Road trip, day two
Long standing readers (pull up a chair, why don't you) will recall my feelings about the M6 motorway, particularly the area around spaghetti junction - a concrete replica of hell that would make Dante Alighieri cut back on the cheese before bedtime.
I've not been through it for a couple of years, but as things would have it I had to do the journey today to get to Wolverhampton for a site visit and it brought all of the bad memories flooding back. The traffic was as slow as ever, and to add insult to injury they have a large illuminated sign to tell you that the M6 is congested but the adjacent toll road is clear (not much use for me when I'm only going to junction 10).
I had planned to get away from the site at a reasonable time, but trying to submit a file to the HMRC online portal proved to be an irksome business, and particularly frustrating after I'd sorted out a number of other problems with the data. I ended up leaving at four, just in time to get caught in the afternoon rush hour going the other way.
At least I've had a good catch up on podcasts, including a particularly good indie hodge podge from Coverville featuring this awesome version of Norwegian Wood crossed with Kashmir by the Aaron English Band which I downloaded off of iTunes as soon as I got in tonight, and I recommend that you all do the same.
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
The Slow Train
Down to London for a meeting today.
I set my alarm for half past five and still managed to wake up half an hour before that - not quite enough time to attempt to get back to sleep. The drive down was not too bad and I parked in Harpenden to catch the train from there into Moorgate.
The meeting itself went reasonably ok - lots of action points to take note of - but nobody seemed unhappy about anything in particular. The HMRC real time information project is going to be a biggy though, with a ridiculously tight deadline.
Back at my mum and dad's now and piggy backing on the next door neighbour's wifi.
I set my alarm for half past five and still managed to wake up half an hour before that - not quite enough time to attempt to get back to sleep. The drive down was not too bad and I parked in Harpenden to catch the train from there into Moorgate.
The meeting itself went reasonably ok - lots of action points to take note of - but nobody seemed unhappy about anything in particular. The HMRC real time information project is going to be a biggy though, with a ridiculously tight deadline.
Back at my mum and dad's now and piggy backing on the next door neighbour's wifi.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Haikusday
A mist shrouded sun
Rises reluctantly as
I make a cuppa
Blue tits appraising
The nesting box on the fence
Cats watch with interest
Ninety nine percent
No need to initialise
Integer array
Smiley Culture sang
Of police brutality
His words, prophetic
Rises reluctantly as
I make a cuppa
Blue tits appraising
The nesting box on the fence
Cats watch with interest
Ninety nine percent
No need to initialise
Integer array
Smiley Culture sang
Of police brutality
His words, prophetic
Monday, March 28, 2011
Night Zombies
Back to getting up in the dark this morning, although it won't be for long - the sky was already getting light by the time I'd made my way downstairs to put the kettle on this morning. There was a touch of frost on the car too, but I can live with that given the achingly blue sky and pleasant spring sunshine.
Busy at work - a tricky remote install and then supporting one of my cow-orkers in one urgent bit of work whilst simultaneously wrangling another bit of work for the same client. I've got to make sure I'm up to date by close of play tomorrow, because I'm down in London for a meeting Wednesday and then heading back via Birmingham for a site visit on Thursday.
In music news, my last.fm freebie download this morning was a collection of hip-hop mashup tracks from a producer called Tor who has been remixing songs by Sufjan Stevens. It makes for an interesting cross section of genres and moods, and it's worth your listening time I would say. Download the tracks from this last.fm page.
Busy at work - a tricky remote install and then supporting one of my cow-orkers in one urgent bit of work whilst simultaneously wrangling another bit of work for the same client. I've got to make sure I'm up to date by close of play tomorrow, because I'm down in London for a meeting Wednesday and then heading back via Birmingham for a site visit on Thursday.
In music news, my last.fm freebie download this morning was a collection of hip-hop mashup tracks from a producer called Tor who has been remixing songs by Sufjan Stevens. It makes for an interesting cross section of genres and moods, and it's worth your listening time I would say. Download the tracks from this last.fm page.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
We Stole Light
It's five minutes to eight, and there is still a smidge of light in the sky, if you look for it. I *like* this day - I don't feel as if I have lost an hour, I feel as if have won back my light evenings with the promise of warm summer days to come.
A bit of T215 work - mostly setting up some collaborative work on a team project wiki and the online bit of block 2. I need to start thinking about my report on LTE 4G technology, but I've already got some ideas about how I need to tackle it.
In games news, I got past the bit I was stuck on in BG&E last night and made a fair bit of progress past some tricky stealth bits. What made the biggest impression on me, however, was a little interlude with a personal message from P'eyj on a cd that was oddly affecting. This game truly is a classic of videogame design.
