Back in 1992, it was the “economy, stupid”, but here in the future, its the stupid economy.

The economy is stupid because it has been built on credit, not actual assets. That’s stupid and its no wonder its tanking now.

The people running big business are stupid too, for letting things get to this unbelievable state.

But worst of all are the collective governments dumping tax money into private companies to bail them out. That, my friends is the wrong answer yet everyone is still wondering why the stock markets continue to drop.

Simple, investor confidence is non-existent. How could it be anything else, when governments are rewarding badly run firms with bailouts. That’s not how business works and investors won’t respect it.

CEOs and MDs are used to making difficult and painful decisions, that’s why they make the big bucks. They don’t hesitate to decide to cut 10 or 20% of their workforce, if it makes their companies more profitable in the longer term and screw the poor saps who lose their jobs. Life is tough. I don’t think this is a good thing, I just think it is a true thing.

So these tough, hard-assed managers are used to executing painful edicts for the good of their firms and they’re not accustom to throwing good money away. When a government throws good money away, it worries everyone.

That’s what all this bailout bullshit is, just plain throwing good money away. It’s not going to save any regular folks, its not going to prevent the stock market from plunging and in the long term, its not going to prevent any of these poorly run companies from going under.

Its not going to do anything except make things worse.

They should have let all of these poorly run, badly managed, shitty companies falter. Economic Darwinism and survival of the financially fittest would have been the sensible response. That would have probably resulted in the complete restructuring of the world’s economies into something sustainable and workable. Most of all, it would have sent the right message and let the captalist-pig world know that if you fuck up, you lose.

And then we wouldn’t all be fucked.

Except me, I’m not fucked. I’ve been gathering shells, beads and berries. I reckon I’ll be able to trade them for weed and junk food when the time comes. That’s all I really need to survive.

Don’t throw away all those bills and bank notes just yet, though, as they’ll still be useful as toilet paper.

After all the whinging and complaining over the last week about my problems getting my new iPhone 3G from O2, I thought I would share some of my initial impressions of it.

Yes, that’s right…I’ve got my brand new, shiny, lickable, 16gb black iPhone 3G. I exclusively revealed this exciting bit of news on FaceBook last Thursday when it was delivered to my north London lair.

And again, yes, you read that right, I posted it on my FaceBook profile, as a status update.

Status updates on FaceBook are a lot like Twitter posts. It’s another reason why you should be my FaceBook friend!

Even though it was 6 days later than expected, I was still very pleased to be receiving iPhone 3G and couldn’t wait to unbox it and fire it up.

I didn’t buy the original iPhone, as it was only released officially here in the UK around 8 months ago. My reasoning was sound, or so I thought. As I expected a 2nd generation of iPhone to come out around now, I didn’t want to be in a position of wanting to buy it so soon after getting the 1st gen.

How was I to know that O2 were going to be handing out cheap (or free) upgrades to existing customers? Doh!

I was bit disappointed that Apple left out a couple of goodies that shipped with the original iPhone - the dock and the microfibre cloth to wipe the screen. The lack of the microfibre cloth is a real silly miss, they can’t cost that much when you’re buying a million of them.

The touchscreen does pick up a lot of fingerprints, though they are only really noticeable when the the screen is off. When the screen is illuminated, its very bright and you really don’t see any.

The screen is actually gloriously bright, extremely crisp and pin sharp. I could easily watch a full length film or television programme on it and probably will. The multi-touch control of the device is nothing short of astounding. It’s extremely intuitive and very accurate.

The iPod functions are also impressive and it blows away my old 60gb 5th gen iPod with video.

I’ve also set up several email accounts on my iPhone. If you want to reach me when I am on the go, you can contact northlondonhippy@gmail.com or northlondonhippy@yahoo.co.uk and I’ll receive them pretty goddamn quickly! You might even get a mobile reply…

I’ve also got the FaceBook mobile application, AIM for instant messaging and I’ve been playing around on Twitter with that cool app called Twinkle. I’m northlondonhippy on all of those services too, though Twitter registered my username as n_londonhippy because they don’t give you enough characters for my full online name.

Surfing the web on the iPhone is something else I’ve spent a good deal of time doing and its the first hand-held device that gives you any sort of useful internet experience. I’ve accessed the net from various mobile phones and an old Palm Pilot of mine and I’ve always found it sorely lacking. Spend ten minutes doing the same on the iPhone 3G and you will wonder how you lived without it. I’ve used both wi-fi and the 3G network and pages load very quickly too.

I read that the new iPhone 3G has about as much computing power as a laptop made in 2003; similar processing power and storage is what I took that to mean. Think about it - I’m now carrying something as powerful as a five-year-old laptop in my pocket now. It blows my mind!

There really are only 2 major differences between the new iPhone 3G and the original iPhone (and yes, I know there are plenty of minor changes, just humour me, please). The inclusion of 3G network access and GPS.

The GPS is nothing short of amazing. Even sitting here , deep inside my north London lair, not near any windows and it still knows where I am with frightening accuracy. The map software lets you know how certain it is of your location, by using variously sized circles to indicate your approximate location, until it is certain and then places a push-pin like marker where you are. Outside with no obstructions, when the iPhone can see the sky, you get a remarkably accurate reading of your location, so much so that if you walk a bit, the blue dot adjusts to your new position.

