Matt’s Journal

A Week And Counting

Posted by Matt under General

The wedding is officially only a week away and now it’s becoming very very exciting!

The table layouts are finalised, the flowers and table decorations are all making their way to the wedding organisers and both bride and groom are realising that at this time next week, they will be married!

The speeches have been mostly finished, I have gone for a funny but traditional speech and I hear my best man has one that will be remembered for it’s humour I don’t want to know its content, just hear it on the day and chuckle as he regails the tales of yester year and showers Katie with compliment after compliment.

I will get the pictures and the video up for those that are interested, it should be bloody brilliant!

Stag Weekend

Posted by Matt under General, Wedding

My lack of updates coincides with my lack of sleep as of late.

This weekend saw a group of ten men travel up to Northampton to enjoy two days of laughing and general fun. Having taken the Friday afternoon up, we meandered up to the hotel in the afternoon, taking a very confusing route.

Upon arriving at the hotel, we dumped our bags, got changed and then headed out for a bite to eat. Luckily just across the road there was a restaurant type complex that housed a TGI Friday’s, a KFC and all the major fast food places. We made a beeline for TGI Friday’s, this turned out to be a good choice (you have to love Ribs/Steak/Onion’s in abundance!). After a few beers, taxi’s were ordered and the ten of us ventured into Northampton.

The night itself was fun, we ventured to a Vodka Bar’ and other night spots and consumed a fair few drinks. It wasn’t meant to be a big night but it kind of gained momentum, my Stepdad falling asleep in the disabled toilet and apparently I was egging a Policeman on to Pepper Spray me in the face “because I was Police trained and I could take it”. We got home at around 2:30am and slept for only five hours before waking for karting.

Waking at 8am and walking over for breakfast, it really showed from people’s faces that the night before and the lack of sleep had caught up with us. Everyone ordered some sort of American breakfast from this US themed diner and then we ventured off to the Karting arena to race to the death.

Upon arriving, we were shuffled into a little hut and told to put on our waterproof clothing, a helmet and racing gloves. After putting on the gear, we were briefed on the course and then herded over to the track all giggling like little schoolgirls. Having been assigned a vehicle for the day, we all leapt into our karts and waited eagerly for the practice laps. You could see as soon as we got going people were thoroughly enjoying themselves, people sliding off in the wet, people nudging into each other, it was a riot (and that was just practice!).

Times and positions for the start of the race were sorted, I qualified in fourth place. As the race started, it was a mad dash for the first corner, everyone slipping off the track and trying to lead each other. We continued to race for 25 laps, it was honestly the most fun I have had on a day out for years.

Two other races followed this race, with us starting in reverse order for the second race and having a sprint to our karts for the third. My brother and my friend Mike really excelled themselves, managing to not slip off the track in the wet as much as everyone else, much to the annoyance rest of the racers!

Lunch quickly followed the conclusion of the racing, with Sausage and Mash or Lasagna being the order of the day. As soon as we were fed up, it was over across the fields to where the clay pigeon shooting would take place. Being the Stag, I was pushed into going up first……I came in with 6 out of 6 shots, not bad for my first time! The others soon followed, some doing very well and some not getting the hang of it. It was a good crack though, everyone was supporting each other and everybody really enjoyed themselves. We returned back to the hotel, had a quick nap and then headed out (to TGI’s again) to get some well earned food.

After stuffing ourselves, it was time to hit the town. The older members of the group retired to the bar at TGI’s and left us young folk to continue our night. We hit the town again, this time going to a few other places, all with me sporting a Viking blond wig and a moustache.

We partied ’til we could no more, got a taxi home and then fell into bed. We were up early-ish in the morning to get home quicker, that day was pure relaxation! I had a fantastic time, I would recommend Karting to anyone, it’s especially fun in the wet!

4 Weeks and Counting

Posted by Matt under General, Wedding

An opinion on what will make the Wedding rock:

1. I am marrying the most stunning and awesome person on the planet besides myself.
2. The wedding has kept a chocolate brown and gold theme throughout, including the suits, dresses, invites and order of service’s. You name it, it’s themed and going to look spot on.
3. We have had our up’s and down’s with so called “friends” but have still managed to make sure that we have people to support us on the day.
4. We will have two photographers photographing every passing second of the wedding day, giving us all of the pictures so we can decide what to do with them. This eliminates copyright problems and people wanting different kinds of pictures for their albums. It does also mean of course that I can post them wherever I want, show them to distant relatives who couldn’t be there on the day.
5. The videographer has no problem with us using the video after he was authored it to DVD. People will be able to buy their own copy from him and I am free to share it with the above mentioned family members so they can see it free of charge.
6. Our wedding will take place at a lovely church which can hold hundreds of people, the good news so far is that we are on course to filling the church, so the vicar is happy with my suggestion that I could give them a few photo’s of the church looking at it’s best.
7. The vicar (a female) has been very supportive and helped us continually throughout the whole affair (I suppose she is meant to but she still deserves a mention!), helping us choose nice hymns and giving us permission to film in the church. As a thank you, I have offered to build them a website for the church.
8. Our reception will be at The Lawn in Rochford, take a look at the picture below to see how nice it will look if the weather holds out.
   
9. Nearly everyone who was invited accepted, so we have a nice mix of people at the wedding.
10. At the end of the day Katie will be Mrs Brian

Twitter: Mountains and Molehills

Posted by Matt under General, Social Media, Spendage

I have been reading Techcrunch and various Web2.0 blogs recently bemoaning the fact that Twitter has been down so much since it’s popularity sky-rocketed. You have Michael Arrington single-handedly charting their ups and downs, telling us how Twitter can change their ways to maximise their cluster computing from Amazon.

The problem is that people are building this service up on a pedestal, making its very existence essential for them to live their lives.

I happen to have Twitter, Gmail, MSN, Yahoo and my blog as other communication mediums. When certain services are down (there have been times I am unable to connect to Gtalk and I bet they have better server management than Twitter), I have just switched to another service.

I’m stuck for things to do this Sunday afternoon and have been bombarded on Twitter and Google Reader with anti-Twitter propaganda and wanted to sound off.

Just for the record, Friendfeed is a useless service and I have no idea why people are singing its praises so much.

Bank Holiday

Posted by Matt under General

You Americans have no idea what a Bank Holiday is and I shalln’t tell you. All I shall tell you is that I will be relaxing a little longer than usual this weekend.

Things have been moving, I have been snowed under at work and only managing to come up for air once the clock hits 5pm. Katie has returned from holiday and got straight back to work, so we haven’t seen much of each other.

This weekend we were going to see the Moscow State Circus but when tickets came in at £27 each, I thought I could go to the zoo two times over the weekend and still pay less!

You like the new theme? I chose it and installed it all today, Twitter is catered for as well as the odd movie quote at the top.

Is this a quick, short and sharp blog post folks? Yes it is!

Turn Off Lighting In Your Home With Twitter

Posted by Matt under General

A clever guy named Justin Wickett with a little help from tech guys sets his Twitter account to turn off the lights in his house by sending a text message to his Twitter account.