2014 Update

Happy New Year everybody! I know it might be a bit late, but it’s my first post of the new year and it’s never a bad thing to wish something nice!

Anyway, 2014 has already began and from what I can see it’s going to be quite a year. Already, I’ve moved offices. I’m now based in the general area around Monument, Tower Hill and Aldgate underground station. I’m still in the same company and team, just in a different building. We’ve also started some major changes in the house. The scaffolding was put up yesterday to help the builders that will come to replace our roof and guttering and install windows and insulation for the loft conversion. In the meantime, we ordered to get connected to the gas network again. I need with JJ to prepare the house for that, digging a trench, routing some plants, etc. It’s all very exciting. And all these are only planned for next couple of weeks.  

In the meantime, my lodger who stayed with us for the last year, will move out mid-February. We had some ups and downs as all people have living together. I believe there were more ups though during that year. We had said we’ll help her out till she finds a proper job and everything, which we did. It is time now she moves on and for me and JJ to enjoy our house alone. I’m saying that because it’s been decided that in the summer we’ll be getting a dog! I can’t say how excited (and scared) I am of that prospect. It will be amazing! More of this, I’ll definitely explain later.

Since I’m talking about arrivals and departures, I need to add how excited I am of the arrival of my nephew in spring. If all goes well, and I pray that they do, the dynasty of my family will live on through my nephew that is due in April. It will be my only brother’s first child! With the child of my first cousin arriving a month earlier, these two children will be the first of that generation. It’s going to be truly amazing! And my parents will become grandparents which means that they will have something else to worry about! Hopefully that child will keep them occupied enough!

This is more or less how my year will go. It is said that in order to make God laugh, tell him your plans. So, I’m going to stop here and try not to jinx anything. I will definitely keep you posted on what happens though

Geeky Update

It’s been a while since I’ve last done one of those.

Firstly, I want to mention a Marvel graphic novel that I read recently. I’ve been reading comic books since I was a small boy. I remember laying wake from excitement in my bed in anticipation to a trip to the city where there was a proper comic book store, where I could buy things that were not available in the small town I grew up in. Since then, lots of things have changed. I’ve lost that children’s excitement, but not my total interest in them. What I do now is instead of purchasing the bi-weekly or monthly releases; I wait a bit and buy complete graphic novels or collections.

Lately, I bought a graphic novel titled “Avengers: the Children’s Crusade”. It features mostly the group of heroes called Young Avengers. I had a glimpse of them in the Marvel’s “Siege” storyline but I didn’t know mostly anything about them. They are as the name implies the new generations of super heroes that aspire to become like the proper Avengers and were formed during the time the senior Avengers team was temporarily disbanded. The graphic novel overall isn’t bad. Its art is quite nice and the storyline good. I would give it higher marks if it didn’t include dead people from the past coming back to life. It always puts me off when that happens.

 In any case, I was happily surprised to find a proper gay couple in the team. Wiccan, a powerful wizard who could be the reincarnation of Scarlet Witch’s son, is in a relationship with his alien shape shifting male teammate Hulkling. They properly refer to one another as boyfriends; they kiss and complain when given a room in the Avengers mansion with separate bed. The whole situation is written in a very realistic and respected way. There aren’t many gay characters in comic books and it’s always nice when I come across them. The Young Avengers series was discontinued, but a new version is coming up that still features both Wiccan and Hulkling, even if changes to the rest of the cast have been made:

Since, it is the beginning of March, I can’t not mention my upcoming birthday. It’s next week! Yay! Anyway, I was looking for a present for myself and I was delighted to find out that the new SimCity will be released on the 8th of the month! That’s so very appropriate. I’ve been a SimCity fan since the very beginning. I used to play it when the game still looked like this, back in the 80’s:

So, I can’t really miss it, when it looks like this:

I don’t normally pre-order stuff. I’m generally cautious before proper reviews are written and games are properly tested. I’ve made an exception in the past for the Elder Scroll’s latest release, Skyrim, and I didn’t regret it. I was extremely confident that Bethesda would deliver. In SimCity case, the preliminary previews I’ve read are quite good. Also, I trust the development company ‘Maxis’ and Will Wright. I’ve played every SimCity release there was. I love this type of strategy, resource management and control games. Another amazing example of the genre is Civilization. That’s another series of games I utterly love.

Finishing this post, I’d like to mention that EA, the company that now owns Maxis, is hosting next week a one-day conference in New York to discuss lesbian, gay and bisexual issues in the video game industry. That same company is the one that published with Microsoft the games in the ‘Mass Effect’ series. It was highly criticized when same sex couples could be formed in the last release of the game as I mentioned here.

Weekend thoughts…

• I really love the sound of footsteps on nice and fresh snow! It snowed a lot the past few days in London. The scenery was simply lovely. So, I put my wellies on and I went for a walk to the neighbourhood and nearby Park, yesterday morning. I stayed out as much as I could. When I started not feeling my face, I went indoors for a lovely warm coffee to read the Sunday paper and watch the people outside slide over the icy roads.

