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steph's Diary
Part Five
`Asymptotically Approaching Susan'
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 17 12:50:08 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
Welcome to Part Five, in which your humble narrator attempts to find a job
before he runs out of money to pay the rent.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 17 21:05:37 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Surprises
I've just looked in my building society account, where I thought I might have
about L2000 to get by for a little while. I actually have about L6000, which
is a pleasant surprise, and should keep me going for a while.
The other exciting surprise is a message from the boss of Laser-Scan from
before it was taken over by Yeoman. He wants me to send him my CV in case he
could fit me in anywhere in his company. Any job would probably be in
Farnborough, so it's unlikely to be of immediate interest, but I may send a CV
over speculatively. Another pleasant surprise, anyway.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 18 17:34:57 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
Full credit to those still working for Laser-Scan; they've been asking their
contacts in the industry whether they have any vacancies for talented people
they've had to make redundant, and I've had two places where it's been
suggested I send my CV. Unfortunately, getting mail from lsl.co.uk reminded me
of all the things I did for their mail system: friendly names, virus scanning,
spam checking...
It's a lasting mark I've left on the place, and I feel thoroughly unthanked for
it.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jun 19 23:36:56 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
My first really poor day since becoming unemployed. First off, I woke up late,
so I was only up and about after ten. Then, after a morning spent reading, I
dozed off during the lunchtime news. In the afternoon I went to the GROGGS
garden party, but didn't really enjoy myself for reasons I can't pin down, so I
wandered back home, and promptly fell asleep on the sofa until ten.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 20 00:29:35 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
At least I've fixed a bug in PuTTY today. The fact that I put it there
diminishes only slightly from this achievement.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jun 21 11:25:24 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, that's a surprise. The Redundancy Payments Office have got back to me
already, and will shortly be paying L1560 into my bank account. Jolly good.
The fact that they've got the name of my employer wrong -- who the hell are
Custometal Products Ltd? -- is bizarre rather than worrying, but I shall phone
them on Monday to see what they're up to.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jun 22 14:39:32 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
Recently, I have been reading:
The Handmaid's Tale, by Margaret Atwood
Untied Kingdom, by James Lovegrove
The Last Resort, by Paul Leonard
Wonderland, by Mark Chadbourn
Coraline, by Neil Gaiman
The English Patient, by Michael Ondaatje
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 23 14:28:35 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
The Redundancy Payments Office are complete muppets, it appears. Due to an
error on their part, they've paid me under completely the wrong details, so now
I have to pay back the money they've paid me so that they can pay me the
correct money under the correct employer.
I'm just grateful I'm not absolutely desperate for the money right now!
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 25 18:35:02 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
A lovely evening last night, with a few drinks to celebrate Kate's engagement
to Nigel. Starting at the Granta at about 6, I met her there and we sat and
watched the cygnets for a while until more people arrived. The assembled party
wandered on to the Sala Thong for Thai (although I only had a starter since I'd
been hungry and had a baguette at the Granta), and then a few of us drifted on
for drinks outside the Mill. Finally the remnants of the party (Kate, Mobbsy,
Pete, and I) sloped back to Kate's room for whiskey-assisted wittering. Most
pleasant.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 27 00:50:13 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
A sleepy day, although in the end I managed to get a fair amount done. I
listened to the intriguing `Project: Lazarus' Who audio, and managed to get a
bit of PuTTY work done before going out in the evening to meet people at the
pub. I felt a bit lost for a bit; for some reason I didn't know quite what do
do and it was all very `I'm bored Mum'. Pudding courtesy of Lucy, and then the
Great Game of Britain at Relativity helped substantially.
Subject: Dreams
I keep on having dreams about Laser-Scan. In most of them I've still been
going to work for the past two weeks even though I'm technically no longer an
employee, on the basis that I don't have anything better to do. (Which gives
pause for thought; it's almost as weird that people not paid by a company
shouldn't do work for it as it is that everyone is expected to work.) In some
I end up shouting at rooms of coworkers, and in others the discussion of the
Iraq dossier becomes discussion of the redundancies...
I suppose it's my subconscious. It's been going to work with me most days for
the past six and a half years, and it's rather freer than I am to ignore the
realities of my new situation.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 01 15:30:05 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
Not such a good day today. Although I've read a book and reorganised my
bookshelves so that new acquisitions can slot into their correct alphabeticl
position, as well as getting a `send us your CV' mail from a would-be employer,
I'm feeling a bit fed up. One of those things, I suppose.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 02 22:31:36 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
It's scary how fast time passes when you're unemployed. It passes at exactly
the same speed when you're employed, of course, but that's not time you count
because it's the usual thing. Being at home all the time is unusual, so you
count it. Sometimes I think `What am I doing here? I'm not ill.'
The time that is passing is money, too, and it's trickling gently away. That's
not fun either. Still, an interview on Tuesday suggests that someone thinks my
CV is worthwhile.
I wonder if they miss me at Laser-Scan. I wonder if they even notice I'm gone.
It would at once be the worst and best testament to my time there if they were
getting along just fine without me.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 08 23:24:09 2003]--
From: (S) Enigmatic, Phlegmatic, Apocalyptic (steph)
Subject: Is
I had an interview today at ESRI in Aylesbury. Although they were very
friendly and based in a lovely old house near the centre of town, they're
rather too Windows-based for my liking, and I suspect I'll be too Unixy for
theirs. Still, good experience.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 15 12:19:12 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
It's still too hot and I'm still unemployed. I'm still pottering around with
the Windows CE port of PuTTY, although it's very much in fits and starts as my
enthusiasm waxes and wanes.
Subject: Sunday
Sunday was a good day. After `The Archers' omnibus in the morning, I wandered
over to Jesus Green to meet Mary and James, and then a whole host of people,
for a little picnic and some frisbee throwing. It's good to run around in the
sun from time to time, if only to prove to yourself that sweat does in fact
work. Sunday picnics are something we should do more this Summer, weather
permitting.
After that was `Doctor Who' at Simon's. `The Pirate Planet', to be precise,
which I've seen several times before. It's _very_ Douglas Adams, but still
kind of fun.
Later still, some Chinese food and then a game of `Traders of Genoa'. Unlike
many of these games where you collect abstract point tokens, this one involved
collecting lots and lots of money. It gave it something of the `Monopoly'
feel, even though there's a lot more strategy involved in the game. (Not that
I can work out exactly what a good strategy is...)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 18 15:08:27 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been watching a lot of `The West Wing' recently, having borrowed the first
season in DVD-sized instalments from James. It's a very engaging and snappily-
written series, and has led me down all sorts of entertaining avenues of
pointless research: into the American Constitution and its amendments; into the
history of the two principal political parties in America; into the Civil War
and the War of Independence. It's also infected me with a weird enthusiasm for
politics, but hopefully this will be cured by a little thought on the fact that
the characters in `The West Wing' are all just pointless overpaid politicos.
(I think this knowledge is currently being clouded by my status as a pointless
unemployed geeko.)
Another thing all this leads me to wonder about is the European Union, and what
I think it should be. I'm not very positive about the current state of
European institutions; the Parliament seems little more than an expensive
talking shop with no power, the Commission seems far more an unaccountable,
centralising, and overreaching executive than the civil service it's supposed
to be, and I never seem to hear very much about the Council of Ministers at
all. However, I'm increasingly of the opinion that America needs a
counterweight that can bargain with it as an equal and if necessary stand up to
it, and Europe is to me the most palatable candidate for that role.
Everybody argues against a European State, though. At least, nobody argues for
it, and that's probably to avoid rattling rabid Eurosceptics like me. Maybe
I'd be a little less sceptical of European institutions if I felt they were
something worthwhile, something to be proud of. I don't see it happening any
time soon, though.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 19 16:00:44 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
Somewhere between bored, depressed, and useless, any of which may be an
explanation for any of the others. This may recurse.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jul 20 00:48:42 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
And now it's too hot to sleep and there's some noisy party one street down that
makes it harder. Argh.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 22 11:08:25 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
One of the very best things about the University of Cambridge is MA borrowing
rights at the University Library. Just because I got a mediocre degree a few
years ago I am now entitled to borrow from one of Britain's copyright deposit
libraries. Is that not a wonderful privilege?
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 22 11:11:32 2003]--
From: (S) Six bungs blocking the bath-flight (steph)
Subject: Is
I also accidentally bought the first season of `The West Wing' on DVD because
WH Smith didn't know how much they should charge me for it and therefore
charged L37. Since HMV were selling half-season boxes for L35, this seemed
like quite good value.
It only occurred to me a short while later that L37 is still quite a lot of
money. Oops.
I shall have to gnaw the carpet for the next month in place of food.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 22 15:33:59 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Today is a day of Being Crap. Much though I'd like to stick to the lower dose
of antidepressants, unemployment seems to be a depressing factor and I need all
the seratonin I can get at the moment.
Nothing's really happened on the job front yet. There are two or three
interviews on the near horizon, two through friends and one through an agency,
so that's progress of a sort, although I'm really not sure which of the three
jobs I'm keenest on. None of them are traditional system administration
roles, although there's a certain amount of that in all of them. Thinking
negatively, it could all be horribly scary and not suited to me at all.
Thinking positively, it could be a fresh new direction in which to expand my
skills.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 23 18:01:32 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
When I say `the near horizon', I mean `a week today', it seems. All I need to
do is juggle things so that I can attend two interviews on the same day.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 25 16:33:12 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
I am capable of disassembling an old telephone and following simple
instructions to make it ring properly. I am capable of playing Sticky Tetris
to level twelve or so. I can speak four or five foreign languages and I'm not
bad at English, so...
WHY CAN'T I GET ANY INSPIRATION FOR STORIES?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 04 12:53:43 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
See how idle I have been in my continued failure to update this diary. That's
because I'm not sat at a computer for eight hours a day with occasionl spod
interludes. Little has happened except...
Subject: Two interviews
On Wednesday I had two interviews. One, in the morning, was for a QA job at
nCipher, where a number of friends work. It's a different job to what I've
been doing for the past six years, but uses a lot of the skills I've picked up.
The interview went well, and I've got a second interview with them on the 11th
August.
The second interview was with Autonomy, but I found out about it through an
agency who neglected to tell me -- perhaps they didn't know -- what the job
actually was. Since it was a first-line support role, it didn't sound like my
cup of tea, and although the interview probably went OK, I doubt I stood out.
Subject: A wedding
It rained on Friday morning, but it became brighter and drier by the afternoon
so Ben, Clare, and I punted down to Grantchester for Chris and Yasmin's wedding
reception. It was held in the Orchard, with large scones, clotted cream, and
jam, as well as giant Jenga, Connect 4, darts, and a number of other expanded
games. So now it's Chris and Yasmin Emerson. Gosh.
Subject: Saturday
My parents came to visit on Saturday, so we had lunch at the Pike and Eel by
the river and wittered pleasantly for an hour or three before wandering back to
mine for a coffee. Because my Dad wanted to, we watched a spot of cricket on
the television, with I continued doing after they left. I've never watched
cricket on the TV before, and it's rather relaxing.
In the evening I wandered over to Kirsten's party. It was a strange event,
full of spods I didn't know as well as a few people I did. It also had a warm
paddling pool in which people got damp, which was very bizarre. Still,
pleasant witterings with Ben, Simon, and sundry others passed the time until I
wandered off shortly after midnight.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 07 18:22:27 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday, it was officially too hot. Today I have a cold and am sipping Lem
as fast as is permitted. Tomorrow I have an interview which at this rate I
will not be well enough to attend. Life is not fun.
We watched the last few episodes of `Babylon 5' last night, and as I have done
on all previous occasions I cried buckets at the end of `Sleeping in Light'.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Aug 08 14:01:05 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Another interview this morning, with Landmark. They're part of Halliburton and
do data management for oil companies, among other things. The weirdest part of
the interview was being interviewed about something technical by Jon Amery, but
I seemed to do OK on that, and the rest of it went well too. They seemed
particularly cheered by my knowledge of Cyrillic.
I'm now enthused about this as well as about the nCipher job. I wonder what I
will end up doing?
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 09 12:22:28 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
I got my first water bill today. Even though I have no idea where it is, I
have a water meter, and from this Cambridge Water can tell me that I've used
16,000 litres of water since February. That's a scary amount of the wet stuff.
I wonder where it all went?
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 10 13:52:41 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Now I come to think of it, if I took some of that water and put it in a mobile
swimming pool with wheels, going to the Gallery this afternoon might actually
not be quite such a terrifying prospect.
It is too hot. If Summers continue like this I may have to move to Iceland.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 11 15:18:58 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
I had my second interview with nCipher this morning. It didn't feel like it
went as well as the first one, but that might have been the heat and the fact I
found it quite hard to read one of the interviewers' facial expressions.
Whatever the case, I won't find out for a couple of weeks, because it's August,
and some things take longer to happen at nCipher in August. This means I'll
hear about the outcome of the Landmark interview long before I hear about the
nCipher one. I wonder what I should do if Landmark offer me a job before I've
heard back from nCipher?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 11 15:22:00 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Was, insects
I had a hard time sleeping last night. Partly this was due to the excessive
heat, but partly I was scared out of my skin by the `plap' sound of something
landing on my bed. It skittered away, I shrieked, and turned on the light to
find the culprit was a bright green thing about an inch long. I can cope with
insects, but not insects with, you know, _mass_. I squashed it with the bin
and spent the next half hour awake, worrying about whether its green corpse
would stain the carpet.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 12 14:35:08 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
My mother visited this morning and gave me a strimmer, a hedge trimmer, a
watering can, and a spring-loaded extension cable. Although all of these are
useful -- indeed, my hedge is showing the benefits of a trim already -- the
most fun is the extension cable. Press a button, and *swoosh*, your cable is
spooled back at an extremely whizzy rate. I could almost go and do some more
gardening just to get to play with the extension cable again.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 16 21:46:29 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Lots has been going on. I seem to have spent most of the week at the Gallery,
what with one thing and another, mostly playing board games and Tetris. There
was also `Pirates of the Caribbean' at the cinema, which was an entertaining
and slightly knowing take on the pirates genre. Finally, there was Eek's party
at the Gallery, complete with the by now obligatory wonderful cake creation
from Emma.
After I returned from the Gallery last night I had a splitting headache, worse
than any I've had that I can remember. I rang NHS Direct, and they were of
little help, although the hour or so faffing on the phone made me sleepy enough
to be able to get some rest in spite of the pain and I woke up with only a
shadow of the former headache. It's still there, slightly alarmingly.
I've been watching the Test Match on the telly these past few days. Not
something I've done before, but it's pleasantly relaxing. It was provoked by
my parents visiting a couple of weeks ago, when my Dad wanted to watch a few
overs; after they'd left I kept watching. I'm familiar with cricket because it
was played at school, and since I was an incompetent non-athletic type I kept
(sometimes slightly wobbly) score for the First XI instead.
Ben visited today and gave me an Alpha, on which I hope to be able to build
nightly snapshots of Alpha NT PuTTY once more. He then asked me whether I had
any spare laptops, which was strange. What was stranger was that I did, so I
lent him a Laser-Scan cast-off 386 with a dodgy battery and a D-Link parallel
port ethernet card. I seem to have accumulated all this stuff, almost without
realising it.
And now... now I'm feeling strange. Possibly slightly headachey, possibly
slightly bored, possibly slightly lonely. It's getting a bit late to seek out
company now, though, so I shall work on the headache with paracetamol and the
boredom with a book or something on the TiVo. I'm sure I can occupy myself for
an evening. I used to be able to, at any rate.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 19 11:21:15 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
Since nobody has yet offered me a job, I applied for another one. Now
Sainsbury's are here with my shopping, so I must go.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 21 12:51:51 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is not
`Let us not go to the Lighthouse to-morrow,' thought Mrs. Ramsay. `It is a
silly place.'
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 21 12:58:50 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Was
This past week, Radio 4 has been reminding me of my school days. First there
was Ian Hislop's programme on women hymnodists of the Victorian era, which
threw up the fact that one of the verses from `All Things Bright and Beautiful'
is rarely sung these days due to being rather un-PC. It goes like this:
The rich man in his castle,
The poor man at his gate,
He made them, high or lowly,
And ordered their estate.
I distinctly remember singing this both at my state primary school and later at
the private secondary school I went to. I'm only twenty-eight, so has the
world really changed that much since I was a child?
The other thing was Tony Robinson's `Sack Race Blues' about school sports days,
which led me to wondering why the sack race, the three-legged race, and the
egg-and-spoon race stop at the age of about ten. Why are there no Olympic
egg-and-spoon champions? I think we should be told.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 23 01:18:50 2003]--
From: (S) Equal and opposite inaction (steph)
Subject: Is
At the Gallery this evening there were two games of Puerto Rico, the current
favourite board game there. In a break with tradition Gareth didn't win either
of them. In keeping with tradition, neither did I.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 26 14:20:39 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
Today I have been attacking the end of the garden to remove it of its burden of
copious nettles and brambles. Having reduced it to a few persistent weeds, I
have blasted the area with Weedol just to be sure. Bwahahahahaha.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 28 16:02:58 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
It's been an unusual but pleasant couple of days. On Tuesday evening I went
round to Simon's to join him and Gareth for a bit of `Traders of Genoa', and on
Wednesday evening I decided I hadn't seen Clare for absolutely ages so I went
round to Relativity to visit her and got to see Dan and Ian into the bargain.
We made some small headway on a big Guardian crossword without any numbers in
the grid and with all the clues listed in alphabetical order of their answers.
Very odd.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 01 12:04:44 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Catchup
On Saturday I joined Clare and Ben at the station for a trip to Ely, where we
wandered around Riverside Antiques. They had an old Bakelite telephone
labelled OWen by which I was sorely tempted, but since it was L85 I managed to
resist. On the way back to the station we encountered some very cute
ducklings, most brown and yellow but some still in their comedy yellow fluff,
and all making entertaining squeeping noises.
We collected Ian at the station at lunchtime, and after lunch in a riverside
pub we went to the Babylon Gallery for a strange exhibition of modern art
inspired by SF and comics. It was only a small exhibition, but it was fun.
Strange virus-shaped things that twitched, magnetic martians you could move
around, and a variety of upholstered things with PVC spikes.
Then pootling around Ely looking for bookshops, discovering that the Cathedral
now charges for entry (!), and finding a rather surprised gallery owner in his
new little gallery. It featured an iron duck pulling a girder with a question
mark on it. Cute!
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 02 14:57:58 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
After much faff and delay, I finally heard back from nCipher today, informing
me that they'd decided not to offer me the job. It's not necessarily very
surprising if I consider that the other applicant who got a second interview
might have been a QA specialist in a more traditional mould.
At this moment, that leaves Landmark. I'm still in limbo with them, after they
rang me a couple of weeks ago to let me know that they wanted to offer me a job
but needed to get approval from Houston. Fingers crossed, but perhaps one to
follow up.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 03 19:03:48 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
Oops. Yesterday, in my ongoing quest to add IPv6 to the number of protocols
flowing around my house network, I built a new kernel for my Soekris green box.
Said kernel failed to boot for mysterious reasons, and, worse, LILO couldn't be
told to boot the backup kernel because it couldn't detect shift being held down
on the machine's serial console. Bum. I faffed with it for a long time and
gave up. I could have booted it over the network using pxelinux, but I had
none of the infrastructure or the means of assembling it across the webternet;
the green box, y'see, is my firewall. Bum.
This morning I went into town and bought a small CF-card reader so that I could
take the flash card out of the green box and fiddle with its boot settings from
another PC. I have thus spent most of the afternoon arguing with LILO to no
avail as it tries enthusiastically to configure itself for booting off a
non-existent SCSI disk. It took a call to Simon to take me back down a track
I'd abandoned, and now all seems to be well again. Many thanks there.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 04 18:03:03 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
I've still heard nothing from Landmark, which is worrying me. I need to notch
up my job hunting a gear or two.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 11 14:47:31 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
I've not done very much today, or indeed yesterday. Written a couple of
reviews for TTBA, sowed some grass seed, but otherwise it's been a couple of
days of falling asleep and not getting enough done. Bah.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 12 17:44:19 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
I tried ringing Landmark's HR guy today, but both times there was no answer.
Boo.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 16 13:47:56 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday I was very organised. After a morning spent jobhunting and reading,
I walked into town to return my library book to the UL. Then, because all this
unemployment is making me feel a bit lardy and couch-potatoid, I went for a
swim at Parkside pools. It's surprising how easy it is to swim after not
having done so for a long time. I'm no great swimmer, but I managed a few
stints of three or four lengths, which was enough to give my heart a little bit
to think about. I should do it more.
I read over a coffee in Borders before going to meet people for pizza.
Post-pizza was at Relativity, where I took photographs of Clare covered in
books for the cover of the next TTBA. Later, I joined Ian in a spot of
Starcraft alien-bashing, which was fun after a shaky start.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 17 17:27:57 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday was active, too. After a morning doing useful things for TTBA I went
into town to meet Gareth for some snooker. It got quite tense at one point,
with the first frame going to a respotted black after Gareth conceded twenty or
so points in fouls. He still won all three frames, though.
In the evening at the Gallery, Simon and Richard joined us for `Tigris and
Euphrates'. I was quite surprised when I won.
Today, on the other hand, has been a waste of time. I've not managed to do
anything productive at all, and I've spent much of the afternoon asleep. I
might be a bit ill, I suppose -- paracetamol has been a headache-fighting
necessity -- but I still feel useless. Perhaps this evening will be highly
productive to make up for it all.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 17 18:30:25 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Is
And, lo, I have been five pages' worth of productive. Hurrah.
Also, the PlayStation2 Linux people have got in touch with me to let me know
that they have a Linux boot disc that they can sell me, so hurrah to that too.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 18 16:05:29 2003]--
From: (S) Herbicidal Maniac (steph)
Subject: Magic E
Things were different in the early 1980s. There was nothing at all wrong with
a schools' TV program featuring songs about the wonders of `Magic E'...
(This comes from the discovery, courtesy of ceb, that CBBC are showing the old
`Look and Read' stories, including `Dark Towers'. Ooh.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 22 17:55:39 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Is
Today's task has been fixing things which were working but have stopped doing
so. I have a Kensington Expert Mouse trackball and a Wacom Intuos2 graphics
tablet attached to my Linux box here, and I use them interchangeably with
whichever hand happens to be free at the time. Sometimes, for example with The
Gimp, I find one hand on the trackball and the other on the pen.
Anyway, this all used to work, and then a Debian security update ate my X
configuration. Admittedly I'd inadvertently asked it to when I first installed
XFree86 version 4, but it's still frustrating to have your beautifully crafted
configuration vanish. I have recreated it, and ensured that debconf will no
longer trample on my configuration. Now I have no excuse but to get on with
the editing of the upcoming issue of TTBA.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 24 11:15:59 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Is
I have such bad luck. I've just received the PS2 Linux discs, and the boot
disc has scratches on it and won't boot :-(. What's the betting that I have to
wait another few months for them to have another one they can replace it with?
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 24 11:29:07 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Phew
Fortunately, they seem to have a stock of the discs at the moment, so it's just
a case of popping it back in the jiffy bag to send it back to them.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 26 19:17:28 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: The Archers
So, Brian's made the right decision, but has he been killed for it by the evil
Siobhan?
Ooh, tension heartbeat.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Sep 27 23:10:52 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Is
Today I joined Gareth, Verity, and Ben in taking the train to King's Lynn, and
walking the thirteen miles or so of riverside and coastline to Sutton Bridge.
For what should be a very dull bit of country, being completely flat, it's
actually a fascinating place to walk. The sea defences zigzag their way across
the land, demarcating the territory East Anglian man has stolen from the sea
with his wily cunning. The sea itself, all but invisible at low tide, tempts
you from behind miles of sand and mud and marshes. The artificial reservoir
raised out of the Wash as an experiment, and now a sea bird sanctuary,
resembles nothing so much as an unenthusiastic volcanic caldera. The Argonath-
like lighthouses that stand either side of the Nene as you walk inland once
more provide a dangerous end mark to a trek that still has two miles left in
it. Finally, there's Sutton Bridge's eponymous bridge, the whole of which
swings open a few times each week to allow traffic to and from Wisbech.
So not dull, and in spite of a few scattered showers and a breeze, we had good
weather for it, not to mention a superb rainbow which stalked us much of the
way up the Nene.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Sep 27 23:15:39 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Surfleet
Ben bought a map for our expedition, although he forgot to bring it with him.
On that map I noticed the small town of Surfleet, which is where my mother grew
up and where my grandfather was stationmaster. Surfleet station has long since
closed, of course, and the railway that was the Lincolnshire Loop has turned
into the A16(T), but being reminded of the name has made me want to find out
more about the line and the station. I wonder if there are any old photos at
home that might be interesting?
Google has let me down and given me precious little information. If I can find
anything, I shall clearly have to provide a little home for Surfleet station on
the web.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 29 12:19:47 2003]--
From: (S) Antloynant. No antloynant. (steph)
Subject: Is
It turns out, from talking to my mother on the phone, that there are two
stations I should be interested in. One is Surfleet, and the other is
Postland, which was on the line between March and Spalding.
Subject: Sunday
A good day, with a fairly good `Who' and a game of `Lord of the Rings' with
Gareth eating us all in his Sauron guise. Let down at the end, however, by the
fact that my TiVo managed to miss recording the Grand Prix.
I should explain. To record things from the cable box, the TiVo needs to be
able to tell it to change channel without human intervention. However, cable
boxes are designed to be operated by humans rather than computers, so there's
no sensible way for the TiVo to control the cable box. Instead it pretends to
be a remote control and squirts infrared at the cable box. Combine the
unreliability of this in various lighting conditions, the fact that the cable
box uses a weird infrared protocol that the TiVo can only closely approximate,
and a good dollop of Murphy's Law, and occasionally you'll end up with two
hours of Channel Four rather than ITV. Boo.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Oct 02 10:15:52 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I have a job! Or rather, will get an offer in the post from Landmark in the
next day or so, and should be able to start a week on Monday.
Huzzah.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 03 12:23:01 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Memo to self: `ttba' is not a Unix command.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 06 01:25:44 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I have mostly been wrestling with the PlayStation 2 for the past few days.
Having been offered a job on Thursday, I spent a bit of money on the combined
network adapter / IDE interface from Sony. They don't advertise its IDE
interface capabilities, largely because there are no games that use it at the
moment, but the letters HDD on the back of the network adapter were a dead
giveaway.
Since then I've had all sorts of fun trying to get a disk from my TiVo (from
before I upgraded it to 120Gb) to work in it, so that I can install Linux.
First came the fun that the TiVo `locks' disks that are in it, with the result
that 15Gb appears to be 9Mb. Once I'd worked out that this is what was
happening, I could unlock the disk with a little DOS program and suddenly I
could see all 15Gb of it.
Then I started arguing with the keyboard, which appeared to have utterly
ludicrous delay and repeat settings. This was a red herring. It's now clear
to me that the _whole machine_ is being slow, which rather explains why
installation steps the manual suggests should take a minute have been taking
ten or fifteen. (And this is all before we even get to writing anything to the
hard drive at all.)
Some fault detection by a process of elimination this evening has brought me
back to the hard drive. Without the hard drive plugged in, the Linux
installation program runs at an entirely respectable speed.
So what's so special about this hard drive? The word from Sony people is that
any old IDE drive that fits should work in the PlayStation 2. Do I possess the
exception, or have my various attempts at buggering around with its cylinders,
heads, sectors, partitions, and unlocking done something profoundly strange to
it?
For the answer, tune in to the next exciting episode of `PS2 Linux on the
cheap'.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 06 01:27:28 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Having said all that, I am still potentially doing quite well. I've managed to
assemble all the components of a Linux kit -- DVDs, hard drive, keyboard,
network adapter -- for around L50, which is significantly less than what Sony
charge for the whole thing. Admittedly Sony's kit works and mine doesn't, but
I'm working on that...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 06 11:50:04 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, if you don't use a Quantum Fireball lct15 from your TiVo, and use another
hard drive you have lying around instead, it just works. I think there's
either something funny about that make of disk that the PS2 doesn't like, or
the TiVo has done yet another weird thing to it that I don't know about.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 07 21:30:46 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I was at the CUSU Societies' Fair today, and it's changed a lot from the way it
was ten years ago when I first came up to Cambridge. For one thing, it's not
run by Emma Hockey Club any more, and CUSU spend a lot of effort on promoting
themselves at the expense of providing space to societies. For another, it's
now been colonised by commercial stalls, with some societies' stalls being
pushed out to secondary halls by ASDA, Vodafone, Orange, Barclays, Blockbuster,
Staples, Endsleigh, LloydsTSB, National Express, and a variety of other
companies. You wonder whose fair it actually is.
Fortunately, the science fiction society was in the main hall, and in my stint
from setup at 12:30 until I left at 3:30, we collected a little over a sheet's
worth of interested names. Back again tomorrow.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 07 21:33:47 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I wonder why my machine does not beep.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 07 22:58:52 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Now, that's a scary thing. Gary Russell, who does a lot of the Big Finish
`Doctor Who' stuff, turns out to have played Lord Edward Dark (the young one)
in that wonderful `Look and Read' story, `Dark Towers'.
Scary biscuits, eh?
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 14 20:43:18 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is (New Job)
I started my new job with Landmark EAME Ltd. yesterday. So far it's going
well, particularly since I was given a shiny new computer and two LCD monitors
for my workstation. I seem to have got off to a reasonable start and got a
machine working that my predecessor had labelled `a nightmare', and all the
other people in the office seem friendly. (I'm also working with Jon Amery,
who I already knew, so it's not an office completely full of new people.)
On the minus side, their Internet connection has been absent due to idiocy on
the part of BT, so I've been a bit out of touch and unable to use one of my
main job resources, viz. Google. I have also caught Jon's cold, with the
result that my head is full of porridge and I ache all over. I do hope I feel
better by tomorrow, since I'm sure it's not a good idea to take one's third day
in a job off sick...
Another minus is that they have no proper coffee machine and thus no proper
coffee. This will be rectified.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 15 18:51:44 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Feeling mostly better today, although a day's work (and some exploratory
wanderings to see if there's a shortcut home) has left me a bit tired, so I'm
probably still not quite 100%. My boss said `we'll pay you this month' in
response to my having got the truculent machine working. I think I've made a
plausible initial impression (although I'd hope they were going to pay me
anyway!)
I'm now rewriting some scripts, allegedly written in perl but since they say
things like system("sleep","1") it's hard to be too definite. It's interesting
how Landmark has scripts, just as Laser-Scan did, with all sorts of historic
long-since-skipped machines coded into case statements. I think this must be a
common form of organisational cruft that builds up.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 17 01:25:06 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
It turns out that when my boss said `we'll pay you this month', he actually
meant it. I got a payslip in the post this morning, paying me what probably
works out to be a month's pay even though I've only been there a week.
Confusing, but very welcome, and a great motivator.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Oct 18 23:04:20 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Bleah
The cold I had earlier in the week returned last night. I first really noticed
when I went round to Relativity for dinner and my voice went all croaky and
strange. Although I felt better this morning, and fine while my parents were
here, I now feel headachey and generally ill once more. I've thus not ventured
to Girton to warm the new house various friends have moved into...
I hope to feel better tomorrow.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 21 11:18:09 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
Although last week's cold is being annoyingly persistent and hasn't yet been
shaken, I'm feeling largely OK now. My wrists have been aching in their new
environment, but I think I've got it largely adjusted to minimise problems now,
and the office refit in December will apparently give us adjustable desks.
Since one of my main complaints about work desks, and this one in particular,
is that it's too low for anyone tall, this should be a big boon.
Last night, after pizza, we gathered at House! to watch Andrew Walkingshaw
represent Jesus (and thus Cambridge) in University Challenge. Many cheers as
he got a number of useful starter questions, and more when Jesus won. The next
round, we're told, will be shown in January or February; although the whole
thing has already been recorded, we don't know the outcome...
It became too hot and noisy at House!, so I went home and floomped on the sofa
in fromt of some Stargate before going to bed.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 21 16:06:24 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I now have a Kensington Expert Mouse trackball at work, which I can apparently
charge to expenses. Hooray for companies with willing Health and Safety
policies.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 24 11:14:55 2003]--
From: (S) All too short a date (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm nearly at the end of my second week of work with Landmark, and I've mostly
recovered from my cold. I have been spending rather too much money on `Doctor
Who' DVDs, and I am halfway through `Light' by M. John Harrison.
Following an invitation from Lucy, I went to the Carlton Arms pub quiz on
Wednesday, ending up on a team with Lucy and Dan. At the risk of starting a
tradition, the team I was in came last and won a nifty booby prize. Last time
it was a bubble machine; this time it was a bucket of lollipops.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 27 09:48:49 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
On Saturday evening, people gathered at Kate's house to celebrate her
engagement to Nigel and Andrew (`Jesus') Walkingshaw's birthday. It was great
fun, and one of the most enjoyable parties I've been to in a while. Kate and
Nigel both seemed very happy, and it was particularly good to hear that Nigel's
enjoying his teaching again. There's something about a teacher enthusing about
their work that makes you want to go and find the nearest blackboard. Good
conversations too with Pete, Lucy, Vicky, Richard, and of course Kate, and
goodly measures of champagne-approximant too.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 28 09:41:58 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
It was only a matter of time before the obligatory stupid thing happened to me
at work. I bought (with the agreement and approval of my manager and
coworkers) a coffee machine for the office because instant coffee doesn't
really cut it. I waited until I had some spare time. I followed the
instructions, and filled it with water so that I could rinse it clean of the
smells of manufacturing. I realised with horror that the water was dribbling
straight out of the base of the whole machine and on to the floor, and this is
before I've even plugged it in. Water all over the floor. No harm done, but I
felt very silly.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 28 17:01:44 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Today I feel rather unwell. It's a combination of headache and slight
grogginess that makes me want to go home and flump on the sofa. Bah.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 29 12:52:28 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, I flumped, and I feel slightly better today. Something is still trying
to burrow its way out of my left eyebrow, however.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 31 09:07:21 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
On my way to work this morning I noticed that Worldcom, the well-known business
ISP, are digging up bits of Green End Road. I wonder why?
