steverogerson

I have just watched last night's Emmerdale. I have never watched Emmerdale before, and I am glad about that. It really is an awful programme. However, the reason I watched it was because Paul Darrow was in last night's episode and will be in it for a few weeks. He really was the only highlight. He plays a totally over-the-top motorcyclist called Eddie - the role suits him down to the ground. And he had a classic line delivered in a way only Paul Darrow can - "I have a tiger on my backside; do you want to see it?"

I've had my cholesterol checked again.

Back in October 2008, my cholesterol was high at 6.4 with my bad cholesterol level at 4.2, and that should be below 2. I thus went on statins.

In March this year, my cholesterol had fallen to 4.9 and bad level to 2.6.

Now, my cholesterol level is 4.6, which is slightly better but she said they couldn't measure the bad cholesterol level because the amount of triglycerides in my blood was too high. This apparently is caused by drinking a lot of alcohol. I do recall that I had a hangover when I had the cholesterol checked, so must remember not to go out the night before my next check.

I have a hangover and I'm trying a hangover cure I used to use when I was younger - drinking black coffee while listening to Black Sabbath. It still seems to work.

We are only a week away from the Bristol Beer & Blake's 7 meet, so come and join us for a Saturday afternoon in Bristol drinking and chatting about Blake's 7, other SF stuff or anything that takes our fancy. All welcome.

When: Saturday, 18 July, 12:15 PM

Where: The Knight's Templar, Unit 1 Temple Square, Temple Quay, Bristol, Avon, BS1 6DG.

To get to the pub from the (railway) station, you walk straight through
the ticket gates and foyer, ignoring the main exit to your left, and out
into the covered car park. Go straight through the car park and out, and
you'll be on the path leading to Temple square. As you arrive in the
square, the pub is the large glass-fronted building on your left.
http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/10/10235/Knights_Templar/Bristol

Here's how to get to the pub from the station
http://www.spacefall.co.uk/FC/b7meet.jpg

This event also has a Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=102834416944

The event goes from approx 12.20 to 7pm, though some of us may stay longer.

If this is your first time and you don't know any of us, let us know what you look like and roughly when you'll be arriving so we can look out for you.

My Mac Pro has developed an interesting problem. It is constantly scrolling down. Say I am in a window and click on the top item, then it immediately scrolls all the way to the bottom. If I am in a Word document, for example, and click on the first word it scrolls straight down to the bottom. It is not a mouse problem as I've tried it with two different mice and even without a mouse, and it still does the same. I've rebooted to no effect. This is stopping me working and is very annoying. Has anyone any idea what might be wrong and how to fix it?

A few moments ago, I decided to make myself a cup of coffee and sit down and watch last night's Torchwood. I'd made myself comfortable and was ready to go. I flipped to the Sky planner page and there it was with the dreaded word "failed" next to it. Grrr. Sky seems to be doing this a lot lately. So now I have to wait for it to download.

I've compiled my blog about bars in Eindhoven into one piece with links and pictures:

http://homepages.poptel.org.uk/steve.rogerson/eindhoven09.html

tracey_jane, Joshua and I on Saturday afternoon went to Stafford Castle to see an open air presentation of Twelfth Night. We were lucky with the weather, in that the first half was bright sunshine but we did have an unscheduled brief interval in the second half while rain stopped play, and within minutes of it all finishing, it really chucked it down. The play itself was an unusual version in that it was set in the 1960s. The dialogue was as written by Shakespeare but the cast were all hippies and the play was interspersed with 1960s songs. None of us had read Twelfth Night, and we struggled a bit in the first half to follow what was going on though we laughed loudly at some parts. A read of the summary in the programme at half time filled in the gaps and we enjoyed the second half a lot more.

In other news, I've invented a new word - fartriloquist - meaning someone who can make their farts sound like they've come from someone else.

Trafalgar, 12 Dommelstraat
With a name like that, one would expect an English pub and there is a certain Englishness about it, typified by the red telephone box in the corner. This is not though reflected in the beer list – on draught the Irish Guinness and Kilkenny vie for space with Hertog Jan, Jupiler, Leffe, Hoegaarden and Palm. Various Dutch and Belgian bottled beers are also available. At first glance, the pub looks small and dark, but a little exploring shows it is bigger than expected going a long way back to another bar at the far end and a beer garden out back.

