Weekly Rewind #103

Welcome to another Weekly Rewind. This edition could either be considered overdue from last week or early for next, depending on whether you’re a glass half empty or full kind of person. I’ll let you decide. I was trying to think of witty things to link with the number 103 but I’m drawing a blank. The only two examples I can come up with are the Peugeot 103 and the Manchester radio station Key 103, neither of which seem particularly relevant. If you think of something I’ve missed stick it in a comment at the bottom. There’s no prizes, it’s just for fun. Maybe I’ll invent some arbitrary points system like have on Q.I and award you a million points. Anyway, let’s stop this nonsense and begin ploughing our way through the last 10 days or so…

I believe I last left things late on the afternoon of Monday January 16th, so let’s pick up there. I went on to broadcast Linux Outlaws with Fab in the evening. You’re probably tired of hearing me say this but it really does seem odd that we can be 247 episodes into this podcast now. As we close in on 250 episodes and 5 years in the business of pod, I don’t think either of us ever imagined this popularity or longevity could happen. The show was fun as always and I edited it later that week. You can grab it now as Episode 247 – “Poke Him With Your Pipe Old Boy”. Continue reading

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Weekly Rewind #102

Hello again and welcome to another Weekly Rewind. Updates and tales from the interesting (or not so interesting) happenings in my life. We’re just over a week from the last article so that’s not bad going. Only 1 day late. Let’s begin with Sunday night, January 8th…

I broadcast episode 69 of Rathole Radio and it went pretty well. There was some lively chat going on in the IRC and it seems the new website is holding up well. I need to fix a few things on there still but you know how these things are. You’re never 100% done, at least not if you’re a hopeless perfectionist like me. Continue reading

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Weekly Rewind #101

Hello and welcome to the first new Weekly Rewind since October 30th. It’s seems as if I got to number 100 and decided that was enough. It’s a nice round number certainly but I’m not done yet, I just got busy. It’s 2012 (I’m sure you noticed) and with the passing of the New Year I decided there were lots of things I should really get in order. One of those is keeping this blog up to date more regularly. Hopefully you’ll see these articles a lot more frequently in the weeks and months to come. Let’s talk about the first week of 2012 and what I’ve been up to…

Last Sunday it was New Years Day so I didn’t do a whole hell of a lot to be honest. Stayed at home, watched the telly, ate a nice dinner. The basics. On Monday I prepared for the first Linux Outlaws of 2012 which we broadcast that evening. It felt good to get back into the swing of another Outlaws year and it dawned on me, we’re heading for our fifth birthday this year. It’s not till September but still it’s strange to think we’ve been making the show all these years. Continue reading

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A Plan Comes Together

A picture of me playing my usual red guitar at the party

Singing at OggCamp11 - Photo by Hannah Greer

Hello again everyone, I hope your 2012 has kicked off well. It seems to have brought with it ridiculously strong winds in the UK, and many other parts of the world. So watch out for flying debris if you’re out and about. I’m writing today to share a plan that’s recently formed in my brain and also ask for your feedback.

In my recap of 2011 I talked about my desire to do more music this year, and also find a way of generating income from it. I don’t want or expect to get rich from music but I am considering ways to make a modest sustainable income. I’ve thought about this a lot in relation to my band 20lb Sounds over the last 18 months. I came up with very rough plans for subscription fan clubs, crowd-sourced tours, merchandise and much more. None of them have yet come to fruition but hopefully they still will. Leaving the band to one side for now though the new plan is fairly simple. Continue reading

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2011: The Year That Was

An 8 bit representation of me on the presenter t-shirt. Designed by @fabsh

My awesome 8-bit OggCamp shirt, designed by @fabsh

Hello everyone, I hope you’re all well. I thought it was high time I finally got back into the swing of writing. It’s New Year’s Day 2012 as I write this to you and I hope you enjoyed a great festive period. Whatever your denomination, or even if you don’t have one. It’s a perfect time to reflect on the previous year and that’s what I’ll focus on today. 2011 was a good year for me and I’d like to quickly recount some highlights.

Living In The City

I’d been planning to move to the centre of Liverpool for years but it was the start of 2011 when I finally found an available and affordable flat. I signed all the paperwork and got hold of the keys at the end of January, before promptly heading off to Brussels for FOSDEM. I didn’t even have time to move much stuff in before leaving. One of the first things I did upon moving to the flat though was get my stereo connected and listen to “Living For The City” by Stevie Wonder at a good volume. It seemed appropriate. It’s not long till my 1 year anniversary of being a city slicker now. I still love it here and fate (and landlord) willing, I’ll be here a while yet. Continue reading

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I’m Still Alive

Wow… well this is embarrassing isn’t it? You skip writing one post and all of a sudden it’s 2 months later. I’ve been fairly busy since the end of October, that goes without saying. But I’ll endeavour to write up a proper review of my year over the next week. This is just a quick post to let you all know that I’m still very much alive and to thank the kind people who told me they miss the Weekly Rewind. Yeah there were a few, honest. I’ll get back into regular blogging swing in the New Year.

I do have a small treat for you though. One of things I’ve been doing lately is video editing and animation. So here’s a quick stop motion clip I did a few weeks ago. This was only a test to see if the method worked to be honest but it came out looking ok.  I can’t really draw but that’s supposed to be an L appearing and fading away. I’m going to use a technique like this to make titles for some videos I’m doing. I also used my dartboard as it was the only thing I could use chalk on in my flat. I know, I’m just so manly, ha ha. The lighting isn’t great so you might need to squint a bit.

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and New Year and as always thanks for your support throughout 2011. Take care of yourselves and I’ll race you to 2012 ;)

Dan

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