How to cook a perfect poached egg (the easy way)

Eggs are amazing, and undeniably poached eggs are the finest of all the eggs. However, they're fiddly to do well and getting the cooking time right can be tricky. Most of the recommended cooking methods involve making a vortex in the boiling water and adding some vinegar, but having used this method for a number of years, I found it produced unpredictable results and made for a washing up is a nightmare.

It sounds pretty weird, but I suggest you try poaching your eggs using cling film. This is a cooking tip that I picked up from b3ta a couple of years ago, and have spent a while perfecting.

You will need:

• A fresh egg
• A mug, or glass
• A square piece of cling film
• A little oil

Start by tearing off a square of cling film and laying it over your mug/glass to create a shallow plastic well. Ensure that the centre of the cling film is in the middle of your receptacle. Grease the inside of the well by adding a drop of oil and running it around the with your finger (this makes for easier egg removal).

Next, crack your egg into the ready-greased well, then carefully gather the corners of the cling film together - I usually pick a starting corner, grab the opposite corner and move around until I have all the corners neatly together. Next, seal the egg in by twisting the cling film round. Make sure you remove all the air from the cling film pouch when you do this as air bubbles prevent perfect cooking.

Finally, loosely tie the top of the cling film and your egg is ready to cook. If you're doing a batch, you can pop it on the side now while you wrap your other eggs.

To cook, bring a saucepan containing enough water to cover the eggs to a fast bubbling boil, and then drop your eggs into the pan. Set a timer for 4 minutes and then use the cooking time to get on with making your toast/beans/tea/coffee etc.

Once 4 minutes is up, fish the eggs out of the water and pop them on the side.

To serve, cut the knot off the top of the parcel and gently pull the cling film apart to release the egg. I usually go straight from the cling film to the top of the toast.

Voila! A lovely poached egg, cooked on the outside and runny in the middle with no messy washing up. Give it a go and let me know how you get on.

Please note that the example is quite a long way from my normal standard. I was so caught up in taking the photos that I ignored the timer for a bit too long and also burnt the bacon. May was not impressed.

Spotify. The next big thing?

Spotify is somewhat old news. It launched silently launched in the UK back in October last year and received a small amount of press coverage at the beginning of this year. Spotify provides a free streaming music service over the internet, it's like iTunes but you can only listen when you're online. The other key difference from iTunes is that you can listen to full tracks and albums free of charge.

At launch, Spotify was invite only so that they could control their growth rate. I recieved an invite from Morcs back in January and after signing up I quickly dismissed the concept when I discovered hat I'd have to install some client software on my PC to use it. "You're going to stream me music, and you want me to install something? Haven't you heard of software as a service?" I cried in an indignant technological rage. A few months later, when there was a lot of noise amongst my friends and colleagues about Spotify I bit the bullet and installed the client. I've been using it for about 6 weeks now, and I'm so impressed with it that I've become something of a Spotify bore/zealot.

Here's the key reasons that I'm so impressed:

• It's a free, legal internet music service which has the support of the record industry - The record industry have been absolute dullards when it comes to harnessing the internet as a platform for retail and distribution (a topic worth a whole post in the future I think). Despite the idiocy of the music industry and their currently small user base, Spotify already have buy in from Sony, Universal, EMI and Warner and have commited to provide their entire catalogues for your listening pleasure. They've also recently signed Record Union, who are a distributer for independent artists, so hopefully this will bring even more interest to the music available. Currently, they're adding around 150k tracks a week - I've seen the fruits of this as searches for artists which I like initially returned zero hits and are now returning entire discographies (6.9 hours of Hybrid anyone?).

• Excellent audio quality and user experience - Spotify uses the Ogg q5 codec which is roughly 160kbps and sounds great. Search results are returned lightning fast and even though they're streamed to you, tracks start playing almost instantly (it turns out that you need to install a client because P2P techniques are used, which I'm sure helps with the instant play feature). Spotify even works reliably over a 3G connection.

• Playlists, sharing and collaboration - You can create your own playlists quickly by dragging and dropping albums and tracks. Brilliantly, playlists are tied to your login not your computer so they are accesible wherever you login from. Tracks, albums and playlists can be shared with friends via simple HTTP links, and playlists can be made public so others can add to your existing song selections.

• Spotify radio - Only want to listen to 80s disco? No problem, With buttons to select time periods and music types, you can let Spotify play you tracks randomly based on your choices.

So what's the catch then? Well, crucially you can currently only use Spotify when you're both at your computer and online. In addition, the free service is paid for by adverts, so every 20 minutes or so, a 30 seconds audio advert get played inbetween tracks. At the moment these are invariably hilariously lo-fi and I haven't found them irritating, although with a limited selection of ads at the moment they can get pretty repetitive. I'm finding the adverts are a small sacrifice in exchange for unlimited, high quality, legal music online. Further, this catch actually leads onto another great Spotify strength:

• Smart premium options - currently there are 2 premium options available in the UK, a monthly subscriptions (£9.99) or a day pass (£0.99). Both bring the benefit of no advertising, and the monthly premium option also brings a higher quality stream (Ogg q9 which is roughly 320kbps), unlimited use of Spotify while abroad and additional invites so you can share Spotify with your friends. The day pass is particularly clever as it enables you to put together a party playlist which you can then stream advert-free all day for less than the price of a loaf of bread. For more nerdy types, the premium subscription also enables you to use the open source DeSpotify client if you wish (The free service blocks DeSpotify, and rightly so).

Looking forwards, Spotify are certainly one to watch. I firmly believe they have the potential to revolutionise how we buy, store and listen to music. So what can we expect from them in the future? Well, given that they've just added their first audiobook, perhaps they will branch out into delivering other types of media such as TV shows or movies. Mobile clients have already been confirmed with iPhone and Android apps in development, and their jobs section suggests they're also working on a client for Nokia's S60 handsets. In the video below, you'll see that they're demoing a syncronisation feature to enable you to play tracks on your mobile even when you're offline - you can bet that this will only be available to paying subscribers, but the prospect of unlimited music both at home and on the move for just a little more than a single album from iTunes is highly compelling.

When the mobile clients launch, I can forsee Spotify partnering with the handset manufacturers or mobile networks to bundle the client onto new phones, or include a premium subscription within the price of a data bundle.

I also think there's an opportunity for an additional charge on top of the premium subscription which could be used to give you access to pre-release music. The idea would be that as soon as you heard the new Dizzee Rascal song on the radio, the label would have made it available to Spotify and you could go and listen to it online before it's release. This would hopefully cut down on the piracy of pre-release music by enabling people to get their fill of brand new tunes legally, but without diminishing their appetite to buy them on release.

