Andrew’s Blog

So it’s January again and the department is only just now starting to get back up to full steam. I’ve been back in since the 2nd in order to give myself plenty of time to get going again while it’s quiet. I actually quite like it like that. For most of the first week, there were very few academics in. Notably, Phil was around (the mark of a good head of department) and Marian was also in towards the end of the week. Other than that, it was pretty much just me, Monika, Kirsty and a few other VT students (Henry and Maslita then Mohammed and Ali on the Friday) around our part of the building.

Henry spent most of the time trying to finish sorting out his new accommodation and, most importantly, his Internet connection. It seemed like a good idea to go with the discount O2 gave him via his existing mobile contract in theory. In practice, their website was obviously designed by idiots and caused no end of problems. Why should we have to tell the web site that we’re logged in? Surely it should know!

Ibby also made an appearance on the Thursday (although much later than I expected from his phonecall the day before!) and Henry suggested some post-birthday drinks which was very nice of him. We spent a couple of hours in the Swim, having a good chat before going home.

This nice little spell of quite winterdom was over by the next week when people started to reappear en mass. There still weren’t enough people to warrant a postgraduate seminar session though, on the Monday, so it was cancelled much to Ramsay’s dismay at the loss of pizza. Most of my time over the last two weeks has been spent on getting the Sun stuff going, of which you can ready more on my other blog; other than that, it’s been lots of nice chats over cuppas as usual.

The biggest event of the last couple of weeks has to be our impromptu night out. Last Thursday, me and Henry bumped into Emily in the kitchen (she having returned on Monday, when we sadly took all the Christmas decorations back down) and were given a rather strange invitation to a night out. You see, she didn’t ask us if we wanted to join her but rather if we’d meet up with her if we were already going out. Kind of bizarre. We weren’t sure what to do, given the short notice. I know Em would never go out at such short notice, so it seemed a bit cheeky her expecting us to.

In the end, we decided to go and I texted Em to let her know. We were forewarned it was apparently a ‘girly night’, whatever that means, but even without any mascara, we still decided to go. Unfortunately, we were a little late in getting across to the Varsity and when we got there at 9, Em had left. We stayed for a drink anyway, then went across to the quieter Cavendish for another. As usual, the Varsity was playing loud music for the very few customers it has, while it was noticeably quieter but packed with people in the Cavendish. After some interesting chat, the two of us headed down to the Leadmill, again via the Globe, having agreed to meet Emily there.

The streets were desolate, with the Cavendish seemingly having the majority of tonight’s party people. To say we got to the Leadmill later than we have before (about half eleven), and yet it was still nearly empty, it shows how much the night-going population of Sheffield is dominated by the students, who were all still mostly away on Christmas vacation. We spotted Em and friend not long after getting there, but there seemed to be little hint of the girly night we were told about. Rather than interrupting her, we waited until she spotted us as well and decided to come over.

The night was a bit different to what I remember the last Thursday at the Leadmill being like. The music in the main room was way more cheesy than before, being a smattering of all sorts of pop music, while room 2, rather than being the usual indie stuff, was playing house music. Sadly, as always popularity surrounds the worst music, and the poor DJ in that room had very few people on the dancefloor. These kids today just don’t have any taste — I mean, Peter Andre? The guy kept repeating tracks too which always annoys me. 3 Britney Spears songs (1 twice)?

It worked out well though, because I think the DJ in room 2 realised he didn’t have to play to the crowd but could just play what he fancied. We went back and forth a few times; I got Henry to join me in there the first time, then the second time he initiated us going in there after hearing that the guy had moved on to playing some trance. The main dance floor was a joke. Not only was the music not too good, but the majority of people there weren’t even dancing and seemed to take it badly that some of us wanted to actually enjoy ourselves. They’d rather just stand there like idiots and get drunk.

