Over the last four days I have:
- Made it to the final six nominations in this year’s Sun Microsystems IT Journalism Awards, in the “Best Technology Reviewer” category. Those who’ve read my About Me page will be aware that I’m pretty much always the bridesmaid in these things, but that’s cool — I’m still chuffed to make it this far. Hurrah also for my clone, who’s up for the Helen Dancer Best Consumer Technology Journalist.
- In the “less chuffed” category, I recently won a prize holiday up at the recent MediaConnect Kickstart event for a weekend away at Coolum with my wife. Normally, that would engender a “hurrah” at least, but owing to the complexity of both flight bookings (and prices) and hotel availability, we’re not going to be able to go. Boo.
- In the “more chuffed” category, the very nice people at Solution6 (who were giving away the prize) are happy for me to use the plane ticket cost towards other flights, and it looks like we may be able to sneak in a family trip up to Townsville to visit my First Ex-Step-Grandparents. Or “Grandparents”, as I like to think of them. In case you’re wondering about a term like “First Ex-Step-Grandparents” — don’t ask me about my family tree unless you’ve got several hours (and a few beers) to spare. Trust me on this one.
- In the “entirely un-chuffed” category, my Xbox 360 joined the masses and masses around the planet by dying on me, with the prototypical red rings of death. I’m waiting to see if Microsoft can top their previous appalling record of four months to replace a dead hard drive. Watch this space.
- In the “travelling into negative chuffitude” territory, my beloved (and lovely) wife has a bacterial throat infection and has been on and off flat on her back for the past three days with no voice and no temper.
- In the “welcome to the Twilight-Zone-Of-Un-Chuffing-Behaviour” category, my daughter Zoe has chickenpox. But it’s not just chickenpox. It’s chickenpox three days before her fifth birthday party, something she’s been counting down to on a nightly basis for the last three months. If anyone knows of good ways to mollify irritable, scratchy and depressed children, drop me a line. Or three…
Can I reboot the week now please?