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!

We’re already over a week into 2008 and I haven’t posted a thing. In that case, belated New Year greetings and seasonal wishes to you. I hope that this brand new year brings you everything you’ve ever hoped and dreamed for.

This is a shitty time of year for me, as I am not a fan of the holiday season, cold, grey weather, or my birthday which is also falls this month. Another year down the drain is all I can think.

I’m going to be 45 this month, which is undeniably middle-age, or at least how we define it. The reality of me actually making it to 90 is laughably ludicrous, which makes the term middle-aged a total sham in my case.

I don’t feel 45, not that I even know what 45 should feel like. I still feel 15, which could say more about my stunted emotional growth than anything else. Ageing is the physical process, maturity refers to your mental age. Maybe I am 15?

Sometimes I think I am obsessed with ageing and growing old; it’s even a category on my blog. I do think about it too much. It’s the passage of time that really gets me, not the growing old.

My life is finite. I only have so much time and with each day that slips by, I have less. If I am really hoping to accomplish anything with my life, I better get my skates on or come to terms with the reality that my dreams will never come true. I’m not sure which one is worse.

The change in the calendar, combined with a milestone birthday is really bumming me out. You see, even hippies get the blues. Forty-five years of underachievement and failure can have that effect on even the cheeriest of souls and trust me fuckers, the last thing I am is cheery!

What’s a poor hippy to do?

The usual, just keep plodding along, doing whatever it is I do and distracting myself as best I can. If it weren’t for soft drugs and consumer purchases, my life would be as empty as a void in deep space!

Oh and don’t forget my exercises in creative futility! I am going to record that album of original northlondonhippy music!

And I am going to work on my novel. My real novel, the one I have been planning for over a decade. I did knock out 2 other novels in the last few years, the second one will be published soon I hope. They’re not under my real name, they’re not even under my hippy banner. I don’t really count them, but they were fun to write.

My real novel will actually be done under my REAL NAME. I don’t do anything under my real name, so that should tell you how serious I’m taking it. It’s also why I’ve been taking so long with it, I want to get this one 100% right. I want it to be a literary masterwork, which perfectly captures the human condition.

I want a lot of things.

Like right now, what I want is a high-end, pump driven, espresso machine and this has become my latest obsession. I’ve been hanging out on a couple of coffee-obsessive websites, CoffeeGeek and HomeBarista are my two current favourites. If you’re serious about coffee, you should really have a look.

Don’t laugh. The pursuit of the perfect espresso is right up this hippy’s street. After all, caffeine is a drug and we all know I dig drugs and I also adore a good ritual as prerequisite to enjoying any drug. Espresso extraction is a skill and at the hobbiest level and beyond, it becomes a religion.

There are some seriously serious people out there making some amazing coffee at home and I want to be one of them. I’ve been doing research online for the last month or so and am now ready to take the plunge.

The first thing I learned is that the grinder you buy is every bit as important as the espresso machine you choose. And if you’re serious about coffee, you will only want beans freshly roasted, they start to go stale after around 2 weeks. You need to spend at least 50% of what you spend on the espresso machine, on a decent grinder.

Pulling the perfect shot of espresso isn’t simple, it requires knowledge, practise and skill, but if you can master this, you will be rewarded with exceptional coffee every time.

The home espresso scene is nowhere near as big in the UK as it is in north America, but there are several companies specialising in high-end kit. After a lot of research and careful consideration, I’ve decided to go with the Rancilio Silvia espresso machine, paired with Rancilio’s Rocky grinder - the doserless model. It has quite a good reputation with aficionados online, but is not an easy machine to master. I think that’s part of the appeal, that I will have to work hard to get the best results.

That’s what hobbies are; distractions from reality. My new found coffee obsession is a healthy diversion from the things that bring me down. Once I have perfected my extraction technique and I am regularly fuelled with the finest cappuccinos, expertly crafted, I will be buzzing with caffeine. That in turn should inspire me to spend more of my increasing limited free time, writing. Everyone wins!

I’ll be ordering my new machine hopefully this week, as soon as they come back in stock following a rush on them for xmas. I’m hoping that by next week, I’ll be brewing my own, right here in my north London lair. How fucking cool with that be!

My life might not be perfect, but at least my coffee soon will be!

Happy fucking xmas, fuckers!