Towards the end of the night, there were people falling all over the place, so I escaped once again to the other room, especially when I heard the DJ was now playing some drum ‘n’ bass! That made me very happy, even I was one of only about three people in there, while the rest were staggering around in the other room to Whitney Houston. Admittedly, it was commercial drum ‘n’ bass (Pendulum’s ‘Slam’ followed by Puretone’s ‘Addicted to Bass’) but this was still a league above what the annoying wedding DJ was doing in the other room. It’s always a sign of a bad DJ when they feel the need to talk to their audience and tell you what tracks they’re going to play. Honestly, it was like listening to Hallam FM or something.

The DJ finished the night with some old skool stuff, and then I met up with Henry again and we walked back up towards his house. I was in no rush to get back and I didn’t want to leave him until I knew he was cognoscent enough to get home okay. All in all, it was a good night and I enjoyed the chance to have a good chat with Henry. He’s a really good friend.

Tonight we went out for quadruple birthday celebrations (Emmanuel, Mahmood, Simon and Ramsay). Clearly, as Ramsay says, people liked having sex at Christmas parties in the 70s and 80s. We let Henry plan things. In retrospect, that was a bad idea…

The night started out quite nicely, although it took a while to get things moving. Simon had to leave relatively early to get back to Chesterfield in good time, so he left for the pub with Ramsay and Stannett earlier than the rest of us. Myself, Henry, Emmanuel, Mahmood and Abraham headed off just after 6pm, after being informed that we’d had to change our pub from the Star and Garter to the University Arms as the former was shut. Took a while to get them all out of the building, due to some prevarication, but we eventually headed off there dropping by the cash machine on the way. We were notably Ibbyless; he’d already whined about not staying the whole thing earlier, but decided to do a sly little wander off again and not come at all in the end.

We had a nice drink there (formally Club 192 or whatever) and some interesting conversation including Stannett telling us about his ‘picnic’ (which turned out to be rather unlike the departmental one and more like the Gay Pride parade) and Emmanuel letting on about his fear of bees. It’s not as bad as Ibby who is apparently scared of everything including kittens and ants. I hope Mike Holcombe doesn’t decide to do any live experiments near him.

After that, and Simon leaving, we headed to the Harley where most people indulged in several rounds of pool. Emmanuel, like the time we went out the first time, chose to sit out. I did as well, knowing I’m no good at it, but Stannett eventually made me have a few shots. Another guy in there (Keith) also decided to join in, giving the guys tips and eventually playing them in a game. It was interesting to see Mahmood’s first encounter with someone relatively intoxicated…

After a fair number of games had been lost and won, Mahmood turning out to be something of a pool shark, and Ramsay having bid his goodbyes for Walkley and a warm bed, we headed to RSVP via Aslan’s. Emmanuel seemed to perk up a bit after getting some food, and he was dancing about both in Aslan’s and RSVP. The music in the latter was really good, the DJ playing an eclectic range of stuff from the Chemical Brothers through ‘Yellow Submarine’ to Barry White’s ‘The First, The Last, My Everything’. Stannett passed on details to him offering him the chance to broadcast on his station and I hope he does.

Mahmood got a headache and so went home rather than going on to Embrace. What a good choice! The fact that they were handing out free entry/drinks flyers should have been enough of a hint as to what a dive it was but we still went anyway. Last time, we had to queue up and then got turned away, so we’d all made sure we had shoes not trainers on this time and such, and then there was no queue, no interrogation and we just waltzed in. I wish we’d not bothered on both counts. I’m glad we didn’t pay (it certainly wasn’t worth it) and I would have been more comfortable in trainers.

Inside, the Ibby tunes pounding were a good hint to how things were going to be. They only seemed to have the one room open. I’d looked at them on dontstayin.com the day before, and none were mega-appealing, but some were bearable. The only one they decided to have open was this Decuba room which plays ‘Pop, Chart & Party featuring stunning stage shows and Tropicana style cabaret’ apparently. That description is enough to put you off to start with.

