Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in robei's LiveJournal:

[ << Previous 20 ]

Friday, November 20th, 2009
2:32 pm	Guitarooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!! Yes! Got the Jackson home last night, Pro-series plays like a beast and is so solid! Just got another £120 to go til the amp is paid off and I can take it as well. The case that came with the Jackson is a SKB moulded, black fur-lined Jackson-branded behemoth, beautiful and comes with locks. The guitar in the flesh is far better than the pics show, workmanship is awesome as it is made in Japan to US spec. The pick-ups are superb, the bridge pickup is noticably quieter than a traditional active metal pick-up but the versatility this allows the guitar is endless. It can apparently do anything and everything from Jazz and blues to Heavy/thrash metal. Thoroughly recommended :) Now to get the courage to remove it from the case and store it with the others on a guitar hanger.. Current Mood: geeky (Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
5:11 pm	AIB For January, 4-6th. That is all. (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, November 13th, 2009
4:05 pm	Weapons of Metal Destruction! Deposits placed on my new gear: ^ Jackson DKM2, maple fret board, Seymour Duncan Jazz (neck) and TB4 (bridge) Humbuckers, Japanese made to USA spec. v Vox VT valvetronix amplifier. Tasty amplifier with an uncanny ability to imitate all-tube amps that are priceless. Special Effects are amazing too! and a lead... WHAT MORTGAGE?!?! Current Mood: mischievous (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, November 11th, 2009
12:12 am	A Charanger appears!   This fantastic axe escaped my radar, I'm pretty much dead-set on it if it sounds good tomorrow.  Is by far the cheapest and comes with a great hard case ;)  Current Mood: happy (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, November 8th, 2009
11:23 am	Which one? Definitely buying one of these in the next few weeks, still a little undecided as the black one has the pick-ups I've loved for years though the awesome looking red chameleon one has similar sounding passive pickups, maybe the tiniest bit below EMG's but each setup has slight advantages in different areas.  For guitar heads I've included the pickup types, the rest falls to aesthetics for non-guitarheads. XPT700 Through neck design (Wizard II neck, reverse headstock) for longer sustain, DiMarzio D-Activator passive pickups, Edge III bridge OR RGT6ex Through-neck design (Wizard II neck), EMG 81/85 active pickups, Edge III bridge Current Mood: geeky (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, October 9th, 2009
6:35 pm	Back to Shito-ryu karate I'm going to start practising Shito-ryu again. I used to do it years ago before University and got to my green belt. If Jennifer's dad will return to Karate I'll be able to join him for sessions again. Jen's Dad was secretary of Scotland for KOFUKAN and also a 4th Dan blackbelt, gave me some absolutely horrific information leading to a good understanding of the style and the havoc when you land it. I can remember a few of the kata but I really need to get graded up as soon as possible so I can 'officially' learn the higher dan katas. Shitoryu was the first of many fighting styles where I found there was no airs or graces or he-man attitudes, everyone was at least 30 years old+ and we had an awesome ethos of using force in attacks without pads and controlling it, even against all the safety/H&S bullshit. I put that down to the fact the club was full of old boys who loved punching me. Here's a bit on the style, shamelessly ripp'd from wiki: ( SHITO RYU style information ) Current Mood: energetic (Comment on this)
Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009
5:53 pm	Save Tchaiovna (Otago Lane) from being demolished http://www.gopetition.co.uk/online/30135.html Turns out in addition to across-the-way dvelopment, the actual Otago Lane area is to be demolished in it's entirety. It is already shadowed from unrelenting urban sprawl by way of the new UNITE student accomodation building on the riverbank. Don't let it happen! Rob (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, September 20th, 2009
8:32 pm	Team Bravo, Bribes and Biscuits, POLC course complete! Hello! POLC was a fantastic success. End of course interview revealed I had excellent communication and my leadership qualities were very good. On Thursday through to Friday I was class leader and faired very well with that. We stayed at HMS Bristol, a 1967 Type 82 destroyer with tiny bunk spaces. Flights were uneventful and landings great. I arrived later than expected due to bad flight scheduling times. Arrived initially at Southampton Airport and took the Parkway train to a switchover at what I believe was Southampton central and then onwards to Portsmouth and Southsea. I took the taxi to Whale Island, a manmade island serving as headquarters for many departments of the Navy. Was met by an armed soldier at the gate, received a greean 'unescorted' pass and proceeded through passed HMS Excellent to HMS Bristol