I've had a gmail.com email address for almost exactly two months. Two months and two days, to be precise. I've never, so far, used it for anything. No subscriptions, no web forms, no purchases. I've only even disclosed what it is to very close family and friends, none of whom has ever used it.
I was spammed on it just now.
How does that work then? I only created the bloody thing as insurance against the day (rapidly approaching) when I'd have to abandon my main addresses at johnberesford.com.
It's about time something sensible, serious, and technologically impregnable was done to sort out flippin' spammers once and for all.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Flasher
I've long been of the opinion that just because you CAN do something, it doesn't mean you HAVE to.
If only BBC programme designers shared that opinion.
Recently we've been subjected to a series of really annoying animations on BBC News output. Whenever they put up a list to underline whatever point the talking head is making, each list item is accompanied by a matched pair of brackets - [ ] - that appear over the middle of the item and then gradually fade out as they slide apart heading for the start and end of the word respectively.
This is the wonderful world of Flash animation. A tool that has its place (probably) and can be very effective (occasionally) but which is so overused and ubiquitous now that it's become a joke. It is no longer clever or cool, assuming it ever was. It's been used in the title sequences of dramas for several years, as the actors names slide over each other in opposite directions, fading in or out as necessary. Or expanding as they fade - a trick that belongs in Flash 101.
None of this adds anything to the piece, whether it's a credit sequence or a news graphic or whatever. It's a distraction, and an expensive distraction at that, as it presumably requires the services of a graphic designer. Still, I guess the producers figure they've got all these graphic designers sitting around, right? May as well use them for something. And if you don't need a pie-chart for your particular piece, what are you gonna do? Go on, stick some Flash animation to the viewers. At least the more moronic ones will be impressed.
If only BBC programme designers shared that opinion.
Recently we've been subjected to a series of really annoying animations on BBC News output. Whenever they put up a list to underline whatever point the talking head is making, each list item is accompanied by a matched pair of brackets - [ ] - that appear over the middle of the item and then gradually fade out as they slide apart heading for the start and end of the word respectively.
This is the wonderful world of Flash animation. A tool that has its place (probably) and can be very effective (occasionally) but which is so overused and ubiquitous now that it's become a joke. It is no longer clever or cool, assuming it ever was. It's been used in the title sequences of dramas for several years, as the actors names slide over each other in opposite directions, fading in or out as necessary. Or expanding as they fade - a trick that belongs in Flash 101.
None of this adds anything to the piece, whether it's a credit sequence or a news graphic or whatever. It's a distraction, and an expensive distraction at that, as it presumably requires the services of a graphic designer. Still, I guess the producers figure they've got all these graphic designers sitting around, right? May as well use them for something. And if you don't need a pie-chart for your particular piece, what are you gonna do? Go on, stick some Flash animation to the viewers. At least the more moronic ones will be impressed.
Monday, September 27, 2010
A series of sorry tales
I've been shopping on the Internet for over a decade, almost without incident. It seems either I've been very lucky, or I was saving all my bad luck up for our latest project.
We've been having an en-suite shower room fitted and our online purchases have, to say the least, not been straightforward. My previous successes in the area of online retail have definitely lowered my guard, to the point where I never even think of checking for adverse reviews before using a new supplier. More fool me. I can't work out whether the plumbing supply trade has more than its fair share of incompetents, but such has been our experience so far.
Problem #1: Broken shower tray; strange approach to customer service
We ordered a Coram shower tray and door from a supply company who quoted up to 5 days delivery. I gave the builder an estimate of arrival, to which he worked. It didn't turn up. To be fair, this was partly my fault for misreading the delivery details. It meant 5 *business* days. Buried even further in the small print, news that this countdown didn't start until after the products were shipped, and it had taken them two days to process the order and pick the goods from the warehouse. Hardly Internet speed that, is it?
But the problems didn't really start until the tray arrived. I should have been suspicious at the haste with which the courier dropped the goods off and presented his electronic device to record my signature, but a cursory glance revealed nothing amiss so I signed and he left. Three hours later, when the plumber came to remove the packaging, he discovered a huge chunk missing from one edge of the tray. A piece had been broken off and was rattling around inside the polythene sheet. I thought at first this had happened in transit - a result, perhaps, of heavy braking and the tray careering into another package in the van - but closer inspection showed that the package had previously been opened, and there was no waste trap included with the tray. It looked like a returned product had been recycled without being checked.
