I’ve not really had the weekend I envisaged or planned, well. Not quite.

Friday evening, 18 April: Started well enough with a wild night of *thinks for a suitable word* hmmm…. debauchery? mindless drinking and general partying down in Wellington City; dragged some complete strangers on the train in along for the ride =p and also blagged a free Limo ride into town! The rest of Friday gets a little hazy as the Bourbon count increases; along with missing the last train back to ‘The Hutt’ where I live - so I had to FORCE myself to party on more until the 06:05am train, yes I officially partyed ALL night.

Saturday, 19th April Due to this unforseen revellry I had to cancel my brass lesson, and sleep through Saturday….so from my weekend, Saturday this time round is officially scrapped so swiftly moving on:

Sunday 20 April, St Georges Day Service with the Brass Band down in St Paul’s Cathedral in Wellington City (next to parliament). It went well, though I must admit first ‘pink’ coloured cathedral I have ever been in. Certainly not a patch on any Cathedral the UK has to offer both in style and grandeur. Sermon and Service lasted from about 09:30am until 11:30am and so now I am about to head out and do my laundry, but before I do; since it will soon be Shakespeare’s birthday I thought I would share a Sonnet with you all which was orated as part of this morning’s service - and a rather apt one I think!

Sonnet No. 25:-

William Shakespeare

Many congratulations!!

After one of the longest labours I have heard of in a long while, you have become a new mum! I am sooooo happy for you I am also incredibly made up that my vibe for a boy was on the money…

Welcome to the world Charles Alexander (Charlie), and may you bring positive change for all our futures…

For those not in the know, Anna is a good friend and former colleagues from my UK days!

Lol listen to me…..’my UK days’, I say it so nonchalently (spelling?)

In all my years working with Cisco kit, I have always been rather dissappointed by the lack of a decent AND affordable alternative to owning your own lab equipment, especially in this increasingly wireless and security conscious age! Now perhaps I have struck upon my Nirvana?

NetworkSims

They bost an emulation environment that not only simulates routers and switches, but also PIX/ASA firewalls and Aironet Wireless devices! Crucial to many of the current Cisco qualification tracks out today. Sounds expensive doesn’t it!! Even the premium personal download, includes two licenses allowing you to not only install it on your main PC, but on your laptop too for when you are on the road?! AND all for the price of…. wait for it! $48 which equates to about £26…

So, what’s the catch?? So far as I can see - there doesn’t appear to be one, other than the software license only lasts a year, by which time the technology is out of date anyway. So, in the small chance you still require it after a year, you’d have to buy another copy - and why wouldn’t you at this price? The only other limitation I can see is that it doesn’t allow you to build custom environments and experiment to your hearts content; hmmmmm maybe I expect too much?

Limitations asside it comes with enough lab/challenge scenario’s to keep you occupied for hours. I have not played with it fully yet, but as soon as I have got my teeth around it, I may post a further review on it here.

There’s certainly a lot of positive ‘SPIN’ in the feedback section of their website, so I’ll give it a look and provide an objective view as someone who has worked on both the provider (WAN) and client (LAN/WAN) side in telecoms.

Of course, if you begrudge even spending this little amount go check this out:- Dynamips it’s freeware and allows you to run real Cisco IOS Emulations for the 7200, and 3600 series on your Linux or Windows PC!!

Weekend kinda passing me by at the moment. I’m trying to remain positive about the house. Though it means I gotta tighten the belt strings financially for now, and also keep my fingers crossed that the exchange rate between Pounds and NZ Dollars remains good.

I’ve also realised just out of sync with TV I am now, since I don’t watch any!! I usually just hire a DVD box set of some series that I never got into in the UK, to see what it is like etc… I ‘did’ however bring back a classics DVD box set from Brisbane which included such titles as ‘Metropolis’ and ‘Nosferatu’ oh and ‘House on Haunted Hill’ - with Vincent Price (think I’ll watch that one today)