Finally, my pipe dream is to see them enable the synchronisation feature for the desktop client and then intergrate the client directly with the iPod. Of course desktop synchronisation is fraught with pitfalls because of the record labels hang ups about digital ownership. Individual files for synchronisation would need to be DRMed and achieve this with the iPod, Spotify would probably need to licence Apple's FairPlay DRM technology. I actually doubt Apple would ever allow this to happen, but it seems to me to be the best way to make Spotify mass-market - there are a lot of people who'd need some serious convincing that they should use their mobile handset instead of their iPod to listen to music on the move.

It's going to be very interesting to see if Spotify can overcome the hurdles in front of them and emerge as the success that I think they deserve to be. Can they scale their service? Can they make the model profitable and attract the elusive 50 quid man? Can they win users from iTunes and Amazon? Time will tell, and I for one will be watching closely.

Status: June

June 1

07:05 Tim has had a really long day. In Monterey, CA now. Dad still suffering waves of intense pain every few hours, I can't remember having seen him like this ever. Called the Doc and he arranged a prescription of maximum strength vicodin for us to pick up on arrival in Monterey.

June 2

00:16 Tim is at the dentist in Carmel with his Dad.

01:55 Tim is pretty overwhelmed by the kindness of Californians. The camp dentist looked at Dad, did an x-ray and referred him to a specialist free of charge. Apparently he has the 'best infection of 2009' in his jaw. Off to see surgeon tomorrow.

06:06 Tim has had another long day. After dentist, drove Dad round 17 Mile Drive on the Monterey peninsula and visited Pebble Beach golf course. Fingers crossed that his swollen face and infection are much improved by tomorrow and that dental surgery is not required.

21:02 Tim is back in the dentist's waiting room, Dad getting sedated for absess draining and a tooth extraction.

June 3

01:11 Tim is out whale watching on the Pacific Ocean.

07:04 Tim has had quite a day. Dad's tooth extraction and then seeing humpback whales, pacific dolphins and seals in Monterey bay.

18:14 Tim is having a better day. Dad is up and out, and has taken his camera, so he must be feeling a lot better. Long drive ahead today though, south on 1 to McWay waterfall, then loop back north before heading to Yosemite.

June 6

22:59 Tim is in Yosemite National Park. Beautiful things are all around. Only May is missing.

June 9

06:27 Tim is in the Ahwanee Hotel, Yosemite National Park, CA on the free wifi. Back to the UK on Thursday.

18:49 Tim is going rafting on the river Merced.

June 10

18:29 Tim is headed for home. Drive from Yosemite to San Francisco and then Virgin Premium Economy to Heathrow. A lot of sitting to be done today.

June 11

00:41 Tim now boarding VS20 from SFO to LHR.

11:44 Tim is back in the UK. Mum is a bit planed out and near sprinted off the plane and headed for the nearest loo looking sick.

19:46 Tim is back at home and very grateful to May for the airport pick-up.

June 13

13:19 Tim is http://www.facebook.com/timpoultney - god damn Tim De Pauw in Belgium for bagging timdp.

16:02 Tim is going camping on Purbeck. Yeah!

June 14

19:46 Tim is rocking out the red neck look. A shit load of factor 20 doesn't cut it for my pasty ghost skin it seems. Time to stop pissing about and get a load of factor 50.

June 15

08:36 Tim is back from holiday with a bump, back on the commuter train to LDN. Backdoor Boogie in my ears making it bearable.

18:35 Tim is not in California anymore. I'd forgotten the barely concealed looks of hatred you get from fellow commuters just for sitting down.

June 16

08:45 Tim is working on the train and listening to Backdoor Boogie again. Hayfever quotient is high today.

16:12 Tim is amazed by Audi UK. They have no A3 2.0 Tdi SE Sportsbacks available in the whole of the UK for demonstration. I'd better get the Beemer then.

19:29 Tim rocked out a short LDN run, 2.05k in 9.42. Now on the train to Basingstoke for hot tub and bbq. Girl sat next to me's pink see through thong is massively on display.

June 17

23:39 Tim is at Finchley Road by mistake. Whoops, not paying enough attention to tube route.

June 18

09:01 Tim had his worst nights sleep at the Metropole this year. West Wing rooms overlooking the flyover FTL.

18:03 Tim is running late for massage in Pimlico. Boo.

22:21 Tim is catching up with the Malmaison crew's music recommendations from last night. Now playing: The Presets.

June 19

07:58 Tim is listening to some idiots talking crap on the train.

19:14 Tim has finished work and is off out round London Bridge for Gaurav's leaving do.

June 20

13:24 Tim is at the Audi garage waiting on a test drive of an A3 SE.

16:10 Tim is off to London to meet Tom. After spotting Da Screen in the same carriage as me I've been studiously avoiding his gaze. Thank jeebus for the A3 brochure.

21:08 Tim is full of Persian food and headed for Amazingstoke for hot tub before May's 5k tomorrow.

June 21

10:58 Tim is at the Basingstoke Race for Life. Go May and Clare!

11:47 Tim is really proud of May, 27.16 in the Basingstoke Race for Life 5k.

June 22

19:08 Tim 's mental sprint through Waterloo, running up the escalators 2 steps at a time, has got him onto the 1905. Woo!

June 23

07:52 Tim 's word for the day is 'earlier'. Another sprint, another train caught by seconds. Thanks to the kind guard who let me on.

18:57 Tim is NOT at a TweetUp. In your face Tweetees!

23:37 Tim has fixed the unfixable wifi on May's laptop. In your face DSIS. If I got LEAP working too, I am god.

June 24

08:08 Tim is inspecting the lousy change he's picked up in London so far this week. One '10p' (quarter dollar), a Gibralta pound coin and an Isle of Man 20p. Check your change.

11:38 Tim just had a massive mouse related LOL. Brave 3rd floor office mouse caused a full on scream by mooching around on the floor.

17:58 Tim is going to Boxwood Cafe for dinner tonight. In your face Gordon Ramsay.

22:51 Tim thought the Boxwood Cafe was ok, food on a par with Malmaison, slightly nicer ambience and service. Malmaison on the 2009 voucher wins hands down on price and cool factor though.

June 25

12:12 Tim is meeting May for lunch at Leon behind the Tate Modern, what a nice treat!

19:06 Tim is really pleased that the combination of physio and massage has stopped his arms hurting, woo!

June 26

09:06 Tim is travelling light today so he can run after work. As such, no netbook today so making do with Radio 1 through my E71.