The location data isn’t only utilised by the map application, but any app can grab it. This includes geo-tagging of your photos and with some Twitter apps, can include your location so you can track people nearby. Spooky!

Can someone please release some turn-by-turn, good enough to work in my car, navigation software? I’ve read that TomTom have already written the app, so why can’t I buy it already? My old TomTom is massive, compared to my tiny, slim little iPhone, if I didn’t have to carry the TomTom with me, it would be a real bonus and my pockets would thank you.

And while I’m at it with a wishlist, could someone please design, manufacture and sell the following:

A powered dock for use in my car, that has a suction-cup windscreen mount, so I can position the iPhone like a SatNav, plus a built-in, sophisticated FM transmitter that scans to find the best frequency and then beams audio to my in-car stereo, in high quality.

My super-dooper in-car dock/transmitter/mount is not actually such a big ask and it would sell like proverbial hotcakes. Bundle it with a code to get a navigation app and you would probably sell 500,000 of them in the first year alone. I’m giving you a multimillion pound idea here, for free, so if one of you do this, at least cut me in for a slice of the pie. Or just send me one of these cool in-car suction-cup, FM-transmitter thingies for free. It’s the least you could do!

There is a third thing that separates the new iPhone 3G from its predecessor, though you can upgrade the original to the new 2.0 software and enjoy it as well. I’m talking about third party applications which you can access via iTunes or on the iPhone itself. Some apps are free, others cost. So far, I’ve only installed the freebies.

I’m not being cheap, its just none of the pay apps have really appealed to me and the best ones seem to be games and I’m not that bothered. When I see one I like the look of (navigation software!!!!!), I’ll happily part with my readies.

There are so many applications available already that I’m not going to actually talk about any of the specific ones now, but I’d rather come back at another time to give them proper attention.

What can’t be denied is that this is the real game changer with the iPhone 3G, the ability to do so many cool things with it. And that’s just today, who knows what tomorrow’s killer application for the iPhone might be…perhaps one of you out there in internetland is already working on the next HUGE thing! Just whisper it in my ear, before your start-up has its IPO, so I can get in on the ground floor and make a little dirty lucre too…!

The one thing no-one seems to ever mention when they write about the iPhone is the phone itself. I think that shows you how far we come with personal technology and gadgets, that the voice-communication function of something with the word “phone” in its name, is taken for granted and doesn’t matter that much.

It does to me and one of my concerns about the iPhone was how it performed as a basic mobile telephone.

It turns out I had nothing to fear, the iPhone is a very robust cellphone. Calls over my network on 3G are clear and the connection seems strong. The speakerphone function really works too, dialling a contact or a phone number is also very simple and works very well.

What’s interesting about the iPhone is the many standard mobile phone functions it DOESN’T do. There’s no MMS messaging, so no sending photos as text messages. There’s no way to forward a text message either. The iPhone has BlueTooth, but the only thing it uses it for is to connect a wireless headset. You can’t send a photo to your computer, or to another phone, you can’t exchange contacts with another phone, you can’t even Bluejack strangers!

I don’t really understand why Apple has locked these functions out. At the very least, let us send photos over bluetooth. And synching notes from my Mac would be useful too!

Something else I don’t understand is the lack of cut & paste. It couldn’t be that hard to get a clipboard like functionality running on it. It’s supposed to be the same software that runs on Macs, so what’s the problem? I know some Apple big-wig mentioned that it was on their list of things to do and they just didn’t have time to get to it, but that comes off sounding lame. There’s got to be some marketing reason for withholding this function, I just haven’t a clue what it could be!

All of these cool things do come at a cost and I don’t mean your monthly bill, though they might sting a bit too. I mean battery life, or the lack of it. Surfing the net, checking emails, playing with apps, all drain the battery far faster than you would like and its very easy to see it drop 50% in a couple of hours.

I could see carrying a spare dock cable and attaching it to the nearest PC at every opportunity. It’s another reason why I want a powered dock for the car. I don’t see how I would get through a full day of serious usage without topping up the battery a couple of times.

So am I happy with my new iPhone?

What do you think? It’s easily the coolest, most powerful device I’ve ever had the pleasure of owning. I’m looking forward to 18 months of delirious joy as I find new and fun things to do with it.

And at the end of 18 months, I can only imagine what sort of iPhone I will be upgrading to then! It will probably transport me to a virtual new reality where I’m the king of the universe and everyone worships me as a living god. Now, that’s a app I’d buy!

Man, am I pissed off!

I’m still sitting here without an iPhone and I think every single one of the many people I’ve spoken to at 02 have lied to me about it, repeatedly.

I’m fucking fuming!

Imagine if I had to take Friday off because I was told IT was coming, only to be told on Friday that IT was coming on Monday. Imagine if today was my second day of missing out on work, to wait for a delivery that’s near as I can tell, not coming.

Now imagine I was looking at taking a third day off to actually receive my iPhone. Wouldn’t you be feeling homicidal?

I have the urge to crush, kill and destroy! Thanks O2!

