Announcing The Official Technical Sales Blog at NUM6.co.uk

So this is a weird situation, where my personal world and professional world start to mix.  The technical sales, training and consultancy I set up, NUM 6, is now starting to push out useful (and free!) technical and sales training tips and advice via our new Technical Sales Blog.  It's strange having two different audiences with two different messages, but I hope it provides some value.  It's relevant if you sell anything - such as your ideas to your peers or customers or family.  Yep, almost everyone "sells" something, and here are some regular useful tips on how to excel at doing it in a sincere and honest way.  Sell well!

Stocks & Shots - The Press Loved It Too!

Student, The Edinburgh Evening News and The Herald all picked the story up and ran some nice pieces on it, unfortunately the only high quality scan I have access to is from Student.  We also made a video too!

Scotland's First Stock Market Bar - 13 Years Ago Today

Stocks and Shots was an evening at The Caledonian Brewery, organised between EUTIC and SiS, which brought the first stock market bar to Scotland.  The principle is just like the real stock market - when a drink is in demand, the price rises; when it's not, the price falls.  It's that simple.  And the night was awesome - enjoy!

Google Is Spreading The Love Of Me Underwater

A treat for everyone of Valentine's Day, for any woman, man or other.  After a brief hiatus I'm back in the top four images for "person underwater".  This sexy / questionable *(delete as appropriate) pose, which is very hard to maintain underwater with your eyes wide open, is back in the top four images when searching for person underwater, which means when you enter a normal web search through Google, it offers you me as an image you may want to see!  And who wouldn't...?  Other than those people with functioning eyes...?
#egotist or #ironic or #bitofboth

Happy St. Andrew's Day - Here's That Saltire Sky Again!

Another year, another St. Andrew's Day, another excuse to post "that saltire sky" photo I took from the east end of George Street (whilst hanging out on roof tops, fighting crime).  This time it's on my Instagram profile, so enjoy!  

PS:  It's a little bit cold outside this St. Andrew's Day morning, as in -1.7°C in central Edinburgh at time of posting!

Instagram Web Are Live, Including Mine!

Finally Instagram have launched their own Web profiles! These pages will show the most recent 12 photos that you've taken. Sadly they don't seem to show all history at present, unlike others such as Gramfeed, but it does give you a simple one click follow me button! Unless you opt out, then your profile is coming soon at Instagram.com/yourusername - enjoy my Instagram profile here!

If New Instagram Photo Then Post To Blog

Over the years I've taken a lot of photos, and Instagram allows me to quickly snap something and push it out to my feed, as well as Twitter and Facebook but not Blogger :(  Despite Instagram not having a web feed, you can view my current photos and captions at gramfeed.

So thanks to If This Then That (IFTTT) I've added a link that should mean my photos are added straight to this blog.  Hopefully it won't create double entries in other social media but we will see...  Now if only I could get this linked up properly to Google+ too I could have all my chickens in one basket ;)

UPDATE:  Okay, this auto-posting is causing duplicates in both Twitter and Facebook, so it's easier just to integrate my Instagram feed as my slideshow and manually post the best pictures.  Of course when IFTTT gets the option to add 'exceptions' then I can automate almost everything (will just be waiting for Google+ to provide API access)!

Altruistic Graffiti Or Another Art Student Project?

 Edinburgh is seeing an increase in chalk graffiti right now but this time it has a message.  Unlike a decade ago when an art student promoted his degree show chalking (is that even a verb?) "Who Is Ryder?" across Edinburgh, this time the graffiti has a message of doing good.  The day after Valentine's Day we have "You Look Pretty Today! :)" and a week before Mother's Day (it's tomorrow!) "Tell Your Mother You Love Her!" appears.

Is this the work of someone wanting to make the city a happier place, or an experimental piece of art about love (such a cynical thought!)...?

PS: #700

UPDATE:  Another nice one taken near The Royal Mile (via Google Local Edinburgh's twitter feed)

Handsome, Intelligent Man Reviews Shows For Chortle.co.uk (Seeks Girl!)

