Darren "Excess Baggage" Steele

Updated 30th Nov 2000.

Well another update with a mere one weeks delay - what is the world coming to! Since my last update things have been kinda messy...I suppose I should write a journal about it but I have neither the time nor the energy......actually.....bollocks to it. I will write a journal - it'll be in the journals section. Have fun y'all.

Rents.

Darren "Getting verr verr stressed" Steele

Updated 23rd Nov 2000.

For those people that visit this site with any frequency you will of course realise that it's been down for a while. This had me confused as to why it had "suddenly" stopped working. Everything worked perfectly well on my linux box, but for some reason the servers at ukshells who host this site kept crapping out on me.......even though they are running linux. Very odd.

Anyway, you will now see that full service has been resumed. The fix if anyone is interested was quite an easy one....but very very very tedious, hence the delay in doing it. I kinda streamlined my site by using the shtml include directive. This had meant that each page was generated on the fly. So all the sidebars, the www.steeley.co.uk graphic, the footer and such were all contained in two files called head.shtml and foot.shtml. So all that was in index.shtml was a couple of include directives for the head and foot, and a single include directive for the text that you're reading now. This made site maintenance very very easy. However, the UK shells server demanded that there be a HTML meta tag and corresponding closing tag in the files. Which totally pisses me off. Works fine on my system so I really don't see the problem.

Anyway, the consequence of this is that if I want to change the looky feel of the website, then it will undoubtedly be a nightmare.

So onto my life.....the past week has as usual been crappy. I've been getting very stressed as to whether or not I will get all my stuff back to England on the two flights that I'll be taking [ I'm now pretty sure I will be able to ]. I've got to notify all the German authorities...and there are lots of them.....that I'm leaving. I must get my accounts sorted out, disconnect my telephone, disconnect my mobile phone, send Robin's monitor to Holland, clean my flat, make a few repairs, earn some money, negotiate with people for the sale of my furniture, shampoo the dog, worm the cat, feed the fish and milk the cow. Essentially I'm busier than a nymphomaniac on Viagra in an orgy.

I remember when life was simple!

Darren "Homeward bound" Steele

Updated 7th Nov 2000.

As usual I will begin this piece of writing with apologies for the lack of updates. Ho hum...but this time I do have good reasons.

If you look in the Archive section then you'll notice a front page that I wrote that didn't even make it up to the web server. This discusses my new girlfriend Emma. You'll all be pleased to hear that we are still together and blissfully happy.

Emma has been over here in Germany for the past week, hence no updates to the website. Prior to that I spent a few weeks mashing around in Phoenix having lots of fun. I do have a half created journal for the America trip but ummmmm I can't really remember much of what happened as most of it was spent in an alcohol induced haze.

Breaking news right now, and the reason for the title of this page is that yesterday I resigned from Nokia. It was a terribly polite resignation and pretty much said that I wished to return to Manchester due to family and girlfriend stuff. What it didn't mention is that I've become very bored with Ulm and Germany as a whole. This really pisses me off as the snowboard season is now back upon us. Grrrrr!

So I shall be back in Manchester on roughly the 10th December but then I fly out to Sydney with Ryan and a bunch of other friends on the 17th December'ish. We shall be partying our little cotton socks off in Sydney for Christmas and New Year. Which should be a hoot!

So what's new this time around.....half of a new holiday journal in the holidays section, a heap of new photo's in [ oddly enough ] the photo's section - in 'Phoenix' and the archive contains a piece where I declare undying love for Tony Blair.

Also, you know when you click on the message board thing and it says this bit will be coming soon....well I've spent hours trying to get the contemptuous little piece of shit software to work but I'm failing miserably. But work is in progress on this little problem.

Also, because of the sporadic updates that I do, I'm thinking of adding a feature whereby people who register will be e-mailed when the site changes.

Darren "Tony Blair - I love you" Steele

Due to my new found romance I have decided to be a one woman man, monogamy is my current goal in life, hmmmm, we'll see. Anyway, I have spent the past 3 out of 4 weekends flying into Manchester. The latest trip was when all the fuel crisis crap was going on.

The reason that I now love Tony Blair is due to Emma having very little petrol so we had to cancel all our plans and just ermmmm do what new couples do...repeatedly...frantically!