Luckily, I haven’t had to take any time off work; I was off on Friday anyway and while I am working tonight, Mrs. H is off today, so it wouldn’t have been a problem if it was coming today.

But its not grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

This morning’s O2 liar is “investigating” why my order hasn’t been shipped yet. She says the “stock hasn’t been released”, which is bullshit, because I was told on Weds that it was following my credit check. She says it could be still sitting in their warehouse, awaiting clearance for shipment…

As fucking if!

There probably isn’t a 16gb iPhone 3G to be had right now in the entire country. The chances of a stray one, just sitting on a shelf in a warehouse with my name on it, awaiting someone’s green light is laughably absurd.

I’ve just had a call back from O2…they still don’t know if I have an iPhone waiting for me. Their “system” is giving them mixed signals and its not clear what’s going on. How impressive is that?

The woman who phoned me back says she will keep an eye on my order all day and will phone back if it is shipped out today for delivery tomorrow.

Put it this way, I’m not going to sit by the telephone waiting for that call.

I don’t think I’ve ever put so much effort into spending my own money. This is beyond a joke. I wish I could go to another network and get one, O2 appear to be shite!

I have iWorries over my brand new, shiny, lickable iPhone 3G.

iDon’t think its coming today.

And ok, ok, enough with the iWord jokes. They are wearing a bit iThin now.

As I previously posted, I was assured on Wednesday that my iPhone would be delivered today, but that now appears not to be the case.

According to O2’s website, I should have had a text message before 6pm yesterday, confirming delivery today. I didn’t get that text. Further more, a mate of mine who is getting an iPhone 3G as an upgrade has been able to track his package all the way to DHL. My order is showing online as still “in progress”.

I’ve already phoned O2 this morning. Yes I am sad.

The rep I spoke to told me they are still having problems with their website and database and she couldn’t confirm if it was coming today or Monday. She said the stock had been allocated, but it didn’t appear to be shipped yet, but because of their internal problems, she couldn’t be sure. Her feeling was that a Monday delivery was much more likely, but again she assured me I was definitely getting one and told me not to buy one at the shop.

As if the shops have any left by now! I’ve had reports from my spies of small (10-30 people) queues at every O2 and Car Phone Warehouse shop they passed this morning. With the very limited stock numbers, I’m not the only potentially disappointed person in the UK today.

Of course, I could be pleasantly surprised by the arrival of my brand new tech-toy, but I am not feeling confident at all.

It seems like O2 screwed this up royally and they should never have attempted to pre-sell them online. If they kept all the stock they had for the shops, I’d probably be stroking mine right now. Instead, I foolishly believed that pre-ordering as soon as they went on sale would secure me one on launch day. Oh what a twat I am!

Instead of having a huge celebration of gadgetery-geekery, I’ve spent the better part of this week suffering from a bad case of tech-stress and customer service rage.

So there you go, its 9:30am on the 11th of July, international iPhone day and rather than playing with my new toy, I’m sitting here playing with myself and that’s no where near as satisfying as it sounds!

Please Mr. iPhone man, deliver mine today! I’ve waited oh so long and I’ve been oh so patient! I deserve to have all my iPhone 3G dreams come true!

Don’t I?

Doesn’t everyone?

That’s not wishful thinking, the title up there. That’s what O2 told me on the phone today.

I won’t bore you with the details, but I managed to get a real live human on the phone, provided the info they needed for my credit check and had it confirmed that a black, 16gb iPhone 3G will be delivered to my north London lair on Friday.

I’ll believe it when I see it, and so will you, because I’m going to post some pictures of it once its here.

Tune in again on Friday to see if O2 make one particularly demanding customer in north London very happy. I’m counting the seconds already.

Back in September, I wrote a little piece on why my phone was not an iPhone, yet.

But soon, my phone will be an iPhone.

iHope.

iPray.

iDream.

iPre-registered…

…for the brand new, shiny lickable iPhone 3G just as soon as O2 let me. Yesterday, I received an email advising me that I could pre-order one of these little babies online and it would be delivered to my north London lair on Friday, which is the official launch day for this latest version of the world’s favourite touchscreen mobile.

Sorted!

Or so I thought.

I placed the order before 8:30am yesterday, put in all my details and saw the conformation screen with my order number. They said I would receive an email with all of these details as well.

I’m still waiting for that email to arrive.

In O2’s FAQs, they say you can email them your PAC code, from your previous network and they can add it to your account, so I did.

The reply I received was a bit surprising.

I need to mention that this reply to my email wasn’t spotted by me until many hours later, because I slept all day, because I was between shifts.

I still am, so there will be another snooze very soon.

While I was sleeping, O2’s entire online ordering system was melting down into a steaming puddle of poo.

They were overwhelmed by the number orders being placed, or “victims of their own success” as I am sure some O2 spokesperson will be stating in front of a TV camera very soon. That’s what all companies say when they can’t keep up with demand; its an oldie but a goodie.

So anyway, I wake up and waiting for me is an actual reply from an actual human O2 employee, who apologised for the lack of a facility to input my PAC code when I placed my order and then explained what I needed to do with it (all after I receive the iPhone 3G) AND then went on to share an extremely important fact…

“Your order (on-xxxxxxxxx) for the 16Gb (Gigabytes) iPhone 3G is currently out of stock. You’ll receive your order on or after 11 July 2008.”

