All Categories - Jungleboy

A Lot of What Have You's and the Internet of Things

4/21/2017

Running your own company comes with a lot a caveats. Mostly the finances that come in are siphoned off to HRMC - either in VAT, Income or Company Tax. Then I pay my accountants and the travel costs. Then I pay myself a measly £200 a week..

But it is not all bad; I get to experience a lot of different work places, cultures and way of working. I also have learned so many new things and gained valuable experience, which will certainly aid me for any future positions. I worked for the Scottish Government and the Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh. Both very Systems Admin positions that basically improved my knowledge and skills immensely!

I have bought and installed many different electronics and technologies, to much annoyance of my wife. My most used bit is the Google Home. Yes, I am an early adopter and I have especially bought Philips Hue and ChromeCast v2 to accommodate this. I upgraded my Spotify from Ultimate to Premium and now most parts of my home is voice controlled.

Contract Finished.. and now what?

7/10/2015

Looking for a new job, that is what.

After a great 4 months at Revenue Scotland I have regained some confidence in my skills and added some new ones to my existing ones.
Who knew I was a wizard with Word and Excel? From scratch I created workflows, process diagrams and more. All using the Service Management ITIL framework foundation knowledge I have. I set up internal Change & Incident logging forms and to top it off I created an Asset Management Recording, from scratch.

In my last week I was (t) asked to start of a Standard Operating Procedure document and I know I did an amazing job.

Below are some examples of my handiwork

Jungleboy Limited Company

2/26/2015

Registered yesterday - In Cheshire

I am now the proud Owner and CEO of a private Limited Company called 'Jungleboy'

How did this happen? Well.. eh.. pretty fast.
Tuesday I got the job at Revenue Scotland. The recruitment agency who sourced it is not an Umbrella Company. So they advised that I was to contact PayStream. They offer Umbrella and Limited Company services.

What does that mean?
When you are a contractor at a company or organisation, somebody will need to pay you. Now this can be done in 3 ways.

Guess who's back!?

2/26/2015

It has been quite a few turbulent weeks for me and my wife.
Due to certain disagreements regarding the work processes and guidelines I found myself without a job.

Depressing stuff, I know.

However that was also the encouragement I needed to become more of who I wanted to be and what I wanted to do. You see I am very much for fair work treatment and life balance. Thus I took a good look at myself and the situation I now found myself in. Questions like:

What exactly happened?
What could I have done different?
Now what?
Is this a good thing or a bad thing?
What will my wife say?
What kind of jobs can / should I apply for?

.. and plenty more of those.

On the bus ride home I texted my wife. Her reply was nothing short of amazing! Eventhough she was dissapointed, she was fully supportive of the situation and showed full confidence in my ability to land a new job.

When home I started applying straight away. Now the job situation in ICT isn't the greatest, but luckily the skills I have are easily transferable.

Needless to say that I sent out many, many applications, 74 to be exact. Out of those I got 8 interviews: Manpower, Lloyds Bank, Scott Reed, Wipro, CraneWare, Rockstar North, Heineken and Revenue Scotland

Although my wife and I said that the very first company that offers me a position I should take it. I had my personal favourites. Each of these jobs had something going for them. Some offered great working conditions, generous salary, good working hours or permanent positions.

There was the final conundrum. I was accepted by Heineken UK. This was to be a contracted position for 3-6 months. Wow, just imagine..

Amazon Fire HDX 8.9"

1/28/2015

I am not a jealous guy. I do not need to keep up with the Kardashians. I did however became very envious of my wife's Fire HDX 7" - I knew it was only a matter of (little) time before I too succumbed to the pleasures of this incredible gadget. - Yes the lightest on the market and so easy to use.

This arrived about a week ago and honestly; it was so engrossing that I completely neglected to update this page.
I got it all. Netfilx, Prime Videos, Firefly, Android games, Social Media, Cloud Storage, Kindle Books, Audio Books, Office Documents and Skype.

If you like the specific details - here is the Amazon Product page about the Kindle.

All I can say is: wow.

