and racism. No doubt in time these places will also be policed.

At work I am subjected to Radio 1 which for the most part is light and fun, the news bulletins however are bizarre in their spin and exaggeration. I don't want to go on about this for too long but I feel I have to mention a couple of examples. Firstly (most recent) they report on the turkey bird flu outbreak, they say there is no risk of infection and no infected birds were processed, etc etc, not a thing to worry about. Problem is it was obviously a slow news day as they had nothing better to do than go and find a local supermarket and stop people on their way in and out to ask them if they were going to avoid buying turkey because of the bird flu outbreak. Am I the only one who sees this as trying to scare the shit out of people for no reason? Trying to make a story out of nothing, influence the people into doing something they normally wouldn't do. Imagine you went to Tesco for some milk and outside some newsreporter/ scumbag from BBC asked you if you were concerned about the anthrax outbreak at the local milk depot, you'd all of a sudden be a bit concerned/worried. The fact they are there in the first place is the worry, danger or not.
Im not even gonna go on about racism and the big brother thing, talk about mountain over a mole hill, not even that a non-existent mole hill! But that's enough on that, far too many column inches already wasted im sure.
Lastly just a bit on Iraq, im sorry I just cant help it. Can anyone tell me why exactly we are in their country/ killing them/ telling them what to do and stealing there oil? Anyone? Please? Bin laden is long gone (or back working for the CIA) sadam is dead, as are most of his "crew". Then we come to the terrorists, this word is now being used to describe anyone who doesn't like the USA and owns a gun. Have a look at this video. In light of that video, imagine for a second the boot is on the other foot, imagine that for one instant Iraq had more guns than the USA and UK, AND THIS IS ALL IT COMES DOWN TO. They would then be "in charge" they could come over here if we happened to be sitting on a resource they wanted (like oil), drive down the road in a H2 punt you out the way and have no one to answer to. Wouldn't you get a bit cheesed off? To the point of voicing your opinion? How long before the people with guns got together and tried to defend their country?

What do you know about the war that you HAVN'T seen on the tv or read in the paper? This is the propaganda, the wool that has been pulled over your eyes, they have to report it like that, they are told to but we dont have to believe it. Next time you see Blair in his suit, smiling and explaining that he wants there to be peace in the middle east, ask yourself who exactly is doing all the fighting and killing?