Its typical really, 4 days before I'm due to fly home and I am getting into the swing of things. Last week was a much better week. It was still very busy, but things are starting to feel more controlled and I personally feel as if I am starting to make progress.

So yesterday I thought I'd take the day off. I had a nice lay in and a leisurely breakfast before meeting up with Laurence and heading into New Delhi to meet Chris and a few of the Indian guys for a few beers and a late lunch. It was Chris's 40th so it seemed like a a good excuse. We started off at a place called Blues and after a cocktail and a couple of beers we headed to a local restaurant called Karims. (Check the Photo Gallery)

It was nice to hang out and get out of the hotel. Life here really does play out right in front of your eyes, and it never sleeps. I got back to the hotel about 18:00 had a couple more beers and kicked back in front of the movie channel.

This morning I woke up early but laid in bed watching cartoons. I eventually got up about 09:30 and wandered down for breakfast with the papers. After breakfast I went back to the hotel room and got a couple of hours work down and now, well i am typing this and then I am going to catch up with some personal email, and afterwards I am going to go and lay by the pool for an hour or two.

Tags: Food, Sightseeing

It's been a little longer than I intended between updates this week but I am finally finding my feet. The jet lag that kicked in over the weekend was still messing with me Monday and Tuesday, to add to that "Delhi Belly" finally caught up with me Monday.

So Tuesday night I came in about 19:00 had a shower and went to bed. I didn't wake up until my wake up call at 08:00 the following morning. Since then I have felt normal and the belly is also a lot better, although not perfect.

I went out yesterday and looked at some apartments. I looked at three, all of which were furnished three bedroom places with en-suites, lounge / dinner, and kitchen's. The first was the best an also the newest but I have asked to see some more. Otherwise it's pretty much been work hotel sleep, work hotel sleep. So I am really looking forward to this weekend.

Oh by the way I am now not returning to the UK until the 3rd August and then I will be home for about a week.

Just wanted to say thanks to all the people who have left comments. It's much appreciated. It's funny being so far away and having all the normal human interactions, but not your families. Hearing from everybody makes it a lot easier.

Okay, so I think the jet lag caught up with me. I really felt it yesterday and in the end just spent the day in the hotel room. I went to bed around 22:00 but work up again at 23:30 and couldn't get back to sleep until about 02:00. I woke up at 10:00 this morning and forced myself out of bed and into the shower.

About 11:30 I met up with Lawrence and he showed me around the local malls and supermarkets, and explained how a few things worked. We grabbed some lunch and he got his driver to drop me back at the hotel. I've done a little bit of work ready for tomorrow morning, but plan on going for a swim about 16:30 when it's cooled off a couple of degrees (Currently 37c) and generally chilling out for the rest of the day.

I really need to sort out somewhere to live and arrange a driver. You wouldn't believe the traffic over here, it's just mad. Dad if you imagine Vietnam substitute cars for bikes and times by 3 your pretty close.

Another funny thing is the power over here is extremely unreliable. It doesn't matter where you are the power fails 3-4 times a day. It's strange at first but you kind of get used to it.

Tags: Travel

Okay so my first week, well it certainly has been busy. My alarm call is 06:30 and after a shower and a shave I head for breakfast which is either Corn-flakes, toast, coffee, and lime juice or corn-flakes, yogurt, coffee, and lime juice. After that I grab a cab to the offices which aren't that far away arriving about 07:45.

07:45 until 09:00 is catch up email and stuff that I should have done yesterday time. At 09:00 the jaws of hell open and I enter with a smile which I maintain some how until about 21:00. I then grab cab back to the hotel where I try and eat dinner without looking at my blackberry before sitting down with my email for another couple of hours, usually heading for bed around 01:00.

Today, Saturday it all caught up with me and I laid in until 11:00 even when I did get up I just milled around the hotel room for several hours. About 15:00 I thought I better do something so I jumped in the shower and went for a stroll around the hotel.

I'm now sat in the business lounge writing this up and wondering what I can do this afternoon. I have put a new photo album in the photo gallery but at this point in time it only has the pictures I have taken out of my hotel room window and of the hotel room itself. I promise more next week.

Tags: Travel

Well I eventually got to the hotel and checked in by about 13:30 this morning. The hotel is fairly new and I lucked out with a free upgrade to one of the executive suites. It was a bit dark last night to take any pictures but I will take some at the weekend (It's too messy first thing in the morning) Anyway by the time I had unpacked and grabbed a shower it was nearer 02:00.

I didn't sleep very well, just a strange bed I think, but the sound of horns didn't help to much. I think I woke up every hour on the hour until 06:15 when I got up. Of course the wake up alarm came just as I was about to get in the shower.

After breakfast in the hotels new business lounge I headed for the travel desk to book my car to the office. As I walked out the building the heat really hit me, and apparently today is quite a mild day. A pretty uneventful and short jorney later saw me arrive at the office where I had to tackle the obvious language barrier and 324 secuirty guards who were all looking for something to do.

Well I am not sure what happened in the next twelve and a half hours but all I know now is it 20:00 local time and I am on my second cold beer writting this. Well hopefully things will start to sort themselves out from here but for now I will say good bye, no I will say until later.

Tags: Travel

Okay so it was an early start. I had the taxi booked for 05:30 but was awake at 04:00 and just couldn't get back to sleep about 04:40 I got up, jumped in the shower, packed my final bits and pieces, and did one final check, making sure I hadn't left the Iron on.