I hope you all stuffed your faces and got got everything on your wish list; not limited to, but probably including: an iPhone, an iPod Touch, an iPod nano, a MacBook, a PSP, a PS3 and if you are seriously lucky, a Wii and if you are super lucky, naturally you found an nlh deluxe under your tree!

I’ve had a fairly normal xmas, well normal for me, because I’ve worked right through the holidays and I ain’t finished yet! I worked xmas eve, xmas day and I am working tonight, boxing day too.

Apparently, loads of people have to work over xmas, only I didn’t “have” to. I chose to and given the chance, I will probably choose to again next year.

Next year is a long way, away. Who knows what the next 12 months may bring? Do you? If you answered yes, then email me with some horse racing results for next week, or better yet the lottery numbers for the next giant rollover. Please?

The first xmas I ever sold was 18 years ago. I was offered the chance to do a shift in a newsroom in NYC for double pay, 400 cool dollaroonies.

Did I just type “dollaroonies”? I must be stoned.

I am.

I remember ringing up my mother and informing her that I was going to be a newswhore for xmas and I’d be missing the usual family gathering. That was 1989. She was less than impressed, but ka-ching! That was a lot of money! It still is!

As a kid growing up, xmas was a big deal and in my (now estranged) extended family, there was much celebrating to do with both my mother’s and father’s side of the family.

As I got older and we fell out with various branches of our family tree, xmas’s were downscaled, but still big events in my immediate family.

I liked it mainly for the gifts.

Xmas stopped being fun when I stopped getting bicycles.

The last xmas I shared with my parents was 1991 and every year since, I’ve either worked or just not gone. My dad died in Sept 2004, my mother is very disabled and has been confined to a bed, following a stroke in 2003 and now lives in a nursing home. That’s 13 xmas’s avoided.

I tried to write about all of this last year and I couldn’t finish it. I went into far more detail and skipping down memory lane was difficult, if not impossible and I gave up. I still have what I wrote, but I haven’t been able to bring myself to read it again. Hey ho.

For most people, I think the holidays are pure stress. All you need to do is visit your local high street or shopping district and watch how cunty everyone is to each other to see proof of this. Expectations have to be met at all costs, even if it means elbowing some old lady out of the way, so you can get the last copy of Nigella Express.

Xmas for me, has come to mean my family, my immediate family. When I think about xmas, I think about the four of us, my parents, my younger brother and me.

I can remember spending many xmas eve’s unable to sleep, because I was so excited; adrenaline coursing though my veins, making it impossible to rest.

I can remember the smell of my mother’s home-baked xmas cookies.

I can remember my dad swearing when he thought I couldn’t hear him, as he tried valiantly to assemble some crappy toy that wouldn’t survive in one piece for more than a week.

And I can remember my younger brother, just as excited as me, checking to see if our parents were awake at ridiculously early times, because we weren’t allowed to go downstairs until they were ready to accompany us for the ritual ripping of the wrapping paper.

I can remember more, much more, but it all just depresses me now because I’ll never have those times with my family again. I can’t.

These days, I don’t get excited about xmas, instead I count the seconds until it’s the 2nd of January. Then its all over and I can exhale.

Though when I think about that first xmas I sold, back in 1989, for 400 dollaroonies, I wish I could give them a refund. Four hundred bucks for one more xmas with my family would be the bargain of the millennium!

I hope wherever you are, all your holiday dreams came true and you spent it with people far less miserable than me. Maybe having me trapped behind a desk over the holidays is good for everyone, not just me. We’ll never know…

Do you need some cool gifts for some cool people? This hippy is here to help!

Xmas is less than 2 weeks away and if you haven’t finished your holiday gift shopping, then you are just like everyone else! But you’ve got something they haven’t got…a certain north London-based hippy with a questionable character. I’ve got a few suggestions to help you out.

I find xmas stressful, everything is busier, people are ruder and nothing pisses me off more than queueing up to spend my hard earned money.

Let me share a tale with you from last Saturday….

Last Saturday afternoon, I made the rather unfortunate mistake of visiting my local supermarket in my car. It’s a large chain supermarket, with a large car park. I needed to pick up a few things and didn’t have a choice.