A bit of T215 work - mostly setting up some collaborative work on a team project wiki and the online bit of block 2. I need to start thinking about my report on LTE 4G technology, but I've already got some ideas about how I need to tackle it.
In games news, I got past the bit I was stuck on in BG&E last night and made a fair bit of progress past some tricky stealth bits. What made the biggest impression on me, however, was a little interlude with a personal message from P'eyj on a cd that was oddly affecting. This game truly is a classic of videogame design.
Sunday Links
- Wee Kiwi, Another Columbus Zoo First! Check out the beak-u-lar action on ZooBorns
- Why can’t we all have Red Pandas as pets? Why not indeed?
- 10 Reasons Frogs Are Awesome
- 50 Unexplainable Black & White Photos
- You are listening to Los Angeles Ambient music plus live police radio - oddly compelling
- Contradictions in the Bible poster
- The Aurora a beautiful bit of video
- The Wire A review of a Victorian classic (h/t Rachel!)
- Yee hah! John C.H. Grabill's Photos of Western Frontier Life
- I-Spot Guide to Internet Hoaxes
- WeatherSpark Interactive weather charts for your location - perfect for climate wonks
- Retro handheld games collection Play all of your favourite handheld LCD games again
Saturday, March 26, 2011
The Book of Saturday
Weather - considerably nippier than the last couple of days, but seeing as I was mainly ensconced indoors working on my M255 TMA 04, I wasn't overly bothered. Talking of which, I finished question one which is 50% of the marks on this assignment and the last couple of units look to be fairly straightforward stuff on file handling.
I played a bit of Beyond Good and Evil tonight, until I hit some sort of glitch where I was stuck in a dark void beneath the main map level. Grrr. I'll try that bit again tomorrow.
Currently chilling to Attached by Orbital on my last.fm mix station. It really benefits from having the phat bass cranked up playing through the 5.1. Smashing.
I played a bit of Beyond Good and Evil tonight, until I hit some sort of glitch where I was stuck in a dark void beneath the main map level. Grrr. I'll try that bit again tomorrow.
Currently chilling to Attached by Orbital on my last.fm mix station. It really benefits from having the phat bass cranked up playing through the 5.1. Smashing.
Friday, March 25, 2011
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Christ on a Bike
Richard Herring says that he is not the son of god ... that is for other people to say.
In this show, Herring sets out to explore the reasons why he, as a devout atheist, should be so drawn to the character of Jesus. Even after being able to recite the genealogy of Christ from memory and hence spotting the glaring mistake on page one of the New Testament, he retains a fondness for the beardy bloke in sandals that stretches right back to his childhood.
Some of the more obsessive Christians who have emailed in with threats of hell and damnation for daring to mock god (and providing a highly amusing extra twenty minutes of the show in the process) seem to have missed the point entirely. If god is the sort of petty tyrant who would arrange for John Lennon to be shot in the head some fourteen years after making a rather boastful remark about the relative fame of the Beatles and Jesus, then is that really a good advertisement for Christianity?
As Herring says, Jesus is like the Fonz - he is cool, it's just the people who follow him who are idiots.
There is plenty of food for thought here, as well as the usual collection of knob gags, childhood memories and surreal digressions. Herring also proved that he is still the maestro when faced with a bizarre heckle about knitting needles which proved to be one of the highlights of the night.
Truly, a divine comedy.
In this show, Herring sets out to explore the reasons why he, as a devout atheist, should be so drawn to the character of Jesus. Even after being able to recite the genealogy of Christ from memory and hence spotting the glaring mistake on page one of the New Testament, he retains a fondness for the beardy bloke in sandals that stretches right back to his childhood.
Some of the more obsessive Christians who have emailed in with threats of hell and damnation for daring to mock god (and providing a highly amusing extra twenty minutes of the show in the process) seem to have missed the point entirely. If god is the sort of petty tyrant who would arrange for John Lennon to be shot in the head some fourteen years after making a rather boastful remark about the relative fame of the Beatles and Jesus, then is that really a good advertisement for Christianity?
As Herring says, Jesus is like the Fonz - he is cool, it's just the people who follow him who are idiots.
There is plenty of food for thought here, as well as the usual collection of knob gags, childhood memories and surreal digressions. Herring also proved that he is still the maestro when faced with a bizarre heckle about knitting needles which proved to be one of the highlights of the night.
Truly, a divine comedy.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
I wanna be your dog
Another glorious day in the corps, weather wise.
I had a minor kerfuffle this morning as I was getting ready for work. Barney usually stays in his basket in the mornings, but it was sunny out so he wuffed politely and I let him out into the garden to do his necessaries whilst I went upstairs to get a shower. I came down to let him back in again and realised that the gate was ajar and that he had wandered out into the field, so I quickly got some clothes on and went out to find him.