The key words in that sentence are:
- out of stock
- on or after

Fuck.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

FUCK!

You have no idea how deeply my little heart sank at this most distressing and unpleasant turn of events.

I ordered my iPhone 3G less than 30 mins after they went on sale and it sounds like there’s a better than average chance I will be sitting here all day on Friday, staring out my window for a courier that will never come.

Oh the horror!

I’ve been waiting a seriously long time for my iPhone 3G, forgoing the original version which I could have had last autumn…and if I did get that one, I would be getting a free upgrade to the new model, just for signing a new 18 month contract.

These ain’t tears of joy staining my keyboard, trust me.

So I wait and I wonder. Is there an iPhone 3G sitting in a warehouse somewhere with “the northlondonhippy” on printed on the label!

I hope not, because there’s no way they’d know where to deliver it, but my real world name and proper address might be better.

You get the idea anyway, either I ordered early enough to have them allocate me one, or they have so few that they ran out in like 10-15 minutes of online trading and I’m screwed.

No one knows for certain how many iPhone 3G’s are even available, O2 and Apple have remained silent on this issue, at least according to the various newspaper reports I read this morning. The closest I got to any sort of detail was that one newspaper thought half the iPhone 3Gs were being pre-sold online and the other half were heading to O2 shops around the UK. How do you play the odds on that one?

So here’s my next quandary, do I cancel my online order and gamble that I will have better luck at 8am on Friday at my local O2 shop? Will there be a queue? Will there be enough to go around? Will I get mugged on my way back home, because criminals read the news too?

I don’t have the answer to any of those questions, except that last one…I would die or kill to protect my brand new, shiny, lickable iPhone 3G, so you best think twice before you attempt to pilfer it from me!

I’ve got mixed feelings about O2 already and I’ve only been a (non active) customer of theirs for only 24 hours.

On the one hand, I’ve had a personal reply to my emailed question, but on the other hand, they have not confirmed my order by email, as they said they would, nor given me any sort of update on my order’s progress.

In light of the massive media attention this launch has seen and will likely see over the next week, you would think O2 would be prepared for a situation like this. Holding emails and press statements would be out there already to counteract all the negative information I’ve seen about shortages and poor customer service.

Maybe they should hire me to do their PR.

Then again, they don’t have to do anything. It seems we’re all slavering like rabid dogs at the prospect of owning the latest iPhone and no matter how badly we’re treated, we still want one.

It’s not like we can get one elsewhere, thanks to O2’s exclusive deal with Apple, we have no real choice.

I’m no different, I’m willing to jump through multiple hoops of fire and swear an oath to satan if I have to, as long as I’m clutching mine this Friday.

Ok, I know I’ve already sworn several oaths to satan, one more’s not going to make a blind bit of difference.

As long as I get my goddamn iPhone 3G on Friday, I don’t care about anything else!

Please oh great gods of high technology, may you be smiling upon me, your most worthy and devoted disciple!

Just gimme my goddamn iPhone, goddammit!

There’s about one week left to enter my rocking Bubbler contest. You can really win a brand new Bushmaster Bubbler, plus other cool prizes. You want some cool shit from the hippy, don’t you? Click here, click now!

I took delivery of a Playstation 3 this week, along with a copy of Grand Theft Auto 4 (GTA 4). I’ve abandoned north London and am now a resident of Liberty City. Just call me the libertycityhippy from now on.

I’ve never been much of a gamer, the last console I owned was a Nintendo NES, back in the early 80s. I haven’t really played any computer games since then.

I debated buying a PS3 for a while as I think having one is the equivalent of giving up on reality, though technically I gave up on it a couple of decades ago. I’ve got friends who have been telling me how cool they are for a while and with the release of GTA 4, I thought it was time to take the plunge.

I very nearly bought a PS2 and GTA San Andreas, but convinced myself my free time would be better spent pursuing random acts of creativity. I’m feeling far less creative at the moment and rather than trying to extract blood from a stone, I’ve elected to spend my leisure time in a virtual world where I can steal cars, shag whores and kill people. That’s better than exploring the same activities in reality around north London, I guess.

Video games are time bandits and they will eat up your free time quite effectively and if you’re as crap at playing them as I am, they will take up even more of your time.

I thought long and hard about this purchase, seeing it as a mini-surrender to having a life. In some ways, this is me giving up, just a little. Not forever, not even until I finish GTA 4 (which at the rate I am going will take years), but just enough to clear some of the cobwebs out of my skull. It was either this or some LSD and finding quality acid these days seems like too much of a struggle, so I am now a gamer.

Setting up the PS3 was a breeze, I’ve connected it directly to my Bravia’s only HDMI input and I have the output set to 1080i, which is the best resolution my tv can deliver. The audio also goes via the TV and is then fed back to my amplifier via a stereo cable – not ideal, but serviceable. I only have 2.1 audio, so its not like I am missing out on the 5.1 surround sound – I don’t have enough speakers to benefit from it.

