Thursday 30th September 2004
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19.40 BST
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Weather - cooling off after a sunny afternoon
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It
was surprisingly sunny late this afternoon. It was still very grey, but
also very mild, when I went for my interview at the job centre. Once
that was over the sun started to break through. I am sure there was
something poetical about that. The interview itself was a non event. My
New deal adviser, like most of the staff, had been called away to a
meeting. Eventually I found someone to first confirm that I was there
at the right time, and secondly to book me a new appointment in a
fortnights time.
After the job
centre I went shopping for some breakfast in Tesco's. Up until that
point I had not eaten all day. I bought a few nice things and some nice
condiments to go with them. I satisfied an urge for some lime and
aubergine chutneys. The lime is the same very sour stuff you get in
Indian Resturants, and the aubergine is much sweeter and seems to be
rarely found in Indian Resturants.
I finally finished the stuff I was doing in my
workshop this morning so I was able to "veg out" for the rest of the
evening. I think tomorrow I will have another go at getting over to The
Herne for another drink.
The last task for today has been to prepare the page for Octobers diary. It can be found here.
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06.45 BST
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Weather - dry, cloudy and almost mild
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This
morning I have a headache. This time I think I can blame it on beer.
Last night ended very well with a couple of pints with Patricia, and
then 90 minutes later, several more pints with Kevin and Iain. I now
seem to be slightly hungover. But it was worth it. I enjoyed it a lot,
and even more so when I was with Patricia.
Prior to all
the hedonism of boozing I did a few other things that had variable
degrees of pleasure. I spent some more time in my workshop being
constructive, and I watched a very good film. The film was a
classic that I have never seen in its entirety before, but have seen
numerous clips from it. I think it was directed by Alfred
Hitchcock, but I am not 100% certain about it, and was called "The 39
Steps". I think it was described as an action thriller, although that
description today is more normally reserved for total and complete
bloodbaths - which I hate. In The 39 Steps the action was far more
subtle and not over done. I can now understand why it hailed as classic
movie as it was thoroughly enjoyable. I can remember that the lead
character was played by Kenneth Moore, but I can't remember who played
the leading female rôle. Watching her was an interesting
exercise in changing fashions - both clothing and attitudes towards
women. When first seen she was made to look like a very frumpy
schoolteacher. That part still worked OK in modern times. In the middle
of her scenes she was dressed in a casual manner, and with her
windswept hair as the travelled over the moors, she looked very nice,
attractive even, and that is by moderm standards. For the last part of
the film she is dressed up for the theatre and so is supposed to be
glamorous, but to me, with contemporary views, she looked awful in the
formal clothes, make up, and hairstyle of the day. I would just like to
add that I do not view all female schoolteachers as frumpy. Some are
very beautiful !
Today has
become a bit of a dilemna. My next appointment with my New Deal adviser
is written down as Friday the 30th. Seeing Friday written down I had
assumed that tomorrow was going to be the 30th, but it is obviously
today. This will be the second time that my appointment has been
written down incorrectly. I did the writing, but it was dictated by my
adviser. I am thinking that he is looking at the wrong month on the
calendar. It seems fairly obvious to me that the appointment is today,
but worst of all is at 15.15. This effectively ruins any plans I had
for more drinking today, although I could go over to The Herne later in
the day. My original plan was for Iain to pick me up around midday, as
he will be passing nearby on his way from something or another, and go
back to the school with him to look at at Paul's microwave oven. The
microwave has a fault that is "only the on/off switch" - which in my
past experience as a TV engineer can mean anything from the truth to a
complete smoking disaster. I have never worked on microwave ovens
before (or even used one), but I know what is inside having seen many
spread over colleagues benches. So I have volunteered to look at this
one as a well deserved favour to Paul. Perhaps that will have to happen
tomorrow because I can see no way of fitting it in today.
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Wedneday 29th September 2004
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06.30 BST
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Weather - dull
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For
once I have had a dream that I know was directly inspired by my
circumstances. A dream that did not use extremely bizarre imagery to
reflect the real world. Of course it did not accurately portray my
exact circumstances, but the meaning behind it was unambiguous. I was
walking round a large supermarket carrying just 4 bottles of either
shampoo, or shower gel, and I kept being drawn back to a section
selling light fittings. Some of the fittings were rather obscure as to
their exact use, but I was drawn to an anglepoise lamp. I kept thinking
I could not really afford one, but came back to look at it several
times. Eventually I had to pick one up and then headed off to the
checkouts. I then woke up and as my eyes opened I thought it was
strangely light so I closed them again. This happened several times
before I decided I ought to open my eyes properly and see what was
going on. I had obviously fallen asleep with my reading lamp on.
Although my reading lamp is not an anglepoise lamp it is obvious that
my brain was thinking like a wartime ARP warden - "Turn that bloody
light out !!".
I can't
remember what the circumstances were that I should have left my light
on. I don't think that it was when I first went to sleep, and I wonder
if I got up in the middle of the night to have a pee. I am sure I was
not excessively tired when I went to be. I did go to bed soon after
22.00 so I could do some reading. After hearing yesterdays episode of
The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy I was inspired to try and work out
what had been used from the books and what was new material. So I
decided to re-read "So Long, And Thanks For All The Fish" and see what
had been used from there. I actually finished the whole book just
before midnight after having started it sometime after 20.00. I feel
sure that I turned out the light after that and spent some time
thinking about the book, life in general, and Patricia, before falling
asleep. What is more I am sure that those 10 - 15 minutes of thinking
were done in the dark. So when did I turn the light on ?
Despite my
strange nocturnal light turning on actions I felt reasonably good
yesterday. Many of the aches and pains of the previous days did not
appear and I had a reasonably productive day. If I can get through
today without feeling too unwell then I will have to assume that I did
most certainly have some sort of bug, and that I am now free of it. I
think my tooth may be a little sore, but I can't be certain until I try
eating on it. Yesterday I was careful not to aggravate it too much as
it did seem to be on the mend. I'll be careful again today as well to
give it more chance to settle down. One part of me is still sore and
that is my right thumb. So far I have not explained the circumstances
of when it first became painful. It was while toweling myself dry after
a shower yesteday morning (or was it the day before ?). It is not easy
to explain just what the actions were, but basically I had the two ends
of the towel, one in each hand, and I was drying my back. At one point
the towel seemed to wrap itself around my thumb and as I pulled it put
slight backwards pressure on the thumb pulling it the wrong way. This
was very obvious without it causing any pain, and so I stopped and
readjusted the way I was holding the towel, but a few seconds later I
was aware that my thumb joint was feeling sore. It was still sore until
a few moments ago when I was flexing it so I could better describe
where the pain was coming from. Although far from agony it was at its
most uncomfortable when I tried to touch my palm with the tip of my
thumb. After doing that a couple of times it seems to have loosened up
a little. There is still some undefined tenderness there, but it does
not feel nearly as bad as it has earlier on.