for accommodation. Upon arrival at HMS Bristol, I noticed how large the area was. All the decor in the jetty seemed to be shrouded in green and you could see nothing but Naval ships, some Frigates from the E.U. as well as two of the RN aircraft carriers. Upon entering HMS Britol I was presented by the following door: Went in and proceeded to the following hatch: Which took me along the bowels of the ship to Mess 6 where I was berthed. The bunks themselves are at rating level and as an officer you would actually get a small room to yourself. Here's my bunk: We went to sleep at around 12am every night and awoke around 5.55am each morning. We'd get washed up near the heads (toilets) at the end of the ship in the shower/washroom and get changed into our suits for breakfast at HMS Excellent, in the Officer Wardroom. The decor in this place was historic and amazing. The wardroom was VAT excluive, so a half pint of very high quality heavy was only 61p. Pints were a tiny bit over a £1!! On one evening, a visiting Commodore arrived at Excellent so drinks were FREE before dinner. Dinner that particular night was a Carvery, I.e. Roast pork, stuffing, applesauce, baby roastpotatoes etc. carved and arranged for you in front of you. Fantastic. Dinner at HMS Excellent was in the same breakfast area,at the sme massive elongated polished oak tables though you had 6 pieces of silverware per person with glasses and napkins all arranged in front of you. Everytime I asked one of the Wardroom chefs/servers for something or if they addressed me it was always sufficed by "Sir". Made one feel rather important I can say! The dining area itself was surrounded by history, artefacts of Naval legend arrayed in glass cabinets as well as centuries old oil canvasses measuring 7 by 3 ft in areas! Amazing. Here's a picture of the bar to give you a very rough idea of the plushness of the area: After breakfast at Excellent, the class of Potential Officer cadets were picked up by bus and taken to HMS Collingwood, to the Royal Naval Leadership Academy. Once there, we recieved lectures, briefs and gave presentations to be assessed by Lieutenants. The physical teamwork was in Planned Leadership Tasks, Assualt courses, Low ropes challenges as well as other general team building such as dogwatch sports in the evenings (volleyball, pass-back and the crazy Brighton Cricket). Did well on the Multi Stage Fitness Test, passed it and got all round good reports in other areas. Was told that my leadership as class leader was very good, particularly for the last day. I made a conscious effort to get to know each person individually, we had all sorts from a young 16/17 yo girl to a 25 year old lad who had almost completed the full Officer training at Dartmouth and had unfortunately failed the final MARL exercise. By the end of the week, a few of the lads were referring to me as Sir, which I found rather bizarre. So much happened to possibly explain it all, but we did well as a team and our particular syndicate (the 15 of us were divided into two syndicates, Alpha and Bravo) did the best. On the last night we were rewarded a night out to the Indian Palace at Port Solent. Food was good and we had a right good laugh! Awards were given to a few, myself included. My award was named the "Baywatch Award" for posing. Apparently I have the unconscious habit of making a pose whilst stroking my chin, so it wasn't for slow-motion running or posing in trunks!! The prize was a packet of Spar Nice biscuits. Biscuits are what the Royal Navy traditionally uses for small favours and rewards so I felt really happy for receiving this. An amazing experience and I'm well on my development towards AIB and Officer training. Sorry for not cutting, I'm a diabetic. Current Mood: accomplished (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Monday, September 7th, 2009
8:27 pm	New Adventure boots! Hopefully my manly toes will break them in in time for next week. Next.. WEEK!? Waaaaah! Back to the kit list and presentation, checking the flights and rail tickets.. where'd I put that Sherpa?! Current Mood: bouncy (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, September 4th, 2009
5:27 pm	Gym stats Another Gym update, weights are steadily increasing. We got a few new machines and a tonne (literally?) of new uber dumbells ranging from 32.5 kg to a mahoosive 40kg. Managed up to and including the 37.5kg for flyes but will conquer the 40's soon enough! As always butterballs, if any of you wanna train let me know and we can organise some sessions. Upper body Benchpress: 110kg, 6 reps of 100kg Flyes (knuckle to knuckle): 37.5kg dumbell x2 (75kg) Shoulder shrugs: 120kg Shoulder press: 70kg Anterior delts: 45kg approx Biceps: secondary exercises, not known Triceps: Pull-65kg, freebar (skullcrushers)- 50kg approx Deadlifts: 120kg approx Seated row: 50kg approx dumbell row: 37.5kg Core ex: 30kg a side Lower Body Seated Leg press: 250kg (10x 25kg plate) Don't ask how, harsh farm labour as a child if I had to guess. Squats: 120kg (have managed 140kg before but no chance am I risking injury from a relatively weaker core) Leg extension (Thigh): 18/20 plates, 90kg approx Rear of thigh curls: 14/20 plates, 70kg approx Calf extensions: Full weight of press machine, 80kg on seated calf machine (max possible sadly, need a better machine at the gym) Cardio Running every second day where possible: 20 minute sessions of Fartlek or extended periods of same-speed running. Going to try for 30 minutes tomorrow if I get up early enough. Fuck running man, none of this fight/flight pish for me. When's the last time you saw a Rhino running away? ;) Current Mood: cheerful (2 Comments |Comment on this)