I returned to the supplier's website to look up the customer services number and was horrified to find they didn't have one. Policy. To "keep costs down" all customer complaints were handled by email. I emailed them, and proceeded (belatedly) to search out online reviews of the company. What I found sent a cold chill down my spine. Appalling reviews seemed to be the norm, and numbered in the hundreds, with only a handful of notes from satisfied customers. Late, incomplete, or totally absent deliveries, damaged goods, money taken from accounts before goods were shipped and never refunded. Lack of response to complaints. The same story told over and over again.
And then I received a reply to my customer services email. They handled (they said) all contact in the order of receipt (i.e. no attempt to prioritise urgent problems), and my ticket was #126 in the queue. I would receive an update on its progress every two hours until it was answered. Two hours later, I had moved to position #110 in the queue, but by now it was 3pm and they only work until 5. And this on the Friday before Bank Holiday weekend. I passed on the bad news to our plumber and builder, who began the process of scratching heads to work out how they could rejig their schedule to cope with the lack of a tray for what would probably be a minimum of another week.
The day after the holiday, the email countdown resumed. By then we had already investigated alternative suppliers. No local outlets carried stock and it soon became obvious our only recourse was to wait for the original suppliers to deal with the issue. This turned out to be a good thing, as my first contact with the support department that WASN'T a countdown informed me that a replacement would be despatched immediately. I replied that if this second delivery was going to take 9 days, like the first, that was unacceptable. "As a gesture of goodwill" they agreed to upgrade to next-day delivery and sure enough the replacement tray arrived the next day.
So a good result, eventually, but not without a deal of angst and I still wouldn't use them again. If I'd been able to talk to someone on the phone it could have been sorted on the Friday and a replacement delivered Saturday.
Problem #2: "Pedestal" Sink
We ordered a washbasin/toilet combo which came complete with pedestal. An easy assumption then that it had a standard fitting (wall mounted) to go with the pedestal. Wrong! The version supplied was designed to be fitted atop a vanitory unit. Luckily our builder had dealt with such a situation before, as none of us could face another trip around the complaint/replacement loop.
Problem #3: "Chrome" robe hooks
We chose a small (300mm wide) heated towel rail for the small return wall at the side of the shower, and I wanted some robe hooks to clip onto this similar to the one we already have in the main bathroom. I found two suitable designs but the one from taps4less, which because it was "chrome" came in considerably more expensive - like five times - the other, was exactly what I had in mind.
Delivery was swift, as was the disappointment when I opened the package to find the hooks (two of them in the deal) were not solid chrome, nor even chrome plated brass, but that awful faux-chrome plastic that they use for kiddies toys.
A brief sojourn in the online forums yet again revealed one awful review after another, with no evidence that anyone had ever had any satisfaction from long months of complaining. I decided to swallow it. Yet another company I'll never deal with again.
We've been having an en-suite shower room fitted and our online purchases have, to say the least, not been straightforward. My previous successes in the area of online retail have definitely lowered my guard, to the point where I never even think of checking for adverse reviews before using a new supplier. More fool me. I can't work out whether the plumbing supply trade has more than its fair share of incompetents, but such has been our experience so far.
Problem #1: Broken shower tray; strange approach to customer service
We ordered a Coram shower tray and door from a supply company who quoted up to 5 days delivery. I gave the builder an estimate of arrival, to which he worked. It didn't turn up. To be fair, this was partly my fault for misreading the delivery details. It meant 5 *business* days. Buried even further in the small print, news that this countdown didn't start until after the products were shipped, and it had taken them two days to process the order and pick the goods from the warehouse. Hardly Internet speed that, is it?
But the problems didn't really start until the tray arrived. I should have been suspicious at the haste with which the courier dropped the goods off and presented his electronic device to record my signature, but a cursory glance revealed nothing amiss so I signed and he left. Three hours later, when the plumber came to remove the packaging, he discovered a huge chunk missing from one edge of the tray. A piece had been broken off and was rattling around inside the polythene sheet. I thought at first this had happened in transit - a result, perhaps, of heavy braking and the tray careering into another package in the van - but closer inspection showed that the package had previously been opened, and there was no waste trap included with the tray. It looked like a returned product had been recycled without being checked.
I returned to the supplier's website to look up the customer services number and was horrified to find they didn't have one. Policy. To "keep costs down" all customer complaints were handled by email. I emailed them, and proceeded (belatedly) to search out online reviews of the company. What I found sent a cold chill down my spine. Appalling reviews seemed to be the norm, and numbered in the hundreds, with only a handful of notes from satisfied customers. Late, incomplete, or totally absent deliveries, damaged goods, money taken from accounts before goods were shipped and never refunded. Lack of response to complaints. The same story told over and over again.
