Neil Hopcroft

Anyone out there on LinkedIn? Want to add me as connection? Leave your LI email in a comment here – comments screened….

ETA: or I think you might be able to find my profile.

Househunting – this entry made more for personal reference than the enjoyment of others, though if you have any suggestions for sensible places to live they would be appreciated.

First stop, Feltham…

Music to crash cars to…though perhaps not quite the music I would have chosen.

Saab opera (or maybe its a ballet?)

Belly dancing gone mad

Wednesday I went to the Dresden Dolls gig – I’m not sure I’ve got a great deal to say that hasn’t been said better by someone else. But thats not going to stop me writing a little more about them and their friends anyway.

Bang On, who were playing as we arrived, looked like they’d be more at home busking somewhere – they were a pair of great drummers using a kit made up of all sorts of weird and wonderful bits of noisy metal, they were a great show and would have been better placed somewhere where they could be better seen, but maybe that destroys the intimacy of their show.

Next up were Devotchka, who were great, bringing influences from most parts of Europe and at least two instruments each, some of which were bigger than they were. They’re the kind of band that make a lot of sense live, but I’m not sure how they’d come out recorded.

Then there was an arielist who performed various manouvres dangling from the ceiling. I was wondering how she practiced the show, but maybe she has a tree she can use, or something.

Finally the Dolls themselves came on stage. You either love them or hate them – I can understand both – I love them. Theres a tension in the air as they launch into their set, something about how they interact on stage, they know each other well, it makes for a slick show.

Fabulous evening out, not a normal gig for sure, and somehow reminiscent of some of the finer craziness I found in Tokyo, never quite knowing what would come next.

Lunchbox-a-le-le

Augmented trampoline – playing with fire

Porsche remember they make cars – though I’m somewhat disturbed that the three pictures on that page show such different cars, wonder which one they’re making?

“You may think while reading this that it could be a “troll”, a humorous invention for the amusement of its author. It isn’t; the enumeration of verifiable events (even if those events are difficult to check) should prove that. You may also think that it’s close to the symptoms of psychiatric illness and can be explained in those terms. But the reason this type of harassment was started in the first place is because those initiating planned to simulate the symptoms of illness; any complaint of harassment would be seen at first glance as indicative of psychiatric illness and “treated” accordingly. The fact that so many people now have a good idea of the truth makes it difficult for that position to be maintained.” – theres a part of me that wants to take the ‘evidence’ and remix it into a semi-consistent story, just to throw more fuel on the fire, but I fear thats a touch cruel.

Your light cone

“Sweetheart or psycho? Can’t make your mind up if they’re too good to be true or a total nutter in sheep’s clothing? Stay Safe…”

Tree house

First week down and I’m still alive. Its been a close call thing with rather too much sitting on trains and rather too little sleeping. At least I’m getting some reading done.

The job itself is going OK, I’m taking over from someone I worked with a long time back, which is cool ‘cos that means I can already understand his coding style, as well as catching up with him. I’m working on Mobizines, doing mobile client programming, but won’t bore you with more details than that.

Its unusual (for me at least) not to be hit by a wall of doom entering new offices – these guys still have something of a startup buzz to them, but with a little more world-weary cynicism than my last proper startup. How bright the future is I don’t know, and I’m sure theres someone, somewhere, with their hand just reaching for the ‘doom’ dial, but in the meantime it’ll be nice to see how these guys think it should be done.

The trains this week only had one bad day (out of ten journeys), where they’d lost a train somewhere near Biggleswade and dug around in the sidings to find us another. The tubes had a couple of busy days, but not quite as bad as the days of pushers on the Yamanote line at Shinagawa.

I think I’ve remembered how to fall in love. Totally inappropriate, as ever, but so so eloquently broken.

Why aren’t the girls I meet like that? They’re just broken.

Once again my mp3 player is mocking me, ‘the begining of the end’ as we pull into kings cross? It’s a bright new future and i’m not going to have technology tell me anything different.

Now, though, is waiting. I’m due to arrive in 25 mins, so i’m just catching a quick coffee before going to the new office. If all the journeys are like today it’ll be ok. Except for the getting up so early.