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Nov 01 18:47:41 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
It's the first of November, and the point at which I have to decide what to do
about NaNoWriMo this year. Last year I managed to write a 50,000 word novel in
a month and I was pleased with the result. This year I don't think I shall be
taking part. Mostly that's because today (and every day for the past week) I
have had a splitting headache just above my right eye. I've made an optician's
appointment in case it's something to do with my eyes, but that isn't for a
couple of weeks.
I'm also feeling vaguely down, which is probably just the attritive effect of
the headache, and although I spent money today -- I bought the big 40th
anniversary `Doctor Who' book, a tin of Patrick Troughton Dalek stories, and a
coffee machine for work -- it doesn't seem to have improved my mood much.
So I won't be writing a novel this month, probably. Of course this has a
depressing effect in itself, since I feel under an obligation to myself and my
friends to succeed in this area again, but I'd rather err on the side of
caution and safeguard my health (particularly in the comparatively stressful
environment of a new job's probationary period). None of this is to say that I
might not write something this month anyway, but I'm unkeen to start from
behind. In any case, I'm one novel ahead of everyone else I know who took part
last year, so this can be their year to catch up :-p.
Some food might help, and I might show up at a party later.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 03 13:51:34 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Slightly frustrated at work today. The two people who normally guide me as to
what to do are not here, and most of my ongoing projects are blocking on
someone telling me something. As a result I'm casting around in a way that is
really rather unsatisfactory. Perhaps I shall come up with some inspiration in
due course.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 05 16:44:51 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
After destroying my machine yesterday in what can only be a freak weird thing,
I've reinstalled it today and got back to where I was. I've also made the
flatbed scanner work under Linux and it seems to have met with my boss's
approval, which beats tha alternative of paying L100 for some Windows software.
I've run out of energy at the moment, but I may think of something useful to
fill the remainder of my day...
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Nov 07 18:22:12 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
All this stuff about a Royal scandal that the BBC can't tell us about is
slightly surreal. It's even more surreal (not to mention completely
unbelievable) when you know what the allegations are. As I was told the story
today, it goes:
"The guy whose name just came out had a relationship with Gnarly, and as a
result Gnarly protected him during allegations of rape against the guy by
another male servant."
Aren't butlers and valets supposed to totter by their clocks and cars rather
than making up weird stories?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 10 10:15:01 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Saturday featured walk three in the ongoing series of rambles around East
Anglia. Gareth, Verity, Ben, and I ventured out to Thetford station on a cool
day and walked along the Little Ouse for ten miles or so until we reached
Brandon. It was a very different walk from the previous two, mainly because
the scenery wasn't completely flat all the way to the horizon. Trees and that
most unusual of landscape features, hills, gave it a much more enclosed feel;
even though it wasn't nearly as remote as the first walk in the Wash, at times
I thought it might have been.
We encountered two moles on the way, one dying from a gaping wound and the
other dead.
The other slightly sad thing was the state of the stations. At Thetford, one
of the station buildings was boarded up and the rest of the station buildings
were closed. At Brandon the station building is boarded up, but at least it is
in use by a local builder's company. It's sad but I suppose we should be
grateful that there are stations with services at all. (I wonder what the role
of the station master was in days gone by; why don't we need them any more?)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 10 15:33:22 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
My boss's elusive boss is in the office this afternoon. When he first appeared
in my first few days here I was a bit afraid of him since he seemed a bit
shouty and boisterous. However, he seems to have been pleased that I got a
DHCP server working for his laptop and that we have our 10Mb/s network
connection going, and I think fundamentally he just wants to Get Things Done.
I suspect if I just Get Things Done too, we will get along fine.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 12 09:13:55 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Gareth and I went to see Ross Noble at the Corn Exchange last night. He was
very funny in a kind of train-of-consciousness way, and I was certainly
giggling most of the way through.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Nov 14 11:31:37 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
Bleah. I got into work early this morning, and felt OK for a little while, but
now I feel completely exhausted, slightly flushed, and rather giddy. Having
tried coffee and food I think I may have to go home.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Nov 15 18:49:54 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
...so I told my boss and he drove me home, and I dozed on the sofa for the rest
of the afternoon.
I felt mostly better by 4:30, so I don't know what was wrong. In any case I
taxied to the station and made my way to London to hear Neil Gaiman and Dave
McKean talk about `The Wolves in the Walls'.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 18 10:43:09 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Saturday
I had a birthday party, and it was fun. Gareth and Yasmin get silly points for
giving me a birthday jaffa cake with a candle several times its size on top.
Gareth gets cool points for his present to me of an Underground map jigsaw
puzzle, too. Ooh. I've nearly done it all now, except some of the white bits
round the edges.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 19 11:33:50 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
A good evening yesterday. I went to the pub with Kate and Pete and thence for
coffee at Kate's. Lots of conversation about how viruses work, which always
makes me wish I could keep more of the whole DNA/RNA/etc. jigsaw in my head for
longer.
I'm feeling slightly unwell today, but I'm well enough to be at work, and if
I'm being useless it's more because of the awful database I'm dealing with than
because I'm not 100%.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Nov 20 16:04:42 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
chiark is very unwell, it seems. Random oopses and no clue why they suddenly
started today may well lead to lengthy downtime. If you need to contact me
with any degree of urgency, you may want to CC my owen@ixion address in case
chiark a mal a la spindle.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Nov 21 01:13:50 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm unhappy, possibly even upset. I should get a grip. It's only a computer,
after all.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 24 10:43:42 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
I have been feeling vaguely out of sorts for the past few days. I'm not sure
why, but I suspect it has a lot to do with the new job. It's not that I'm not
enjoying it, but the return to full-time work after four months of idleness has
taken me by surprise; there's so little time to do anything, and I'm too tired
in the evenings to do much even though I want to.
Also, the more frustrating parts of work are a source of stress. I have a set
of things to do by the end of the year, but my attempts to achieve them end up
depending on other people who are too busy or lazy to pay me any attention.
On Saturday I was going to go for a train ride somewhere, just to get out of
Cambridge -- I like train journeys in the rain -- but it was eleven o'clock by
the time I was ready to leave the house and it didn't seem worthwhile by that
point. I bussed into Cambridge in the rain instead, and wandered around the
centre getting slightly damp and failing to buy anything I wanted, not because
it wasn't there but because I was being even more miserly than usual. I came
away with only a ten-way extension cable.
The evening was better, as I went to the Gallery, played `Domaine' with Simon
and Gareth, and got a lift to Duxford for Richard and Louise's engagement
party. It was fun, with nice food and people, and a very silly game of
`Werewolves' at the end. It was slightly surreal having a lemur there to make
up the numbers, particularly when we decided to lynch it for being evil.
It rained on Sunday, too, but that didn't stop me walking to Histon station
along the railway line. I surprised some spray-painting youths under the A14
with my presence, but since I didn't bother them, they didn't bother me;
technically, none of us were supposed to be there. Histon Station is a very
strange place, still looking like a village railway station even though it
hasn't seen any passenger services since 1970. As a bizarre coincidence, a
bunch of the Cast.Iron (www.castiron.org.uk) people were there, so I said a
slightly surprised hello before they went on their way by car and I continued
to the Gallery for `Doctor Who'.
Later, Chinese takeaway was delayed by an accident on Huntingdon Road, and Ben
had to go and fetch it by bike. After that I reluctantly trudged off through
the rain to the CUSFS discussion on SF and Technology, which was actually quite
interesting.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 24 10:44:50 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
I forgot to mention that on Saturday night, a chewy sweet nudged my filling out
of place, so I'm now eating with extreme caution for fear of it falling out. I
have a dentist's appointment this afternoon to fix it...
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 25 10:44:42 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
That nice Mr Mullins put some paste in the crack in my tooth which should keep
it reasonably happy until mid-December, when I have an appointment to get it
sorted out properly.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 26 16:27:22 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
I think I must have been using my mouth muscles to frob my tooth. My mouth
feels tired. It's in good company, though, because I'm feeling pretty zogged
myself. I've been trudging through a few things today but I've not really
achieved very much.
You can tell that I'm not in the ideal state of mind by the fact that I'm ready
to leave work an hour before I'm due to.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Dec 01 12:13:30 2003]--
From: (S) Thouth Thouth Wetht (steph)
Subject: Is
On the way home from the Gallery last night, I spotted a cat in the road. It
had obviously been run over or at least hit by something. It was panting and
bleeding, and howled when I tried to pick it up to move it off the road and out
of the way of immediate harm. We were near Relativity, so Simon went to phone
someone appropriate while Ben and I looked after the cat and tried to prevent
it being run over again. Scared by something, it managed to lollop to the
other side of the road, before sitting down again on the verge.
Simon wasn't able to summon help; the RSPCA emergency line put him on
indefinite hold, and the best we could do was leave a message on the Blue Cross
answering machine. (It turns out that phoning any vet would have done the
trick, since they're obliged to provide 24 hour service, but we didn't know it
then.)
We left the cat hiding in a driveway. We had at least got it out of further
harm's way, and although it seems unlikely it would survive, we had done what
we could for it and shown it some kindness in what might have been its last
hours. Poor thing.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Dec 08 10:58:29 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Was
I've been lazy, busy, and tired, and so haven't said anything about the week
just gone. Given it's been one of the busiest and most stressful weeks in
recent memory, I should fix this. So.
Subject: Monday
On Monday evening there was pizza, followed by post-pizza. Since Ian and Clare
were both ill, we went to House! for post-pizza instead of Relativity. For
whatever reason I ended up talking about various mathematical oddities, and
they were all disappointing. The fact that there are only five platonic solids
is rather disappointing, even though it can be proved to my satisfaction, as
was the result of my musings on the four-colour theorem. Four colours are all
that is needed to colour a 2D space (divided up however you like). Obviously,
for a 1D line, all you need is two colours. A 0D point needs only one.
I wondered what would be the most needed to colour a 3D space, and the
disappointing answer to this question was infinity.
Thence to discussions of infinity, which are fundamentally confusing. (There's
this hotel which has an infinite number of rooms, all of which are full. You
can accommodate new guests by moving every guest from room n into room n+1.
Infinity only has one end, it seems.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Dec 08 11:01:14 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Tuesday
In the evening I went to the final CAST.IRON public meeting. I do plan to
write it up, including details of my conversation with the chief Guided Bus
advocate Shona Johnstone, but I've not had the effort yet.
Subject: Wednesday
The last CUSFS showing of `Firefly' at House!, finishing off the fifteen
episodes that were made. Apparently there may well be a film, so this may not
be the last we see of Mal, Jayne, Kaylee, and friends...
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Dec 10 12:26:58 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Moving
Not me, the office I work in. Except it's moving to its current location, via
storage so that the office can be repainted and refitted. As a result
everyone's putting things in boxes and all I've really had to contribute is a
little bit of paper shredding. I like shredders; they have a sinister secret
police feel to them so that when I walk into the corridor I am no longer Owen
Dunn, Application Engineer, but Secret Agent Dunn with a licence to shred.
The shredder has a notice above it which reads "not for use of children". I'm
not the only one to have misread that as "not for use on children".
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Dec 10 21:30:14 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Dive bombers and empire down
Is empire down a fluffy coat that empires have before they grow their adult
feathers?
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 16 10:59:12 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm getting behind again, but there's been lots of news. Warp back to...
Subject: Friday
Friday was a day of chaos in the office, as we strove to move all the remaining
desks away from the walls so that the painters could get to work, all the while
keeping an eye on the clock because the office Christmas lunch was due for
12pm. We made it, and had a very pleasant dinner -- I had turkey, of course --
at a pub in Fen Ditton, followed by coffee and chat. It turns out that the
husband of one of my coworkers speaks Arabic, which would have been a chance to
show off a bit if my Arabic weren't so rusty, particularly when I could barely
hear what was being said on the other side of the table.
It also turned out that my boss' boss thinks I'm a good thing, and wants to
give me extra responsibility for networking in the whole group he manages.
This means I'll get some training, and get to travel a bit to Aberdeen and
Leatherhead. (And you never know, I might get a bit more money too.) Despite
some of my frustrations with bits of Landmark's infrastructure, it does seem to
be a company which tries to get the best from people.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 16 11:08:40 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Saturday, Christmas Day
Saturday was Christmas Day at the Gallery, and although not everyone could be
invited to lunch as they had been in the past (all these couples!), for some
reason I was invited anyway. Perhaps I'm lovely or something, although perhaps
they won't come to the same conclusion next year; I nearly wrecked the stuffing
by breaking a champagne glass into it! Of course, it's possible that this will
be the last Gallery Christmas, because by next year one or both of the
household or the house may have collapsed.
In the evening there was a more populous puddingy thing, and lots of people
gathered around the tree and got presents! The things I gave seemed to be well
received, and I got some great stuff in return. I'm told I have a good
reaction to being given even small things, but I'm not aware of it being
anything particularly deliberate. I think presents must just bring out my
inner child.
And then there was PUDDING, and some more PUDDING thanks to Yasmin visiting
Tesco's. Hurrah. Merry Christmas.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 19 21:07:49 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Sunday, Boxing Day
It was obvious that we should do something Boxing Dayish after the Gallery
Christmas, so we listened to the rather silly pantomime Doctor Who, `The One
Doctor'. Featuring Christopher Biggins. Oh yes.
We also played `Amun Re', which was the game I bought the Gallery and
associated games players for Christmas. At first I wasn't sure about it, but
after the Old Kingfom I warmed to it and worked out how I might do better in
future. (With Gareth having gone away, of course, I won't get a chance to play
it again for a week or so, but c'est la vie...)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 19 21:09:49 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Was (Monday-Wednesday)
These have to be candidates for most useless days of my work at Landmark to
date. To a first approximation all I did was pack up the office and point out
places where we needed more power points in the new cabling scheme. Still, I
did that.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 19 21:14:14 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Thursday
The office was closed for redecoration, so I had a free day off. Just as well
since I only get four days of proper holiday this year. As a treat to myself I
went to Cambridge railway station and bought an Anglia Plus Pass for L9. This
is a marvellous little ticket that lets you take any Anglia Railways train
anywhere in their core region. I wandered to Norwich, did some Christmas
shopping, and then made a slightly unusual trip back to Cambridge via
Stowmarket and Bury St. Edmunds. I would have explored these places too but it
was getting dark by the time I got there.
Still, a marvellous day out, and Anglia Railways definitely get my vote to run
the Greater Anglia Franchise starting in April next year. Their trains were
clean and punctual, the staff friendly, and the stations clean with good
signage.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 23 14:03:57 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Is
And of course, no sooner do I decide that GB Railways are doing a good job
running Anglia than they lose the Greater Anglia franchise to National Express.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 23 22:59:55 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: A little is of a large was
http://www.brb.gov.uk/ is a strange relic, the website of the remains of
British Rail. Particularly poignant is http://www.brb.gov.uk/enquiries:
`We do not handle travel enquiries, because we no longer operate trains.'
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Dec 31 15:33:44 2003]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Is
And so I am back after Christmas with my parents. I could say that I had a
relaxing time doing very little and that I got a fleece, a food processor, a
few books and CDs, some gift vouchers, and a candle as presents. I could add
that I retrieved some railway books and bits of the model railway I had as a
child. Do you want to know about all that, though? I certainly don't
currently feel up to describing it all.
Back in Cambridge since Sunday, and since then there have been gatherings at
the Gallery and at mine, and it's been fun, but today I feel low: tired,
queasy, and unmotivated in spite of the diminishing number of days remaining
before I go back to work.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jan 01 11:41:35 2004]--
From: (S) Seasonally adjusted (steph)
Subject: Happy New Year, then
I wonder where 2003 went. It was definitely a strange year, 2003. Lots of
change (house and job particularly) but no great stresses or angsts about it.
Fairly unmemorable, really.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jan 03 21:20:34 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, mechanical (steph)
Subject: Signally sad
I've been playing with http://www.simsig.co.uk/, a signalling simulator not
dissimilar to the system Network Rail use. But I always forget to operate the
level crossing so all the trains from Oxford are late.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jan 05 15:45:13 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, mechanical (steph)
Subject: Is
Back at work today, and the office is tidy. More computers are gradually being
connected up, cables are being tidied away, and I'm about to embark on a
long-overdue list of what software we have.
On the minus side, my training course in Oxford isn't going to happen because
equivalent training is available here in Cambridge.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jan 07 16:18:00 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, mechanical (steph)
Subject: Is
Landmark certainly like their employees to travel. I'm going to Leatherhead
next week to meet other bits of the team I'm in and to witness their weekly
system downtime change control thing. Then in February I'll be off to
Aberdeen for a few days for an internal conference.
In other news, we were visited by my boss's boss's boss's boss today. He has a
Welsh accent and seems a very nice guy. He gave the usual sort of corporate
Queen's Speech for the year to come, and then we adjourned to a pub in
Waterbeach for a company-paid lunch. As an added bonus, the pub was serving
Mild, which is rare enough to be a much-appreciated luxury.
Getting back to the office, I found that four IP phones had arrived for me.
Hurrah.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jan 13 15:01:14 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, mechanical (steph)
Subject: Was
Executive summary: last night I was assaulted on Carlton Way. My nose is
probably broken, but apart from that I'm OK.
Last night, I was walking back home from Relativity, along Carlton Way. At
some point, just after the shops perhaps, I was asked for a cigarette. I
mumbled that I didn't smoke, and he asked me again, so I said again, more
loudly, that I didn't smoke. He then asked me where in Arbury I lived, to
which I replied that I didn't. He asked me where I did live. At this point I
thought it would be best just to shut up and let him get bored. Instead he
moved in front of me and threw me into a hedge. I backed off, scared, and
froze in the pavement not quite sure what to do. The guy had a mate with him
who seemed to be trying to calm him down and restrain him.
I moved to cross the road, but the angry one moved into the road, screaming at
me to turn back or he'd tear my head off or something. His mate was trying to
hold him back from me, and when he seemed to be succeeding I went to the side
of the road with Arbury primary school on it and kept walking in the direction
of Kingsway Flats.
`Run,' the guy shouted at me. I kept walking. His mate said `run like any
normal person,' but I didn't think that would be a good idea because they might
chase me and I'm not very good at running. Unfortunately, disobeying this
instruction led the angry one to run at me, shove me into the hedge just past
the power substation, and then throw me to the floor. I was whining something
like `I just want to go home.' He then kicked me a few times in the head at
which point I started screaming `Help me' as loud as I could until it seemed
that they had gone away. Then I called the police and headed back to
Relativity, rather shaken and covered in blood.
Thanks are due to Ian and Clare for helping clean me up and arranging to get me
to A&E, as well as lending me a bed at Relativity for the night because I might
have been concussed or something.
Now I'm back at home, and the police are coming to take a statement.
(By some hideous coincidence, Dan was attacked last night too...)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jan 13 15:02:49 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, mechanical (steph)
Subject: Coincidence
By another astonishing coincidence it was probably the first time in a year or
so that I had my mobile phone on me.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jan 16 12:45:47 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, bechadical (steph)
Subject: Was
Wednesday was a long day. I woke up at five and got to Cambridge Station a bit
after six, making it to Leatherhead just before nine. After a day of meetings
and finding my way around there was dinner and then the weekly scheduled system
maintenance session. Some things went wrong, so I was there until 1am. I was
really rather glad to flump in bed and get some sleep.
The people in Leatherhead are friendly and fun, and between them they have a
lot of knowledge about the systems. What they don't seem to have is a lot of
time, so having me to help might ease the load on them a bit.
On Thursday morning I got up just before nine so I could catch hotel breakfast,
and made it to Leatherhead station in time to catch a 10 o'clock train to
Victoria. The journey back home was remarkably fast and efficient, as well as
multi-modal; the whole trip taxi-train-tube-train-bus-foot took me door to door
in a little under three hours.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jan 19 16:40:59 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, bechadical (steph)
Subject: Is
This morning I went to Addenbrooke's for an appointment to fix my nose.
Unfortunately, the doctor I saw (wth the excellent name Constant Nwoji) said
that my nose was still too swollen to do useful things with, so I have a new
apoointment to get it looked at next Monday.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jan 21 16:44:59 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, bechadical (steph)
Subject: Is
In spite of my sore throat and slight headache, I'm being very productive
today. I've managed to get all the IP phones to their owners, and I've made
some headway in diagnosing network bottlenecks. Generally I feel like I've
been useful, and that's always a pleasant feeling.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jan 27 09:55:39 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, bechadical (steph)
Subject: Is
I went to Addenbrooke's again yesterday morning, to be seen again by Constand
Nwoji, who _still_ has an excellent name. He arranged to get me an appointment
to get my nose straightened. What happens is that I get given a general
anaesthetic, they break my nose again, and then set it back in its proper
place. This will all happen on Thursday. Once that's done I should be able to
get on with my life and not take quite so much time off work having hospital
appointments.
On Saturday afternoon Ben came round and we did some signalling on SimSig.
Apart from sending a coal train off to Reading and getting thoroughly confused
by trains which split into two parts before joining up again, we did quite
well. Fun, and definitely gives you an appreciation of why everything slows
down because of just one failure.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jan 28 15:40:41 2004]--
From: (S) Rude, bechadical (steph)
Subject: Is
It snoweth heavily, such that I can barely see Milton Road from my office.
Interestingly, it is almost exactly a year since the last huge freeze hit
Cambridge. I remember being in a bus with my now-coworker Jon Amery that day.
It took us forever to get down Milton Road before we gave up for Shanks' Pony
at Mitcham's Corner.
Now everything is white and my commuting coworkers are looking anxiously out of
the window at the big flakes.
Me, I'm just glad that I'm going to Aberdeen _next_ week.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jan 29 11:46:39 2004]--
From: (S) There's no nose like good nose (steph)
Subject: Is
I got up early and went to Addenbrooke's and waited a lot while they mustered
sufficient people to frob my nose. When the head person of this lot arrived he
took a look at my nose and declared that he wouldn't be likely to make it any
straighter, and it would probably be better to avoid the anaesthetic risk and
the risk of making it worse (`anaesthetic', even, haha). So I waited some more
until they let me go, grabbed something approximating to breakfast at
Addenbrooke's, and then came to work. Worra lorra faff.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jan 29 14:34:24 2004]--
From: (S) There's no nose like good nose (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm glad it's not just me who feels that the Hutton report was unfairly
uncritical of the Government when it was so critical of the BBC. With Gavyn
Davies and Greg Dyke now having been forced to resign I'm worried about
Auntie's future...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 02 16:22:15 2004]--
From: (S) There's no nose like good nose (steph)
Subject: Will Be
I will be in Aberdeen on business from tomorrow lunchtime until Thursday
evening. Since some of you worry about these things and will fret unless you
can check that my flights have landed safely, here are some details:
03/02/2004 12:00 BA 1308 LHR -> ABZ, arrives 13:30
05/02/2004 18:30 BA 1315 ABZ -> LHR, arrives 20:05
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Feb 04 15:52:42 2004]--
From: (S) There's no nose like good nose (steph)
Subject: Is
So I'm in Aberdeen, in a quiet office with the noise of the air conditioning
from the machine room next door. I've been getting stuff done to the extent
that I can, but my boss and the system architect (who's acting as my guide to
the system until I know my way around it) are both away at a meeting, and I've
got about as far as I can without being able to ask questions. The web can't
help me, because these are questions of the form: `How do we usually do this?'
Still, as you can see I've got hold of a laptop temporarily and I've managed to
connect out to the world.
It has stopped being quite so windy here. After yesterday's gales and
excitingly bumpy landing, it's gone to being grey and wet. Aberdeen is
allegedly known as `The Silver City' for the gleam of sunlight on its granite
buildings. It's more dismal than silver at the moment, I have to say.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 05 10:17:55 2004]--
From: (S) There's no nose like good nose (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I went into Aberdeen to see `The Return of the King'. It was really
rather good, although I regret the lack of Saruman and his Scouring of the
Shire. As with the previous two films, it's made me want to read the whole
LOTR again, although when I'm going to find the time to do that I'm quite
unsure.
Aberdeen is a silly city. Its leisure complex is separated from the rest of
the city by the docks and lots of warehouses, also known as the red light
district. I was convinced I'd gone the wrong way when I tried to walk there,
but when I went back into town and took a taxi, the driver took exactly the
same route and pointed out the area's particular, ah, economic forte.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 05 23:15:14 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, I'm back.
I'm going to bed in a moment, but before I do...
Dear British Airways,
Your Airbus 320 aircraft wanted me to have a neck shaped like this (side
view):
____
### / o\
## | _\ # headrest
## | ~ o eye
#__/ _/ ~ grimace
/ /
| |
| |
I am not sure this neck configuration is common in the population at large, and
perhaps your seat design should reflect the scarcity of this upper body choice.
Also, I do not have a hole in the back of my head but your aircraft is designed
for those who have heads shaped like this (top view):
_n_
/ \
| _ |
# |_/#\_| #
###########
For my future comfort, please send me vouchers for the appropriate corrective
surgery.
Yours &c.,
A Traveller
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Feb 06 13:48:47 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
Our printer has just taken a dislike to the letter `s', when printed in Times.
All our documents are printing out essless. This has to be one of the silliest
failure modes for a laser printer.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 10 11:46:07 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Saturday
On Saturday it was time for yet another jaunt into the wilds of East Anglia,
this time along the Roman Road from Wandlebury to Haverhill. It was a day with
a very cold wind and some warm sun, and the path was a bit boggy because of
rain the night before, but it was otherwise a pleasant walk. Unfortunately,
Gareth's knee gave in a little way along, so we stopped early at Linton,
perhaps having gone for seven miles. Still, good to get a bit of fresh air and
exercise.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Feb 11 21:01:21 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
I think I'm coming down with a cold of some sort. You know how it is when you
can smell a cold? I've had that much of today, and it's now conspiring with a
temperature and a headache to make me go and be useless on the sofa. I was
hoping to finish a story and start wrapping up the current edition of TTBA (the
science fiction society magazine I edit) this evening, but my lack of health
appears determined to thwart that. Boo.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 12 12:13:09 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
And indeed I felt sufficiently ropey this morning that I decided not to go to
work. I hate doing that; I always feel there's an immense total of sick days
piling up which will reflect badly on me in the eyes of my employers. I guess
all I can do is think about it rationally and say `it is not my fault that I am
ill, and I should do what I can to minimise the amount of time I spend being
ill'.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Feb 13 11:11:17 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
Another day off work, another day going `bleagh' at home. It's feeling crap at
home that really persuades me that I'm not skiving...
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 14 16:57:21 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
Boredy bored bored. Bored. Boredy bored. Bored.
Anything happening this evening?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 16 12:46:37 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
In fact, I found that Gareth and Verity weren't doing Valentiney things, and
were just having pizza to celebrate a year of being together, so I went round
there and helped them ship goods from Puerto Rico, be Princes of Florence, and
Raid Tombs.
This week will mostly be eaten by Aberdeen, for what promises to be the utterly
tedious Landmark Innovations Conference. This means I'll be away from
everything from Tuesday evening until Friday evening, although I might be able
to find somewhere to log on in Aberdeen... You'll know I haven't if you don't
see any entries after tomorrow.
Speaking of this diary, it's now available as an RSS feed. Not a very good
one, as yet, but it has the text. I understand this makes it easier for those
who have been assimilated by the LiveJournal borg.
http://www.greenend.org.uk/steph/diary.rss
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 16 16:00:40 2004]--
From: (S) Domimina Nustio Illumea (steph)
Subject: Is
I thought Windows was bad at providing information, but Citrix goes one better:
it actually lies to the administrator.
On machine A, I'm running the Citrix ICA client. It is displaying its output
on machine B, and connecting to machine C.
But does Citrix on machine C say machine A is connected to it? Noo. It claims
that machine B is. The lying toad.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 17 13:23:04 2004]--
From: (S) Domitio Minaillu Nusmea (steph)
Subject: Is
For the first time in ages I didn't sleep well last night. I don't know if
it's because I had more port than usual at post-pizza, or because I'd been
thinking about something, but ideas whirling around my head made it difficult
to get to sleep.
Now I'm so sleepy I feel like I might end up typing with my right cheek.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 17 16:31:05 2004]--
From: (S) Domitio Minaillu Nusmea (steph)
Subject: Is
If you build it, they will come and make it better with perl scripts. Ben's
just given me an improved RSS generator, so this is by way of a test.
Do not adjust your set.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 21 00:11:37 2004]--
From: (S) Domitio Minaillu Nusmea (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back in Cambridge, finally, after a sometimes gruelling few days in
Aberdeen at Landmark's internal `Innovations Conference', which is a large
organisation's attempt at getting everyone at least marginally au fait with the
Company's plans and products.
My original lift to Heathrow evaporated a few days beforehand, so I instead had
to go there the evening before with my boss and stay in a fairly basic Ibis
hotel. Unfortunately I still had to get up at 5am to get to the airport and
check in for my flight, so by the time I finally got to the conference at 10am
sleep deprivation was really beginning to kick in. The first day, therefore,
did not go well.
Partly that was because I was so tired, and partly it was because I didn't
understand what was being said; it was either in Landmarkese, industryese, or
Marketingese, and I'm not fluent in any of them. Partly, though, it was
because I didn't _like_ what was being said: the speakers were trying to
impress on us the importance of increased growth for Landmark.
Now, I'm not opposed to businesses making money -- after all, it pays my wages,
is the motivator for businesses doing societally useful stuff, and well That's
Just The Way Things Work -- but telling the employees of an organisation that
they should be focused on increasing growth for that organisation seems rather
grubby to me. I don't actually _care_ how well Landmark do, except inasmuch as
I'd like them to remain solvent enough to keep paying me. What I do care about
is doing what I do well, taking a pride in my work, and making a difference to
people; a corporate-wide drive for even more profit -- why is a steady state
not acceptable? -- seems to me to devalue that.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 21 00:16:42 2004]--
From: (S) Domitio Minaillu Nusmea (steph)
Subject: Wednesday
By the end of Wednesday's presentations, I was shattered. I sloped off to the
hotel and slept for a few hours and felt at least marginally human for the
communal evening meal at the hotel across the road. I didn't stay long
afterwards and preferred to catch up on my enormous sleep deficit. Many
weren't so wise and went off into Aberdeen for more nightlife.
I don't know if it's fair, but Landmark seemed a very boozy company if the
evenings were anything to go by. Perhaps that's just people, though, or people
at company conferences in the middle of nowhere.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 21 00:30:47 2004]--
From: (S) Domitio Minaillu Nusmea (steph)
Subject: Thursday
The presentations started getting into the interesting stuff once all the
corporate marketing had been dealt with. I got some idea of what Landmark
actually does, what its various products do, and had a very good introduction
to `The Awl Budnis'. This, along with a fascinating talk from a drilling
engineer on Friday, was the highlight of the conference for me.
A half-way decent Chinese buffet in the evening, a pub with some real beer
(Island Dark, IIRC), and conversations with a Frenchman living in England and a
Russian living in Norway rounded off the evening.
Subject: Friday
Aforementioned drilling engineer was presenting something called DecisionSpace
-- yes, most Landmark products seem to be named in StudlyCaps -- which was the
shiniest application I've seen. Not only visually, although it _is_ very
pretty and _does_ spin your data around in 3D, but also technically; it can
work out the targets you want to hit to get your oil, and then work out the
optimal way of hitting as many of the best targets as possible with a given
sort of oil rig. I'm sure you could make a good Pontifex-like game out of it,
but I doubt my ability to get Landmark to make one!
The conference ended at about 3:30, so we had about two hours of faffing at the
airport before the flight. After the flight, my lift home evaporated as my
boss's car turned out to have a flat battery. He called the RAC; I took the
train.
Subject: Quote of the week
`Do you have a mud problem?'
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 23 12:48:49 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Having got Phil Kendall's Spectrum emulator, FUSE, working on my PlayStation 2
a couple of weeks ago (much to anakin's delight), I've been working my way
through that old puzzler XOR. It was the inspiration for amf's Enigma and
involves pushing fish, chickens, dolls, and bombs around a maze in an attempt
to collect all the masks and reach the exit. Of its fifteen levels, I've
finished the first six. The rest may take some time...
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Feb 25 15:47:07 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Pancake Day
I, like Anakin, had forgotten about this, but since the PuTTY team went out for
a Chinese meal and filled pancakes with crispy aromatic duck, we managed to
celebrate in our own way. After a very nice meal (with an orange sorbet in a
real orange shell) we went to Simon's to play silly games. Although some of
these were Spectrum games, it turned out that Simon's own brand games were the
flavour of the evening once more; Jacob had never seen `Rocket Attack' so of
course we had to play that.
Later, when I was playing against Ben, I thought it would be interesting to
play chicken with the other player as to who would take off first. The result
was that my little rocket sat on the ground, gently fizzing with a little bit
of thrust. This was not such a good strategy because it reduced me to
hysterics for a minute or two...
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 26 17:34:28 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
More XOR, this time because I showed Simon a map and he decided to convert the
XOR maps into Enigma levels. I imagine we'll find some priority problems along
the way, but Enigma now has plausible variations of the original XOR levels.
Some people are so _constructive_ when they're wasting time :-)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Mar 01 13:57:54 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Weekending
On Saturday, my parents visited. As usual, this was pleasant and involved
spending most of the day nattering and sitting in the pub. In the Pike and Eel
on Fen Road, in fact. It's unremarkable as a pub for the drink it serves, but
the food isn't bad and it's right by the river so you can watch the aquatic
world go by.
After food and three large glasses of wine, though, I felt very tired in the
evening for Clare's pancake party. It was a pleasant evening nonetheless,
without too many people there to make it crowded. Ian was notably quiet; he'd
bought the Horowitz and Hill electronics bible and spent a lot of time quietly
buried in it, surfacing only to say `this is mad!'. Unusually for me, I was
sufficiently tired that I took a taxi home.
