As I Xi It v2.3 » Quirky

Digital regression

XiYu — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 18:01:32 +0000

Tetris for the iPad was 69p today (I know, I’m a big spender) so I figured, ‘Why not?’

I still have my bulky, old Nintendo Gameboy and it still works! The only game I really ever played on it was Tetris. Unfortunately, the iOS Tetris doesn’t have the classic theme tune!! It’d be cool if had a Gameboy classic mode emulating the original.

The joys of being a 90's kid

04:24

XiYu — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 04:44:45 +0000

For the last couple of years, if I’m still awake in the wee hours, I can hear an alarm go off at 04:24. At first I thought it was an old digital watch, but in my recent room clear out, I found what I thought was the offending article but the battery had died. Just now, I heard the beeping go off at 04:24 again. Whatever it is, it must have a pretty low power consumption to still be tormenting me at 04:24.

It’s a bit of a conundrum.

They’re everywhere

XiYu — Sat, 01 Oct 2011 23:16:17 +0000

In light of my recent post on annoying positive phototactic insects, today, I found various bits of insect carcass on my car.

Arachnid with one less leg

Vespid abdomen

Freedom

XiYu — Tue, 02 Aug 2011 22:17:35 +0000

free·dom/Noun

1. The power or right to act, speak, or think as one wants without hindrance or restraint.

Indeed!

8.02.11 – It’s not only Wi-Fi day, it’s also the day I’ve shaken off my shackles.

How appropriate that this article was published on the BBC today – Click here.

Oddies on the street

XiYu — Fri, 27 May 2011 20:03:25 +0000

Spot anything odd?

Inamo in ma belly

XiYu — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 13:30:27 +0000

Last night I had a bit of an off-beat dining experience, perhaps an insight into what the future holds for eating out.

I went to the recently opened Inamo on Regents Street, a stone’s throw away from the original one on Wardour Street. I think it’s a pretty safe generalisation to say that those who dine there mainly go for the experience rather than the food itself, which isn’t too bad by the way.

The main “attraction” is the interactive table menu system. Basically, the desktop is projected onto the table and you navigate the menu using a touchpad. The user interface is quite smart and simple to use, when you select an item, it projects the dish onto your plate, however, what you see is not neccessarily what you get as we very soon discovered. Along with food and drink, you can also change the backgroungd, have a look at real-time footage of what’s happening in the kitchen, play games (nothing fancy), look at local transport options, call a human waiter over and get the bill.

The thing I didn’t like about the menu system was that you couldn’t easily see what other diners in your party are ordering, it’d be useful to have a screen with an overall table order list and also to be able to see what has already been ordered.

Food was pretty good if somewhat pricey. I think the worst value for money dish we ordered was the black bean tuna, it was just three small canapé sized portions for £7, that’s like £2.33 a bite! It was good, but not £7 good. I’d have to put it up there with the 7 salted prawns (gambas a la plancha) for €8 in Madrid (they weren’t even deshelled!) in my list of all time dining extortions. My favourite dish was the pork ribs, they were finger lickin’ good, I just wished there were more of them, “only” £6.75, a bargain in comparison.

Who knows, perhaps the next technological advance in novel dining will be robot waiters. At least there’d be no need to feel bad for not tipping them.

Birds, birds, birds

XiYu — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 23:25:35 +0000

I was hoping to catch one of Cici’s friends with a bowl of dry cat food I left out but all I got was either the same greedy magpie pop up time and time again or several different ones. I’m not sure if the wood pidgeon got anything though.

The stones are there to stop the bowl moving about.

Temperature temp

XiYu — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 22:57:50 +0000

Think my heater might be on the blink. I need the water to be at a constant 26^oC while I’m treating the tank for ich. Noticed that the heating element was still on this morning even though the thermometer read 30^oC, the built in thermostat’s suppose to switch it off once the water reaches the defined temperature. To check, I popped in a spare analogue thermometer and put new batteries into the digital one after turning the heater down to 22^oC just to be on the safe side. A few hours later, I see the values are different between the analogue and digital one and the heater still on. Now, one analogue read 26^oC, the other 29^oC and the digital one 31^oC, but according to the heater, it still wasn’t 22^oC so it just kept heating. I’ve turned the heater to its lowest at 20^oC hoping to compensate for it’s lack of sensitivity. Just to be sure of the temp in the tank, I’ve dunked in my watch which has a built-in thermometer so shall see how that goes.

Haven't seen you before

Retro revival

XiYu — Sat, 26 Mar 2011 11:59:58 +0000

Seeing as my car has a cassette player, I had a rummage in my cassettes collection and this popped up. I remember buying it from HMV back in the day, oh the memories.

Surely this must be a collectors item now?

Chewing my way out (of writer’s block)

XiYu — Fri, 25 Mar 2011 12:42:37 +0000

Anything’s worth a shot right?

I’m chewing away and it feel like a Holland & Barretts just opened up in my mouth. On the back of the pack, it says it contains Bacopa monnieri, which for those who know their planted aquariums, is a submerged aquatic macrophyte. Perhaps once I’ve finished the pack, I’ll have a nibble on a few leaves out of my fishtank.

Academic doping