He turned out to be be pottering around at the far end of the playing field and came straight away when I called him, bounding through the wet grass like a pup with no sign of a limp. Phew and all that.
Work has been busy today, with an all day meeting discussing such riveting topics as divisional communication strategies and training methodologies. I still managed to squeeze in a bit of OU reading at lunch time, dealing with the technology used in GPS systems - absolutely amazing little gadgets precisely interpreting signals of vanishingly low power (imagine a 50 watt light bulb as seen from 20,000 km) with a timing accuracy measured in nano seconds all in a device that fits inside your pocket. Amaze.
I had a minor kerfuffle this morning as I was getting ready for work. Barney usually stays in his basket in the mornings, but it was sunny out so he wuffed politely and I let him out into the garden to do his necessaries whilst I went upstairs to get a shower. I came down to let him back in again and realised that the gate was ajar and that he had wandered out into the field, so I quickly got some clothes on and went out to find him.
He turned out to be be pottering around at the far end of the playing field and came straight away when I called him, bounding through the wet grass like a pup with no sign of a limp. Phew and all that.
Work has been busy today, with an all day meeting discussing such riveting topics as divisional communication strategies and training methodologies. I still managed to squeeze in a bit of OU reading at lunch time, dealing with the technology used in GPS systems - absolutely amazing little gadgets precisely interpreting signals of vanishingly low power (imagine a 50 watt light bulb as seen from 20,000 km) with a timing accuracy measured in nano seconds all in a device that fits inside your pocket. Amaze.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Haikusday
Speechification
Archive of talk radio
Voices lost in time
A grieving father
Goes on stage to entertain
Tears of a clown
The sun crosses the
Celestial equator
Vernal equinox
Warm sunshine, cool breeze
A perfect early spring day
Shame I have to work
Archive of talk radio
Voices lost in time
A grieving father
Goes on stage to entertain
Tears of a clown
The sun crosses the
Celestial equator
Vernal equinox
Warm sunshine, cool breeze
A perfect early spring day
Shame I have to work
Monday, March 21, 2011
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Sunday Links
- Four Formosan Hoglets in Taipei ZooBorns
- World's Smallest Monkeys Born at Perth Zoo I normally restrict myself to just one post from Zooborns per week, but I'm going to make an exception here because "World's Smallest" + "Monkey" = very cute indeed
- 25 Pictures Of Cats And Dogs Photobombing Each Other Redonkulous behaviour
- Blowing up a microwave by cooking a sealed bottle of liquid Heh heh. Cool.
- A Brief History of Title Design The evolution of movie titles - how many do you know?
- Famous Objects from Classic Movies Nifty little movie quiz
- SimplyNoise A white noise generator for when you just want a bit of background buzz to drown out the world (h/t Pewari)
- A IS FOR ATOM A classic documentary about the growth of the nuclear industry from Adam Curtis. Essential viewing.
- Radiation Putting radiation exposure into perspective - a handy infographic from XKCD
- Nuclear Power Plant Simulator Game An interesting simulation of the sort of feedback loops involved in running a reactor
- CERN 360 degree pictures of the LHC. Slightly worrying that when you pan down there appears to be a black hole at your feet ... :-)
- the blank page The next time somebody complains about writer's block, show them this web comic ...
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Kick Out The JAMS
Saturday night chill out radio on Last.FM has thrown up some gems tonight with an Orb theme - What Time is Love by KLF, Halcyon and On and On by Orbital and the awesome Papua New Guinea by Future Sound of London being particular highlights. Yum.
Today has been all M255 work and I got through the whole of unit 11 (a fairly slim unit, to be fair) covering lists, the collections utility class and overriding compareTo() methods for objects (not forgetting to override hashcode() at the same time to avoid the classic junior programmer error). Good fun. I'll make a start on TMA 04 tomorrow before catching up on T215 work so I am up to date on that course too.
I think that running two courses in parallel has been tough and it would have been a real struggle if I hadn't been so confident with the M255 material to start with. At least the end is in sight with the current work load and by doing it this way I have knocked a good six months off of the time it will take to get this degree.
Today has been all M255 work and I got through the whole of unit 11 (a fairly slim unit, to be fair) covering lists, the collections utility class and overriding compareTo() methods for objects (not forgetting to override hashcode() at the same time to avoid the classic junior programmer error). Good fun. I'll make a start on TMA 04 tomorrow before catching up on T215 work so I am up to date on that course too.
I think that running two courses in parallel has been tough and it would have been a real struggle if I hadn't been so confident with the M255 material to start with. At least the end is in sight with the current work load and by doing it this way I have knocked a good six months off of the time it will take to get this degree.