12:57 Tim is using his work issue anti-swine flu hard surface wipes to remove Borough market lunch stains from his raincoat.

17:56 Tim gave a new meaning to running for the train with a run from work to Waterloo: http://is.gd/1eyt1.

23:46 Tim is answering the age old question of whether or not you can tell the difference between coke from a bottle (glass vs plastic) or a can using statistics.

June 27

15:49 Tim is on a narrow boat on the Stratford canal. I understand the naming now.

June 28

10:42 Tim is lying atop a narrow boat on the Stratford canal, covered in factor 50. It's a beautiful day today.

14:55 Tim is operating canal locks. Who knew lock doors weighed 2500kg?

June 29

18:42 Tim is all boated out. Looking forward to getting home and relaxing. Need to pack for Prague though.

June 30

18:39 Tim is filling out his visa for India.

Status: May

May 1

08:58 Tim wishes May a happy official birthday.

May 2

16:34 Tim is en route to Cambridge to see his bro and watch May run the GEAR 10k.

May 3

09:13 Tim is waiting for the train to Kings Lynn with the running crew.

11:58 Tim is proud of May and Chris, 10k in just over an hour.

16:47 May & Chris in the Gear 10k (plus Dan, James & Steve)

19:08 Tim is moving hands so Comfortable hot air is sent out automatically.

May 4

17:34 Tim is back from Cambridge via Hatfield Galleria, Hatefield Galleria more like. Bit spooked by May's ability to make cars pull in one lane by pointing at them.

May 5

22:25 Tim is a bit confused as to why his status didn't update with the link to his new breaks mix: http://is.gd/wHXL.

May 6

22:45 Tim is a bit freaked out by the face transplant woman.

May 7

08:51 Tim is trying to develop an advanced internal radar for swine flu on the tub. All you sneezeers and snorters watch out.

May 8

00:03 Tim had a very nice dinner at Roast with May, teh Marsh, a surprise Dean and Em and a last minute Simpso.

13:41 Tim is being the design AUTHORITY. And picking up bits of Hindi.

18:07 Tim has learnt a valuable lesson. Never ever ever turn up at Waterloo at this time without a ticket. Ever. Never ever.

May 9

15:02 Tim dun did another run. Short and fast baby: http://is.gd/y2Vc.

18:00 Tim is heading for Basement's.

May 10

00:41 Tim is a bit concerned that 54% of the UK swine flu cases are in London, and at the moment I spend ~64% of my time there.

17:11 Tim has been playing Lit on WiiWare and is now making rhubarb crumble.

May 11

09:37 Tim has had the bit of tooth enamel that fell off on Marek's stag do replaced. Mouth feels weird.

21:05 Tim has made it to Brindisa with Vince. Bring on the acorn fed charcuterie.

May 12

14:32 Tim just had a really posh palma violet. Surprisingly it didn't taste of soap.

May 13

08:01 Tim is on the train to LDN from BSK (Amazingstoke). Yawn.

16:22 Tim has successfully used his work issued anti-swine flu surface disinfectant wipes to remove a pasta sauce stain from his raincoat.

May 14

09:11 Tim thinks anyone who can not notice they've paid of a mortgage for 18 months and 'accidentally' claim £16k expenses AND who has the facility to immediately pay that sum back needs sacking.

19:59 Tim is feeling the pressure at work. Relaxing tonight with massage and now dinner at Jenny Lo's tea house. Phew.

May 15

09:27 Tim is listening to Bloc Party remixed on Spotify.

18:13 Tim is on the train after a tough week at work. Using the time to review someone else's work and it's making me want to cry.

20:23 Tim is back home, out of work mode and getting looked after by May. Have also attempted to run my stress off: http://is.gd/Adyf.

May 16

11:43 Tim is on his way to Stratford-upon-Avon for a wedding.

May 17

17:50 Tim enjoyed the wedding and avoided the nerds. Fixed parents PC woes and saw Alex, Max and Cass this afternoon.

May 18

08:35 Tim feels like he's running late, but yet it's still early. Weird.

14:58 Tim maintains there are few things worse than a bad mouth ulcer.

19:48 Tim has been listening to remix albums on Spotify all day, 480mb over O2 3G, think I might find the upper limit this week.

May 19

12:13 Tim just squeezed one big spot.

19:45 Tim is meeting his bro in London for dinner.

23:00 Tim holed up in the Metropole, sigh.

May 20

11:25 Tim is close to having cashless catering induced groin strain. Put £20 onto card to buy breakfast, then refunded it. Have 16 pound coins and shrapnel in my pocket.

22:54 Tim has cheered up after some bad ass Turkish food and a good old rant with Simpso.

May 21

22:18 Tim left work a 10pm tonight, pwned. Did go out for a trendy LDN run along the Southbank before going back to finish up though: http://is.gd/C8Po - In Wagamama now for duck gyoza, ginger chicken udon, ginger beer and sparkling water.

May 22

08:12 Tim had a little lie in this morning and is now having a crack at getting into the M&S penny bazaar.

18:48 Tim has finished another week in London, thank f.ck. This time next week I'll be flying to San Francisco, woo!

May 23

00:50 Tim 's mix website has not translated well to the new server. Botched solution in place at http://www.timdp2.com.

12:42 Tim is getting a hair cut then heading to Windsor for a night in a spa hotel.

May 24

09:40 Tim is in the Stables Spa, Windsor. Next stop, the castle.

12:54 Tim is sat outside at Ha ha in Windsor. It's an amazing spot for watching loads of people take the same bad photo of a fake steam train with the SLRs. All with pop-up flash enabled.

14:39 Tim is hanging out at the Queen's house. Glorious weather in Windsor, sat at the bandstand listening to the regiment play.

22:28 Tim is feeling pretty pleased with his new profile picture.

May 26

14:59 Tim wishes Vik get well soon. Any LDN people fancy a gig with me tonight at 333 Old Street?

20:22 Tim only has 2 working days till holiday. Quick dinner at Wagamama then off to Old Street to see http://www.iremembertapes.co.uk.

22:14 Tim just remembered tapes. They were pretty awesome. Hanging out to hear the headliners for comparison.

May 27

12:01 Tim is anxious now that his parents are on the plane to San Francisco.

19:31 Tim just discovered he can track his parents flying location in real time, amaze: http://is.gd/HeOZ.

22:34 Tim is attempting a high risk item transfer with Munns at Basingstoke station, the idea is he gets a platform ticket and then I hop off and back on the train for the pick up.

May 28

08:20 Tim is adopting an "if I don't have it, I don't need it" approach to rapid packing.