And then I received a reply to my customer services email. They handled (they said) all contact in the order of receipt (i.e. no attempt to prioritise urgent problems), and my ticket was #126 in the queue. I would receive an update on its progress every two hours until it was answered. Two hours later, I had moved to position #110 in the queue, but by now it was 3pm and they only work until 5. And this on the Friday before Bank Holiday weekend. I passed on the bad news to our plumber and builder, who began the process of scratching heads to work out how they could rejig their schedule to cope with the lack of a tray for what would probably be a minimum of another week.
The day after the holiday, the email countdown resumed. By then we had already investigated alternative suppliers. No local outlets carried stock and it soon became obvious our only recourse was to wait for the original suppliers to deal with the issue. This turned out to be a good thing, as my first contact with the support department that WASN'T a countdown informed me that a replacement would be despatched immediately. I replied that if this second delivery was going to take 9 days, like the first, that was unacceptable. "As a gesture of goodwill" they agreed to upgrade to next-day delivery and sure enough the replacement tray arrived the next day.
So a good result, eventually, but not without a deal of angst and I still wouldn't use them again. If I'd been able to talk to someone on the phone it could have been sorted on the Friday and a replacement delivered Saturday.
Problem #2: "Pedestal" Sink
We ordered a washbasin/toilet combo which came complete with pedestal. An easy assumption then that it had a standard fitting (wall mounted) to go with the pedestal. Wrong! The version supplied was designed to be fitted atop a vanitory unit. Luckily our builder had dealt with such a situation before, as none of us could face another trip around the complaint/replacement loop.
Problem #3: "Chrome" robe hooks
We chose a small (300mm wide) heated towel rail for the small return wall at the side of the shower, and I wanted some robe hooks to clip onto this similar to the one we already have in the main bathroom. I found two suitable designs but the one from taps4less, which because it was "chrome" came in considerably more expensive - like five times - the other, was exactly what I had in mind.
Delivery was swift, as was the disappointment when I opened the package to find the hooks (two of them in the deal) were not solid chrome, nor even chrome plated brass, but that awful faux-chrome plastic that they use for kiddies toys.
A brief sojourn in the online forums yet again revealed one awful review after another, with no evidence that anyone had ever had any satisfaction from long months of complaining. I decided to swallow it. Yet another company I'll never deal with again.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
A Grizzly tale
Just back from another get-together with mates in Nottingham, where as usual a good time was had by all.
The festivities were not dampened at all by the weather, or my discovery a few minutes after arrival of another slow leak in one of my tyres, and were only slightly blunted by the absence of one of the couples.
This time round we enjoyed the hospitality of someone who hasn't hosted before (personal reasons that it would be inappropriate to bore you with) and who did an excellent job of not allowing his self-confessed lack of culinary accomplishment get in the way of a good party. He proved perfectly capable of (a) preparing enough garlic bread to sink the Bismarck, and (b) assembling a fine selection of takeaway flyers that empowered us to choose some of the most intensely cheesy pizza I have ever feasted on. Way to go, Griz.
The festivities were not dampened at all by the weather, or my discovery a few minutes after arrival of another slow leak in one of my tyres, and were only slightly blunted by the absence of one of the couples.
This time round we enjoyed the hospitality of someone who hasn't hosted before (personal reasons that it would be inappropriate to bore you with) and who did an excellent job of not allowing his self-confessed lack of culinary accomplishment get in the way of a good party. He proved perfectly capable of (a) preparing enough garlic bread to sink the Bismarck, and (b) assembling a fine selection of takeaway flyers that empowered us to choose some of the most intensely cheesy pizza I have ever feasted on. Way to go, Griz.
Saturday, September 25, 2010
Sometimes, the little guy wins
Just been reading a weekly news breakdown on the Guardian website. In among the headlines of Vince Cable's conference speech and Fatty Moyles' BBC Radio One rant, is the story of Paul Taylor, a 61-year-old widower who this week won a fight he began in 1995 to buy his council house under the right-to-buy scheme.
Back then the local authority refused the sale, arguing the house stood on consecrated land and also had a public footpath running through the garden. Undeterred, Taylor took a law degree and eventually was able to prove the house is built on separate land, and has no legal right of way through the garden.