On Sunday I went round to see `Snakedance' at the Gallery. It was quite a good
`Doctor Who' story, especially considering it was a sequel that brought back
the Mara from `Kinda'. After that we played Robo Rally, which we've not done
for a long time. We even finished the game by someone reaching checkpoint 6,
and I'm sure we've not managed that for even longer.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 02 14:45:36 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been feeling reasonably happy for quite a while, but a sudden feeling of
depressed doom has descended on me in the past hour. Partly this is due to the
recurring flamewar on IRC about content vs design on the web, which irks and
depresses me intensely because it goes nowhere in a very heated way and yet is
about something sufficiently important that I find it hard to ignore.
Partly it's due to internal company IT faff. This annoys me for lots of
reasons, although I suspect the most significant one is that although I'm IT
support in this small Cambridge office, I'm nowhere in the corporate IT
structure. Anything that even vaguely impinges on the rest of the company is
outside my bailiwick and I end up at the user end of a helpdesk.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 03 17:10:51 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been vaguely productive today. I reflashed our little firewall box with
some new firmware that let the phones work again, so the Internet was available
again by the time any of my coworkers got in (although it's been mostly just
Jon Amery and I in the office for the past two days).
I've dug out information for people, asked people to do things, chased people
not doing things: all useful, if not actually providing a sense of achievement
of any sort.
Simon and Gareth have both rushed madly ahead of me and finished XOR, mostly
because they're better at thinking than I am. They've both been playing it in
the Enigma engine, however, so I think they have an advantage over me. I've
been playing it on a Spectrum emulator on my PS2, so (a) I don't get to play as
much as they do, (b) I only get to see an 8x8 square of the level at any one
time, (c) I can't really save mid-level sensibly, and (d) they get to avoid
switches. That makes me feel a bit less stupid, if only a bit.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 10 12:54:33 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm on training courses this week, learning about Check Point Firewall-1. The
courses are at NetConnect, rjk's erstwhile employers and one-time host of
chiark.greenend.org.uk, so I'm even in the same building I normally work from.
Apart from the usual problems of dozing off and completing the course labs too
quickly, it's going OK. Sometimes I want to grumble at some of Firewall-1's
security-through-obscurity measures, and driving the GUI is a nuisance, but I'm
learning stuff that might prove useful so I can't really complain.
We were having a conversation over dinner yesterday about foreign scripts and I
let slip that I was on the PuTTY team. I expected the usual blank looks or
perhaps a murmur of `oh that thing' before I could continue talking, but
instead I got a `wow, that's great' reaction that surprised me rather. I don't
think of the stuff I do for PuTTY (and I don't really do that much) as
particularly marvellous. Still, it inspired me to do a few useful PuTTY things
in the evening to atone for receiving undeserved praise.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 10 12:59:27 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Was
61 Green End Road was a big and slightly shabby house that was home to a number
of geeks, myself included, and it was the place that brought greenend.org.uk
into being. I was sad to leave it last year.
Subject: Is
I'm sadder, now, to find that it was bought to let and has been converted into
a number of bedsits. I'm not sure why I should care about this; I know I can't
go back there, after all. Perhaps it's that now I _really_ can't go back
there, because it doesn't exist any more.
I wonder if someone in the future will buy the house, merge it back into a
single dwelling, and cause surprise in generations to come at an excess of
sinks.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 10 17:17:12 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Having said all that, it still has our grotty piece of laserprinted A4 with the
house number `61' blu-tacked to the porch window.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Mar 12 17:07:11 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I am what you might call bored out of my tiny little mind. I've just not had
very much to do today and I've not found constructive ways of passing the time
either so I've been clock-watching since lunchtime.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Mar 15 09:46:31 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Argh. People I know are making offers on houses, so the good old renting vs
buying argument has surfaced again on IRC. I hate this, because it always ends
up making me feel like a second-class citizen for renting a house and being
largely content with this state of affairs. Someone commented that buying a
house was growing up, with the unspoken implication that you're just a child if
you rent.
I can understand that it might be nice in some ways to buy a house, but I can't
afford to live somewhere I want to live, am debt-averse (so the idea of
borrowing more money than I've ever seen scares me witless), and it _really_
pisses me off when I'm made to feel crap and useless for this.
(Never mind the fact that it's very silly that houses cost more than nearly
everybody can actually pay for.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Mar 15 11:41:37 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I am having a Bad Day. All people's irritating traits are making me annoyed
and I have next to no tolerance of anything.
I think this must be what is meant by having got out of bed on the wrong side.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 16 17:01:26 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Some of you read this diary via its RSS feed on LiveJournal, and you comment on
it too. I can see your comments (if I remember to check for them) but because
LiveJournal doesn't allow anonymous comments to RSS feeds I can't reply to
them.
Everyone else, move along. There's nothing to see here.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 17 12:26:24 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Can anyone explain why www.projectgutenberg.org redirects to iraqi-mission.org?
When you've done that, can you explain why the latter hasn't been updated to
reflect recent, ah, developments?
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Mar 19 16:20:20 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
One of the things I've been doing a lot at work lately is scanning tapes.
These are the wonderful old half-inch 9-track tapes that come on big reels and
are wont to spool their contents into a big squiggly brown pile on the floor if
you're unlucky. Note that I didn't say _reading_ tapes -- that gets done later
by others -- but _scanning_ them; that is, I take the tape, put it on a flatbed
scanner, and take a picture of it. Does this sound silly yet?
Well, it's not. These tapes contain data, but their labels are a veritable
mine of metadata, and while we want to archive away the data we don't want to
lose the valuable information that the tape's reel has accumulated over the
years. There can be quite a lot: one tape I scanned this morning had no fewer
than twelve separate labels on it each indicating processing, receipt, copying,
transfer, indexing, and so on by someone or other.
So while it may seem repetitive and dull to take tapes out of their boxes,
avoid them going squiggle over the floor, record their number, and take a scan
of them, it's actually fascinating and immensely worthwhile.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Mar 22 13:47:57 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Saturday
My plan for Saturday was to get out of Cambridge, potter around Covent Garden
and perhaps visit the London Transport Museum, and see if I could find the Ian
Allen transport bookshop near Waterloo. After that I was going to go to
Steve's pub-party.
Unfortunately, the London Transport Museum seemed very expensive so I decided
not to go there, and I browsed its shop instead. Unfortunately by this time I
had become sufficiently opposed to the idea of spending money that I didn't buy
anything. I think the excuse might have been that there would be a better
selection elsewhere or something.
After grabbing some lunch I wandered off to Waterloo station, and after getting
a bit lost around the station (admittedly giving me a chance to appreciate the
grand Southern Railway entrance to the place) I found my way out.
Unfortunately it was the way out the wrong side of the station, and after being
blown about a bit by the very strong winds (and going `ooh, big' at the London
Eye) I realised this and trekked to the other side of the station. Several
minus points go to Network Rail's maps here; the maps of the station told you
where you were with respect to it, but the maps of the surrounding area gave
you no clue. I finally made it to the bookshop, and started browsing the books
when the person behind the counter told me it was chucking-out time. Humbug.
By that point I was annoyed enough that I didn't feel like staying around in
London for Steve's party, so I went back to King's Cross to get back to
Cambridge. I missed a train by a matter of seconds, and the next one suffered
from signalling failures, a failed automatic half-barrier level crossing,
failed overhead line electrification, and a lack of platform space at
Cambridge. Some people really whinged about all this; I just sat back and
dozed.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 23 09:47:34 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Time Frames
Some of my newer readers have asked about the `Is' and `Was' in this diary.
They attempt to give a rough idea of the time frame of the entry, with `Is'
covering the past week or so and `Was' taking up anything before that. (I'm
more reluctant to use `Was' than I should be, perhaps because I feel it belongs
to events years, rather than months or days, ago.)
I use `Will Be' for the future. Dan suggested I should use `in sha'a allah'
(or `inshallah' if you want to run it all together in an Anglicised stylee) but
that literally means `if God wills it' and I'm a bit too atheist for that.
At times I've embellished the form, with negatives and multiple time frames to
indicate the starting and stopping of events -- `Was Not, Is, Will Not Be' --
or an indication of the reflections of the me of one time-frame on the me of
another; `Is of Was' would be me talking about the past, although I'd probably
only use that if there was a particular present-day thing I wanted to compare
the past to. I could do `Was of Is' for past predictions, or `Was of Will Be'
for past predictions of the future, or `Will Be of Was' for what I might think
in future about things currently gone past. It's remarkably flexible.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 23 21:22:02 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been trying to build Mac PuTTY in the hope of prodding it a bit.
Unfortunately the Mac I have on loan from Nigel is very slow and took the best
part of an hour to build something which says `The application PuTTY.ppc could
not be opened because an unexpected error occurred'. Thank you MacOS for that
helpful message. Maybe they should sell advertising space on fatal error
boxes.
I wonder if an original iMac is likely to be faster than this Performa 6200.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Apr 03 13:04:11 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
Oh, good grief.
For some time now the PuTTY team has been in contact with the Arabeyes project.
They're a free software bunch intent on adding Arabic support to a variety of
applications, including PuTTY, and given my background I was delighted when
they got in touch with us.
Unfortunately when they got in touch with us they seemed to be utterly
incapable of doing anything by themselves, and insisted on getting back to us
with all sorts of questions rather than sitting down and actually doing
anything useful. After some amount of this I got stroppy at them and I think
they took the hint, since a couple of days ago they got back to us with a
patch. Since they'd found the gear on their collective bottom, I wrote back to
them with prompt grateful enthusiasm and said I'd look more closely at their
work over the weekend.
Guess what? Their code doesn't even compile.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Apr 06 10:19:53 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
The Arabeyes people sent us a new version of their patch with all the relevant
files in, Simon hacked it about a bit, and we now have a PuTTY that can display
and shape Arabic text correctly. It's really very shiny.
Of course, it still needs a lot of work, but I'm quite impressed and enthused
by the whole thing.
Subject: Work
Work is being strange at me. Last week they sprung a requirement to have a
particular credit card on me, which I'm not sure they have any right to do, and
this week I discover that I have to do online training about bloodborne
pathogens in spite of not having anything to do with blood in my line of work
as a system administrator. Someone at the very top of Halliburton must have
made some decision that everyone must know about sharps bins, protective
equipment, and Hepatitis, so I get to learn how to transport biohazards
according to the US Department of Transportation's rules. *shrug*
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 14 17:21:54 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Easter
It was Easter, so I went to Blackpool for Eastercon, the UK's annual national
SF convention. It was fun, and a lot of interesting things were said, but it
suffered from the thing these things always suffer from, for me: I don't know
any non-Cambridge people and I'm too shy to talk to people I don't already
know. It's not a big hindrance to enjoying it, since I can still go to
programme items and hear and make interesting points, but it always makes me
feel that I could enjoy it so much more. Ah well.
On the way back, I took the train via London and thus had an opportunity to
travel in one of Virgin's shiny new Pendolino trains. `Shiny' is definitely
the word here; the train was new, clean, comfortable, and very very shiny.
Compliments must go to designers who made seats high enough to support my head
and not contort my shoulders. Positive congratulations must go to them for
providing lots of leg room. The air conditioning made it pleasantly cool when
the sun outside would have made it too hot.
On the other hand, the train felt a bit claustrophobic, with smaller windows
than usual and a more curved luggage rack area. Not all seats lined up with
windows, so if you were unlucky you'd not get any natural light at all. Also,
the air conditioning was quite noisy and every now and then the train would
emit inscrutable beeping noises.
Still, it was probably the most comfortable train journey I've had, and that
was just in standard class.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 14 17:23:32 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I should be back at work today, but I think Blackpool took umbrage at my
departure and decided to inflict a cold on me, so I have mostly been dozing and
going `bleah' in front of the television instead. Bored now.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Apr 16 09:26:10 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I took Thursday off too, and now I appear to be taking Friday off. I really
dislike being ill, and self-certification is one of the worst parts about it.
It seems like some horrible procedural hack to get around the fact that it's
not possible to get an accurate 30-second professional diagnosis first thing in
the morning. I'm not a doctor; how should I have any idea whether I'm well
enough to go to work or not? I can start from `I feel ill' but the
self-critical anti-skiving thought processes kick in and make the decision
immensely complicated so that however right it might be I feel bad about being
ill and taking time off work as a result.
It's the borderline cases where this is hardest. If I had 'flu, there'd be no
question of going to work, simply because I wouldn't be able to get out of bed.
Similarly, most days the question of whether I'm well enough to work doesn't
even cross my mind because I'm fine. But when I could probably drag myself
into the office, even though I might not get a lot done and it might make me
feel worse, it's a hard decision to make.
What we need is a magical doodad you can press to your skin, which will read
either `go to work' or `stay at home'.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 21 10:04:24 2004]--
From: (S) Do you have a mud problem? (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm definitely better this week. I actually have energy, and I've been up to
some semi-useful stuff at work, notably working out ways to shoehorn our
codebase into CVS.
On the home front I've been enthused by an ST emulator, STEEM.
(http://steem.atari.st/) It's free as in beer but not free software, although
there were some mutterings that that might change. This has let me play some
of the games I really loved on the Atari, notably `Wings of Death', which is
the shoot-em-up I got most addicted to in my Atari days. However, it's not the
same playing these things on a PC keyboard, and an analogue PC joystick doesn't
cut the mustard either; what's needed is an interface to plug old 9-pin
switch joysticks into a PC.
Lots of people have come up with these interfaces, but I showed the circuit
diagrams I found on the web to electronics-minded friends and they came up with
a circuit of their own. I hope to build it this weekend and see what happens.
Woo.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Apr 23 11:28:26 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm feeling rather low, depressed, and unenergetic at work these past few days.
Maybe it's just a quiet time, and things will pick up, but at the moment I have
comparatively little to do, and the stuff I do have to do is fiddly stuff I
can't really get my teeth into. In my previous job, I would have been checking
the servers were up-to-date and investigating possible new things to do, but
I'm sufficiently low in the food chain here that I don't have responsibility
for anything interesting, and our IT people are Windows-centric and in a
different city so there's not much I could do in any case.
Friends have suggested that I should just get hacking on the code and turn
myself into a programmer. It's not a bad idea, but this is where the
depression comes in; getting out of my box and doing unusual things has a very
high activation energy. Perhaps I should bring my dose of anti-depressants
back to one a day for a while.
For all their faults and the fact they made me redundant, I still miss working
for Laser-Scan.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Apr 26 11:04:26 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Sunday
Sunday evening was strange. I'd volunteered to sponsor the CUSFS discussion of
Walter Jon Williams (author of `Aristoi', `Knight Moves', `Metropolitan', and
the current `Dread Empire's Fall' trilogy), which means guaranteeing to write
the blurb for the discussion and turning up to the discussion with something to
say.
This was scheduled for 7:30, so we watched this week's `Doctor Who' (`Warriors
from the Deep' featuring the return of the Silurians and Sea Devils but this
time with less convincing costumes and fewer string vests) with barely a pause,
ate Chinese food, played Puerto Rico, and finished on the dot at 7:15, at which
point I vanished off to Relativity for the discussion.
The discussion itself was very strange. There were five of us there, but only
Ian and I had actually read any Walter Jon Williams, and in spite of this we
somehow managed to talk (enthuse?) about his work for an hour. Then I walked
back to the Gallery, where they were finishing off a game of Robo Rally, and we
watched the next episode of the second season of `24'. The second season of
this fairly watchable thriller is a strange beast. It doesn't suffer as much
from poor pacing as the first one did, but it would take another season before
the writers realised that we really did not care about Kim Bauer being
kidnapped over and over again and gave her something less boring to do, and the
rot of bringing back characters from the first season has already begun to set
in. (To become endemic by season three.)
We had some time left after that, so we had another game of Puerto Rico.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 28 11:39:15 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
Although I have a headache, my mood seems to be better today. I've broken down
large problems into lots of little nibbly ones so that I can get a sense of
achievement from doing just a small amount of stuff, and the result is
pleasing. I'm still unable to do a number of things because of other people
being busy or slow, but that's Not My Problem and I'm determined not to worry
about it.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Apr 29 10:40:40 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
Here's a puzzle, but it only works if you take milk in your coffee or tea.
Make yourself a nice cup of coffee or tea, and add a splash of milk, but don't
stir it. The milk forms interesting swirly pattens inside the coffee, but if
you rotate the mug the swirly patterns don't rotate with it. Why?
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Apr 29 12:17:03 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
Thank you all for your helpful answers. The coffee is lazy and can't be
bothered to move unless pushed, and possesses insufficient rigidity for the
motion of the mug to move it.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue May 04 09:53:20 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Bank Holiday weekend
The weekend started with Saturday and I met Ben, Gareth, and Verity at
Cambridge bus station, where we caught the bus to Eltisley to start our walk to
Huntingdon. Of course, it started raining en route so that it was a steady
drizzle by the time we got off the bus and headed over to Yelling. Several
rabbits, both alive and dead, dotted our path, and the rain continued until we
were around the next village (Graveley), where it had dried up and we had lunch
in a small pagoda.
The rest of the walk was dry overhead but a little muddy underfoot. We chose a
route which went straight to Godmanchester rather than down to the River Great
Ouse because that might have been really very boggy indeed. A field of
brassicas in very clayey soil was the worst (ooh, heavy feet!) our altered
route had to contend with, and I enjoyed the rest of the walk down into
Godmanchester and across a meadow to Huntingdon bus station. In all it was a
little over ten miles.
In the evening there was a barbecue at the Gallery, followed by `The Seventh
Voyage of Sinbad' on the TV. I don't remember much of it apart from the
Harryhausen cyclops and a princess in a box because I fell asleep halfway
through.
Sunday featured World Championship Snooker, in which Graeme Dott surprised
everyone by going 5-0 up against Ronnie O'Sullivan. Unfortunately, Ronnie
remembered how to play and managed to narrow the margin somewhat. `The
Awakening' was the day's `Doctor Who', and reminded me a bit of `The Wicker
Man'.
Monday had more snooker, a visit from my parents (and hence lots of
conversation about politics, computers, and railways, accompanied by food and
wine at the Pike and Eel), and games at the Gallery. O'Sullivan won the
snooker in short order, so we played a bit of `Puerto Rico' with the
alternative purple buildings, I sprinted Lara Croft into walls in `Tomb Raider
III', Verity went mad in `Eternal Darkness', and that was about it, really.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 05 10:51:24 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
A little while ago, a new policy came in at work which required all employees
to pay for travel expenses using a corporate American Express card. Neither
Jon or I was happy with this for a variety of reasons, the foremost among them
for me being that it seems wrong and unfair for my employer to require me to
enter into financial agreements with a third party, with no opportunity to
refuse.
Maybe I'm just being awkward when I shouldn't be. Should I just sign the forms
and put up with it? Do any legally-minded readers have any opinions on the
legality of this requirement? Whatever I end up doing, the whole thing is
making me feel very stressed once more and only serves to increase my current
unhappiness with work.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 05 21:12:05 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm sitting at home faffing aimlessly. My life doesn't seem terribly
purposeful, useful, or healthy at the moment. Maybe some coffee will help.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu May 06 11:05:23 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
Work gets dafter by the day. From Monday my username changes from odunn to the
eminently memorable HBL3665.
This place is mad.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 12 11:05:42 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
Remarkably, my username didn't change to HBL3665. This is for the entirely
sensible reason that Windows believes I'm based in Stavanger, Norway and
the Norwegians don't get their accounts fiddled with until June.
I'm feeling rather better again, particularly at work but also elsewhere.
I doubled my dose of anti-depressants and started being able to cope again. It
also helped that Jon found me something useful to do at work.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon May 17 11:28:58 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: Is
It has become hotter, and with the increase in heat my energy levels have
declined markedly. It is at about this time of year that I start to consider
the merits of aestivating.
Still, the hot weather didn't stop my determination to be useful over the
weekend, so I attacked the garden with the strimmer and lawnmower and now have
a lawn of untidy drab grass cuttings rather than an untidy lawn of verdant
grass. Perhaps I should buy a grass rake and collect up all the grass, that
sounds like quite a lot of effort. In other garden-related news I went to
Mackay's to buy a nut for my hedge trimmer's handle, but they refused to charge
me for a single nut. I put a few pence in the charity box instead.
On Saturday I went to see `Troy' with Becky, Mobbsy, Dan, Lucy, RJK and LNR.
While definitely inspired by the Iliad rather than based on it, it wasn't a bad
attempt at presenting the story for a modern popular audience, and I won't
grumble too much about a missing ten years of siege. Plus points were an
Agamemnon worthy of Brian Blessed from Brian Cox, and as wet a Paris as you
could hope for from Orlando Bloom. Minus points included any point at which
Brad Pitt's Achilles opened his mouth and proved himself as wooden as the
ultimately more successful horse.
Aeneas turned up at the end, making me instantly wonder if we're going to see
an Aeneid any time soon.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue May 18 16:53:29 2004]--
From: (S) slimy ministrations (steph)
Subject: India 2004
Indian political parties have much cooler symbols than ours. Looking at
http://www.indian-elections.com/partyprofiles/
there are parties symbolised by a telephone, a pair of spectacles, a bicycle,
and an umbrella. Quite a number of bicycles, in fact. I wonder what it is
about the bicycle in India that makes it a desirable symbol for a political
party.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 19 12:07:26 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Is
Some twenty years after the A14 severed the old route between Milton and
Cambridge, the new Milton Cycle Bridge has reinstated the link. It's been
under construction for the past year or so, and the actual bridge has been in
place for a fair few months, but they've had to build the access ramps and put
all the fittings in place so it was only opened yesterday. Named the `Jane
Coston Bridge' after the Councillor who's been lobbying for it for years, it's
very pretty. It'll also be very useful for me because it'll reduce my journey
time to Tesco's and the Country Park by about ten minutes! Hurrah!
http://the-hug.net/photos/index.php?album=bridge_opening&image=P5180056.JPG
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 19 12:17:34 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Wasn't
Very strange dreams this morning, as I dozed while the Today programme was on.
I was missing lectures to attend some kind of sperm donation clinic, except
they didn't get around to doing anything and just took my temperature and
suggested that I needed more stem cells. Oddly the clinic was in
my childhood home town of Wellingborough (on the same street as my playgroup)
rather than Cambridge. I got bored of the talking and left to catch some
lectures, but I was distracted on the way by some small girls who were carrying
some Christmas lights they'd taken from the nearby pub. They wanted me to get
them some more but I thought this was a bad idea and gave them some convenient
balloons instead. They seemed far from impressed, so I pressed on down the
hill into town and dropped all my lecture notes in my rush. Mysteriously, my
lecture notes included all the exercise books I had ever used at school. Even
more mysteriously, John Major stopped by to help me pick them all up.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 19 14:13:52 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Is
An email arrives at work with the subject "Dress Code". It must be a joke.
Haha hahahaha hahahaha hahahaha haha. Ha.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 26 11:02:30 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Is
Work's been rather better over the past few days. Lots of tapes have arrived,
so I've joined everyone in dealing with them: scanning the faces of the tapes
to preserve the all-important metadata, reading the tapes on big whirry 9-track
tape drives, and finally checking the data for problems. It's distracted me
from my usual gripes, and actually been enjoyable for much of the time. (No,
it's not strictly system administration, but that's not a problem. I like
finding out about stuff in general.)
On Saturday I collected Waterbeach station and made it the first in my
collection of British rail stations. By `collect' here I mean `take a few
pictures of, and get on or off a train'. Since there are over two thousand
railway stations in Britain, I don't expect this task to be completed soon or
at all, but it's nice to have a goal.
It's the beer festival all this week. I went last night and had a couple of
nice halves of mild, and I'll probably go again later in the week.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri May 28 17:58:57 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Wednesday, Thursday
I decided to have a quiet Wednesday evening in, and so I did a bit of reading
and watched an episode of `Inspector Morse'. It must have been quite a late
one, since it revealed Morse's first name and I remember that a bit of a fuss
was made about that on Radio 4.
On Thursday I went along to the beer festival again. It was much better
weather than Tuesday, and so I sat on the grass outside as the sun and the
daylight faded away. Lots of fun people were there, including David (with blue
hair), Kate, LNR, rjk, Duncan, Sion, Becky, Jon, Sarah, Mark Waller, Matt Reid,
Martin, and doubtless others I've forgotten. The beer was good too. I'm a big
fan of mild, perhaps partly because it's so uncommon to find it in pubs, so it
was good to have a choice! My favourite was probably the Dark Ruby Mild, which
was slightly syrupy and fruity and anything but mild at 6%.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri May 28 21:39:57 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Is
Since Abu Hamza has been arrested, I thought I'd mention that his name means
`father of the glottal stop'.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 01 14:00:44 2004]--
From: (S) absolute block (steph)
Subject: Weekending
On Saturday there was a gathering in Oxford for Verity's birthday party, so I
made my way there by train, using the WAGN bustitution between Cambridge and
Royston as an excuse to collect Royston station. Because the weather was wet,
if also hot and humid, the party was initially mostly in the kitchen, which I
didn't enjoy so much until I did a bit of juggling; when we later went to the
University Parks, Richard and I detoured via the shops in the search for a
frisbee, and having found one we were able to throw it around enthusiastically.
Later there was tea, and a game of `Ghost' at Verity's; I'd not encountered
this game before (it's sort of like Cheddar Gorge, but with each player adding
a letter and trying to avoid making a word) but it worked well and came up with
some wonderful non-word bluffs such as `cruesque' and `sigmoiopsis'.
Simon and I stayed at a B&B on the Saturday night, and on Sunday we went for a
circular walk around the Uffington White Horse. Definitely more hilly than
some of our earlier walks, and perhaps a bit shorter than I would have liked,
but Gareth was beginning to lose his knees and others were flagging, so that
was probably just as well.
It's good to get out of town once in a while.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 04 14:31:00 2004]--
From: (S) cruesque sigmoiopsis (steph)
Subject: Is
I had a good Tuesday and Wednesday at work, but Thursday and Friday have been a
plod and I've been feeling generally worn out. Perhaps I just need a weekend.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 08 09:41:39 2004]--
From: (S) cruesque sigmoiopsis (steph)
Subject: Weekend
The weekend was hot, but not too hot, so I decided to escape a Cambridge full
of Strawberry Fair (with the concomitant dog-on-a-string brigade) and visit the
Mid-Norfolk Railway out in Wymondham. The train out to Wymondham was nearly
empty, and because some of the aircon wasn't working in Standard Class, they
declassified First and let plebs sit there. Very comfy. From Wymondham
station, which I collected in the usual way, I walked the shortish distance to
the MNR's station at Wymondham Abbey. I just got there as a train pootled in,
so I bought a ticket, got on, and we were off. It was an old diesel thing, and
it trundled along the line in a way that could hardly be called fast, but the
BR notices and the metal-framed windows made it feel like a real train.
Perhaps that's because that was how the trains were when I was very young.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 08 09:57:54 2004]--
From: (S) cruesque sigmoiopsis (steph)
Subject: Is
I think I may have mentioned that I hate Summer. I particularly dislike it
when it's as hot as this; it makes me feel stupid and sleepy and then guilty
for not getting things done (due to being stupid and sleepy).
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 09 16:30:43 2004]--
From: (S) cruesque sigmoiopsis (steph)
Subject: Is
The breeze and the cloud is making today rather more bearable than yesterday or
Monday. I'm just hoping that my sojourn in Scotland next week (for a `Oil and
Gas Exploration for non-Geophysicists' course) isn't too hot and sticky.
Last night I invited a few people round to mine for port, cheese, and the
selection of good quotes from the many that have been submitted to
quotemaster@ucam.org. It was fun, although I'm sure there were more duff
quotes than the last time we tried this...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 14 16:49:21 2004]--
From: (S) cruesque sigmoiopsis (steph)
Subject: Weekending
A fun Veizla at New Hall, complete with some superb poetry in answer to the
Reeve's Challenge. On Sunday, a Canadian Grand Prix and Who at the Gallery in
the form of `The Twin Dilemma', Colin Baker's inaugural story.
I'm off to Aberdeen this evening to spend the next three days on a course
entitled `Oil and Gas Exploration for Non-Geologists'. I'll be back on
Friday...
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 18 11:17:55 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back in Cambridge. The course was very good and I know now a lot more
about geology and looking for oil and gas.
The sleeper was a very comfortable way to travel. I sat in the lounge car for
a few hours over a book and a glass of wine before retiring to my cabin to
sleep. All sorts of odd things were provided in a complimentary wash bag
thing, including a blindfold and a pair of purple ScotRail socks. The main
thing, both on the way there and on the way back, was that I got to the
destination on time and having slept. Waking up at the other end of the
country has a certain magic to it.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 21 23:55:41 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
A little while ago I contacted my letting agency to ask them about a few
gardening things I wasn't able to do: my front hedge has become top-heavy and
is leaning over the pavement, so it needs a trim, and the ivy at the side of my
house is beginning to grow over the window but is too high for me to reach.
They arranged with the owner for a gardener to visit, but his remit seems
mysteriously to have grown. I came out of the house this morning to find he
had trimmed the side hedge, which I was pleased about since I'd been meaning to
do that for a while. I returned this evening to find he had removed all the
shrubbery from the house's front wall. It makes the front of the house look
very bare, and there's an empty flowerbed in front of the wall. It all looks
sad and forlorn and because I've not had any hand or say in it the outside of
the house no longer feels quite like mine.
Worst of all, the hedge still leans and the ivy still covers the window!
It's possible or even likely that the gardener will return tomorrow and do the
jobs I actually wanted to be done, and it's also possible he'll plant something
to fill the bare spaces. Even so, it'll take a while for me to think of it as
my garden again.
(None of this is new, of course. When I lived at Greenend, I greatly resented
Steve's mother attacking `my' garden.)
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 23 17:20:55 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
I woke up today with a splitting headache and a sore throat, so I took the day
off work and spent most of it asleep. On waking up again just now and looking
at local newsgroups, it looks like where I live is losing its bus service.
This is annoying since it's a convenient way to get into town or to the
station, especially in the wet or when I'm tired. It's also one of the more
reliable bus services I've come across in Cambridge. I've emailed my local
councillor but I don't hold out much hope that she'll be able to do anything
about it :-(.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jun 24 11:13:01 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Was
Last night I watched a documentary about the rise and fall of Margaret
Thatcher. It was one of those things made entirely of archive footage of BBC
news reports, and the most notable thing was how the style of BBC News
presentation changed over the years. From the chintzily digital of the early
eighties:
http://www.thetvroom.com/images-bbc-one-news/news-past/83-afternoon-a.jpg
to the new look lunchtime news:
http://www.thetvroom.com/images-bbc-one-news/news-past/86-one-start-g.jpg
and the flippy six:
http://www.thetvroom.com/images-bbc-one-news/news-past/86-six-start-f.jpg
and the incredibly tacky:
http://www.thetvroom.com/images-bbc-one-news/news-past/85-nine-start-f.jpg
And then we get the antenna and it's almost tasteful:
http://www.thetvroom.com/images-bbc-one-news/news-past/89-nine-titles-a.jpg
Now, of course, we've got the almost dance-music thumping with added
bleepy bits.
(All the wonderful images from www.thetvroom.com.)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 25 12:56:41 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
Recently I have been reading:
`The Tomorrow Windows', by Jonathan Morris
`Genocide', by Paul Leonard
`Grunts', by Mary Gentle
`Natural History', by Justina Robson
`The Year of Our War' by Steph Swainston
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 28 09:07:12 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Weekending
I think Thursday's illness must have continued in a low-grade way right through
the weekend. On Saturday I woke up late with a headache and after a shower and
breakfast I promptly dozed off again. I went to Rachel's birthday barbecue in
the afternoon but for one reason or another I never felt quite right so I
wandered back home in the early evening.
Apart from continuing headaches, Sunday was rather better. I got a fair number
of useful things done in the morning and in the afternoon and evening at the
Gallery I managed to get my copy of the `Transformers' comics from Gareth as
well as enjoying the week's `Doctor Who', `Vengeance on Varos', and playing
`Goa', the new board game the Gallery-combine has recently acquired.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 28 09:12:17 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
This morning, a mad Irishman came to my house to fix my bathroom ceiling.
Well, I assume he's Irish from the accent and the leathery skin that looks like
it's spent six thousand years in a peat bog. He also talks all the time in a
way that makes it entirely unclear whether he's talking to you or to himself.
To be honest, I'm a little nervous about leaving the house in his care.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 29 14:14:13 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
However, he seems to have painted the bathroom ceiling, so I mustn't complain
really.
By a remarkable collection of coincidences, there were only three people at
pizza last night. At first I thought this might be because of some boycott --
last week the manageress was seen talking on a mobile phone while driving her
car to park in a cycle lane -- and the restaurant staff obviously suspected
this too, but it was just that everyone else was otherwise occupied. Still,
Ian, Simon, and I had a pleasant pizza, and downstairs for a change as well.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 29 16:52:41 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Will Be
I'll be off to Norwich with Gareth and Simon to see Marillion this evening.
It's their tour to promote their new album, `Marbles', and so I bought the
single CD version of the album and had a listen. So far it doesn't really grab
me at all, and it's certainly a lot poorer than `Anoraknophobia'. There is too
much of what I'd call long whining to a musical background and not enough of
the well-structured song. I realise it's trying to be an album as a whole
rather than just a set of songs, particularly with the `Marbles' vignettes
between most of the tracks (largely about losing them), but it doesn't really
work for me.
Perhaps I should add `yet' to that, though. It may grow on me, since it's
pleasant enough to listen to. Listening to it live may help too.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 02 17:30:39 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Thursday
A day off work, and some familiar faces in a slightly unfamiliar scenario. No
idea what will come of that.
In the afternoon I lost at snooker to Gareth by 3-0 and made up for it by
beating him at Goa on tie-breakers.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 03 23:37:28 2004]--
From: (S) autopsychostratigrapher (steph)
Subject: Is
I was going to go to London today for a barbecue thing, but I was struck by a
solitary urge instead. It's not a particularly depressive mood, but rather one
in which my own company seems preferable to social interaction; it seems to be
a phase I go through from time to time.