09:56 Tim is watching the guy on the opposite table on the train getting drunk. He's on his 3rd can in 40 minutes and has his 2 young teenage daughters with him. He's making me real mad.

19:38 Tim is officially on holiday having just had a massage. Shame I haven't quite finished work and need to pop back in for an hour.

21:55 Tim is now officially officially on holiday. Work delivered, now tube to Heathrow to meet ny brother,.

May 29

10:27 Tim is checked in for SFO with Chris, bagel breakfast complete now onto shopping.

11:12 Tim is onboard VS019 'Mustang Sally' 1130 from LHR to SFO. See you in 10h2min.

May 30

00:11 Tim has landed in San Francisco, bit late so nap time squeezed out of schedule and failed to sleep on the plane. Alcatraz night tour and Mr Scruff looming.

03:14 Tim is totally on Alcatraz.

18:47 Tim is a cool San Francisco runner: http://is.gd/K0PS. 2km before breakfast. Off to shop and satisfy May's American Eagle needs now. Baseball tonight.

May 31

02:57 Tim is totally at the baseball. It's pretty wicked. Great seats.

08:22 Tim saw the baseball, the home team got thrashed, then met up with some noisy drunken rednecks and got bought a beer by them. Also left an impromptu voicemail cuss on one of their friends answerphones.

16:24 Tim is trying to find an emergency doctor/dentist for his Dad. Here comes my first experience of US health care. Wallet at the ready.

19:10 Tim has sorted out his Dad's medical crisis for now. $320 has resulted in an array of pills including Vicodin. Now to sort the defective hire car.

broken/mended - a new DJ mix

Last weekend, I finished and published my first DJ mix in over two and a half years. This post is to 1) tell you about the mix and 2) tell you why the completion of this mix is a significant event for me.

In September of 2006 through a combination of working too much and not looking after myself enough, I developed RSI in both my arms. I'd had some discomfort in my arms for a while, but rather than listening to my body (for reference, pain is one of your body's ways of telling you something) I continued working and did perhaps the three hardest weeks of work I've done yet in my life. When the work was completed and the adrenalin cleared out of my system I realised that my arms really hurt a lot, all of the time.

The doctor diagnosed me with bi-lateral epicondylosis (aka tennis elbow in both arms), prescribed anti-inflammatories and rest, signed me off work and told me I'd be feeling much better in a week. After a week, there was no change, and the doctor moved me up onto diclofenac and signed me of for longer. At this point, everything hurt; getting dressed, washing my hair, opening doors, driving... I couldn't chop vegetables, lift heavy things, type, play video games - in the 12 weeks I spent signed off work my life became increasingly defined by things that I couldn't do. In fact, May became so fed up with taking the brunt of the housework while I was unable that she pretty quickly went out and bought us a dishwasher.

I remained on the diclofenac and started seeing a physiotherapist who turned out to be ex-Army. He put me on a program of regular icing (20 mins ice, then rest) and delivered some brutally painful massage. In January 2007 I returned to work on partial hours and started using Dragon NaturallySpeaking voice recognition software instead of typing. By this point, my physio was unhappy with my rate of progress and referred me back to my GP who prescribed steroid injections into both of my elbows. I had these done two weeks apart and just as things were starting to look up I was involved in a car crash which significantly worsened my symptoms.

Shortly after my accident, my ex-Army physio emigrated to Australia, leaving me searching for someone new. I called BUPA and asked to see a physio specialising in forearms which led me to my current physio Sam (yep, from the acupunture story). On my first appointment with her I rather meanly said "I've been told you're a forearm specialist, is that a true statement?" to which she responded "No, I'm a general physio. I suggest that I perform your assessment today and if you're unhappy with me after that I'll refer you to someone else"; great answer. Meeting Sam was a pivotal moment in my recovery as she identified the cause of my problems (restricted movement in my neck causing inflammation of the nerves in my forearms) and started addressing them, as opposed to the ex-Army physio who was just treating the symptoms.

Since then, I've been gradually piecing my life back together and shifting the balance from being defined by things I can't do back to things that I can do - which brings me round in a rambling way to highlight the significance of being able to release a new DJ mix. Putting a mix together in Ableton involves some intensive computer time, and mindful of my tendency to get deeply engrossed in the process, I've been too terrified to start work on a mix for fear of setting back my recovery. Unfortunately I require my arms for my livelihood, so recreational computing has had to take second place.

At the beginning of April, I finally plucked up the courage to start a new mix with the confidence that it would not interfere with my health. Spurred on by my brother's request for a new breaks mix to run to (he'd been using my Air Breaks mix as his soundtrack for a long time!) I produced broken/mended; hopefully the reason behind the titling is clear. Throughout my illness, I continued buying tunes from Beatportand Juno Download and so had quietly amassed a rich seam of quality dance music to mine; I expect this to be the first of a series of comeback mixes.

Broken/mended underwent five revisions before I finally finished it, with some severe nitpicking in the order of the tracks and the addition of more cowbell, crash symbols and square waves. This was mostly as a result of Morcs complaining that the 2nd half of the mix had "nonce-le-ponce singing about the future", which was his way of saying it was getting a little too soft. I'm really pleased with the final result, and for your interest I've included a screenshot of the finished mix as produced in Ableton. The red line is the BPM which as you can see varies between 134 and 146 - hopefully good for the exercise crew.

It's ended up being a full-on, no holds barred rave-tinged electro breakbeat mix filled with big synths, squelchy bass lines, huge drum rolls, crash symbols and cowbells. Please give it a download and a listen, then let me know what you think - I hope you enjoy it.

The day I went viral

On April Fool's day, I was enjoying a rare day in Hursley as my client's offices in London were closed for the G20 protests. While checking Facebook in the morning, I discovered that I had become a viral phenomenon, with lots of my friends (and "friends") changing their profile pictures to match mine. That was pretty funny for starters, but then there was some Photoshopping and other variations which made it even funnier. The screenshots below are for posterity of the one day that I became a meme.

Status: April

April 1

08:11 Tim is not in London. Office closed due to G20 protests. Looking forward to a rare 2 days in Hursley.

10:27 Tim has taken over Facebook. Sweet.

22:42 Tim just saw A view from the bridge at the Duke of York theatre. It was very good. Guy sat in front peaked a bit early and shouted 'brav-ee' half a second after the last line.

April 2

14:16 Tim is no longer viral.

April 3

14:21 Tim is having acupuncture again this afternoon.

16:46 Tim didn't have acupuncture after all, got a bit too tense beforehand. Pick your battles.

18:22 Tim is on the phone to Natwest. They are a f.ing shambles.