I was also able to get the PS3 straight onto my home wi-fi network, which means online game play and updates are already within my grasp. I’ve actually run some updates already and my operating system is bang up to date.

I bought 2 games with the console, the afformentioned GTA 4 and Gran Tursimo 5 – The Prologue, on the recommendation of a mate.

Gran Turismo is positively stunning, especially the backgrounds. I’ve been doing laps around a track in London and it is pin sharp and photo-realistic. If you’ve seen it, you’ll know what I mean, it is positively jaw-droppingly good! I’m still crap at controlling the car, though and I definitely need lots of practise.

GT5 is a taster of the full version of the game, which is due to be released next year and only cost me 17 quid, which I thought was a real bargain.

GTA 4 is unbelievably involved and has a scope and scale which is mind boggling. The gameplay takes place in an expansive and extremely realistic realm, which is massive and has a level of detail which would thrill most feature film makers. I can’t get over how good it all looks.

The main reason I really bought all this is I’ve felt for a while that I was missing out on a significant part of home entertainment by not having a games console. Video games are big business, making as much or more annually than most feature films. I think I read GTA 4 took over 50 million dollars in its first week of release, making it the best selling game of all time.

GTA 4 cost nearly 40 quid, which may sound expensive, but if you factor in the number of hours I’ll be playing it and the shear size of the playing field, you can see why they are that expensive. The amount of time and man-hours that go into developing such a game is immense and they have to make it back somehow.

I also think there’s probably work to be had in the world of gaming, for a middle-aged, make-believe hippy from north London. Someone has to write the storylines and create the characters – I could do that! I would love to do that! Games probably reach more people than films, so it’s a big audience to satisfy and satisfy them, I would!

So who out there has any contacts with the major gaming developers? Wanna hook me up with a highly paid, emotionally satisfying position coming up with concepts and stories for future games? I promise you that given the chance, I could come up with the most compelling games imaginable!

Like how about this…a northlondonhippy videogame! You would get to be me, in an RPG sort of way. You could hang out in my virtual lair, roll and smoke virtual spliffs, watch TV and play PS3 games, as me. And then their would be missions, like scoring weed on a Friday night, but still having time to get home and order a nice Japanese take-away, before the restaurant closes.

You’d pay 40 quid for that, wouldn’t you?

You can still win my bubbler. Go on, take a chance, its not like it costs you anything!

I’ve just finished a mammoth run of work. I collapsed in a heap yesterday and stayed that way for around 12 hours until one of my kittens woke me up around 4:30am this morning. Hey ho.

My kittens are now 10 months old and the little boy is already huge. He is going to be a giant, monster cat when he is fully grown. He was the one who woke me this morning, by sitting on my chest and staring me awake. His little sister was laying on my legs at the same time, sort of rolling around, also trying to get my attention.

And that’s really all they wanted; attention. There was plenty of food and water for them, they didn’t need me for that. They simply required me to pay them attention. That didn’t take very long.

Once up, I had to feed the older cats, a 3 year old and a 16 year old. The 3 year just needed me to pretend to feed her, so that she would think it was time for her to eat. Yes, she is slightly neurotic, but that’s OK.

The 16 year old, our oldest cat needs tinned food these days, as the dry stuff is a bit too hard for her to chew. She’s nearly completely blind from cataracts, but still gets around the house very well. That’s not true outside though and as of a couple of days ago, I can no longer let her go out. She went under the fence into my neighbour’s yard and couldn’t find her way back - I had to go and rescue her and she was carried home in my arms. She’s still quite feisty and is doing quite well considering her age.

After sorting out the cats, I parked myself in front of my iMac and did some surfing. Between my RSS feeds and sites I visit regularly, I probably visited at least 30 of them before 6am.

I also downloaded the latest episode of Lost. Yes, I know I could wait a few days and catch it on Sky One, but why would I do that? Then I would miss out on all the cool stuff on the internet that follows, which is released at the American ABC pace.

I’m really into Lost, I think it is easily one of the best programmes on the box. It’s so complex and layered and mostly it does my head in, but I know they are taking it somewhere. I am really looking forward to watching the last 2 seasons play out, especially as there are only 3 more hours of it left this series, before another agonising 10 month wait for more.

I’ve also been watching Mad Men, which I missed when it first aired and was easily downloadable, but thanks to BBC4, I’ve been able to see the entire series. Wow, its good and Don Draper has got to be the ultimate in capitalist anti-heroes. I’ve always liked anti-heroes and secretly like to think I’m one myself. You’re all rooting for me, even though you know you shouldn’t.

After hanging out with the Losties, I made myself my first proper coffee of the day with my Vivi. I haven’t used it over a week, because of my erratic work schedule and sleep pattern, but I haven’t gone without excellent coffee.

My secondary method of brewing fresh coffee is now a device called an AeroPress.

It’s quick and easy to use and it cleans up in seconds. What’s not to love?

The cool thing for me about my AeroPress is that I can use the exact same coffee I use in the Vivi, ground the exact same way, so no messing around with the setting my grinder. The AeroPress makes what I would describe as something similar to espresso, in strength and volume, but not in texture or complexity. That’s ok, because the AeroPress costs significantly less than a proper pro-sumer espresso machine.