Today I will do
some more stuff in my workshop. I did spend a fair amount of time in
there yesterday, but I have more to do. Later on today, around 16.30,
or perhaps just a little bit later I am going to have a chat with
Patricia, and possibly have a beer with her as well. That will be
assuming she is in work today. She is scheduled to take a day off
sometime this week, but on Monday she could not predict when. Much
later tonight is Wednesday night drinking with Kevin, Iain, and perhaps
Howard.
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Tuesday 28th September 2004
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06.40 BST
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Weather - cold but dry
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Yesterday
was probably better than the day before which was better than the day
before that. Following that pattern today should be even better. I
still felt rough yesterday, and the evening was worst of all. My head
felt tight and aching, and for much of the day several joints were very
stiff. The main area of soreness this morning is my right hand thumb
joint where it joins the palm of my hand. Overall I feel a bit of a
wreck. Perhaps the most annoying thing is that nothing feels really bad
by itself, and nothing feels as if it should stop me doing anything I
want to do, and yet I still feel vaguely ill. Even my sore tooth is not
enough to stop me eating on it providing I do not attempt anything hard
and crunchy. It feels like I should go out and sink several pints at
lunchtime, but I tried that yesteday and it only provided momentary
relief.
I guess that is
enough moaning for one morning. So here are the positive things that
happened yesterday. I did manage to force myself into my workshop and
do some work yesterday morning. I made good progress, but I did not
finish what I set out to do, and I will have to try and finish things
this morning. At lunchtime I met Taz in the local Weatherspoons to swap
a few items. I gave her a copy of last weeks episode of The Hitch
Hikers Guide To The Galaxy (the silly girl missed it after thinking it
was on Wednesday nights instead of Tuesday [Tonight !!!]). She gave me
a "mares tail" fibre optic lamp that she no longer wanted. It was
looking very dull and the fibres were coated in fag smoke tar. I gave
them a good wash in washing up liquid and they now look bright and
sparkling again. It looks quite good beside my lava lamps.
After 3 pints
of Stella Artois we left the pub and I got talked into helping her
choose some hair dye. I don't know how she thought I could help. I know
nothing of such things, but it was sort of interesting looking round a
couple of shops I very rarely venture in to. I left her as she started
again at the begining rechecking the first shop. Once I had dropped off
the fibre optic lamp at home, and had a sit down for 10 minutes I went
out again to go and see Patricia. We didn't end up in the pub this
time, but spent some time nattering in her classroom, and then quite a
long time at her bus stop after she just missed a bus. She had a lot to
talk about and it felt quite gratifying to be taken into her confidence
about some things. We do seem to have developed some sort of bond over
these last couple of months, and it seems to be getting stronger. It is
hard to believe it could get any better than this, and there is a 99%
chance that it won't, but I'll hang onto that 1% chance that it will.
When I got home
my head was really aching. It was not a hangover type headache,
although that may have contributed to it, and it was not an eyestrain
type headache. It was a mixture of both and something else.If that
headache, and the other aches and pains are a result of 'flu than I
seem to be fighting it quite well. Hopefully it will strengthen my
immune system for the winter when many people come crashing down
with 'flu and the virus spreads all over the place. I seem to
recall a similar scenario many years ago when I had some mild symptoms
like this in early autumn and then survived half my workmates dropping
like flies during the winter.
So today I must
finish what I started in my workshop. If I get that done sufficiently
early I might venture out for a lunchtime pint, but I think that
unlikely. I may delay my next drinking session with Ivor and Iain (and
the others) until, maybe, Thursday. If, as seems likely, I don't go out
then I think I will tackle the paperwork for my house "regeneration"
(see Friday 24th for an explanation). I have done
some of it, but there is more to do. Of course the highlight of the day
will be at 18.30 when the next sensational episode of HHGTTG is
broadcast on Radio 4.
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Monday 27th September 2004
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06.45 BST
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Weather - cold and drizzling
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Bother
! As I woke up I was dreaming that I was being served a pint of beer.
The last drop was going into the glass as I woke so I never did get to
drink it. There is one other bit of dream I can remember in a hazy sort
of way. An old workmate of mine, Peter Wright, who had some senior
position in the Air Training Corps, was giving me the same test they
used to select cadets to go to Pilots School in the R.A.F. He was only
doing it for a laugh as he happened to have the testing papers with him
at work. I think we were both surprised, he more than me, when I passed
with flying colours using only educated guesswork, and a certain amount
of bullshit.
Yesterday
started off fairly slowly, but actually ended quite well. I didn't
achieve, or for that matter even start, what I had originally intended,
but I did have some good results on the computers. I finally put the
Quadra back together again after anchoring down the two hard disks
using cable ties instead of the metal bracket I was going to make. I
then set about loading it up with extra software. Finally I managed to
get it connected to the internet via my own network. I can now "surf
the net" and send and receive e-mails from it. When I get enthusiastic
about it next time I will try and see why some programmes seem to cause
it to crash. Although it was top of the range for its generation, and
has plenty of RAM, it is still rather slow. It is hard to see why Macs
are so revered by their owners when it's performance would seem to lag
so far behind a Windows PC of similar age.
Getting the
Quadra operational again was not my only Mac success. On my Windows
2000 machine upstairs I have an emulated Mac. One thing that lacked was
internet access. It was quite by chance that I found out how to set it
up to connect to the internet. While searching the hard drive looking
for something else I came across a text file explaining how to do it.
In fact it was quite easy. All I had to do was to install an extra
protocol into the Windows network connection, and the files to install
it had been sitting on my hard drive all the time. A quick(ish) reboot
followed by booting up the emulator and I was online. The emulation
software was originally written some time ago when the fastest PCs used
something like a Pentium II processor. On my 1.4GHz Athlon processor,
using fast hard disks, it absolutely flies. I am sure it runs as fast
as the very latest generation Macs, although it has to be remembered
that the software it is running is very much simplified compared to
that which the latest generation of Macs will run. Funnily enough it is
set to emulate a Quadra 950. That being the fastest choice available.
The difference between the original and the emulated is stunning. In
the time it takes the original just to boot up I can have the emulated
version booted and connected to he internet and the first porno picture
downloaded (if I should chose to do such a thing !).
Today I really
must get up ino my workshop and do some technical stuff. Some pints of
beer depend upon it. My first goal is actually to go and see Patricia
and see if I can arrange an after work drink with her sometime during
the week. I really missed her last week, although I did see her Tuesday
morning.
I seem to have
something wrong with one of my teeth. It is not painful unless I put
pressure on it. I think it is one of my crowned teeth. That is worrying
as if any work needs doing to it, it will be a load of bother. As
it is only very uncomfortable when I am eating I am hoping that it will
heal by itself if I stop disturbing it. Maybe it is just some
inflamation of the gum that will pass.
I made mention
of the fact that I had bought some new shower gel. It is made by Nivea
and I tried it out yesterday morning. One of the "flavourings" in it is
sandalwood. I like sandalwood, and it does indeed contain that smell,
but I am not so keen on one of the other smells in it. There is
something that smells a bit like old aftershave, Old Spice perhaps. the
combined smells are very powerful, and I wonder if they are too
powerful. Even this morning, when I wet my hand, I can still smell it.
