Amusing analysis of AOL user searches...

K. Scott Allen : 7 Virtues for Software Developers.

I've been away for a couple of weeks, and am now playing catch-up with piles of email and news.

I can't remember ever taking 2 consecutive weeks off any time in the last 11 years that I've been working (though I may have at some point). I've certainly never taken a week off without having any solid plans for it - and it's been fab.

Things I did:

• Aikido summer school (for the first week)
• Sat around reading a lot: finished The Amber Spyglass (and started Freakonomics)
• Wandered out for Officer Lurve's birthday
• Added a new dish to my repertoire - a fishy one!
• Had lunch and moquito at Havanas
• Took a gander round Sophie's residence-in-waiting
• Went out for a messy indie night at Audio with Donovan and Sam
• Recovered from the above. For about 24 hours.
• Popped into work briefly for a couple of important chats.
• Had an outdoor Aikido class on the grass of Wild Park, necessitated by vandals breaking into the karate club where we train on Thursdays: but "Airenjuku Karate Club"? Someone can't use google to fact-check...
• Went up to London, visited the Science Museum, Natural History Museum, Nordic Bar and Ping Pong
• Started rebuilding David's web site (with guilt trip assisted by finally getting the piece he'd done for me mounted in the hallway)
• Saw Vic and her band play another gig at the Sanctuary Cafe
• Went running regularly (not quite every day, but nearly)
• Bit the bullet and upgraded to a K800i. First impressions: nice, but the camera optics aren't as great as I expected and it's a teeensy bit large. I am officially weaned off Nokia, though (sorry Nokia folks).

Lots of people have been busy this week too:

• Nan and Nige were joined by their firstborn, Rory Brady Hosker
• Mr Falletti expanded his personal empire: Luca has a new baby brother, Leo
• Jay and Emm transmogrified, G-force style, into Mr and Mrs Caines-Gooby
• On a more mundane note, my dad's been transforming the hallways of Rosehill (a job only 5 years overdue thanks to my own procrastination), and we had a slight but temporary planning setback in our efforts to remodel the bathroom...

And I failed to get around to:

• Playing with the X10 home automation kit I bought when reading Everyware got me excited
• Visiting Kew Gardens
• Catching up with Mrs Komorowski

Back to work tomorrow, and whilst it's been a lovely break, I'm actually rather excited about getting stuck into FP things again. I've had a chance to think and refresh myself.

Underestimation: "When early, rough estimates are used to guide artificial deadlines, you have to be very careful to assess the accuracy of those estimates and adjust those deadlines accordingly."

The mobile industry must change its retail model: ""There are more publishers and developers coming to market, but the pool of users is not growing. If people were more worried about the 90 per cent of consumers that haven’t played a mobile game before, then everyone would reap the benefits.""

Cough casual gaming cough.

Cough cheap pay-per-play models cough.

Cough long-term relationships with customers cough.

Cough Puzzler Mobile cough.