Ladies and Gentlemen, we have floated in space
Back at work after a 10-day holiday, which consisted of:
Oggcamp
This nice little 'unconference' saw it's second running, this time in Liverpool.
Lots of interesting talks again this year, ranging from geek politics to women (or the lack thereof) in technology, software patents and MQTT (including an oggcamp success story - the mosquito message broker which was born out of a "wouldn't it be nice if there were an open source version of this" commment from @andysc last year).
As with the first oggcamp the social side was a big draw as well - nice to see some familiar faces from last year, meet new folks and put some faces to IRC names.
Bath
As we were bookending this week with two trips we decided that rather than coming home we'd just find somewhere to chill out for a few days, and decided to visit Bath. This turned out to be an awesome idea as we had a wonderfully relaxed and lazy week in a great hotel, along with some interesting culture from the Roman Baths and the Fashion Museum.
All Tommorows Parties
Back in Minehead for another installment of this most awesome music festival. This time it was curated by Simpson's creator Matt Groening who is also a massive music fan and had lined up a fantastic array of interesting acts.
Amongst what I saw were Iggy and The Stooges (incredibly at 65 Iggy still moves like an 18 year old), Spiritualised (epic performance of Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space), Joanna Newsom (only caught a bit of this set, interesting but her voice jars a little), The Tiger Lillies (the musical embodiment of a victorian freakshow, darkly comic), She and Him (60s rock'n'roll brought bang up to date), Deerhunter, Toumani Diabate, Boredoms (totally awesome - 8 drummers going at it, Taiko-style, on modern kits), Broadcast (beautifully ambient sound and visuals).
Oggcamp
This nice little 'unconference' saw it's second running, this time in Liverpool.
Lots of interesting talks again this year, ranging from geek politics to women (or the lack thereof) in technology, software patents and MQTT (including an oggcamp success story - the mosquito message broker which was born out of a "wouldn't it be nice if there were an open source version of this" commment from @andysc last year).
As with the first oggcamp the social side was a big draw as well - nice to see some familiar faces from last year, meet new folks and put some faces to IRC names.
Bath
As we were bookending this week with two trips we decided that rather than coming home we'd just find somewhere to chill out for a few days, and decided to visit Bath. This turned out to be an awesome idea as we had a wonderfully relaxed and lazy week in a great hotel, along with some interesting culture from the Roman Baths and the Fashion Museum.
All Tommorows Parties
Back in Minehead for another installment of this most awesome music festival. This time it was curated by Simpson's creator Matt Groening who is also a massive music fan and had lined up a fantastic array of interesting acts.
Amongst what I saw were Iggy and The Stooges (incredibly at 65 Iggy still moves like an 18 year old), Spiritualised (epic performance of Ladies and Gentlemen We Are Floating in Space), Joanna Newsom (only caught a bit of this set, interesting but her voice jars a little), The Tiger Lillies (the musical embodiment of a victorian freakshow, darkly comic), She and Him (60s rock'n'roll brought bang up to date), Deerhunter, Toumani Diabate, Boredoms (totally awesome - 8 drummers going at it, Taiko-style, on modern kits), Broadcast (beautifully ambient sound and visuals).