It may be that it will turn on all the women and they will come
flocking to me, or perhaps it is too much and they will avoid me. Time
will tell after I have used it again this morning.
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Sunday 26th September 2004
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06.45 BST
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Weather - clear looking sky, cold
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Yesterday
was not a good day. I felt cold and miserable. Apart from shopping in
Tesco I don't think I achieved anything that I wanted to do. I suppose
that tripping over the lid of the Quadra 950 in the morning was just a
taster for the rest of the day. Not that most of the day was just
disasters, although I did have another one much later in the day.
It was already
very late by the time I had finally got washed and dressed. After doing
a few sundry things like loading the washing machine, and recieving a
longish phone call, I set off for Tesco. It was past midday when I got
home again so I started on some of the food I had bought. As usual I
couldn't wait to tuck in to some of the nice stuff I had bought. This
is a sort of impulsive behavior that I find very hard to resist, and it
is not just confined to food. I had bought some new shower gel that I
had not tried before. It has some aromas that I like, or at least it
mentions on the bottle that it has sandalwood in it. I had a strong
urge to test it out there and then even though I had showered once
already. I resisted that temptation, but not that of eating more than I
would have liked. My desire to eat was strengthened by the cold and
general gloominess of the day.
By early
afternoon I was feeling bored and cold so I slipped under the duvet to
read a book. It was one by Larry Niven (World of Ptavvs) that I
had started the night before. That was quite pleasant. I was warm and
enjoying what I was reading, but I did have pangs of guilt that I
should be doing something more constructive. I think I had a nap or two
while reading. Once I had finished the book I decided that I ought to
get up and do something else.
The obvious
thing to do was to do more work to finish off the Quadra 950, but that
did not appeal so I switched the TV on. UK Gold were showing a day of
Porridge so I watched some of that. After a while that began to get
boring so I went upstairs to continue re-mastering copies of the first
two radio series of The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy that Iain had
given me on a CD. They had been very enjoyable to listen to, but were
marred by several technical faults. The prime fault being that they
were very quiet having been recorded some 10dB lower than average
recording level. Some also had mobile phone interference on, and at
least one had a few seconds of repeated dialogue where two sides of a
tape had been edited together. I have now corrected everything on the
first six episodes, and also managed to reduce some of the tape hiss on
them. My removal of the mobile phone noise in episode two was not
perfect, but still a great improvement.
Once I had finished episode six, the last episode of that series (The Primary Phase),
I decided to leave the next series for another day. I went back
downstairs and started flicking around the TV channels again. I found
nothing very exciting, or at least nothing that really caught my
attention. So I looked for something else I could do. I decided that I
ought to try and write my own sci-fi story. I have often wondered if I
could write and generally concluded that I probably could not. And yet
I seem to be able to write loads of rubbish right here. This is all
factual though, and does not require imagination or any skills at using
dialogue. Nevertheless I had a few ideas for cranky scenarios, and if
someone else would not write them for me I ought to try myself. So I
actually started. I had no idea for an overall plot - just some ideas
that I thought should be included. It started off quite well. That is
quite well in so much as I found it satisfying. Whether it had any
merit in the wider literary world is anyones guess, probably not, but
the important thing is that I was enjoying writing it. What's more the
ideas seemed to come quicker than I could type so I never got stuck. I
haven't mentioned that I was writing this on the laptop yet, have I? I
was using notepad for the writing as it is quick and easy. I could cut
and paste it into something like Word later. I had written enough for a
first page, perhaps more, when I thought as I should save what I had
written so far. Just as I decided that, the battery died on me taking
all my work with it. This was the second major disaster of the
day. It was disappointing, but I have decided that was just a practice
run to see if I could do it. I had already decided that I should open
the story in a slightly different way - one that would use up more
words, still be interesting, and delay the already rather thin bit of
plot that I had thought out so far, thus making for a longer story.
I'll have
another go at writing fiction another day, but after that I decided to
go to bed and do more reading. I read until close on midnight and then
turned the light out to go to sleep. I fell asleep very quickly. That
was surprising considering the lie-in I had in the morning and the
several naps during the day. I remember several snippets of dreams, but
I'll only recount one bit here. It is very bizzare and somewhat
disturbing. It must mean something,
but just what I don't think I even want to think about (although the
dream itself explains most of it). In this dream fragment I had thorns
growing out of my penis. Three of them. I was examining my penis
outside what was, and maybe still is, the newsagent at the bottom of
George Lane. I cannot remember what came before this so I have no
explanation as to why it was happening in that precise location. These
thorns were a product of old age and I had to pull them out. The
external appearance was of a small quill a few millimetres long.
If didn't pull them out then they would grow and would become
difficult to remove, and what's more, would make intercourse all but
impossible. They actually pulled out very easily, and with no pain that
I can recall. I suppose they were a sort of analogue of an
ingrowing hair. At the point where they entered the skin was a small
lump of zit like material, while inside they had a hard root that would
, apparently, curl round making removal both difficult and painful if
left for too long. I woke up very soon after, and although it seemed
strange it did not feel a very scary thing to dream about. In the dream
it had all been done without any sense of drama as if it was an
everyday thing that everbody does.
I have two
things that I want to do today. The first is to try out the new shower
gel. It is close on 100% certain I will do that. The second is to get
up into my workshop and do something creative. I have a friend who is
waiting on what I will do there, and it means more beer if I finish it.
So it is fairly important, but I can't say I have much enthusiasm for
it at this very minute.
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Saturday 25th September 2004
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09.25 BST
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Weather - cold with occasional drizzle
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There
was some sunshine yesterday, but this morning it feels as if autumn is
really taking a grip. The sky is grey and there is evidence of a small
splash of rain outside. It is also getting cold. When I opened the back
door for Nelly there was a real icy blast blowing across my feet and
legs. It is also starting to feel cool in the house. Last night I came
close to putting some heating on. I think I had better dig out, and
clean, my old Mastercare jumpers. They are all I have as extra means of
staying warm without using any heaters. It is a shame that they have
Mastecare emblazoned across the front of them or I could also wear them
outside. In severe weather I have done so, and will do so again, but it
has to be a bit exceptional to use them as mere casual wear.
Yesterday was
very boring. It was not that I didn't have anything to do. I did, and
some of it was semi important, but I found it very hard to get
motivated. The Macintosh Quadra 950 is still sitting here in bits. I
now have almost everything I need to complete that project. All that is
lacking is for me to make a small metal bracket to hold the hard
disk(s) now that the original mounting bracket is used for a CD ROM
drive. Everything wlse has been tested and more or less set up ready to
go. If I had been inspired enough to finish it I would not have almost
tripped over the case lid this morning and cut my foot up on it. (I
have several painful scrapes, but there is little blood). I think that
my lack of motivation is because having been asked for my phone number
I have not had a call from Patricia about an after work drink this
week. I knew she would almost certainly be too busy last night so I
should have tried to arrange something for the night before (Thursday),
but I was feeling off colour that night (excess fruit eating !). I'll
have to see what I can work out for next week.