The music was awful. I like most of the tunes, don’t get me wrong, but I wouldn’t want to go out and dance to them. Most of them were far too slow and this DJ guy had no idea how to order things. He puts two trance songs on (terming them old skool wrongly — since when is mid-90s old skool?) and a bit of electro house (but awful commercialised versions, like what they’ve done to The Creeps), then we’re back to slow-ass r’n'b, and not even good ones. I mean Mariah Carey and Justin Timberlake??? And repeating songs — how many times do you want to hear Out Of Office? It’s boring the first time.  I could have done a better set from my iPod. Heck, Ibby would have done a better set. At least he would have probably stuck some Darude, some Brainbug and Hans Zimmer in there. I don’t know if they were doing requests, but it would have been very tempting to request some Prodigy or Pendulum. Most of their stuff I’d play in the day as background music. Heck, the Frog and Parrot was playing better music as we went past, banging out some Dizzie Rascal.
The floor was full of chavs. Seems this rethink has already fallen on its face. Stannett put it aptly when he said it was more gay than the Gay Pride parade. This was something more akin to a seaside disco in Skeggie than a nightclub. Seriously, drop the booze and it’d be a good spot for school discos. They having some Galaxy 105 shite this weekend, which says it all. Ripped up the flyer they gave me straight away, as there’s no way I’m going back there. It might be fine if you’re so fucked out of your head you’re willing to dance to Bob the Builder, but this place truly is awful. Sleazy Kingdom by another name…

Blame Mike, he inspired me. I’m doing this off the top of my head, so I’ve probably missed many. I’ve also avoided going for too many from the same artist.

Nineties (and a little before)

• New Order - Blue Monday
• Black Box - Ride On Time
• Adamski - Killer
• The Adventures of Stevie V - Dirty Cash
• Snap - Rhythm Is A Dancer
• The Orb - Little Fluffy Clouds
• SL2 - On A Ragga Tip
• Goodmen - Give It Up
• The Prodigy - Out Of Space
• Baby D - Let Me Be Your Fantasy
• Robert Miles - Children
• Brainbug - Nightmare
• Energy 52 - Cafe Del Mar
• Olive - You’re Not Alone
• Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit
• Double 99 - Ripgroove
• Sash! - Encore Un Fois
• Alice Deejay - Better Off Alone
• Faithless - Insomnia
• Faithless - Salva Mea
• Madonna - Ray Of Light (erm… the album?)
• Tori Amos - Professional Widow (Got To Be Big)
• Dario G - Carnaval De Paris
• Cornershop - Brimful of Asha [Norman Cook Re-mix]
• The Prodigy - Smack My Bitch Up
• Apollo 440 - Ain’t Talkin’ Bout Dub
• Fatboy Slim - Right Here Right Now
• Fatboy Slim - Going Out Of My Head
• Chemical Brothers - Setting Sun
• Nakatomi - Children Of The Night
• DJ Flavours - Your Caress (All I Need)
• Wildchild - Renegade Master ‘98
• Basement Jaxx - Red Alert
• Massive Attack - Unfinished Sympathy
• Massive Attack - Teardrop
• ATB - 9pm (Till I Come)
• Groove Armada - At The River