22:46 Tim is Friday night, 10.45, bedtime. Shattered. Commuting sucks.

April 4

17:12 Tim in London again, to meet Buff Tom.

April 5

09:31 Tim is not surprised that Alistair Darling's economic predictions turned out to be bobbins. Good job he didn't have any credibility in the first

place.

April 6

07:48 Tim is trying the commute from Guildford.

19:42 Tim just missed the fast train for the first time in 10 weeks, now on the stopping service. :(.

April 7

08:37 Tim has upgraded from own brand cereal to Nestle for commuting breakfast. Shreddies this morning.

20:54 Tim is in the Hilton London Bridge. It's MUCH nicer than the Metropole. Bijou exec lounge fully stocked with beers, wines, spirits and snacks.

April 8

20:16 Tim just left work, was going to Wagamama but it's rammo. Humming Ghostbuster's theme tune. Busting makes me feel good.

April 9

18:47 Tim is pretty pissed that £435 of monthly TravelCard does not translate into having a seat. Again. Scrap one of the 1st class carriages kthxbai.

April 11

19:32 Tim is missing Fin and Marl already. :(.

20:32 Tim just used the food processor for the first time. Making potato rosti.

April 12

22:14 Tim is pwning May at Easter Scrabble. Could be close though, I can has vowels?

April 13

12:16 Tim is in Oxford to see the parents. Trying out park and ride.

April 14

13:19 Tim is back in LDN, here all week this week. Another day another dollar.

20:39 Tim is testing out 4oD catchup up over 3.5G on the netbook, works very nicely in full screen mode. Gonna watch Around the World in 80 Trades after

going out to forage.

21:40 Tim is now using Westwood's phrases 'cake up' and 'swag on' despite not knowing what they mean.

April 15

18:41 Tim is away from home and feeling ill ill ill. Shivers and aches FTL.

20:23 Tim has never been more pleased to get back to the Metropole. Couldn't face tube so took taxi with hair trigger on window control balancing

shivers/nausea.

April 16

14:34 Tim is still holed up in the Metropole, trying to gather the strength to set off for home.

April 17

09:48 Tim is glad to be back in Winchester after getting rescued by May yesterday. Still feeling ill/10.

April 18

14:38 Tim is home alone, still ill. Blown away by Skream remix of La Roux, late to the party I know... http://is.gd/t8M1.

April 19

21:16 Tim had a nice day today. Did cool walk from home to Shawford: http://is.gd/tkNu. Dentists at 08:20. :(.

April 20

09:20 Tim has survived the dentist, but can still taste it. Bleagh.

20:36 Tim is on the 2035 home from Waterloo and has had McDonalds. This is living?

23:14 Tim just set a new record for booking taxi to the station. 8 seconds on the phone. Wessex Cars == efficient.

23:53 Tim Sat 31st May. Late night baby! (umm 830?)

April 21

07:15 Tim is possibly at the station too early, first here so don't know if I'm at a door or not. Stick to my convictions and hope or risk and join the back

of one of the queues?

19:47 Tim is watching Skins S3 finale on netbook on the train. Ah, Effy.

23:03 Tim is supposed to order his new car within the next 4 weeks. S40 ruled out, Golf ruled out, 1 Series this weekend and late breaking A3 Sportsback

wildcard. Ideas?

April 22

09:46 Tim is glad May got through the dentist ok. Interesting to be there as an observer and see a filling done.

22:58 Tim is sponsoring Macca for the marathon. First watch the vids: http://is.gd/tXJo then sponsor him: http://is.gd/tXI6 - great cause.

April 23

08:48 Tim is going straight outta Euston. Word.

21:32 Tim had dinner at Jenny Lo's Tea House in Belgravia after finding out his Pilates teacher no longer runs a class there.

April 24

18:34 Tim made some good progress at work today, and also received some great news that he can't reveal yet.

23:04 Tim is encoding the 5th cut of his new breakbeat mix.

April 25

10:13 Tim has a 118D SE for the weekend, and is going to drive it to the Audi garage to check out the A3 Sportsback.

20:12 Tim is at the champagne bar in Liberty, then going to meet my brother in Soho, before returning to the Marriott to crash Daisy Kumar's 40th birthday.

April 26

10:39 Tim is watching the marathon from near The Mint on East Smithfield. Elite chairs just came back past mile 22 and waiting for elite men to arrive for

mile 13.

13:38 Tim saw cousin Adam run past at mile 13, then again at mile 21. He was well in front of Gordon Ramsay, and probably on for 3hr35!

April 27

08:21 Tim is captivated on the train by the blind guy reading his electronic braille book. I've also filled in my form to replace my lost season ticket (it

had to happen).

23:24 Tim just spotted that there are 2 new Air Woven colorways out next month, Tier 0 mint & melon. Yes please.

April 29

00:20 Tim meant to go straight to bed, but didn't and now it's late. I blame BBCNews 24.

22:07 Tim got a nice surprise on discovering Andrea Corr was in the play. She is still well fit.

April 30

21:08 Tim has just finished the Le Corbusier exhibition with Vik, it was ace.

23:01 Tim took the opportunity to use the Malmaison voucher one last time on the final day possible. Amazing cheeseboard scenes.

Marathon Man

Today I went to the London Marathon for the first time. My cousin Adam was running, and we went up to provide some moral support. My brother & his wife stayed over at the Travelodge at Tower Gateway, so they were able to secure a great vantage point just down from the Mint Pub on East Smithfield, behind the elite runner refreshments. Having never been before, I had no idea what to expect, and from the various articles I'd read, I thought that the area around East Smithfield and Tower Bridge would be incredibly busy (it was even listed in the "Places to Avoid" sections). However, arriving at around 10.20am, although there were a lot of people it was fairly easy to find a space with a good view, even right up to the railings. East Smithfield is a great place to watch from, as the runners go past you in both directions, first at around 13 miles and then again at around 22 miles after they've cleared the Isle of Dogs and are into the final stretch.

We were able to see the elite wheelchairs hitting mile 22, followed by the elite women, before the elite men arrived at mile 13. After the elite men, the main body of the runners arrived and given Adam's target of 3hr 30mins, we were able to work out when to start looking for him. We didn't know what he was going to be wearing and the task of trying to spot a face in the throng is a tricky one. You watch the runners for so long that when you stop watching, everything still seems to be moving. It's one of those times where you can really appreciate how smart the human brain and visual system are, enabling you to quickly sort through so many faces and find ones you recognise. A few minutes after we spotted Gordon Ramsay (let's go, yes?), cousin Adam came past us at mile 13. I was pretty impressed that I managed to spot him, shout his name AND capture video at the same time! He ran past looking very comfortable and also looked very pleased to see us.

