Artem Russakovskii's programming and technology blog

Updated: July 15th, 2006

Edit 7/1: And this is what happens during England national team soccer games in UK (I can't imagine what the finals would be like).

Edit 6/30: Just came back from the pub after watching the UKR-ITA game and hanging with the guys. Very upsetting game, horrible performance by the Ukraine, although I wasn't expecting anything good to come out of it anyway. On a brighter note, the weekend is finally here! Sleep time…..

Edit 6/29: I'm awake at 3am because some idiots outside the hotel are screaming their heads off, and one is running around yelling "Punch me in the face, punch me in the #$#%%#@#@ face!!". I truly, truly wish he gets what he wants.

The past 2 days have been good. I've worked a lot and accomplished nice chunks. Yesterday the hotel was out of space and they kicked me out, so I had to go to work with my suitcase. They have proceeded to rebook me into the same hotel for 1 more night, followed by Autonomy's own company apartments tomorrow.

So far I've gone out to a couple of pubs, which are all over the place in the UK. They are bars but most serve food until 9pm or so. There are also restaurants but those are way expensive. Cambridge is a very expensive town overall, but who can blame them when a gallon of gas costs $9 (4.5 pounds) or so?! And we, Americans, complain about $3? Ha!

On Friday the guys from work and I are planning on going out and watching the "footie" as everyone calls it here. Ukraine is playing Italy in the quarter finals, and I think they need a miracle to win. We're gonna go root for them anyway. By the way, the Blinkx team here in the UK consists of mostly young guys 25-30 or so (when I talked to them on the phone from the US, I thought they were all big, fat, important looking 50 year olds). Sometimes it's hard to understand them due to the accent, but other than that I'm enjoying their company. There is also a Russian guy on the team, which makes it even more pleasant to go to work.

Edit 6/26: the game was long but in the end it was awesome! Ukraine moves on to the quarter finals!!! Many beers later I returned back home with some chicken kebab and chips (which are actually french fries here) and passed out.

6/25: I have just arrived to Cambridge, UK! It took about 15 hours overall, not too bad. Blinkx put me up in the University Arms hotel.

Here are some pictures I took so far: 2006.06.26-07.01 Cambridge Week 1.

And now I'm going out to a pub to watch the UKRAINE-Switzerland game live. Go UKRAINE!!

TODO: buy cambridge and london shirts, sweatshirts, shotglasses, souvenirs.