Friday, March 18, 2011
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Trace Amounts
A disturbed night's sleep, last night.
I woke up several times with aching muscles and only managed to nod off again at about half past five which was not really enough time to hit deep sleep before the alarm went off at the usual quarter past six. It probably didn't help that I fell asleep on the bed last night as soon as I got in from work, so I am determined to avoid doing that again.
At least I managed to leave work at twenty to five tonight, which made a world of difference traffic wise and I was home just after a quarter past. This gives me a bit of wind down time and a chance to get an hour of studying done to keep on top of things. I got my first TMA back with a score of 84% which is perfectly respectable, but slightly disappointing in that my suspicions were confirmed that I had pitched my essay at a too technical level for the target audience. Still, live and learn and move on to the next one.
The current unit that I am looking at is a study of mobile phone technology, and I am now finding out about the intricacies of 3G systems and high speed packet switched data. Fascinating stuff, particularly when you look at when the standards were agreed for these technologies back in the early 2000s while 2G was still comparatively the new kid on the block.
I woke up several times with aching muscles and only managed to nod off again at about half past five which was not really enough time to hit deep sleep before the alarm went off at the usual quarter past six. It probably didn't help that I fell asleep on the bed last night as soon as I got in from work, so I am determined to avoid doing that again.
At least I managed to leave work at twenty to five tonight, which made a world of difference traffic wise and I was home just after a quarter past. This gives me a bit of wind down time and a chance to get an hour of studying done to keep on top of things. I got my first TMA back with a score of 84% which is perfectly respectable, but slightly disappointing in that my suspicions were confirmed that I had pitched my essay at a too technical level for the target audience. Still, live and learn and move on to the next one.
The current unit that I am looking at is a study of mobile phone technology, and I am now finding out about the intricacies of 3G systems and high speed packet switched data. Fascinating stuff, particularly when you look at when the standards were agreed for these technologies back in the early 2000s while 2G was still comparatively the new kid on the block.
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Slow Ride *
I had hoped that the traffic situation for my daily commute would be improving by now, but apparently not. It's been foggy the last two days, as in proper pea-souper, Sherlock Holmes would feel right at home along with the entire population of Silent Hill and that depressing novella by Stephen King foggy, but I still don't see why it should take well over an hour to travel less than thirty miles.
I seem to get in from work, do a bit of studying, have some tea and before I know it I'm falling asleep half way through whatever we are watching on tv, and going to bed before getting up at stupid o'clock to start the whole groundhog day over again.
As a result, I'm tired and a bit fed up. Blue skies and sunshine, nao plz?
* Appropriately enough by 'Foghat' ...
I seem to get in from work, do a bit of studying, have some tea and before I know it I'm falling asleep half way through whatever we are watching on tv, and going to bed before getting up at stupid o'clock to start the whole groundhog day over again.
As a result, I'm tired and a bit fed up. Blue skies and sunshine, nao plz?
* Appropriately enough by 'Foghat' ...
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Haikusday
The Earth, indifferent
Shrugs and sends terrible waves
We watch in horror
A burning cauldron
Spreads poison across the land
Magic has a price
Orange sodium
Pierces the enshrouding fog
Another slow drive
Mitch Benn cheers me up
By playing a song based on a
Neil Gaiman blog post
Shrugs and sends terrible waves
We watch in horror
A burning cauldron
Spreads poison across the land
Magic has a price
Orange sodium
Pierces the enshrouding fog
Another slow drive
Mitch Benn cheers me up
By playing a song based on a
Neil Gaiman blog post
Monday, March 14, 2011
B&Q Man
Well, I have to say that I really enjoyed this series of Being Human - fantastic acting, well filmed and with a real gut-wrenching twist of an ending. However, there's just one nit I'd like to pick ...
It seems that there are quite a few vampires in the police force and other positions of power. Now, if they can't be photographed, how do they get their pictures on their photo id cards and driving licences? Police stations have more than their fair share of CCTV cameras, so surely somebody would have noticed that Chief Inspector Adracul isn't showing up on the monitors before now?
Also, what happened to Junior McWerewolf at the end, eh?
It seems that there are quite a few vampires in the police force and other positions of power. Now, if they can't be photographed, how do they get their pictures on their photo id cards and driving licences? Police stations have more than their fair share of CCTV cameras, so surely somebody would have noticed that Chief Inspector Adracul isn't showing up on the monitors before now?
Also, what happened to Junior McWerewolf at the end, eh?