Next, we moved to Canary Wharf and arrived just in time to see Adam come past mile 19, still looking enviably calm and composed in comparison with some of the other runners. A few minutes behind Adam was Gordon Ramsay, so he must have executed a neat overtake! I was quite taken with the sheer volume of people running, and also the wide variety of good causes being championed. The marathon looks painful enough as it is, but there were plenty of people in hot/heavy/uncomfortable fancy dress (guy in silver thong, owww) enduring it to raise maximum money for their charity. It was very refreshing and quite moving to witness such human achivement and to share in the excitement and joy of the race (nb. not all the runners looked joyful, some of them looked totally pwned, particularly the guy with obviously over-chafed, bloody nipples). My summary is that it was a great experience and I recommend you go and watch if you haven't before, or to use the summary from the spectator's guide "The London Marathon is a celebration of all that is great about sport and all that is great about people." - well put.

Adam finished in 3hr 36min, which is an amazing achievement; well done, Adam!

Status: March

01 March

13:06 Tim is generating quotes for a new company car.

21:28 Tim is putting the finishing touches to his Seefeld video.

02 March

07:14 Tim slept terribly, and now has to commute to London. :(.

21:59 Tim is loving the new Calvin Harris tune.

04 March

08:03 Tim just missed his first commuter train due to morning hot tub and unfamiliar Basingstoke ticket machine.

20:42 Tim is checked into the Metropole again. Off out to meet PLS for dinner, eating complimentary cookie as I go.

05 March

17:47 Tim is off to The Rake to meet Vik.

19:41 Tim thinks maybe synchronising podcasts over 3G made O2 angry. 475mb today = packet data authorisation failure.

20:51 Tim is back in the game, seems O2 kiss and make up quickly. Now, I wonder where that limit is?

06 March

08:38 Tim Jubilee line FAIL, so walking from Waterloo in the sunshine.

13:39 Tim is avoiding the Jubilee line and waiting for the Thames Clipper. It's late and I hate waiting.

19:48 Tim is cooking sausages from the Ginger Pig in Borough Market and being generally grumpy.

07 March

17:37 Tim has been tidying all day, the flat looks ace. Doing some final logistics before HSM3 then maiden voyage to Oceana.

09 March

04:05 Tim is developing a serious addiction to M&S sweets. Percy Pig & Wiggly Worms FTW.

10 March

15:48 Tim has performed his first properly smooth commute. Suspect this is more luck than judgement.

11 March

15:11 Tim is on the train trying out his new breakfast kit. Too much milk today.

12 March

16:07 Tim has a stinking sore throat.

06:33 Tim had a nice evening with Ant and successfully escaped the one man advert against alcoholism that was at the Hilton bar.

13 March

14:28 Tim just woke up from a weird dream and had a 'where am I?' moment. So much for my planned little lie in.

00:09 Tim has been using Facebook mobile all week and is now having a "new home page" freakout.

14 March

17:40 Tim just bought a netbook, Lenovo S10e White, Linux + 6 cell battery - £259.

19:01 Tim is hoping that the Estee Lauder shop doesn't disappoint May too much. She's been having dreams about it all week.

02:31 Tim is getting a bit obsessive about collecting Hilton points.

03:24 Tim is checking out his hairdresser's band - http://www.iremembertapes.co.uk.

06:08 Tim is trying to resist peeking as May prints out logistics for tomorrow's 6 year anniversary surprise.

15 March

20:58 Tim is spamming his neighbours to see if he can buy their houses on the cheap.

21:25 Tim is off to destination unknown for 6 year anniversary surprise planned by May.

16 March

02:30 Tim is back from surprise visit to Hotel du Vin in Poole. Thanks lovely May! Just a bit gutted I felt so ill throughout - damn you flu thing.

17 March

01:07 Tim is feeling a bit healthier today, enough to commute up to London for work. Meeting Stef tonight.

05:55 Tim has forgotten his toothbrush, waiting on Hilton to bring one. Wishing May was here so I could just use hers.

18 March

04:08 Tim is at the iMax to see Watchmen. It's rammo.

19 March

10:07 Tim enjoyed the first 2/3 of Watchmen, great narrative style and looks gorgeous. Final 3rd (after jailbreak) was a load of trite, predictable shit. Plot FAIL.

02:05 Tim is on the First Great Western service to Oxford for May's PGDip graduation feeling proud, Staying at the converted prison Malmaison too.

20 March

09:34 Tim is bedding down in the amazing Malmaison Oxford, our room is 3 prison cells knocked together. Best renovated hotel in UK, FACT.

16:38 Tim is on the 0731 from Oxford to Paddington. Bit sad to leave May snoozing in the beautiful Malmaison 'cell'.

22:32 Tim is developing a love hate relationship with Borough market. Taste buds love, wallet hates.

02:16 Tim really needs to stop buying day returns instead of open returns. Stupid automated ticket machines.

21 March

09:32 Tim had fresh ravioli from the market for tea, it was delicious.

17:57 Tim is up early and has caught up on Skins. I heart Emily.

23 March

17:18 Tim had an excellent weekend with Ed and is now feeling travel sick and sad on the commuter train.

24 March

16:58 Tim is on the train again. Sainos Rice Pops have very disappointing snap crackle and pop. Think I'll have to switch to branded variety box.

01:22 Tim is daydreaming about buying some rollerblades and skating to work along the south bank from Waterloo.

04:14 Tim is going to Hotel du Vin Winchester on the 2009 voucher tonight, now extended to end of April. Go to your nearest.

25 March

17:37 Tim just read about the EOS 500D. They've trickled the 1080P video recording down from the 5DII.

20:38 Tim just got asked if he'd consider a trip to Dehli for work.

22:51 Tim is cursing Twitter for causing .

07:12 Tim is not waiting 40 minutes for Hilton room service. Going to forage on Edgeware Road.

26 March

08:23 Tim defaulted to McDonalds. I feel dirty, Won McFlurry and hot drink on Monopoly though.

16:11 Tim just woke up about 5 seconds before my alarm went off. Spooky.

02:31 Tim is off for massage in Pimlico, then Pilates in Belgravia.

27 March

04:19 Tim is on the LOLtrain. It's rocking around, rattling and has many hilarious people and announcements. Campest man ever on my left with good value phone calls.

28 March

20:03 Tim 's new netbook doesn't want to be ghosted (NIC won't load). It's about to get blasted for Windows 7.

23:47 Tim 's netbook is now purring along happily! I'm quite impressed.

