They must have been somewhere. There were shelves of mince pies, stollen, festive booze, tins of sweeties, party food, but no sign I could see of plum puds. Very odd.

Not to worry. I'm planning on spending my Co-op divi this week, and they're bound to have some puds available.

Belfast - Trying to buy FHM for the first time in a decade and neither the garage or Spar has it, and the newsagent's is closed. When I went into the garage the other day they didn't even have crisps ffs.

Did see a headline that a Russian gang is taking over - maybe they'll be able to get stuff into the shops. And they won't look out of place the amount of shifty fcukers I just saw in tracksuits...

This is a classic tale of fail and the fail is mine entirely. Ok, almost entirely... I do feel that the wife has to take at least some of the blame but anyway, here goes.

I got the Christmas tree and associated crap out of the loft earlier today. We then had the annual "plug in the lights to see how many have died during the year" event. What the hell is the story with Christmas lights? They work. You put them away for a year, testing them after they've been taken off the dammed tree. You plug them in a year later and the duckers have died! When?! How?! No, really!

Anyway, I've found two sets that don't work. No problem. I've got the multimeter to hand, so I can open the plug and test the fuse. That works. Ok, still not a problem. Put one of the leads onto the fuse and start checking the light sockets.

Bingo! Find the blown bulb. Replace it. Happy days.

At this point the wife asks me to get her a drink from the kitchen. Fair enough. She's got a bad back so I don't mind. Except she wants it now. Not in a minute.. NOW! And trust me, when she gets screechy it really does motivate you to get the hell on with it!

So I get her a drink, pick up the plug and plug it in...

Word of advice kids. Before you insert a plug into a live mains socket make sure you put the back cover on. 240 of her majesties finest volts hurt like duck. I also managed to blow the main fuse which killed the wife's 26 year old alarm clock. I also swore. A lot.

Luckily I didn't die so that was alright then.

Be safe everyone and don't have nightmares!

By the way, no, we didn't end up putting the tree up. It's still in the storage bag in the living room and will be assembled tomorrow. Probably.

Sent from my big ass Sony Xperia Z Ultra, using Tapatalk 4.

He got very lucky.

http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming/co ... le-1205958

wow, they're having to give them away already...

A fail indeed but a massive +1 to the bit in bold.

One of the sockets at work had been wired up wrongly. The Earth connectors in Germany (2 of them per socket, so the plug can go in either way round) are exposed, which is a good thing, if you need to earth yourself, for example. Anyway, I was standing next to the sockets and lost my balance and grabbed the window sill above the socket and my fingers brushed the Earth terminal in the socket and I got a hell of a whack up my arm, I couldn't use my arm for about half an hour.

The place had been rewired in the mid 90s. Somehow nobody had ever used the socket since (luckily). They checked the socket after my shock, the idiot had wored life to earth, earth to negative and negative to positive! But only on the one socket.

Me.

I have lived about 6 miles from JJ since 2010 and never got off my fat arse and made the effort to go and see him. It's on the way back from work FFS.

6 miles...

... Anyone fancy a meet-up in the new year?

I'm game (provided I can get wherever by train).

One thing to consider is a meet up in the spring/summer. I know there are a few exotic car owners here. We could all descend somewhere for the day (thinks Bletchley Park as a good geeky place, and will have a new visitors centre next year).

Not a bad idea!

Mandela's funeral

I like that everyone assumed Michelle Obama is just jealous of the Danish PM. Maybe she just finds that behaviour disrespectful? I'd have been furious if someone behaved like that next to me at a funeral.

Such fuss over a moment. In the big scheme of things who cares? Would rather have seen a picture of Nelson on the front page of the Metro this morning.

Facebook for iOS now automatically starts playing videos in your news feed

Monumentally stupid idea. It's got to the stage where I genuinely don't see the point of facebook any more.