Chris

I'm in the same situation. Looking to move into a slightly different role which I've got qualifications and some crossover experience for but finding it hard to get that initial step away from my current job into a job where I can develop properly into the other role. Keep getting encouraging bites from agencies and had a couple of interviews but then it goes quiet for ages. Just need to keep plugging away. Tweak the CV and use each talk with an agency as interview practice.

Got a small supplier chasing us for payment for an order I raised in our system in fucking December. It's now 4 months since they sent us an invoice and it's still not been paid! I work for a very big company, it's embarrassing how bad we are at paying suppliers. Not even through deliberate acts, just sheer incompetence. After chasing this one for a couple of days it ended up being rejected because the renewal date on the PO didn't match the one on the invoice. The really frustrating thing was I didn't put a date on the original order, procurement just dreamt one up and added it to the PO then rejected the invoice when the date on it didn't match the PO. Fucking hell. After pointing out that we've now been using a service for 8 months without paying for it and doing a colossal amount of chasing we've now got it approved and sent out. I've had other ones that I thought had gone through with no problems only to get an email from the supplier a few months later wondering why it's not been paid, usually it's just sitting in someone's queue in the system waiting for approval and they can't be arsed clicking a button. The amounts aren't massive but this kind of stuff could break small companies. Not cool.

It is. But it's so difficult it's like you're getting punched in the nuts every few minutes. It's just attrition. I just don't find myself wanting to play it as for the short amount of time I get to play games I'm not going to make any progress. Whereas if I play a few games of COD or fire up GTA I can have a lot more fun.

I've read a lot about Southland Tales over the years. Part of me still wants to watch it.

Sorry I shouldn't write reviews while I'm at work, keep coming back to it instead of finishing thoughts. Basically without the Rock it would be a decidedly average heist film pretending to be a comedy. With The Rock it's a decent Friday night film, though it's still half an hour too long. If they'd trimmed it down to 90 or 100 minutes it'd be great.

Dark Souls II on Xbox 360. Would swap for Titanfall ideally, but would consider something else.

Yeah I think I'll still buy it. Mostly getting 7s and 8s, so not bad at all but sounds like it's mostly made up of the best bits of AC and Farcry then moved to Chicago. Which sounds pretty good. But I also want Titanfall. Have given up on Dark Souls II.

Pain and Gain Mark Whalberg, The Rock and some other guy are a bunch of body builders who think they deserve better. So they hatch a scheme to kidnap a rich client and force him to sign over all his money. Sadly for everyone involved they're all fucking idiots so it goes wrong and the whole thing escalates. It's directed by Michael Bay so everything looks sharp but can't help feeling it's half an hour too long, most of that in the first half. Once it gets going it's pretty decent with most of the laughs and the sympathy going in Dwayne Johnson's direction. Seriously, can we just have The Rock in every film from now on? Guaran-damn-tee'd success. He gets almost all the fun in the film from the site of him looking fucking huge and carrying around an 80s style skateboard, or as a jesus loving nice guy to coke addled psycho knocking stuff over and threatening the white collar neighbours. Also LOL'd at Whalberg's happy face on top of the ride on lawnmower. Was surprised that unusually for a film claiming to be a true story, this was a true story. Though sadly The Rock's character was more of an amalgamation of gang members with some poetic licence thrown in.

To the North and West of Stoney you're looking at Ury and Rickarton estates. Should be easy enough to find contact details for them via google. Not so sure about the south. Dunnottar Castle is owned by Dunecht Estate but I think a lot of the farmland to the south is owned by the Forbes (the F of FM Group who own Ury). Could be wrong though. This site might give you an idea of the areas owned by large landowners: http://www.whoownsscotland.org.uk/property-index.php?c=kn&r=az You can subscribe to find out more detail of exactly who owns what.

Went to Copenhagen for a few days and took my trainers with me. Had an ace early morning run round a park/nature reserve/common beside the hotel on Thursday morning. http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/507036233 Bloody roasting weather though so was melting through most of it. Scolty hill race at the weekend. Not sure yet if I'm going to run. Did a lot of walking round the city while we were there and ended up with sore feet and legs. So might save myself with Skye half coming up.

Some out of the box suggestions: Cowdray Hall Seventeen (probably too small, plus no drinks licence I assume) Peacocks (definitely too small) Exodus Somewhere on one of the uni campuses... Aberdeen must have a suitable space? Woodend Barn (hard to persuade people to travel to) Stonehaven Town Hall or similar Shire venues. Hotel function room somewhere. Must be plenty of those but might be expensive.

Decided to switch my avatar from the slightly racist French caricature to Deschamps instead.

What's to stop you setting ridiculously easy targets and raking it in?

Could change their member title, sure.

I'll take France.

It is pish, but it's quite ridiculously over the top, takes itself too seriously pish. So as long as you go into it knowing that then it can be quite enjoyable. White House Down was the better of the recent White House terrorist films.

That's quite the difference! No mean feat into the wind. I was 6 seconds quicker in the second 5k.

Checking my times again and my 2nd 5k (negative split!) was within 30 secs of my 5k PB! Which makes me think I should really get along to a parkrun soon. Going to Copenhagen on Wednesday and there's one in the park behind our hotel...

Full results are up on http://www.chipresults.co.uk/ now.

How'd everyone get on? I took 2 mins off my PB and finished in 48:38. Felt pretty good all the way round. Had planned to take it easy and do 8 mins per mile for the first couple and then push it towards the end. But when I got there and felt the wind I figured fuck it and decided that making the most of the wind assistance along the beach would be the way to go then it wouldn't matter if I lost a bit of pace with the wind in my face on King St. In the end managed every mile under 8 mins except the last one through Seaton and past PIttodrie which I did in 8 mins dead. http://connect.garmin.com/modern/activity/501705543

Predictably, now for sale on Facebook and less beautiful than when you bought it.

I can understand a discussion on gauge, perhaps. But not brand. Even then I have different gauge strings on different guitars. My tele has fender 9s and my ESP has power slinkies. Then to top that off I use stainless steel strings, but that's due to an allergy not anything to do with sound or feel. It WILL affect the sounds and feel, slightly, but I don't have a choice.

Someone on Reddit posted this album of possibly the most beautiful dog I've ever seen. It's ace: http://imgur.com/a/0KoeX Oh and it maybe thinks it's a cat...

I was at a trad workshop recently and someone asked the guy (a well known trad mando player) what kind of strings he used. I didn't get it. They were also asking what picks he recommended. These are completely down to personal preference and you're going to replace them that often that you can try a few different ones out until you get to a set you like so I don't understand why you'd base what you have on your instrument on what another player uses. It was almost like some of the attendees thought it was part of the secret to why he was a good player.

Fixed it for him.