As I left, I noticed the chalk board also listed Old Speckled Hen on draught, but I’d not seen any sign of that. I asked and was told it was on but was using one of the two Jupiler taps. Surely not, I thought, a Greene King beer masquerading as something else!

Little One Bar, 26 Jan van Lieshoutstraat
This delightful little bar is possibly the smallest in Eindhoven, and the building is old, in fact the landlord told me that the building itself dates back to 1654 and is the oldest building in Eindhoven, though it has only been a pub since 1960. Just to see the old fashioned mechanical till behind the bar makes it worth a visit, especially as it is not for show, it is the bar’s working till. The 15 or 16 bar stools are the only visible seating inside, though there are some tables and chairs outside. On a busy day, the punters would have to gather round the piano The three draught beers are Hertog Jan Weizener, Dommelsch and Leffe Blond; Belgian bottled beers are also available.

De Vooruitgang, 11 Markt
This large touristy looking pub has seating spilling out onto Eindhoven’s main market square. An unusual feature in the large bar area is an old Daf 33 car; Daf used to have a factory in the town. This is a good place to try the Hertog Jan beers as it has three different ones on draught – Pilsner, Weizenbier and Lentebock. Dommelsch is also on draught joined by Palm, Hoegaarden and Leffe Bruin. The Palm beer I tried was served much too cold. There are the usual bottled Belgian beers. The bar does do food, but if you are in the mood for a Chinese I recommend the New Nan King opposite. I did have a beer in there – was a bottle of Heineken Oud Bruin – which was dark and flavoursome despite its 2.5% strength!

Kaffe de Groot, 8 Wilhelminoplen
This bar looks and feels like a bar should with wooden stools at the bar and old looking table seating; the plastic seats are reserved for the pavement outside. It also has an impressive beer pump with a model of three dancing ladies on top. Hertog Jan Weizener and Lentebock were on draught, and I tried the Lentebock, a very nice slightly sour beer. Also on draught were Dommelsch, Palm and Guinness. Belgian bottled beers were available as usual.

De Kram, 42 Stratumseind
This pub is on a busy street full of pubs but what makes it stand out are the three giant kegs of Bavaria suspended above the bar. The lady serving told me the two large ones each hold 1000 litres and the smaller one 500 litres. They are working kegs, as the piping runs from them straight to the Bavaria tap on the bar. Hoegaarden and La Chouffe were also on draught and the Dutch La Trappe sat among a range of Belgian bottled beers. The rock music was noticeable but not over loud and the medium sized bar also has a darts board and pool table.

As I mentioned in my blog last night, I've just come back from a work trip to Eindhoven and as promised here's the first part of my review of the bars.

Bars in Eindhoven appear to be dominated by beer from Belgium, which is not a bad thing in itself but it is a shame that the Dutch beers seem to be limited to the pilsner style Bavaria and Dommelsch. Even the Trappist style La Trappe is rare. However, the one light on this is the range from Dutch brewery Hertog Jan, which has a wide range of interesting beers on bottle and draught. Belgian beers regularly seen on draught include Jupiler, Leffe and Palm, but bottled beers from many of the Belgian Trappist and Abbey beers are freely available.

Grand Café Berlage, 16 Kleine Berg
This was the first bar I called and is a bar and restaurant on a small shopping street. There is a gorgeous beer garden out the back and a rack with newspapers and magazines for the customers to read. Sadly, the moderness of the bar took away its atmosphere somewhat. The beer range was OK though with Dommelsch, Hoegaarden Witbier, Leffe Blond and Dubbel, La Chouffe and Hertog Jan Weizenbier on draught plus a selection of Belgian bottled beers. I had a glass of Dommelsch, the first time I’d tried this beer. It was a basic pilsner and very refreshing on a hot day.

The Baron, 26 Kleine Berg
I returned to this lovely bar three times during my two-day visit. It presents itself as a Belgian beer bar with an impressive bottled range on show and Belgian beer signs forming the decor. There is seating upstairs and downstairs and in front on the pavement. This is an older, more traditional looking bar than the Grand Café round the corner. It even has proper wooden bar stools. The Hertog Jan on draught here was a slightly sweet pleasant pilsner. The rest of the draught range included Jupiler, Blanche de Namur, De Konnick, Palm, Leffe Bruin, Hoegaarden and La Chouffe. This was one of the few places I found that sold bottled La Trappe and I had a nice bottle of the 10% Quadrupel as a night cap on my second day.

