Lizard Lights!

I could not ASK for better! That is lush. I mean, really, that's made my day that has - and it's a Friday where I get the weekend off, for goodness sake! :D

*coughs* Sorry. Now I'm over that nerdgasm of OMGTHATSAWESOME, I'll be a bit more rational. His Lordship says "Yarbles", which is an agreement into their funktastical appearance.

I have to admit, I nearly smacked myself in the nose when I picked up the box - I was expecting it to be a bit heavier, and I was surprised when I opened it - I was expecting something much clunkier! I was expecting a chunky laptop style transformer, so that was quite good too as it takes up much less room, and I don't have to worry about where to fit it in my plug-shelves.

That's actually perfect though - flexible and thin for fitting, it's only wired up one end to a wee dinky transformer which makes life SO much easier and the colour of the light is delicious. It's brought a healthy, late afternoon sunshine feel to their tanks at last.

Kyle was so astonished, she's actually come out of her tunnel of her own accord and has been sat looking at the pretty new lights (bottom tank picture, sat on the hut). More than that though, she actually looks happy about it. She's a grumpy girl at the best of times, but that's just her way. Tsam, my male lizard, was thoroughly bemused (top tank, looking confused). He's now sat on his hut to take a closer look and pull faces at them, which is always a good sign with Tsam.

Brilliant Butterfly

I saw a rather extraordinary insect about a week ago, and promptly went mental trying to find out what it was. After literal hours of poring over guide of butterflies of the UK and then moving on to butterflies of the world, picture after picture after picture, I finally discovered what this creature was!

It turned out to be a MOTH of all things - a Magpie Moth.

As you can see, I found one today flutting round the garden - until His Lordship's father accidentally stood on the poor bugger. Thankfully he didn't do too much damage to the insect's wings as it managed to squeeze between two large stones at JUST the right moment - very lucky indeed. I scooped it up gently and took it inside to grab a picture or two.

The pretty little creature fluttered off my hand, flooted a neat circle and came back again. As luck would have it, I already had some nectar mix made up with added calcium as a treat for Terry and the dragons. Better yet, calcium is GOOD for butterflies (and moths, in this case)!

Hahahahah! I just found out this pretty little creature that I just rescued, fed and released is the little sod may very well have been behind the destruction of my gooseberry bush! It must have been a lucky escapee from the earlier infestations. Hah. Well, I have fruit, just no leaves on my poor, beleaguered plant. I won't complain though, what with such a pretty insect!

Developing Dragon Lights!

If you're a reptile keeper, you'll know we all have the problem of struggling with the right lighting - I don't trust Mercury Vapours as they are too unstable for my liking, tungsten bulbs are getting rare and aren't energy efficient, and fluor 10.0 tubes are too dim to be ideal for doing the job of lighting alone... (Pic: example of dim UV lighting. Model - Tsam.)

However, after hours of research, I've finally sorted my favourite combination into the PERFECT combination. I'm using ceramics on thermostats for energy efficient heating, 10.0s for UV - and DoneDeal1966 on eBay has been helping me customise an ideal compliment to brighten up the tanks.

We've developed a modular parallel LED striplight system. Yup, you got me. Warm white for nearer daylight colours to complement the UV fluors, sensible cable lengths for stacked or close together tanks, multiple strips from the one transformer for efficiency and cost effectiveness. We've even worked out how to have the strips "disconnectable", so if you're like me and only currently have two tanks and a third being built, you can unplug one until you're ready. Also, it will help SO much with fitting the lighting strips (which by the way have adhesive cushion backs for easy fixing!) - no more dangerous cutting of cables, simply unplug from the transformer, run the cable through the hole or vent, fix and plug it in - the ultimate plug and play lighting!