Ulm is beginning to get on my tits and I'm currently investigating the possibility of getting a job working from home - which means I can spend some time in Ulm, some time in Manchester, some time in Spain, some time in the Alps - basically it means I'll be totally mobile and be able to work wherever the mood takes me. Which could be good fun I reckon. Editors note: Had a conversation with the people involved with this thing yesterday...it looks 90% certain that I have the job and will be totally, utterly, completely mobile.....a quick message to my friends.....be afraid....be very afraid :)

I'm also slowly but surely making plans to get my arse back to England where I shall endeavour to destroy Chris' life as he seems to be doing remarkably well in life.

Darren "Can somebody please teach me how to read a map" Steele.

Editors note: This is the new looky feely steeley website - as it stands I know I have broken links but this is just a quick upload to stop people moaning at me. This weekend I will have some time and it will all be spick and span by Monday.

Tuesday 5th September 2000

OK, so I'm improving - updated again in just two weeks. I reckon I should be able to get this update to once a week since I've radically cut down on drinking and there still isn't a woman keeping me warm at nights - although as you will see from the latest journal I do have plans to rectify this situation.

My left hand now sports a funky green plastic ring with a big red plastic flower that I found at the "Atlantis" swimming pool thingy last week. But then I lost it again on the stagnight

Ummmm, that's about it. I fly into England on the 24th August for a few days where I will be available on my British mobile number.

There's probably some new photos in the ummmmm "Photos" section and as mentioned above a new journal is up. Not yet...these will come next week

I'm also working on a hoopy new web site design.....yeah yeah, I know I've been saying this since arriving....but really it's nearly ready. PHP and MySQL - funky tables - archives - message board - the works man I'm telling you.

Updated: 22nd August 2000

5th August 2000

"Forgive me father for I have sinned, it has been two months since I last updated this page.......and I've been having impure thoughts about Sister Frasier".

OK, so it's been a while. What have I been doing since the last update thingy. Ummmm, dunno. I had four weeks of shooting in and out of airports to fly to Berlin, Manchester, Manchester again, and London. Spent the last couple of weeks in Ulm. Popped up to Frankfurt for a night to party with Herr Larkin and Herr Howarth.

In Berlin I met up with Anke and generally mooched around the place.

In the first Manchester trip I spent some quality time with Mama, did a little shopping, watched "The Chicken Run", got my hair cut and pierced my nose.

The second Manchester trip was a night out with Herr Jones where we had a competition to see who could look the most homosexual - according to the barmaid chick Chris won, which pissed me off. The following day I embarked on a drinking binge to end all drinking binges with my father. The night ended with me sat in the "Jolly Jacks" in Ashton playing Bingo with my Nan, Grandad and about 60 other pensioners. I feared for my life as if my numbers had come up I would have had twenty zimmer frames and 30 wheelchairs chasing me down the road. I left when the "Artiste" arrived and began murdering various "Hot Chocolate" songs.

The London trip was a bit of a nightmare - London was fun but because I flew from Munich I had to hire a car which sat on Munich Airport car park for the weekend - which pretty much negated the couple of hundred DM's I'd saved by travelling from Munich and not Stuttgart. Oh well you live and learn.

Anyway, whilst in London I met the usual Solna pussies but spent most of the weekend partying with Jaz and Ryan, and Aggy and Ajat had walk on parts in the play. Saw a bit of Caroline whilst I was there also but the best bit had to be myself and Ryan booking our Christmas holiday over to Sydney. We fly on around about the 17th December, with a one night stop over in Singapore. Party our arses off with people we're meeting out there for Christmas and New Year. Then begin our journey back on about the 11th or 12th of January, taking in another stopover in Singapore. In the words of the god Eric "Sweeeeeet, super sweeeet".

A new journal in the journals section, a write up of a snowboard trip I made last year in the Holidays section. The hatelist , CV and other sections have been zapped. The Foties section is back and since I now have a hoopy digital Canon Ixus this section will probably be updated quite regularly.