The courts awarded him the right to buy the house (current value £350,000) at its 1995 market price, less the right-to-buy discount for long-term tenancy - in his case 30% - which reduced the price to £63,000.
It gets better. On top of that, he won back payment of rent paid since the fight began in 1995. A total of £36,000. Way to go, Paul. Wonder if he's now going to sue them for wasted time, distress, psychological trauma and hair loss? Be a shame to let that law degree go to waste.
Back then the local authority refused the sale, arguing the house stood on consecrated land and also had a public footpath running through the garden. Undeterred, Taylor took a law degree and eventually was able to prove the house is built on separate land, and has no legal right of way through the garden.
The courts awarded him the right to buy the house (current value £350,000) at its 1995 market price, less the right-to-buy discount for long-term tenancy - in his case 30% - which reduced the price to £63,000.
It gets better. On top of that, he won back payment of rent paid since the fight began in 1995. A total of £36,000. Way to go, Paul. Wonder if he's now going to sue them for wasted time, distress, psychological trauma and hair loss? Be a shame to let that law degree go to waste.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Silent Key VE3QF
I've never known much about amateur radio, but the little I do know has always interested me. Whenever I think about it, it's with a feeling that if I'd been born one generation earlier it would have been something I'd have been into. My existing penchant for chat, on IRC and now more modern alternatives, is easily interpretable as a leaning towards communication with new and interesting people in exotic places all over the world, and amateur radio was always the best - indeed only - way to do this in the years before the Internet.
I've never known much about the man who I liked to think of as my father-in-law, but the little I do know has always interested me. Whenever I think about him, it's with a feeling that if I'd been able to spend more time with him, through an imagined combination of meeting Nikki earlier and living closer than 3,000 miles away, he would have been someone I'd have got along with really well, what with our shared background in computing, our tendency to geekiness, the chat thing, ...
But now, after one of those traumatic late evening phone calls and a poignant Facebook status update, I'll never have that chance. "Silent Key VE3QF" was Paul's brief message, and although I knew the background to it, knew that VE3QF was Tony's call sign and I could work out what "silent key" meant, I still looked it up. What I found was a clear explanation of a simple yet profound message for the amateur radio community that I found unexpectedly moving.
Part of the explanation reads: You may hear a silent key referred to as an SK in Morse Code, although "SK" can also signal "end transmission."
End transmission. What a perfect expression for any geek at the end of their life, especially one steeped in the lore of the amateur radio enthusiast and who had a well-developed appreciation of irony. Sleep well Tony.
I've never known much about the man who I liked to think of as my father-in-law, but the little I do know has always interested me. Whenever I think about him, it's with a feeling that if I'd been able to spend more time with him, through an imagined combination of meeting Nikki earlier and living closer than 3,000 miles away, he would have been someone I'd have got along with really well, what with our shared background in computing, our tendency to geekiness, the chat thing, ...
But now, after one of those traumatic late evening phone calls and a poignant Facebook status update, I'll never have that chance. "Silent Key VE3QF" was Paul's brief message, and although I knew the background to it, knew that VE3QF was Tony's call sign and I could work out what "silent key" meant, I still looked it up. What I found was a clear explanation of a simple yet profound message for the amateur radio community that I found unexpectedly moving.
Part of the explanation reads: You may hear a silent key referred to as an SK in Morse Code, although "SK" can also signal "end transmission."
End transmission. What a perfect expression for any geek at the end of their life, especially one steeped in the lore of the amateur radio enthusiast and who had a well-developed appreciation of irony. Sleep well Tony.
Friday, September 10, 2010
Vinyl: In The Land of Grey and Pink
Owned on digital media: Yes
Want to replace: n/a
By the time Caravan released this their third album, they already had a small but dedicated following, but this was really their breakthrough disc and is the one that widened their fan base considerably. Most significantly from a personal perspective, it was my first exposure to the band that were to become firm favourites in my late teens and the first one from whom I bought more than one album.
Even though later supplanted by Genesis in my affections, this remains one of my all-time favourite records. Surprising then that I didn't replace it with a new digitally-remastered version until April of this year, but it was certainly worth the wait. Rediscovering Golf Girl, Winter Wine, Nine Feet Underground and the title track again after not listening to them for over a decade was a total delight.
Thursday, September 09, 2010
We've been carpeted
Great excitement yesterday evening as the carpet company called to say our replacement carpet had finally arrived and would it be convenient to fit it today? You bet your sweet bippy* it would.