The journey to Heathrow was quick and there was hardly any traffic on the roads, which is something you can rarely say about the Heatrow run. Arriving at Heathrow the cab driver dropped me off right outside the British Airways check in desk. I walked in and the checkin desk was open and empty, so I checked in using the self service terminals and then just checked by bag.

Once through security I had the required walk around the shops but was bored by the 3rd so grabbed a coffee and watched the planes come in and out. Once again you can only watch this for so long before you start going crazy.

I met up with a collegue who as also flying out and we boarded without problems. We had the customary drink (soft) well it was 10:00 in the morning then the brunch, before kicking back and watching a film (300 - quite good, not really much of a story, but lots of blood).

We then did some work before kicking back and well I'm writting my blog......I'll update again later, once I reach the hotel.

Tags: Travel

Well today Katrina, Rob, William, Mum, & Dad, came over for Sunday dinner. It was planned a while ago, to give Katrina a rest after the work up to Williams Birthday but it got redefined as a leaving meal after I made my India announcement.

So I cooked roast beef with all the trimmings and laughed as I watched William devour the black forest gateau I had brought. I am going to miss everyone but I think most people would understand if I said I am going to miss him the most. I have been a regular part of the first two years of his life, and have watched him change from a helpless infant to a determined 2 year old with his own character.

So now I have about 12 hours before I leave for the airport and I intend on spending as many of them as I can in bed. I haven't slept well or for very long all week, but have no reached the point where I have adopted the if it aint done, it aint getting done!

Well William (My nephew) turned two on the 12th July which of course meant a birthday party, which we had yesterday. As usual he was totally spoilt and didn't know what to play with first. Generally anything with Bob the Builder on it resulted in a look of total surprise and a dance with added monkey impression. I got a few pictures which I will put up in the gallery. Anyone who got any others please can you email them to me.

Tags: Birthdays

Okay so I haven't reported anything this week, but for a very good reason. How long would it take you to pack up your life and move nearly 4000 miles? 7 days?

Well that is exactly what I am doing. I have accepted a job that takes me to Gurgaon in India and to say things have been a little hectic would be an understatement. Add to that the fact I hadn't told my immediate family until today, and you (I hope) will understand.

Now the most important people in my life know I feel that I can openly talk about it, which is another hugh relief.

I am as you would imagine both excited and scared, but to be honest I can't explain why right now. All I can say is watch this space and I will explain as I start to understand and as things fall into place.

//I have removed the gallery and the other pages because I am in the process of updating them based on these events. They will be back online soon.

Tags: Travel

A few years ago you could guarantee that if you asked the vast majority of home users if they backed up their computer most of them would say no! These days however people are a lot wiser mainly as most of them has at least once lost the family photo's or that important presentation.

However the question I find myself asking now is "Have you tested your backup?"

Yes, while most people do backup the family computer in some way, shape, or form, most never test the backup / restore before they really need it.

So today I set about testing my own backup and restore procedure. The first thing I did was to take a new Full System backup using the existing backup plan (I do a weekly full backup of my Home directory to an external USB drive). I then wiped my machine (Not an easy thing to do).

Now I was where I hoped I would never be, unplanned, again. I then went about restoring my system.

1) I reinstalled Mac OS X
2) I connected the external USB hard drive which as well as holding the backups in a directory called backups has a directory called emergency in which I keep two text files. The first contains a copy of my WEP key, the second a list of the applications I have installed.
3) I now connect to my Wireless network and run a software update.
4) Once the software update has completed and I have rebooted and rerun the software update to ensure that everything is the latest version I kick off a restore.
5) Once the restore has completed I re-install the applications I have listed in my second text file. This is a good test to make sure I have the source for all the applications I have paid for, which I normally keep in a folder in my home directory. It also ensures that I have all of the serial keys.
6) The last step is to make sure everything works, making sure applications run as expected (all the preferences should be as before as they are store in plist files that are stored in my /home/library/ blah directory).

For me it all when fine with a couple of groans like Parallels requires me to re-enter two serial numbers (the original and the version 3 upgrade one) and for some reason some of my email is showing up as not having been downloaded from the server (all very old archives so not major). One major issue is that the restore of my Photo's and iPhoto didn't happen. It would appear that the pictures were not being backed up. Now normally at this point I would be throwing the laptop around the room and opening a large bottle of whisky but I know I copied off my entire collection to my parents machine two weekends ago, so I will pop round there tomorrow and copy them back. However it is something I need to investigate, but that was the purpose of the test. Imagine if this had happended a year down the line?

Tags: Technology, Photography

Well it's been an extremely busy week with early starts and late finishes and I now find myself looking out at gorgeous day. I know I should be out doing something, probably one of the many jobs that I haven't been able to do for the last few weeks because its been raining, but no I am sat in front of the TV trying to stay awake.

One good thing however is that I managed to finish my book this week, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke. Quite an unusual book and Susanna Clarke's first, but a very good read. The book follows the journey of two men (Strange & Norrell) as they try to restore magic to England. I'd recommend it to anybody that's into Sci-Fi / magic / mystery books or anybody like me who will read anything. (6/10)

Hopefully tomorrow will be as nice as it is today and I will actually do something interesting....that said I think that I need to get a few jobs done first.

Tags: Books