Instead I went to Sheringham to visit the North Norfolk Railway, and to take a
quick train journey to Holt and back. On the way there the train was full of
Morris Men and other assorted jangly people, until they all got off at Kelling
Heath. On the way back it seemed like I had nearly the whole train to myself
as we jounced back to Sheringham. A quick walk across the road took me back to
the rail network proper, and because I was feeling strange I came back to
Cambridge via Ipswich.
Other observations:
The line to Sheringham passes through a station which is an interchange with
the Bure Valley Railway, and it's good to see this little narrow gauge line
advertised on the national rail station: `Hoveton and Walsham - change for Bure
Vallery Railway'. On the other hand, narrow gauge rail looks really silly.
When travelling by train from Cambridge I find myself drawn east. Perhaps
that's just the topology of the rail network around here, and I'm sure the
availability of a nine pound day ranger ticket helps, but I feel there's
something about East Anglia that makes me Look East (as it were). Something
about this rural blobule of England makes it that much further from it all for
the actual distance travelled. I certainly feel Cambridge belongs better in
East Anglia than in that nonentity the Midlands (or worse the East Midlands).
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 05 12:48:25 2004]--
From: (S) Complete, but not unique (steph)
Subject: Is
Because Verity was moving into the Gallery, Who on Sunday was at Simon's. It
always feels odd having Who elsewhere, but with newer Galleriacs being less
happy with people coming round of an evening to watch something, I suspect
it'll happen more often. I shouldn't grumble, really, since they live there
and I'm just a guest, but it comes down to my old discomfort with change and
perhaps a more general bit of grumpiness I seem to have on me at the moment.
This grumpiness is manifesting itself on IRC, too. More and more, when people
are being upset or angry (however irrationally or otherwise) on IRC, I find
myself with an urge to snipe and point out things that are obvious but
unpalatable. I used to have something of a talent for saying the unsayable to
people in a palatable way, but I seem to have lost it at least for the moment.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 05 15:37:08 2004]--
From: (S) Complete, but not unique (steph)
Subject: Is
There was an item on Radio 4's `The Learning Curve' last night about the
Bethany School near Sheffield. It teaches everything through a Creationist
Christian point of view, so instead of talking about whether Henry VII and VIII
were good rulers, they talk about whether they were godly. (Apparently
although Henry VIII was an ungodly ruler, God worked through Henry's
ungodliness to bring about the Reformation.) Creationism is taught as the
truth, and evolution is taught as `some people think'. There was some waffle
about the Grand Canyon being proof for the Flood rather than evolution, but I
didn't quite follow it.
What I wonder, amidst all this, is what would happen to a child who decided
they simply didn't believe in the Christian Protestant God.
I also wonder how you put God into Maths.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 05 16:55:06 2004]--
From: (S) Complete, but not unique (steph)
Subject: Is
Lots of good answers to that one:
anakin '...in the beginning was the Empty Set'
obo 'It teaches you addition mod 2: 1+1+1 = 1.'
marnanel 'by telling people to go forth and multiply?'
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jul 08 04:01:11 2004]--
From: (S) Complete, but not unique (steph)
Subject: 4am
Argh. Normally I have no difficulty sleeping but tonight I just cannot get to
sleep at all.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 09 11:49:33 2004]--
From: (S) Complete, but not unique (steph)
Subject: Is
After Wednesday night's abysmal sleep, I soldiered through Thursday until about
9:30 in the pub, when I finally ran out of wakefulness. Fortunately, I slept
properly last night and woke up rather late this morning but rested.
Work in itself is soporific at the moment. I am typing metadata from scanned
well logs into spreadsheets, which was interesting for the first fifty or so
but the attraction has paled significantly now I'm past the 200 mark. These
things are basically long pieces of fanfold paper that have been run through a
scanner to produce an invariably poor digital image, and I have to interpret
the various squiggles, splodges, and mistakes (31-JUL-1991, anyone?).
This is not exactly the best use of my skills.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 14 09:26:11 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Over the past few weeks, I've been collecting railway stations, and gradually
improving the navigability and presentation of the result at:
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~owend/interests/rail/stations.html
It's definitely a work in progress, so don't be surprised if it vanishes or
does other strange things.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 16 09:03:42 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Woke up just after seven this morning feeling somewhere between hungry and
queasy and slightly headachey. I had an early breakfast and resolved this in
favour of feeling queasy, cold, and headachey. So that's another sick day :-(
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 16 21:26:07 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Some random googling [1] just came up with the following wonderful description:
The Magic of Composting Video (suitable for all ages), features: a compost
fairy who takes a skeptical person on a composting odyssey. $25.00.
[1] OK, I was after googlewhacks, which "compost fairy" wasn't one of.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 20 09:22:15 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I went to a Prom at the Royal Albert Hall, which I should make an
effort to do at least once a year to remind me of how marvellous both the place
and live music really are. This time it was Elgar's Cockaigne, a very dreamy
piece called `Sea Drift' from Delius, and after the interval Holst's `The Hymn
of Jesus' and Elgar's `Enigma Variations'. They were all great, particularly
the last two; `The Hymn of Jesus' did very exciting things with a large choir
and earns plus points for playing plainsong on trombones, and the Enigma
variations are just great fun from someone who was obviously enjoying his
composing a great deal.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 23 13:33:39 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night, since Rachel recommended it, I went on a short walking tour of the
Castle Hill area of Cambridge. It was great fun, with a very enthusiastic tour
guide who's a street sweeper in his day job, and I found out about a number of
alleyways and courtyards in the area which I didn't even know existed. He also
pointed out a number of things from the top of Castle Mound; I'd not realised,
for instance that you can see the railway station or Guildhall from up there.
I've always imagined the City Council in the Guildhall glowering up at the
County Council in Shire Hall on Castle Hill; it appears that from the top of
each building you probably _can_ do some actual glowering.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 26 13:58:32 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm feeling rather depressed at the moment. Work is dull, my life only
marginally less so, my house is untidy and my garden needs tending.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 27 09:26:14 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Monday evening was better than Monday as a whole. Post-pizza went round to
Rivendell (the Amery/Vernon residence in Girton) and there with some help from
Simon I was able to get Matthew's Mac OS X laptop talking to the Relativity
Battle.net server. It was just the sort of thing I enjoy: tracing a running
program to find out what it's doing and then working out the system behind
that. If only I could do some of that at work...
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 27 16:20:30 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
A little while ago, the website www.saveourstation.org.uk ran out of web
maintenance tuits and moved to www.saveourstation.co.uk. This in itself didn't
bother me, but the first version of the new site was so hideous compared to the
old site's relatively clean design that I wrote to the maintainers to point out
some problems.
I got a pleasant email back pointing out that the site was in development and
asking me for details of the problems I saw in the site. I obliged, and for my
pains I got a tirade back today from the guy who's doing most of the website
design. It's one of the most patronising emails I've ever received, suggesting
that I know nothing about web sites, HTML, copyright law, or grammar compared
to this webmaster's long experience in journalism, websites, and civil law.
This, in response to a list of web site problems I was explicitly asked to
provide!
Worse, this webmaster is the press officer of CAST.IRON, the group campaigning
against Cambridgeshire County Council's Guided Bus scheme and for reopening the
Cambridge - St. Ives railway line; if his attitude to me is anything like his
attitude to the press I'm surprised CAST.IRON get any positive publicity at
all! He's not the only one, though. Slightly less recently I pointed another
of the CAST.IRON executive at some critical questions about their plans in a
newsgroup, and got the astonishing reply that these questions weren't
constructive and that people should trust CAST.IRON not to have come up with an
unworkable plan.
I care a great deal about the railway, but my recent experiences aren't
inspiring a lot of faith in the plan's promoters. Hopefully those experiences
are isolated and atypical.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jul 29 12:25:08 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Wednesday evening, and there's money in the Paypal account, so it must be time
for a PuTTY curry meet. Ben, Jacob, Simon, and I gathered at the Kohinoor on
Mill Road for a pleasant evening's noshing courtesy of our presumably grateful
users. It was very nice, apart from the staff being more than usually
confusing from time to time, and we retired full of food to Simon's for some
more wittering and Tetris.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 30 01:12:18 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Sometimes we like to regard the thoughts of our brain, our mind, our
subconscious, as the desires of a separate being; we are given feelings about
people, places, and things that we cannot explain by some hidden system inside
us that will not explain, and perhaps it is preferable to imagine this voice as
an insightful (but annoyingly secretive) confidant than to accept that we do
not in fact know what our own mind is up to.
I'm usually quite good at self-analysis, but when the subconscious comes up
with things completely out of the blue, I have very little to go on. It makes
me nervous, since without the full facts I can't defuse the dangerous thoughts,
and without that ability the thoughts keep ticking, demanding my attention, and
eventually persuading me into foolishness and unhappiness.
Actually, I can think of a trigger for all this, but not a reason. Some like
to trust their subconscious -- Simon comes to mind -- but I'm less trusting.
Stomp up and down on daft ideas and perhaps they will go away and leave us in
peace.
Sometimes we like to think that we have that option.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 02 10:23:40 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Weekending
On Saturday morning I got up early (for a Saturday, although it wasn't much
earlier than a weekday start) and went to the rail station to meet Ben, Verity,
and Gareth for a walk. We'd decided the previous evening that we'd get to
Ipswich, buy a map of the Sutton Hoo area, and then take the train onwards for
a circlar walk there.
The plan very nearly failed. We got to Cambridge station in plenty of time for
the 8:46 to Ipswich, but this train didn't exist in spite of it being in the
printed timetable and on the `one Anglia' website. We faffed and decided to
get on the first train to Ely and think about what to do next. We were just
about at Ely when we'd decided to go to Thetford for a walk in the forest
there, but when we arrived at Ely there was a train waiting to go to Ipswich.
This train _didn't_ exist in the timetable, but _was_ running.
Confusion about trains aside, the plan worked pretty well after that. I bought
a map in Ipswich, we picked a route on the way, and set off from Melton for a
walk of about seven miles. There were hitches along the way: the National
Trust wanted to charge us to walk through their land so we went round the side
up the public footpath for free access to exactly the same place; the forest we
decided to walk through for refuge from the heat was much too dense in parts;
and we took a slightly wrong turn near Woodbridge golf course. Otherwise,
though, a pleasant jaunt. The heat didn't bother me as much as I expected, or
as much as it bothered others, but I was glad of a pint of cool cider at the
end of the walk.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 02 10:53:11 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Saturday night
Once we were back in Cambridge, we slouched around at the Gallery for a bit,
playing `Puerto Rico' and watching Verity finish `Eternal Darkness' on the
Gamecube.
Later I wandered on to the Carlton Arms for a pint in celebration of Mark
Waller's birthday. They had Mild, and there were good conversations with Peter
Benie and Andrew Walkingshaw too. Hurrah.
Subject: Sunday morning
My parents visited, which was nice. After nattering over coffee we went to the
Pike and Eel down the road for lunch and several glasses of wine. Our
conversation was fun and interesting, but apparently too much for a sourpuss
old biddy who came up to us and asked whether I worked in advertising because
I'd given her a headache. Since my parents had observed her sitting at a
dinner table with her companions saying nothing, we all concluded that she had
lost the art of conversation and was offended by others who hadn't.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 02 15:14:50 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Sunday afternoon
For a change, people came round to my house on Sunday afternoon to watch
`Doctor Who'. This week we moved into Colin Baker's `big hair' era as we
started `The Trial of a Time Lord'. Later, there was a game of `Amun Re', in
which I didn't come last.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 02 15:17:51 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
The condom machine in the toilets at Tesco advertises its wares as `new
easy-on'. Presumably they used to be hard-on.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 03 12:38:11 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
It has been too hot recently, but today's rain makes me hopeful that it will
get slightly cooler. The big thunderstorm last night woke me up, but the
lightning was pretty so I'm not going to complain.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Aug 04 10:26:40 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
I am feeling depressed. My letting agency are trying to organise an inspection
at awkward times, I have no enthusiasm for my work, I have the beginnings of a
cold, my bath is blocked, and work's air conditioning is decidedly dodgy in a
time of heat.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 05 15:49:02 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
Here's a fun game. Using an online National Rail journey planner thing such as
http://www.dracos.co.uk/railway/timetable/ find the journey with the most
changes without explicitly setting a `via' station.
I can get to 7[*]. Can you do more?
[*] Shanklin-Ryde Pier Head-Portsmouth Harbour-Waterloo-Liverpool
Street-Manningtree-Ipswich-Norwich-Berney Arms
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 09 11:56:39 2004]--
From: (S) My dog's got no gnosis! (steph)
Subject: Is
It was far too hot yesterday, and it hasn't improved this morning with the
addition of lots of humidity. Walking to work this morning was like wading
through energy-sapping soup.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Aug 11 10:43:43 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Is, of was, or might have been
On the way to work this morning I bumped into two former co-workers from
Laser-Scan. One is working for the new rejuvenated company and it doesn't seem
to be doing to badly. The other was one of the people made redundant at the
same time as me. Although I may complain about my job, I do at least have a
job; he's not been able to find anything since he was made redundant. Odd,
really. You'd think that someone with masses of VMS, Unix, and Windows
experience would find employment quite easily...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 16 09:44:05 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Saturday
Unless they involve meeting someone somewhere, my plans to do things and go
places on Saturday are invariably wrecked by my inability to get up at a
sensible time on Saturday morning. Nevertheless, I managed to get myself to
Cambridge station for eleven so I could go to London on the 11:15.
Unfortunately Cambridge station was _packed_ -- I've never seen it so busy --
and I was waiting fifteen minutes in the queue for the ticket machine so I had
to go for a later train. (How is it that I always get stuck behind the queue
of uncomprehending Europeans, doddering oldies, and impatient Americans?)
The purpose of all this was to get to Ian Allan's bookshop in Waterloo to buy
the shiniest historical rail atlas I know of. 700 large pages of 1971
inch-to-mile Ordnance Survey maps with the railway lines carefully marked in
with dates of opening and closure of the various sections and stations. I
nearly drooled all over it in the shop, but it was the last one they had so I
bought it instead. A snip at a hundred quid. It was also big and heavy, so I
left it at the shop to pick up later, for I had other things to do.
Something I never realised about Travelcards until recently is that they're not
just valid on buses and the tube, but also on National Rail services within the
London Underground zones, so I took a train down to Hampton Court. After
taking a few photos of the station I sat on the grass by the Thames with a
coffee and idly watched boats go by. All very pleasant, as was the walk
through Thames Ditton to its railway station, where I took the train back to
Waterloo. Thames Ditton station had a marvellous waiting room, where someone
had left a jigsaw for passengers to do while they waited. I managed to put a
piece of sky into place before the train arrived.
Back in Cambridge, in the evening, it was Eek!'s birthday party at the Gallery,
which made for a pleasant gathering and the chance to say hello to Michaela's
hamsters, three of which she'd brought along with her. Hurrah.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 16 12:15:12 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Sunday
Every Sunday, once I've finished the main bit of the paper, I go through the
week's TV listings and program the TiVo with anything that looks interesting.
This week I noticed that the TiVo didn't have listings for the second half of
the week because its daily `phone-home' call hadn't got through for whatever
reason. Instead of giving it an alternative phone number as a workaround, I
decided that it would be good to configure it to do its daily call over
ethernet and thence through my broadband connection. This was an error. The
program to frob network settings funted them sufficiently badly that when the
TiVo was rebooted it had no network at all. Worse, it was configured to do its
daily call over this non-working network, so I had to fix it if it was to be
any use at all as a TiVo!
After much cursing and fiddling with serial consoles (bash with no job control
and no working control keys, just say argh), I managed to get it to work as a
TiVo once more, though not yet as a TiVo with networking.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 16 15:28:09 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Is
We have a new proximity entry card system on the office door, because upper
management think we're insufficiently secure against the rampaging hordes of
pinko liberal terrorists who threaten big influential friends of the US
Government. Unfortunately the sensor is about six inches too high for me to be
able to trigger it with a card in my pocket, so several people have now been
treated with the sight of me jumping up and down next to the door before
walking into the office.
Presumably the plan is to make any hiding terrorists laugh out loud and thus
reveal themselves. I feel so much more secure already.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Aug 18 22:36:06 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm feeling rather low and worthless at the moment. Partly it's the weather
and heat in the office making me less useful at work, partly it's that even the
menial work I'm doing in the office is beyond me, but mostly it's depression
and self-image playing tricks on my poor little mind.
Of course, knowing that doesn't help that much and it doesn't inject energy and
enthusiasm into my attempts to entertain myself, so I slump in front of a TV or
a computer and feel guilty about it. Still, only an hour or two to go and then
I can slump in bed and that, at least, is something I rarely feel any guilt
about.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 23 11:58:25 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Is
After a fairly good weekend (featuring a trip down the Felixstowe branch) I am
feeling utterly shattered today at work. I seem to have no energy at all for
anything, my head and feet are aching, and everything else is just a lot of
effort to move. In retrospect I should have stayed at home, but I was
reluctant to take time off work for what is essentially `tiredness'.
There might be a cold in there too, of course, since I've been sniffling for
the past couple of days.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 24 12:58:55 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Monday
I felt better in the afternoon, and then worse over the course of pizza and
post-pizza: slightly feverish and slightly queasy. I slept fairly well and
felt better in the morning, although today I seem to be doing the opposite and
feeling gradually more tired and unwell as the day goes along.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 24 14:14:30 2004]--
From: (S) Content-Type: text/self-raising (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm talking to Anna, Ikea's Online Assistant.
anna 'Hello. Can I help you?'
steph 'Yes'
anna 'Very well.'
steph 'Can I get Billy in Medium Brown any more?'
anna 'I'm sorry, to which IKEA store do you want directions?'
steph 'I want Billy in Medium Brown.'
anna 'The BILLY product line includes a number of independent but
related products, available in number of colours. Please feel free
to click on the one you want in order to see which colours are
available.'
steph 'Not medium brown!'
anna 'Art really isn't something I can talk about. Please ask me
something about IKEA instead.'
steph 'But it's not art.'
anna 'Please have a look at the Framed Art Subcategory.'
steph 'I don't want to.'
anna 'You don't have to do anything you don't want to.'
So, not exactly passing the Turing test there, and more to the point, no
answers to the dilemma that they've stopped making the Billy bookcase in
Medium Brown.
(http://193.108.42.79/chatbot.htm if you'd like to talk to Anna yourself.)
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 26 12:36:05 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday, I complained at Rachel that my work was soul-destroying, and she
cunningly suggested that I should do something soul-rebuilding in between,
going on to suggest Project Gutenberg's Distributed Proofreading
(http://www.pgdp.net/) which I took up a while ago but didn't get into with the
same kind of enthusiasm as Clare or Ben. Now it's proving to be a valuable
bolster to my (currently rather shaky) sanity, so many thanks must go to Rachel
for the suggestion.
I've been proofreading some Catullus, a Roman poet I studied at `A' level, and
it's rapidly becoming clear that although the bits we studied were a bit racy
they were really very tame compared to some of Catullus' other work!
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Aug 27 11:45:25 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday announcement, wherein the shiny new `practice' company organisation
was revealed to include a shiny set of possible redundancies, was slightly
worrying.
Today's discovery that my NT user account had been disabled was even more so.
Fortunately a quick call to IT in Leatherhead has reenabled the account, but it
doesn't explain to my satisfaction why it was disabled in the first place...
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Aug 27 16:45:47 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
The office finally has a new printer which, among its many other features, can
print the letter `s'. This is a significant improvement on its predecessor (or
should I say its prede e or?) which took against any serifed `s' and many
serifed `c's.
In spite of all this I am feeling a little down. Plans to go somewhere
interesting tomorrow are washing against the wall of `costs too much money and
effort' but I can't see myself doing anything interesting instead.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 29 11:50:49 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Saturday
Having failed to get up ludicrously early I abandoned both my main plans for
Saturday (taking the train to Wales and Lakenheath respectively) and sauntered
to Waterbeach for a trip up to King's Lynn stopping at Littleport and Downham
Market.
This has revealed one of the things I'd hoped would happen with plotting
stations on a map; look at:
http://www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~owend/interests/rail/stations.html
and the line of the Great Northern route from Cambridge to King's Lynn is
beautifully clear.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 29 12:13:14 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Sometimes I love my TiVo. It's just decided to record today's Grand Prix
because it's noticed me recording it in the past. *beam*
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 31 11:08:21 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Sunday, Monday
I hosted the usual gathering for `Doctor Who' at mine on Sunday afternoon,
which made for a pleasant change. We listened to `The Space Pirates' as well
as watching the extant episode 2 of this Troughton story. Later there were
games of `Puerto Rico' and `Goa'. I didn't do well in either game, which is
not unusual, but in one of the games of Puert with the alternative buildings my
defeat felt less bad than usual; Verity had a combination of buildings which
meant that whenever I got points, she got more points, and I couldn't really
see any way I could escape this fact.
I idled away Monday morning reading, and wandered to the station in the
afternoon to buy a Network Railcard. I make enough trips to London to make
this worthwhile and it'll help with some of the station collecting too. I used
my new-found rail cheapness to take a train to Whittlesford, but I accidentally
came to an Audley End when the doors wouldn't open at Whittlesford and the
train moved off with me still on it. Still, the lady at Audley End ticket
office was happy to write me an official note to say that I wasn't trying to
fare-dodge, and I was able to collect Audley End for free.
Pizza and post-pizza in the evening felt slightly subdued somehow.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 31 11:22:57 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
It's just been pointed out to me that in fact I won one of the games of `Puerto
Rico'. This suggests to me that I've become so accustomed to losing that I
fail to notice when I win, which can't be a healthy attitude. I still mostly
enjoy playing games with people regardless of how well I do, which is the point
of the exercise, so I mustn't be too worried.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 31 12:37:34 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Sniffles, headache, queasiness, and feeling chilly suggest that I have a cold
of some sort. I seem largely unable to do useful things at work, although well
logs are still a brainless enough task for me to accomplish, sadly.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 01 10:07:25 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Sometimes I struggle to work out why I (or in a wider sense I suppose why
_people_) go to work. For the money, obviously, but it seems a tremendous
waste of a life to go to work one day, do something, go to work the next, do
the same thing, and so on until it's the weekend and then after that a week of
the same again.
Rationally, people have to work so that things get done, but it always seemed
to me completely mad that everyone was expected to do so quite so much of the
time. What's the point? Most of the time in my work life I don't do anything
that makes much of a difference to anyone, after all.
It's now September, Summer has nearly gone, and I barely noticed its passing.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 02 10:47:16 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
Off work today, with a cold that I think has been with me since Tuesday but
never really bad enough to merit not going to work. The result, I think, is
that I've been getting incrementally worse but like the boiled frog I haven't
noticed...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 06 10:17:58 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Weekending
I was off work on Friday as well, with the same cold thing. On Saturday I was
feeling mostly better so I went on a grand station-collecting expedition to
London and back, going up to King's Cross and coming back down from Liverpool
Street. It was remarkably easy to use normal tickets with breaks of journey to
collect quite a few stations, and on a busy route with frequent trains there
wasn't too much faffing about.
I had a great time until I stopped off at Stansted Mountfitchet on the way
back. I wandered around the extremely pretty village for a bit before
returning to the station to wait for a train. Also on the station were a
number of (presumably drunk) teenagers who kept pushing each other on to the
rails and using the trackbed as a shortcut between platforms. I felt quite
intimidated by the main group (and a bit afraid of being pushed myself) but
when a girl tried to cross the track near me I tried to suggest that she should
use the bridge. I got a torrent of abuse for my troubles.
I felt rather scared for my own safety and theirs but I couldn't decide what to
do. The station is covered by CCTV but I doubt either British Transport Police
or `one' would be able to do very much with just CCTV pictures; railway
trespass doesn't merit a police `Have you seen this girl?' poster, I suspect.
Still, when I get the films developed, the page for Stansted Mountfitchet will
have a picture of an abusive teenage girl risking her life.
My only consolation was that she missed her train.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 06 16:33:07 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Clarification
I should point out that she missed her train about 35 minutes after
trespassing.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 08 11:53:55 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Palimpsest
On Monday, at a Relativity post-pizza, I noticed a small flash of yellow next
to the pattern on my mug. Holding the mug up to the light revealed that the
yellow flash was part of a pattern underneath the mug's swirly pattern, and a
bit of squinting showed that this had been a Cadbury's `Time Out' mug before it
had been resprayed as a kitchen reject.
A second mug of the same apparent design turned out to have had a previous life
as a promotion for the `101 Dalmatians' film.
All this is interesting enough, but Relativity have had these mugs for _years_.
It's fascinating that these designs had been there, under the surface, all this
time and nobody had noticed them.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 09 09:25:19 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
(Sadly, my mug discovery is not new; the mugs are Clare's and Ben found the
patterns many years ago.)
I had difficulty sleeping last night until finally drifting off at about 3am.
This means I'm more tired than usual at work today. Ho hum. Perhaps coffee
will help.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 09 12:46:41 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
I watched a documentary about how the King's Cross Underground fire happened
last night. Key to the sudden rapid spread of the fire was the Coanda effect.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coanda_effect tells me what the documentary told
me: that this is the tendency of a stream of fluid (or gas) to cling to a
convex surface; it's the effect you get when you hold the back of a spoon close
to a stream of water from the tap.
What I couldn't find from the web was why this happens. Any fluid dynamicists
out there care to enlighten me?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 13 10:08:13 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Saturday
Saturday was another day for pootling about in trains, this time in
Lincolnshire with stops in Grantham, Sleaford, Heckington, Boston, and
Skegness. Like Blackpool North, Skegness station is one of those seaside
termini which still has a ludicrous superfluity of platforms still in use.
(It has six, rather incongruously numbered 2-7.) Unlike Blackpool, which has a
certain faded grandeur, Skegness is just faded, but was still bustling with
visitors. It just goes to show that the British seaside isn't quite dead yet.
I wandered down to the beach to look at the sea for a bit before visiting a
model village near the seafront and heading back to the station.
On the way back, the timetable conspired to give me time for a stopover in
Boston, so I took advantage of a pub in the station building to have a swift
half of mild.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 15 11:42:12 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Sunday
With Gareth and Verity in Cornwall, and Simon off to some party, there was no
`Doctor Who' to fill Sunday afternoon. Instead Ben came round and we did
simulated signalling with SimSig, in a Didcot area unusually afflicted with
track circuit failures and broken signals. We (mostly Ben, really) did quite
well, and only sent one coal train off to Reading...
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 16 10:14:32 2004]--
From: (S) nonspecific utensil (steph)
Subject: Is
In yesterday's invasion of the chamber of the House of Commons, the Deputy
Speaker (Sylvia Heal) didn't exactly shine. No news reports have commented on
it, but in recordings of the event you can hear her repeatedly bleating
`Sitting Suspended!' in the hope that someone will take notice of her. Quite
a contrast with the purple flour incident when Speaker Michael Martin simply
got up and said `Order. The House is suspended.'
Fortunately, Hansard has spared her blushes by omitting her words. The
official record just mentions an [Interruption].
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 17 12:31:52 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
At the pub last night, I found myself feeling increasingly queasy, flushed, and
headachey, so I vanished off a bit before ten. I still don't feel 100% today
but I'm at work anyway.
Whenever I leave the Carlton early, I always feel a twinge of sadness at all
the people who suddenly jump up and say `Oh, are you going?' who I'd not had
the chance to talk to. I should acquire more health from somewhere, so that I
can talk to you all.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 17 21:47:31 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm having difficulty with intermittent depression at the moment. I think it's
largely a reaction to work being uninteresting and a lack of immediate escape
routes, but it can't help that I have a magazine to fill and am short of both
contributions and the inspiration to produce them myself. Matters will
probably improve in that department when I receive more material.
In the meantime, I'll just keep taking the pills...
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Sep 19 00:37:34 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Another day, another social gathering, another departure due to mopiness. I
don't feel like I fit in anywhere at the moment. Nevertheless the party was
fun and the party people friendly, so I shouldn't complain too much.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 21 12:23:20 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
news.com has a fascinating feature in the URL format of their stories. The
lengthy URL:
http://news.com.com/Linux+group+rebuffs+Hollywood+piracy+charge/2100-1030-53745
28.html
is equivalent to:
http://news.com.com//2100-1030-5374528.html
and you can put anything you like in the first path component, to add your own
spin to the story:
http://news.com.com/MPAA+are+idiots/2100-1030-5374528.html
http://news.com.com/Commie+pinko+liberals+targeted/2100-1030-5374528.html
http://news.com.com/Anne+Widdecombe/2100-1030-5374528.html
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 21 23:42:25 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I've had a productive evening. I've re-found a version of KWord that works
with Debian stable, which is useful because it's the only word processor I'm
remotely friendly with and I didn't really want to spend ages upgrading my
whole system just to get the version from the more modern testing distribution.
Armed with this, I've begun putting together the next issue of TTBA, the
Cambridge University SF society's magazine. It's going well, too. Some large
contributions and a number of smaller ones are conspiring to make it very easy
to fill the pages; it looks like I might be able to get this issue out the door
without too much `contribute or there'll be no magazine' armtwisting...
I've also added Hitchin and Welwyn North to the stations collection. Huzzah.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 22 20:47:50 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Unfortunately yesterday's productivity is not to be followed by an equally good
evening tonight. I've been feeling queasy since mid-morning and it's not gone
away. I've managed to get another couple of reviews into TTBA but I appear to
be wobbling in my computer chair so I'm going to go and say hello to Mr. Sofa
instead.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 24 01:09:57 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Although I've been feeling slightly queasy for the past day or two, I had a
good evening in pubs, firstly at the Castle with Jon, Sally, and Matthew, and
then at the Carlton with a vast assortment of people. Time flew and I have no
idea why, but a swift cheerful evening at the pub is much better than an
evening where nothing clicks and the time flows past like treacle.
A game of `Bubble Bobble' followed at Simon's shortly after closing. We're
fairly consistent at it these days, and it's rare that our fifteen credits
don't take us beyond level 80.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 27 11:33:01 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Over the weekend I received two text messages on my work telephone. Since I
don't give the number out this was something of a surprise. Here, in all their
glory, are the messages:
U ON PATROL? ARE YOU NEARBY? IF SO CAN U SPARE A JOINTSWORTH FOR MA KIP COZ
KENNY ISNAE GETTIN TIL RA MORRA RATTLIN M8 HE-HE!
This is interesting. The intended recipient is someone who might be
patrolling, but also someone who might have a `jointsworth'. The sender is
erhaps Scottish from the `isnae', and perhaps he wants this stuff to get to
sleep. I'm not sure what Kenny is doing and what the rattling is all about
though.
U AWAKE MATE? ITS MIKEY CAN U TEXT ME BACK PLS!
No, Mikey. I'm not awake, I'm not your mate, and I can't text you back, pls or
otherwise.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 27 14:01:36 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Everything feels like an immense effort today. I've just walked to Tesco's and
back, and every step felt so heavy...
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 28 00:37:16 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
It's getting darker in here.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Oct 02 21:17:50 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I've nearly finished the current TTBA, so that's one thing off my mind.
This afternoon I watched the DVD of `The Empire Strikes Back' and it was, as
expected, excellent. I was amused to note that the end credits and copyright
notice dated from the 1997 Special Edition rather than from the DVD release, so
Clive Revill is still credited as the Emperor even though his bug-eyed Emperor
has been replaced by Ian McDiarmid from all the other films.
The evening so far has been taken up with `Dirty Filthy Love', an ITV drama
about obsessive/compulsive disorder and Tourette's syndrome. Definitely not
the sort of drama you expect from ITV, this was thoughtful, compassionate, and
fun with some superb direction and camerawork. The scene at the start where
the main character tries to get out of bed and fails several times rang
particularly true with me, as I'm sure it would with anyone who's sat staring
at the wall desperately willing a recalcitrant body to move.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 05 21:53:42 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Sunday
Two things in the afternoon. One was a visit to Kate's to see her dog, Dave,
visiting from Cheltenham. He's a big ball of fluff from all directions except
the front, from which direction he clearly has a huge nose. He's also great
fun and very friendly, which is nice since I haven't always got on with dogs in
the past. I'm more of a cat person.
Thence to Simon's for Who (`Delta and the Bannermen'), Puerto Rico, and `24'.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 06 19:51:38 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I went to work this morning, but gave up at midday because I was feeling too
grotty. Somehow this feels slightly worse than not coming into work at all on
a particular day, even though the company gets half a day more work out of me.
I suspect it's because I feel it implies either poor judgement on my part ("You
decided to come in even though you were clearly ill.") or that I'm skiving
("You were OK to work this morning, so surely you can manage the afternoon.")
However, my boss did it the other week, so I feel marginally less bad about it,
and judging from the way I slept for three hours on the sofa, my body needed
the rest.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Oct 07 09:34:13 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
After a poor night's sleep interrupted by dreams about floods, being burgled,
and policemen mowing my lawn and washing my cat, I am still feeling pretty
ropey, so I'm not in work today.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Oct 10 19:12:58 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Catchup
I wasn't in work on Friday either; my head still ached and to some extent it
still does. I had a pleasant day on Saturday as my parents visited, and I went
to the pub in the evening. There was an unexpected Grue (Sue from Australia)
there but since I don't really know her I wasn't as surprised at this fact as
some were. I left, feeling depressed in company, and that's a feeling that's
not entirely gone away either.
I should be at the CUSFS squash this evening to greet people who signed up at
the Societies Fair. However, I'm not because I'm entirely unconvinced that I'm
in a good frame of mind to be engaged and interesting in the company of
strangers. I also still have a headache.
Nevertheless I shall be going into work tomorrow, because sitting at home is
too much tedium to be borne for more than a few days at a time.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 11 11:46:42 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Aha! There's a lot to be said for paracetamol and taking it easy; I feel much
more human this morning, complete with improved abilities to breathe and think.
I also have a shiny new laptop to install things on today, so I'm not even
doing hideously boring things of doom.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Oct 14 10:14:26 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I went round to Simon's to play a few games, but after a couple of
goes at Puerto Rico everyone seemed to lack effort to suggest something new to
do. Since I didn't have any effort either I wandered home.