Wow!  There I was reading the latest reviews from the Edinburgh Fringe on Chortle.co.uk when I noticed two reviews that had a certain charm to them.  There was a brilliance in the writing that spoke to me and a very familiar feeling that I knew what the reviewer was experiencing.  I scrolled down to see who this fresh new talent is and it reads "Review by Phill Gillespie".  WTF!?!  Oh yeah, did I forget to mention?  I'M the new reviewer for Chortle!!!  After all these years of paying my dues in the Fringe I now get press-passes and my words are shaping (or breaking) the careers of hopeful comics!

The first two reviews are already reprised here (as I wrote them!), first Neil Delamere and then Holly Walsh.  I've back-dated the reviews to when I finished watching the shows (as I normally do here) and so far there are another seven lined up for review. All reviews should appear with this clever Google search. I'm so very happy, and I owe all the thanks in the world to the Vary wonderful person who made this happen...

ERRATA:  It seems part of the above text has caused offence and needs correcting.  People who know me understand both the non-serious "I love myself" persona that comes out in vaguely entertaining ways, but more than that they know of the respect and admiration I hold for stand-up comedians.  For almost a decade I have spent so much time and money seeing as much as I can at the greatest comedy festival in Edinburgh.  I've written an unusually un-elaborated line about "After all these years..." which tries, in a tongue-in-cheek way and using the analogy of a comedian making a break through, to express that what I am about to start writing could have serious consequences on people's careers.  This is was not meant in a glib, gloating or disrespectful way - far from it.  I was trying to concisely convey the slight nervousness and trepidation about the unintended affects that could happen from a miscommunication in a review.  Ironically this sentence itself was miscommunicated and caused offence.  This was never my intent and rest assured my admiration and respect for anyone who gets up on a stage to give to my favourite art-from (that is criminally undervalued in general) is as high now as it has ever been.  Apologies to anyone who felt it had a different meaning.

This Birthday Will Be Number Six!

Wow, six years of PhillG.com and 600 posts (the six-hundredth was my great urinals gag yesterday).  It's been a long time with a lot of fun, some world exclusives (Toy Story 3 European premiere date, my various resignations during this time) and quite a few great pieces of humour (still love "what medicine cures a broken heart?").  As it stands this is my longest on-going relationship (with a non-male) and by my birthday next year it will be my longest relationship of all time!  Scary...

My First Official New Word: Double-Wicking

Yes I know it sounds obscene, but here's its official meaning / definition:
Double-Wicking - verb (only used in Present Perfect Continuous tense)
To burn the candle at both ends, e.g. I've been double-wicking a lot recently

In a moment of creativity it came to me and I now submit it to the ages as my first official* word.  Believe it or not but I'm hot on your heels Colbert...

* = Well, my first public word.  Like most people there are dozens of words I've created or altered in a unique language known only to me and my (at the time) better half.  You know if anyone ever actually makes a physical, hand-stitched version of 'Your Language' to English dictionary then they should probably be crowned the Most Romantic Man Alive...  Excellent, I now have a title to my collection and another thing to chase Colbert with!

500 Posts Over 5 Years ... Happy Birthday To PhillG.com!

Wow!  I've been doing this for five years now, spanning three different careers!  500 different posts, many of which I don't even remember (such as the fact I'm a Googlewhack!) until I re-read them...  There are course many posts that will go down in infamy, like me deciding after 9 months to close down PhillG.com and open a new blog reflecting the "real" PhillG.  Thanks to all the different readers and the 205 comments made over the years.  Why do I keep doing this?  Simply to inform and enlighten.  There are literally hundreds of people across the world who are guided by my reviews of World Premieres during the Edinburgh Fringe Festival for deciding whether or not to see the show when it reaches them, or even the performers keeping in touch with fans pre-bookface!  People can also find out how to fix a showers, why swans abandon their eggs and of course, when the European & UK Premiere of Toy Story 3 was (last night and it was excellent!).  Keep on reading and I'll keep on bloggin'...

I Took On The Internet, And I Won! I Was Right Sounds So Good...