When I arrived at the supermarket, I noticed the queue of cars departing, but didn’t really think too much of it. The car park was quite full, but I managed to find a space without any stress. I decided to abbreviate my shopping list, grabbed a hand basket and swept through the shop quite quickly. I even found a till with no one waiting and was checked out in record time. And then the real fun began.

I returned to my car to discover the car park had filled up even more and the queue of departing cars stretched to the very end of the car park. It took me around 10 minutes just to get out of my space, because of being blocked by other passing cars, arriving or departing.

After getting out of my space, I joined the queue of departing cars, heading towards the exit and that’s when the real fun began. The line of traffic was barely moving and after 15-20 minutes, I phoned Mrs. H to warn her I would be a bit later than I expected.

After 30 minutes of not moving, other people were starting to get restless and I began to see examples of road-rage, or rather, car-park rage. Cars, were trying to cut into the queue of cars heading for the exit, others were trying to merge from unexpected directions. Then cars arriving, started queuing up for limited parking spaces, cutting off departing cars and allowing merging cars to jump in front. It was total car-park chaos!

Being the resource sort and maintaining my calm through the regular ingestion of cigarettes and chocolates from my shopping, I got the number for the supermarket and rang it from my mobile phone. I asked to speak to the manager, identifying myself as a customer trapped outside in my car. After a few minutes waiting, I was connected to the duty manager and I explained the predicament facing his valued customers just outside the doors of his shop. He was sympathetic, but blamed the local council for not allowing them to build more access to the car park. That was hardly going to help me out at 2pm on a Saturday afternoon, 2 weeks before xmas!

The manager suggested I phone the local police station, which I was only too happy to do. After getting passed the first operator, I was connected to the despatch desk at the local nick and I again explained the situation, pointing out the it could easily turn nasty and as well as near accidents with cars, I’d seen a couple of drivers leap out of their vehicles and nearly trade blows. The despatcher took my details and said she would send some officers as soon as possible. I didn’t see any before I left, around AN HOUR LATER!

Yes, I spent 2 hours in the supermarket car park, in my car, in the pouring rain. It was absolute hell and I wouldn’t wish an experience like this on any one, ever!

Which brings me to my main point, which is this…if you can, do all of your shopping online! Everything I’m going to suggest is available on the internet, so grab your credit card and getting ready to shop!

My top recommendation this year is an iPod Touch from Apple. I bought one for Mrs. Hippy and we’re both blown away by how good it is. The touchscreen is gorgeous, so user friendly and as I suspected, the killer app is definitely being able to surf the internet on it.

It’s actually a very usable, readable browser and its the first satisfying internet experience I’ve ever had on a hand-held device. To put this in perspective, I’ve surfed on various mobile phones and a high-end Palm Pilot and none have come close to this. The iPod Touch found my home network, let me put in the password and joined it instantly. The mobile version of Safari rocks, its fast, responsive and renders pages beautifully.

Oh and did I mention it plays music? And the video dazzling too, so is the photo browser. I haven’t hacked it yet, because it’s Mrs. H’s, not mine and I don’t want to end up bricking it on her. I’m holding out for a 2nd generation iPhone, hopefully that will come in the next few months.

I bought the iPod Touch from Amazon, £243 for the 16gb model, which is a real savings compared to other retailers, but your mileage may vary, so look out for the best deal. Also, don’t leave it too long as its considered one of the hot gifts this holiday season.

In general, I can recommend Amazon, they’re normally very reliable and they are good with delivery too. I shop with them so much that I signed up for Amazon Prime, which costs 50 quid for a year, but in return you get upgraded to next day delivery on everything you buy. I usually pay for next day delivery anyway, because of my erratic lifestyle, that way I never miss anything. I’ve already placed a few orders with it, so it will pay for itself in no time.

The other online retailer I can recommend is everyonedoesit.com or EDIT. The adverts you see on my site are from EDIT, as my endorsement of them is longstanding. They are also the exclusive distributors of the NLH Deluxe, the bong I designed, made by RooR in Germany.

EDIT stock a wide variety of goodies, from pipes and bongs to a wide selection of legal highs and one of the best stocks of cannabis seeds on the internet. If you like to party, or know someone who does, they’re certain to have something desirable.

Of course, you can check out the entire shop for yourself RIGHT HERE, I do have a few recommendations for you.