I'm really pleased with the £45 ($70 USD approx) price, bearing in mind it was fully customised for my requirements and can be for your exact needs too! Mine's 3x 1M of Warm White Waterproof LED strips (60 LED's per Metre), each with 1M power tails and "disconnecting plugs" going to the 110-240 transformer with nearly 2M of flex to the 12Volt Plug. Better yet, because it's a 110-240V self alternating transformer, it's going to work for you good folks in the US too, all you'd need is a travel adapter to sort the plug to fit your wall socket! :)

I haven't got pictures yet, as he's only just began building it, but I hope to have it by the end of the week, upon which date pictures and installation story will be unveiled on this here thread :D *excited*

If you're interested - and fancy a bit of discount whilst you're at it! - have a word with DoneDeal1966 on eBay and mention "indigobluefish". With a bit of work, you'll have a happy dragon like this! (Pic: Happy dragon. Model - Kyle.)

I may have looked like I was slacking since the Bearded Dragon Soap testing, but I'm still hard at work! Shame I haven't been able to crack the UV LED puzzle yet - then we'd be really set.

MOVIE NITE '84 - BEST OF!

Himself could not believe that I'd never seen "The NeverEnding Story". No, really, the original 1984 classic? Never seen it. In fairness, I haven't seen Labyrinth either. His Lordship swore at me because I haven't seen that OR Dark Crystal. He then swore profusely when he discovered I hadn't seen "Labyrinth" either. I was promptly seated to watch a marathon movie session and...

I swear to goodness, if you're a weirdazoid like me whom also hasn't see "The NeverEnding Story" (or any of the other "classics" for that matter) - do yourself a favour and find a copy. Don't bother reading the reviews (I'm not going to say much about it) and don't bother swatting up on the storyline - you don't want to go spoiling the pleasure! So go on and treat yourself with a fresh and open mind for a change, even if it it just this time.

"The NeverEnding Story" was cheesy, the animatronics dated and clunky by today's standards and no CGI whatsoever - but that's all part of the wonderfully quirky charm. The mere fact that there's no computer imagery at all makes is astonishing - the detail and the sheer work put into the puppets and scenery is truly beautiful and timeless. I particularly liked the walls in the ivory tower - I can only imagine how long it took to shape and laquer them into their pristine, curlicued glory!

A thought on Labyrinth: I was thinking earlier to myself: how DO you judge your own self worth? I worked out that you're worth more than they pay you, but not as much as your mother thinks you should be paid. Anyhow, I carefully browsed for feedback on the sequels, and was glad I trusted my instinct - apparently they ruin the originals for you for life. So yes - avoid the sequels, but please, watch the originals - and enjoy.

"Falkor - it's Woooooonderful!"

Terry-fied!

Well, my folks found out about my hobby and I got a phonecall from my grandmother. She said she was hurt... but only because she nearly fell off her chair laughing at my blog! My mum on the other hand went "hmmm", much to my worry. "We'll have to think of a proper stripper name for you then, won't we?" she goes! Mind you, when I had my tattoo done, the first thing she said was "COOL! Let's look then!"

What can I say, my family are pretty damn cool.

I bought Terry a new plant today. Now, I'd heard the rumour that geckos don't much like it when you change their territory, but I hadn't realised just how true this was. He spent the first 15 minutes sat carefully at the far edge of his bed-plant, looking at it. Then he approached it with extreme caution and sat with great trepidation on his bendy vine to examine it. With braver bounds, he shot up the back wall to glare at the intruder. From a safe distance of course. He's been stalking round it, muttering to himself and is currently creeping up on it glacier-style along the top edge of his corkbark along the ceiling. Correction - he's just leapt on it with a resolute "CRASH" and is trying it out for size. These bigger leaves appear to be quite comfortable to reptilian behinds once you stop panting fit to burst and get used to the idea that the invader isn't actually dangerous.

I did grab this lovely photo (again with the ancient phone) just after he'd had a massive drink. He'd noticed the vine was damp and so was licking off the residual wet. Yep, he climbs up on his branch first every evening to watch what we're doing, then climbs to a U in the vine where he lazes, hammock-style to watch TV.