I still do not
feel very motivated this morning but I think there are some things that
I will have to do. Besides the usual Saturday laundry, and a trip to
Tesco's, I want to persuade myself to spend a couple of hours in my
workshop. If I could do all that before 13.00 I would happily see if I
could round up some drinking partners and go and get drunk, but it is
nearly 10.00 already and it will probably be many hours later before I
can really relax.
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Friday 24th September 2004
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07.00 BST
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Weather - clear sky, sunny and rather cold
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Last
night I had a demonstration of advanced brain fatigue. My brain was
showing all the symptoms of lack of RAM, or possibly my hard drive has
gained too many bad sectors. It was around midnight and I had been
doing some reading in bed while listening to the radio. I was tuned
into the Dutch station Arrow Classic Rock and they had been, as usual,
playing some good music. I was just about to turn the radio, and
reading light, off when they played a Doors track. It may have been
Riders On The Storm, but I am not sure this morning. So I turned out
the light, put my brain into neutral, and lay back to enjoy the music.
As I listened an image started to form in my mind. It was probably of
some event in the past and it felt good. The trouble is I tried to
sieze that image and conciously analyse what was going in an attempt to
derive even more pleasurable memories from it. Once I did that the
image popped and evaporated away. All I was left with was a sort of
warm feeling and an impression of brown like the light in an autumn
forest. I am aware that I have been experiencing similar things for
some time now. I'd guess that listening to the radio is one situation
where my brain relaxes and I get ideas forming that I can't remember
once I try and conciously think about them. I think there have been
other times when this has happened which did not involve listening to
the radio. Could this be the start of some sort of mental
deterioration, or is it that I have only just noticed something that is
quite normal? Does a madman know he is mad? Does a Sinclair Spectrum
know that it is not an fast modern PC? The answers to all these
questions will be told sometime in the future (if I have a brain then).
Wheeeeeeeeee.
After a week or more of very unhealthy eating, all the fruit I ate
yesterday has started to detoxify my body. It started last night and
has possibly reached a conclusion this morning. It all seems remarkably
fast. Last night I had some very unhealthy food that had some fairly
strong chilli sauce on it. It seems, and probably is, improbable. but I
am sure I detected that same chilli passing through this morning. I
won't go into details, but I am sure the average mind can guess all
they details it wants !
Yesterday I
listened to a very funny radio series - all 5 episodes of 30 minutes
each. It was called Seymour The Fractal Cat. It was a sci-fi comedy
involving sentient computers and a talking cat. At a guess I would say
the writer, whose name I can't remember, was inspired by Douglas Adams.
There were several little throwaway one liners that were very
remeniscient of the humour in The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy.
Even the lead character, who once again I cannot remember his name, had
some of the same mannerisms of Arthur Dent (who was the lead character
in THHGTTG).
Today I feel I
must do some paperwork. The local council wants to "regenerate" my
house (along with all the others in the road). This involves cleaning
and restoring the brickwork, building a new front garden wall with a
new gate, and some other stuff. I am not sure if it a truly altruistic
offer from the council, or whether in todays new world order they want
to make the area conform to their idea of what a modern council estate
should look like. They probably feel that if all the houses conform to
their pattern of thought we can all be controlled like good little
citizens. Casting all paranoia aside as it is really only worthy of
certain weird American citizens, it is actually a useful service at a
time when I cannot afford to do the external maintenance of my house.
Being on Job Seekers Allowance and having no other income and precious
little savings it should all be done for free. There is a slight catch
involved though. Should I decide to sell the house in the next five
years I will have to pay 25% of the cost of the work in the first year.
It reduces by 20% each year until after 5 years there is no financial
penalty for selling the house. There is also a clause that I would not
be able to make any major alterations to the exterior of the house
during that 5 years. I feel I can live with those conditions so I will
go ahead with it. Initially it involves a lot of paperwork and
beurocracy, and that is obviously followed by the disruption of the
builders doing there stuff. In the long run it will be worth it.
|
Thursday 23rd September 2004
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|
22.35 BST
|
|
Weather - cooling down after sunny intervals
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|
Good
news ! I've just found some details of my BT pension. I am due to get
that pension when I am 60. Just 10 more years to hang on. It should be
fairly lucrative as well. In 1992 it was worth £4507 P.A. and is,
I believe (or hope) index linked. Now assuming that the index is based
on the price of beer and fags it should be worth about £96,000 a
year by now !
|
12.15 BST
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|
Weather - occasional drizzle but very mild
|
|
Just
for a change I thought I would write something at midday (or quarter
past for the more pedantic). Although it is very overcast, and
occasionally there is a little drizzle, it is surprisingly mild
outside. When I went to Tesco I was very surprised at just how warm it
felt. I was almost feeling too warm after lugging a heavy bag of
shopping back from Tesco. In the end I compromised over my desire for
healthy and unhealthy food. I did buy one sandwich (a triple meat
pack), but did buy some fruit as well. They had some fruit on special
offer, and I bought one melon and some yellow plums. The plums are
nearly, but not quite, ripe. I have eaten two already and they do taste
rather good. If I can I will only be eating fruit for dinner tonight,
although I am craving for something "nice" even just thinking about it.
By nice I mean chips, or curry, or kebab, or chinese, or chocolate ice
cream, or peanuts, or sausages, or even roast lamb with mint sauce and
roast potatoes and other vegetables, or practically anything that is
bad for you.
|
07.00 BST
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|
Weather - dull and windy
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|
After
a good night out it is traditional to wake up in the morning to find
you have taken a traffic cone to bed, although where this tradition
comes from remains a mystery. I don't think I know a single person who
has ever admitted to taking a traffic cone to bed with them. I had a
good night out last night, but not on the traffic cone collecting
scale. Far from it. I was virtually sober when I got in after the pub
last night. Yet I managed to wake up with a small trophy. It was a coat
hanger. I think it must have slipped off some clothes, perhaps as I got
changed to go to the pub, and fortunately it was at the far end of the
bed near my feet. Had it been the other end I suspect I would have had
a very uncomfortable night.
There were
trophies of far greater importance that I brought home from the pub.
Iain has very kindly printed out the manual for the Quadra 950 Mac and
found me the dongle like thing that converts Apples rather bizzare
AUU-15 network interface connection to a more world standard RJ45
connector. He presented both to me in the pub last night. I am now able
to push my Quadra 950 project through to its final conclusion. That
will be to get it connected to my home network and able to connect to
the internet. Ideally I should be able to do file sharing beween the
PC's and the Mac, but because Apple do it differently it will be tricky
to set up.