Naughties

• Delerium featuring Sarah McLachlan - Silence [Tiësto’s In Search Of Sunrise Re-mix]
• Storm - Time To Burn
• Darude - Sandstorm
• Azzido Da Bass - Doom’s Night
• Zombie Nation - Kernkraft 400
• Tomcraft - Loneliness
• The Prodigy - Voodoo People [Pendulum Re-mix]
• Röyksopp - What Else Is There? [Trentemøller Re-mix]
• The Knife - We Share Our Mother’s Health [Trentemøller Re-mix]
• Moby - Go [Trentemøller Re-mix]
• Madonna - Paradise (Not For Me)
• Madonna - Let It Will Be [Paper Faces Re-mix]
• Tiësto - Adagio For Strings
• William Orbit - Adagio For Strings [Ferry Corsten Re-mix]
• Da Hool - Meet Her At The Love Parade
• Electric Six - Gay Bar
• Arctic Monkeys - Fake Tales of San Francisco
• Hot Chip - Over And Over
• Skream - Kut-Off
• Oakenfold - Faster Kill Pussycat [Roman Hunter Mix]
• Ferry Corsten - Junk
• Lilly Allen - LDN
• Amy Winehouse - You Know I’m No Good
• Prydz vs Floyd - Proper Education
• Gnarls Barkley - Crazy
• Justice vs. Simian - We Are Your Friends
• Mason - Exceeder (esp. Brass Band version…)
• Fedde Le Grand - Put Your Hands Up For Detroit [TV Rock and Dirty South Melbourne Militia Re-mix]
• Roger Sanchez - Lost [D. Ramirez Re-mix]
• 50 Cent - In Da Club
• Paffendorf - Be Cool
• Intenso Project - Luv Da Sunshine
• Mirwais - Naive Song
• Tiësto featuring Maxi Jazz - Dance4Life
• Faithless - We Come One
• TV Rock - Flaunt It
• Sander Kleinenburg - This Is Not Miami
• Madonna - Impressive Instant
• Basement Jaxx - Get Me Off
• Shy FX - Shake Ur Body
• Puretone - Addicted To Bass
• Timo Mass - Get Down
• Philippe B - Ibiza Mi Amor
• Kinobe - Slip Into Something More Comfortable
• Trentemøller - Chameleon
• Oakenfold - Southern Sun [Tiësto Re-mix]
• Rapture - Whoo! Alright! Yeah… Uh Huh
• Drumsound and Baseline Smith - Cold Turkey
• Drumsound and Baseline Smith - Cape Fear
• J Majik and Wickaman - Crazy World
• DJ Yoda - Wheels
• Gorillaz - Dare [Soulwax Re-mix]
• Gorillaz - Dirty Harry
• Gorillaz - Clint Eastwood
• Electric Six - Danger! High Voltage

This Year So Far (Or Thereabouts)

• Fedde Le Grand vs. Camille Jones - The Creeps
• Freaks - The Creeps (You’re Giving Me) [Vandalism Re-mix]
• Mika - Grace Kelly
• Just Jack - Starz In Their Eyes [Trophy Twins Aftershow Re-mix]
• Gossip - Standing In The Way Of Control [Soulwax Late Nite Version]
• Calvin Harris - Acceptable In The 80’s [Tom Neville Re-mix]
• Alex Gaudino featuring Crystal Waters - Destination Calabria [Drunkenmunky 2007 Re-make]
• Panda - Panda Style
• Mark Ronson and Paul Smith - Apply Some Pressure
• Mark Ronson and Daptone Horns - God Put A Smile Upon Your Face

Hardcore

• CLSM - John Peel (Is Not Enough)
• K Complex - Adagio
• Druid & Sharkey - Bonkers Anthem
• Scott Brown - Boomstick
• Scott Brown - Ghosts
• DJ Eclipse - Ultraworld 5

Well, it’s been over a week since I last blogged, but my fellow blogging cronies haven’t done anything further either… Stuff has happened though. Last Thursday, we did have a little party in the Research Retreat, with Abraham, Fran, Ramsay, Liang, Ibby, Mahmood and myself all in attendance. Pictures are available on my web site. I don’t remember much about the Friday, other than that the new room still wasn’t sorted, but would be for Monday, and that I had to tell Mahmood it would only be for two. That’s also when we sorted out Simon a desk for his return. Also the last time I saw Fran in the flesh….

Monday was the big move. I hardly spent any time in the original VT lab (VT Lab 0) after about midday, as we moved Mahmood, Sarah and Shaukat in. Yes, that’s not a mistake. Mahmood did move in there in the end, and that was the cause of much debate. It was clear that, with how the lab initially looked, another desk of the same size as Shaukat and Sarah’s couldn’t be fitted in. So Mahmood brought in what has since been christened ‘the baby desk’; one that Georg wouldn’t even give his children and Tony Chilton also said wasn’t a desk. With the removal of the bookshelf though, and three of the shelves, Mahmood got a bigger desk on the wall and everything seemed okay. The lab was christened ‘VT Lab 3′ and they seem to be quite happy in there now. After they moved in, I ended up in a discussion with Mahmood and Emmanuel on topics varying from Turing completeness through communicating X-machines (of which Emmanuel is apparently ‘the god’ with a small ‘g’) to girls… ’nuff said. Zubair also made a reappearance, but seemed very quiet.

