10am. Are we done with London and ready to go then?  Well, I guess so.  We've been running around for a while getting everything sorted, running through checklists and just Getting Things Done.  The post is supposed to be redirected from today or maybe even tomorrow.  It doesn't help that some came through the letterbox today from the dentist we had requested our records from and closed our accounts with.  There's a minor panic was just averted in the other room when we discovered that we had too many clothes to bring with us and not enough suitcase space.  We're going to be overweight on that flight to DE I can tell you. Nothing we can do about it though, our stuff is not going to get there for about a week, maybe two and we simply have to have enough stuff to last us through.  It may be even longer than that too - everything we have is going to be stored in Anna's parent's basement, and we might be able to leave it all boxed until we find somewhere to live.  
17:53. It seems like the end is in sight.  I kept the PC and server running and they're all that is left now, apart from the laptops which are coming with us tomorrow.  I have to disconnect the speakers, which means moving all the furniture so I can take up the carpet so I can get the wires.  The line from my DSL router to the socket runs under another piece of carpet around the wall and that has to go too.  The server needs to be taken down and disconnected (and I have to go through the disks in the array and make sure they are secure.  I never managed to get hold of an HDD shipping case (the kind that manufacturers would ship them to OEMs in) so I'm going to leave them in the server and write "FRAGILE!!!" all over it in luminous radioactive poison.  That's about it I think.  Power strips and cables are all that remains I think.
This is the last post I will make from this flat.  That is really only starting to sink in. I have been so busy with the logistics of this move that I may have forgotten to be excited about it for the last few days.  Wow.  Last!

If my laptop had a nice score on WEI, you can imagine how awesome the desktop is to use. Look how that graphics card roars...

Sorry, this was actually posted yesterday, but it was breaking my compliance with XHTML, so it got pulled.  Here it is again, this time without the breakage.
Right, so new laptop.  I needed to pick up something for Germany and settled on a Sony Vaio.  More specifically, I settled on a Vaio VGN-CR11Z/R.  It was reasonably priced and with a great feature set:
It is actually a very impressive piece of engineering.  I have never really liked laptop keyboards before, but this one is pretty special.  Even though the keys aren't full-travel keys, it really works extremely well for my typing style.  Likewise with the cursor keys.  I have always given up on them on previous laptops, but here they just work.  I can get to them, and also the Home, End, Page Up and Page Down keys with with ease.  The wireless behaves pretty well with my home network, and it has Draft-N for future use.  That's a pretty nice feature, as upgrading would require physical hardware. 
Windows Vista rates it better than my work laptop, which actually surprised me.  It rated as follows :


Note that the graphics card is the slowest factor, even though it runs Eve-Online with ease.
It came bundled with the usual shite on it, which all got removed very quickly.  I ended up formatting the hard disk and installing Vista again from fresh.  It runs effortlessly now.  Boot Up time is a little slow, but that's maybe something to do with the 5400rpm HDD.  I imagine sticking a 7200 in there would lower the boot speed, but it would also raise the temperature.  Control of heat is very impressive on this machine.  It has never heated up seriously.  It never feels like I'm going close to the edge of what it can do, and is always comfortable.  My desktop is more like a racing car than this laptop, always treading the fine line between working and going on fire.  This new laptop though is destined to be a Land Rover - it just gets it done.  It also has the finest heat control I think I have ever seen in a laptop chassis before.  So, overall very satisfied!
Moving plans are accelerating this week and next of course. 
We blitzed the kitchen today and separated everything into two sections: those we are taking with us, and those that will be left behind.  It didn't take too long, and if we can get through the rest of the flat a day at a time like this we'll be well done by the time we leave.  There isn't actually all that much left to do now, as we have cleared a lot of it already.  Wow!

Last week was punctuated by two hangovers. Wednesday we went out to the Porterhouse for some leaving drinks, and for some reason I actually drank a lot of porter.  It was remarkably like real porter too; about halfway between Guinness and Murphys. It was very tasty, and of course very hangover inducing. If that wasn't enough, I seem to have been way more drunk than I expected or wanted to be on Friday night. Oh well. Then Saturday we were out for dinner with some friends, and there were coctails and beer. Luckily it wasn't enough to cause any harm so the night was nicely tame. Like I said though; a boozier week than usual, and hard on the body afterwards. Interestingly enough, I don't think I have ever had a hangover from German beer before, and I have several times been stewed on the stuff.

Right, this is going to be a little fragmented as I'm feeling delicate again this morning. (Also, its no longer morning, its night and I still haven't finished this damn post.) It is of course self inflicted, and I should know better, but there you have it. Yesterday was the last day of work, so some celebrations were in order. It wasn't the complete mashed that I was on Wednesday, but it wasn't too far off either.
So... I am now officially unemployed.  My SecurID was handed in door pass taken, and UKDavidW is no more. I may have accounts in places that were setup with UKDavidW, but I can always get them again.  So from now on I'll be DaveWhiteNet at... well just about everything :-) It has been a long time coming, and I still don't know how to feel about it. I mean, its awesome and all, and we're finally getting to move to somewhere that we both really want to live, and we've been talking about getting out for so long... but. So, until I get UKDavidW back I will be CorkieUK on AIM and the usual on everything else.  I can't seem to find any of the cooler screennames I used to have... where is UKDavid, or UKDaveW or even DaveWhite? Maybe they have been recycled in the last few years, which is at least how long since I signed on with them.
Luckily, its all just logistics now. The movers come at the end of next week, and we move on the Saturday. We're staying in a hotel in Heathrow on the Friday, and I think the flights are late enough for a leisurely breakfast before we vacate the country forever. Dave and Anna have left the building. Wow.
So, I have a new laptop. This is the first time I have ever (in twenty years of building PCs) bought a new PC in its entirety. Of course, it was necessary as it is a laptop, but it was a strange and lovely experience nevertheless. It is a Sony Vaio which is nice because if nothing else Sony make beautiful machines.  However, in addition to being physically nice to look at, it is also a beast on the speed front.  It is actually faster than my work laptop and scores higher than it in all the Windows Performance tests. Specs and picture below, and more tomorrow.  While prepping this picture I just started to doze off, so I'll finish this tomorrow.

The three most painful words in the English language: "Out for delivery".