Is it the End of the World?

Jesper Grønne in Denmark snapped this beauty happening last night, and manage to grab some wonderful footage of the initial shockwave, as shown on YouTube here! Jesper also has a website full of his stunning pictures over here at: http://www.groenne.eu/ Please, check it out - he has a magnificent eye for colour and form caught in nature including dazzling snowflakes in sharp, magnified focus, and the extraordinary bullion blocks of natural brown sugar in deep definition. Mr Grønne, I'm impressed! More please!

Shawn Malone did a wonderful job with a specially set up Canon camera in Michigan.

Make a note for the 12th though, as the Perseid Meteor Shower is making it's return around the planet, and you may be able to see some shooting stars occasionally throughout most of this month. We'll be able to see the best ones from around 11pm on the 12th, becoming more dense the later it gets towards dawn on the 13th, developing into a veritable fireworks display. The new moon means you stand a good chance of seeing even more of these fast shooting stars than usual! Fingers crossed none come through or hit anyone - it is Friday 13th after all!

Oooh, pretty! Look at that star ripple! At least we have the ability to say that we've lived through the biggest solar storm of this generation. The reason they were worried about blackouts and powercuts is because these particles are unusually high in energy, with the potential that it might knock out power stations with massive power surges.

Here the sky a lovely teal for quite some time on the east (the opposite of sun set, I did get it right!), but nothing spectacularly visible from my house, more's the pity. We didn't lose the internet though. My friend in America, panicked when he heard about two massive explosions occurring on the sun and thought the world was going to end, bless him. Soon calmed down when he realised it was just going to make pretty lights in the sky and it wasn't the blazing swords of avenging angels...

This Week's Weirdness...

We discovered a rather unusual nightclub that promotes Green Thinking and eco-friendliness. Not only do Surya use solar power and turbines, but they've developed a piezoelectric floor that bounces on a combination of generator springs and crystals to create its own electricity. When packed, this club generates over 60% of it's own power requirement - from the people dancing. Yep, you heard me. Dancing makes this club awesome!

Actually, talking of solar power, we may be set for a solar blackout here in the UK, as NASA have it. Apparently we're in for a once of a generation space storm tonight, as sunspot 1092 has produced an extremely rare double magnetic eruption, pointed directly at Earth - and the major wave is heading on in. The Solar Dynamics Observatory predict that it will trigger off some spectacular and amazing aurorae (I'll keep watching for pictures when it hits) and they're a bit concerned as to what effect it's going to have on communications satellites and that there mau be powercuts. (Img: SDO's picture of current sun activity in high frequency UV.) Have a look HERE for a wicked cool movie and pictures of the storm as captured by solar satellites. It's nice and clear - apparently we'll be able to see the aurorastorm tonight if you're in a dark enough area! Woot!

Today I had to laugh. I came downstairs looking for His Lordship, to find him in the middle of our "temporary kitchen" whisking away at a bowl of yellow mush. After promptly splopping egg everywhere and looking round for a bowl to pour his creation in, he suddenly stopped. "Aw FECK. I forgot to put flour in my cake!" I nearly wet myself laughing - how do you forget to put flour in a cake?! Apparently it's a finely tuned technique all to do with how you read your own handwritten recipe - if you get one bit and do one bit at a time, it's very easy to accidentally skip a skip a line. And that, my love, is why you should always read a recipe in full before starting!

Never mind sweetie, I found your favourite clip for you!


We also got a new word registered on the UrbanDictionary - Spob: to spob; the act of bouncing a spoon of soup or similar liquids to reduce chance of spillage, with the drip hopefully falling back into the bowl from whence it came.

"I spobbed the spoon, and the soup droplet clinging to the bottom dripped off."

Perfect Party or Brutal Beating?!