Sunday, March 13, 2011
My Own Sun
After an unpromising and rainy start, the day blossomed into glorious spring sunshine, perfect for a walk round the woods. We're keeping an eye on Barney at the moment because he's been limping on one of his front paws - we couldn't see any signs of a cut or anything stuck in it, but hopefully it will improve if he can be persuaded to rest it for a while.
In other news, I proof read my my M255 TMA and picked up a couple of mistakes in the document. One slightly clunky thing with this course is the need to paste source code into a word document to submit. It's easy to copy the wrong method if you are not careful, or for auto-formatting to kick in and screw up capitalization or indentation without you realising it. I also managed a bit of T215 work - we are kicking off a group collaboration project with an associated forum and wiki so I'm hoping the others in my team will get stuck in and contribute.
In security news, I've bitten the bullet and enabled two stage verification on my Google account. It really is worth doing this, particularly if you use Gmail or Google Docs for anything important. The process is a little long winded, but it helps if you have an iPhone or iPod touch you can use for generating verification codes. It's also very spooky to get a phone call from Google on your home phone as soon as you click the relevant button.
In other news, I proof read my my M255 TMA and picked up a couple of mistakes in the document. One slightly clunky thing with this course is the need to paste source code into a word document to submit. It's easy to copy the wrong method if you are not careful, or for auto-formatting to kick in and screw up capitalization or indentation without you realising it. I also managed a bit of T215 work - we are kicking off a group collaboration project with an associated forum and wiki so I'm hoping the others in my team will get stuck in and contribute.
In security news, I've bitten the bullet and enabled two stage verification on my Google account. It really is worth doing this, particularly if you use Gmail or Google Docs for anything important. The process is a little long winded, but it helps if you have an iPhone or iPod touch you can use for generating verification codes. It's also very spooky to get a phone call from Google on your home phone as soon as you click the relevant button.
Sunday Links
- Rescued Alligator finds Home at San Francisco Zoo Snap-tacular action on ZooBorns
- OMG OK THIS IS EET BEBEH ANTEATER RIDING ON MAMA’S BACK, WE’RE DONE HERE -BOOM- — Cute Overload
- Pinepoint Memories of a town that disappeared - an interactive documentary
- Pontypool A Canadian radio drama about the outbreak of a zombie apocalypse, as heard from the (comparative) safety of a radio studio
- Euler's Identity explained in five minutes, including 120 digits of pi recited in less than fifteen seconds. Amaze.
- How To Care for Your Books Five top tips
- Lost Generation Inspiring
- How to grow plants in a CD Spindle Case DIY mini propagator
- Top 10 Ways to Rock Your Resumé
- Incredible film of a trip to Saturn made entirely from photographs taken by the Cassini spacecraft
- The strange unearthly music that appears when you import Windows program files as audio data
- Mr Men Books reviewed
Saturday, March 12, 2011
When the Work is Done
After posting my audioboo yesterday I was struck by a sudden determination to make the most of the remaining evening light, so after walking Barney I got stuck into a bit of garden tidying. I took the brushwood off of the pergola which was looking a bit threadbare after a couple of years up there. The vine should provide enough shade when the leaves grow back in the spring.
After that, I bundled up the bits into the wheely bin and unleashed the vortex of doom, aka the leaf blower, to scour the patio of leaves and debris as well as hacking back the dead bits of pampus grass in the corner. Unfortunately the palm tree is looking very sorry for itself after the extreme cold of the winter, but it may yet surprise us.
Today has been mainly tackling the last bit of the M255 TMA 03 which has been all sorts of stuff on the Java collections framework including sets, maps, and to really mess with my head, adding sets to maps to collate them. Eek. It wasn't too bad once I'd figured out what the question was actually asking for and the syntax I needed to use. I'll print it off to proof read tomorrow, but that shouldn't take too long so I'll be able to get a bit of T215 work done as well, also.
In Rock Band 3 news, we've been experimenting with the filters and party shuffle mode to give us a random selection from the three hundred and odd songs that we've got on there. It still manages to spring some new tracks on us, even after playing it every week for months. Which is nice.
Saturday Night Chillout on Last.FM : Nat Johnson, Client and Riding the Low (natch)
After that, I bundled up the bits into the wheely bin and unleashed the vortex of doom, aka the leaf blower, to scour the patio of leaves and debris as well as hacking back the dead bits of pampus grass in the corner. Unfortunately the palm tree is looking very sorry for itself after the extreme cold of the winter, but it may yet surprise us.
Today has been mainly tackling the last bit of the M255 TMA 03 which has been all sorts of stuff on the Java collections framework including sets, maps, and to really mess with my head, adding sets to maps to collate them. Eek. It wasn't too bad once I'd figured out what the question was actually asking for and the syntax I needed to use. I'll print it off to proof read tomorrow, but that shouldn't take too long so I'll be able to get a bit of T215 work done as well, also.
