The beginning of a new year.... 24 days late!

My poor, poor Blog... I have neglected you these past few weeks...

Not much to report on the baby front - Michelle had her first visit to the midwife on Monday 12th January and other than signing some forms and filling out her FW8 so that she can get her Maternity Exemption Certificate, there isn't much else to say. Michelle has her first scan on Thursday 5th February which I am eagerly looking forward to.

Christmas came and went, and so did my 32nd Birthday. Work has been full of the usual - students forgetting their passwords, getting verbal abuse from the little shits when I catch them doing things to the computers that they shouldn't be doing. The most challenging thing we've been involved in at the school is replacing our crap email supplier with our own in-house Microsoft Exchange 2007 server. The toughest part is still yet to come - not teaching the kids.... but training the staff!

Still, almost a year after selling my entire Star Trek video collection, I am happy to say that I now been able to purchase all of the Deep Space Nine and Voyager DVD boxsets (along with my existing Star Trek TOS boxsets). Thanks to some extreme selling on eBay, next month I will get Enterprise, followed by The Next Generation and my collection will be once again complete!! Yippeee.

They will stand proud, next to my Gavin and Stacey boxset!!!!!!!!!

I must go now and nurse a nasty headache.

3 + 1

Just a quick post to say...

I'M GOING TO BE A DADDY AGAIN!!!

We both found out today that Michelle is once again up-the-duff... bun in the oven.... PREGNANT!!!

We are both over the moon. This is without a doubt one of the best Christmas presents ever. We have worked out that she is 5 weeks gone already which means that she should be due sometime during the middle of August 2009.

As you can see, I am ecstatic, and I will be using the Captains Blog over the next 8 and a bit months detailing all the events that will lead up to the birth of Wilson Junior number 2.

Stay tuned.....

Live long and prosper...

With the new Star Trek movie only 176 days away from release date, I am really geeking out at the moment with all the new information coming out about the new movie. I haven't been this excited about a Star Trek film (any film actually) since the release of Star Trek 6 : The Undiscovered Country in back 1992!

JJ Abrams is doing a great job at keeping everything secret about this movie, just like he did with Cloverfield, but the official trailer for the new film is released this Friday, so I am sure a lot of questions will be answered then.

One big question was answered yesterday though - What will the Enterprise look like in the movie... Well... here it is!

Obviously they couldn't use the original design - afterall, it was designed in the 1960s and would look pretty dated now.

First impressions - Honestly, I am not that impressed... But then, I thought the Enterprise D from the Next Generation was one ugly son of a bitch at first, but after time I came to like it!


WOOHOOO!!

Can we fix it..... Yes we can. (PSP Repair Guide)

Whilst playing Star Wars - Force Unleashed on my PSP over the weekend, I noticed something strange happening with the console. Even though I was not touching the joystick, Darth Vader continued to walk - like some strange 'force' had control of my PSP. I decided to try Monkey Island 2 (using the Scumm emulator), and noticed that the mouse pointer had a mind of its own and moved to the bottom right hand side of the screen without me doing anything. I decided to pop on to eBay and fortunatly found a replacement joystick module for an amazing £5.00 (including P&P)

I have decided to do a small guide so that if any of you have the same problem as me, you can fix it yourselves without forking out £40 - £100 getting it repaired.

Be warned though that it does involve opening up the PSP, so if yours is still under warranty, I'd advise not doing this.

Firstly, the most important thing to do is find somewhere nice to work - somewhere that is'nt cluttered. Oh, and make yourself a cup of tea too.

Next, get your replacement joystick module handy, and a very small cross head (Phillips) screwdriver. You may need a small flat head screwdriver, depending on whether you have good finger nails or not.

Pull off the joystick cap. If you have long nails, you could probably use your fingers. If not, use a small screwdriver. Just pry it off. Trust me, it comes off.

Turn the PSP over (screen down) and locate the following three screws. Unscrew them with the cross head (Phillips) screwdriver.

Remove the battery compartment cover and the battery and unscrew the screw as shown in this picture.

The next screw that you need to remove is located under the 'guarantee void' sticker. It is impossible to remove this screw without damaging the sticker, so unless your PSP is still under guarantee, unscrew the screw! You will probably not be able to see the screw, but trust me, it is there (well it is with my PSP1000 model). Either unscrew it through the sticker, or remove the sticker completely.

You can now remove the cover to the PSP. Try not to get your fingerprints over the screen.

Locate the faulty joystick module, and unscrew the two screws completely.

Replace the joystick module with the new one, and screw it back in to place. Re-assemble the PSP (making sure that the screws are tight) and....

Voila!!! One perfectly working PSP, with a joystick that no longer moves on its own!!!

They don't make 'em like they used to.

This morning I've been rummaging through our loft, trying to make room for some of Kierans baby toys which he does not play with any more. I was pleasantly surprised when I came across a couple of boxes containing some of my old computers that I haven't used in years. I just had to get them out and have a go!!!

Amongst the collection was an un-upgraded Atari ST520FM, a Commodore Amiga 1200 (with a 1gb Harddrive), and my beloved Commodre Amiga 500 with its super 68040 accelerated processor (from 7Mhz to 40Mhz thanks to the A530 upgrade), 120Mb harddrive, toggle switch for changing between Kickstart 1.3 and 2.0, external floppy disk drive, Action Replay Mark III cartridge and a VideoMaster digitiser!!! WOW!

Fortunatly years of neglect did not mean that these machines would not work, and within minutes of setting them up I was able to load up all sorts of stuff stored on the harddrives. I found programs and songs that I had written years ago which I had forgotten about.

It nearly brought a tear to my eye!

Although I emulate the Amiga on my PC to play all of my old favourite games, nothing beats playing the games on the original hardware - It's the same with my Commodore 64 and Plus 4... Games load instantly when emulated on a PC, but sometimes it is nice to type Load, press play on tape and wait several minutes for the game to load.

The full retro experience!

The A530 turbo with 120Mb harddrive and 40Mhz (68040) processor), Action Replay III cartridge and VideoMaster video and audio digitiser.

A retro icon.... An original Atari joystick - what a classic!

The Amiga 1200 with its 1Gb harddrive

The toggle switch for swapping between the different ROMS - Kickstart 1.3 and 2.0

Sheesh...

What an incredibly hectic week it has been!!

I don't think I have ever had such a busy first week back at school like the one I have just had. It's amazing how everything was working fine during the holidays, and on the first day back we lose the network in one part of the school, and the main administration software decided to not work (partly due to an error made by a senior member of staff)

We managed to fix the network on Friday afternoon after discovering that it was down to a faulty fibre transceiver in one of our cabinets. As for the other problem, we have found a solution, but can't do anything until Monday morning.

It never rains but it pours.

On top of that, you will not believe how many new Year 9 students came up to my office telling me that they could not log on! I mean, come on - I created the accounts in the holiday and set all of their passwords to their date of birth. All staff were told this, so is it really that hard for these kids to remember the date that they were born????

Anyway, changing the subject a little, I am pleased to announce that in my attempts in getting Michelle more tech-savvy, I have finally convinced her to start up her own blog. She has started a diet and after having an extremely successful first week (yep, she lost over 8lb in just one week), she wants to write all about it. This is the first time she has ever done anything like this, so if you do go and visit her blog, be easy on her!

You can access her blog by ---CLICKING HERE---

Right, I'm off now to relax on this rather grey Saturday afternoon and listen to some more movie soundtracks - Currently listening to 'Raise The Titanic'. Not a great film, but certainly one of John Barry's best soundtracks in my honest opinion.

T T F N - Ta Ta For Now!