• Question of the day: Am I supposed to feel sad or sorry for Lance Armstrong? Because I’m not. I didn’t watch his full interview, but from the part that I watched, I thought he sounded as smug as ever. I don’t think he’s sorry about it. He’s only sorry he got caught. The only but high credit I can give him is from having cancer and stopping it. Being diagnosed with the big C is probably the worst news someone can get.

• I also realised how my perception of things change over the years. Things I used to love don’t mean that much to me anymore and vice versa. To be more specific, I’ve recently re discovered a love I have to Mediterranean / Greek cuisine and its value. After the excessive holiday eating, we’ve been trying with JJ to cook a bit healthier. So, we’ve found some Greek recipes that I really despised while growing up. Things like Greek style spinach and rice (spanakorizo), pork with leeks and Briam (tourlou) were dishes I really didn’t like. I now thankfully (for my waist line) love them. On the opposite side, I watched Coppola’s ‘Dracula’ the other day with Gary Oldman. I hadn’t seen it for years but I remember really falling for it when I first watched it. Now, watching it again felt like such a disappointment! Unfortunately, after all these years, it has faded out.

 

Happy New Year

I’d like to wish for you a jolly, healthy, successfully and productive New Year!

We went to central London for the change of the year. We had arranged to meet some friends, but it was so busy that it was impossible to reach them. To give you an idea we were in the North Bank of Thames around 10 pm, close to Temple station (that’s two stops away from Westminster), and it was already crowded and we couldn’t get closer. They had already blocked parts of the road leading to the area around Big Ben. By 11pm the closed road where we were was full of people and there was nowhere to go but stay put and wait for time to pass.

At midnight, the fireworks display was really nice. I tried to enjoy the ‘show’, so I didn’t take many pictures. It wasn’t easy to zoom in, keep steady with everybody moving around and take a decent shot of the fireworks anyway. The atmosphere of the joyful crowds was pleasant as well (excluding some drunk people).

When the display was over, we quickly tried to get to a convenient open tube station and head home. JJ was working the next morning and we couldn’t afford to get stranded in the centre. The way back was funny. There were lots of people wishing each other for the New Year. The girl sitting next to me in the train had a carton decapitated Queen with her. Since she was slightly drunk and falling asleep, the Queen was resting on my shoulder as well. I couldn’t resist and told JJ to take a picture of me:  

  

Becoming paranoid or cautious?

The world is supposed to end this Friday, which kind of sucks, since we’ll be missing the weekend. Why couldn’t the world end on the following Monday? Although to be honest, that Monday is Christmas Eve and it’s only half a day at work, which means that everybody will be in holiday spirit and not much work will be done. Apart from very emergency issues, the rest of the day will be spent chatting, gossiping and mindlessly browsing the internet. I think there will be a Christmas party for the employees’ children in the mess room, but I’ll try to stay far away from that one. Then it’s Christmas. Can the world end at the end of next week?

To be honest, I don’t think the world will end. Maybe, I’m being too selfish believing that I will not die this Friday, or maybe too optimistic. In any case, I have planned to do my Christmas food shopping late this Friday to try to avoid the weekend hordes of panicking consumers. My local big supermarket is open till midnight, which is very convenient. I’ll go home, have dinner and later that night, we’ll get ready and instead of going to a bar, we’ll go food shopping. On Christmas day, it’s going to be the two of us, so food shopping will be somewhat easy, even if we will stuff ourselves with food, as expected.

Anyway, what I wanted to talk about is ‘prepping’. According to the Google dictionary, prepping is ‘preparing oneself for an event’. During these modern times, prepping has a new meaning and it concerns people getting ready for an apocalyptic event, i.e. the end of the world. There are some people really serious / fanatical about it. They believe that a disaster of that proportion will soon happen, whether it is a zombie attack or a civil outbreak or a spreading killing virus, and they have made preparations. They have escape routes from their houses, evacuation packed bags with necessities, a destination where they believe they can isolate and support themselves for weeks, even months, and they train themselves in first aid, hunting and various other similar self-preservation skills.

My self-preservation skills are almost non-existent. Even in the most user friendly forest, I wouldn’t know how to survive. OK, maybe I would try to find a water source and some shelter for the night. But that’s it. I was never a boy scout and I don’t think I would be able to light a fire without a lighter. If the zombies came, I would be one of the first to go. To be frank about it, that wouldn’t be a very bad thing though. Who wants to live in a post-apocalyptic world anyway? Have you read the ‘World War Z’?

However, some recent events made me thinking. Without taking the situation too far, wouldn’t be a good idea to be somewhat prepared? I’m not talking about the zombies or aliens coming. I’m talking about more real everyday stuff. For example, if a natural disaster occurred, like hurricane Sandy that left so many people without electricity for days, do I have the proper equipment at home to sustain myself for these days? Do you?

So, I made a mental list of things needed. In case the electrical supply was down, the supermarkets remained closed for some days and we got stranded at home for a few days. It would be good to have some candles or source of light, lighters, some lasting cans of food, water and a small bottled gas cooker like the one my grandmother used to use to make Greek coffee. Am I taking this too far? Is this just the beginning of me turning into a crazy prepper? OK, that’s not a proper word, but anyway, you know what I mean... Will I start looking into conspiracy theories and wait for the dead to rise?