When I first
woke up I was convinced it was a Saturday. I was awoken to the sound of
a sort of crashing noise and it took a few moments before I could get
my senses together and realise the noise was the dustmen, and that it
is really Thursday today. I feel sure something is supposed to happen
today, but I can't think what it is ! I intend to go to Tesco and buy
New Scientist, possibly Micro Mart, and definitely some fruit. If I
can, I am going to eat nothing but fruit until this evening, and maybe
even then. I seem to have eaten nothing but crap for the last week and
I feel pretty yucky because of it. Of course once I am in Tesco's there
will be loads of temptations and I would not be surprised if I didn't
come out with some sausage and egg sandwiches (or similar). I reckon it
is about 50 - 50 that I will stick to fruit.
|
Wednesday 22nd September 2004
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|
05.45 BST
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|
Weather - slightly windy, dry
|
|
Euuuuuuurgh,
I feel rough this morning. Yesterday was a good day, but I only ate
junk food (and nothing but junk food), and I had too much to drink.
Yesterday started with me going to sign on and then popping in to see
Patricia. Somehow that lasted quite a long time. Normally I would leave
before too many of her pupils arrive, but yesterday half the class were
in before I left. After leaving there I went into the Aldi supermarket.
I didn't buy that much, but what I did buy was mostly junk food like
peanuts, tortilla chips and liquorice allsorts. It was only these that
I ate all day. Nothing much happened then until I went out at
dinnertime to have a drink with Ivor and the rest of the gang.
We would
normally go to The Herne, but they were not doing any food, and so we
went to The Fox On The Hill which is a short (uphill) walk from Denmark
Hill railway station. It had its good points and bad points. Being a
Weatherspoons pub it made for a very cheap round - just £10.01
for six of us. Unfortunately there was a great lack of seating that
could hold all six of us and we crammed into a booth that would have
been more comfortable with only four. It was rather pleasant being
scrunched up with Max, but overall it felt almost claustrophobic. After
walking up he hill to the pub I was feeling very hot and I had to go
outside to cool off after fifteen minutes of being packed in like on a
commuter train. After an hour the workers (Ivor, Iain, Pat and Gill)
had eaten their lunch and headed back to work. Ivor dropped Max and
myself off at The Herne on the way back to work, and he and Iain would
re-join us there later.
One thing I
definitely wanted to do was to get home by 18.00 so that I would be
relaxed and ready to listen to The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy.
That never happened ! It was more like 19.00 when I got in, and perhaps
a little later than that. It had been a good afternoon, although Ruth,
who had joined us mid way through the afternoon, was a little
distracted by other business and was not such good company as usual.
When I finally
got in I was feeling quite drunk and very sleepy. I watched some TV
before going upstairs to listen to the recording of The Hitch Hikers
Guide To The Galaxy that my faithful computer had made. It was all
there, but it was a shame that I wasn't. I fell asleep twice while
listening to it and had to rewind it every time I woke up again. This
morning I will have to listen to it again in its entirety. What I did
hear, and can remember, sounded good although in the 20 years since the
first two series some of the actors voices have changed slightly, but
are still instantly recognisable.
Today poses a
problem. I am sort of expected to go for another drink this dinnertime.
In fact I would like to, but I am not sure if I should. Being a
Wednesday I will be going for my regular evening drink anyway, and
there is also the very slight possibility that I will be called to have
a quick after work drink with Patricia. At this point in time some
"hair of the dog" sounds both good and bad. One positive thing is that
the venue is to be O'Neils. I don't know too much about it as a pub,
but it is literally built on top of Denmark Hill railway station and is
therefore very simple to get too. It would be nice to steal a hug from
Max again, but I think I will have to wait until nearer the time before
I commit myself.
|
Tuesday 21st September 2004
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|
07.15 BST
|
|
Weather - clear blue sky, sunny, but very fresh
|
|
Yesterday
remained gloomy all day, and it was pretty windy as well. Right now the
sun is shining, the sky it totally blue and the air is fairly still. If
it were not that it is pretty chilly outside it could almost be a
summers day. Originally I was happy that yesterday started gloomy so
that when my eyes were photographed I wouldn't come out the place into
the full glare of a low-in-the-sky sun. It turned out that I didn't
need the drops in my eyes that dilate the pupils and leave normal
vision over exposed and painful. The results from the pictures showed
one tiny blemish on the network of blood vessels at the back of the
eye. I had a similar one, though in a different place, found on the
test before the last. That had healed by the last test. Just to make
sure everything is OK my next test is being brought forward. It will be
in eleven months instead of twelve months. The only thing I am worried
about is whether they will change the location of the lab where the
test takes place. It had changed for this visit after they opened up a
brand new suite in the hospital. I went to where it used to be and then
spent an age running round like a blue-arsed fly trying to get to the
new rooms.
I did a little
more playing with the Mac Quadra 950 yesterday. I have now increased
the RAM to 40MBytes. I was trying to identify some of the sticks of 30
pin RAM that I have lying around. Mostly my internet searches came up
with nothing, but for one set of 4 sticks I did have a full part number
to search for. Several sites came up with the answer that they were 1
MB modules, manufactured by Apple for use in Quadra 950's. I found that
a litle surprising as they were only 1 MB sticks, but the real eye
opener was the price that some sites listed. One site listed them at
$206.37 EACH !!! I have 4 of them, and as far as I can remember they
were just discarded from an obsolete old PC, or may have even come out
of a loose box of RAM at a computer fair - 50p a stick ! The price of
parts for Apple computers is vastly inflated compared to the prices for
standard PC's.
It is quite
possible that I will be going for a drink this lunchtime, but by hook,
or by crook, I will be home by 18.00. At 18.30, on Radio 4, there is
the first of the latest series of The Hitch Hikers Guide To The Galaxy,
or the Tertiary phase as it is officially called. We have only been
waiting 20 years for this to happen, but the BBC have managed to get
together the original cast, with one notable exception, to perform all
their original parts. That one exception is the late Peter Jones who
played the part of The Book. His part is played by someone whose name
escapes me, but has managed to do the readings in the same style as
Peter Jones. One actor will be playing his part posthumously. He is
Douglas Adams who wrote the entire HHGTTG and decided that he would
record the part he wanted to play before he died. Just proving that the
man is a genius !
Before all that
happens I have a couple of things to do this morning. The first is to
go and sign on. The second is optional but far more pleasurable. I
think I will call in on Patricia.
|
Monday 20th September 2004
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|
06.45 BST
|
|
Weather - cold and grey. but no rain
|
|
It
feels very autumnal this morning. The sky is a steely grey colour and
there is a fair amount of wind. I am sure tere was some rain during the
night, but it seems to be dry now. Perhaps in another hour or so the
sky will brighten up as the sun rises higher, but for now it feels a
bit depressing. Even Nelly declined to have a look outside. As I opened
the back door a gust of cold wind blew at her and she ducked down, with
her ears flattened, as if she were battling against an invisible foe.
At that point she turned around and came back inside again.