I tried out Sky One's new Western series, `Deadwood', but it was rubbish; the
characters were laughable when they were comprehensible and swore gratuitously
the rest of the time, the plot was indiscernable, and Lovejoy (Ian McShane)
was the barman.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 15 09:50:46 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I was quite cheerful last night. I bought a couple of books about America in
Waterstone's (`Colossus' by Niall Ferguson, which Steven Kitson has been
recommending for ages, and a more general textbook on the American political
process) and nattered to people at the Carlton before wandering home.
There I watched my recording of the last Presidential debate. Unlike the
second one -- I missed the first -- this third one revealed George Bush's
charm. It's something analysts are always talking about but something I'd not
seen until last night: George Bush can come across as a very nice guy. He
stumbled on his words, of course, and used the word `litany' as if he'd only
just discovered it and it was going out of fashion, but he performed a lot
better than in the second debate where he was shouty and hectoring.
There was a question about a shortage of 'flu vaccine in America. It turns
out, and this surprised me, that it's routine for most Americans to get a 'flu
jab each year. Recommending the jab only for the elderly and other at-risk
groups, as we do here, is seen as a temporary emergency measure. Different
attitudes.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 15 09:52:29 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
(In the background of the CNN post-debate analysis were a host of
placard-waving supporters of both candidates. One of them held up a sign
saying `Kerry eats babies'. I really doubt that, you know.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 18 00:04:46 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I've taken to watching the CBS Evening News to get a bit more of an idea of
what things are shaping US politics at the moment. Normally, this is presented
by Dan Rather, an elderly gentleman who speaks very calmly and reassuringly
about the news and makes me think that the US media isn't as bad as all that.
Last night's edition was presented by someone called Thalia Assuras, who spoke
agitatedly and couldn't sit still. It was as if someone had put ants on her
chair.
At least she gets a chair. In the past, British newsreaders have had to make
do with protestors.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 18 14:43:07 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Weekending
Saturday was a day of shopping, which is something I've not done in a while.
It was sufficiently breezy that it was quite pleasant to wander around the
shops and pick up a few things I was looking for, but still early enough in the
year that few places have yet gone into Christmas mode. In the evening I could
have gone to a party at Castle Emerson but I didn't really have the energy to
arrange getting there and back. (A shame, since from reports it sounds like it
was a fun party.) Instead I read lots about the workings of the US Congress.
There's something disturbing about the mayfly nature of my interests.
Sunday afternoon was Who at the Gallery (`Remembrance of the Daleks'), followed
by a game of `Cities and Knights' which we aborted quite early on due to some
appalling die rolls and a nightmarish shortage of coal. Instead I edged a bit
closer to the end of `Tomb Raider III' which I've now been playing for years.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 20 11:59:58 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Monday
I felt shattered at the end of the day so I went home rather than to pizza, and
after a nap and a bowl of pasta I felt able to go to post-pizza at Relativity.
With Ian and Clare away, and much of the rest of pizza having dissolved
elsewhere, the gathering was just me, Simon, LNR, Mike, and Peter Corbett. It
was a pleasant gathering with wittering and later some arm-wrestling. Mike
also expressed an interest in the Linux in my TiVo, as his company's internet
radio has an internal Linux distribution as well.
Subject: Tuesday
Tuesday was going to be my day at the Guided Bus public inquiry, but it's
running behind schedule so I used the day off to go pootling around the Bittern
Line on trains and collect Cromer, Hoveton & Wroxham, and Worstead.
In the evening I went round to the Gallery for a few games of `Puerto Rico'
with Ben, Gareth, and Verity and a hilarious game of Mao in which I banned the
use of the words `failure' and `card'.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 20 22:09:17 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Oops. I have been hacking on the old PlayStation game `Circuit Breakers' in an
attempt to make it possible to play the one player tracks in multiplayer mode.
Unfortunately I've produced something where the cars materialise above the
circuit and repeatedly plunge to their explosive doom. More work required, I
think.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 20 22:27:04 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Yargh, though. I've just made it work. Wibble.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 26 16:17:31 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Catchup - Weekending
Saturday was the day Richard and Louise got married, so Ben and I met at
Cambridge station and made our way on an increasingly wet day to Rainham in
Kent, collecting Rochester on the way. The ceremony was wonderful: obviously
heavily inspired by Eastern religions and relatively serious apart from the
giant party poppers. Both Richard and Louise looked wonderful and very happy.
The food afterwards was very welcome and filling, and small puzzles and toys on
the table kept us occupied. In addition a magician did the rounds along with a
silhouette artist, who snipped a profile of people from black card. I was
surprised by how much my silhouette looked like me, and also by how huge my
chin is.
Sunday's `Who' was going to be at mine, but a sudden change of plan moved it to
Simon's. This, combined with the competent copy control on the PS2, irked me
for a short while until I regained my happiness.
RoboRally featured a lot of carnage. Later I reached the final battle in `Tomb
Raider III'.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 27 22:48:04 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Today I appeared at the Public Inquiry into the County Council's bizarre plans
for a Guided Bus system. I said my piece briefly, making points which others
may have obscured by saying that they wanted a railway. After I'd done so, I
felt slightly miffed not to be grilled by the Council's remarkably patronising
solicitor, Robin Purchas QC. Having heard him earlier in the day battling with
a witness for Transport 2000, I was expecting him to pick lots of tiny little
holes in my case and point out articles I'd posted to USENET (as he has
apparently done with other witnesses: almost the equivalent of `Yet you said in
the pub three years ago that...') but he just said `No questions'. I can't
work out whether this is because I hadn't said anything he could find fault
with, because I'm not a terribly important objector, because I wasn't pushing
any plan of my own, because he was grateful for my brevity after the previous
witness's 35-minute ramble on the subject of Life the Universe and Everything,
because he'd been ticked off by the Inspector for being aggressive to witnesses
earlier in the day, or simply because he had a cold.
This evening I've been playing with the buffer overrun in the PlayStation 2
emulation code for old PSX games, and I've satisfactorily managed to run
code not approved by Sony on the bare PS2. What I haven't yet done is managed
to run a copied PSX disc, which I want to do for reasons mentioned earlier in
this diary. I feel sure it should be possible, but trying to find out how
involves wading through fora full of drivelling illiterates who think
punctuation is just so many smily face components.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 02 12:36:47 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
It's Election Day in America, so I'll have a bit of a late night tonight
watching the results.
In other news, I've acquired Gareth's old PlayStation which allows me to play
with Circuit Breakers disc swapping more easily than I can with the PS2, and
I've bought one for myself from eBay; if all cunning disc-swapping tricks fail
I can always just splash out a tenner on modchips.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 03 12:44:31 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
It depends on Ohio's provisional and absentee ballots, but it looks like Bush
has won another term in office. He isn't my favourite candidate, but it looks
like he'll have been elected by a majority of the popular vote as well as the
electoral college vote. With luck that'll mean a minimum of legal wrangling
and general acceptance that America got who it voted for.
Having followed this election and made an effort to learn more about the US
political process and history, I find myself increasingly irked by the
knee-jerk reactions of friends. It seems to be acceptable to regard Bush and
the Republican Party as `nasties' with evil intentions and no redeeming
features. While I disagree with them on many, possibly even most, things I
know it's not as black and white as that.
I stayed up until about 2:30 this morning, and dozed through the radio after
that, so I'm quite tired today.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 08 10:23:37 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Today has not started well. I have acquired the same headache I had on
Saturday and Sunday and work has also run out of real coffee, so I shall have
to rely on instant.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 08 11:08:04 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: `Fallen Heroes'
I get my ideas of what's in the news in the US by watching the CBS Evening News
on the Sky News channel. One slightly creepy part of this is the `Fallen
Heroes' segment in which a dead US soldier is briefly profiled with family
photos and a warbling soundtrack.
It bothers me for a number of reasons. Firstly, I really can't imagine any UK
news outlet doing this for dead British soldiers, and it seems so fake and
tacky. Secondly, it assumes that anyone who dies in the field is automatically
a hero regardless of what they may have done which seems very strange indeed to
me.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 09 00:31:58 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: YIPPEE!
After lots of failed attempts which worked on a PlayStation emulator but not on
the real thing, I've managed to produce a Circuit Breakers disc with the tracks
swapped so that the single-player tracks are playable in multi-player mode!
Along the way, I discovered that the PlayStation gets really confused by CD-RW
media and refuses even to spin them, and that its playing of CD-Rs is greatly
enhanced by putting the unit on its side. Also that bjh is amazingly useful
when it comes to hacky perl for grobbling around binary blobs.
Anyway, the net result is that you can put in your original Circuit Breakers
CD with the PlayStation lid open but the lid sensor held down with blutack and
as soon as it's just playing music, swap the disc for your specially prepared
CD-R, and hey presto, 32 extra tracks are yours!
I have that smug feeling of persistence rewarded. I suspect I should also
thank Supersonic Software for writing the game in the first place and making
their game engine sufficiently general to be able to cope with this kind of
stunt.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 15 15:21:47 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is, catchup
On Friday I was 30, and was rewarded when the usual Gallery lot went to Richard
and Louise's for `The West Wing' by a small cake with a candle. Hurrah for
that!
On Saturday I went a-wandering, and collected some stations around London.
On Sunday `Doctor Who' watching people came to mine for `Battlefield'. There
was also much `Circuit Breakers' and Ben played a fair amount of `Grand Theft
Auto III' for our entertainment.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Nov 15 23:52:00 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Hurrah! Two more birthday presents today. One is a wonderful anthology of
Spike Milligan from LNR and rjk, and the other is a PlayStation from me.
The PlayStation works, and is sufficiently old that you can play copied discs
on it without having to swap them while they spin, although the laser is
elderly and (as seems traditional for old PlayStations) only really works
properly when the console is propped up on its side. I shall have to make it a
stand so that it doesn't fall over. It came with a controller with two unusual
features: firstly that you can steer by tilting the controller (although
steering may be too strong a term for this activity), and secondly that it can
crash and sit in your hands gently throbbing its little vibrating heart out.
(I suppose `feature' may be too strong a term for this latter.)
Spike Milligan is just Spike Milligan and therefore wonderful.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 17 10:06:14 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
When I was younger and a much stauncher Tory than I am now, a Labour government
seemed like a terrible thing. As time went on and the colour of government
changed in 1997, it became clear to me that in fact very little that had any
direct impact on me would change. On a national level, there have been good
things and bad things but it turns out that government doesn't actually make
that much difference to me on a day-to-day basis.
Until now. The government's proposed ban on smoking in restaurants and most
pubs is something which will have a positive effect on my life. Hurrah for
that.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 17 16:52:37 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: agp440.sys
Today I have been trying to persuade a truculent Windows XP machine to start
booting again. Yesterday it decided that all attempts to boot would freeze the
machine shortly after agp440.sys was loaded. Judging from Google, this is a
remarkably common problem, but one for which there is no one clear solution.
Without the ability to tell what the boot process is doing at the point it
freezes, it's very much stab-in-the-dark stuff. All I know is:
* The freeze happens after agp440.sys is loaded and is not due to agp440.sys ;
if agp440.sys is disabled or renamed away, a different driver is the last one
successfully to be loaded.
* Using on-board graphics rather than AGP makes no difference.
* Disabling ACPI, nVidia, or Adaptec SCSI drivers does not help.
* Removing the nVidia and Adaptec cards doesn't help.
* This is not the SP2 `Prescott' bug where `Prescott' processors with a low
stepping cause a freeze [1]; renaming update.sys away makes no difference.
I'm getting a bit stuck. Has anyone seen this error before? More importantly,
does anyone have any tips for solving it?
[1] or your Vice President invokes the 25th Amendment on you, for that matter.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Nov 18 00:40:07 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Was and Is
I had lots of favourite books when I was growing up. Right up there alongside
Scarry's light book, `Swallows and Amazons', `The Hobbit' and `The Owl Who Was
Afraid of the Dark' was a big hardback called `What Makes It Go?'. It had
everything in it, from how televisions work to where escalators go when they
get eaten by the teeth at the end, and it was one of my favourite books for a
long time because it satisfied an insatiable curiosity for how things work and
how the whole thing fits together.
When I first got my ZX81 computer I spent ages soaking up the manual that came
with it, that original Vickers and Bradbeer masterpiece which I still think of
as `programming for ordinary people'; I wanted to know what made it go, how it
all fitted together. When I learned Latin, French, German, Greek, Russian, and
Arabic, the biggest joy was the sheer obvious intricacy of the mechanisms of
tense and mood, case and number. When I encountered Unix, I had that same
feeling of discovery: of assembling the puzzle without even knowing what the
whole picture would look like, just that there would _be_ a picture and it
would feel great to know what it was. What makes it go.
It never ends. Writing, railways, the US political system... There's
something in me that revels in discovering all the little cogs in the great
machines: what makes it go.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 23 17:29:22 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been ill for the past few days. From Saturday (which I spent pootling
around the Midlands on trains) until today I've been bunged-up and headachey
and haven't had energy for much besides essential maintenance (food, drink,
paracetamol, sleep) and TV. The TiVo is a godsend when I'm off work ill; the
squillions of programmes it has stored provide something to do even when a book
is too much. The downside is that it makes me feel like a bit of a vegetable
and I start to worry about taking root on the sofa.
Fortunately I'm feeling mostly better today and I should be at work (for
whatever oh-so-productive joys that may have to offer) tomorrow.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Dec 01 14:14:31 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
It's December now. It's been a while since I ran out of anti-depressants and
arranging to move doctors so that I can get a convenient appointment to get a
repeat prescription is taking time.
It's easy to become blase about anti-depressants. You take them, day after
day, and your life goes up and down much as before. It's only when they go
away that you notice that the downs used to be deeper and quite how
debilitating reacting to everything with near-tears can be. (Not bad things
necessarily, just peas in a pan and things like that.) With luck I'll get them
sorted by the end of the week.
Last night my house smelt very strange. Almost like a gas leak, only smelling
not of gas but of coal. Since I don't have a metered coal supply I decided to
ignore this and go to bed. The house was still standing by morning.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 03 08:41:21 2004]--
From: (S) Come and waste another year (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I gradually started to feel very queasy until it got to the point
where I reached the Carlton and decided to phone for a taxi home. The rest of
the evening was spent feeling about to throw up but never managing it. I'm
still not feeling quite right, so I'm not at work today. As I said in my email
to my boss, I seem very prone to random sicknesses lately :-(
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Dec 06 08:34:21 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Queasiness continues. Both hunger and food make me feel sick, even though thus
far it has only been a feeling. I think it probably is connected with the
anti-depressants, but that doesn't help beyond providing a probable cause.
I'm taking today off work, although I'm fairly sure that will only alleviate
the symptoms, rather than working towards a cure. Still, if this persists I
shall probably have to go and pester the doctor.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Dec 06 15:01:50 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
What does it mean to be ill? That something in your body isn't working
properly, and if you take a day off work, that enough things are sufficiently
broken that you think that you wouldn't be able to do your job. Or that you
think in some way that while you could do your job, you're not going to get any
better by struggling into work. My absence is somewhere between the two; I
could do my job -- typing numbers into spreadsheets isn't hard -- but perhaps
not very well or very efficiently, and I might stop feeling so queasy in time.
Mostly I'm afraid of throwing up on work's carpet.
I note in passing that this is the fifth entry in a row in this diary about
being ill. This must say something. Probably that I'm a slob who does too
little exercise and doesn't eat healthily enough. (My heart never accepts the
logical explanation that stress provides.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 07 14:00:47 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back at work today, and feeling mostly OK. Only five more days of work
left this year and then I have a couple of weeks of leisure, with which I'll do
something even though I'm not yet sure quite what.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 10 15:09:08 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
For the past couple of days I have been writing CDs for one of our customers,
helping to meet an unexpected deadline. It's been rather fun, being a
combination of a variety of physical activities (putting CDs in drives,
printing labels, applying labels to CDs) and a fair bit of waiting. The
waiting gives me leisure, so it's been quite relaxing.
Last night was work's Christmas dinner at Le Gros Franck, paid for by work.
The food was nice, if not utterly spectacular, and there was a good amount of
pleasant conversation. Hurrah for that.
Monday will be my last day of work for the year. I'm looking forward to the
break.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Dec 16 10:41:04 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm on holiday now, until just after New Year. So far I seem to have spent it
shopping, and mostly for batteries. (One for a Macintosh, one for my camera.)
Last night I invited Ben and Simon round to try `Top Shed', the railway game
Gareth got me for Christmas. Unfortunately, it has vague guidelines rather
than rules so some creative interpretation was required. We managed to play a
game, and I won, but I'm sure that with some thought we could create a better
game reliant more on skill than luck. We'd also use slightly less enthusiastic
capitals in the manual, which waxes lyrical about the age of STEAM and PISTONS.
Simon bested me in his `Rocket Attack' and `Sumo' PS2 games, and Ben pushed his
GTA3 game on a few missions.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Dec 21 12:02:25 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
To be honest, I'm not sure what this holiday is for, except perhaps using up
work vacation days I'd otherwise lose. I'm doing nothing particularly useful
or interesting during the daytime most days; I'd suggest that work would at
least give me something to do but that's not guaranteed either.
Anyway, on Friday I took a trip out to collect Newmarket, Westerfield,
and Saxmundham in Suffolk on a slightly chilly day. I had a bit of a panic at
Westerfield when the train arrived on the other platform and I realised I'd
been waiting on the wrong side; once the train had gone past the level crossing
I had to run round there to the other platform and shout to ensure the guard
didn't let the train go without me. (I probably needn't have been in such a
hurry, since the train waited for a minute or so more, presumably obtaining a
token or something.)
The East Suffolk Line now seems to have its Community Rail Partnership up and
running, and its logo on some of the station signs. Hopefully this will
help a little to regenerate this slightly run-down bit of railway.
Saturday evening was rjk's birthday party. Having found a card mounting for it
I was able to present him with the photo I'd been hoarding all year: a Mini
Cooper I encountered on my travels with the numberplate "HI RJK".
On Sunday, I gathered at Simon's with Ben and we watched the first of the Peter
Cushing Dalek movies (with an unexpected Roy Castle), played Chinese Checkers,
and watched Ben make quite a lot of progress in GTA3. I've been playing this
game myself a little, but it's really a lot more enjoyable to watch Ben or
Gareth play it than it is for me to take the controls. I think I get
frustrated with my own incompetence too easily, and watching someone else play
preserves the tansion of tightly timed missions but relieves me of any
responsibility for it.
I was going to go swimming on Monday afternoon, but when I got to the Parkside
pools they were closed for refurbishment over Christmas, so I lounged in
Borders until it was time for pizza. Afterwards, there was Zendo (a
rule-guessing game with transparent pyramids) at Relativity.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Dec 24 13:44:13 2004]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I think I must be slightly _too_ good at guessing what my mother likes; I got
here yesterday to find her reading the book I'd bought her as a present.
Luckily I was able to nip to Kettering and buy a replacement gift, and collect
Wellingborough and Kettering stations on the way. (Bothersome contrast of the
week: return bus journey from Chesterton into Cambridge -- about a mile
-- costs L2.50; return train journey from Wellingborough to Kettering costs
L2.60 for nine miles.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jan 04 11:50:51 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Was
Christmas was a few days at home with my parents. As ever, they make an
excellent Christmas dinner and are good company for a few days of slouching in
front of the television interspersed with walks.
Once back in Cambridge I wasn't much more active. For a few days life
consisted of little but gatherings of Gallery-type people, board games, and
GTA3. Pleasantly relaxing.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jan 04 15:04:22 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
As a diversion, I was led to investigate the age of the book so many of us
relied on for our Latin grammar, Kennedy's Revised Latin Primer. As far as I
can gather, it goes roughly like this:
1866 `Public School Latin Primer' by Benjamin Hall Kennedy with the
assistance of other headmasters.
1888 `Revised Latin Primer' published under B.H. Kennedy's name, but mostly
written by his daughters Marion and Julia.
1930 `Shorter Latin Primer', an abbreviation of the 1888 text (?)
1930 `Revised Latin Primer' edited and revised by Sir James Mountford
While searching for this I found:
http://www.users.globalnet.co.uk/~loxias/news/britten.htm
...which points to a section of Benjamin Britten's opera `The Turn of the
Screw' where one of the characters sings a lot of Latin nouns from the bit at
the back of Kennedy; this, Latin learners of the right sort will remember, was
full of awful doggerel designed to help you remember the gender of nouns, the
cases taken by prepositions, and other such things.
But as the article points out, Kennedy (and thus Britten) is being a wee bit
rude for although the Primer refers to hind-leg, cabbage stalk, and bellows,
clunis, caulis, and follis might better be translated `arsehole', `dick', and
`scrotum'. The things you never noticed at school, eh?
The libretto for `The Turn of the Screw', incidentally, can be found at
http://www.karadar.com/Librettos/britten_turn.html
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jan 06 10:54:17 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
In mid-December while trying on a jumper in Debenhams my old pair of glasses
finally broke, so I went into Dollond and Aitchison to get some new pairs.
Helped by their friendly assistant, we settled on some frames and got them
ordered to my prescription. The assistant worked out the price once I'd
given her a money off voucher I'd received through the post, and I agreed to
the price and paid on my credit card. I went away happy to have organised this
so quickly, and collected my new glasses a week later.
End of story, I thought. However, a few days after I'd collected my glasses I
received a letter from D&A asking me to collect my spectacles. It apologised
if I'd already done this and the letter had crossed in the post, so I binned
it. A week or so later, another letter arrived saying the same thing. I was
slightly nonplussed but assumed they must just have failed to tick the
electronic `spectacles collected' box on their system. I binned the letter.
Earlier this week I got another letter, saying the same thing but with slightly
more panicky wording: `It is very important that you collect your spectacles to
avoid your eyes turning to jam and your nose dropping off'. (Perhaps I
exaggerate a little.) I ignored, but didn't bin this one, as the letters were
getting irritating and at some point I'd have to tell them that I was grateful
for the concern but I did actually collect my glasses in December and didn't
need to be reminded of it any more.
Then they tried to phone me at work, leaving a message saying `Specs are ready
for collection' with a coworker. If I weren't already wearing the damn things,
this would be a useful service, but it was an annoyance, so I phoned them back
to put them straight.
In spite of all the letters and the phone call insisting that I collect the
glasses, the problem was that I owed them forty pounds. `It can't be!' I said,
for I had paid the amount asked in full when I first ordered the spectacles.
I wouldn't have asked for any deferred part-payment or anything; I'm a
pay-up-front kind of guy. They said they'd look into it and call me back.
Today, they called me back. Actually, the nice assistant who had first helped
me select the frames called me, and explained that she had accidentally applied
the discount on the voucher to both pairs rather than just the first pair, and
that therefore I owed them forty pounds. I explained that we'd agreed on a
price, I'd paid, and therefore as far as I was concerned I didn't owe them any
more. `You may see it that way,' said the nice assistant, but I still owed
them money. As apologetically as I could I said I disagreed and wouldn't be
paying the extra, she replied by saying she'd have to take it to Head Office,
and the call ended.
This is all rather upsetting. D&A are plausible opticians, open at convenient
times, and I've had good service from them in the past. Surely, though, you
can't sell a good or service for one price and then later change that price and
ask for more money?
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jan 07 00:13:13 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
A pleasant evening at the pub, with good conversations with Rachel and Becky
but also some reflection brought on by discussion of Rachel and Tony's wedding,
the increasing age of my parents, and the time of year.
I've never really thought of my parents as old before. They've always been
parent-age and presumed to be an almost immortal fixture, but with them now in
their sixties and my mother now retired I think it's beginning to sink in
(on an emotional rather than a rational level) with me that they're getting
older and won't be around forever.
At some point, and this is where the time of year comes in, they won't be
around for me to go home to at Christmas and I'm not sure what my life does
with that. In the normal way of things people of my sort of age start to
settle down and think of having children, and experience as parents the magic
of a child's Christmas once more.
But aside from the lack of opportunity -- this is not a lack-of-love-life
diary entry -- I don't see myself as a future parent. Fear of the
responsibilities, unwillingness to give up freedoms, whatever; `I like children
but I couldn't eat a whole one.'
I'm not moping, just musing, and ensuring that I have some words to eat should
fate go all weird on me.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jan 10 14:11:44 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
As mentioned here previously, I've been playing Grand Theft Auto 3. Last
night, as the result of a particular jump, I ended up driving on the railway
line that goes round the first island and it felt very peculiar. The game
requires you to commit theft, murder, arson, and all this is perfectly OK; I
think it says something about my prejudices that in a world where all of the
above are right, trespassing on the railway is still Right Out.
In passing, I'll note that although GTA3 is happy to have sex and violence on
the right side of its little world, the game is quite persistent in its
anti-drugs message. It probably says something about someone in the whole
design process, although it's entirely unclear who.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jan 14 10:46:31 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
After Nigel kindly loaned me a PowerMac last year, I finally got it working
with the network last night by dint of the (obvious in retrospect) tactic of
downloading a new driver from the card manufacturer's website. I think I must
have spent too long in Unixland, where that's almost always of no help when
solving problems, and forgotten that it's expected behaviour in the world of
the mass-market operating system.
Still, I now have a vaguely fast (200MHz!) Mac with working networking, so I'm
going to investigate the current state of the old mac port of PuTTY. I'm
feeling very energetic about PuTTY at the moment. I suspect it's a contagious
energy I've caught from Simon, who's done a lot of PuTTY work lately.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jan 19 18:44:07 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, I now have a version of the latest PuTTY which compiles, links, and runs
on my Mac. Unfortunately, it is unexpectedly green.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jan 21 00:06:21 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Having investigated the mysterious greenness, I eradicated it. I type this
from a correctly-coloured PuTTY on my Mac. The changes incidentally brought
Mac PuTTY up to supporting xterm 256 colour mode. If PuTTY is now any colour,
it is a suffusion of pinky yellow.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jan 26 12:41:54 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Tuesday
Tuesday was the company's Managed Services roadshow, where bits of our part of
the company go round all the offices in Western Europe to talk about how nifty
they are. Unfortunately, Cambridge is too small to deserve a visit so we had
to get down to Leatherhead for a 9am start. This meant waking up not long
after 5am, so I was shattered at the end of the day and went to bed at 10pm.
In the meantime we had a supposedly reassuring talk about job title
harmonisation. Why does it matter? Who knows? I doubt anybody actually cares
that much, but management seem to have spent a few months earnestly giving
everyone a new job title anyway. Perhaps it makes them feel useful. I was
amused by the way the manager doing the presentation became incredibly hostile
and defensive when someone asked if the job title changes would mean pay
reductions. `They always have,' someone quipped. She became almost
schoolteacher-esque, something like `No, Jones, I want you to explain to the
class what you meant by that.'
I confess to having snoozed through some of the later presentations.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 01 10:04:47 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Happy New Year
Yesterday a new year, and a new sun, was born thanks to Jomsborg the New.
The night before was the Wake, which I attend each year with an increasing
sense of bewilderment as to why I choose to do this. Perhaps I'm getting old,
but a night without sleep doesn't seem so much of a fun thing to choose these
days. Still, there were some silly games either side of a nap I took in the
middle, and we trooped up at dawn to Castle Mound.
I've done this ten or so times now and it's been variously windy, cold, icy,
wet, grey, misty and a variety of other weather conditions which obscure the
sun or your enjoyment of it to some extent. This year Clare raised a sun
(invoking it in British Sigh Language - how cool is that?) into a gloriously
clear sky with only a few clouds scudding along in the West. It was
beautifully round and orange and you could feel its warmth.
Mornings like that make me feel glad to be alive.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 01 10:45:15 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
If non-musicians can be tonedeaf, can perl programmers be typedef?
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Feb 02 10:11:45 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Was
I did of course mean British Sign Language, rather than British Sigh Language,
although I do like the idea of the latter.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 08 11:01:01 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I suspect I want to learn how to job-hunt again.
With the exception of a brief honeymoon period where there was stuff to do at
the beginning, I've never really been happy with this job. In the sphere of
things I'm good at, there's not enough to do, and so my time has increasingly
been occupied with menial tasks that I'm not particularly good at.
Every day feels like doing time. It's a chore to get into work, where I don't
start doing anything until about 10:00, and then it's clock-watching with
regular welcome breaks to make coffee, go to the loo, whatever.
I feel as if my skills are rotting through disuse. There's not much
opportunity to use them, and where there is the general depressive air of the
place (and the difficulty of any interface with Central IT) makes the whole
thing seem like too much of a hill to climb.
I plod through tedious spreadsheet-filling exercises, and feel great loathing
and resentment when asked to do even more tedious parts of the same job.
It's clear I'm doing nobody any favours by remaining here. The only reasons
I'm still here are that I lack the effort to initiate a change and that I'm
afraid of running out of money. (For all that I'm a spreadsheet monkey, I'm an
exceptionally well paid spreadsheet monkey.)
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 10 10:37:36 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I got a repeat prescription of anti-depressants from the doctor yesterday.
When I exchanged it for actual drugs at the pharmacist, she didn't charge me
and I volunteered `I have to pay for that.' She seemed deeply surprised by
this and whispered as she rang it up in the till that I should have just taken
it. What would have been the point of that, though? I would have felt
sufficiently guilty about it to undo some of the positive effect of the
anti-depressants.
Anyway, when I got them home, the antidepressants turned out to be Spanish.
Same manufacturer, same content, different packaging and brand name. Instead
of Lustral it's Besitran, which sounds more like a passenger transport
executive than an anti-depressant. Still, a quick web search revealed that
Lustral and Besitran are one and the same thing.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Feb 11 16:26:11 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Yesterday I felt slightly queasy, with intermittent headaches and the strong
symptoms of chemical depression. Until about 9pm, time felt as if it was going
very slowly and I felt like everything was doom: people hated me, there was
nothing I could do, and all the usual things. Gradually after that my mood
brightened, and in that context I was able to see the lethargy, headaches and
queasiness as a non-depression illness. When they persisted this morning it
wasn't a hard decision to mail into work sick. I then proceeded to sleep for
the rest of the morning, which must say something since I normally despise that
kind of lie-in even when I can afford it.
Unfortunately, I missed what passes for an annual review at work, and since
this is a process working to a fixed timetable my boss had to do it without me.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 12 13:07:06 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I am in the land of mope. Everything is too much effort and doing nothing is
unsatisfactory. I have yet to decide just to sleep, but I'm veering that way.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 14 14:43:25 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Feeling rather better today, so I can tell you more about the perils of
imported medicine. As I mentioned, my prescription for sertraline
hydrochloride was fulfilled with a box of Besitran instead of the usual English
Lustral. Not a problem, and if it makes medicines cheaper for the NHS to buy,
that's great. However, although it comes with an informational leaflet in
English, the day names on the pop-out tablet pack are in a language I can't
readily identify. Instead they're in some language where there's one weekday
whose abbreviation is X.
I think I shall take a marker pen to the pack so that I know when I last took
one.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Feb 21 11:34:37 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Weekending
I was going to go to Picocon on Saturday, but that plan was scuppered by waking
up at 11:30, so Saturday was spent inside fiddling with Mac PuTTY instead.
Then there came news of a vulnerability in PuTTY's SFTP code which required the
third security-release in a row. Although I've been in none of the cases
responsible for any of the actual code, I feel a kind of cabinet-style
PuTTY team collective responsibility for it and also a smidgeon of pride that
we got the fixed release out so quickly. Nearly all Simon's work, of course,
so kudos should go to him. (It's hardly surprising that after the hectic
Sunday he had his cold managed to gain a foothold...)
Little else to report. The Mac port of PuTTY now has a nearly-working nifty
drop down selecty thing for character sets, but that's of interest to nearly
nobody.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Feb 22 15:43:39 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
It snowed last night on the walk back from Relativity's post-pizza gathering to
mine. I know a lot of people object to snow -- it makes driving awkward, it
can be like cold napalm if you're not sufficiently wrapped up, it freezes and
makes walking hazardous -- but I still have the childlike `wow' reaction to
snow. I walked through the snow, watching it fall in the orange sodium light,
and only reluctantly pulled my coat's hood up when I finally chose warmth over
the wonderful feeling of snow falling on my face.
I love the whumfing sound of snow compressing underfoot or the crisper crunch
of frozen snow the next morning, and the way different road surfaces conduct
heat differently and reveal the lines of the latest roadworks. If there were a
god, I'd say how wonderful they were for creating such wonderful stuff, but it
wouldn't do it justice. It's somehow more powerful, more wonderful, to know
that it's pure physics at work: pressure, temperature, crystals and light on it
all.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Feb 24 15:07:46 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
In 2002, the US Congress passed the Notification and Federal Employee
Antidiscrimination and Retaliation Act. You might think this is a long title,
but all becomes clear when you quote the acronym: the No FEAR Act.
Similarly, you might not recognise the `Uniting and Strengthening America by
Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism' Act,
until you acronymise it into USA PATRIOT.
Someone who writes Bills for Congress is having great fun inventing acronyms
and making up bill titles to match them. Other gems include:
`Controlling the Assault of Non-Solicited Pornography and Marketing Act'
(CAN-SPAM Act)
`Secure Authentication Feature and Enhanced Identification Defense Act
(SAFE ID Act)
`Prosecutorial Remedies and Other Tools to end the Exploitation of Children
Today Act' (PROTECT Act)
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Feb 26 19:18:14 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Will be
Last night, as I got in from work, the phone has just finished ringing. I
dialled 1471 to see who it was, found it was my parents, and decided that if it
was important they would ring me back. Later in the evening I went to the
Gallery for Louise's party and the topic of children came up; I'm disinclined
and unlikely to father any myself but some people mentioned that I'd perhaps
make a good uncle.
This morning my parents phoned again to tell me that my brother is
(unexpectedly, and as far as I know unplannedly) going to be a father.