Oh and the "It seemed like a good idea at the time but I'm bored with it now" came from a conversation that Jason and I had in a bar in Frankfurt. I was in my usual post-piss-up-blues state and moaning about the fact that I'm sick of Germany, blardy-blah. Jason then came up with the suggestion that those are the very words he has heard from me about the various idiotic schemes I've come up with and the various women I've been with.

9th May 2000

Two updates in two weeks, my aren't *you* all a lucky bunch of readers!

So the changes this time are once again not too severe. There's a new journal detailing the latest in my life and loves, and I've also started archiving these front page things, which can be found in the "Days gone by" section. I'm also in the process of sticking one of those counter things on this page to see if anyone ever actually comes here to read the crap that I write.

As you'll see in my journals pages, Eva and I have gone our seperate ways and I 've just returned from a crazy weekend with Ryan in Zurich. I'm just about to fire up "Stigmata" on my hoopy new DVD player as Rene reckons it's a "rude film mate...safe", so I'm just having a quiet night in......detoxing!

20th April 2000

So it's been 4 months since my last update and all I can be bothered changing is this crappy front page. The reason I have a bit of time to spare is that I'm waiting for my German frau, Eva, to come over before we go out for dinner and drinks. Eva is the girl I left Vicki for and whom the people at Aggy's mad [ as usual ] party met.

The changes in my life have been pretty good. I'm still working for Nokia but I have managed to get off my arse and get out of the hotel. Living in the hotel was OK, chicks changing your bedding and cleaning your room and stuff - but it just wasn't home. My apartment is in the centre of Ulm [ more on this later ] and within staggering distance of all the restaurants, pubs and clubs that the city has to offer. It's a nice two bedroom gaff so if anyone wants a trip over to sunny Deutschland then it's the usual e-mail address, which if you can't work out from the domain name then you're not welcome over here. I've spent the past month and a half buying beds, a desk, some drawers, some kitchen stuff and a sofa. The next acquisition will be a wide screen TV to play DVDs and stuff on - as German TV really isn't up to scratch.

The reason my updates are so sparse is a combination of things. Most weekends involve either a trip to the German alps or the Austrian alps to do a spot of snowboarding...oh, another thing I managed to buy was a funky snowboard replete with boots and bindings. Ulm [ well I promised ] is about 1.5hrs drive from a sweet German resort - Obersdorf, or you can do a couple of more hours and be in St Johan or any of a dozen Austrian ski resorts. Perfect positioning I think as long as you can outrun an avalanche. My weeknights usually involve partying in Ulm or having lovely dinners cooked for me by Eva.

Hopefully now that the snow is beginning to melt :( I'll be able to do a bit more work on this thing and get some piccies and journals wrote just to show you what a shitty place England is.

This weekend my Mother and Paddy are over to visit so I'll be showing them the sights and popping up to the Alps for lunch....hehehehehehe life is sweet.

Ummmm, Big Hellos to:

Aggy - Get those snowboard piccies developed [ sweeet weekend ] and get the skydive vid over to me.

Ryan - Get those snowboard piccies developed and I'll get my arse up to Frankfurt to party in the next couple of weeks.

Coopester - Sorry I missed you in Cambridge but I'll be out to test drive the speedboat this Summer.

Vicki - Darling I miss you like I miss a rectal wart - I am sooooo pissed with you for giving all my stuff to the f*cking charity shop. What can I say - "hope you die soon".

I've also just bought a funky new webcam to speak to my Mummy back in England, I'm trying to get it sorted out as you read...probably.

Ummmm, October/November'ish 1999

Yeah I know it now looks crap, but trust me - it'll get better. For those that are interested the latest addition is the journals section, and I've made a few changes to Ruperts foties bit. That'll probably get moved into the Foties general page soon to be replaced by some sort of geek page I expect.

For those of you that remember my old journal e-mails you'll quickly realise that these versions are a little tamer since my Mum and stuff will be reading them. Also I think they're a bit poorly written compared to the journals of old.....maybe I'm losing my touch. Or maybe my life just isn't as exciting as it used to be.

My new e-mail address is ext-darren.u.steele@nokia.com

My new landline, into the office is +49 731 5056912

My new mobile number is +49 173 4716180

My old mobile number will only be active when I'm in England, and will more likely than not be disconnected in a month or so.