The
highlight of yesterday was when Iain dropped the Mac Quadra 950 off for
me to play with. It is a surprisingly big beast. I had read
descriptions on the internet that suggested it was designed to be floor
standing, but had taken that with a pinch of salt, and yet that is not
far from the truth. It actually stands a few inches shorter than
the large tower PC case that my video editing PC is housed in, but it
does look a lot bigger and bulkier than that. Opening it up I find that
it has indeed been fitted with a Power PC processor upgrade card, but
rather surprisingly it was never fitted with a CD ROM drive. It has a
single 1 GByte hard drive, and is fitted with what must be 8 x 4 MByte
SIMM memory chips. There is still room for at least another 2 banks of
four memory chips, and maybe even five banks. It has a lot of memory
slots ! I do have a selection of spare SIMMs but I am not exactly sure
of their capacities. I think
they are 1 MByte, but they could be less. Assuming they are 1 MByte
each I have enough to fill another 2, or 3, banks of 4 chips at a time.
Ideally I would like some bigger chips such as what appear to be the 4
MByte ones already fitted. I can see I have a lot of experimenting to
do.
Apart
from no CD ROM drive I was a little disappointed that it did not come
with an Apple Super Disk drive (or LS-120 drive to PC users). It may
have been the later production models of the Quadra 950 where they were
fitted as standard, or they may have been an optional extra. Before
Iain pulls me up again on this description of the 120 MByte, floppy
disk compatible, disk drive I have to say I am confused as well. In
modern Macs a DVD burner, or maybe even just a DVD reader is called a
Super Drive, but I believe the earlier technology of the LS-120 drive
was referred to as a Super Disk
drive. Unfortunately I can't pull up the Apple specification
while I am running Linux - or can I ? Please wait................Got it
! Directly cut-and-pasted from an Apple technical paper, it says
" The upper-front location will always be filled with a 1.44MB SuperDrive.".
Unfortunately it is described as a 1.44 MB drive which suggests that at
the time Apple were using "Super" to mean high density, as opposed to
720KB disks, rather than the 120 MB magneto optical drives that were
compatible with standard floppy disks. It seems that maybe Apple just
add Super to any description of relatively new technology.
Last
night I connected the machine up and gave it a test run. It works fine.
I found that it was running system 7.5.3 and I will probably leave it
at that. There are several useful applications already installed, but I
could find no old data on it which may have been embarrassing to the
previous owner. All I did find was a single text file which included
the words Radio Free London on it. Using the built in voice synthesiser
set to Vardox (I think) I immeadiately recognised it as the basis for a
certain series of RFL jingles.
I
seemed to have lots of little dreams last night, but only one sticks in
my mind as being bizzare enough to describe. In fact it is just one
scene from what was presumably a longer dream. In this fragment of
dream Howard was modifying a laptop computer by cutting off a portion
of the motherboard using a very large angle grinder. I have no idea
what the point of this was, but I know the board was powered up at the
time. Every so often he would stop the angle grinder and press the
power botton on the board to see if it would still boot up. It seemed
to work everytime so he went on cutting. I have to say that he was
making a very neat job of it considering the board was only about 8
inches wide and the angle grinder had a 12 inch disk in it. The
strange thing is, apart from the totally ludicrous idea of slicing up
mother boards, I would normally associate attacking things with an
angle grinder with Lee and not Howard.
The sky is a
little lighter now, but it doesn't look as if there is going to be much
in the way of sun today. Perhaps none at all, but it might happen yet.
It would actually be good if it stayed gllomy until a bit later this
afternoon. At 11.30 I am due to get my eyes photographed at the
Hospital as part of the last remaining bit of diabetic care I get.
Everytime I go there, about every 6 months, they keep nagging me to get
a new doctor after the last one retired 3 or 4 years ago. As I have not
felt very ill, well not close to death, since then I still have not
bothered with a new doctor. I suppose it could be useful once I start
work in case I need a sick certificate, but I managed for many, many
years during the time I thought I didn't have a doctor (he had moved
twice in the period from about 1973 until 1999, during which years I
had no need of him, and I had lost track of him). Oh, in case you are
wondering about the need for gloom. When the eyes are photographed they
use drops that dilate the pupil making everthing seem glaringly bright.
It is actually the retina, deep in the back of the eye that is
photographed.
|
Sunday 19th Sptember 2004
|
|
10.25 BST
|
|
Weather - bright and sunny but cold
|
|
In
the final analysis yesterday was rather boring. I don't think I really
achieved anything of any significance. It is strange then that I
finally went to bed so late. It was something like 01.30 before I
finally turned over and went to sleep. This morning I have been very
lazy and had an extended lie in. I did get up briefly at 07.30 to feed
Nelly, and I have ben up again now for a little while. Just for a
change I am writing after washing and dressing.
I have no real
plans for today. Well, at least nothing that will take up much time.
Looking through the local paper yesterday I did find another job to
apply for, but that will not take up much time. The job, for an
electronic test and repair engineer, is one I have applied for once,
several months ago, by e-mail. That last application was not even
acknowledged so I am going to send this one in by post. It is a job I
know I can do well and enjoy doing - a bit like the job I am still
waiting to hear about in Hainault. There is one major difference
though. This new job is located in Bellingham. Getting to work there
would be a doddle so I am going to pull all the stops out for it. If
experience and charm do not work I will have to step things up a
little. Maybe starting at bribery and finishing with nuclear weapons.
(I bet that last sentence started alarm bells ringing in the Pentagon !)
|
Saturday 18th September 2004
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|
07.45 BST
|
|
Weather - grey and damp
|
|
|
I
took the liberty of taking my camera along when I met up with Patricia
yesterday. I had gained the impression that yesterdays drink was going
to be a part two to the one on Wednesday when Debbie and Brian were
there. But no, it was just the two of us. I think we were in the pub
for nearly 90 minutes, although it seemed much shorter than that. We
only had the one pint which we shared, although I did drink the
majority of it, and amazingly I didn't smoke a single fag until I had
waved goodbye to her at the bus stop. That's why I can't believe it was
as much as 90 minutes, and from 17.35 to 19.05 seems to be 90 minutes
in my book of calculations. I do so enjoy these little meetings. It is
a shame that they are destined to go nowhere.
For a short
while during our drink Patricia went back into teacher mode, but it had
nothing to do with job seeking. In fact it was to do with reading. I
know that Patricia has read many classical books and I mentioned that I
had recently read Lewis Carrol's "Through The Looking Glass". She
suggested several more books that I ought to read, or might enjoy, so I
suggested that she write me a list as I would never be able to remember
some of the titles she suggested. She joked that she was setting me my
homework and would be testing me on it later !
One suggested
book title I do recall was "The English Patient". I am familiar with
the title and I do wonder if I have read it already, or just recall it
as the name of a film. Perhaps I have even seen the film, or maybe a TV
play based upon it. It is probably unlikely as I cannot recall any of
the plot.
|
Yesterday
evenings drink was really the highlight of the whole day. The morning
was spent receiving a couple of phone calls followed by a trip to Tesco
where I bought a rather large lunch. Much of the afternoon was spent
listening to some old radio programmes and having an (unintentional)
afternoon nap. Having got back from the pub I watched some TV, ate some
supper, and did some reading in bed until almost midnight.