Cripes, gosh, etc.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Mar 03 16:11:39 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I felt fine when I got up this morning. Once I'd walked to work through the
rather biting wind, I felt a bit sniffly. After I walked over the road to
Tesco's to get some decongestants, I felt rather unpleasant and bunged up,
which is pretty much the state I'm in now. I'm doing fragments of work
interspersed with sniffling and wondering where my brain is.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Mar 04 11:46:03 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
It got worse and turned into a night with only fitful sleep, interspersed with
chills, sweats, and headaches. I'm marginally better now, merely lurching from
dose to dose of paracetamol. When you're used to small under the weather type
colds where you take a day off as a precaution, a full-scale cold really knocks
you for six.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Mar 05 14:27:26 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Walking to the Gallery last night for the usual Friday `West Wing' watching
wasn't necessarily a good idea, ending up as I did shivering in a corner, but
it did mean I got to see people which I miss after any amount of enforced
solitude. I actually slept tolerably last night, which was nice, and the
headaches are now subsiding though the congestion remains.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Mar 05 18:49:57 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Argh. I nip to the shop because otherwise I will have nothing to eat and I
will _starve_ (which can't be good for me, cold or no cold) and my body
retaliates by making me feel much worse. I hate hate hate this cold and I have
already had quite enough of slumping on the sofa watching TV. Bah.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 08 13:01:26 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back at work, so here's a little puzzle for you. I have a postit note to
my right which reads:
4:20 = 1:200
9:20 = 1:500
42:40 = 1:2500
17:40 = 1:1000
Why?
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 09 11:02:31 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back at work, and able to do useful things, but my head still feels as if
it is full of goo. For the past two evenings I've slumped listlessly on the
sofa and had an early night in the hope of clearing it, but it's not worked
yet. Bah.
Still, I am determined that I will be fine and well for this evening's PuTTY
team meal. Perhaps a hearty meal is exactly what I need.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Mar 10 16:27:35 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is (Incoherent Rant)
It is rare that my blood boils when listening to the radio. I know that others
get more annoyed and turn off at all sorts of programmes, but I'm generally
calmer. However, every time Charles Clarke, Hazel Blears, or one of their
cronies pops up on Radio 4, I want to lock them up somewhere they won't be able
to continue dismantling my freedom.
They say that there is a great dilemma, that Liberty must be balanced with
Protection. This is the Big Lie of our time, the mantra that is repeated so
often that it comes to be believed even though it goes against everything we
know. It does not matter what the threat is. It may be that the intelligence
services have accurate intelligence on would-be terrorists (although anybody
would be forgiven for mistrusting the intelligence services after the Iraq
debacle), but there is no balance to be struck. There is a choice here, but
it's not one of balance, it's whether you want Liberty or Tyranny. I want
Liberty, but Clarke and Blair appear to want Tyranny.
I don't care if the life of one or twenty intelligence officers or sources is
endangered; they knew the risks when they signed up, and they know that nothing
stays secret for ever. Either you have the evidence to convict someone of a
crime, or you don't. If you do, you charge them and try them. If you don't,
you leave them be, possibly watching them for future crimes. If we gather
intelligence that we can never use, what's the point? If the only way we can
use intelligence is by creating a parody of a judicial system which denies
suspects knowledge of the evidence against them, what's the point?
People say, `We need to be protected.' How protected do you want? Perhaps
those who need to be protected would be best served by being confined to their
houses, where nothing need ever threaten them again.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Mar 14 10:25:21 2005]--
From: (S) Prairie Tortoise (steph)
Subject: Is
Those numbers again:
4:20 = 1:200
9:20 = 1:500
42:40 = 1:2500
17:40 = 1:1000
Several spreadsheets, including Excel and OpenOffice, erroneously convert
scales (the right-hand column) into times. 1:200 is 1hr and 200 minutes also
known as 4 hours and twenty minutes. The postit note is there to help me
convert back from spreadsheet brain damage into sane scales.
Gareth's version was better:
> They're clearly odds for the timing of the End of the World. After all, it's
> most likely to happen early in the morning so that it annoys the most people
> possible. The end of the working day is much less likely, as everyone would
> be too worn out to notice. And twenty to thirty-one in the evening has the
> longest odds because it would require a redefinition of the clock first.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 16 13:06:46 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
Playing catchup here, as ever. Still...
Subject: Saturday
On Saturday I decided to venture out to Sudbury, the Suffolk terminus of a
little branch line mostly in Essex. As the crow flies, it's quite close, and
indeed the line used to continue up from Sudbury to Cambridge. Sadly, Beeching
turned it into a stump and I had to go the long way round via Ipswich and
Colchester. It was nice to get out and about again, and to have the chance to
visit the East Anglia Railway Museum at Chappel and Wakes Colne station. The
conductor did get a bit confused checking my tickets when I took the train
straight back from Sudbury at which it had just arrived...
In the evening was Kate's fluffy birthday party, with a number of fluffy
things, not least Dave the Dog. It's been a while since I've seen him, and
he's grown a huge fluffy coat that makes him look huge.
Subject: Sunday
The second Cushing `Dr Who' film, at the Gallery. Cripes, it's bad, although
in an amusing way.
Since the weekend, I've been fixing bugs in PuTTY and getting my hands dirty in
some of work's Java code. Hurrah for actually using my brain for a change.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 22 13:00:31 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is (was?)
National Rail's station information page for Cambridge can be found at:
http://nrekb.nationalrail.co.uk/stations/?a=findStationByCrs&crscode=cbg
Apparently Cambridge station has `Women-Only Waiting Rooms'. News to me.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Mar 22 21:18:16 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been trying to track down an off-by-one error in the Mac port of PuTTY for
two hours now, and I still can't work out what's going on. Perhaps Java at
work has addled my brains so that I can't write C at home.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Mar 30 11:04:20 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm back at work after a long weekend in sunny Hinckley for Paragon 2, this
year's Eastercon (National British SF Convention). It was a good con, though
not the best I've been to, mostly due to poor programming. Still, there were
some interesting discussions and it gave my interest in SF an added spark as it
does every year. It's also given me something of an enthusiasm for the more
academic side of things, SF criticism and the like. Anything that might stop
my brain withering away can't be bad.
The only problem, and this is always a problem with all sorts of conventions,
is that I don't really know that many people other than the Cambridge people I
came to the convention with. That's kind of inevitable if you go to one con a
year and have little other contact with fandom otherwise, of course, so I have
a Cunning Plan to pay more attention to what goes on in between Eastercons.
(This year will have Worldcon as well, which can only help.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Apr 05 17:29:11 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: A smattering of random times
Not a lot going on, really. I've watched the new `Doctor Who' since its first
episode over Easter, and in general I'm fairly impressed. I've written a
review (based on the first episode) for the coming TTBA, so I won't say much
specific here. One general thing that occurs to me is that telling a story in
one 45 minute episode will result in stories that are on the surface more
simplistic than the tales of old `Doctor Who', but because of the way it's
being written the individual episodes will offer up much more in the face of
repeat viewings and critical analysis. This may say as much about me as it
does about the new Who, of course.
Ben has been taking work avoidance to a new high and has all but planned a
great station-collecting jaunt for May, when we will be trundling around
Cornwall. It has a little over forty stations, so we should be able to manage
those in a week without too much trouble, and do a bit of walking while we're
at it.
We've lost a Pope. Lots of people are saying `good' or `who cares', but
although I disagreed with many of the policies of John Paul II, my emotions are
still definitely on the `that's sad' side. As the leader of 1 in 6 of the
world's population, I don't think the media coverage of his passing is
extravagant either. I'm now looking forward to the election of his successor;
I've tried to find a webcam of the relevant Sistine Chapel chimney but I've had
no luck so far. (Everything I know about Papal elections I learned from Robert
Silverberg in `Good News From the Vatican', incidentally.)
And we're off to the polls in May, as predicted. Labour will probably win, but
hopefully with a small enough majority to make them less likely to be able to
do stupid things. With any luck, Cambridge will oust Anne Campbell for whoever
the Liberal Democrat candidate is. I've had quite enough of Anne Campbell's
opportunistic political flipflopping, so it's a tactical yellow vote for me.
(Tactical voting relieves me of the need seriously to analyse what my political
views on anything actually _are_ any more. Phew.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Apr 11 09:48:40 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Weekending
It's annoying enough that I get a lot of random short colds -- my boss wonders
whether it might be something nasty in the air conditioning here -- but what is
even more annoying is their tendency to hit me on Friday and have subsided by
Monday so that they eat solely into my free time.
As a consequence I stayed in on Saturday rather than getting out and about, and
mooched in front of books, CDs, and the television. Of course, you could argue
that by taking preventative action like this and looking after myself, I've
shortened the cold's duration and stopped myself having to take time off work.
But, dammit, I want time off work now to make up for the weekend I've not
really had!
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 13 10:40:39 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
Memo to self: a not-turned-on coffee machine never makes coffee.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Apr 14 10:15:28 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
*yawn* I woke up late this morning, and in the haste to get to work I sat on
part of my glasses. Fortunately the net result of this is just to have bent
one of the arms a bit, and I've bent it back. Unfortunately it seems to have
lost some of the springiness when you close the glasses.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Apr 15 11:49:49 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm getting the distinct impression that one of the catering ladies here
doesn't like me, or is fed up with me in some way. She always seems slightly
fed up and surly when I buy things. I wonder what I can have done to offend?
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Apr 21 12:32:06 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
Not much to tell really. I recently finished `River of Gods' by Ian McDonald.
It's a wonderful SF tale of a balkanised India in 2047, having to deal with the
new challenges of water shortages, increasingly sophisticated AIs, and the
outcomes of elective surgery and genetic manipulation, all alongside the old
challenges of politics, business, religion and caste. Following nine main
characters and a host of extras through a fortnight of cataclysmic events, it
manages to combine engaging personal stories with a fascinating big picture,
all the while giving us a rich textured setting which feels at once eminently
futuristic and authentically Indian. McDonald apparently visited India while
writing this book; it was well worth the effort.
(Longer review in the coming TTBA.)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Apr 22 11:33:47 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
Thursday's usual gathering in the Carlton was especially fun last night. Maybe
it was just the particular combination of people, but the conversation was
pleasantly non-computery, and Clare, Peter, Peter, Dan, and I talked lots about
country parks, trains, `Doctor Who', `Babylon 5', and all sorts of other such
guff. I like computers, but sometimes it's nice to find a conversation which
doesn't really involve them at all.
I went to bed with a huge headache, which was strange since I'd only had one
pint in the pub. When I woke up this morning, I had much the same headache,
although paracetamol has completely vanquished it now.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Apr 26 11:14:26 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
On Sunday evening, after eating the sweet and sour pork from Yumee, I felt
increasingly queasy and subsequently spent a fair part of the night throwing
up. On Monday, after a few attempts to get up were thwarted by fainting, I
spent most of the day in bed before I managed to reach the sofa. Today I'm
feeling a little headachey and queasy, and quite tired (probably due to lack of
food!) but definitely better. I might even make it to work tomorrow...
It's galling to note that even when I'm so ill I can't get out of bed I still
feel guilty for not crawling to work.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 27 09:43:44 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: The Great Poster Poll 2005
In the course of my travels around Cambridge, these are the numbers of posters
I've seen for the various political parties.
Liberal Democrat 25
Labour 5
Respect 1
Green 1
Even if this isn't terribly representative -- it's limited for one thing to the
places I walk -- it does highlight just how much the Liberal Democrats are
campaigning in Cambridge.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Apr 27 10:03:03 2005]--
From: (S) Any Permitted (steph)
Subject: Is
Back at work today, since I'm feeling rather better now. The only thing that's
not quite back to normal is my appetite, but I'm sure I can cope without that
as long as I eat something.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue May 03 12:10:56 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: The Great Poster Poll 2005 - Update
Liberal Democrat 32
Labour 11
Respect 3
Green 1
Labour have finally made it into double figures, and Respect have trebled their
representation in Cambridge windows. The Liberal Democrats are still heading
for a window landslide, though, and there's no sign at all of the Tories.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu May 05 14:41:20 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Election Day
I've done my bit and gone to vote. I never really understand why other people
don't; it's a little ritual that I enjoy, it takes very little time, and
nobody will criticise you for taking a little time out to go and do it.
Perhaps it comes from the fantastic feeling of being a teller for the
Wellingborough Conservative Party in my late teens, watching all those people
come and go and realising that the same thing was happening across the country.
Perhaps I also have an over-developed sense of civil duty, and a life
sufficiently devoid of interest that elections are actually interesting.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 11 12:28:49 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
Nearly a week later. Cambridge now has a Liberal Democrat MP, I still have the
cold that started on election night, and I have a shiny new digital camera for
taking pictures of Cornwall at the end of the month.
Other than that, not much to report. The latest edition of TTBA is very nearly
out of the way, lacking only the final finishing touch of a cover before it
gets printed and distributed.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu May 12 17:06:12 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
Warning: boring Java nargery ahead.
I have spent the past day or two trying to work out why some Java code at work
has been failing. It boils down a bug in how anonymous inner classes are
handled by the antique compiler we've been using.
Consider the code:
package bob;
public class test {
public void A () {
new java.lang.Object() {
public void aa () {
B ();
}
};
}
public void B () {
java.lang.System.out.print("B");
}
}
For this, the compiler creates two .class files. The first is test.class which
contains the method definitions for A, B, and a dummy constructor for bob.test.
The second is test$1.class which contains the following:
final synchronized class bob.test$1 extends java.lang.Object
{
private final bob.test this$0;
public void aa();
bob.test$1(bob.test);
}
We have a magic variable this$0 the class can use to find the surrounding
class, a definition of the aa method, and a constructor which fills in this$0.
This is the (slightly ugly) magic which makes inner classes work.
Add a second source file, though:
package bob;
public class bob {
public void C () {
java.lang.System.out.print("C");
}
}
(Not called or used anywhere, just compiled in.) Suddenly test$1.class has:
final synchronized class bob.test$1 extends java.lang.Object
{
private final bob.bob$test this$0;
public void aa();
bob.test$1(bob.test);
}
The type of this$0 has changed to bob.bob$test - an inner class called `test'
in class bob in package bob. No such beast exists, and the whole thing
justifiably fails when it meets the Java bytecode verifier. This only happens
when there's a class with the same name as the package. It's a bug (though I
can't find any reference to it in Sun's bug database) and it has been fixed in
later versions of the compiler. Not sure why I'm relating it here, but I
thought you might like to know :-)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri May 13 10:49:11 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
I didn't sleep well last night. After nice mild at the pub and retiring to
Simon's to play Tetris and Ikaruga, I went home and failed to get to sleep. My
stomach felt bloated and I began to fear that I'd caught yet another
sick-making stomach bug. Fortunately, I managed to get to sleep eventually,
but I'm really rather dopey today.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon May 16 12:01:43 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Sunday
My father visited on Sunday. It was going to be both my parents, but a rather
abrupt phone call early in the morning informed me that my mother wasn't coming
because she was ill.
Only it's more complicated than that. She didn't come because she was worried
that she was ill, which is a different thing and connected to one of the
crueller bits of genetic determinism.
I never knew my maternal grandmother; she died fairly young of Huntington's
Chorea, a disease of the brain which arises from an excessive number of repeats
of a particular word -- CAG -- on chromosome 4. If you inherit a faulty
version of this gene from one of your parents, and there's a 50% chance of
this, you too will develop the disease. This is the source of my mother's
worry.
I've not noticed her change over the past ten years or so, and neither has my
father, so I suspect it's just worry. Nevertheless, I wonder whether _I_
should get my DNA checked out, or just shrug and get on with my life; there is,
after all, no cure.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon May 16 16:17:02 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm not feeling well today, in any sense of the word. My legs ache and I feel
tired, possibly as a result of wandering around hilly Brighton (although
walking doesn't normally make my legs ache) on Saturday. I'm a little worried
about my family (see today's earlier entry), and should probably phone my
mother. I need to phone someone else about something unrelated. I need to
correct the errors in the latest TTBA and get it printed and distributed. I
need to pack for next week's holiday and sort out some things on the laptop I'm
taking with me.
More immediately, I need to work out whether at 5:30 I should just go home and
collapse (although I have little to eat at home) or go to pizza since it at
least involves food and company and I seem to feel the need for both. (On the
minus side it also involves getting there and getting back somewhere, which is
a lot of faff for someone with no energy.)
*sigh*
---------------------------------------------------[Wed May 18 15:41:06 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm gradually working my way through the to-do list of oppressive impendingness
from my previous edit, and I'm feeling more cheerful probably as a result.
Plus I'm going on holiday in a few days! Hurrah!
---------------------------------------------------[Thu May 19 17:16:34 2005]--
From: (S) Neither here nor theremin (steph)
Subject: Is
Going on holiday seems to require taking a vast number of power adapters with
me. One for the laptop, one for the shaver, one for the digital camera...
OK, perhaps three isn't that vast a number, but you get the idea.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat May 28 18:52:21 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
Well, I'm back. With the help of a lot of planning from Ben and a Cornish
rover ticket, we have visited and photographed every national rail station in
Cornwall.
In case that doesn't seem like enough, there were a selection of good walks in
there, notably over the hills between Camborne and Redruth, along the
coast between St. Ives and Lelant, from Gunnislake to Bere Ferrers, and from
Luxulyan to St. Austell via Par. We also got to see the Royal Albert Bridge
really quite a lot, as well as saying hello to the Torpoint ferry. Cornwall's
geography seems to lead to stunning scenery combined with engineering on a
grand scale, and the result tends towards the impressive.
I'll be putting the photos of the stations up over the next few days.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun May 29 00:00:37 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
I think drama must be a bit like a drug. I have had a week away from it all,
away from radio and TV drama and the drama of people's lives in their online
diaries, and on my return it has all hit me emotionally. The little ups and
downs of people's lives, fictional and real, seem to be focused through a lens
of a week of peace, and I find myself smiling and crying, consecutively and
concurrently, in front of the screen.
Our lives have always been strange. Little happenstance incidents throw us
together and tear us apart, jostling Brownian emotion around this tiny little
box of a world.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 03 16:10:10 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
In our small office here, the company I work for has a smaller office which we
use for a variety of things including our weekly priority-setting meetings.
These meetings aren't particularly dull, and indeed often remind me of
interesting things I should be paying attention to, but I often find myself
falling asleep in them anyway. Today there was a definite gap when I realised
that someone was asking me to talk about something and I had to um and ah my
way back up to consciousness to do so.
I'm not otherwise tired, so I think there must be something about that room:
the staleness of the air and inefficiency of the air conditioning, an excess of
CO2-breathing people, even perhaps just the flicker of the screen on which my
boss displays the master priority list. Given these conditions, I wonder what
I can do to avoid dozing off...
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 06 00:47:01 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
There's a feeling, like the one you get when you've walked a mile in a
daydream and you realise you really have no memory of getting from there to
here. And there's the feeling that follows where you desperately scrabble in
the tatters of your memory for the thread of the lost daydream.
There's a feeling, like walking along one side of a valley when on the other
side people approach, meet, and pass.
Life feels very strange at the moment.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 08 22:13:16 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
On the way back from the Gallery last night I decided to have an impromptu play
with my new digital camera, and after some fiddling with settings managed to
get it to take a night-time picture without flash which nevertheless looked
like something.
The result is http://www.greenend.org.uk/owen/sparklies.jpg (shrunk for
size and convenience) which is vaguely pretty but what I'm really wondering
about is why the sparkles around the lights are hexagonal stars.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jun 09 13:40:59 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Would have been
As we all know, Brunel's seven foot and a quarter inch broad gauge (to which
the Great Western Railway was originally built) lost out in the end to
Stephenson's four foot, eight and a half inches gauge which we now call
standard gauge. This track gauge (measuring the distances between the two
running rails) is used across much of the world, including America.
But, as we consider all those cartoons and films where the damsel is bound head
and foot to the railway tracks, we're bound also to consider:
What would the moustache-twirling villain have done had broad gauge prevailed?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 13 14:25:48 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: This miscellaneousness
Since I got back from Cornwall, life has felt rather odd. Everything seems
somewhat vague and undirected, somehow _miscellaneous_, as if I'm living the
wasted part of a sphere packing problem. The spheres / meat / marrow of life
seem to be rather absent at the moment. One possible explanation for this is
that the holiday was a week of fairly simple well-defined goals -- visit these
stations, catch this train, walk from here to here, find a B&B -- which
contrasts starkly with the rest of my life: a barely varied social calendar
that I vaguely enjoy most of the time, a job which has become more interesting
but which lacks many firm deadlines or goals, and my remaining free time which
is taken up with small pieces of housework and other minute tinkerings.
Another possible explanation is that I am reacting less well to the gradual
reduction in my anti-depressant dose and should go back to see the doctor.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jun 18 21:17:10 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
The heat and humidity have sapped my happiness. The consolation is that it's
already past nine so I can go to bed in an hour or two and see if tomorrow is
any better.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jun 19 14:26:44 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: LieJournal
This diary makes its way via evil scripts and RSS to LiveJournal, where as is
the wont in those parts people can pass public comment on my witterings.
Unfortunately, due to crapness on LJ's part, anonymous people aren't permitted
to comment on feeds, so I can't _respond_ to comments that are made, but I can
_read_ them. If I can find them.
The comments are made available on the pages linked to from the main feed page
http://www.livejournal.com/users/stephdiary/ but because LJ just redirects
http://www.livejournal.com/users/stephdiary/rss to the original RSS feed
http://www.greenend.org.uk/steph/diary.rss, they don't appear in any syndicated
form that I can read with my RSS syndicator of choice.
However, the URLs of the various comment pages might be predictable, and if so,
perhaps I can add them to a <comments></comments> tag in my RSS feed before the
data even hits LJ.
So, from the dates and URLs on http://www.livejournal.com/users/stephdiary/ can
_you_ see a way of predicting the URLs?
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jun 20 16:45:10 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
Today my employer quite literally made me an offer I couldn't understand.
It turns out to be a bonus plan, whereby if both the company and I do well
enough I get more money, but the accompanying documentation was sufficiently
wrapped in legalese and management buzzwords that this really wasn't as clear
as you'd expect.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jun 24 13:00:15 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
Hurrah! It's raining! Never mind the fact that I am not dressed for rain;
after the oppressive heat of the past few days it's an enormous relief to see
the whole thing washed away with a bit of _proper_ British weather.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jun 25 01:13:45 2005]--
From: (S) The open road is infinitely hopeful (steph)
Subject: Is
A good Veizla (for which many thanks to ceb for organising it) and a fun
Aftermath, at least until I decided I had to go since my parents are visiting
in the morning.
There are some puzzling things for this diary to muse on, but they can wait for
a time when I'm not drunk and tired.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jun 25 18:11:43 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Trolling Callcentres
Trolling Indian callcentre operatives trying to sell me a telephone isn't as
rewarding as it could be. The other end plays far too straight a bat. In
spite of my telling the nice Indian woman that I was afraid of mobile phones
because they caused brain cancer, she continued to try to sell me the phone.
From there we went to Bluetooth...
`Is that some sort of pirate?'
`No Mr Dunn, it's wireless technology.'
`Do normal mobiles have wires, then?'
`No, but this is wireless technology that you can put in your ear so that you
can drive.'
...to the phone's triband features:
`Triband? What does that mean?'
`Mr Dunn, you can use this phone in any country in the world so when you are
travelling you can keep in touch.'
`I don't hold with travel. It leads to immorality.'
`That's OK Mr Dunn you can use the phone just at home.'
I got bored at the point she tried to start selling the video features -- I
think the repeated assertions that I was the luckiest man in Britain for
receiving this call began to grate -- so I didn't argue that photography stole
your soul...
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jun 26 00:59:02 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Will not be
...running Debian for much longer. Following Simon's bad experiences with his
upgrade from woody to sarge, I was a little worried about the prospect myself
but this turned to relief when I discovered that he hadn't followed the
instructions (due to not knowing they existed).
I've just followed the instructions.
I now have a system where xdm won't let me (anyone, actually) log in on the
console. Goodness knows what other joys I have waiting for me when I manage to
solve that one.
Is the future Ubuntu? Is it SuSE? I don't know, but I'm fairly sure it's not
the laughable effort of a distribution that Debian is becoming. I'm sure this
is the cry of people who don't know what they're doing, and that's fine because
Debian isn't for them. I used to think that for people who did know what they
were doing there was a distribution that itself knew what it was doing.
Experiences like this suggest to me that one of Debian or me doesn't.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jun 26 14:25:09 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
Restarting xdm again seems to have fixed the login problem, although quite why
this didn't work the first time I don't know. Now I have the joy that all of
my fonts have changed size and appearance. (Never mind the fact that I've now
got a version of fixed that's had its ASCII part broken by the International
Unicode Jihad.) I don't want to have to find all my preferred fonts again!
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 28 10:04:59 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Monday
Pizza was small by normal standards with only Ian, Clare, Jon, Peter, and me
there. Afterwards we trundled over to Relativity for sorbet, coffee, and
booze. Also, slightly oddly, we ended up solving a Sudoku grid I'd got
half-way through.
Later, Clare and I ended up going through my diary archives to work out what
marked the beginning and ending points of the various parts they're divided
into. It was alarming to discover that for the vast majority of even vaguely
cryptic entries in my diary I now have absolutely no idea what I was on about.
I suspect I'm going to have to spend some time collating information from
email, my own private diary, and others' memories to work out most of it. This
appeals to me, actually; I like the idea of something I write becoming a text
for analysis and comment even if the commentator is me.
The other thing I notice is just how much more _stable_ I've become. Actually,
how much more stable everyone's become, but let's talk about me. I'm less
depressed, and even when I feel depressed (rather than unhappy or bored) I'm
better at pulling out of it or at least coping reasonably.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jun 28 19:34:25 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
Bah, bah, and thrice bah. I tried to add a USB card and some more USB ports to
my computer this evening, and the result is that the system won't boot; the
BIOS gets as far as the screen where it lists all your peripherals and then the
screen blanks and the whole boot process starts again. Buggeration!
I hate fiddling with hardware. Whenever I try to install something in a PC,
_something_ goes wrong. In this case, removing the new thing and reseating all
the cables doesn't seem to have worked and I'm probably going to have to taxi
the poor beast to WoC for surgery.
So much for getting lots of photos uploaded this week, then :-(.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 29 10:06:21 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
I am unhappy. Someone should cheer me up.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 29 14:12:48 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
I've never before come to the point of paying a taxi driver and found I didn't
have enough money. This happened this lunchtime. I found and announced that I
was a pound short, ummed and ahhed and tried to suggest ways I could get the
money to him. He just huffed, told me I should have checked my money
beforehand, and resisted all efforts on my part to get information about him so
that I could get the money to him.
Thinking I should pay up anyway, I phoned Panther and explained the situation.
The operator said that if the taxi driver had cared he'd have driven me to the
Police station, so it obviously didn't matter and I shouldn't worry about it.
I still feel guilty.
Anyway, I have now entrusted my broken computer to the care of WoC's engineers.
Fingers crossed that it's just something trivial and I don't have to replace
the whole motherboard, CPU, and case.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jun 29 23:15:56 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
It's thundering outside, and I'm about to go to bed. Partly for the mundane
reason that I'm tired, but mostly because I'm hopeless with mysteries. No
sooner do I get a whiff of something interesting in the air than it's starting
to niggle at me, and given any opportunity I start to niggle at it. Sleep is
one of the very best solutions for niggling.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 01 00:06:28 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been feeling slightly ill all today (and now I come to think of it, most
of yesterday) and it's culminated in quite a lot of queasiness this evening.
Nevertheless I made it to the Castle to see Jon and Sarah before wandering on
to the Carlton. There, introspection, gloom, and my stomach's gurglings got
the better of me, so I didn't enjoy myself that much.
What _was_ good was assorted witterings and reminiscences with ceb afterwards
at Relativity.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 01 00:09:51 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: 19 BC
All evening I've been trying to remember the first couple of lines from Book IV
of the Aeneid, which I studied for GCSE Latin. So I don't forget them again,
here they are:
At regina gravi iamdudum saucia cura
vulnus alit venis et caeco carpitur igni.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 01 12:26:12 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
With all the things my social circle throws up, I have to wonder: am I too
backward or is my social circle too advanced?
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 01 17:41:41 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Is
I've heard back from World of Computers, who have been looking at my sick
computer, and apparently everything is fine with it except the primary hard
drive. This is good news in one way, since the rest of the system is fine.
It's bad news if the primary HDD really is fried, although since the BIOS can
see it I'm going to have a good look at it with a Linux boot disc before I
write it off. I do have some backups, although they're a little elderly, and
I'd rather not have the faff if I don't have to.
Now I think about it, I wonder whether the disc `failure' is in fact a funted
bootloader and an artefact of the Debian upgrade I did on Monday.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 01 18:21:59 2005]--
From: (S) Meaning's just a seven letter word (steph)
Subject: Hold on to these moments as they pass
Before looking at others, before looking over _there_, it's as well to look at
yourself and what's over _here_, so that's what I'll do. The primary version
of this diary is still on the Monochrome BBS (www.mono.org), where I got an
account about nine years ago. It started with a friend who talked about her
mono diary and once this strange idea had been explained I had to get an
account to satisfy my curiosity. A diary that anyone can read? This was a
strange concept; remember that the web was only a couple of years old, Netscape
2 was still pretty hot technology, and nobody had yet said the word "blog".
Nevertheless it was amazing. The feeling of being privileged to read someone's
thoughts (regardless of the fact that anyone can get an account and people
obviously won't write exactly the same in their mono diary as they would in a
private diary) was immensely powerful and I found myself reading the diaries of
a few more people I knew.
There's something about this sharing of the everyday that builds a sense of
community. Mono generates this in a variety of ways of course -- discussion
files are still a mainstay of the system -- but the diaries were the killer app
and I was drawn into it to give something back: to broadcast. And since I've
an unhealthy dose of angsty teenager in me to this day, it was mostly angsty
mopings, worries, poetry, and the like. You'd half expect my diary in its
early days to slam the door of its room and sulk to the accompaniment of
ear-splittingly loud music. That diary has continued to this day and archives
of the whole thing can be found at http://www.greenend.org.uk/steph/
A couple of things about mono for those that don't know it. It's plain text
only, although you can decorate your text with colours, bold, and underlines.
(This is why the whole thing appears on LiveJournal in a <pre> tag.) It has no
friends-list type filtering either; to a first approximation anything you post
can be read by anyone on the system. (There are a couple of exceptions to
this: you can stop your diary being visible to anonymous guest users, and in
extremis the system's administrators can block particular users' accounts from
accessing particular diaries.) Finally, it has no comments as such. You can
reply to diary entries by sending a private message to the author, or you can
comment in a separate file somewhere, but comments aren't linked to the diary
entry.
At some point it became obvious that some people wanted to read my diary but
didn't have or want a mono account. I obliged them by setting up a web version
of this diary and later a gateway of the same content into a newsgroup. (The
newsgroup theoretically changed the dynamic of the diary, since in principle
people could leave comments there as followups to the original posts, but
nobody ever did.)
When LiveJournal appeared I was a little miffed. At the time it had the
invitation-only system for accounts and it irked me that some features were
only for those who paid or only became useful once you paid. I remember,
possibly unfairly) using the term "bait and switch". The thing that most
annoyed me was that I'd gone to some effort to make my diary accessible to
other people without getting a mono account, but the structure, code, and
culture of LJ meant that nearly nobody in this new world would do the opposite
for me.
At some point my attitude to LJ shifted from loathing to mere dislike and I
went the extra mile by providing my diary as an RSS feed, which appears on
LiveJournal as stephdiary. With an RSS aggregator from Ben Harris, I could
even read the public parts of friends' LiveJournals. It was almost a sane
situation, except that:
* There was no mechanism for people to allow "friends" access to those without
a LiveJournal account, so I missed a lot. (OpenID may start to fix this, but
it's not there yet.)
* Because of the way LJ treats RSS feeds, I was in the bizarre situation of not
being able to reply to comments on my own text!
Principles get you nowhere in this world, of course. Having been drawn to mono
by curiosity over a friend's diary, it was inevitable that curiosity over
friends-locked posts on LiveJournal would eventually get the better of me too.
Therefore, the LiveJournal user stephdairy (yes, the cow milking enclosure) now
exists as an access control principal; i.e. if you're on LJ you can friend it.
Yes, I've gone over to the Dark Side, just a bit, but it won't change anything
for readers of this diary. It'll continue to be available in all the places it
currently is and I won't be starting a "real" journal. I won't be creating
friends lists, polls, or any of that guff -- and if you're reading this other
than on LJ and don't know what I mean, then good for you -- so really the only
difference is that I'll be able to read more of my friends' dirty laundry and
COMMENT ON MY OWN FLIPPIN' DIARY.
That explains where we are and how we got here. At some point soon, I want to
look at _why_.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 02 17:33:03 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Loath as I am to interrupt lengthy musings on the nature of diaries,
metadiscussion is not the only fruit. Having got my computer back from World
of Computers, it looks like it was indeed Debian's fault; there was nothing
wrong with the main hard drive but its boot sector had obviously gone awry when
I upgraded Debian. Booting using a rescue disk (from the previous release,
mind; I couldn't find an equivalent thing for the new version) let me rerun
LILO and all is now mostly well.
Except my mouse buttons have gone wacky.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jul 03 23:49:59 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
That's it. I've had enough. It is obvious to _everyone_ that this reduction
in anti-depressant dose is doing me no favours at all. I'm jittery about
everyday things, nervous about anything out of the ordinary, even more
reactionary and curmudgeonly than usual, and far too often prone to finding my
eyes welling with tears for no clear and present reason. Hell, I'm even
missing some of the side-effects.
I shall make an appointment with my GP tomorrow and see if I can persuade him
that I still appear to be a bit of a wreck without them. (And in the meantime
up my dose to what it was before I most recently started to reduce it.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 05 11:09:47 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Monday
I do mostly enjoy the weekly Monday pizza gatherings, although sometimes the
unchanging nature of the thing and the mostly geeky conversation overwhelm me a
bit. For a change, yesterday's was almost completely non-geeky, with
conversations about almost everything but computers. I didn't think it could
last, but post-pizza (possibly the last post-pizza to be held at the
Vernon/Clough/Amery shared house in Girton) went the same way. A good evening,
then.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 06 10:08:43 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I brushed off my rusty cooking skills last night and produced what I hope was a
passable meal for a visiting Sally: gammon with a mustard and horseradish sauce
with herby mashed potatoes and cabbage, followed by a Java spice chocolate nut
slab. Both seemed to go down well and combined with conversation made it a
very pleasant evening, so hurrah for that.