Yes, this is purely a self congratulatory post (I'm allowed one ever year...).  I wonder what happens if you Google "Toy Story 3 UK Premiere" (either on Google UK or the real Google.com)...  Well, as it's happening in Edinburgh I see The Scotsman in position 7, then STV in 5th, Edinburgh Guide in a respectable 4th, naturally the BBC make it in the top 3, Yahoo Movies is number 2 but at number 1 is *still* my exclusive reporting last year!  For the best reviews of the Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF 2010) or the Edinburgh Fringe 2010, your first choice should be this site.  And the irony is for the first time ever I am happy being referred to as a number...

More Intelligent Audience Seen At Previous Senior Scottish Debates...

These "leader" debates are really starting to annoy me...  They are so damaging for politics in the country in a pathetic attempt to try to get more TV ratings and mislead the public.  We operate a representative democracy in the United Kingdom and there is no popular vote.  No one has the choice to vote between David Cameron, (James) Gordon Brown and Nick Clegg - they are all standing in different constituencies.  I think there should be far more local debates (that can still be televised) but are representative of local issues and candidates.  Here's the audience at the 2001 Election looking far more engaged when listening to a panel of Alistiar Darling, Sir Malcolm Rifkind and Alex Salmond, moderated by Sky's Adam Boulton:

BTW there is a far more intelligent (and less egotistical) man sitting to my right but I don't think he made it on camera :-(

Working Lunch To End ... What Will I Be On Next?

Only a few days after the announcement that Working Lunch's original host Adrian Chiles is leaving the BBC, an even bigger announcement comes that Working Lunch is to end.  Sad days...  Let's take a look back at on of their heydays when Adrian passes over to Rob who's "in Edinburgh [with] an unusual share club; they say they're not bothered if they don't make any money" who in turn interviews "a frighteningly well dressed bunch" (according to Adrian)....

Le Temps Détruit Tout? Or, Things, Can Only Get Better!

Yes the first part of this subject is a very powerful line that really moved me when I first read it*.  It translates as "Time Destroys Everything" and whilst it is not summarising the second law of thermodynamics, it is very true:  Things decay and everything ends.  However, thanks to superstar keyboardist and modest physics genius Brian Cox (no, not Hannibal Lecter, the younger one), we have the line from the D:Ream song (okay, he was an occasional keyboardist whilst at university and then went on to be a superstar physicist).  So which is true?  Well, lots of things decay over time but fortunately PhillG.com is not one of them!  A brand new theme with a great shot of Little Scotland, a nice slideshow of one of my Picasa Albums and, wait for it, all previous posts from Wordpress imported over to Blogger so the whole site is together again!  450 posts and counting over four and a half years!  Woo-hoo!  Now to end on a sad note, if you do want to depress yourself more than you were at the end of A Single Man or The Wrestler, rent Gaspar Noé's masterpiece, Irréversible and find out why Time Destroys Everything.

Helloes Ladies (once) of SNIPEF!

Lock up your daughters (and lock down your IT Systems)... The boys are back in town!  Sadly, the SNIPEF 2010 reunion has a lower turn out than expected!

Wishing You A Merry Valentine's Day & A Happy New March!

The end of the anti-penultimate day in February and there is a blizzard of snow in the centre of Edinburgh. It's like the good ol' days, at least according to one source who had thick snow some 20+ years ago in the beginning of April!  Chances of that this year...?  Oh yes, taxi!

Finally ... A Social Network For Bees!

I'm really happy that the human-centric web has finally reached out to our cousins, the delicate bees, and created them their own social network called Buzz (unconnected to the directory service from AT&T).  It seems it's all part of Google's "do no evil" strategy and has nothing to do with facebook or twitter and the on-going battle for the future of mankind (aka the internet).  I went to see what the, erm, hub-bub was all about and low and behold, Google think I'm so important they have created a profile of me (very flattering, much better than being profiled in a serial killer kind of way!).

Happy New Decade With A Grainy Picture!

What happened to January...?  Any way, here's how I welcomed in the new decade, kneeling in the middle of the frozen Union Canal with a glass of champagne in my hind.  Start as you mean to go on...