The very personable man on the phone assured me that since we'd been waiting ages and the (replacement) order was marked as urgent, he would put us down as the first call. Which meant the fitters should arrive shortly after 9am.
At 10:45 I tried to call the shop. After the third busy tone I was in the middle of trying again when my mobile lit up with the shop name, calling with sincere apologies that the fitter had been delayed but was loading up his van RIGHT NOW and would be with me in 20 minutes. Which turned out to be, naturally, 40 minutes. But at least he was here! With a carpet!! Which was the right size!!!
But didn't have any underlay or gripper rods with it.
Chief Fitter walked into the room.
"Just going on the floor, is it?"
My initial reaction, which I managed with superhuman effort to bite back, was to say "No, it's a carpet. It's going on the fucking ceiling, where do you think?"
Then I realised what he was saying. That he was going to lay the carpet on the bare floor.
""No, there should be underlay with it."
"They've not given me any underlay. Or grippers."
""You ARE joking?"
I fetched the invoice.
""Underlay," I pointed.
He called the shop, and shortly afterwards with much muttering under his breath at the incompetence of both the shop and the previous fitter, who "if it had been me" should have at least fitted the underlay and grippers before taking the too-short carpet back, returned to the depot to pick up... underlay and grippers.
An hour later he was back, and not much more than half-an-hour after that (it always amazes me how fast professional carpet fitters work), our new room was finally, finally ready to receive furniture, and have its new curtains hung.
A task for the coming weekend. With any luck, we only have one more night on the sofa bed! Yippee!
*What exactly is a "sweet bippy"? Does anyone know?** And why would you want to place a bet with it?
**Yes, I know. Google does. Slang term for unspecified body part (probably 'ass') as used in Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. God, I never knew it was THAT old.
The very personable man on the phone assured me that since we'd been waiting ages and the (replacement) order was marked as urgent, he would put us down as the first call. Which meant the fitters should arrive shortly after 9am.
At 10:45 I tried to call the shop. After the third busy tone I was in the middle of trying again when my mobile lit up with the shop name, calling with sincere apologies that the fitter had been delayed but was loading up his van RIGHT NOW and would be with me in 20 minutes. Which turned out to be, naturally, 40 minutes. But at least he was here! With a carpet!! Which was the right size!!!
Chief Fitter walked into the room.
"Just going on the floor, is it?"
My initial reaction, which I managed with superhuman effort to bite back, was to say "No, it's a carpet. It's going on the fucking ceiling, where do you think?"
Then I realised what he was saying. That he was going to lay the carpet on the bare floor.
""No, there should be underlay with it."
"They've not given me any underlay. Or grippers."
""You ARE joking?"
I fetched the invoice.
""Underlay," I pointed.
He called the shop, and shortly afterwards with much muttering under his breath at the incompetence of both the shop and the previous fitter, who "if it had been me" should have at least fitted the underlay and grippers before taking the too-short carpet back, returned to the depot to pick up... underlay and grippers.
A task for the coming weekend. With any luck, we only have one more night on the sofa bed! Yippee!
*What exactly is a "sweet bippy"? Does anyone know?** And why would you want to place a bet with it?
**Yes, I know. Google does. Slang term for unspecified body part (probably 'ass') as used in Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In. God, I never knew it was THAT old.
Wednesday, September 08, 2010
What happened at the car doctors
I took the car to the garage this morning. You may remember reading exactly the same opening sentence to yesterday's blog. There's a reason for that. I had exactly the same opening sentence to my day. This is because unfortunately, despite my mechanic being both very good and very reasonably priced, he has a limited grasp of scheduling.
The way it works in his garage is that he says "yes" to any work that appears on the horizon and then proceeds to handle them sequentially. If it transpires that he's taken on more work than can be done in a day, the ones left over simply get shunted to the next day. Which is fine (I suppose) if you can leave your motor with him overnight. I can't. So when I call up towards the end of the day I get "sorry, I've not even looked at it yet."
Which has now happened on four out of the five occasions I've taken the car to him. In any other circumstance this would be grounds for me to take my business elsewhere (with a level of huffiness dictated by my grumpiness at the time), but he IS cheap. And the garage IS within walking distance.
Anyway it turns out all this enginemanagementpoorperformancelumpyrunning business is my own fault. I haven't been checking my oil regularly enough. He actually said that. "I get the impression you don't check your oil very often." Yeah, that would be right. Well, to be entirely honest, "at all" would be closer to the mark. I usually leave it until the oil warning light flickers when I'm taking a hard corner, and then think "ah. Must get some oil next time I fill up."