Cooking for people (particularly people I've not cooked for before) is a
nervous business, but with the dual rewards when things go well of compliments
and a nice meal.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jul 07 23:07:31 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Doctor's appointment tomorrow morning. I don't expect him to do anything for
me that I'm not already doing for myself, but he can legitimise what I'm
already doing for myself (returning to my `normal' dose of anti-depressants)
which is rather necessary if he's to keep feeding me prescriptions.
Once I've got my chemistry back to normal -- and it does sometimes feel like I
have some mad professor's lab in my head with bubbling flasks of proteins and
tubes of hormones competing for attention with a giant Van de Graaff generator
-- I can start being me again and do useful things like eating properly, having
enthusiasm, and staying in the pub.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 08 12:32:20 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
The doctor saw my plight and increased my dose to a whole tablet a day, which
is twice what I was on before this whole coming-down thing started. This
should mean that I can get back to being a normal human being again.
On the minus side I've been feeling queasy all morning (probably a general
withdrawal symptom) so I'm not at work. I'm currently pondering whether to
have any lunch, and if so what.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 09 22:56:06 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Today was wedding day for Tony and Rachel, in Trinity College chapel. The
service was lovely and I enjoyed the singing even if I am utterly incapable of
it. (I can sing rather better when I put on a silly voice and sing from a
different part of my throat, but it sounds silly, is too loud, and would have
been out of place in a solemn wedding service. I settled for my default
tuneless warble instead; I vaguely hope it was made up for by the tunefulness
of Vicky to my left and Sally to my right.) Once they were happily married we
went out into Great Court to find a glorious sunny day, wedding guests, and
bubbles floating above it all as a Trinity-approved alternative to confetti.
Afterwards there was the reception in Arbury Community Centre, with ample food
provided by the guests and a large amount of booze from the hosts. I enjoyed
plenty, if not more than plenty, of both, and spent a lot of time flitting from
friend to friend. Odd that it takes occasions like this to remind me just how
many friends I have.
I think this entry was going to be deeper, but its meaning has been snuffed out
by alcohol, which is No Bad Thing.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 11 14:07:44 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Spot the difference
http://www.3dchessfederation.com/images/i-1.jpg
http://thumbs.fotopic.net/706017000318.jpg
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 12 14:11:55 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Monday
With Ian off in Helsinki, pizza was once again very much diminished, but it was
once again an enjoyable gathering with the conversation much more on the
non-geeky side. I wonder whether I'm going through a phase where I'm less
interested in geekery. Anyway, there were only ceb and I left for post-pizza,
so we paid a couple of people an unannounced visit: first Kirsten, with whom we
chatted pleasantly over tea, and then Simon, with whom we played Chinese
Checkers, Tiddlywinks, and his home-grown PS2 games Sumo and Rocket Attack.
Fun.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 12 14:17:43 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Frisbee!
The weather is nice and I am feeling undersunned and underexercised, so I'm
going to be on Jesus Green from about 7:30 this (Tuesday) evening to throw a
frisbee around. Anyone fancy joining me? Leave a comment/message if so; I'll
try to be in the corner of Jesus Green nearest Park Street and the Maypole.
(I'll make another entry later to confirm or cancel this, depending on whether
anyone expresses interest.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 12 17:09:30 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Frisbee!
I've not had any interest, so I shall go home instead.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Jul 14 14:58:43 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I went swimming last night, for the first time in ages. Although I always
worry that my trunks are going to have stopped fitting, they still seemed fine
and I had a good hour's gentle trundling around. More energetic swimmers would
be able to tell you how far they swam, but I'm content with having managed six
lengths in one burst.
I've never been a good swimmer, but it's nevertheless nice to have these small
achievements, and then just to enjoy the weightlessness of my hands and arms in
the water.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 15 16:17:03 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is (of Was)
I forgot to mention it at the time, but I submitted one of my favourite station
photos to the BBC's `Picture of Britain' competition. Since you're unlikely to
stumble across it by yourself, here's a link to it so that you can rate it:
http://tinyurl.com/8cfpx
(bbc.co.uk, TinyURLed for sanity. The competition home page is at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/apictureofbritain/competition.shtml)
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 16 10:03:39 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I walked over to Rivendell, the Amery/Clough/Vernon shared house in
Girton, for a very nice dinner to celebrate (or possibly bemoan or probably
just mark) the house's break-up as Jon and Sarah come to live nearer me in
Chesterton, and Matthew and Sally move close to the centre, again nearer me.
It's a lovely walk out there, along the old St. Ives railway to Histon and then
along a footpath across fields to Girton itself; it's a pity I only discover
this as everyone is preparing to move out!
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 16 15:17:09 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Thoughts
Emotions are strange things. We encapsulate them in simple words, like `sad',
`happy', or `worried' and some people even have little icons to illustrate how
they're feeling, but emotions are never that simple. We don't experience pure
emotions, in the elemental form if you like, but always an alloy, a compound.
Sorrow comes with happy memories tinged with regret and humour, happiness with
concern and anxiety, love with fear, or pain with hope. I'm sure this is all
perfectly normal, but sometimes it means that words are surprisingly
inadequate.
`How are you?' isn't a question most of the time, or at least not a simple
unvarnished question looking for an answer. It's a universal conversation
starter, a way of saying `Hello, I'd like to talk to you, would you like to
talk to me?' but like all these things there's a form answer that you have to
provide in response before you can get going. It's just a form answer, and it
doesn't have to be comprehensive or accurate, but I still have difficulty with
it because I'm never just `happy' or `grumpy' but always a combination of all
the other dwarves and a veritable host of other mental elves and pixies.
I've written before about how I like to understand systems, be they languages,
laws, computers, or whatever else. I think I try too hard to apply the same
sort of systematic analysis to people. Sometimes it works, and I've been told
in the past that I'm very good at reading people and understanding why they do
what they do and feel what they (say they) feel, but sometimes it's much harder
to work people out and I suspect that's in part because nearly everyone has a
fantasy menagerie of emotions and moods in their head. Sometimes I just
recognise some of the goblins.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 16 20:59:12 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm at a party, but the fact that I'm spodding suggests that coming here may
have been an error. Not because the people aren't lovely (although I don't
know most of them) but because my mood seems to be low and I don't want to
pester anyone I do know for hugs or sympathy. Mostly because, knowing me, it
probably wouldn't help that much.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 19 00:03:29 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I seem to be mostly better after the weekend's dip in my mood. Thanks to Sally
for making me feel slightly less bad about leaving the party early, and to ceb
for stopping to hug a passing depressive on Huntingdon Road...
In other news, I am looking at the homepage of my very own LiveJournal site.
It has one user, who has made one post. Friends-only, naturally.
(This is mostly part of a vain attempt to persuade the LJ developers to do
useful things by providing them with patches they can just apply to their
steaming pile of^W^W^Wbeautiful code. I predict that it will not work.)
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 20 14:33:13 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: What airport are you?
OSD Ostersund, Sweden
...and some friends:
CEB Lapu-Lapu, Phillippines
GLT Gladstone, Queensland, Australia
IWJ Iwami, Japan
JDA John Day, Oregon
MCV McArthur River, Northern Territory, Australia
SAC Sacramento, California
SGT Stuttgart, Arkansas
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 22 10:41:07 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I like it when I manage to do several things in an evening. It makes me feel
as if I'm making a good use of my free time, and I enjoy all the individual
things more.
On Wednesday I went swimming and increased my maximum number of lengths in one
stretch to eight, which felt like rather an achievement. After that I walked
over to the Gallery to enjoy a very nice quiche made by Verity in her new flan
dish. That was followed with a game of `Ticket to Ride Europe', some chocolate
sponge, and watching Ben play a bit of `Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas'.
On Thursdays I usually meet up with Jon and Sarah in the Castle before
wandering onwards to the Carlton. This week for some reason we ended up having
a great conversation about food, wine, and languages before they had to go and
catch a bus and I walked over to Arbury. Then, there was a freshly-honeymooned
Rachel and some fascinating conversation about kitchen gardens in Cornwall.
And after all _that_, I joined Simon at his for coffee and a few games of
two-player Tetris.
The days are just packed :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 23 18:20:11 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
So, as I suspected at the time, it looks like the man shot yesterday at
Stockwell was nothing to do with the bombings in London. I hope the officers
who fired the shots now face criminal charges so that their actions can be
judged in court and they face any due consequences; mere expressions of regret
from the Metropolitan Police are not enough.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Jul 23 23:33:51 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm pretty sure I've seen `Hamlet' at some point in my life, but my memory of
it is fairly vague. It may have been a performance of it at Stratford that I
remember, although since my mother cracked a rib there and I ended up being
driven home by the headmaster (taking an entirely coincidental school trip
to the same performance) I may have been a bit distracted by surrounding
circumstances. Anyway, when Clare suggested that we should go and see
Tom Stoppard's `Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead' I didn't know how much
`Hamlet' it required or whether I could remember that much anyway.
I needn't have worried, and a quick readthrough this morning put enough
knowledge back in my head in any case, so that when I watched it at the Arts
Theatre this evening I enjoyed it tremendously. It's clever, funny, and very
strange, reminding me at times of both Sartre and Monty Python as well as, of
course, `Hamlet' (and by association much of the rest of Shakespeare). Great
fun.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jul 24 11:43:02 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Further to my earlier comment (about Friday's plain-clothes killers) I gather
the independent inquiry which will look into the shootings can refer the case
to the Crown Prosecution Service. If the investigative procedures are fair,
and aren't unduly biased by sentiments of the form `wargh, terrorists, clearly
anything is justified', that seems reasonable to me.
I've said elsewhere that I have no experience of guns. I've not to my
knowledge seen a gun up close in real life -- I'm sure I have seen armed police
before but they've been on the sidelines such that I didn't really notice them,
and I did see a guy with a rocket launcher in Palestine -- let alone had one
pointed at me so I don't really have any clue how to react or how I would
instinctively react. My one experience with a threat of violence on the
streets suggests that I stop being able to take anything in or understand
clearly what anyone is saying, and it's a toss-up whether I freeze and
um-and-ah or run like the wind. Regardless of which I'd done, I'd've been shot
on Friday.
It is spooky how the authorities' reaction to the attacks is much scarier than
the attacks themselves.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Jul 24 23:40:15 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Will be, Is, Was
Clare has spent the past several years trying to persuade me that life does not
go in circles, that in spite of similarities between various dramas I've made
into crises over the years I am not in fact doomed to repeat the same
circumstances, agonies, and mistakes over and over again. Of course, in
emotional messes I have tended to see only similarities with the past while
remaining blind to differences, and that's just depression doing its exciting
chemical dance. However at this precise moment it's worth noting that a few
things I've seen as desperate doom-in-the-making over the past few months have
turned out well; I've kept my head as a reasonable human being and gained from
it.
On the other hand, it's surely in the nature of circles that from time to time
one thinks one has escaped :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Jul 25 22:55:45 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Elsewhen
Not done this for a while, so:
7S(R) 8P(R) 2P
5S V(R) I(R) 3P
KP QW 5C
Bit of a mixed bag, there. The overall view is optimistic, which is worth
remembering in spite of the reversed cards towards the centre.
(Note for newcomers: I do not believe that there is anything special about
Tarot cards. All that's special about this particular pack is that I'm the
only one ever to have handled them and put randomness into them, but they're
really mostly just tools for introspection. Like horoscopes, only still with a
little mystique attached. The spread is my own, very loosely based on one used
by a friend, with a rough progression of time from top left to bottom right and
a separate card for some kind of overview. You may now feel free to tut in
disgust at my disrespect for the fine art of divination.)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Jul 26 13:36:18 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been rather depressed, both yesterday and today. Although I have an
assortment of things to worry about, none of them account for it so I suspect I
have to put it down to chemicals eating away at my reason.
Still, I hope I'm not as dreadful company to the rest of you as I am to myself.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Jul 27 15:32:02 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Having cheered up somewhat over the course of the day, I cooked for Sally last
night (minted lamb chops with pea puree, potatoes, and carrots) and although I
made a mistake it seemed to come out OK anyway. Fear me; there may come a day
when I actually believe I can cook and then all will tremble before my mighty
meals.
Afterwards we went and sat in the Waggon and Horses in Milton and played a few
games of bar billiards. I've not played since they used to have a table in the
pre-refurb County Arms, so I'd forgotten how much fun the game is: Snakes and
Ladders with a bit more skill. Sally won the first, I the second, and we
declared the decider a draw. (Technically I probably lost since the black
skittle teetered and fell just as the final ball fell in the 200-point hole,
but I'll accept a draw :-) ) A good evening.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Jul 29 13:04:47 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Entitled
I've made a few tweaks to the script that converts this diary into RSS, mostly
to change what appears in the <title> tag for the whole diary. I've opted to
have it reflect my nameline, which appears in green at the start of each entry.
Namelines, for those not on mono, are 40 characters you can define to appear
next to your mono username at the top of posts you make. They're ostensibly
for putting your personal name in, but nearly nobody uses them like that;
instead you get bad puns, mopings, memes, lyrics, and any other nonsense people
happen to feel like.
While this seems to match the way many people I know on LiveJournal use their
journal title and change it relatively frequently, it's not really the title of
this diary, which has a number of titles and subtitles:
* The file on mono is called `Diary for steph'.
* The title in the header of the diary says `steph's Diary'.
* Individual parts of the diary have numbers, and some have titles; part four
was called `When I grow up I'll be stable' and this part is
`Asymptotically Approaching Susan'.
So really I'm not sure what I think it should be called. I'm torn between
leaving it as `Steph's Diary' in the RSS and the nameline approach, but I'm
trying the nameline approach to see what it looks like.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 01 00:36:35 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Let's talk about sex
I've been single since, um, I'm not good with dates but a few years ago, and
for most of that time I've been either determinedly single and happy with that
state of affairs or fairly ambivalent about relationships one way or another.
Recently, perhaps a few months ago, this changed. Perhaps as a result of
changing dose of anti-depressants (which tend to act as slight libido
suppressants anyway), and perhaps for other circumstantial reasons I don't
understand; it doesn't really matter why this changed. It's the consequences
that are interesting.
I heard myself think recently `I need a girlfriend to remind myself of why I
don't want one' and then had to mentally backpedal, because I _did_ want, and
_did_ greatly enjoy, both my previous relationships. But in both cases there
came a point where I started to get itchy feet; I started to be uncomfortable
with the feeling that my life was in part under someone else's control and that
I couldn't just do what I wanted when I wanted it. A feeling rather than a
reality, in all probability, but it did for both relationships. (Arguably, if
I was feeling uncomfortable in this way, I'd probably fallen out of love and
the relationships had reached their natural end, but that didn't feel plausible
at the time and it still doesn't.) So, admittedly based on a sample size of
just two, I don't appear to be good at relationships and probably don't `want'
one.
What I do seem to want is sex. For whatever reason, be that biological
imperative, the feeling of skin on skin, shared pleasures, warmth, some social
or cultural pressure... It's probably an entirely healthy desire -- certainly
the human species wouldn't have got very far without it! -- but it's also one
which doesn't fit well with the above. Yes, there are in theory crap one-night
stands or prostitutes, but besides being some or all of immoral, illegal,
expensive, and degrading, they don't fit the extra requirement I've not
mentioned yet: context. I need the context of being with someone I know
well and trust, or to put it more succinctly: someone I love, or to highlight
the very nub of the matter: someone I'm in a relationship with.
So, basically, I need either to stop caring about singleness again, or to have
more cracks at relationships in the hope that 100% isn't statistically
significant with a sample of two or that it's the sort of thing that just takes
practice and experience. When my age still began with a `2' the former
approach wasn't a problem, but now I'm thirty-something that's not really an
option. Youth is gradually running away from me, and I seem to have failed to
take advantage of it to learn how to drive life safely and with due
consideration for other cosmos users; I'd better learn quick or they'll confine
me to the slow lane with the broken metaphors.
The practical problem -- all the people I find attractive are either not
interested or already attached -- is of course another matter entirely. (And,
um, the added bonus that any interesteds can now read this and run a mile.)
But let's stick to the theory. Fortunately, there's far more to life than
sex and relationships anyway, and I'm really quite happy at the moment. Far
better to get the introspection over and done with while I'm in a good mood.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 02 00:04:55 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Will be
From Wednesday until the following Tuesday I'll be away, either travelling or
actually at Worldcon (the World Science Fiction Convention) in Glasgow. If for
any reason you want or need to get in touch with me while I'm away, I will have
my mobile telephone with me; contact details are on my cabal homepage.
I'm looking forward to it, in a vague sort of way. I rarely seem to reach
Clare's level of enthusiasm about these sorts of things, although it's
sufficiently infectious to give me a sort of meta-enthusiasm: a `this is
something to be enthusiastic about' feeling. It'll doubtless be fun, and I'll
doubtless be inspired by people saying interesting things about SF and Fantasy.
I'll probably also come home with a renewed desire to write, though after past
cons I've not got very far with doing anything about it.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 02 17:50:09 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
Right, off home now and then tomorrow I'm off to Worldcon. `To seduce pretty
girlies' if Sally is to be believed. It seems rather more likely that I'll
talk about science fiction, but it wouldn't do to dismiss any interesting idea
out of hand :-)
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 09 16:57:13 2005]--
From: (S) Cow milking enclosure (steph)
Subject: Is
So, I'm back from sunny Glasgow, Worldcon's 4000 science fiction fans, and a
giant metal armadillo. The time seems to have gone by very fast, and I only
found myself being particularly mopey once, which is really rather good going.
As predicted, there was lots of interesting discussion of SF and fantasy, about
which I shall probably write more in a con report for the next TTBA.
I also made a determined effort to do something I'm historically _very_ bad at,
namely going up to people I don't know and talking to them. One of my major
problems with SF conventions is that I feel I know just the tiny bunch of
Cambridge people I went with, and this was a small part in attempting to remedy
that, if only by having had a few conversations.
It's a useful life skill I appear not to have picked up over the past thirty
years, though if I'm serious about my flingy musings it'll probably be
essential; my existing social circles are incredibly well partnered up at the
moment!
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 11 00:39:18 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
Bollocking bollock badgers of twarg. Not only did I apparently leave my
swimming trunks in Glasgow (an error of merely financial proportions) but it
looks like I also left eight weeks' worth of antidepressants there after having
collected them from a pharmacy. Now I shall have to wheedle another
prescription out of my doctor, pay another NHS prescription charge, and cope
with the fallour of three or four days without pills :-(.
I wish I'd never gone to bloody Glasgow.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Aug 11 23:25:47 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Very depressed, very unhappy
An evening in lyrics.
`Hello.
Is there anybody in there?
Just nod if you can hear me.
Is there anyone home?'
`But I always feel like nothing
When I'm in the dark alone'
`She says, "It's only in my head."'
She says, "Shhh....I know it's only in my head."'
`And then one day you find ten years have got behind you,
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun'
`And all you touch and all you see
Is all your life will ever be'
`Just when you thought it was safe to go back to the water
Those problems seem to arise the ones you never really thought of.
The feeling you get is similar to something like drowning:
Out of your mind, you're out of your depth, you should have taken soundings'
`I been hanginaround this town on the corner,
I been bummin' around this old town for way too long.'
`You go to sleep dreaming how you would
Be a different kind if you thought you could
But you come awake the way you are instead'
`I need medical attention
Where's my memory gone?
Everything I told you - including this,
I already forgot'
`Put it away this dream you can't stop dreaming
Put it away this anger and desire
The open road is infinitely hopeful
Take all those memories and throw them in the fire'
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 13 00:46:45 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
And as the heavens opened, the clouds lifted.
One of the things that most convinces me that there is no dualist separation
between mind and brain or soul and brain is depression. The way my reactions
work when I'm depressed (most recently due to running out of pills) contrasts
so amazingly with the way they work when I'm not that it's sometimes hard to
credit that I could ever have thought in the other way. The chemicals slosh
one way and I can't think my way out of a problem; the other way and I don't
even see the problem. The brain really is just this amazing ball of wet
sloshy goo that does exciting chemistry and physics inside all the biology,
and thoughts are the emergent property of all the sloshing.
Or to put it another way, I got some more anti-depressants and at some point
they kicked in and started to make me normal again. And then this evening
Simon unveiled a new puzzle he'd invented while I'd been away in Glasgow, which
by a slightly lengthy chain of coincidences turns out to be exactly the
four-colour-problem puzzle I suggested to him many moons ago. Yay for that,
and also yay for the final episode of `I Claudius' and much wittering about
mediaeval historians and transcendental numbers at the Gallery.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 14 00:26:36 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Wedding 2, Colin and Kirsten
Ping! Ping! Ping!
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 15 12:50:11 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Little luxuries
Although people are often surprised that I live alone in a three-bedroomed
house, I don't really live like a king. I do, however, like my little
luxuries. You know, those little things that make you feel happy and fluffy
and special when you're in a good mood, or that make life that tiny bit less
bad if you're gloomy.
* Satin sheets from www.betweenthesheets.co.uk make going to sleep (and for
that matter making the bed!) a lovely smooth, soft, experience. Satin
pillowcases provide entertainment as they whizz off the side.
* Palmolive's milk and honey scented handwash. Doesn't actually contain milk
or honey, so not actually really sticky, but smells quite nice.
* Real coffee. Even just for a single cup, I put the filter machine on.
Perhaps it's wasteful, but the smell and taste of good coffee makes it
worthwhile.
* Hot chocolate with milk. You can make instant hot chocolate with water, but
it's so much nicer, creamier, soothing and warming with milk that it's worth
the extra hassle.
I'm sure there are others I've forgotten, but these are some of the things that
make me smile.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 16 00:13:33 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
A good day. At work I spent most of it wrangling large files of various
degrees of awkwardness, top prize going to a pile of EBCDIC with lines about
2Mb long that sent assorted editors into a spin until I waved Simon's hex
editor `tweak' at it. Thence to pizza on the Pizza Express veranda, where it
was just the right temperature for eating outside, and half the party could
wonder what the Greek inscriptions on Downing library's octagonal turret said.
Mike was being infectiously enthusiastic about having written a new puzzle for
Simon's puzzle collection, which made me smile; I like it when my friends get
really bouncy about things.
After pizza the party went to Matthew and Sally's new flat in Honey Hill Mews,
just round the back of the Folk Museum. It's a lovely little place, and we
warmed it a little with booze and conversations about the rules of Mao and
education. I'm sure it'll be more warmable once there are fewer boxes around
the place, but for the amount of time they've had it, the new occupants have
already made it remarkably inhabitable :-).
So, back to Downing College library. It's called the Maitland Robinson Library
and was built in the early 1990s. The octagonal lantern on the top of the roof
is modelled on the Tower of the Winds in ancient Athens, the eight winds being:
Boreas
Skiron Kaikias
Zephyros Apheliotes
Lips Euros
Notos
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 16 21:37:59 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is not
...at the Calling, due to queasiness as well as a lowering of my mood.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Aug 17 23:09:56 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
I've had the day off work ill today. It was marginal, but given the difficulty
I had concentrating when I tried to do something on the computer (and the
constant headache) it was probably the right call. Sadly this means I missed
out on this week's swimming. I'm not going to turn into lard overnight, but
getting regular strenuous exercise is a habit it's very easy to get out of.
I have plenty of other things to say, but I've resolved to keep them inside for
a bit and talk to just one person at a time about them. Broadcasting things
here is sometimes useful but sometimes just comes across as a `Waah, I'm so
depressed, look at me' which I'm sure can't be attractive or all that
interesting. (It's an entertaining Catch-22 situation, being depressed and
unintentionally single; each makes the other harder to escape.)
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Aug 19 17:33:42 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
Prompted by the mysterious `Number of Readers: 31' on the Syndication
Information page for this diary's incarnation on LiveJournal, I've been trying
to find out how widely the diary is read in its various forms. With the help
of a few people with LJ paid accounts I've been able to eliminate people who
read it there as well as here, and I've come up with some numbers. (Gender is
from user info or personal knowledge.)
Readers on Mono: 26 individuals,
of whom 12 I don't know personally,
15 are male,
11 are female
Readers on LJ: 27 individuals,
of whom 1 I don't know personally,
15 are male,
12 are female
Two people read the RSS feed via Bloglines, and seven people who may or may not
be distinct from the above read the web version. In addition, a number of
people may read the version that's gatewayed to a local newsgroup on chiark.
I'm surprised in particular at the gender numbers, which I'd expected to be
much less balanced. It works out at something like a 57% male / 43% female
split.
And obviously I must be very interesting to be so stonkingly popular ;->
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 20 19:32:57 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: We didn't mean to go to sea^WRetford
I went north today, to collect some of the stations on the line to Grimsby and
Cleethorpes. Unfortunately, due to wanting to be back in Cambridge by the
evening for whatever parties might transpire, some awkward train timings
between Peterborough and Lincoln, and a failure on my part to realise that the
Lincolnshire Day Ranger extends to Nottingham [*] I ended up coming home via
Retford. This is of very little moment, but will please Sally, who was
bemoaning its absence from my collection.
[*] Yes, sometimes the best way to get from Lincoln to Peterborough is via
Nottingham.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Aug 20 20:14:41 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
Our railways heroically defend against terrorism:
http://www.greenend.org.uk/owen/lincolnbin.jpg
http://www.greenend.org.uk/owen/lincolnrubbish.jpg
...by moving the rubbish ten metres from the bin.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 21 12:01:53 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Saturday Night and Sunday Morning
Cigarettes: 0
Whisky: 2
Wild wild women: 0
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 21 15:03:55 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Uncle Owen
At about 6:50pm on Saturday, my brother Giles and his girlfriend Sarah became
parents to a baby boy, Drew. He was born by caesarian a little early and
weighed 5lb 13oz. They're keeping Sarah in hospital until Tuesday to let her
recover from the operation, but both she and the baby are doing well. Giles
sounds ludicrously happy.
Gosh, I'm an uncle. Uncle Owen, indeed. I expect the stormtroopers will be
along very soon to torch my domed dwelling.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 23 00:55:43 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
At the moment, with the antidepressants, my mood seems to have a period of
about two or three days in which it veers from cheerful (verging on the
ludicrously bouncy) to a low mopiness. Both ends of the spectrum are
preferable to the status quo ante, but after a cheerful weekend I had been
predicting the low phase and was annoyed to find it happening this afternoon.
Still, I went to pizza on the basis that it would at least avoid depression
brought on by hunger, and then walked through the rain to post-pizza at
Relativity. I'm glad I did, because that really improved my mood; what
with looking at Mike's `Loopy' puzzle, talking about crochet and life with
Eleanor, some atrocious puns from Simon, and Peter C lurking in the tundra, I
lost track of time and left at around midnight.
Also, Eleanor cut my hair back a bit to even it up at the back and cut off some
of the manky splitendy bits. It feels really nice :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 23 22:47:05 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Will Be
...who knows what? People I care about are having troubled times and I'm
just a bystander hoping to be sympathetic while staying out of the way.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Aug 26 00:36:56 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Thursday
It's been nice to have something to do every evening this week. This evening
it was a chance to catch up with Clare, Lucy, Dan, Peter B, and Debbie at
House! over a meal which would have been chilli but for the absence of chilli
powder so was a random other thing instead. Very nice it was too, as was the
company, the conversation, and the chocolate cake that followed.
After that, onwards to the Carlton where I briefly felt a bit lost before I
fell into a conversation about languages with Becky (A* GCSE Spanish Becky -
congratulations!). I sometimes wonder if I become a bit of a bore when it
comes to languages, though if I am people are polite enough not to say :-).
I'm still feeling very bouncy, on a bit of a high after managing to kill
negative moods by doing positive things several times this week. I can't tell
whether it'll last, or what it bodes for the future, but my past makes my hopes
cautious and that's good. Just as good is that it does not quash them
entirely, though, because what's life without hope?
`Put your arms around my soul / and take it dancing...'
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Aug 28 01:49:08 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
Lovely small drunken partyette at the Gallery to celebrate Verity's finishing
her thesis. It's good not to be depressed and thus to feel able to let myself
get a bit drunk without the fear of becoming melancholy. (There was a brief
moment where I began to sink but I got distracted and forgot about it.)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Aug 29 22:36:44 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Bank Holiday Monday
Spent doing nothing much, really. Some pottering around the house, a nap, some
shopping, pizza, and post-pizza, but throughout it all I was distracted and
slightly not with it and in the end I gave up and wandered home from
Relativity. My mind is currently busy pondering (or mad hamster wheeling) and
doesn't quite seem to have grasped the concept of patience in the face of what
Clare dubbed an `insurmountable opportunity'.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Aug 30 15:13:27 2005]--
From: (S) to catch up with the sun (steph)
Subject: Is
My desk has a pen-eating gremlin. For the third time in a week I've had to go
to the stationery cupboard to get a new pen because my existing one has been
eaten.
I have tethered my new pen to my desk in the hopes of trapping this heinous
calamophage.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 01 00:22:44 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
After a slow slog of a day at work, I dragged myself to the swimming pool but
didn't manage to go any great distance, probably because the heat and humidity
had sapped my energy so much. Still, it's exercise, and that can't be bad.
Afterwards I wandered over to the Carlton for dinner and found the pub quiz, so
I joined Mobbsy and Adam in a team that came last.
Becky turned up just as we were finishing scoring, fresh from hiking up and
down Snowdon. I rather envy her the mad active outdoor life she seems to have,
although at the same time the more enthusiastic stuff doesn't feel very _me_,
and I know from Duke of Edinburgh Award stuff I did at school that I don't
enjoy being stuck up a mountain in a howling gale with the only escape being
several more days' slogging with a heavy pack. I'm such a southern pansy
sometimes.
More generally, life continues. I've been happier today than I was yesterday,
but I'm very much in the would-be ex-single phase and that's its own whole
emotional rollercoaster. I see how wonderful so many people I know are for
the first time again, perhaps even find some of them attractive, and then
stress myself out endlessly about their interest or lack of it, my inability to
tell whether they're interested, and the suspicion that I wouldn't have the
guts to do anything about anything reciprocal in any case. Then I get onto the
whole mental game of `they hate me' / `they're ignoring me' / `I'm pestering' /
`who'd be interested in a depressive anyway?' which can cheerfully distract me
for hours on end so that if anyone actually _were_ interested I'd probably
never notice.
I'm sure it's supposed to be more fun than this.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 02 10:19:16 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
And from a down to an up. Sometimes my negative moods have so little to do
with outside factors that it's hard to believe that I still associate the two.
Anyway, last night was a good night. Dinner at the Castle with Jon, Sarah, and
Sarah's brother, and then to the splitters' gathering at the Fort St George.
Good to see people, and in particular Janet who I'd not talked to for aaaages.
The final stop of this peripatetic evening was at the Carlton to get together
with the usual crowd for an hour or so. Good stuff.
Subject: Will Be
I've got a remarkably full weekend ahead of me, which will be nice in its own
way though I suspect I'll want to make up for it with a quiet night or two in
next week. It's nice to know that I can leap out of the usual routine to do
something different if I want to; sometimes I think I stifle myself by going
for the default, easy option.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 05 15:53:13 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Saturday
It was a busy weekend, but a good one for all that. After a bit of shopping on
Saturday morning I went to the LJ picnic on Jesus Green and sat in the shade
eating and chatting. True, I talked mostly to people I already knew (LNR,
Patrick, Chess, Adam, Col and Kirsten) but I saw a fair few others and got to
associate some usernames to faces. In one way at least mono meets and LJ
gatherings are similar: `Oh, so _you're_ spoddyname!'
After I'd finished most of a bottle of pink (with some help, I should add) I
wandered over to Nursery Walk for fanf's birthday barbecue. It took me a
little while of wandering around feeling a little lost for me to settle in and
start enjoying myself, but Kirsten helped cheer me up and I started to enjoy
myself properly. Mostly the usual suspects, but I got to meet Sion's
previously mysterious friend I-- (from O--) who seemed nice, though in
confirming the name behind the dash I did accidentally out Sion as a blogger
:-).
All in all, a good party rounding off a good day.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Sep 05 23:54:03 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Sunday
Instead of doing the usual Sunday thing of going round to the Gallery for
assorted TV and games, I stayed in at mine this week and cooked dinner for
Eleanor. Having found that I could get all the ingredients from Tesco, I
cooked pan-fried venison with an orange and blueberry sauce, which seemed to
go down well in spite of being prepared in the usual frenetic haze. This was
followed by a good old natter on the sofa over wine and my spiced chocolate
dessert, which will end up being my trademark dessert unless I learn to make
something else!
Lovely food and lovely company made for a good end to the weekend. A busy
weekend, yes, but oddly also one of the most relaxing I've had in ages.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 07 23:42:04 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
`If you gotta dance,
You can't go dancing,
So while you can go dancing,
You gotta dance.'
A bit low, and don't really want to talk about it generally.
I dunno, I expect I'll be OK. These things just take a bit of thought and
getting used to.
(I must thank Eleanor for listening even though she has worries of her own
right now. *hugs*)
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Sep 10 13:21:31 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Friday
Bmovie rocks! Not just gravel, or pebbles, but totally rocks. Sort of like a
London version of a very good Calling, with more bouncy music than you could
ever hope to bounce to all of. And and and, a dancefloor that's actually got
some ventilation so it's cooler than the rest of the place, a space where you
can get away from the music and have sensible-volume conversations, and free
tap water for those as want it! I'm sure they sell more beer that way. Maybe
it doesn't sound like much, but it's so damn _civilised_ while also letting me
exercise my inner bouncemuppet.
Plusplusplus there were lots of cool people I've not seen in aaaaages: Liz
Keogh, Kitty, EJ (though I didn't recognise her at first!), Karen (no, the
other one), and doubtless more that I've forgotten or vaguely recognised but
didn't talk to.
You may have noticed that I'm just a little bouncy :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 13 20:40:59 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
I'm sat at home, feeling low. There are concrete reasons for this, but I
suspect none of it would feel quite as overwhelming if I hadn't missed an
antidepressant on Friday night when I went to Bmovie.