Tuesday morning kicked off with me finally moving across the lab, and then spending some time with Georg going over the transfer report; he’s actually read it you see… We had a Concurrency group in which Simon spoke at length on prioritised calculi and Mike didn’t appear for. I tried to have a conversation with Fran, but the stupid messenging thing played up on me, and I got insulted by Simon for my trouble.

Wednesday saw me demonstrating on Peter’s module, which turns out to be the Intro. to AI one. Some interesting sessions, especially when he missed most of the first one, and I had to make the decision to kick it off on my own. I also went to the later one with Sanaz and Ben, which got a lot more students (helped by not being at 9am). There certainly are a lot of first years this time round, but I think we could do them all in one session next time.

It was nice to see Ramsay again on Wednesday, and we went on a mission to find the Main Library and Kirill’s thesis, which failed as it’s apparently somewhere in the vaults. We may have another try next week though, after Simon mentioned we can go down there as postgrads. We also went to St. George’s, where the early allocation of books to the Information Commons confused us completely. But it looks like most of the boring undergrady stuff will be moving, leaving more space there for the good stuff. The day finished with some tunes, as the lab emptied, bar me, Ramsay and Ibbs.

Thursday was a bit more relaxed. Ibby turned up and struggled on with his transfer report… poor guy… while myself, Ramsay and Kirill again tried to tackle that Sun machine, although removing the memory seemed to make things worse not better. It’s now down to the point where one of the processors is being removed too…

Today (Friday) has just been a really tiring day. Simon arrived earlier than normal, which knocked me for six a bit. I kind of expect him around 9:30ish. We had the fire alarm go off at about 9, and I ended up getting soaked because we had to go out in the rain and I was out of the lab, on my way back from the bathroom, when it went off. No-one seemed to know if it was for real or just a test, but I do remember there was one this time last year when I first started. Fortunately, Peter turned up after about five minutes with an umbrella and sheltered me, which was nice of him. It seems a odd time to do it because there were so few people in; it was mainly just secretaries, the three of us (Simon, me and Emmanuel) from the lab and Tony Simons, along with some members of the other groups and some undergrads.

Couple of hours later I did Siobhan’s database course, again handling the demonstrating with Henry. Nice to be back doing this stuff again. The seminar followed. Simon wasn’t too impressed with how his went, but I thought it seemed okay. Mine seemed to get the best reception I’ve had yet from one of these things, and I was quite happy with it.

It’s best not to say anything about the afternoon. It suffices to say the lab was very quiet, by the time it got to 3pm and Theory SIG, neither myself nor Simon seemed that keen and having to deal with Mike in a mood where he constantly contradicted himself and just argued every single point wasn’t the best way to end the day.

A later start than I expected today, but it seems to have been a good day. Movement of the VT clan is still very much on the agenda. Sarah definitely wants to move to the research overflow lab, and Shaukat and Ali seem to want to go too. The problem is, according to Tony Chilton, it might not even be ours to use; he thinks it might be reserved for SpandH and NLP. I’ve contacted Phil to find out, but he’s away at present — so they are in limbo to an extent.

After finding out that we needed some tables that were imminently for the rubbish tip, myself and Mahmood grabbed them and moved them into the lab, thus making a start on the movement already. As a result, the two biggest issues have been sorted; both Emmanuel and Azman now have a proper desk and Emmanuel even has a machine. I also moved Frank over to the back table, which is eventually going to just house the printer, and moved Fran’s simulation machine to its rightful home. Things should thus be a bit simpler tomorrow.

Neither me nor Ibby met with Mike, as, with us working on the reports, there isn’t much point. He did drop in at the end of the day, and spotted my CDs, which he seemed interested in. Also, as with most people, he was perplexed by my crazy diagram of the lab — not to scale or aspect ratio! Yet more transfer reporting, but I think the end is in sight now — just djoin, biology, pi types, p systems and bigraphs to cover I think. Hopefully, some will be clear prior to tomorrow’s move, which starts with a lunch at 1ish.