This, apparently, is not the best approach to take. Especially on modern engines with hydraulic tappets. Because, well, being hydraulic, they need - you know - oil. If the oil level drops all their little reservoirs go dry in a kind of homage to the state of the country's water supply a few weeks ago, the valves don't open properly, and the engine management unit registers a misfire and turns on its little light to tell me all about it. Occasionally the whole situation gets so bad the misfires become audible, and affect more than one valve, which explains last Friday's (and Sunday's) journeys.
He cleaned it all up, reset the EMU codes, and topped up the oil. For my part, I'll be doing weekly oil checks from now on. Me ol' Dad would be proud of me. Exasperated, but proud.
The way it works in his garage is that he says "yes" to any work that appears on the horizon and then proceeds to handle them sequentially. If it transpires that he's taken on more work than can be done in a day, the ones left over simply get shunted to the next day. Which is fine (I suppose) if you can leave your motor with him overnight. I can't. So when I call up towards the end of the day I get "sorry, I've not even looked at it yet."
Which has now happened on four out of the five occasions I've taken the car to him. In any other circumstance this would be grounds for me to take my business elsewhere (with a level of huffiness dictated by my grumpiness at the time), but he IS cheap. And the garage IS within walking distance.
Anyway it turns out all this enginemanagementpoorperformancelumpyrunning business is my own fault. I haven't been checking my oil regularly enough. He actually said that. "I get the impression you don't check your oil very often." Yeah, that would be right. Well, to be entirely honest, "at all" would be closer to the mark. I usually leave it until the oil warning light flickers when I'm taking a hard corner, and then think "ah. Must get some oil next time I fill up."
This, apparently, is not the best approach to take. Especially on modern engines with hydraulic tappets. Because, well, being hydraulic, they need - you know - oil. If the oil level drops all their little reservoirs go dry in a kind of homage to the state of the country's water supply a few weeks ago, the valves don't open properly, and the engine management unit registers a misfire and turns on its little light to tell me all about it. Occasionally the whole situation gets so bad the misfires become audible, and affect more than one valve, which explains last Friday's (and Sunday's) journeys.
He cleaned it all up, reset the EMU codes, and topped up the oil. For my part, I'll be doing weekly oil checks from now on. Me ol' Dad would be proud of me. Exasperated, but proud.
Tuesday, September 07, 2010
The smell of green
I took the car to the garage this morning. Its 'Engine Management' light had been glowering at me for some days. In recent months this hasn't been cause for concern as, before I could (be arsed to) organise a visit to the garage, it would go out again. And then come on again, a few weeks later.
This time it came on and stayed on.
Worse than that, on long journeys (such as last Friday, and again on Sunday) the car would give a worrying lurch, the light would start flashing, and the performance of the car dip alarmingly, as if it's only firing on two cylinders. Which, given it's the Engine Management light, is entirely possible. So I booked it in yesterday, and dropped it off this morning.
The garage I've used since the demise of the garage I used to use before I started using the one I use now, is only a short walk away, which is the main reason I chose it. That, and the fact that it comes highly recommended on the local community forum. It's wedged between two semi-detached houses on a bend in a normal suburban street, so "dropping the car off" entails hunting down a parking space before walking back to the garage to leave the keys.
I started to explain where I'd left it. "I'll find it," he breezed. How are you going to do that when you haven't even asked me for the registration, I wondered? I offered him the registration. "You wouldn't believe how many people don't know their own registration," he mused. Well actually mate, given my penchant for examining the human condition, I would.
This time it came on and stayed on.
Worse than that, on long journeys (such as last Friday, and again on Sunday) the car would give a worrying lurch, the light would start flashing, and the performance of the car dip alarmingly, as if it's only firing on two cylinders. Which, given it's the Engine Management light, is entirely possible. So I booked it in yesterday, and dropped it off this morning.
The garage I've used since the demise of the garage I used to use before I started using the one I use now, is only a short walk away, which is the main reason I chose it. That, and the fact that it comes highly recommended on the local community forum. It's wedged between two semi-detached houses on a bend in a normal suburban street, so "dropping the car off" entails hunting down a parking space before walking back to the garage to leave the keys.
