There aren't many things that I'll miss once I leave this island but having the road blocked by a herd of goats might be one of them.

While catching up with the blogosphere I came across some sad news - Jon Watson and Kelly Penguin Girl aren't hosting the GNU Linux User show anymore :( I think the podcast network lost two great hosts which will be difficult to replace after 29 shows under their belt. Jon & Kelly now have a new show called Jak Attack which I've yet to listen to but the show notes look promising.

This got me thinking about rearranging a bit my blogroll which hasn't been updated in quite some time. I think that blogrolls shouldn't be a never ending list of references to other sites or at least they should be divided into different categories. For now I'm going to keep the blogs I'm presently reading in my blogroll. For starters out goes the linux user show and in comes the revamped tales from the motherboard.

The December / early January depression (as in downward slope not as in medical treatment required) seems to be subsiding a bit. My joy for computing is returning (it's up to you to figure if that's good or bad) and I'm starting to dream (as in planning) again. I also got a 'new' hobby (assuming job searching is not a hobby), playing online poker online.

I'm sure this blog has seen better days but I think I'm might get into blogging mood soon. The culprit of this resurrection is the 2006 bloggies which reminded me that blogs are fun. Some of the new blogs I found that are really worth their nomination:-

Best Humourous Blog - stuffonmycat.com

Hilarious!!!!

Best Writing - Finslippy

The only blog I actually started reading from the nominees

Best Designed - Karen Cheng

Nice and simple. Inspirational!

Best British or Irish - Girl with a one track mind

Funny probably real over 18 blog

Best Australian or New Zealand Blog - information aesthetics

Creative information visualization. Illustrative!

Best Tagline - joshuaink.com

"More love than a bus full of hippies"

Best New & Topical & American - Postsecret

I can't understand the theme but the pictures are funny

Best Food Blog - The Domestic Goddess

Appetizing

To get a copy of What color is your parachute? I had to wait for my queen to go for a week to London (on her new duty as Internal IS Auditor), but the laugh I had out of the book today made the wait worth it. In the section about finding a job overseas Nelson Bolles refers to a site called FindYourSpot.com which recommends the best places to live according to your likes. My top location according to the site was Ogden, Utah. Naturally as a first instinct I clicked on the link of job vacancies and there I found a post for technical support specialist. These last months I've read scores of job postings but this surpassed all of them. In the list of fringe benefits the company offered A Biweekly Massage. Hilarious! For the skeptics who don't believe me (I wouldn't believe somebody who claims this) this is the link on monster.com

Having no better way to communicate my current state of mind I've decided to write whatever passes through my head in these few minutes. Do it yourself and start a MEME.

A - Apartment
B - Boss
C - Compensation
D - Dublin
E - Empathy
F - Forsaken
G - Gambling
H - Haruki Murakami
I - Immigration
J - Job
K - Konfusion
L - Lawyer
M - Metal
N - New Zealand
O - Outsourcing
P - Project Manager / Poker
Q - Quo Vadis?
R - Restructuring
S - Stability
T - Testing
U - Unrest
V - Void
W - Waiting
X - ...
Y - Yearning
Z - ...

January: Overloaded with Leave Management System
February: Should have been finalising Leave System
March: Went to Tanzania
April: Birth of my lovable demons & We had a new pope
May: Blogshares craze
June: Wedding Month & Red Hat Exam
July: Travel plans galore
August: Productivity craze and summer fun
September: Went to Ecuador & Galapagos
October: Recover from Ecuador, Video and Testing craze
November: Test and Performance Conference, NY
December: Abandoned in the office, Christmas time

Best Film Watched: Lord of War & Hitch
Most useful software: Evernote
Project of the year: Leave Management System
Best Holiday: Ecaudaor & Galapagos Islands
Favourite Recipe: Peanut Chicken
New Thing tried in 2005: Photography
Favourite PC Game: NHL Hockey 2005

I was looking at last year's Christmas time blog posts and there were the presents I brought. As otherwise I'm sure to forget I will list this year's presents also.

• 2 figurines lady on horse - special hand numbered edition - and a small fairy (purchased online)
• Breil bracelet
• Wild Africa & Wild South America DVDs
• My dying bride DVD
• National Geographic subscription
• Fat cat soft toy (pupix-fufi cross product)
• John Grisham's latest

On the other hand I received a wonderful D&G Chronograph which is so splendid my wrist blushes when it sees the watch approaching. I also got two big photographically brilliant books - one with a daily African thought and another about mountains, and a sweater.

December was officially the month of reflection and anti-computing. I spent hours thinking, thinking and thinking to the extent that I ended boring myself with all my thoughts. Whisky played an important part in my thinking but I was excused it being the festive season and everything. Anyhow this was the reason why I didn't blog, other from the fact that at the moment I'm treading some dangerous ground publishing stuff on the web ... privacy is big at the moment.

Amongst other things I thought about mindspill ... I think that I'm going to split the blog into 3 the technology / computing section, the travel section and the normal blog with opinions, thoughts, personal experiences etc. Does anybody care to give an opinion on this? With all this planning only God knows when I'll redesign my blog as January should be the action time.