Check the Bushmaster Double Bubblers on this THIS PAGE. I’ve got the midnight blue one and I can’t recommend this pipe enough. It’s only 20 quid and its a real bargain, pieces this good normally cost lots more.

I cleaned mine out the other day and it reminded me what a useful piece of kit the SPACE CASE GRINDER is…I put all my bud through mine and around twice a year, I scrape out the crystals inside. You will be amazed how much you can collect, if you use it regularly to break up your weed. And if you think about it, everything you’re collecting, would probably just have been lost. I can’t believe everyone doesn’t use one!

I’ve heard lots of people complaining about the cost of RooR glassware and I won’t deny that some of their pieces are pricey. That said, you get what you pay for and RooR quality is the best you’ll ever find. But if you don’t want to spend a fortune, here are a bunch of RooR pieces that all cost under 100 pounds, including one (that I own) that costs under a tenner! That means you can give someone a piece of pure RooR quality, no matter what your budget may be!

I’ll start with the CLASSIC THREE PIECE WATER PIPE, which is a piece that I own. It’s a great looking water pipe, well constructed and it smokes so sweetly, you will love every hit!

How about a RooR gift set, including a RooR bong for only 65 quid? Check out ROOR GIFT SET 5! And check out the rest of the RooR gift sets RIGHT HERE.

And if you want a full sized, proper RooR? No problem, we can still do that for you and here’s 4 models from the RooR red range, with 3.2mm glass, that cost between 85-100 quid! Go on, check ‘em out RIGHT HERE.

And remember, I said there are RooR pieces under a tenner? Check out the MINI-STEAMROLLER, for only £5.95. I’ve got one of these too and its my favourite tiny pipe. It’s perfect for a quick blast, when you need a little hit to take the edge off life.

But what RooR gift guide from me could ever be complete without a shameless plug for my pretty little baby, the “RooR Custom 5.0 - northlondonhippy deluxe” - the best bong in the world! Of course, I’m biased, because I designed it and it carries my name, but trust me I’ve smoked out of loads of pipes and nothing hits as well as my bong. It costs a bit more than other bongs, but trust someone who’s smoked out of it a lot now, its worth every goddamn penny! Treat yourself, or treat someone you love, you won’t be disapppointed!

The best news about all the goodies I’ve mentioned from EDIT is that they have it all in stock right now for immediate shipment and that includes the NLH Deluxe! I know the NLH Deluxes have been hard to come by, since the initial shipment sold out, but they’ve got ‘em now!

Xmas doesn’t have to be stressful. If you can visit my site, then you can visit Amazon or EDIT, or any one of a number of sites which will ship things to you quickly. If you can avoid the shops, the malls and the high street, you’ll make your life a lot easier and isn’t that what we all want? Trust me, you don’t want to lose 2 hours of your life in a car park!

It’s become very clear to me that I’ve already blown my “100 posts in 100 days” challenge. It’s time to abandon ship, because this captain’s not going down with it.

My intentions, as always, were admirable, but as usual I let myself down in the delivery. As much as I would like to post something every single day, my erratic lifestyle just doesn’t make it possible to sit down with the prerequisite focus and inspiration as often as I would like.

To put it more bluntly: I suck.

If this blog was my full time job, then yes I could make several posts a day. But until this blog can provide me with a six-figure annual income, it won’t be my main focus.

To put this in perspective, one of the things distracting me from blogging over the last week was putting together my long-overdue accounting for my media empire, for tax purposes. Having done the sums this week, I can tell you that I am running my empire at a loss. Being a media tycoon costs me money and not a small amount either. Any revenue this blog generates is quickly swallowed by my expenses.

This is not a cry of poverty, my full time job provides me with ample income and I can afford my media empire losses without any hardship. I won’t be seeking donations to my paypal account. I don’t even have a paypal account!

As I am the chief sponsor of my own blog, perhaps I should replace my banner advertising with some of my own, but that would be silly, because if you’re already on my site, you don’t need to see adverts for it - you’re already here!

The only money I generate from this site is through my affiliation with EDIT including their exclusive distribution deal for my beloved “RooR Custom 5.0 northlondonhippy deluxe”. If you’re going to shop at EDIT anyway, and you click through my site, you’re handing me 10% of whatever you spend, so if you want to say thanks the best way anyone can (with cash!), please feel free to do it. I know quite a few of you do that, anyway and I don’t often mention this, but again, prepping up my taxes has made me take a good look at my finances.

