Alkam’s blog

Ever spent a lot of time going nowhere fast? Well, yesterday I was going round in a circle many times trying to find a parking space and not getting anywhere in particular. Normally I have no trouble getting parking spaces, so this was a rather unusual experience for me. It was only after a very long while that I realised that doing the same thing over and over like this was rather like trying to make an opening in a brick wall by repeatedly banging your head against it. It hurts a lot, and doesn't you get very far.

So at the next junction, instead of turning right as I had been doing every other time, I turned left instead. Lo and behold, after going down a few winding streets, a parking space appeared! Oh, you've no idea how grateful I was for that! Such a simple thing, and yet sometimes the simplest things are the best.

This reminds me of something that I had written about before in my previous blog Inspiration, Not Expiration about going left instead of right. One Valentine's Day in 2005, a monkey decided to take a leap into the unknown :)

Jump the other way

I think it just goes to show, we have choice but not control. And it's the choices we make that makes the difference.

I recently had a chance to go back in time.

Well, it was more in the historical sense, rather than physically undertaking time-travel. I was able to use the Wayback Machine's nifty little web-archiving service to peek at a few webpages as they had been. If you've not heard about this before, there is an automatic 'spider' that trawls through the internet saving pages it finds to its own archive. I think the web was a whole lot smaller back then.

I first started blogging way back in 2003 when I was living in Australia. I found a really useful blogging site called Upsaid, and it was a great tool because it dealt with all the setting up of layouts and webpages, so that I could concentrate on jotting down my errant thoughts. My blog was called 'Sleeping Among the Awake', a title chosen partly because I liked sleeping so much! Unfortunately Upsaid decided to charge for their services, and my blog was removed from their servers after I decided to move to a different site.

I was reading though a Wayback Machine snapshot of my blog taken back in April 2003. I had to smile at entries such as On-call: The Aftermath and some of the other posts because even though it was me writing those entries, it was a younger me. Me from 5 years ago. So different, so fresh, so witty! With the benefit of hindsight it's easy to think back nostalgically and remember how great the good old days were. It's only when I started to read posts that I had written then that I realise that some of those days weren't really all that good, and I think I moaned about them then as much as I moan about some of the days I have now!

But still... change is inevitable. We grow and develop. Maybe even (hopefully) evolve a little.

I think it's good to reflect back, and say that I'm where I am now because of this little incident or that thing happening. Some changes, though, I have found is totally and utterly inexplicable. I can't even begin to explain it. Take, for example, the fact that I suddenly developed a taste for bananas a few months ago. I mean before this point I didn't even like bananas, so why the sudden change? I really don't know, but at least going bananas means I'm getting enough potassium!

But then there's another change that I've noticed in myself. It's probably an improvement, but I can never really tell. I think that I'm now more happy with not knowing why about everything. I still have heaps of curiosity, but I can also just accept some things as what they are.

I wonder sometimes what the next change will be and where it'll lead me? I don't know for sure - but it's sure going to be interesting finding out! ;)

I was working on a presentation I have to present tomorrow for quite some time today, and I thought I'd just about had enough of it after concentrating on it for several hours.
 
As it was such a nice day, I felt that I needed to unwind a bit, and with the usual magic of random driving, I somehow ended up in Golden Acre Park near Leeds. It's a lovely place and I've been there several times before. Luckily, I brought my Canon S70 camera along, so I could take some photographs as well!
 
The weather was fantastic today, and I'm really glad I didn't spend it all at home slaving away over a Powerpoint presentation!! Here are some of my favourite photographs of the day:

As usual, I've uploaded most of the photos to my Picasa Web Album.

This is Spofforth Castle, a ruined manor house halfway between Wetherby and Harrogate. It's quite small, but worth going to have a quick look and walk around. I ended up here on a random drive today.

What was really funny was there were a family kicking a ball around inside! I guess it's another thing to add to the list if you're ever stuck wondering what to do if you wind up in some ruins!

Additional: I've now uploaded the photos taken from my Canon S70 camera to my Picasa Web Album

I was just using the London Underground today and was struck by the differences between this and the New York Subway I'd been using daily last week. One thing that I noticed the most was the calm and collected recorded voice announcing the stations as we approached. Although clearer and more informative, it was nowhere as entertaining as the driver's voice on the New York subway. I remember one woman driver was especially annoyed by people blocking the doors when she was trying the close them and announced in a typical New York fashion, "For the last time, will passengers PLEASE stand away from the doors! THANK YOU!" I can't imagine the London Underground having a recorded voice say that! :)

This post comes courtesy of the top of the Rockefeller Center in New York City at night. I spent the day today on a 2-hour cruise Tour, followed by a walking tour of the Rockefeller Center. I decided that it'd be nice to go to the Top at night and see the night lights. This photo was taken with the Treo, which is a bit more grainy than the photos I've taken with my other camera. Thanks to people who've commented! I'll reply once I get access to the internet proper as I've been doing all this from my mobile phone and roaming costs are quite prohibitive! :)

I should really be paying more attention to the basketball game really but it's Time Out. I visited Bloomingdales earlier today and explored the Time Warner Center. The game is great so far and the New York Knicks are playing the Charlotte Bobcats today. It's been an exciting game so far.

Update: The Knicks won! :)

She's a lot shorter in real life! :) Just kidding. I'm on a small visit to New York City, this being my first ever trip to the US. I decided to do some seriously touristy things today! The hour it took to get through the security check and get on the ferry was well worth it. I took a few photos from my Treo, but most of my other photos are still in my camera. I also visited Ground Zero and the Brooklyn bridge today. Good stuff! :)

A year ago, I was starting a set of night shifts and I sat down and wrote, quite unintentionally, a list of what might be called 'intentions'.

I called that entry "Revisions and Night Shifts".

Times have changed a lot since then, and although I still have a healthy dislike for night shifts (which I no longer have to do - hooray!), I think that somehow the things on my list have managed to fulfil themselves!

Here is my list:

1. Travel more and visit interesting places
   
2. Get more free time to do the things I enjoy, like digital photography
3. Have no agenda so that I don't have to get things done all the time
   
4. Chill out and not have to worry about climate change, world politics and the price of fish.
5. Not have to sit exams to show how skilled and clever I am, ever!
6. Be more in the company of genuine and caring people

I like number 5 on the list a lot, because I've done heaps of exams in my time. I recently passed some major exams which means that I don't have any to do, unless I really start looking. I'm really hoping to try and stay away from examinations in the future!

My personal favourite, though, is number 6 because I reckon I've met lots of wonderful people who have been really fantastic and I've learnt a lot from them. OK, some have been a bit exasperating, but only in a good way! I'm really grateful for the people in my life right now, and it's lovely the way things have gone so far.

I might change my list a little, but it's a pretty good one as lists go.

And the price of fish? No worries!