Random Thursday Thoughts and a naked prince

Have you seen Prince Harry’s naked photos?
I knew I could catch your attention with this opening line. Apparently, he was playing strip snooker with his friends in a hotel in Las Vegas. Nice… I’m really happy for him for enjoying life and having fun with his friends. Of course he’ll get grief over it, but he’s young. Let him enjoy life and even be a bit irresponsible. Here are some pictures:

She's not going to be happy:

On a different note I’m flying to Greece this weekend. I’ve turned it a bit into a tradition, but I go to visit my parents every year, around the August’s Bank Holiday. We have a day off every last Monday of August and by taking 4 days of holiday I can go away for a week. This time however, I’ve planned it differently and I’m flying through Zurich. I’ve arranged to stay there for a day on my way to Greece between flights. I have a very good friend of mine there and I expect it to be fun. I don’t know if you’ve been to this side of the world, but Switzerland is quite beautiful and Zurich’s a lovely town to spend a day or two.

I’ve already planned so many things to do while in Greece. I’ve invited friends of mine to stay over at my parents’ place and also arranged to meet old university colleagues and old school friends. That’s the main reason I love social websites and mobile communication apps. With my new smartphone which I really love I’m in contact with them constantly on the go. It’s amazing… PS. Does any of you play ‘words with friends’?

where I'm heading...

Goodbye Nokia

Or how a company can let you down…

After my very first mobile phone which was a yellow Ericsson many years ago with one line of a black and white screen and tiny buttons, I switched to Nokia and I stick to it. I went through many different models, including some legendary ones which still function even today. I always believed that Nokia makes really good, sturdy and resilient phones. They might not jump onto new technologies quickly but they were innovative, like introducing WAP to mobile phones, with good hardware.

One of my first Nokia phones! Simply immortal

After focusing on phones with good cameras like the N81 and N86 that including an amazing 8MP camera before many of its competitors, I decided last year that it was time to try a smartphone. Even before it was released, I fell in love with Nokia N8 by watching the promo video on the Nokia website. The phone had good enough specs and featured an amazing 12MP camera. I wouldn’t go for an iphone (I’m reluctant to follow the masses) and most Android smartphones weren’t that impressive (low battery, bad camera etc) at the time.

When it was released reviews were a bit harsh on it. Everybody said that the phone itself was good, but its operating system crap! However, Nokia released a note that the Symbian operation system will receive updates and will get better and the company will support developers in creating enough applications to support their new Symbian smartphones. So, while I suspected that the OS would be a bit bad, I bought the phone I think very early February 2011. It went all downhill after that.

Innovative 'Matrix' phone

Elop, the relatively newly appointed Nokia CEO (and previous Microsoft employee) released a memo about how ‘Symbian is a burning platform’ and that Nokia should abandon it! That happened around 2 weeks after I bought the phone (which wasn’t very cheap)! That memo was the beginning of the end for Nokia at least for me and I can explain why. It affected developers who refused to work on Symbian applications. Which serious company would spend money to create apps for a dying platform, even abandoned by the company who created and supported it for years? However, without any applications, how can a company expect to sell smartphones?

That memo had tremendous effects on the company itself. Elop singlehandedly rendered all Symbian phones obsolete without having to offer an alternative. He said that Windows Phones would be the future of the company, however the first Nokia Lumia with WP as an operating system was months away from production. The company lost its credibility and its sales dropped so significantly that it now faces tremendous financial issues.

Very good phone 

As a customer I felt like I was stuck with an outdated phone making me angry on a company that I used to like. Nokia focused more on creating the Lumia series and the preannounced Symbian updates arrived with months of delays. Now, after months of waiting I’m running Symbian Belle. It is so much better than the early Symbian version but it’s too late, too little. There are hardly any good applications released on this platform for months. That is the reason that I refuse to go for the Nokia 808. That phone was awarded as phone of the year in the Barcelona conference at the beginning of the year for featuring a staggering 41MP camera! However, it runs Symbian and not generally supported even by Nokia itself.

Generally, Nokia and Elop are all about the Lumias now but I refuse to follow them. I see the same mistakes happening. They announced that not any of the existing Lumias can be upgraded to version 8.0! That means that if I buy a Lumia now, I’ll get stuck with yet another obsolete platform. Why would I do that again to myself? Not to mention the mobile phone carriers who are boycotting Windows Phones since Microsoft bought Skype! Skype is loathed by them. I feel bad for all the people who lost their jobs working for Nokia but things look very gloom for the company now. Its market share dropped so much in such a short period of time. Maybe Microsoft will buy it… I don’t know. If you want to read more about it, this blog by Tomi Ahonen is simply amazing. He used to be in Nokia and simply hates Elop's guts! You can read how a CEO put his company in turmoil. 

But as a let-down customer I say goodbye to Nokia and hello to Samsung! 