5:04 pm	Dumbest things quiz What is the dumbest thing you've ever done? View 560 Answers One of too many. Firing a shotgun directly and repeatedly at a car, aiming for the fuel tank with the intention of blowing the car up.  From 3 metres away. (Comment on this)
2:03 pm	A week today I'll hopefully be in Portsmouth on my way to HMS Collingwood (or thereabouts) for the week long POLCourse. Received the train tickets the other day and have already got the flight tickets through, just need to work on the presentation atm, which seems to be going quite well. The presentation topic I chose was to do with interfaces and their design from usabilty and cyberpsychology perspectives.  I've included a small video of the windows surface within the slides though I had to edit it to keep the time down.  Hilariously, the audio is perfect despite the video edit! So will be able to keep the annoying American voice rather than dictate over it.  7 minutes presentation time is absolutely ideal, can't usually be bothered with the whole 20-minute thing.  No need fretting too much over the content of the presentation though, it is mostly an exercise in communication & public speaking, which I have absolutely no trouble with.  I suppose the fact that there could be anyone from a Royal Marine to a Commander present in Uniform could be a slight put-off but I'm not really apprehensive at all, even regarding the whole trip.  You just need to get on with these things. Current Mood: busy (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, August 31st, 2009
1:16 pm	Good weekend Was a great weekend looking back at it now.  The weather was rather strange but we managed to get in a lot of hiking and fishing along the coast of Milport.  Gary has covered the majority of the goings-on and I'm quite tired so am only contributing a small part.  The camping was great once we found a site and the mood was pretty hilarious at times, especially since we had the exact same "2-man" tent and I was having the one to myself whereas Colin and Gary were absolutely crammed with their equipment in the tent, apparently having to meticulously co-ordinate movements in order to actually achieve the necessary setting-up of bags etc.  The barbeque was quite nice, especially to sit for an hour with a well-earned beer.   I spent most of the trip with soaking feet (non-waterproof Merrel trainers) and a slightly sore heel from having to run back to Gary et al. post-casualty drop-off.  Jim had a minor cut in his leg from where a large piece of sandstone slab had jumped out when I exemplified the art of lifting and smashing what was a very light and fragile rock which looked deceptively heavy.  My joke feat of strength definitely backfired :/  My Dad and Sandy picked jim up after a short bus ride at the Sport centre jetty to take him in the boat across the channel and to their paramedic friend who would usually join us for a tea and biscuit now and then at the marina.  Sadly, his leg would've been fine had he chosen to continue on but it is preferable that he went to get it checked out. A lot of awesome stuff went on:  We saw a Typhoon Eurofighter in the channel not half a klik from our location performing for the Regatta at Largs, we had swallows diving a foot in front of us in cheeky displays of flying prowess, we had a seal eat all Gary's fish, we had a Gary lose all our fishing tackle!, we met a very angry and somewhat mexican stand-off crab who was spared from the bbq, we had double rainbows as far as the eye could see, we saw plenty of nice country sights and we had an awesome boat trip on the way out and on the way back with yours truly managing to catch a nice mackerel on the very last cast of the day!  Last time I caught a fish was with my late Grampa so it was a really happy moment to be honest.  Tasted great as well.  Will try gather the pics and vids of the weekend at some point to post. Only 13 days to go until the POLCourse down south, so should get cracking to wrap up my presentation and do some final fitness preparation.  Would be better if my back wasn't broken though :/  Probably from carrying something in the region of 30kg or so.  Should pack it all up and measure it to check, was a 70 litre rucksack after all :) Current Mood: hungry (Comment on this)
Friday, August 28th, 2009