29 March

11:58 Tim has been playing Guitar Hero and drinking cocktails all night.

30 March

04:10 Tim left his wallet on the train this morning, and still doesn't have it. Do I remain trusting & hopeful and try lost property at Waterloo in the morning, or give up faith in humanity and go on an cancelathon? YOU DECIDE.

07:10 Tim has cancelled all his cards. http://is.gd/pK6O was incredibly useful.

Introducing the Lenovo S10e

I've finally sucumbed and bought a netbook. When Asus bought netbooks (small, light, low powered, cheap laptop) to the mass-market with the Eee PC in late 2007, I was interested, but the specification wasn't quite good enough to convince me to part with my cash. Then last year, new netbooks arrived powered by the Intel Atom N270 chip arrived with better performance and battery life, making me a little more interested. Of course, as with all technology purchases, you can always wait and get something better, and I'd decided to do just that and hang on for the dual core Atom processors rumoured for the summer.

Then I started out on my current project, and became a commuter. After 8 weeks of that and lugging my huge work issue Thinkpad T60p around, when I spotted a great deal, I couldn't resist. The choices for me where between the Samsung NC10 and the Lenovo S10e, I finally plumped for the S10e for the keyboard quality. Here are some pics to give you an idea of size:

The spec is Atom N270 1.6Ghz, 1.5Gb RAM, 160Gb HD and 6 cell battery. It weighs in at a very comfortable 1.3kg and the 6 cell battery gives it a nice weighting towards the back. The screen is clear and sharp, very usable on one-above-minimum brightness and downright impressive on maximum brightness. I've yet to time how long I get out of the battery, but the general expectation seems to be about 4.5 hours. Should you wish to upgrade it, pleasingly both the RAM (1 slot) and HD are user replaceable, with the obvious candidates being 2gb RAM and a 7200 RPM HD. My only minor gripe is that after 2 days in my bag, a small part of the silver "e" of "Lenovo" on the lid has come off.

I chose to save some money and gain some RAM by ordering the Linux edition, but I've installed Windows 7 beta onto it as XP is just too old and naff (I'm looking at you sleep mode), and Linux doesn't run all the applications that I want.

Loading Windows 7 beta was very straightforward, and installation from a USB key completed in under 25 minutes with very minimal input (partitioning and licence key only iirc). If you want to try out Windows 7, here's the links that got me up and running:

1) Installing from USB key (use the command "list disk" first to ensure you format the usb key, not your hd)

2) Get a licence key (requires a Microsoft Passport login, eg. MSN, Hotmail etc)

3) Fix the desktop.ini bug

The S10e shows one missing device in Windows 7 (not sure what) and neither scrolling on the trackpad, the FN+F5 wireless key or the wireless off key work, but otherwise everything is functional right out of the box including the webcam and mic.

For applications I've installed:

• Chrome 2 Beta
• Live Messenger (ads removed with APatch)
• Antivir Antivirus
• Ableton Live 8 Beta
• AT&T VPN client (connect to work network)
• Pidgin (Sametime client for internal instant messaging)

The only thing I wasn't able to install was Comodo Firewall as the installation failed.

With that lot installed, Windows 7 boots, connects to wi-fi and gets me to Gmail in about 1 minute 25, goes to sleep in about 8 seconds, and wakes up in under 2. It runs very nicely and certainly feels snappy enough. I was suprised that there's enough power to run Ableton Live, but it runs pretty smoothly, although the screen height (576px) makes things a little tricky.

Windows 7 itself seems to be pretty stable, although the wi-fi connection tends to drop every once in a while. I can recommend not accepting the wireless driver Windows 7 offers for the S10e, as that completely knackered my wireless and I've found that AT&T causes the odd bluescreen, but I blame that on them not Vista. I'll post again about battery life in a couple of weeks.

Ableton Live 8 audio comparison

Ableton Live is a Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) that can be used for music production. I've been using it for a couple of years to create DJ mixes and remix other artists songs (also using another DAW called Reason). I got into Ableton when version 5 was released, as this added lots of features useful for DJs. The most significant feature introduced was 'warping', otherwise known as time stretching, which allows you to change the tempo of a piece of audio without changing the pitch. This is something of a departure from DJing on turntables, where you explicitly have a "pitch" control that true to form changes both the tempo and pitch of the record. Ableton's warping feature gives you creative freedom to modify both tempo and pitch, meaning that you can make use of songs that would be impossible on turntables because they're either too fast/slow and also create in key mixes. For DJs, Ableton also makes looping, restructuring songs and adding a whole wealth of effects very quick and easy, and also removes the hardware limit of turntables meaning that you can play as many songs as you can imagine all at the same time. Ableton is in fact so good, that when version 7 was released, I bought the full Suite edition and came to own my first ever piece of boxed, retail software.

The warping algorithm used in Live since version 5 has been Elastique Audio Efficient, and although this is an amazing piece of software that gives high quality audio results, one of the complaints about upgrades to Live is that they haven't included the Elastique Audio Pro algorithm. Ableton have obviously listened to their critics as one of the key features of the upcoming version 8 release is that they've included the Pro algorithm. The main difference in the Pro algorithm is that it preserves formants, I'd love to tell you why that's a good thing, but that Wikipedia article confused me.

I've been playing around with the Beta a little bit, and I thought I'd do a comparison between the old "Complex" (Efficient) warp mode and the new "Complex Pro" (Pro) warp mode. To do this I've used a snippet of Scott Matthew's Elusive played at normal speed, double speed, and half speed. This is a fairly extreme scenario, so the results are hopefully interesting. Below you'll find three audio files rendered from the same arrangement, one using Complex, one using Complex Pro and for the nerds one with Complex on the left channel and Complex Pro on the right channel.

Complex

Pro

LR Split

The results aren't quite as marked as I was perhaps expecting, but the difference is certainly there and Pro appears yeilds better audio with less artifacts when altering pitch wildly. I had thought it would be worth the upgrade price alone, but having experimented, I'm not so sure. We'll see once the pricing is announced.

The best potato recipe ever

This recipe is amazing and is taken from Nigel Slater's Real Cooking which you can buy here.

Pan-fried potatoes with browned onions and garam masala

For 2 as an accompaniment

• 4 medium sized potatoes
• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil (groundnut works well)
• a small onion, thinly sliced
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon garam masala

"Bring the potatoes to the boil in enough cold water to cover them. Turn them down to an enthusiastic bubble and leave to cook until tender to the point of a knife - about fifteen minutes depending on their size. Drain and peel off their skin.