Getting ready for the Jubilee weekend

 Apart from the Olympics, there’s another reason for the British to celebrate this year! The Queen celebrates 60 years of reigning, her Diamond Jubilee! 60 years? Imagine that! According to the omnipotent Wikipedia she was born in 1926 and her coronation took place in June the 2nd 1953 following the death of her father, George VI the previous year! She was so young when she became a Queen, only 27! She’s the second longest reigning monarch of the United Kingdom after Victoria. If she keeps this up, and I believe that she will, for a couple more years, she’ll beat Victoria no doubt!

So, London and I assume the rest of the country and maybe parts of the Commonwealth (?) are getting dresses in red, white and blue with Union Jack decorations everywhere. The formal celebrations started earlier this year with the Queen controversially hosting all monarchs of the world, the most exclusive member’s club ever, in a formal luncheon in Buckingham Palace. Various other formal events took place earlier this year.

Lego Queen at the Hamleys

However, this weekend is the public’s turn to celebrate. Normally we have a bank holiday the last Monday of May, however, this was transferred to this Monday and due to the Jubilee, we got Tuesday the 5th as well! So, we have a 4-day long weekend ahead of us! Hooray! During this weekend, there’s a massive boat parade on Sunday on the Thames with the Queen also on a boat waving at the crowds. There are numerous street parties organised around the country and a massive concert with popular names (Kylie, Robbie, Tom Jones, Elton John etc) singing in front of the Buckingham Palace for some lucky ones who received a ticket through a ballot.

1953 - Coronation day

I can’t say I’m a royalist. I grew up in a country that turned its back to Monarchy and told the former King Constantine to simply pack his bags and leave, a decade before I was even born. However, I give them credit when needed. I love getting extra days off work. Last year we had the Royal wedding, this year we have the Jubilee! What’s not to like? To me, they are like posh celebrities. They do cost lots of money to the tax payers but act as proper tourist attractions! PS. Harry’s turned up to be very good looking.

Queen picture from the Silver Jubilee celebration (1977)

The Queen lives a very fascinating life, or at least used to when she was younger. She’s travelled all over the world and must have met the most numerous people than anyone alive from country leaders to artists to everyone! I wouldn’t like to be in her shoes though. She’s constantly under scrutiny, on the spotlight and having to cover up and be reliable for the whole family’s scandals and dirty stories. It also must not be very easy trying to keep some balances. Imagine that she had to deal with Churchill at a very young age or Thatcher later on. There are so many conspiracy theories around her, with the death of Diana being the most famous one.

Anyway, I hope you have a great weekend! See you soon.

Isn't it ironic?

1. …that England’s officially in drought that might last for months but it’s been raining so much the last few days?
2. …that France and Germany still put pressure on Greece to keep on buying their expensive military equipment but demand more austerity measures from the public? The biggest market of Germany’s arms exports in Europe is Greece. Interesting read here.
3. …that Africa is actually sitting on big reserves of water?
4. …that Samsung Electronics is now the main manufacturer of ipad retina screens?
5. …that Anders Behring Breivik claims he acted in self-defense and he’s not a racist? (and it’s not even funny)

 

UK Hate Crime Legislation

I’m not that great when it comes to understanding law. However I was reading about a recent case in the UK that included the distribution of gay hate leaflets and I wanted to share it with you.

Ihjaz Ali, 42, Kabir Ahmed, 28 and Razwan Javed, 28, were distributing gay hate leaflets outside a mosque and posting them through letterboxes in the Normanton area of Derby. The leaflet had the title of ‘Turn or Burn’ or Gay - an acronym for ‘God Abhors You’ and pictured a burning man in a lake of fire.

Gay people who received the leaflets were horrified. One man, who didn't want to be named, told Sky News: "They incite violence and I would even say it's incitement to murder. It lists various methods of executing homosexuals from burning alive, stoning, hanging or being thrown from a tall buidling and I felt that was directed at me. My initial thoughts were that I was actually being targeted by an individual, it really was quite frightening, it's a very very scary image, especially when you realise what the message is," he said.

Of course the leaflets created quite a stir in the local community and thankfully the responsible people were arrested and trialled. Ali was sentenced to two years in prison at Derby Crown Court, while Ahmed and Javed were jailed for 15 months.

In that landmark case last month, the trio was the first people to be convicted of inciting hatred on the grounds of sexuality since new legislation came into force in 2010. According to that, hate crime legislation is extended to cover "hatred against a group of persons defined by reference to sexual orientation (whether towards persons of the same sex, the opposite sex or both)."

However, to prevent the Act being used to inhibit freedom of speech on the subject of homosexuality there is a new section entitled "Protection of freedom of expression (sexual orientation)". I’m not going to go too much into detail about it.

The way it was explained to me, a third person can now act and denounce doings that he or she believes are acts of hatred towards people with different sexual orientation. I think that up till now, it was only the person targeted that was able to go to police and press charges. This ‘hole’ in the previous legislation was of course exploited by various people. Hopefully this case will act as a basis for better justice to be enforced.

Picture Fail

I was reading the news the other night and this made me laugh...

There's a local respectable magazine called 'Radio Times'. It's owned by BBC and published since 1923 with radio and TV programme listings and other articles. There was a minor error on the February's issue though! A MAJOR fail with a picture!