In Rock Band 3 news, we've been experimenting with the filters and party shuffle mode to give us a random selection from the three hundred and odd songs that we've got on there. It still manages to spring some new tracks on us, even after playing it every week for months. Which is nice.
Saturday Night Chillout on Last.FM : Nat Johnson, Client and Riding the Low (natch)
Friday, March 11, 2011
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Transmission
Another day of very strong winds. A lorry was blown over not far from our office, killing an unfortunate pedestrian and injuring somebody else. Grim. We didn't see anything, but we saw all of the emergency services threading through the traffic jam on the ring road.
Work is the usual busy run up to the year end with a steadily increasing volume of support calls from customers, as well as various testing issues bouncing back from the QA team. It was considerably quieter than usual in the office as well, with lots of people either out on site or working from home.
OU work today has been some more reading on mobile technology going all the way back to the first generation analog phones that were limited to a thousand simultaneous calls within the available bandwidth of one cell. That probably seemed generous when they were divvying up the radio spectrum back then ... :-)
Right, now it must be time for a spot of Beyond Good and Evil which I am enjoying hugely for the stylish visuals and quirky soundtrack.
PS Just rescued a mousie from the jaws of death (AKA Doris). I can always tell she's brought something in when I hear her pre-emptive growling at anybody who might want to take her plaything away.
Work is the usual busy run up to the year end with a steadily increasing volume of support calls from customers, as well as various testing issues bouncing back from the QA team. It was considerably quieter than usual in the office as well, with lots of people either out on site or working from home.
OU work today has been some more reading on mobile technology going all the way back to the first generation analog phones that were limited to a thousand simultaneous calls within the available bandwidth of one cell. That probably seemed generous when they were divvying up the radio spectrum back then ... :-)
Right, now it must be time for a spot of Beyond Good and Evil which I am enjoying hugely for the stylish visuals and quirky soundtrack.
PS Just rescued a mousie from the jaws of death (AKA Doris). I can always tell she's brought something in when I hear her pre-emptive growling at anybody who might want to take her plaything away.
Wednesday, March 09, 2011
Blowin' in the wind
A chilly day today, made worse by a biting and blustery wind. It was worse overnight and it woke me up a couple of times, but at least the damage was confined to some of the felt ripping off the shed roof. It will need redoing properly at some point, but at least I was able to tack it back into place as a temporary measure when I got in from work tonight.
Interesting stuff in my T215 work about the changes in mobile technology and usage over the last couple of years. I had no idea that it was so easy to track somebody's mobile if you can get hold of it for a couple of minutes to register the IMEI with one of many tracking services online. Another thing that set vague alarm bells ringing was the idea of using mobile phones for making small payments, like an Oyster Card. How long is going to be before some enterprising hacker can produce a trail of data showing exactly where you were and what you spent money on at any given moment?
In other news, I've downloaded the Firefox 4 beta release candidate to have a play with and I'm suitably impressed so far. I need to have a play with the developer tools which look to be very useful for some of the web dev we are doing at work. In a word, shiny!
That's about it for today, I think.
Interesting stuff in my T215 work about the changes in mobile technology and usage over the last couple of years. I had no idea that it was so easy to track somebody's mobile if you can get hold of it for a couple of minutes to register the IMEI with one of many tracking services online. Another thing that set vague alarm bells ringing was the idea of using mobile phones for making small payments, like an Oyster Card. How long is going to be before some enterprising hacker can produce a trail of data showing exactly where you were and what you spent money on at any given moment?
In other news, I've downloaded the Firefox 4 beta release candidate to have a play with and I'm suitably impressed so far. I need to have a play with the developer tools which look to be very useful for some of the web dev we are doing at work. In a word, shiny!
That's about it for today, I think.
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Haikusday
Calloo and callay!
Let joy be unconfined! For
Tis British Pie Week!
The doves are roosting
Reclaiming their home with song
Another sign of Spring
It's been seven years
Since I last set sight upon
The seas of Hillys
Lower Loxley wine
How sweet or dry should it be?
What would Nigel do?
Let joy be unconfined! For
Tis British Pie Week!
The doves are roosting
Reclaiming their home with song
Another sign of Spring
It's been seven years
Since I last set sight upon
The seas of Hillys
Lower Loxley wine
How sweet or dry should it be?
What would Nigel do?
Monday, March 07, 2011
Blasphemous Rumours
In the UK we have a national census every ten years. The results of the census provide critical information that is used to set public policy for future years. This is particularly important for things that need long term planning, such as provision of housing, schools, hospitals and other infrastructure projects.