I was chatting to a work colleague when I got home last night, and we got onto recipes, diet and the sort. I realised it takes a lot of time, effort and money to be in this good shape - round is a great shape! I wooould diet and exercise, but I'm lazy and I like food. To which, she replied: "Oh ditto, food is a bloody big downfall!"

Having been bored senseless with the gym once the trainers stopped pushing me (and being unable to afford £35 a month to run on the spot), I've been looking for something a little more interesting - and it's finally made it to my town. And better yet, they're having an introductory evening!

Yes, I confess - I've always wanted to go poledancing. Whilst I'm not your average sort of character for this kind of thing, I've always fancied giving it a go and think I've got what it takes, with my ability to suck it up and go for it when there's a silly game required at work and everyone else is protesting loudly at how embarrassing it's going to be singing "Old

MacDonald Had A Farm" complete with noises and actions. Look at it this way, it's an interesting skill, it's good exercise and great fun. Will look fabulous on my CV too, doncha think Nan? Hehehehehe...

Not only that, but they're having a party with free dance sessions (burlesque too), goodie bags, complimentary drinks and nibbles, a raffle and a prize draw to win your very own pole. Sounds good to me!

* - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * - * -

So yeah, I went, and now I'm back - it's 10pm. Having just read it, you'll know the advert said games, demonstrations, drinks and nibbles. Well, there was one game, the "demonstrations" were 2x 45 minute WORKOUTS for everyone, I had two glasses of lemonade and there were no nibbles in sight anywhere! But I'm still going to go back. It was awesome fun, frustrating and all. Yes, I've signed up for more punishment, though I have come home with aches, pains, and bruises you wouldn't believe. I didn't expect to get so bashed around - or bash myself so much rather... I have burns, bruises, blisters and scrapes!

Lesson learned: Poledancing really hurts. I have a whole lot of respect for the professionals. You'll have to excuse me - I was expecting food at this "party", so I'm going to haul my ass towards some food and then sleep until I have to go to work tomorrow.

Things That Go Wrong...

So far we've had nothing go wrong with my new bathroom - shown is the trim B&Q tiles we chose to go with the white suite, grey tiles and slate floor. Mind you, there's not much TO go wrong with the bathroom - it's been perfectly empty for days! I have a brand new toilet waiting in the spare bedroom, and my bedroom is back where it should be, though we still have airing cupboard contents all over the place whilst we await the sparkie and the plumber shifting the shower unit in a couple of days.

Oh, and we had the builders in a blazing row this morning, as the kitchen units were being brought in. One of the geniuses that designed it managed to screw up the measurements and now the units won't fit in! Thankfully the company do a slim version of one of the units which happens to fit perfectly in the space we're left - and I have a lovely new hob and oven in place. The hob is shiney, pretty and superglossy (when it's not covered in plaster and breezeblock dust). They even managed to deliver the right sized bit of worktop for the breakfast bar - soon I'll have a seat of my own there, and it'll be all "cathedra mea, regulae meae". I'd say it for the kitchen, but I have to share it. I found a handy little quote too, to bear in mind when things go to-pot. Thanks Mr Schuly!

But my goodness. Things do go much more wrong for some people don't they?

I was reading about the case of two muggers back in '94, having stopped a man in the street and threatened him with two large pocketknives for his money. The victim blinked in surprise: "Are you insane?" They demanded the money again and threatened to cut him. So he promptly broke their arms in multiple places, sat them in the kerb with their knives and calmly waited for the police to come. The man they picked has a 1st degree in Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, an 8th Degree Grandmaster in Tae Kwon Do, 9th in Jeet Kune Do under Bruce Lee and Lee’s best student, Dan Inosanto, a 10th degree in Shito Ryu Karate, 10th in Tang Soo Do, and an 11th degree in Chun Kuk Do - an art developed in his own dojo.

The police were unable to handcuff the men as their arms were so badly damaged with bones protruding from the flesh - and promptly fell about laughing. "Did you not know who he was?!"