I know I could take on more advertising, but I really don’t want to. I suppose for the right price, I would consider a single sponsor with very deep pockets, but there’s a higher likelihood of me sprouting a tail and I don’t expect to be wagging one any time soon!

So what else have I been up to this week besides my dreaded taxes? I had a sight test and ordered my very first pair of middle-aged man reading glasses. It was either that, or have my arms stretched. Ask your parents to explain that one to you.

I also went to my dentist and had the middle-aged crud scraped off my teeth. It was precisely as pleasant as it sounds.

I’m really lucky, I’ve got a good, local NHS dentist. He’s walking distance, his office is never busy and you can almost always get an appointment. I know there’s supposed to be a shortage of NHS dentists, but dig it I’ve got a groovy one and don’t email me asking for his name. I like the fact that its never busy there, so it will remain my secret.

Tomorrow I’m taking the Yaris in for its annual service (one year or 10,000 miles), which is technically a bit fucked, because I have only had the car for around six or seven months and I’ve only put less than 3,000 miles on it. Toyota say its due because it was new a year ago and they had it on the road as a company car, for all of 1,600 miles. It’s not expensive and I can live without the car for a day, so what the fuck.

Today, Sunday, I had a delivery from IKEA. I finally got around to getting a new mattress. Our bed is around 10 years old and it was time. Luckily, you can now shop online with IKEA, which is a very good thing.

The bed frame is still in perfect condition, so we saw no need to replace it, but our old mattresses were showing their age. The bed is a superking size, originally from IKEA, so the easiest solution was to get the replacements from them as well.

Their website was ok, nothing fancy and many of the items listed were not actually available to order online, but you could check the stock on the item at your nearest branch. Great, but that defeats the purpose of shopping online.

I hate going to IKEA, it’s always crowded, it’s always stressful and at the end of all that effort, you have to hand your purchases over to the independent delivery people, who if you’re lucky, lug it to you within a few days. Even with the meatballs from their restaurant, I’d rather not go if I don’t have to. Thankfully, the online gods of shopping were smiling upon me and everything I needed to order was available for delivery from the website and I checked out.

IKEA phoned a few days later to confirm my delivery, which was not the date I was given by the website at checkout, but a few days later. A Sunday. That’s quite impressive, especially for normal people with Mon-Fri jobs, but for me it matters far less because of my erratic lifestyle. The middle of last week would have been better for me.

The delivery was painless and the 2 guys who brought me the stuff were cool. Now, all I have to do is wait for the council to come collect the old mattresses and my work here is done!

Following on with my consumerism, I am being forced to buy something unexpected - a new sound system, sort of. My present stereo, a cheap Technics mini-system is having some serious problems and is prone to cutting out completely. A few gentle taps on the top and the sound returns, but this is not a sustainable solution. I’ve been forced to research AV amps and receivers.

Fuck me, its confusing. Consumer audio has become a minefield of complexity which has left my head slightly spinning. I’ve finally settled on a model from Pioneer, which I haven’t actually ordered yet, chiefly on its features, price and most importantly, availability. It’s a VSX-917V if that means anything at all to you, 7.1, HDMI switching, blah, blah, blah.

I haven’t even got the space for 5.1 sound, nevermind 7.1, but I am thinking I might opt for 3.1 - center, left, right and subwoofer. I’m not sure yet, I haven’t really gone as far as speakers. My simple plan is to use some old speakers initially, as I expect my old stereo to die any day and I’ll need to make a quick swap to the new one. If we ever move house, this system can grow a bit.

I’ve got three audio sources, which are all digital, SKY+, my Sony DVD recorder/player and my Mac mini. Oh wait, I have a fourth analogue signal, which feeds out of my Bravia’s Freeview receiver.

My biggest problem, as always, is space. My new amp, when it comes, won’t fit where my old mini system stereo is, which means I’m going to have to tear down my entire media centre and rebuild it from scratch, including all the cabling. What fun!

On the plus side, the new AV Amp will do all my audio switching for me. At the moment, audio switching is the one weak link in my system as it requires you to get off the sofa, go to the media centre and manually turn the dial. That means changing sources will all happen at the touch of a button, audio and video because I have a Logitech Harmony 885 remote.