In other news, there is likely to be a postgrad meeting next week, and I’m trying to recruit people to apply for Google’s pizza ambassadorship, to increase the likelihood of it happening at Sheffield… busy times. At least, one thing is off my mind. I was delighted to see a friendly face pop up on MSN today; a jet-lagged Fran appeared briefly who I’m happy to say arrived safely and will be giving his presentation tomorrow. Best of luck, mate — VT is rooting for you.

Just got back from the Mexican Independence Party organised by El Presidente, Abraham. It was fun, and no less than eight members of the VT lab turned up (including myself, Ibby, Zubair, Ramsey, Carlos, Ravie and Henry, who only seems to turn for the parties). By the end of the evening, Ibby, Ramsey and Henry had all strutted their stuff on the dance floor with the ladies; seems our group has a few lotharios….

It’s been a good day all round. I started by finishing off the RTP stuff which me and Simon started the day before. Fran then managed to actually find a use for that freaky eyeball webcam that’s been around the lab all this time. We stayed in the lab until eight, which means it again turned into VTCrasher. We had some of Ibby’s banghra music on too, and I played some Arctics too — don’t think Ibbs was too impressed with the latter, but myself and Fran enjoyed it.

Fran leaves for China tomorrow (or today, now… sort of). Poor guy is really worried about it, and my thoughts will be with him over this next week. He’s got to try and get from one airport to another in three and a half hours, including time leaving one airport (getting bags, etc.) and checking in at the other. I hope everything goes okay. Then he’s got a talk on Wednesday… fingers crossed for him.

The week after, when he returns, we have a pretty full day planned for the 28th. CompBio are organising something that evening, which works out pretty nicely as that’s the day I had planned too. So hopefully, we can have a VT chillout beforehand, and then go on to a club after the CB thing. Not only are we saying our farewells to Fran, but Carlos is also leaving and it will be Ibby’s birthday that weekend. So a big fuss is in order…

I’ll be back in the lab tomorrow… maybe I’m mad but I do need to get this report done if we’re gonna party in two weeks…

Another late blog… oh well. I seem to be really tired the last couple of days. Anyway, yesterday was a pretty busy day. It started with myself and Simon grabbing Mike to sort out the RTP forms. Turns out he’d completely forgotten about them, even though we only told him the day before. Poor guy seems really stressed out at the moment.

At midday, a big gang of us went out to lunch. I don’t think Fran realised that none of us, except him, knew where this noodle bar was. That resulted in quite an interesting game of follow my leader, but it all seemed to work out okay in the end. There were nine of us to start with. We were then joined by Tony, who was the only academic to bother to turn up… shame on the rest of them. Seems the rescheduling of the lunch to 12pm happily coincided with Julian taking ivy off-line… I texted Ibby to let him know about the lunch, and Mahmood did the same with Zubair. Ibby replied, saying he was feeling ill, but I managed to convince him to come down anyway. This resulted in a rather interesting phone conversation where he was asking for directions and I could see him stood outside in the courtyard. He didn’t stay in the end, because by that time everyone was seated and eating, and there wasn’t really any room left. Zubair said he would come, but didn’t make it in the end; he should be at the Mexican party today though.

The meal ended with some fun, because we had to work out how to split the bill and ensure everyone had the right change — which is fun when most people turn up with ten pound notes. Somehow, I ended up a pound in credit, so that means the VT lab now has a positive cash flow for once! Maybe we can afford a chair or something… or a night out in the research retreat. The noodles had a good effect, as they helped Fran to win his badminton game. Clearly, VT is now blessed with noodle power.

Simon left for his holidays in the afternoon. We’ll not see him again until October now. Ramsey seems to be settling in nicely, and seems happy to ask questions and stuff, which is nice. It also now seems to have become traditional to end the day with a song. As Ibby will tell you in his new and fantastic blog, we closed Thursday with Faithless’ ‘We Come One’. Always a good tune

Most of the weekend has been spent on this bloody transfer report… it’s like hacking down a wall with a toothpick. I compensate with some dance tunes, and that helps a bit. The rest was largely spent sleeping I think. Went to the gym on Saturday morning, and was surprised to find that I could still keep up my old pace after not going for such a long time. Wochenende just go so quickly, it seems. The fun starts tomorrow with the Hyper party…