You can pick up an AeroPress for as little as under 20 quid (email me if you want the site selling them that low, they also sell the best freshly roasted beans in the UK) and it will make amazing coffee for you too.

By far, the most important thing you need for making great coffee is freshly roasted, freshly ground beans. When I first started looking into coffee, this was the most difficult thing to get my head around, mainly because of the cost of a decent grinder capable of producing the quality you need for a good espresso machine. Some people even say the espresso machine is an accessory for the grinder and that didn’t really make sense to me until I used my set-up for a while.

An espresso machine basically has an on/off switch; you turn the pump on to force water through the ground coffee (at the right pressure and temperature) and then you switch it off when you’ve reached the required volume or level of extraction. That’s all the control you really have, on and off. The grinder is what actually gives you any say in how your coffee is produced, the coarser the grinder, the faster the pour, the finer the grind, the slower the pour. You aim to produce a double espresso in around 30 seconds, with the colour of the coffee stream going tan around that time as well.

Ok, this is tedious to you if you have no interest in coffee, but as you can probably tell, I’ve really got into this in a big way. I’m drinking my 2nd coffee of the day right now and its every bit as good as my first. Consistency is what you aim for in making good coffee and I can pretty much reproduce the same result over and over. That job in Starbucks is looking more and more likely!

It’s just gone 8am, here in north London, the sun is shining and its expected to be another warm day. I’ve been awake for 3 and 1/2 hours and I’ve pretty much told you everything I’ve already done. I’ve replied to a few emails and now I’ve written this post. You are fully and completely up to date.

All that’s left to do now, is post this on my website and you’ll know that’s happened because you’re reading it. I’ve got nothing left to share with you for now.

A-hoy hippyfans, there be hippies here!

Well, one hippy, actually and I’m not even a real hippy. Sue me for false advertising and then request a full refund!

My month of little working isn’t panning out as I had planned. Who’s surprised? No matter how much free time I have, its never enough, but then it’s never really free either.

How do normal people do it? You know, people who work Monday through Friday, 9-5, every week. How do they manage to keep it all together with nothing but the weekend to do their real life stuff? It boggles my mind.

For the better part of the last 20 years, I’ve managed to avoid the Mon-Fri routine. The life of a shiftworker is much more fun and there’s nothing I like better than having days off during the week. Except maybe easy sex and hard drugs, but then they go hand in hand with lots of free time and the soul of a junior-satan.

Don’t you have the soul of a junior satan? Guess its just me then!

You see, I understand the inherent difference between good and bad, I’m just a bit capricious when it comes to deciding which side of the line to choose. I make up my own mind, using my own moral compass for guidance and my “true north” probably differs from most people’s.

I often choose the path of least resistance, but then at my age and so lacking in ambition and direction, what else would I do?

I spent an entire day this week swapping out my shitty, cheap old stereo for a brand new, shiny silver AV Amp. I bought a Pioneer VSX-917v and saved 60 quid waiting until after xmas. That’s when I first scoped it out, back in December, but elected to wait and it was a wise decision.

My old stereo, an 8 year old Technics, was a combo CD player, cassette deck(!!) and radio receiver, but all I really used it for is the amp, which had SKY+, a DVD player and my mac mini connected to it, all with stereo analogue connections. For the last couple of months, the sound has been cutting out, only restored by a well placed, measured slap on the top of the unit with a flat palm. I’m sure that’s the best way to fix anything, anyway.

The cutting out was steadily worsening, so I ordered the Pioneer unit a couple of weeks ago and finally got around to installing it last week.

I bought some digital audio cables, TOSlinks for the mini and SKY+ and a digital coaxial for the DVD player. The new amp was too big to go on the shelf where the old stereo lived, which meant I had to tear down the entire set-up and re-cable it all from scratch. Yawn.

It took me a few hours to rip it all apart and clean out the years of dust trapped in the inaccessible bits and a couple more hours to reinstall, configure and test everything, but eventually I had it all working well.

The new amp will support 7.1 audio, but my living room won’t. I can’t even fit 5.1, because I have no space for the rear surround speaker. Right now, it only has 2 speakers connected, but I have a subwoofer ordered and the space cleared for it when it comes.

Everything worked great the first day it was connected and I was very pleased with the sound quality. I kept the Technics speakers from the old set-up because they are small, but decent and are bi-amped, which the Pioneer also supports. I am very happy with the sound and expect the subwoofer will make it sound even better.

On the second day, Mrs. Hippy discovered a burning smell coming out of the amp. It turns out, the amp runs ridiculously hot and needs to be well ventilated. It’s current home, underneath the shelf where my TV lives, has precious little space between the top of the Pioneer and the shelf. Ut-oh. I have to move the Pioneer. Yawn.

My house is small, and my living room is smaller. I don’t have any other options for placing the Pioneer amp. I have to magic up a 50cm x 50cm space, and I think I’ve found it, all I need is a small table to put the amp on…and IKEA sells one for £7.99. Now, I just have to get myself to IKEA, which is hell on earth with extra-added yuppies.