In February there will be a TV programme for the Royal Marines in Afghanistan. With the listing, a picture of the Marines was published! In that picture though, one of the marines was going commando! Without anyone noticing the picture was published! Of course an apology was issued by the editor and probably someone got fired.

However, the whole incident was hilarious. I give you the published picture. Check the guy around the middle in the green / gray shorts! I think you can enlarge the picture by clicking on it.

PS. Thank you for voting to my poll about the new template. It is much appreciated.

Inspirations…

Fauja Singh was born in India in 1911. He was a farmer in the Punjab until he moved to Britain in the 1960s, already at his 50s. There are lots of things that are amazing about this man. First of foremost he is still alive and reached his 100th year. 11 years ago, when he was 89 years old, after his wife and son died, he decided to take on running! Yes, at 89!

Some years later, last week, he finished a marathon run in Toronto! He is the oldest man EVER to have done this at his age! I’m not sure what most (alive) people who are 100 years old do in their everyday life but they surely don’t run 10 miles a day training!

According to the article:
He puts his stamina down to ginger curry, tea and "being happy".
Mr Singh said: "The secret to a long and healthy life is to be stress-free. Be grateful for everything you have, stay away from people who are negative, stay smiling and keep running."

I will give ginger curry and tea some more credit but I’m not sure how easy it is to stay stress free! I wanted to add to this sentence ‘at the times we’re living in’ but this is all bull. Yes, there are problems like the recession and the environmental threat but you can’t claim that the times are generally worse than before. People during the cold war feared that the world would end with a nuclear blast and earlier there were quite a few World Wars to keep them occupied. There were always problems…
 

There’s a Greek expression which translates to ‘write them/him/her/it on your testicles’ which basically means ‘ignore them/him/her/it’. I’m not sure exactly how it started but it is widely used. The ‘testicles’ word can be ignored and people do say in a dismissing tone: ‘Just write him’ or ‘he has him written’. Mr Singh reminded me of this expression. Some things need to be written on our testicles to live a happier life…

So, Fauja did it when he was 100, what's your / my excuse?

Silly morning questions

Today’s ‘dress down day’ at work. We don’t normally do it. Oh, no. We wouldn’t want to look human at all. We have to wear our uniforms, our suits, every day. However, today we have the ‘Jeans for genes’ day when with a small contribution to the charity, everybody can wear their jeans. It’s nice. It looks like a children’s party. I like it. Most people here do look as normal human beings.

I have to confess though that it took me much longer to figure out what to wear than the rest of the days. So, the uniform does have its advantages. I do blame the weather which turned for worse. It’s getting very cold again, the normal temperature for this time of year. However, lots of people are wearing t-shirts today. Why? Are they not cold? Is it me coming from a warmer background that is more sensitive to lower temperatures?

I’ve also noticed that the majority of people in t-shirts are wearing ‘Superdry’ t-shirts. How come? Is ‘superdry’ the ‘Ambercrombie’ of the straight people? I don’t think I own any Superdry clothes. For a gay person I am completely fashion-less. The first time I tried to visit their central store in ‘Seven Dials’ a couple of years ago, it was during summer sales. I innocently asked one of the saleswomen about whether they do sales. She gave me a harsh look, like I had tremendously offended her just by looking at her and replied: ‘We don’t do sales’. ‘Piss off’ was probably what she thought afterwards or at least this is how it felt. Needless to say I never visited that store again.

Changing the subject, I have another silly question. Yesterday after work I went to JJ’s for dinner (delicious by the way). In order to get there I need to take the tube and change a couple of times trains. Since it was during the evening rush hour and there were some delays on the service of some of the lines, the stations were packed! So, I arrived in the station where I should change trains and I waited patiently for the next train to arrive. The platform was simply heaving with people in work clothes and tourists. Most trains that arrived in the station were already packed, but the vast majority of people still tried to squeeze in! Why on Earth did they want to do that? I could see the passengers by the doors bent in weird and painful angles. However, the next train was two minutes away and the one after that, three minutes away! Were all of them really so much in a hurry that they couldn’t wait 2 to 3 minutes?

I waited for the third sequential train which arrived in 5 minutes and was less than half full. I didn’t find a seat but I wasn’t that bothered. I stood and read my book calmly until I reached my destination. I don’t understand how people get into that manic mentality and need to push other people aside in a tiny spot in a train barely having space to breath! For what? To save two minutes of theirs lives? Didn’t they have an already busy and tiring day at work to extend their frustration for a longer period of time?

Last but not least, when I move in with ‘JJ’ will I have to throw my porn collection away? You know, as a good will gesture to put my past behind. Not that I have any porn OF COURSE. I’m just saying…

Friday happiness…

I’m so glad it’s finally the end of the week, not to mention the month. I’ve always dreaded Septembers. They meant the end of summer and the beginning of schools, the beginning of the nasty season. At least during October there is an element of romanticism and of autumn.

This week has been generally uneventful. Work has been busy. I’m generally getting at ease with my new responsibilities, people and environment. I only have another 4 months to go to finish my probation period! Yoo-hoo! I don’t think I have anything to fear but still. I would be nice to get it over with.