Last Sunday, tracey_jane and I went to see the new Star Trek movie. I liked it, it was good to see Star Trek back on the big screen and I thought all the younger versions of the characters we know worked well; I could just imagine them all being like that, though Scotty felt a little forced.

I did have some misgivings before hand as I'd heard time travel was involved. Time travel is something Star Trek always does badly. They never seem to get the hang of cause and effect and resetting time lines and so on, with the net result that just about all the travel episodes make very little sense. This was an exception to a degree, helped I suspect by them actually wanting to reset the time line so they can carry on with new episodes without being dogged by existing canon. It still had its flaws but at least it didn't ruin the story.

I look forward to more adventures with the young crew.

In other news, I've just got back from a two-day work trip to Eindhoven, so beer reports to follow.

The news that Setanta has gone into administration doesn't surprise me. I saw this billboard in Manchester in the days when they were just starting up. With advertising such as this, it is hardly surprising that football fans didn't flock to them with their cash.

I mentioned before that Joshua and his friends had made a video on YouTube:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZ1_7b3hdsE

Being of an acting nature, he's a little disappointed at the lack of comments. So if any of you feel motivated to make some (nice) comments on the YouTube page, that would be good.

Just a reminder that we are only a month away from the Bristol Beer & Blake's 7 drink. All SF fans welcome for an afternoon of chatting and drinking.

When: Saturday, 18 July, 12:15 PM

Where: The Knight's Templar, Unit 1 Temple Square, Temple Quay, Bristol, Avon, BS1 6DG.

To get to the pub from the (railway) station, you walk straight through
the ticket gates and foyer, ignoring the main exit to your left, and out
into the covered car park. Go straight through the car park and out, and
you'll be on the path leading to Temple square. As you arrive in the
square, the pub is the large glass-fronted building on your left.
http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/10/10235/Knights_Templar/Bristol

Here's how to get to the pub from the station
http://www.spacefall.co.uk/FC/b7meet.jpg

The event goes from approx 12.20 to 7pm, though some of us may stay longer. This event also has a Facebook page:

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=102834416944

If this is your first time and you don't know any of us, let us know what you look like and roughly when you'll be arriving so we can look out for you.

I moved to Nottingham six years ago today.

tracey_jane went into hospital on Thursday to have the lump in her neck/cheek removed. She was really fretting that it would be cancelled again (it has been cancelled twice before but the hospital only classed it as once, which means they still would not have had to compensate if they cancelled this time). Thankfully, the op happened but was more complex than they thought it would be.

The plan was for her to come out on Friday but they kept her in another night, which was not good as she didn't sleep at all the night before in hospital, but she did manage to get some sleep Friday night. I brought her home Saturday. She seems fine but understandably very tired and her stomach was playing up a bit last night (I blame hospital food).

She is still in bed at the moment, catching up on missed sleep. She is also a little sore where they did the operation and it is sore for her to swallow, but no surprises there. She is just relieved that it is over with.

We suspect that what they removed might have been the source of a number of her problems, including the recent dizziness, as her current illness dates back to when she had glandular fever this time last year and the main thing they removed this week was said gland, plus a stone they found there and were surprised to find.

There has always been a problem, a little ironic, with democracy and that is sometimes the wrong people get in. This is OK to a limit, and that limit is when those who get in are an extreme anti-democratic fascist party, such as the BNP.

We all know what happens when the fascists gain real power, as was witnessed in Germany in the events that led up to World War II. That must never be allowed to happen again, and if that means denying democratic rights to fascists parties such as the BNP then so be it.

Sometimes the greater good means restricting democratic rights, and I believe that this now has to be the case with the BNP. They should be made an illegal party and denied the right to stand in elections. It should be a criminal offence to belong to them.

Just discovered that my evil Sky Plus box chose not to record the Ashes to Ashes finale last night. Grrrr! Just rang Tracey and she's got it, so I'll at least be able to see it at the weekend.

I did a job for a new customer nearly two weeks ago and then invoiced them. Last week, I got a call from them asking for my bank details so they could pay me. Now, I'm a little wary about too many people having my bank details, and especially given this was a new client, so I asked just to send me the money by cheque; they had my address from the invoice. They phoned me back today and said they have looked everywhere and have decided that they don't actually have a cheque book. I gave them my bank details, but thought this is a real reflection of changing times when a company with a bank account doesn't have a cheque book.