I don’t want my new amp to burn up, it sounds far too good. Right now, I have a small fan aimed at it, which doesn’t really help with the ambient noise levels, but does keep things cooler and smelling less like an electrical fire! Hopefully, I’ll have the whole thing sorted out in the next day or so.

I meant to wake up really early this morning and visit IKEA, but I didn’t. Maybe I’ll go later today, if the spirit moves me.

I also need to buy another set of cables…longer ones. Repositioning the amp puts it out of range of all the new cables I bought.

Nothing in my life is ever easy, not even the simplest of tasks. Swapping out an old stereo for a new amplifier shouldn’t become a major engineering project. And I should be taller, too!

I’m still digging excellent coffee every day, though, which softens the blow on everything. Right now, I am sipping a freshly made cappuccino, crafted by my own hand not five minutes ago, from freshly ground beans that were grown in El Salvador and roasted 10 days ago. Yumm.

This week’s coffee battle has been over frothed milk. Frothing milk properly takes practise and skill and I woefully inadequate at creating microfoam, which is the goal of baristas. Microfoam has a velvety texture and is pourable, you should never need to spoon it into the cup. It shouldn’t have peaks either and shouldn’t be stiff like whipped egg whites.

I’ve yet to work out the secret to perfect microfoam, though I am trying all the tricks suggested online, from chilling the metal jug, to using full-fat milk. Actually, and this makes no sense to me at all, I am having better luck with skimmed milk, which defies logic and everything I’ve read online. Go figure.

Don’t laugh, one day my coffee brewing skills may save my life. When TV news finally chews me up and spits me out, Starbucks here I come!

I mentioned recently that I bought a brand new coffee making rig. It’s true.

Before xmas, I decided it was time to get a proper espresso maker. I’d rid myself of my old monstrosity; a combination steam driven espresso maker and 8-cup drip pot together in one ugly, black plastic casing.

I never used the drip pot and the espresso maker churned out drinkable, yet not quite right cappuccinos and lattes and I’m a bit of a coffee obsessive, especially now.

I started doing what I usually do when I’m interested in something, I surfed the internet and I found three really good websites:

www.coffeegeek.com

www.homebarista.com

www.toomuchcoffee.com

Each site is chock full of extremely useful information about coffee, from equipment reviews to bean recommendations and tips and tricks on how to get the best from your coffee. I learned loads, but still have lots more to learn. If you look carefully, you might even find some posts from me on one of the forums.

Growing up, I wasn’t into coffee. My parents either drank instant, or weak and watery filter coffee and all of it decaf.

It wasn’t until the early 80s that I had my first proper cappuccino. From then, I was hooked.

It wasn’t as easy as it is now to get a good coffee, this was in the days before there was a Starbucks on every corner, you had to look around to find places that made them right.

My Italian grandfather, my mother’s father, who came from just outside Naples, used to make espresso using a traditional stove-top, Moka pot and I can remember my parents saying that it was far too strong and bitter for their taste. I never got to try any, even though I wanted to. They said I wouldn’t like it. At that age, they were probably right, but I’ll never know. Grandpa’s been in heaven for a very long time.

I’ve owned a couple of steam driven espresso machines, besides the old one I recently binned. I bought my first one in the early 90s and used it for several years before it gave up the ghost. Another one followed and that lasted a few more years, but now, I own a proper machine.

It turned out, before I started my manic online information gathering exercise, I knew less than diddly squat about coffee.

For starters, the online coffee community refers to those steam driven espresso machines as “steam toys” as they don’t make real espresso. By steam driven, what I mean is that the water is heated to the temperature of steam and the steam pressure forces the overheated water through the ground coffee. That would make the water far too hot for brewing coffee.

Coffee should be brewed at just below boiling point; steam is water heated to beyond boiling point. That’s not good.

Proper espresso machines come in three varieties, all of them produce water at “brew temperature” plus steam for frothing milk, but each accomplishes this in different ways.

The most basic machine is called a single boiler-dual use machine and it works like this: Inside it is a a single boiler, with two user controllable thermostats, one heats the water to brew temp, the second brings it up to steam temp. The catch is, you have to wait for the machine to transition from one temp to the next, which can take a minute or so, depending upon the machine. You have to time what you are doing very carefully to get the most out of this machine. These are the least expensive as well and include most Gaggia home models and the Rancilio Silvia I contemplated buying.

At the other end of the scale are dual boiler machines; one at brew temp and a 2nd at steam temp. With this sort of system, you can pull shots and steam milk at the same time, without any waiting or transitioning. Most professional machines work this way.

And in the middle, the third category is what I bought, a heat exchanger (HX) machine. These are clever devices, they use one boiler which only comes up to steam temp, and the brew water is flash heated via a heat exchanger that passes through the boiler. This set up gives you continuous steam and brew capability, but without the extra complication of 2 boilers.

Have I bored the bejeezus out of you yet?
I’ll stop being technical now.

All of these machines are fairly simple to operate, but it takes a certain amount of knowledge and as I am learning, experience to maximise their potential.

By far the most important info I picked up from my new found coffee websites concerned beans and grinders. You need a seriously good grinder and you need freshly roasted beans.