When questioned, one mugger replied, “Yeah, we knew who he was but we figured all that crap on TV was fake! Lesson learned: Don't mug Chuck Norris.

Today's Quote: "I like the way that sparks when I plug it in. Really makes me feel safe..." Said with ironic tones -HL.

Not-So-Tiny Tezza

I thought I'd update you good folks with a new pic of Mr Tackety-Toes himself. He's a sturdy 21.2g now and eatin' like a trooper. He's discovered a love of butterworms and waxworms, and still likes to wipe Alan Repashy's mango mix all over me. :)

This photo was taken with a Motorola V3X mobile. Imagine what I could do with a REAL camera!

He's hand-tame and strokable now, with a proper little character and a squeaky little voice that tells me off with a stern "PRAWR!" or makes little chirpy-beepy noises when he falls off things and bounces around in his tank occasionally. He's only recently started "talking", but my partner had to laugh when Terry told me off last time -it's a really indignant little sound!

He's been a right buggerlugs lately - I've been attempting to teach him how to hand-feed the same as my dragons and axolotls. And it hasn't been going too well. We started off too timid to take it out of my hand, so I'd catch his attention and place it in front of him, where he'd happily savage it.

Now however, Terry's certainly throwing himself into it with vigour - though somewhat... literally. He makes great leaping diving bites at the waxworm in my fingers and has twice failed to accurately snatch the bug - biting ME instead! Much to my amusement I had a rather hungry reptile latched on to the end of my index finger trying to terrier-shake me to death. Thankfully he's only got the wee-est teeth (even the axolotls are more formidable). It's his claws that are the most prickly!

Lately though, he especially likes finding different ways to STARE at me until I pay attention. You know that feeling when you just know someone's looking at you? Terry's got it down to an art, the creepy ratbag!

I find him glaring under leaves, hanging upside down on the wall, peering round the corner of a plant, dangling from the vine, wriggled like this between two sturdy palm leaves - but always so his head is at the same point to see through the little sliver of glass next to my sofa. Right next to my head. Right in my face.

It creases me up every time.

Terry peed on my foot yesterday too and then ran right up and got stuck in my hair.

It doesn't help that he's a bouncy little sod too - with an impressive leap of easily 6x his own body length and a distinct "splat" sound on landing, he's got very good at jumping around on leaves, vines and hands - though he WILL try to bounce at people's faces. I am trying to train him out of being a facehugger though, but with little success so far. That's the trouble with being a sticky-toed wee git - he's discovered there's not much you can't grab if you put your mind to it.

In fact, I'd go so far as to say he's a lovable pain-in-the-neck little crap-packet. Don't you think, Bogle?

Quote of the day: "Your mumma, she is the inventor of crap packet." - My mumma. Try it, it's a great insult!

Beautiful Birds

Sorry, no, this isn't an article on totty. You'll have to try a different site for that. Terry is 18.3g, just as a speedy update.

Now, everyone who knows me knows I'm not that keen on birds in general - but that's mostly due to Jeanie, the budgie my mother acquired from a cousin of mine. Oh, I apologise, there's a typo there; I put budgie instead of CRAZYBITCHBIRDFROMHELL! Even Himself thinks she's a crazy damn bugger-igar.

However, these guys really make it up in my opinion, with their funky feathers and snazzy moves (especially the one with his Dalek-style chasing).


These guys from Papua New Guinea ramp it up a notch:


And this guy wins hands down for his sheer insanity-dance in his funky yellow trance dance pants.

Another Article!

"Congratulations! Your entry (Faerie Care!) has been selected to appear in the Neopian Times. A shiny trophy has been added to your user lookup. Thank you for contributing to the Neopian Times!"

That's the second one of mine published and I've had some fan mail from Faerie Care - I think I'll have to get cracking on Faerie Care II, as everyone wants to know why I've hinted there may be more than one space faerie. My answer? Just because we occasionally see a space faerie, it doesn't mean there's just one! See my works released so far on this page HERE.