Anyway, it was my mother’s birthday yesterday. We talked on the phone. She sounded happy. She’s now in her early 60s. Both my parents are generally very active with a social circle to keep them occupied. They do have some minor health issues but generally they’re well. They’re of course very concerned at what’s going on at Greece at the moment. They’ve seen their pensions diminished and they worry about their future. I generally advise them not to watch too much telly, but I don’t think they can help it. I had told my brother to send her flowers on our behalf.

I don’t have any special plans for this weekend apart from a birthday party tomorrow night. The birthday girl booked a table on our favourite gastro pub. I hope the weather stays as amazing as it is at the moment and we could have a bbq outdoors!

Quiet…

I had an extremely busy day. I got up around 6ish and I went to the gym for an hour before work. I like how quiet it is in the morning. That way there aren’t too many massive muscly guys admiring themselves in the mirror. I’m also able to leave my evenings free by doing that. Work’s been very busy today. I didn’t even get up from my chair to go to the little boys’ room until my lunch break. The bad thing with development is the fact that you can get stuck easily. It’s like having a mathematical, puzzle problem. After you figure it out it you wonder why you couldn’t see the solution earlier. However, before getting there you (or let’s say I) can’t relax before figuring it out.

Anyway, I did have some excitement this evening. A massive spider crawled close to me on the living room’s carpet! I don’t have a phobia but I have been bitten in the past and it is not a fan of the experience. I threw a book on it and I left her there. The arachnoid was massive I’m telling you. The good thing of being a geek is that there are big books at an arm’s length at any time. Eventually I removed the book and threw the spider away. I maybe shouldn’t have killed her but I couldn’t simply leave her wandering around. I’m still looking over my shoulder for her relatives though.

Yeah, I know. I’m living a very exciting life. It’s been a bit like that lately. I haven’t been doing anything extraordinary. I think it’s the season. The day’s getting smaller and the temperature’s dropped. I have been planning some changes, new stuff, concerts, visitors and holidays for the winter though. I’ll keep you posted.

Sometimes no news is good news.

Bad Karma

What is wrong with Japan? Who managed to put a curse on the whole country? Definitely 2011 has not been a good year for the land of the rising sun! After the earthquakes, the tsunami, the cyber-attacks and the nuclear plant meltdown there is now a typhoon on their way! Why? OK, that is a stupid question, but I strongly believe that the people of that country are challenged way too harshly for the sins they might have committed.

I salute them for the way they’ve been handling things. If you’ve seen any documentaries on the Fukushima disaster, you will see that the people seem generally disciplined, resilient and positive. They’ve been trying to help the authorities without complaining. It is unfair that they’ve been going through another natural disaster. OK, that is probably the wrong thing to say. No one deserves to get affected by natural disasters, but still…

I thought of trying to find what wrong they could have done recently to damage their karma so much but it’s not easy. I’ve learnt that Japan has more than 6,500 islands (wow) and a population of 127 million people (tenth largest population). They’ve done some really nasty stuff during the Big War, but who hasn’t? Also, I think that punishing the country now after 70 years, is a bit unjust.

On the top of my head, I could judge the country on their policies regarding whaling. When most countries have signed against it, Japan continues to turn a blind eye towards that issue. I understand that whaling is part of their culture and history. However, the gravity of the situation is such that there might not be whales in the future…

Anyway, I’ve always wanted to visit the country. I am fascinated by their history, culture, food, Manga and technology. I love how they combine the old and the new, maintaining values and looking at the future at the same time. I must postpone my visit for a few years though. Although now the prices must be cheap, I don’t want to bring back radiation as a souvenir.

Seriously now, I wish to them all the best

Random thoughts…

Have you ever thought how nice it would be if your mind had a ‘print screen’ button? You know, the button that locks a mental picture in your mental clipboard that you can store and view anytime you want? Wouldn’t you like to be able to print your memory ‘Kodak’ moments? That is what I was thinking this Sunday at the gym… Yes, at the gym but I can’t go too much into detail… The story is a bit x rated. It includes a sexy straight Middle Eastern man who had the bright idea to go to the sauna in just his white briefs.

Anyway, it’s Tuesday on a very warm night. It’s supposed to be 24 degrees Celsius outside, which is very warm, especially for London, after 10 at night. However, instead of a cold drink / beer / white wine, I’m having a very warm, almost boiling drink. I’m having some Lemsip, because I’m feeling a bit under the weather. It’s probably the time of the year / humidity / viruses / air conditioning / suit wearing that caused this. I can’t afford though to stay in bed so I’ll try to get all the help I can get from the pharmaceutical industry while drinking lots of fluids. I hope I’ll be fine in no time…

I’m turning into a very boring person. I’m being consumed by my new job. For the time being I can’t help it though. I truly feel exhausted after a normal swift and I can’t be my normal social, active person. I had a session with my personal trainer and I wanted to choke him out of frustration. I had no willingness or power to follow him. I hope this will pass as well…

I’m beginning to lose readers of my blog already…

I have the suspicion that my nearly-axe-bearing-Tolkien-hero of manager I described on my last post is a homophobe. It could be because I am slightly more sensitive on the matter so I am still giving him the benefit of the doubt. It includes a story about how his previous boss had a filthy mouth and the worst phrase he used to say was: ‘fucking homosexual’! (Can I say fucking in an r-rated blog?). The verdict regarding him is not out yet…

Changing subjects again, which internet browser are you using to view this website? I’m sorry to say that if you are in Internet Explorer, according to statistics, you are not the coolest beer in the fridge, or the fastest bunny on the fields, or the… you get the picture. That’s all based to this study…

Yet another post about this…

You must be so bored by it by now. The never ending saga of Greece’s political and economic situation is well… never ending. For me it has reached this critical limit when I can’t but laugh at the situation!

