Another sunny morning

Blue skies again, after a very changeable weekend. It's only when the sun shines, that I realise just how depressed the cold and gloomy weather makes me. I managed to find a twenty minute window between the showers to get out and give the lawn a much needed mowing, and it is certainly looking green after all of the recent rain. Now can we have some uninterrupted sunshine in which to enjoy it, please and thank you.

I have finally broken the back of one of the toughest units on my course (hence the return to blogging) so far with lots of fiddly maths to worry about. It also includes using a rather temperamental bit of software to build and train neural networks which can be a bit hit and miss at times. I've also made a start on the next TMA, which against all odds is actually making sense.

In other news, I have a place at the Open University Student Association conference next weekend which will be an opportunity to visit the Milton Keynes campus and find out about how the OU functions. The OU has really taken the brunt of the funding cuts which is an unbelievably short sighted action by the austerity mongers in the current government. It has been shown that investing in higher education (especially part time education combined with a job) gives back a tenfold return to the economy, but apparently 'we are all in it together' means 'I went to Eton and Oxbridge, so screw the rest of you proles'.

In telly news, we are making the most of our upgraded Infinity broadband by watching Dexter on Netflix starting from series one. I am quite impressed with the HD quality pictures that we get via the xbox app for this service. There's no buffering - just the odd dropped frame here and there, but the sound continues uninterrupted so it looks as if the app has been written to cope gracefully with network delays.

We are cancelling the Lovefilm sub at the end of the month, but we need to use up this month's credits still, so Saturday night's movie was 'The Muppets'. Not entirely successful as a movie - it's an odd mix of nostalgia, old style movie musical and knowing satire (with some excellent cameo appearances) - and slightly too long at an hour and forty minutes, but it made me smile and laugh out loud more than once, so I did enjoy it. Your Muppet Mileage May Vary.