House of Pain (in the ass.)

So - we've been ripping out the kitchen. We're destroying the bathroom. We're rapidly running out of rooms to put stuff in, as the electrician wants to take up half of the upstairs floorboards. Boy this is fun!

All the shifting around, tearing up and pulling down is also revealing further "errors" produced by the nice men (AKA Cowboys) that built the extension and worked on the house in general - to a rather spectacular extent...

The list of fails found (and mostly fixed) so far includes:

Leaking flatroof on extension

Spaghetti cables for telephone wires

Carpet in the bathroom - mmm, rotting!

Extractor fan feeding into cavity insulation

Wrong valve type on garden tap

Kitchen concrete floor: carpet stuck in it!

Constant boiler overflow due to failed valve

"Great" wallpaper all over: upside down, overlaps, gaps, creases, and rips...

A random extra windowsill!

Double layer of tiles in bathroom

Incredible black mould in most rooms

Damp problems from leaking boiler

Spaghetti style water pipes in kitchen

Backwards aerial cables throughout house

3 pullswitches: no pulls. Just yanked out.

Gatepost fell off in high winds last winter

We STILL can't work out what the deal is with the pipes for garden tap (Valves?)

Random lightswitches: "Very f*kn random"

Livingroom carpet: big bald SEAM in middle

Burnt 250V cable was sparking/smoking

So they cellotaped it and plastered over it

Concrete facings outside crumbling

Fascias rotted through and falling off

Rat in the attic, climbed through fascia

Ariel fixing rotted and aerial dropped off

Extension main power ring done backwards and needs to be completely redone

Odd air vents left from old heating system

It's TRIPLE tiling in the bathroom.

Himself not happy.

I could cry sometimes. But it would only contribute to the existing damp and mould problems.

Quote of the Day: "You'd only be bored if we had a normal house." - His Lordship. Too true, too true. The sheer amount of fail is very funny though!

Sorry for the minor delay...

I am still here. We're having technical difficulties temporarily - blog incoming with further details. In the meantime, enjoy The Gifford Children's Choir's version of "Still Alive".

Mmmmm, chocolatey.

I blinked, and another week screamed past... How DOES that happen? Thank goodness for warm chocolate walnut brownies and cream - soft and squidgy, near liquid in smoothness, chewy walnuts and all with a crisp, sugary shell like a Smartie. Absolute heaven with a touch of cream - YUMMY! Combined with the original Willy Wonka movie and you have the perfect combination.

As much as I enjoyed the bizarre Burton/Depp, Wilder is better. The reactions of the actors in some scenes really are spontaneous; for example, when the children first enter the main factory and see the gardens, their reactions are real, it was their first view of that glorious set. The set itself is amazing because a large number of the objects and plants in the main factory were genuinely edible, including the giant lollipops - but in the scene where Willy Wonka drinks from the flower-shaped cup and then eats it, the cup itself was made of wax. Poor Gene Wilder had to stay and chew the wax pieces until the end of the take, at which point he spat them out. Further cool info available on IMDB.

I'm all greasy - I've been feeding the dragons both a special mix to help their tummies, as they have been forgetting to drink enough water again and poor Tsammy is constipated. The blended fruit, vegetables, calcium, vitamin D, water and olive oil should do the trick, and a little mango powder for flavouring. Yum yum yum!

PS - how cool is that keyboard? --->

My friend Langmesser said something quite profound (for him) today: "You only get one life, no replay."

I couldn't help myself. I had to comment. "Unless you play Dungeons and Dragons, then you get no life, but as many rerolls as you like. (Although if you ask Silent Bob, he'll tell you that pressing Y, A and Left Trigger simultaneously on Xbox D&D is the cheat code for extra lives. But there's extreme nerdishness for you)."