Oh shit, I will have to reprogram the Harmony when I install the new amp. Damn, this stuff is all so complicated, luckily for me, I’m very techno-friendly!

The other thing I have been researching is espresso machines. We currently got a combo coffee maker, a big drip pot on one side and a steam espresso maker on the other. I’ve never, ever used the drip maker and the espresso side makes really lame coffee.

In doing my research I’ve discovered that steam powered espresso makers burn the coffee because the water is too hot when it is forced through the filter. What a true coffee lover wants, or rather needs, is a proper pump machine.

Pump espresso makers aren’t cheap, but it sounds like if you want to make proper espresso, its your only choice. And if you are going to use it every day, which I would, it would pay for itself in no time.

Think about it, a decent cappuccino costs around two quid or £2.50 from a coffee bar. Let’s say £2 which is on the low side I expect, for a tall one, every day for a year, would be £730 and the coffee makers I’m looking at cost a lot less than that. I haven’t factored in the actual coffee, milk or sugar costs, but they would not be that significant compared to the cost of the machine.

I’m very tempted by a Gaggia, they are well reviewed and extremely popular, but I haven’t decided yet.

This will sound silly, but normally I consult Which Magazine on purchases such as this. I’ve yet to go wrong by following their Best Buy advice and as a consummate consumer, I’d like to continue this guidance, but Which has not reviewed them in over 2 years! Times change, models change, their Best Buys from two years ago just aren’t valid any more!

What’s a coffee loving hippy to do? I might actually have to decide for myself without the benefit of advice from the experts who test all these machines side by side and report on the one that’s best value for money. I’m all about value for money, dammit! What if I buy one that comes up poorly in their next survey? Then what? Do I just throw it away and buy the one they tell me to or do I suffer for years with a substandard device?

These are the problems that currently plague me. It’s a tough old existence, fraught with hardship at every turn. Modern life presents many challenges, but confronting my coffee conundrum could just very well be the most significant difficulty ever faced by a cappuccino sipping-hippy. Well, that or deciding whether or not to switch off my father’s life-support machine, I’d say its a toss up.

I grant you permission to prod my neck or clasp my wrist. Indeed, I do still possess a pulse for I remain alive and nearly well.

I haven’t been ill, not really. I’ve been suffering from a malady known as overwork-itis and I am the cause of this affliction. I’ve worked 10 out of the last 13 nights, with tonight being my final night - number 11. Go me. After that, I’m off for a couple of weeks to catch my breath and catch up with you guys.

So much for my 100 post thing, you might possibly be thinking. Well, I am here to tell ya that 100 days hasn’t passed yet. I can still catch up. How do you know I won’t snort a shit load of crystal meth and stay up for 6 days and nights, doing nothing but blogging?

You know this, because I’m telling you, I shan’t be ingesting any horrible, crappy, man-made shite! This hippy don’t do class A drugs no more, anyway!

But I can still catch up. I haven’t counted to see how behind I am, but I’m sure its not an insurmountable number. This hippy is a hippy that can do! And does! And will…!

Fuck, I might start buying into my own hype. Naw, I’m far to cynical and clever for that. Besides, its not like I’m actually selling anything. Everything I do, I do for you, for free! When’s the last time you got an invoice from this hippy?

I wouldn’t know how to charge for this shit, anyway. Just send me your credit card numbers (and don’t forget the 3 digit signature strip number too) and I’ll buy myself something pretty, on you.

Wouldn’t you like to buy me something pretty? Like a Porsche? Nothing says you love me like a finely engineered German sports car. And I’m going to be 45 years old in January, don’t you think I’m ready for a mid-life-crisis mobile?

And speaking of gifts, I’m sure I’m not the only one who you’re shopping for because it’s Christmas soon. That means this hippy’s holiday shopping guide will be coming soon too. As a fervent consumer of everything, I am well-placed to help you choose gifts for people I’ve never met…as long as they are cool people, but if you’re reading my blog, you must be cool and everyone you know is cool too. It’s simple math, really.

Are you digging it? Groovy!

Recently, I purchased a Slingbox Solo. I ordered it from Amazon and set it up a couple of weeks ago.

For those of you who don’t know what a Slingbox is, please allow me to explain. A Slingbox is a device which you connect to your audio/video sources and to your home network and it allows you to place-shift your viewing on a computer, in your home, or anywhere in the world where you have an internet connection and it also allows you to control the source device.