Decent grinders, like anything good, aren’t cheap and my coffee expert pals all suggest you budget 50% of the cost of your espresso machine, for the grinder. Espresso machines can be quite finicky about how finely ground the coffee is, too fine and the machine will choke and you’ll get nothing out of it and if it is too coarse, your shot will pour too fast and you’ll have a cup of sour tasting swill.

Being a complete beginner at this, it took me a couple of hours of experimentation before I got my first drinkable shot from my new kit. Thankfully, the people I bought it from sent me a free kilo of roasted beans because I burned through half it on that first day and all but the last 2 shots went down the drain.

A proper espresso, single (1 oz) or double (2 oz), should take approximately 20-25 seconds to pour. Using lined shot glasses, marked at the 1 oz level and a stop watch, you aim for this magic timing and amount by adjusting the fineness of your grind. It took me a while to get a feel for all this, but since then I have used different beans, which required adjustments and have been able to fine-tune the grinder to improve my results. Today, I’ve made myself two cappuccinos and the espressos that went into them were the best I’ve made so far. They weren’t perfect, but I’m on my way!

By far, what has made the biggest difference to my coffee is fresh beans. I really wish someone share this key fact with me ages ago. Coffee beans need to rest for about 2 days after roasting, to allow for the CO2 gasses to be released, don’t ask me why. After that, its fresh for around 2 weeks, before it begins to go stale. Oh and it needs to be ground just prior to brewing, as its starts to go off within minutes of being turned to brown dust.

I didn’t know any of that shit! And its all true!

For the last few years, I’ve been using a cafetière, or press pot or French press, if you prefer, but I’ve been putting pre-ground, supermarket bought coffee into it. Drinkable, but nothing like the coffee I’ve been enjoying since I bought the new set-up.

Freshly ground beans are a revelation, with flavours so rich and complex that I don’t have the vocabulary or knowledge to really express it in any meaningful way. I can say, without question, that in the last week or so, I’ve had some of the best coffee I’ve ever tasted, anywhere!

Even Mrs. H noticed when I switched to the freshly roasted beans, that it tasted better. The place I’m getting them from is an online shop, which roasts them to order and ships them out, the same day. You receive them the next day, well packaged, with the date of roasting printed on the pack. And it’s not that expensive, either.

The espresso machine I bought is an Izzo Vivi, which is made in Italy, and is very shiny and heavy. The original design of this type of machine was patented in 1961 and it has a very distinctive grouphead, which if you visit coffee bars, you would probably recognise. It’s called an E61 grouphead; the grouphead is the bit they lock the portafilter into, just before brewing. Oh and the portafilter is the handle-thing which holds the filter basket, filled with ground coffee. I bet you know what I mean!

It took me ages to decide on which machine to buy and while my decision was guided and informed by those websites I mentioned, the person who helped me the most was the salesperson I spoke to at the online company where I bought it.

I spent nearly an hour on the telephone with this salesperson, asking as many questions as I could, including “which one do you own?” and “which one has the least returns?” The Izzo Vivi was the answer to both questions and I was sold. It was one of the models I was considering, anyway, so it wasn’t a complete surprise. Actually, the one I was leaning towards was significantly more expensive than the Vivi, but my salesperson friend said it wasn’t as well constructed and it was made of inferior components.

The Vivi is based on a commercial design and uses many of the same parts and components as its bigger, professional brothers. That means if and when it ever needs repairs, the new bits won’t be that expensive.

The place I bought it from is really cool, they give you a 2-year warranty plus they unbox, check and calibrate the machine, before shipping it to you. I was very impressed. They also double box it, which meant it arrived in pristine condition.

I also bought my grinder from this company, a Macap M4D, but I won’t bore you with too many details, except to say it is a professional piece of kit and should last for years, as should the espresso machine. They told me with care and maintenance, the Vivi should keep going for at least 20 years.

I’m not going to post a link to this company, as I don’t know if they would appreciate being associated with some drugged up weird-o like myself, but if anyone is interested in finding out more, please email me and I’ll gladly provide you with the link; just don’t tell ‘em the hippy sent you! I am very impressed with them and would heartily provide them with my seal of approval and recommendation. I don’t think I would have bought a machine in this price range, from anyone else.

Likewise for my source for coffee beans; I would love to throw some business their way, the coffee from them has been orgasmic and the service has been first class too, but I don’t want to piss them off because of who I am. I’m happy to provide the link privately, should you wish to try some for yourself and they’ll grind it for you, if you wish.

Some companies, like my good friends at EDIT are happy to be associated with me, others might find me a bit too controversial. That’s fair enough, I know I’m not everyone’s cup of tea, or rather coffee.

In my world, coffee is a drug, just like anything else that effects your mood or central nervous system. Caffeine is a serious stimulant and I am very sensitive to it, always have been. That means I have to stop drinking coffee fairly early in my day, or sleep will be elusive come bedtime. It doesn’t matter, because I really love the stuff, never more than I do now!

My coffee journey? The title of the this entry, comes from a phrase I’ve seen often repeated, to newbies such as myself on coffee forums and it refers to the route you take to get the best coffee experience imaginable. With fresh beans, my new grinder and my new espresso machine, my journey has moved several light years ahead in a very positive direction.

Bottoms up!