I have a problem with one of the questions. It simply asks:
What is your religion?
Now the main problem with this is that I don't have a religion. There is a box to tick for 'No religion' but that's not quite the same thing as asking 'Do you have a religion, and if so what is it?'. In the last census 72% of people ticked the box for 'Christian', but a more recent survey into British social attitudes found that only 43% described themselves as Christian and 51% said they were non-religious.
The mythical 72% figure has been used for everything from justifying the growth of exclusive faith schools to maintaining the automatic seats for Bishops in the House of Lords. The NHS spent £29m on Chaplaincy services last year - around £50,000 per chaplain - with large variations between the highest spending trusts and the lowest spending. If spending was reduced to the lowest level, then £18.5m could be saved and spent on other areas that provide a clinical benefit, such as 1000 nursing assistants or a new community hospital. Apparently there are also 390,000 practising Jedi Knights (making them the fourth largest religion in the UK!), but we have yet to see the establishment of any Jedi Academies to cater for their Midichorian based needs.
A proposed campaign by the British Humanist Association with the slogan 'If you are not religious, for God's sake say so' has been labelled 'offensive' with advertisers being unwilling to display the posters.
Unless you are a regular church goer, or hold another belief, then you should make sure to tick the 'No Religion' box and remind your friends and family to do the same, and then maybe we can start to get a true picture of the state of belief (or lack of it) in this country.
I have a problem with one of the questions. It simply asks:
What is your religion?
Now the main problem with this is that I don't have a religion. There is a box to tick for 'No religion' but that's not quite the same thing as asking 'Do you have a religion, and if so what is it?'. In the last census 72% of people ticked the box for 'Christian', but a more recent survey into British social attitudes found that only 43% described themselves as Christian and 51% said they were non-religious.
The mythical 72% figure has been used for everything from justifying the growth of exclusive faith schools to maintaining the automatic seats for Bishops in the House of Lords. The NHS spent £29m on Chaplaincy services last year - around £50,000 per chaplain - with large variations between the highest spending trusts and the lowest spending. If spending was reduced to the lowest level, then £18.5m could be saved and spent on other areas that provide a clinical benefit, such as 1000 nursing assistants or a new community hospital. Apparently there are also 390,000 practising Jedi Knights (making them the fourth largest religion in the UK!), but we have yet to see the establishment of any Jedi Academies to cater for their Midichorian based needs.
A proposed campaign by the British Humanist Association with the slogan 'If you are not religious, for God's sake say so' has been labelled 'offensive' with advertisers being unwilling to display the posters.Unless you are a regular church goer, or hold another belief, then you should make sure to tick the 'No Religion' box and remind your friends and family to do the same, and then maybe we can start to get a true picture of the state of belief (or lack of it) in this country.
Sunday, March 06, 2011
Reload
A bit of catchup work on my M255 projects after the tutorial yesterday, but I hit a problem with my java development environment running slowly and not opening the workspace test environment. I've had the same Ubuntu install since 8.04 and upgraded it every time, so I bit the bullet and reinstalled 10.10 from scratch.
It all went remarkably smoothly - all of my documents and files are backed up on dropbox so they all downloaded automatically, I retrieved all of my Firefox bookmarks from Firefox sync and the reloading of the JDK and my IDE were one click installs in the software center (with one slightly tricky copy of the files for the OU Workspace that was detailed in the OU faq) and all was back and running in a super whizzy fashion.
The whole thing took under an hour, and I certainly couldn't imagine doing a complete clean install and recovery on Windows in anything like that sort of time.
It all went remarkably smoothly - all of my documents and files are backed up on dropbox so they all downloaded automatically, I retrieved all of my Firefox bookmarks from Firefox sync and the reloading of the JDK and my IDE were one click installs in the software center (with one slightly tricky copy of the files for the OU Workspace that was detailed in the OU faq) and all was back and running in a super whizzy fashion.
The whole thing took under an hour, and I certainly couldn't imagine doing a complete clean install and recovery on Windows in anything like that sort of time.
Sunday Links
- A Handful of Baby Platypus Web footed cuteness on ZooBorns
- Red Snow Moon over Edmonton Stunning picture from Astronomy Picture of the Day
- ISS - Visible Passes Useful guide to when and where to expect the International Space Station to pass overhead
- Count of Lovecraft’s Favorite Words Cthulhuchick has assembled a complete collection of HP Lovecraft stories, formatted for Kindle, and also provided a handy analysis of the frequency of all of HP's favourite eldritch words. Squamous-tastic!
- 5 of the best ever Lego illusions….
- Instant Superhero Kit Amaze your family and friends with strange psychic powers! Wooo!