I started to explain where I'd left it. "I'll find it," he breezed. How are you going to do that when you haven't even asked me for the registration, I wondered? I offered him the registration. "You wouldn't believe how many people don't know their own registration," he mused. Well actually mate, given my penchant for examining the human condition, I would.
Walking back from the garage through the leafy streets of Whalley Range on what was a sunny morning following a rainy night, the smells of fresh grass, early hints of autumn, and rain-dampened pavements evoked many memories. Something smells are known for, but for some reason this morning the memories were more powerful than usual. Maybe it's because I don't walk anywhere very much any more, whereas as a boy I walked the 2-3 miles home from school every day. I should do it more often really. But not, I hope, on account of having more car trouble!
Monday, September 06, 2010
Blog fodder
There are times when I have absolutely no enthusiasm for blogging. I'm sure I'm not alone in that. And then there are times when the urge to write is so strong it's like a physical ache. Not ever having experienced withdrawal symptoms, thank God (well... not counting caffeine withdrawal which I've gone through on three separate occasions. I don't suppose a mild headache really cuts it as 'withdrawal'), I imagine that this nagging emptiness combined with the need to do something without really knowing what is about as close as I'll ever get to dependence on 'substances.'
The fates often play a cruel joke on me by giving me lots to write about on those days when I don't feel like it, whereas on the days when my enthusiasm knows no bounds there's nowt to write about. So during those Times of Limited Energy, when subjects present themselves, I make little notes under the general heading 'Blog Fodder' so that I'll have some material for when Mr Muse returns.
And then, being a disorganised sort of chap, sometimes those blog fodder notes get a bit lost, and don't turn up 'til months later. Now you begin to perceive where this rambling is taking us. Back to November 2009, when I made a note about a daily horoscope that was particularly apposite:
"In the midst of a sea of change, you decide that the more routine you can make your day, the better. Doing some tasks in a familiar manner now helps you relax, while only last week they made you bored and restless."
Which I found passing strange at the time, as I was engaged in the TENTH recasting of the deployment schedule for the project I was working on. Dates had kept slipping, and obstacles kept presenting themselves. Servers weren't ready, or had disappeared owing to incorrect DNS entries, or the admin password had been lost or corrupted, or the patch levels were wrong, or the management priorities changed and now we needed to do applications BEFORE firewalls, etc, etc, etc. Only the week before, as the horoscope rightly reminded me, this constant change had been doing my head in. But on the day in question, I distinctly remember thinking that the only thing I really wanted to do was sit mindlessly shifting rows about in a spreadsheet because it was a simple, familiar task too close to therapy for comfort.
The fates often play a cruel joke on me by giving me lots to write about on those days when I don't feel like it, whereas on the days when my enthusiasm knows no bounds there's nowt to write about. So during those Times of Limited Energy, when subjects present themselves, I make little notes under the general heading 'Blog Fodder' so that I'll have some material for when Mr Muse returns.
And then, being a disorganised sort of chap, sometimes those blog fodder notes get a bit lost, and don't turn up 'til months later. Now you begin to perceive where this rambling is taking us. Back to November 2009, when I made a note about a daily horoscope that was particularly apposite:
"In the midst of a sea of change, you decide that the more routine you can make your day, the better. Doing some tasks in a familiar manner now helps you relax, while only last week they made you bored and restless."
Which I found passing strange at the time, as I was engaged in the TENTH recasting of the deployment schedule for the project I was working on. Dates had kept slipping, and obstacles kept presenting themselves. Servers weren't ready, or had disappeared owing to incorrect DNS entries, or the admin password had been lost or corrupted, or the patch levels were wrong, or the management priorities changed and now we needed to do applications BEFORE firewalls, etc, etc, etc. Only the week before, as the horoscope rightly reminded me, this constant change had been doing my head in. But on the day in question, I distinctly remember thinking that the only thing I really wanted to do was sit mindlessly shifting rows about in a spreadsheet because it was a simple, familiar task too close to therapy for comfort.
Sunday, September 05, 2010
Italian Night
The latest safari night on the street kicked off at "new girl" Helen's place, where the antipasti were delightful and the Peroni and wine flowed freely from the very first ring of the doorbell. Yes, it was Italian Night this time round, and having managed to find a stripy shirt, a straw boater, and - courtesy of one of the many local charity shops - a single red curtain suitable for ripping into a rough cravat, sash, and a replacement band for the boater, I'd cobbled together a passable gondolier's outfit.
