I got a proper job!

ahhh! how scary is that?!!! I'm working as a Web Programmer for a PR company called Alkaline in Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne.

Project Northumberland

I went to the Project Northumberland offices today to volunteer to develop a website for them, I'd prepared a little demo site and they liked what they saw. So i've now got a stack of info and tons of photos and I'm going to get it online. I'm going to use Joomla CMS as it will be nice and easy to maintain and has lots of nice features which will be useful to the organisation.

Project Northumberland is a developmental programme, supported by Northumberland County Scouts, which aims to raise the achievements, aspirations and future prospects of disaffected young people to enable them to make the right choices about their future lives.

Hopefully a link will be up soon....

Family Tree

I got on the bandwagon this week and used the wealth of free internet resources available to attempt to trace my family tree. I was doing quite well for a while but kept getting stuck (being unwilling to pay for certificate copies), until eventually I ran out of branches. This is what I got.

I can't trace any of my mother's family, being from the far east. My paternal great grandparents were from Ireland, which destroyed all it's censuses. My father's maternal great grandmother (Margaret Moore) was born on the Isle of Man in 1843 (unfortunately so were two Margaret Moores). My father's mother's father's mother (Harriet Wakefield), is somehow related (through marriage) to her husband, she is the niece of William Ashton, but again, there are too many Harriet Wakefields. Prior to 1800, records are patchy at best.
I started making an mySQL database to hold the information, but then started trying online family tree software already available, I wasn't particularly impressed, so maybe I'll give the SQL thing another go again soon.

London

I had a lovely day trip to London on Saturday, Johnny had to go to some pupillage fair, so i joined him on the 3 hour train ride down from Newcastle and met my old housemate Wendy, who i'd not seen for 18 months. We spent a lot of time gossiping and did a small walking tour of London, Covent Garden - Leicester Square - Trafalgar Square - Along Whitehall, past Downing Street and the Cenotaph - Past Westminister and the Houses of Parliament - across Westminster Bridge - and along South Bank to the London Eye. Then we went to the Dali Exhibition, which was very good but over priced at £8.50 (no more concessions for trish!) It's nice to know London is so accessible from here and hopefully there will be another trip soon.

Gallery Sabotage

Is it a coincidence that the on same day Gallery releases a security fix, mine curls up and dies? It suddenly swelled up to fill all my available space and then refused to be accessed. Could this be someone quickly taking advantage of the publicised security flaw or gallery 'subtly' reminding me to upgrade? More likely I broke it somehow.... Anyway it's annoying - expect there to be a lack of photos for the imminent future.