- Caught on Camera The Smithsonian archive of wild animals photographed by automatic cameras
- Journey to the Center of the World - Astonishing views of the lava lake of Nyiragongo Crater on The Big Picture
- Spacewar! The original 1962 code of one of the earliest video games running on a javascript PDP-1 emulator. Cool.
- Minecraft papercraft
- Web Site Story Nuff said
- {placekitten} Need kitten pictures of any size for your website?
- Mitoza An odd little diversion ...
- Goodnight Dune Frank Herbert's classic story as a children's book
Saturday, March 05, 2011
Lonesome Town
Off to a Leeds today for yet another tutorial, in the cold drizzle
Slightly disappointed that only four people (including me) turned up for it, but I suppose that's down to what different people want to get out of the course. If you've paid it, then you might as well take advantage of four hours of tutorial time, in my opinion. Lots of useful stuff covered about the java collections framework, sets and maps and some more reviews of old TMA questions with plenty of examples to look at.
I learned from my experience last time and took some food with me for lunch time, even more advisable since we were in the other building rather than the Rose Bowl again which would have meant a five minute walk to even get to the cafeteria, never mind queuing up to buy anything.
I didn't fancy hanging around in Leeds in the cold, so we came home and I had a snooze whilst I downloaderized 'Beyond Good and Evil HD' off of Xbox Live. I played this when it first came out on Gamecube and the HD version is well worth the £5.00 or whatever it is in points. Expect a longer post about this at some point.
I suspect it is now time for Mr Smirnoff to join the Saturday night festivities whilst I check out the 'Riding the Low' station on Last.fm on Xbox Live ...
Slightly disappointed that only four people (including me) turned up for it, but I suppose that's down to what different people want to get out of the course. If you've paid it, then you might as well take advantage of four hours of tutorial time, in my opinion. Lots of useful stuff covered about the java collections framework, sets and maps and some more reviews of old TMA questions with plenty of examples to look at.
I learned from my experience last time and took some food with me for lunch time, even more advisable since we were in the other building rather than the Rose Bowl again which would have meant a five minute walk to even get to the cafeteria, never mind queuing up to buy anything.
I didn't fancy hanging around in Leeds in the cold, so we came home and I had a snooze whilst I downloaderized 'Beyond Good and Evil HD' off of Xbox Live. I played this when it first came out on Gamecube and the HD version is well worth the £5.00 or whatever it is in points. Expect a longer post about this at some point.
I suspect it is now time for Mr Smirnoff to join the Saturday night festivities whilst I check out the 'Riding the Low' station on Last.fm on Xbox Live ...
Friday, March 04, 2011
Thursday, March 03, 2011
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Starship
The day started out cloudy and cold, but brightened up by mid afternoon and was clear as the sun went down. A friend over on Twitter mentioned that the ISS was due to pass overhead at a quarter to seven so we went out to watch and had a stunning view of it flying just over the shoulder of Orion (no attack ships on fire though).
I submished my T215 TMA last night - I'm not entirely sure I've pitched the technical level of my writing assignment correctly, but learning how to do things like this is part of the course and I won't really know until I get the feedback from the tutor. Supposedly it was supposed to be suitable for first year undergrads as well as members of the public, which is a pretty broad range of technical ability. Hmmmm.
I've been keeping a weather eye on the iPad 2 launch, and while it is lovely and shiny I can't really justify getting one when I have my Macbook. I am more comfortable with this on my lap than trying to prop up an iPad somehow.
I submished my T215 TMA last night - I'm not entirely sure I've pitched the technical level of my writing assignment correctly, but learning how to do things like this is part of the course and I won't really know until I get the feedback from the tutor. Supposedly it was supposed to be suitable for first year undergrads as well as members of the public, which is a pretty broad range of technical ability. Hmmmm.
I've been keeping a weather eye on the iPad 2 launch, and while it is lovely and shiny I can't really justify getting one when I have my Macbook. I am more comfortable with this on my lap than trying to prop up an iPad somehow.
Tuesday, March 01, 2011
Haikusday
An iced white Russian
Held aloft in defiance
Still, the Dude abides
Five hundred words done
Short article on wi-fi
Now to proof read it
Post gig, head buzzing
Long time since I felt this way
Becoming a fan
Metal dinosaurs
Dance an intricate ballet
Behind steel curtains
My people love me!
Proclaims the tyrant as he
Takes bloody revenge
Held aloft in defiance
Still, the Dude abides
Five hundred words done
Short article on wi-fi
Now to proof read it
Post gig, head buzzing
Long time since I felt this way
Becoming a fan
Metal dinosaurs
Dance an intricate ballet
Behind steel curtains
My people love me!
Proclaims the tyrant as he
Takes bloody revenge
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