For the new bailout which is yet to be decided, the current government (the socialists) made some announcements about further cuts in salaries, subsidizes, increasing taxes etc. I understand that there is nothing else to be done to repay the debt. I can’t believe that the Prime Minister (PM) is happy to make these announcements. However, other measures to be taken, like privatisation of governmental companies and assets are not generally talked about. People once again saw their income diminished.


General strikes and marches are a norm these days. Similarly to what was happening in Spain, people are permanently in the main Athens square called Sintagma (= Constitution), in front of the House of Parliament. Yesterday, it was decided by most Unions to be a general strike day. Most general strikes do happen on Wednesday. It’s mid week and probably most people prefer not to work (but that’s my cynicism talking).

The demonstrations are crowded but at the time peaceful. However, the PM is greeted by the marching people with eggs and other seasonal vegetables thrown at his car on his way to meet the President. The situation escalates and the known ‘Anonymous’ people join the marches. I’m referring to the group of people with hoods, covered faces, sticks and Molotov bombs, who are in war with the Police. These ‘Anonymous’ people after suspiciously being inactive for the last days were ignoring the people staying in the Syntagma square. However, yesterday they tried and managed to destroy the peaceful demonstrations.

People outside the House of Parliament

What happened next can be described as simply amazing.

The PM is in contact with the leader of the opposition (the conservatives) to form a governmental coalition that will include financial experts outside political parties to solve the problems. The opposition leader states that he will concur only if the current PM is not the leader of that coalition! Surprisingly enough the PM agrees and yesterday afternoon the Greek PM resigns to the President!

George Papandreou - the Greek Prime Minister

It’s not certain what happens next. The leader of the opposition makes a statement about a personal victory over the socialists and how it’s proven that they can’t govern the country properly. The way they handle the situation I personally believe is arrogant and improper. The current government becomes furious on the opposition reaction and the Greek PM un-resigns to the President (I know that’s not a proper word, but I can’t explain it)! He withdraws his resignation and states that such a coalition can never happen, only mere hours after his resignation. He now states that he'll change the ministers, reevaluate the situation and maybe create two ministries of financial affairs with some no MP members...

This must be a world’s first!

The supporters of the opposition state that the Greek PM is simply dangerous and even mentally unstable. The supporters of the government state that the conservatives are immature and greedy, only trying to personally gain from the bad situation! The rest of the political parties declared that a coalition government is unconstitutional (which I think is true) and they would never support it, until a referendum or elections are organised.

The outcome of course of this whole fiasco is that nothing’s being done and the situation daily worsens. For the whole day yesterday almost the whole country was on strike. I can’t think of any scenario that this helps the country pay back its debt.

Things out of the ordinary…

This weekend without being something exceptional, it involved some things out of the ordinary happening.

I’m not going to go into the rapture non-incident. It was a silly idea to begin with and stayed one. I still can’t believe how many people actually got involved and believed it…


On Saturday evening, after spending my day with ‘JJ’ and kissing him goodbye since he had to go to work, I was walking towards the bus stop that would take me home. A guy approached me. He was in his mid thirties with shaved head and wearing a football t-shirt and jeans. He told me:
‘The German Nazis are coming!’. I expected him to ask me for money or directions or something, but not a statement like that. So, my reaction was: ‘really?’ to which he replied: ‘Yes, you are warned’.

Of course, I didn’t stay to have a proper discussion about it. He was probably drunk and had his views about the world ending which was the talk of many people that day. However, in case something relevant happens, remember that one drunk prophet told me that first!

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On Sunday morning I went for a spin class! I had taken two (I think) similar classes almost 1.5 years ago but I decided it was time to give it another try. The last time my personal trainer was the instructor and I thought that it would be better to try something new with an instructor I knew quite well. Unfortunately, they had given him a very early Saturday morning slot and the class wasn’t that popular, so after a while it was cancelled.

This time, I went to my local gym with an instructor I didn’t know. He’s name is Darren (or Darryl) and he seemed friendly enough. The class was packed. There were around 18 bikes, cramped in a tiny space. In order to reach the bikes in the back, you had to really try and squeeze through them. However, the class appeared to be very popular and the whole place was full. Not everybody managed to find a bike and do the class.