Heat the oil in a pan (you might as well use the same one), then add the sliced onion. Cook over a moderate heat until a rich brown, perhaps darker than you might normally take. Its flavour will be deeper and more aromatic. Add the garam masala and salt and warm gently in the pan for a few seconds until fragrant. Brown onions and garam masala is a most magical combination.

Break the potatoes up into chunks (you can slice them, but you will lose the lovely rough, crumbly texture of the dish), then stir them briefly with the spiced onion. Cook for a minute or two and serve hot."

For extra WIN, I cook the potatoes and onions in parallel using an extra pan. Once I've drained the potatoes, I pop them back in the pan and give them a vigourous shake to roughen the edges. Any which remain intact I then attack with my wooden spatula until they're down to bitesize chunks.

Test drive: Volvo S40 1.6 DRIVe SE

At the moment, I have a Ford Focus 2.0TDi Titanium as my company car and as I'm nearing the end of my 2 year contract, I'm currently test driving potential replacements. The way my company car scheme works is that I'm given a fixed amount each month that I can either take as cash (meaning I provide my own car + pay tax on the amount) or use to pay for a car from Leaseplan. In theory I can choose any car I'd like, but in practice doing so affordably is complicated by two factors: 1) Company car taxation is tricksy, involving the on the road price of the car (P11D), a percentage based on CO2 emissons and your highest tax bracket and 2) The leasing costs vary wildly between manufacturers, two cars with the same P11D can have wildly different lease prices. Needless to say, I won't be getting an Audi A5 3.2 Quattro for an eye watering total cost of ownership of £620 a month.

A major reason that I chose the Focus was that it represents something of a magic quadrant in cheap lease price, reasonable list price and low CO2 but combined with good fuel efficiency and nice performance. I thought I'd try out the Volvo S40 as it has a better cabin and includes more gadgets important for those of us approaching 30, such as a driver memory seat. It's not quite a strong on the magic quadrant though, as despite have a P11D £400 cheaper than the Focus, the S40 2.0D SE would cost me an extra £50 a month. Because of this I test drove the ecological 1.6 DRIVe SE variant (more expensive lease, but £1200 less P11D and lower CO2 so would cost £20/m less than the Focus).

So after driving the Volvo S40 1.6 DRIVe for a weekend, here are my pros and cons vs the Ford Focus 2.0TDi Titanium:

Pros

• Car felt more solid overall, pleasing door clunk, noticeably quieter and more refined cabin.
• "Floating console", looks good and provides neat storage.
• Better positioning of 3.5mm jack input (In center storage compartment vs in the glove box in the Focus)
• Surprisingly easy to manouver, good visibility and position plus park assist.
• More seat adjustability and driver memory option available.

Cons

• Big car outside, small car inside. Lacking headroom in the front and legroom in the rear.
• Unlocking the boot with the key doesn't release the catch. Focus does this meaning you can then open the boot from any position with one hand.
• Boot is hard to shut fully, I had the "Boot lid open" message on the dash 3 times.
• Sound system lacklustre.
• Lacking seat headrest adjustment.
• Driver memory option disappointing, it's a manual button on the seat and didn't seem to be tied to the key. Also doesn't adjust mirrors.

Given the above, the real deal breaker was the lacking headroom. The uneccessary final nail in the coffin was that despite a stated combined mpg of 62.8, my demonstrator returned 51.5mpg while I had it. Given that my Focus returns around 46mpg and comes with 2 litre rapidity, the Volvo won't be taking the Focus' crown this time. So much for big ideas hey?

Next up is Golf 1.4TSi SE.

Malmaison Oxford

This week, I went to May's graduation ceremony from her postgraduate diploma in Software Engineering at Oxford University. To mark the occasion we stayed in the Malmaison hotel in the centre of Oxford. We'd stayed there once before back in 2006, just after it opened, but I'd forgotten just how jaw-droppingly incredible it is. Set within the grounds of Oxford Castle, the building is Victorian and was one of Her Majesty's prisons up until 1996. The Malmaison overhaul of the prison was part of the overall redevelopment of the Oxford Castle site that was funded by a lottery grant in 2006.

The conversion of the hotel is truly amazing, as my pictures below hopefully attest:

The main hall, hotel rooms are within the converted cells.

The ex-visitors hall champagne bar (panorama made with the excellent autostitch)

Wandering around, I just kept thinking how happy the architect must have been with landing the project. Perhaps even more so when the regeneration of Oxford Castle won the 2007 Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors Project of the Year award.

On our visit in 2006, we stayed in a room in what used to be the prison warden's quarters. It was very nice, but this time we thought we'd go all out and get the deluxe room in the prison hall itself. Our room was originally 3 cells (holding a total of 9-12 inmates!) with 2 cells used to create the bedroom and 1 for the ensuite bathroom which included a rolltop bath and 2 person shower. The "cell" doors are original, as are the tiny, high up windows. The room was very comfortable, if not bordering on luxurious and thankfully the terrible mobile phone signal resulting from being boxed in was compensated by free wi-fi. We ate in the brasserie on the 2009 offer and as they were quite full and we were a party of 5, they put us into one of the private dining rooms.

If you're in the area, I'd highly recommend at least a visit to look around, if not an overnight stay. If you do go, be sure to head for the basement where there are 2 original cells to peruse. To give you an idea of price, we paid £119 for our room.

Hertz are idiots

Last September, May and I went to the Connect music festival on the banks of Loch Fyne in Scotland (see my Flickr set). We hired a car with Hertz (IBM discount) which we picked up in Glasgow, and then dropped off in Edinburgh. Everything with the hire went very smoothly, or so we thought until last December.

When we received this:

(click for big)

As you can see, the letter is with respect to a penalty charge notice from the 31st of August, issued at Queens Gate. Now, we didn't remember getting a parking ticket so after racking our brains a bit and consulting May's diary to see where we'd been on the 31st, I called Hertz to request a copy of the original PCN and also called my credit card company to dispute the payment. This was on the 9th of December and they promised to send me a copy within 10 days.

Here's what they sent me on the 23rd - see if you can spot the problem:

(click for big)

Did you spot it? If not check this one and compare it with the PCN above:

(click for big)

For extra LOLs, remember that I said I rented the car in Glasgow, and dropped it off in Edinburgh, then take a look at the issuing council for the PCN. Commando lol!

With this evidence in hand I called Hertz back on the 23rd December and spoke to a nice chap called David and offered him the opportunity to provide me with a full refund before I instructed my credit card company to reclaim the unlawful charge. After he'd spent a few minutes with the documents, he came to the same conclusion that I had and exclaimed "that's absolutely ridiculous" before proceeding to issue a full refund. Good man.