Today
might well follow on similar lines except I won't be seeing Patricia, I
won't be going to Tesco, but I will probably be going to have a very
brief meeting with someone to buy something off him. There is a very
unlikely possibility that I could get the Apple Mac I mentioned
yesterday delivered today. If that did happen it would change the whole
course of the day. For a start it would probably involve a little
drinking, and I would have many fascinating experiments and journies of
discovery to make.
In case your web browser is only showing a plain red bar next to the date I'll say it again in plain text.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAM
|
Friday 17th September 2004
|
|
07.30 BST
|
|
Weather - dry and almost sunny
|
|
Just
when I thought I was safe from any more offers of junk I have been
offered another old Apple Mac. Somehow I just can't say no to things
like this. I might have been able to refuse the offer if were not that
this sounds like an interesting computer. It is a Quadra 950. My
limited research suggests this was the very last of the breed of 68K
processor Mac's and could be relatively fast (in comparison to other
68K Mac's). But there is more. Until I have opened the box to confirm
the donors memory I can't be sure, but he thinks it had a Power PC
upgrade card fitted. That could be interesting. It would mean that it
should be capable of running almost modern software. By almost modern I
mean the Mac equivalent of Windows 95 instead of Windows 3.11, although
that is a rather simplistic, and not totally accurate description.
Hopefully I will be getting it sometime in the coming week, but in the
meantime many thanks to Peter for the offer.
Yesterday went
quite well. It started off as planned. I went out to buy New Scientist,
Micro Mart and a copy of Rail, but from there on the plan deviated. I
met Taz in the local Weatherspoons for a quick drink and we got talking
about films. She knows so many modern films and actors/actresses that I
just do not have a clue about. I then admitted that I had some DVD's
that I have never got around to watching yet, and amongst them are some
that "I really ought to watch". So she popped here to inspect my DVD
collection. Apparently I have got quite a few films that meet her
approval, and funnily enough about half of those I have never go around
to watching. No matter how good I am told they are I somehow can't
quite raise the enthusiasm for many modern films. I have this cranky
criteria that if you can't enjoy a film by watching it in black and
white with mono sound then it has failed in the style over substance
test. I'm probably just a cranky old git, but I just can't bring myself
to believe that technically brilliant special effects are a substitute
for a good story line.
After the
lecture about my DVD collection I decided to show off my Goon Show
collection. Taz is a Goon Show/Spike Milligan fan and if a couldn't
outdo her in the film stakes I managed to make her envious of my Goon
Show collection. All this took a little time and it was not until
almost 17.00 when I got back in after escorting Taz to the bus stop. I
was feeling rather hungry. Perhaps very hungry would be a better
description as I had not eaten a thing all day. One possible plan was
to go to Tesco and buy a pre-cooked chicken - very tasty and a lot
cheaper than Kentucky fried Chicken. I still wanted to make a start on
reading my new magazines so I opted for a chinese takeaway to be
delivered. It was rather more expensive than the Tesco chicken
option, but so very delicious ! Between eating and watching some
TV I managed to read nearly all the short articles in New Scientist,
and made a start on Micro Mart. I did seem to get a little carried away
with TV watching and ended up watching an old Red Dwarf on UK Gold 2.
After that had finished I nearly got caught watching the next
programme, Black Adder, but decided to take Micro Mart to bed and carry
on reading it there. There are a few bits I might read a little deeper,
but essentially I finished the whole magazine, but not before it was
just past 01.00. I'm sure I wanted to be asleep closer to 23.00, but
that never seemed to happen.
Whatever was
making me feel ill at the start of the week seems to have passed now.
After a slightly short night I do not appear to be tired, and after the
chinese meal my guts appear to be stable. I wonder if all my ailments
are due to sitting in the icy blast of Ivor's cars air conditioning
while wearing a damp T-shirt last Thursday. It felt very nice at the
time, but as I recall some of the reason for having the damp T-shirt
was that I had started on the bad guts a few hours before Ivor picked
me up. It was the exertion of running to the toilet every five minutes
that got me in a sweat in the first place. Well, what ever it was
appears to be over now. So hopefully I will be able to totally enjoy
this afternoons drink with Patricia, when she finishes work at 17.30,
without wondering if I am about to die (actually it never was that bad,
but it sounds nice and dramatic !).
|
Thursday 16th September 2004
|
|
09.35 BST
|
|
Weather - bright and sunny, but very cool
|
|
I
did get up at 06.00 as usual, but after feeding Nelly, and spending
some time on the toilet, I decided to go straight back to bed. It was
only Nelly who woke me up again some 10 minutes ago. I think she was
feeling rather thirsty. Last night I put fresh water down for her, but
she prefers to leave it for at least 24 hours efore she considers it
safe to drink. I let her out into the garden just now and she went
straight to the rather dirty bowl of water out there that lately has
been topped up by rainwater.
I feel a lot
better for that extra 3 hours sleep, although my stomach is still not
totally settled. I think I want to avoid food this morning, but I might
succomb because some of the feeling from my gut is one of emptiness.
What I probably should have is just some fruit, but I fancy something
like some barbecue chicken and chips. I did, perhaps foolishly, have a
few ham and mayonaise rolls when I sat down to watch the recording of
The Bill when I had finished writing the short piece last night. So I
should not be feeling empty right now. On the other hand, last night,
and also first thing this morning, I was a major contributor of
greenhouses gasses (methane !). That seems to have stopped now, and it
might explain why I feel so deflated now.
But enough of my
lavatorial humour, and on with today. I think I am supposed to be
meeting up with Scott and Taz again this afternoon, but only for a
brief drink. I'll have to check on that a bit later this morning. The
first priority, once I am washed and dressed properly, is to go out and
buy this weeks copy of New Scientist and Micro Mart. I am tempted to
get a railway magazine as well while I have this temporary bulge in my
finances. So today may be spent mainly reading with perhaps a brief
drinking interlude this afternoon.
|
Wednesday 15th September 2004
|
|
23.24 BST
|
|
Weather - dry and cold
|
|
I
guess you could say that today has been a good day. The money from the
sale of my shares appeared in my bank account on time so I am solvent
again for a little while. I had a call from Taz asking if I would like
to meet her and Scott in the local Weatherspoons this afternoon. So I
had a few pints with them. I popped in to see if Patricia wanted a
drink after work and found that it was already planned, and what's more
she was going to the local Weatherspoons with Debbie, from the office,
and another chap, Brian (I think) who is her boss or work colleague. So
I managed to have a drink with Patricia as well. Then, this evening, it
was a few more drinks with Kevin and Iain. I don't fel very drunk at
the moment, but my stomach is complaining about something. I feel
rather bloated and windy !
The drink with
Patricia and her colleagues was quite good. Brian was a bit of a beer
lover and bought me two halves of De Konniek Belgium ale while refusing
my offers to buy a round. At the end of the drink we walked Patricia
back to her bus stop. Brian shook her hand, but I felt very priveleged
to get a hug and a reminder to meet again after work on Friday. So you
could say I am feeling rather happy at the moment !
|
06.00 BST
|
|
Weather - dry
|
|
I
am going to have to rethink the colour coding for the weather
background. Originally it was yellow for a bright sunny day, red for an
extremely hot day, and blue for an icy day. I can't remember what I was
using last winter when it was still dark as I wrote it up. Now it is
still mostly dark, although I can see the sky beginning to lighten up,
and that the sky seems to be mostly clear with some darker streaks of
cloud visible in it. I guess it will be a sunny morning, and so I
should have coloured the weather area yellow, but until it actually
happens I feel that grey for twilight is the best answer.