I’ll elaborate: I have a SKY+ satellite receiver and DVR (Digital Video Recorder) in my living room, connected to my flatscreen TV. I’ve connected the Slingbox to the SKY+ and my network and the Slingbox takes the raw TV signal and compresses it, then streams it onto my home network, to be received by, say by my laptop, wirelessly in any other room in the house.

Are you getting the idea? In theory, I should be able to view my Slingbox outside of my house, but I am having some port forwarding issues which I’ve yet to resolve, because it goes through two different routers before reaching the internet.

The Slingbox Solo is a very simple looking device, with connectors on one side and some blinky lights on the other side. There are no buttons or controls, the idea is to connect it, configure it and forget about it, everything else is done via the software you download, called SlingPlayer.

I connected my Slingbox Solo to my SKY+ via an S-video cable, as its the highest quality output signal available. My SKY+ is an original V1 Pace unit, feeding my TV via SCART, but the S-Video output mirrors it. This means the Slingbox Solo only sees whatever the SKY+ sees. If someone is watching the TV at the same time, you both have to watch the same programme.

I used a normal RCA stereo phono cable to connect up the audio from the SKY+ to the Slinbox Solo and connected the power supply. I also put the IR blasters above and below the SKY+ IR receiver as these provide the remote control functionality.

Finally, I had to connect the SlingBox to my network. The SlingBox only outputs ethernet, there is no built in wi-fi, which is fine if your router is next to your television. Mine isn’t, which meant using some sort of bridge.

My first try was an Airport Express from Apple. They are normally very robust and dependable units and this was a cost effective way to do it, but it didn’t work very well. I don’t know why.

I connected the AE to my network in WDS mode, connected the Slingbox Solo to it and within a minute, the Slingbox was connected to my network. I was able to configure the Slingbox quickly and was watching my SKY+ on all my Macs in fairly good quality.

It didn’t last, the bandwith dropped dramatically, and at least once a day, the Slingbox would lose its network connection, though it appeared the Airport Express was still connected to my network. I had other network problems as well, losing connections to my different computers and other Airport Express units, used for music streaming, were having dropouts too. Resetting the Slingbox and associated AE unit restored my connection and got the network working again, but the same problem happened every day.

When I disconnected the Slingbox and AE, my network performed fine, so I decided to connect the Slingbox another way.

I bought a set of NetGear HomePlugs, which do ethernet over powerlines and they are a total revelation. You plug them both into the electrical mains and they find each other automatically and create a durable and robust ethernet bridge between the two locations. Once plug is connected to my Airport Extreme, the other is connected to the Slingbox. Within seconds, they were connected and so was the Slingbox and its held the connection continuously since I connected them. These things are very cool!

I’m still having slight problems with my network; it grinds to a halt and loses the internet about once a day, but then comes back. I think I need to set it all up again, as my base unit is still looking for an AE in WDS mode and its not there anymore. When I have the time, I’ll reboot all the units and reset them up from scratch. That’s how it was before the Slingbox, so it should go back to being perfect again.

I’m also determined to sort out the port forwarding, as it would be cool to watch SKY+ from outside my home, either live TV or recorded programmes. The SlingPlayer software includes a virtual remote for the SKY+, which means you can duplicate any remote command with a simple click of your mouse. Very clever!

There are other models of SlingBox available, some offering more connections for more devices, others offering digital and analogue TV tuners. For my needs, with one main TV source, the Solo was perfect. I’ve got shitty freeview reception here, so a tuner was pointless and there’s no need to connect it to a DVD player, because most computers are already DVD players!

If I wanted to watch SKY in another room, I could have a second box installed, which I would have to pay for and I would be charged a tenner a month for the privilege. It wouldn’t be connected to my main SKY+, which means it would only receive live tv. Also, it would be in one fixed location, like my bedroom. What if I wanted to keep an eye on the news, while cooking dinner?

The Slingbox is a cheaper, more flexible solution, it offers great picture quality, at full screen resolutions, anywhere inside my home. When I can view it over the internet, which I am certain I will do one day soon, it will complete the package. It’s a welcome addition to my A/V arsenal!

Thank you for dropping by tech-geek corner!