Good Vibrations

11/25/2014

Wishlist updated with these cans

House of Marley - Exodus

The House of Marley creates products that are sustainable, renewable and recyclable. Each of the products are packaged in recycled and recyclable material so it avoids the waste stream and can manifest into something useful again:

Every piece of wood used in a Marley product is certified by the Forestry Stewardship Council (FSC). This governing body assures that the wood comes from a forest that is replenished making the material truly renewable and sustainable.
Recyclable aluminum is used in place of plastic in many components. This provides superior durability and reliability as well as giving their products a more robust and solid design aesthetic.
In parts where plastic must be used, they incorporate the highest possible percentage of recycled material.
Marley products provide a high level of style and and great, tactile user experience through the use of natural fabrics such as cotton and canvas.
Marley uses a unique blended fabric made from discarded fibers of hemp, organic cotton and recycled plastic (RPET). Their patent pending “Re-Spun” fabric is not only sustainable and recycled in its first round or use, but it is repurposed for a second time around.

I Want this.. this.. this..

11/7/2014

Amazon Echo has just been revealed

When browsing and looking around the interweb I found this device. Quietly offered in the US only (so far) - the Amazon Echo.

Available on an invite-only basis to start, Echo is regularly priced at $199. But for a limited time, Amazon will offer Echo for $99 to Prime members who receive an invite. Amazon says the black, cylindrical speaker is always connected to the cloud and will provide information, music, news, weather, and more whenever you ask for it. It's the sort of thing you'd expect from Google — only it's an Amazon product.

Echo, easily one of Amazon's most ambitious products to date, is designed to make life easier for users, instantly playing music from your cloud library or telling you the local weather. You can quiz it with general questions and get answers from Wikipedia. Of course, Siri, Google Now, and Cortana can accomplish similar tasks on your smartphone — but Amazon seems to think there's a place in the living room for something like this. Amazon's assistant has a name too: Alexa. That's the phrase you'll use to wake up the always-on speaker. Echo won't run on batteries, which is another hint that Amazon wants this in your home all the time.

Some might say this is a massive invasion on peoples privacy, a HAL9000 in tube form or even a willingly bought NSA lostening device.. I'' let you be the judge. - I want one :o)

Safety First - Veglo Commuter X4

11/3/2014

Safe Commuting

I just received the Veglo Commuter X4. I bought / invested in this so I can safely commute on my (still to be delivered) Scrooser.

Commuter X4 bike light helps other roadusers judge distance and width of cyclists they encounter.
The X4 features four fibre optic lights meeting at a central LED hub. It’s a shape that’s easy to recognise for a driver behind your bike, and makes it easier to gauge your distance, width and speed. It also extends around the side of your body (or your backpack) to increase your visibility at junctions. I can't wait to put this into action. On first view out of the package it looks solid and well built.

TiVo & Amazon TV

10/31/2014

TV Revolution in my living room

I received the Amazon Fire TV - I have yet to install it. I am late to this as we also just received the TiVo box from Virgin Media.

Why all this? Well I am actually SAVING money. Yes £21 a month to be exact.
I am already a subscriber to Spotify Premium, NetFlix and an Amazon Prime member. So on Virgin I was an XL tv subscriber (over 800+ channels) and a Medium Broadband (20MB) user.

Too much? Yeah I thought so too.
Now in order to persuade Sugarpie, I had to come up with a plan. She would STILL be able to watch her weekly episodes of Real Housewives of [Wherever] and at the same time increase the broadband speed and reduce cost..

The solution.
Amazon Prime is inclusive of a instant Videos & series - so Is Netflix.
But Virgin TV was under used - it is basically a tool for watching Real Housewives and record some series that can easily be found on demand online - Dr Who is available on BBC iPlayer.
Music can be streamed through spotify and with a little thing called 'unlocator' I was able to convince Sugarpie to watch her Series on Hulu!

Christmas is coming

10/31/2014

The daylight saving has already passed and it is getting darker everyday. Do I care, well yes and no.

I like it that everyday that passes I'm getting closer to receiving many returns on the investments that I made. I am mostly looking forward to a game called 'Fief'

There have been many updates lately and they are so incredibly close to shipping this - hopefully it will arrive before Christmas! - I cannot wait to play it.