My imagination is clearly as limited as the majority of the neighbours: I was one of three gondoliers. If you think that's bad you should have counted the number of mafiosi in attendance! But as always, it didn't matter. The costumes are only there to get you into the spirit of the occasion, and there was more than enough spirit to go around.
Lasagne may have been a predictable menu choice, but it's all in the execution and this particular lasagne was murdered with relish by just about everyone. Everyone who had room left after scoffing the pizza and focaccia that followed the antipasti, that is. Thankfully the portions were small enough for me to enjoy a helping of spaghetti and spicy meatballs at the fourth house (add obligatory cod Italian accent when reading "spicy meatballs" of course. Something like this: sPIE-see meat-a-BALL!). By the time we hit the last house I could only just manage a single portion of tiramisu. Followed shortly later by an even smaller scoop of trifle. Not sure how Italian trifle is but by that time it didn't matter.
As always the conversation and the company, rather than the food, drink, or costumes, were the highlights of the evening and even though we were one house down due to illness our sojourn to la bella Italia was a great success and another fine chapter in the annals of neighbourly revelry.
Enthusiasm for safari nights remains undiminished too. At one point, when conversation turned to the topic of the next event, no fewer than six ideas for the theme were suggested. Enough to keep us going for another two years at least.
My imagination is clearly as limited as the majority of the neighbours: I was one of three gondoliers. If you think that's bad you should have counted the number of mafiosi in attendance! But as always, it didn't matter. The costumes are only there to get you into the spirit of the occasion, and there was more than enough spirit to go around.
Lasagne may have been a predictable menu choice, but it's all in the execution and this particular lasagne was murdered with relish by just about everyone. Everyone who had room left after scoffing the pizza and focaccia that followed the antipasti, that is. Thankfully the portions were small enough for me to enjoy a helping of spaghetti and spicy meatballs at the fourth house (add obligatory cod Italian accent when reading "spicy meatballs" of course. Something like this: sPIE-see meat-a-BALL!). By the time we hit the last house I could only just manage a single portion of tiramisu. Followed shortly later by an even smaller scoop of trifle. Not sure how Italian trifle is but by that time it didn't matter.
As always the conversation and the company, rather than the food, drink, or costumes, were the highlights of the evening and even though we were one house down due to illness our sojourn to la bella Italia was a great success and another fine chapter in the annals of neighbourly revelry.
Enthusiasm for safari nights remains undiminished too. At one point, when conversation turned to the topic of the next event, no fewer than six ideas for the theme were suggested. Enough to keep us going for another two years at least.
Wednesday, September 01, 2010
HOW many?
I bought Nikki a new Lumix camera for her birthday - she's been hampered for a while by the limited zoom on her old Ixus and envious of the 12x optical zoom on my (older) Lumix, so I thought I'd treat her - and I noticed the other day when copying some photos off her (new, 16GB) card, something that should have been obvious right from the start: the two cameras use identical file naming formats.
This could have been an issue leading to all sorts of photographic clashes and mixups, but for two things. Firstly, we file all our photos chronologically, in top-level folders named 2005, 2006, etc, so unless there was a chance of her "catching me up" it's unlikely that two pictures with the same filename will end up in the same folder. We just have to remember not to change the filing system to be, for example, topic-based.
The second factor is the precise extent of the remoteness of that chance that Nikki will catch me up. I have something like a 6-year head start with my Lumix and I was astonished to find, by comparing recent file names, that in those six years I've taken around 110,000 photos. The wonders of digital photography, eh? If I'd taken that many with my old 35mm film camera it would have cost me something over £25,000.
I'm guessing that there'll be a low-level option somewhere to adjust the file name convention but in light of the above we probably don't need to bother. Let's hope those aren't famous last words.
This could have been an issue leading to all sorts of photographic clashes and mixups, but for two things. Firstly, we file all our photos chronologically, in top-level folders named 2005, 2006, etc, so unless there was a chance of her "catching me up" it's unlikely that two pictures with the same filename will end up in the same folder. We just have to remember not to change the filing system to be, for example, topic-based.
The second factor is the precise extent of the remoteness of that chance that Nikki will catch me up. I have something like a 6-year head start with my Lumix and I was astonished to find, by comparing recent file names, that in those six years I've taken around 110,000 photos. The wonders of digital photography, eh? If I'd taken that many with my old 35mm film camera it would have cost me something over £25,000.
I'm guessing that there'll be a low-level option somewhere to adjust the file name convention but in light of the above we probably don't need to bother. Let's hope those aren't famous last words.
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