I mentioned to Darren that it was my first time, since he asked. Having done two classes so long ago, I couldn’t remember half of it, so I thought it would be nice to be reminded about certain things. I don’t have a bike and I don’t usual cycle in the gym, so I consider my legs not to be properly trained. At the end of the class I was soaked in sweat down to my balls. At times, I felt that I couldn’t go any further but it felt so damn good at the end of the session.

I am now hooked. I believe that spinning will definitely help my running and I hope to keep on going. I do slightly feel my butt sore today, though. By the way, do you know the difference between RPM and spinning? Is it really that different?

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My housemate got a new phone, an ‘HTC desire’ and she absolutely hates it. She can’t figure it out much and she finds it amazing confusing and difficult. We were trying to set up a twitter application for her to use and in order to check how it refreshes the screen; I posted a tweet from my account.

The last time I tweeted before yesterday was in December 2009!!!


There were many reasons I stopped tweeting back then after using an account for more than 6 months and having more than 1300 tweets. I did try to take it seriously and I’ve even attended a gathering of gay people in a local bar through tweeter. It was all fun up to a point, but it became repetitive, dull and unoriginal. Most of the gay friends I was connected with were only interesting in silly online flirting and showing off what they think was their fabulous life!

Maybe, they were the wrong people to be associated with but I soon realised that twitter is probably not for me. However, I’m now starting to change my mind and I’ve decided to give it another shot. I will not start using twitter the same way I did before. I will be mostly accessing my account to check on news or other information.

Last week, while I was in the office, we heard something was going on in the area and a medical helicopter arrived on a building close to us. Only through twitter I found out what happened. There was a stabbing on a bus stop nearby. There weren’t any mention to that incident to any website before the next day. However, through twitter news do travel fast.

I admit that twitter can be an unreliable source but there are some serious news casters who use it. In addition, there is information on almost everything, from train info, airports, local events or gigs etc. So, even if I might not be updating my account regularly, I will still ‘spy’ on what’s going on in the world…

Fetishes and Paraphilias

People come in all shapes and sizes and they have their own preferences when it comes to… well, everything. Internet helped various kinds of groups to come together and discuss, explore these preferences. I believe that gay people in particular should be happy about that.

However, what I find a bit funny, different but at the same time totally respectable are the number of sex fetishes that surfaced with the freedom of speech provided by the www. And I am not talking about the simple shoe, underwear or toe fetish, I’m talking about a little bit more let’s say extravagant approach to things. TV series like CSI introduced to the public some of these fetishes, like the guy who liked to be dressed and treated like a baby or bondage fetishes.

Let’s take for example a user in gay forum called ‘Chazz’ who’s fetish is really specific. He admits having a Superhero / Supervillain feet/shoe fetish. I quote: “I like characters like Spiderman, Venom, and Spawn who have shoe soles with colors like Blue and Purple that stands out with their dark costumes and such.” For a gay comic geek person, I think it to be quite reasonable.

Then there is ‘Formicophilia’. This is deriving sexual pleasure from insects crawling on the body, specifically on the genitals. The desired effect may be a tickling or stinging sensation, or the infliction of psychological distress on another person. That one is definitely not for me…

‘Hybristophilia’, involving being sexually aroused or attracted to people who have committed an outrage or a gruesome crime. In popular culture, this phenomenon is also known as "Bonnie and Clyde Syndrome". One of the most infamous examples of this is the large amount of women attracted to Ted Bundy after his arrest.

‘Burusera’ is a Japanese term for a panty fetish. It is an extremely prevalent fetish in Japan. There are burusera shops in Japan that sell used schoolgirls' panties, and there even used to be vending machines on the streets where men could buy them. The men buy them to smell them!

‘Forniphilia’ is a form of bondage and sexual objectification in which a person's body is incorporated into a chair, table, cabinet or other piece of furniture. It is an extreme form of bondage because the subject usually is tightly bound and expected to stay immobile for an indefinite period of time. They are often gagged and/or placed in position where there is a danger of being smothered. Proper safety requires frequent checks of the submissive's well-being.

‘Vorarephilia’ (often shortened to vore) is a sexual fetish and paraphilia where arousal occurs from the idea of being eaten, eating another, observing this process, or by the general process of eating. The fantasy most frequently involves the victim being swallowed alive, and may or may not include digestion. Since the fetish is very hard to achieve in real life, it is more commonly enjoyed through pictures, stories, videos, and video games!

The list can be endless and I'm missing so many interesting cases, but I couldn’t not mention Erika, 37, former soldier who lives in San Francisco. She has the slightly unusual fetish of falling in love with inanimate objects. As seen here, she in now madly in love with Tour Eiffel. She has pledged to love, honor and obey in an intimate ceremony attended by a handful of friends. She even changed her name to Erika La Tour Eiffel! I don’t want to be judgmental and criticize her but my poor little brain cannot understand some things. I will of course respect her feelings. But imagine being her friend and receiving an invitation for such a ceremony! What do you buy as a present?

(By the way, same-sex marriage cannot legally be performed in France, though some foreign same-sex marriages are recognized and the PACS, which confers some of the same rights and responsibilities as marriage, is available to same-sex couples. However, Erika managed to 'marry' the Eiffel Tower. Go figure...)

But at the end of the day, let’s celebrate diversity!!!