The awareness that it's mostly just a chemical imbalance is a two-edged sword.
I know that all my problems will seem insurmountable like this, so I have the
sense (largely) not to try to do anything about them, but the flip side of that
is that I feel paralysed and helpless.
So anyway, that's why I'm not at the pub. Sorry people.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 15 15:41:40 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
Although I've made lots of progress with my swimming recently, mostly in terms
of increasing my stamina, I didn't feel like being quite so energetic last
night, so I just did a few lengths in bursts and relaxed in the water.
Swimming's a good thing for me; it gives me a bit of proper exercise and helps
keep my wrists fairly solid.
Then to Relativity for a meeting about the 2007 Unicon and Role Playing Society
convention, which Clare is organising. I've volunteered to do publications for
it, so I went along and pretended to be useful, which seemed to fool everyone
there :-).
After that to the Carlton, where I caught the second half of the pub quiz but
listened to a few questions about planes, decided I wouldn't be any use, and so
lurked around being sociable rather than joining any particular team. Due
to quirks of timing, I didn't hear about Sally's bad news (she's not being let
continue with her PhD) until Andrew W. mentioned it to me in the pub; as
so often, though, there isn't much I can do except sympathise, sadly. *hugs*
anyway, though. The Carlton gathering wound up with random conversation with
Eleanor, Becky, Mobbsy, and Adam, and left me in a good mood even though I felt
for people having a hard time of it.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Sep 17 01:17:57 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
No Gallerying this evening for Twin Peaks, since Gareth and Verity are still
off in Cornwall, so instead I was able to join Eleanor, Rachel, Janet, and Owen
in seeing the new Pride and Prejudice at the Arts. I've not read the book (and
yes, I know I really should and I'll probably borrow it from someone in the
next few days) but like most of the country I saw the BBC adaptation so I know
the story.
The first thing I really noticed was how busy the production was. The camera
lets things pass between it and its focus, and almost every scene has something
happening in the background; in soap terms, it's the difference between the
ambience of Albert Square (with its constant hubbub and crowd) and sleepy old
Coronation Street. The second thing is that they've gone to quite some lengths
to make the whole thing just a little _grimy_ and to my mind that little bit
less artificial. Stopping short of the rotting teeth level of realism, thank
goodness, although some of the smiles could have done with being a tad less
dazzling all the same.
The biggest thing, though, is that the cliche goes up to eleven. Having a
moment to think? Stand on a cliff in a high wind. Dancing with the gorgeous
Mr Darcy? Suddenly it's as if you're all alone with him in the room. Going
for a walk on which you happen to meet the man you love? Defend your ears from
the insistent pianist, muse on how it can possibly take two people such a long
time to cover such a short distance, and wish he'd had the presence of mind to
button his shirt properly.
Oh, and wear sunglasses, as the sun is _bound_ to come up as you kiss.
Still, definitely a fun film which left me with a smile on my face.
Afterwards, Rachel, Janet, Owen, and I went to Clown's on King Street, where we
were joined by Andrew W for an hour's coffee and chatter.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 20 14:22:30 2005]--
From: (S) back for more (steph)
Subject: Is
I was off work yesterday, after the cold which had been brewing all weekend
finally took enough out of me that I decided to give in to to the temptations
of bed and paracetamol. Oddly, then, I was fine by the evening, if a little
tired.
Today I'm just slightly unsettled, going through routine things for a Windows
installation on a new laptop, while my brain asks itself questions it knows it
doesn't have the answers to. Silly device. There would be interesting
self-analysis here (something about the degree to which I can still read
between the lines, having learned in cognitive therapy to tone down things
which are just the effects of poor self-image) but I find I can't be arsed.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 22 00:22:28 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
I usually go swimming on Wednesday after work, but the lingering effects of a
cold made me decide to go straight home and potter for a bit before Gareth,
Verity, and Ben arrived to play games. We played `Amun Re', a Reiner Knizia
game involving building pyramids in ancient Egypt. It's a little less abstract
than some Knizia games, where the scenario is some pretty artwork bolted onto a
random game, though I confess that the thing I like most about it is the little
plastic pyramids you get to dot around outlandishly-named bits of desert. I
came second, even though I still have no idea how to win the game; Gareth won,
and he doesn't either.
Afterwards we watched Verity play `Overboard' on the PlayStation for a bit
before people wandered off.
A useful side-effect of this visit is that I've managed to move the flatpack
bookcase that has been lurking in my garage since Rachel delivered it from her
Ikea trip. It is now sitting on my living room floor awaiting the love of a
good allen key.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 22 13:59:36 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Was, Is
A long time ago, back when Netscape was still the dominant graphical browser on
Unix systems, word got around that you could speed up browser startup by
reading the program to /dev/null (a device on Unix which just throws away all
data sent to it) before starting it. The reason for this was supposedly that
the Netscape program code was so disorganised that loading it from disk meant
seeking backwards and forwards through this huge file, and so if you read it to
/dev/null first, the whole thing would be in the computer's memory cache and
therefore be much faster when you ran it. Astonishingly, this worked, although
on fast machines the difference wasn't much and I forgot all about it.
Today, while wondering how to make one of work's Java applications start faster
from CD on Windows, I was reminded of this trick. Not quite expecting it to
work, I added the line:
type bigfile.jar > nul:
to the batch file which starts the application: the exact equivalent of the
Unix trick involving /dev/null. To my astonishment, this shaved at least ten
seconds off the application startup time.
Part of me is enthusing at the speed increase I've achieved. Another part of
me is recoiling in horror from even thinking of using such a trick in
customer-facing code...
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 23 01:32:20 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Fiver
Great night of great gigs in great company at the Junction. Will write in more
detail tomorrow, but for now sleep beckons.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 23 15:53:13 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Fiver
So, in the spirit of discovery and bouncing to new music I joined Eleanor,
Janet, Owen, Mike, Andrew W and his friend Ian for `Fiver', the Junction's five
bands for five quid night. Met up beforehand in the Earl of Derby for dinner
and then walked over the railway for the music. (Disclaimer: I know nearly
nothing about music, so if you want reviews rather than sketches, you'll
have to find them elsewhere...)
First up were Niccokick, who are best summed up by the words `youthful
enthusiasm'. A little bit rough around the edges, particularly with the
vocals, but they were having a whale of a time and it showed through. I really
felt for the tall lanky keyboardist who had to bend down to waist height to
reach the keyboard!
After that, Alizarin. A lot more polished, with a lot more going on in the
music, and a slightly disturbing tendency not to want to pause between songs
for applause. I liked them, though Andrew hated them for trying and failing
to sound like some other bands I don't know; even if he wasn't being too harsh
(and I suspect he was) it makes a change for my general musical ignorance to
be an actual benefit! If I do have one criticism, it's that they don't seem
to have got over the need to descend from tuneful playing to mindless guitar
twaddling from time to time.
Probably the best of the `support' bands -- let's face it, a lot of people
were there purely to see the Broken Family Band -- was a Dutch band called
Skip the Rush. The lead singer had a good voice that suited both harsher
shouty singing and a softer sound, and threw himself about the stage with such
enthusiasm that the techs ended up spending quite some time untangling the
spaghetti he'd made of microphone and amp cables.
Highlight of the night has to be the Broken Family Band though. I'd been
told they were excellent by loads of people before, and these borrowed high
expectations weren't disappointed. Sometimes bouncy, sometimes slower and
more thoughtful, but always with the countryish slant you get from throwing
an accordion and/or Spanish guitar into the mix. Towards the end of their set
I was throwing myself around like everyone else who came in knowing what they
were expecting :-).
Mike went off home after that, as did most of the rest of the crowd, but we
hardy few (and the other bands, hangers-on, and crew) stuck around to watch
the last band, a weirdy electronica setup who could have done with more
rehearsal and a more cohesive sound; their first few songs were all rather
`bitty', although the last one demonstrated that they _can_ make it all flow
into a fluent whole if they try.
So, yeah, discovering good new sounds in good company. I'm a happy me.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Sep 25 20:53:34 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Bleurgh. I've got a cold from somewhere, which is a bit crap since I had
something similar last weekend and took Monday off work. Unless I get better,
I'm going to have to do the same this week and work will begin to suspect I
just don't like Mondays. So I've come back from the usual Sunday with Gallery
people to have an early night...
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Sep 27 09:38:16 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Monday
I felt mostly OK in the morning, so I went into work and although I had a
low-level background headache most of the day (no doubt exacerbated by failing
to bring my reading glasses to work) I managed to get stuff done.
In the evening I let myself be persuaded by Sally to come to pizza, and we had
a good natter about her weekend and all sorts of other things. Afterwards to
Honey Hill Mews for a small post-pizza gathering. Lots of interesting
conversation, particularly with Debbie, who I've not really spoken to much
before.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Sep 28 01:30:54 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Yay! My first Calling in what must be several years, and although it wasn't
very busy, it was _fun_. Not a bad hit rate for good music, and definitely
good for nice people; I caught up with some, put names (and LJ accounts) to
others, and met still others for the first time. Good stuff.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Sep 29 16:53:46 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Waiting
I've been waiting for this installer to finish for well over an hour now. It's
only the progress bar and the occasionally changing filename reassuring me that
it's still going that's stopping me from assuming it's died and killing it.
In a way it's representative of my approach to waiting in general, when the end
is an uncertain amount of time away. I'll wait a lot longer than is sensible
for a bus, for example, and my life is littered with examples of waiting for
months for something that was never going to happen. I wonder whether there's
something deep in this tendency: some fundamental optimism, or a reluctance to
let go of a course once I've chosen it?
More like 90 minutes now...
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Sep 30 13:50:32 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I went round to Nursery Walk to visit Rachel, Kate, Eleanor, Janet,
and Owen in watching `Bride and Prejudice'. Unfortunately Eleanor couldn't
make it, but after dinner with Rachel and Kate (and a brief Keith) Jan and Owen
joined us for the film. It's marvellously silly, very brightly coloured, and
in spite of the change of setting still very obviously `Pride and Prejudice'.
My only complaint was that Darcy was a little too nice from the start; my
feeling (and I've _still_ not read the book, so this is going on adaptations
alone) is that he should be a lot more standoffish.
The cats at Nursery Walk were lovely as ever, and made me wheeze and sneeze
because I'd not taken an antihistamine. I thought nothing of it when I went to
bed, but I woke up with a splitting headache and a sore throat. I have, in
short, the Dreaded Lurgy that's been doing the rounds :-(.
So I'm off work, and I've spent the morning asleep. It hasn't helped much, so
soup and paracetamol are the next order of the day...
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Oct 02 23:07:37 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Sometimes all I want is to snuggle up to someone nice on a sofa, and it's odd
that not being able to do this feels like such a lack. Yes, there are other
things I'd like to do with some lovely people, but they feel like they're
things I _want_ to do, rather than _need_ to; I don't feel their absence in the
same way. I can't really explain why.
(Although at the moment they'd only get the remains of my cold anyway...)
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 03 21:31:27 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
But you aren't, so hey. As I said, I'd much rather know now than months down
the line, and whatever else I may have wanted, I've rediscovered a good
friendship and injected some much needed extra zing into my social life.
Thanks for being so lovely about it.
Onwards!
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 05 00:34:06 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Very nice evening round at Kirsten and Colin's for dinner with them and
Eleanor. I was feeling a bit pensive and tired beforehand, but the good
company and good food perked me up no end. Simon always says that my
two-course dinners make him feel inadequate (though in fact it's a transparent
excuse to melt chocolate, which is one of life's little secret sensual
pleasures along with plunging the plunger on a cafetiere); this time it was my
turn to go wow at _three_ courses, with soup and nice bread to start, followed
by cottage pie with salad, and then dessert of rice pudding with dollops of
jam. Yum.
Winning at Scrabble afterwards wasn't bad for my mood either :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Oct 06 09:41:35 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
My life's a bit non-stop at the moment. What with dinners, theatre trips, and
gigs I'm busy every evening until at least next Tuesday, so it was good to grab
lunch at the Trinity Centre with Clare and have a good natter.
In the evening was the Editors (http://www.editorsofficial.com/) gig at the
Junction. They were great! I'd barely heard of them before Eleanor bought the
tickets, but the sound's very easy to get into and it's hard not to be enthused
by a live band with good music and a room full of bouncing fans! I'm so glad
I've found this :-)
Afterwards, Janet, Owen, and I walked to the Soul Tree for the oddly-named Club
Goo, with Andrew W for company even though he wasn't going to the club itself.
I had a brief moment of worry, fear, panic, whatever, but then just like that
it evaporated. I danced a couple of hours away to good music I mostly barely
knew, with (I suspect) a silly smile on my face.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 07 14:14:18 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Grr, bloody doctors. Although my surgery are generally quite good at arranging
appointments if you're competent and remember you need one a week or so in
advance, if you've been busy and leave it until the last moment -- I have
exactly one antidepressant left -- you end up in the `call at 8:30am and get an
appointment at an inconvenient time' queue.
So I got an appointment at 9:40, which didn't seem too bad even though it would
mean I'd miss an hour of work. I got to the surgery at 9:30, allowing plenty
of time, and then sat there for 40 minutes in the waiting room since the doc
was _already_ running that late. I read a bit of `Ender's Game' while I
waited, but my head isn't well-suited to reading fiction first thing so I
didn't get very far. Eventually I got to see the doctor, though he warned me
that he might have to interrupt to take a brief phone call. Fair enough, I
thought, but when the call came it was of course confidential, so I had to step
out of the room while he took it. I then lurked in the corridor outside for
ten minutes, feeling ever tireder and more fed up by the moment. (I think the
Medical Centre has the heating turned up a bit high, so I was perhaps reacting
to that a bit too.)
Eventually, I was called back in for the rest of the appointment and got a new
prescription as well as a brief chat about the state of my head. A
satisfactory outcome, but not exactly what you'd call a good customer
experience. Good job I'm just a patient patient, really.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 10 11:24:35 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Weekending
Except, blast, I forgot to pick up the prescription on Friday evening and the
pharmacy isn't open at weekends, so I missed two days of anti-depressants. I
predict I'll be particularly mopey until about Wednesday now :-(. Still, I
collected the pills this morning and took one straight away, so it's more like
one and a half days I've missed.
Saturday wasn't much of an improvement. Although I did get into town to visit
Fopp (down many moneys - oops) and Gametron (down more moneys - oops some
more), I was unable to get the Dreamcast dev kit I recently acquired from pm215
to do anything at all, let alone behave as a normal Dreamcast. I built the
Ikea bookcase that's been sitting on my floor for the past week or so instead,
and although I managed it fine, it was an oddly disheartening experience. By
the evening I wasn't feeling at all good, and didn't make it to Karen's
gathering as I'd planned to.
Sunday? Well, it was just a day, really. Watched the Grand Prix first thing,
listened to `The Archers', read the paper, mowed the lawn, went round to the
Gallery for the usual stuff (starting season 3 of `Blake's 7', a game, `Cities
of Gold'), came home, went to bed. *shrug*
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Oct 11 10:14:50 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Monday must win my personal award for `Most Unproductive Work Day Ever'. In
total I managed to write 25 lines of a text file. A customer-facing text file,
admittedly, but still just a text file.
In the evening was the Queen Adreena gig at the Junction. Sadly, Eleanor
couldn't make it due to her cold, so that left just Mike, Mobbsy, and me. Of
the two support bands, neither of whose names I can immediately remember, the
first was the better; the second didn't really have any energy and didn't
really engage the audience either. Mike said they wanted to be U2; to me they
sounded like they didn't really know what they wanted to be.
Finally, Queen Adreena. I only had the vaguest idea of what to expect, but
they were fun. A big sound set off by the voice of their lead, Katie, who
bounced around the stage, clumb on chairs, and generally gave it her all
(including a number of wardrobe failures, or perhaps successes; nobody was
complaining.) People were bouncing enthusiastically to it, and it's hard not
to go along with that to some degree, but for me it was `fun' rather than
great. I think the problem is that they rely almost entirely on Katie's voice
for melody, and it's not the kind of voice that can carry that weight.
Earlier in the evening, between the first and second supports, I think, I
bumped into Marcie. I almost didn't recognise her at first because she was
wearing a light blue dress! We had a bit of a natter and caught up on things;
apparently she's now travelling around the country in a camper van with her
cats. It sounds mad, but she sounded happy, so that's OK :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 12 23:52:37 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
After a grey day that ended in a rainstorm, it was good to head into town for
dinner at Sally's. A ham and mushroom carbonara-y thing with mashed potatoes,
carrots, and broccoli was not only very tasty and filling but also made me
reach that elusive 5-a-day vegetable jackpot. I exceeded it with dessert, if
you count cocoa products as vegetables; Sally was insistent but I have my
doubts on this score.
Then a pleasant evening talking about people, the world, and life. Not much
can go wrong with time spent like that.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 14 10:31:56 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Thursdays
I've not had a `normal' Thursday for a few weeks now. Last week was Editors,
the week before that was Bride and Prejudice at Rachel's, and the week before
_that_ was the Junction Fiver. How time flies.
Last night, though, was a normal Thursday, which means relaxing and reading
over a coffee in Borders for an hour or so, wandering along to the Castle for
dinner with Jon and Sarah, and then moving onwards to the Carlton for the rest
of the evening. Lots of fun conversation -- I always seem to end up talking
about languages to Becky, for some reason -- and a good spell on the quiz
machine.
I have a theory about the quiz machine. It only tempts you with prizes if
you've already put a lot of money in recently. I wonder if this is actually
true, or just a rationalisation of the sod's law appearance of randomness.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Oct 16 01:45:49 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Friday, Saturday
Friday was Bmovie night. Odd how a month has somehow managed to go past since
the last one; time flies when you're having fun I guess. Fun again this time,
though not as busy, and Clare and I had to leave early to catch the last train
home. When I am rich I will own a convenient flat / house / palace (depending
on ambition) near King's Cross so I can dance the night away. Even leaving
`early' I slept until eleven the next day, which is late for me at least.
After a bit of pottering around the house tidying and being useful, I went to
visit Eleanor to have a go on her bike around the quiet bits of Kings Hedges.
I've not cycled for years, since I fell off, lost a bit of tooth, and suffered
dentistry for months afterwards. It never seemed _that_ important to get
places in ten minutes rather than forty anyway, so I just stopped. Something's
changed now, though. I have less time, more people, and even more whim.
So I wobbled around a bit, remembered what my sense of balance was for, and
rode around while Eleanor fixed her other bike. Not actually that
scary, so (shock horror), I might actually get myself a new bike!
Afterwards we ended up looking through her old artwork, and her scrapbook of
bits and bobs, little jigsaw pieces of a life. I love reminiscing, whether
it's someone else or me that's doing it. There's something about a person's
memories that is uniquely _them_, and that's magic. I also discover yet again
that my friends have hidden depths: Eleanor can (could?) draw. I'm not sure
whether I should be more or less surprised that something she draws
particularly well is shoes...
The evening was taken up with Kate and Andrew's party at Nursery Walk. Busier
at the start, quieter at the end, and a relaxed evening either way. Can't
complain, mustn't grumble, and probably ought to smile contentedly and go to
bed.
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 17 16:53:48 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Hands that don't dishes
I hate my skin. I'm sure sometimes it can be soft and smooth and lovely, but
too much of the time it's a red blotchy mess, particularly around my eyes and
on my hands. I can just about cope with having a blotchy red face; I don't
have to look at it that often, and my friends seem to be too nice to comment.
But I have to look at my hands all the time, and the red blotchiness that gives
way to itchiness and then cracked skin is just eww. It heals, from time to
time, but in spite of steroids, moisturising glop, and antihistamines, it
always comes back. It is, literally, a bloody pain.
A co-worker has just come up to me and pointed out (rightly) that I didn't do
the washing up on Friday, as I am scheduled to. I did in fact just forget, as
I do far too often, but at the moment the washing up is something I'd really
rather not do, because my hands are nasty and red and broken. (I will press
for some marigolds, but.)
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 19 12:27:52 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Unexpectedly large pizza gathering on Monday night, with David, Eleanor,
Richard, Helen, and Jack swelling our numbers alongside a fair number of usual
people. Post-pizza was smaller but also a pleasant little gathering at
Relativity. Chatter, port, penultima, crochet, and, er, emergency
wool-winding.
BRMC last night was good. Met up with Mike beforehand in the Earl of Derby and
then Eleanor at the Junction itself. They were fun, starting with a couple of
solo acoustic things and bringing on the rest of the band for the last chorus.
The crowd really got going for some of the stuff from the first album (which
briefly distracted me until I managed to suppress my panicky self-defence
instinct and enjoy the good humour) but it was all very sporadic, and the gaps
between songs were longer than they should have been. Good fun nevertheless,
and is there any instrument they _can't_ play?
Outside, afterwards, a brief chat with Eleanor and Mike in the drizzle. As
Mike said in the cloakroom, it felt like a season of gigs was ending. It's
been a very busy month or so; there'll be more gigs, I'm sure, but perhaps not
for a while, or in such a short time.
The singing bins and benches were out. I do not think that they will sing to
me. Eleanor and Mike cycled off, and I walked slowly home, somewhere between
happy and wistful.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 21 00:14:40 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Is this any way to live a life?
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Oct 22 19:41:50 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Was
Hm. Sorry about that. I think it was mostly depression, which I suppose
explains why I couldn't concentrate on anything all of Friday which was a bit
of a pain since I was supposed to be designing data structures and the UI to
represent them. Then, with it magnifying things that are otherwise not really
problems, I became gloomy and negative and stubbornly refused to let myself
snap out of it. Sometimes I slip into patterns of depression like old
comfortable clothes, particularly at this time of year. I like Autumn best of
all the seasons but it is the time of year when I find it easiest to be
melancholy. Going to bed on the `better in the morning' principle seemed to
work, though.
Subject: Is
I woke up to `Home Truths' on Radio 4, a special programme marking a year since
John Peel died, talking to his family about him, his life, and coping
afterwards. It made me remember quite how good he was as a radio presenter,
particularly when it came to interviews on sensitive subjects; somehow he
managed to put people at their ease in a way few of the presenters since him
have managed. Only Tom Robinson, who presented this tribute, has come close
enough.
Shopping in town was to have been the opportunity to buy a bike, or at least
look at some and go `ooh'. However, I picked Drakes as a good place to go,
which was a bad choice since it's closed at weekends. As anyone could have
told me if I'd asked, but I was trying to be independent and self-motivating.
As if ;-). Ah well. Next weekend I shall try the excessively blue place on
Chesterton Road, and failing that some of the places on Mill Road. I did at
least get some general shopping done and buy a book at Borders. Complete with
free, as yet unexplained, chocolate bar. There was a leaflet too. Maybe it
will explain the chocolate, although I find the idea of unexplained free
chocolate understandably appealing.
In the afternoon I wandered over to Arden Road to return some of Eleanor's CDs.
(I've got a long post on music brewing, so I'll save musical ponderings for
that.) We had a cuppa and chatted about nothing in particular for a while.
Hopefully I didn't overstay my welcome _too_ much; I know how I am when I get
nattering!
This evening, an ELOPP. Perhaps a short one for me, as I have lots to catch up
on at home and sleep always comes in handy...
Subject: Will Be
So, Becky's off to Peru. I hope she has a good time out there; with luck we'll
hear something from her either by postcard or the Magic of the Internet.
`Aaah-ah-ah-ah, someday we will find the Cities of Gold...'
---------------------------------------------------[Mon Oct 24 15:18:33 2005]--
From: (S) soft-centred geek (steph)
Subject: Is
Much more useful at work today than I was on Friday, fixing little bugs and
tidying up little odds and ends. Only slightly distracted by Jon's cough;
although he says he's fine to be in work I'm less certain how good it is for
the rest of us, although I suppose if I were going to catch it I'd have done so
already.
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Oct 26 13:49:45 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
I've been off work yesterday and today with a strange not-quite-cold thing,
manifesting itself mostly as a headache and tiredness which only go away if I
don't try to do anything. I'm gradually getting better, and should be at work
tomorrow, but then I said that yesterday too.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Oct 27 00:30:17 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Evening
By the afternoon I felt well enough to venture out of the house so I let myself
be tempted by Lucy to the Carlton's pub quiz. I'm glad I went along. Apart
from not coming last (which in itself is an achievement for pub quiz teams I'm
on), lots of other things made me smile: catching up with Lucy and Dan; seeing
Eleanor again before she goes off to Whitby; Lizzi[ep] remembering my name;
apple crumble; nice beer (Beijing Black); sharing part of the walk home with
Lucy and Dan.
Once they'd turned off for their place I went back to mine via Kendal Way, a
route which reminds me most of walking to the Gallery in a boiling Summer.
Tonight I walked it in the other direction, on an Autumn night, and watched as
an enormous bank of cloud rolled across the sky and revealed behind it a
crystal-clear starscape. Whatever else may be, I am alive here and now, in a
beautiful world. It's good to be reminded of that now and then.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Oct 28 09:50:51 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
Last night I went to the Corn Exchange to see Carmen with Rachel (CF).
Although it has some of the most memorable tunes in opera, I was slightly
worried that I might not follow it and enjoy it, but I needn't have been. It
was wonderful. Following the surtitles quickly became as much second nature as
following subtitles on films, so I could concentrate on the action on stage.
I won't synopsise the plot, but the contrasts came out particularly well
to me: Carmen was delightfully saucy, whereas Micaela was charmingly innocent,
Red Riding Hood in all but colour. Don Jose's earnest naivete and later
desperation was in sharp contrast to the bold self-confidence of Escarmillo.
The costumes were great, of course, particularly the vivid colours of the
dancers and Escarmillo's multi-coloured toreador outfit in Act Four.
It's easy to think of opera as stuffy and staid; this at least was anything
but. I walked home with a big smile, a tremendous buzz, and a number of very
persistent earworms!
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Oct 29 16:53:24 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Friday
I got really quite a lot done at work on Friday, and acquired some interesting
jobs to do for next week which should keep boredom from the door for a while.
After work, I forwent the usual gathering at the Gallery to watch `Twin Peaks'
to visit Dan and Lucy in their new flat for dinner. However, since I still had
the Peaks video I had to detour via Simon's to drop it off before following
Dan's wonderful ASCII art map of his estate. Passing the `non-abandoned sekrit
lab' on my left and the `abandoned sekrit lab' on the `creepy deserted road' I
passed `Tellytubby Hill' to find my way to their flat.
Even though it's still full of boxes, it's very spacious and they've done very
well to find such a lovely place. Lucy and I chatted in the living room over
tea while we waited for Dan to come home and then once he was back there was
more chatter (`How DNA works for Dummies' among other things) while a crispy
duck cooked in the kitchen. Dinner went down very well (although the last few
pancakes had welded themselves together into an amusing impression of edible
plywood) and then we retired to the living room for raspberry pavlova ice cream
and general slouching. Yay for relaxed evenings with friends, that's what I
say.
---------------------------------------------------[Sat Oct 29 17:09:43 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Will be
I have increased my expected average speed. Or, to put it another way, I have
a BIKE! It is PURPLE!
After last week's failure I tried again this week and was nearly put off by the
poor interaction between the University Cycles guy's vagueness and my shyness-
cum-ignorance. I had lunch in town and finished `Pride and Prejudice' which
gave me enough energy to head to the blue bike shop on Chesterton Road. The
chap there was helpful and enthusiastic and we narrowed down what I wanted to a
couple of bikes which I tried out with quick jaunts around the block. In the
end I went for a Dawes Mojave with a ladies style frame, and left them to bolt
on all the bits and bobs while I had a celebratory coffee. An hour later, I
was riding my new pride and joy home.
I'm going to be a bit ginger and careful to start with. Nevertheless I'm
feeling very bouncy and accomplished right now.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 01 17:22:48 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Weekending
I rounded up Saturday by going round to Vicky's for her impromptu party, though
with people being out of town it was more of a compact and bijou partyette
featuring for much of the time just Vicky and a selection of her exes. Still,
it was nice to catch up with people and try various cocktails. It also gave my
bike its first night-time excursion, which both it and I survived intact.
On Sunday my brother, his girlfriend Sarah, and my little nephew Drew came to
visit on their way back up to Hull. My brother seemed well, and Sarah (who I'd
not met before) seemed quite nice. Drew, now ten weeks old, decided to wake up
to say hello and was immediately the centre of attention. He's still at the
stage of looking at the world and making things out, occasionally following
things with his eyes but mostly just furrowing his brow thoughtfully before
waving his arms around some more. He was quiet, too, even though he was tired
from a weekend's travelling. I suspect his parents should enjoy that while it
lasts!
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Nov 03 01:05:57 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
Some of the best things are completely unexpected. After missing swimming and
shopping due to it being far too wet to get to either Parkside or the Grafton,
I made my way round to Relativity for pizza with Clare, to be joined by Ben and
Mike. A good thing in and of itself, which stopped me being grumpy that the
weather had messed with my evening, and then I was treated to a slightly random
guided tour of Mike's iPod. Lots of music: most of it good, most interesting,
not all to my taste, but definitely fun to explore.
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Nov 04 14:13:09 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
It seems like everyone's away at the moment. Even though the Whitby folk are
now back from their holidays, Becky's still in darkest Peru, Ian's in Montreal,
Tom's set off around the world today, and Sally's off to India tomorrow. I
hope they all have good times, wherever they are.
Meanwhile, back in Cambridge, life continues. I was feeling quite tired and a
little low yesterday evening, but dragging myself to the Carlton helped. Nice
chats with Lucy and Eleanor (and the occasional enthusings of an extremely
hyperactive Lizzie) were just the ticket.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Nov 06 23:04:35 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
In common with a couple of other friends, I had a visit from my parents
yesterday. (Well, they were visited by their parents, not by mine, but you
know what I mean...) It was good to see them and catch up over coffee and cake
and then a pub lunch in the Green Dragon, talking about my brother's visit last
week. And money, health, life, love, and all sorts of things I would never
have talked to them about in the past. I think it's that after years of
healthy life, old age suddenly seems to be catching up with them very fast, and
while I can I'd like my life to be a bit less distant and private from them.
Saturday evening was murder mystery night at Karen's, which I enjoyed
tremendously even though I was horribly allergic to unexpected cats. Nice
people, some of whom I already knew and some I didn't, and the whole game thing
(combined, admittedly, with copious booze) helped get around my talking-to-new-
people-phobia quite nicely. I should adopt outrageously bad German accents
more often, clearly.
---------------------------------------------------[Tue Nov 08 22:53:52 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
Just got back from seeing Wallace and Gromit with Eleanor, Mike, and Ned. Ace,
go see it, it's good for a load of giggles and a happy smile afterwards.
Plus, it has Joe Grundy (Edward Kelsey) from `The Archers' in it as Mr Growbag.
What more could you want?
---------------------------------------------------[Wed Nov 09 11:29:15 2005]--
From: (S) Radio 4 is static (steph)
Subject: Is
With my birthday coming up I got a phone call from my parents last night.
Apparently they're going to give me a wodge of money with which to buy a new
suit and some pannier bags for the bike! Boring, I know, but useful. My old
suit is still just about OK but is getting a little, ah, snug, and panniers are
good because it's best for my wrists not to wear a rucksack too often.
---------------------------------------------------[Thu Nov 10 23:26:45 2005]--
From: (S) a brand new day (steph)
Subject: Is
And it's all because you made me see
What is false and what is true
Like the inside and the outside of me
Has been made again by you
Like a bright new morning
Like a bright new day
I woke up from a deep sleep
I woke up from a bad dream
To a brand new morning
To a brand new day
Like the whole world has been made again
-- Marillion, `Made Again'
Thank you.
---------------------------------------------------[Sun Nov 13 02:01:38 2005]--
From: (S) a brand new day (steph)
Subject: Is
I put nearly no effort into doing anything for my birthday this year. Partly
because I didn't know what my life was doing, but mostly because I'm just plain
lazy. For something I've put nearly no effort into, then, I've had a brilliant
birthday.
Last night was Bmovie, of course, with all the lovely people and dancefloor
bouncing that goes with that, not to mention quite a lot of top-of-the-world
feelings of triumph-against-adversity: what in an earlier era I'd have called
glory. Even having to leave all too soon to catch a train back home didn't
mute the buzz.
Then there was the housewarming lunch at Sarah and Jon's new place, Caraway. A
lovely new house already in amazing shape for somewhere they've only just moved
in; I perhaps might not have been able to tell how recently, had we not spent
the first hour or so building extra Ikea chairs. Lunch was a wonderful spread
of food accompanied by Pimms and conversation, followed by silly party games:
the hat game (a combination of the rizla/postit game and charades) and charades
itself. It had me giggling and smiling and enjoying myself, and I hope
everyone else had a good time too.
I got back to mine at about six, and was just wondering what to do with the
evening when I found an unexpected plan for the evening in my email. So I went
along to Simes and EJ's place to join them, Karen, Steve, and others (including
the suspects from Karen's murder mystery the other week) for drinks, curry,
games, cats, and (as it turned out) trashy TV. It was a lovely relaxing
evening, and it's great to be invited into such a lovely bunch of people, and
that bit more wonderful for the fact that I barely knew any of them until a
few weeks ago :-).
---------------------------------------------------[Fri Nov 18 17:29:38 2005]--
From: (S) a brand new day (steph)
Subject: Is
It was the year of fire,
The year of destruction,
The year we took back what was ours.
It was the year of rebirth,
The year of great sadness,
The year of pain,
And a year of joy.
It was a new age.
It was the end of history.
It was the year everything changed.
-- Babylon 5, Season 4 opening credits
The year, indeed, that everything changed. Ending a part in this diary is a
somewhat arbitrary affair, and in the past I've done it for many reasons:
perhaps the existing part is too long, perhaps I feel like a break or a change,
or perhaps I look back and I'm not really the person I was at the start of the
diary. This time, I think, it's the last one.
Not that I'm the only one who's changed. People are together, people are
apart, friends are reinventing themselves or finding once more all the old
inventions. Interesting times, but in the end, I think, in a good way.
E N D O F P A R T F I V E