2:11 pm	Final details for Bute trip tomorrow Ok folks, we're all sorted.  I have all the equipment necessary for cooking, Gary's picking up a couple of disposable BBQ things and a bunch of meat for a few.  I'd strongly advise you attempt to bring the following if you haven't already: -Something to drink out of. -Something to eat out of -Something to cook/eat MEAT! that will suffice -Any associated cutlery items and water.  Definitely bring water. -Sleeping bag or sleeping something or other -Something to put under the sleeping bag to stop the nasty chills! -Decent walking boots or shoes. -Some clothes to cope with warm/cold/wet weather -Couple of beers if so persuaded -yer phone! -Anything I haven't thought of should also be brought :) Be at CENTRAL STATION for 09:15am!! Train departs for Fairlie at 09:45am! Current Mood: chipper (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 27th, 2009
9:25 pm	O___o  There are no words. (9 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, August 20th, 2009
11:08 pm	Travel details  Bute Trip (Sat 29th – Sun 30th) Travel details Be at Central station @ 09.15am Departing train to Fairlie: 9.45am Arrival @ Fairlie: 10.37am Depart Fairlie @ 10.40am Arrival @ Largs Marina 11.15am Depart Marina NLT 12pm Arrival @ GlenCallum bay 1.30pm (Comment on this)
Sunday, August 16th, 2009
12:07 pm	Oops! Comiserations to fellow shipmates but it seems we were already at max capacity before I'd even posted about the trip :( Seems the boat is only able to hold at absolute max 6 people, considering I had a preliminary 9 people confirmed. Compound fail, considering two of these are myself and the Skipper! It is possible that we may have been able to push numbers but I have been advised that due to the changeable nature of the Firth it is best to cut loose the latest additions of the crew (since I'd already called the initial crew before posting the trip on LJ) and feed them to the basking sharks. jemjen  (Yes, I'm feeding Jen to the sharks as I'm a stickler for fairness :( ) sccorpy  the_psyman  caz_chan  Sorry to get your hopes up guys, considering I only told Si abnout it the other night lol! Now to kick Dad's arse for not informing me of this sooner >:( Current Mood: working (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, August 9th, 2009
4:01 pm	Slow Day Yes indeed it is a slow day at work.  Sundays are ridiculously quiet during the Holiday period here.  Not that I'd rather it were busy, lets me get a lot of research and training done with much extended lunch break goodness. Going swimming with bare-naked wimmin tomorrow so looking forward to that, will be a cool way to finish off work.  I was at home earlier in the week and found my Magnum military boots.  Very dusty and the inserts for the soles were rusted and ripped to bits, so I tore them up and removed the corroded metal from the heel supports and gave them a good scrubbing.  Will return home with new inserts to see if I can salvage me booties. Got the RN presentation theme sorted:  'Benefits of superior HCI/UCD (design) on existing Interfaces'. Just need to populate the slideshow adequately enough to pass a quality 7 minutes.  Should be a piece of cake.  Now all that needs done for this course is the purchase of a few choice goods and more fitness training.  Need to do more running :/  Time to bone-up on Fartlek. Ahem. Current Mood: bored (Comment on this)
Wednesday, August 5th, 2009
5:17 pm	Bute Expedition Yo-ho me hearties!  "A" marks the spot, the Isle of Bute.  I have organised the time for this trip as Saturday 29th to Sunday 30th august.   We will be headed out from Glasgow Central station on the morning of the 29th to arrive at Fairlie station approximately 1 hour later.  It will then be 20/25 minutes walk to Largs Marina where the lovely September Mist is berthed.  Once we have loaded the boat up, it should only take around 1.5 hours to get to Bute via the Cumbrae slip, Northwards.  We will pass Milport and head westwards to the Isle of Bute where I expect we will berth at the horn in the central east location, unless advised otherwise.  There WILL be the opportunity to fish from the boat for the evening meal, I believe there is plenty of mackerel and the odd cod in this region ;)   The route to the camping area is still to be chosen as there are a few different areas possible depending on the preferred route.  I expect we will walk no more than around 2/3 hours for the sake of achieving the most relaxing use of time.   I have a spare 3-man tent for those who may not by the time the trip comes around.  I'll deal as much as possible with cooking etc. though I'll most likely post soon enough about which provisions to bring if necessary. So far we have a few people confirmed and likewise have places for a few. Let me know ;)   Current Mood: cheerful (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, August 4th, 2009
12:39 pm	Random girl came up to me at work for help with something, gave me her number and asked if I'd like to go for a coffee with her and shot off rapid style. BLUH. Was probably my reply if I recall.  Will need to track her down in the base and say thanks but no thanks as ignoring it/not calling would be impolite. :/ But it is proof my fellow men, that sometimes, just sometimes, THEY ask YOU out. Current Mood: amused (10 Comments |Comment on this)