Still on the
subject of weather...Yesterday was mostly dry, but there were a few
showers, although far less than the weather forecasts I had seen
predicted. There was aslo quite a few sunny intervals when the sun felt
very hot still. The main feature was the wind. It was very gusty, and
some of those gusts were very fierce.
Yesterday
morning I did decide to have a look at the laser printer that I
mentioned then. After dusting it down I fired it up and observed
several error codes. It took a lot of research to find the meaning of
those error codes. Being a Canon printer you might have thought that
Canon's website could be helpful. It wasn't. In fact it was extremely
irritating. Unlike most other manufacturers instead of being able to
download a user manual it redirected you to a third party website that
offered to sell a manual. I eventually found a website with a table of
the error codes and was able to ascertain that my errors were very
serious errors indeed. With great reluctance I decided to throw the
printer away. I did retain the brand new toner cartridge though.
I have given it to Ivor where it stands a better, but still small,
chance of finding a new home. So if anyone wants an unused toner
cartridge for a Canon laserprinter, type EP-L (for LBP-4 series of
printers, and probably more), then see Ivor about it.
After doing the
dirty deed of throwing the printer away I went to console myself with a
drink at The Herne. I was still feeling pretty lousy after waking up
with a raging headache, but some painkillers helped a bit. Even with
the painkillers I felt really creaky as I walked down the road towards
the bus stop. My neck felt very stiff, and one of my legs needed a
little time to free itself up. I felt dreadfully tired in the pub, and
towards the end I was struggling with my last pint. I had to leave the
last inch in the glass as I was begininning to feel a little nauseous.
I still feel a little odd this morning. All the symptoms are mild, but
added together it is almost like I am suffering from a mild case of
'flu. As I am not in work I don't think I will let it affect me too
much. Or at least not while it is mild. If it does get worse then I may
have to think again. The chances are that once I am up, washed, and
dressed, and have had a chance to get mobile or busy, I will feel OK
again. There are two very good reasons why I should not be ill today.
The money from the shares I sold should end up in my bank account today
so I will be going on a micro spending spree (at least £20 !!!),
and tonight is drinking night at the very expensive The Ram. There
could also be an even more important third reason for staying well. I
think I may be asking Patricia if she wants an after work drink tonight.
|
Tuesday 14th September 2004
|
|
06.30 BST
|
|
Weather - dry
|
|
I
saw a great documentary about the Sex Pistols on BBC3 last night. It
was primarily about the fight between Johnny Rotten and Malcolm
McClaren, in the high court, to recover money, and song rights, that
Johnny Rotten claimed he was owed. It seems the High Court agreed with
him. To explain how this came about the documentary explored the
history of the band. That included parts of the long banned Bill Grundy
interview where the Sex Pistols famously swore on TV at only 6pm !
After seeing
that documentary I dreamt about going to a Sex Pistols reunion gig. It
wasn't quite as simple as that as lots of irrelevant stuff was going on
before the gig. I am not sure what my role was at the gig. I seemed to
know a lot about what was going on as if I had some official function,
and yet I acted only as a spectator. The gig itself was to take place
out in the open in a place that had some superficial resemblance to
Bromley Market Square, and yet that is a totally inadequate
description. It is easier to describe where I was and what I could see.
I was outside a pub sitting at a table. I can't recall if the pub had a
name, but it was painted black. Opposite me, some 30ft away was some
elegant old buildings. To my left was some rather grim looking 1960's
buildings - concrete, brick, and very plain iron railings painted light
blue. To my right was some warehousing like buildings. The bands
equipment was set up in front of those. At first the band seemed to be
chasing each other about, along with some other people, and it looked
as if a fight was brewing, but mainly it was one or two people
cajoling, and threatening various members of the band to start the gig.
Eventually a guitarist, who I did not recognise as such, but knew he
was a member of the Sex Pistols, got up on the stage and started
playing the opening bars of Anarchy In The UK over and over again. This
seemed to work as a ralllying cry for the rest of the band who
reluctantly started heading towards the stage. Meanwhile I was
approached by a very pretty Indian woman who said I had to stop the
gig. She wanted it stopped not because it would obviously be offensive
to some, but that it might destroy a myth. She was evidently an old fan
of the band and thought this artificial reunion was beyond the pale. I
have no idea who this woman might be based on in real life, but in the
dream I had first seen her some 20 years earlier and thought she was
very beautiful. Now after 20 years I finally had a reason to talk to
her. I told her that she was very beautiful and kissed her on the
cheek. It was at that point I woke up with a really bad headache like a
migraine. My head still hurts now, but it seems to be improving.
There was some
rain overnight, but despite the dire warnings on the weather forecast
it looks as if the sky is turning blue as the sun rises. I doubt
it will last. Yesterday started off raining, but by midday it had dried
up, and in the afternoon there were even a few short periods of
sunshine. All this seems at odds with the pictures shown on the weather
forecasts on Sunday. That was showing huge great swathes of evil
looking clouds covering all of the S.E. yesterday and today. (As
I write that, the sun has just broken through and the tops of the trees
are glowing). If it could only stay dry until later in the afternoon I
could easily get the urge to go for a drink at The Herne.
Some days
ago I wrote that I was going to strip down and clean up my Epson Stylus
Pro XL A3 ink jet printer (what a mouthful that was). I finally did it
yesterday afternoon. It is still not perfect, but I think I have
improved the printing on it. It would be a lot better if it had not
apparently run out of black ink. The colours seem good though. I must
go and buy some black ink to refill the cartridge before the special
offer in Tesco finishes. After the success of that (the small
improvement, but more importantly the fact that I managed put it all
back together and it still worked) I am tempted to have another go at a
laser printer I was given years ago. It has a paper feeding problem
where someone probably put it back together incorrectly after cleaning
it (no it wasn't me!). As it is only black and white it was a very low
priority for me and has just sat there gathering dust for years. maybe
now is the time to tackle it again. So what should it be - printer or
The Herne ? Watch this space !
|
Monday 13th September 2004
|
|
12.00 BST
|
|
Weather - occasional rain, some heavy.
|
|
I
went out in the pouring rain to see Patricia and to call in on the Job
Centre first thing this morning. It seems my guess is right. Patricia
did look in at the pub last Friday just at the time I had gone to the
toilet. Damm and blast ! I'm still not sure how long she could have
stayed if we had met up, but I doubt it would have been that long.
Although no day has been mentioned I have been given the OK to try for
a extra night this week as well as Friday. In fact it was almost
suggested that I ask her out. My getting the OK was more or less
just a clarification of something she said (the exact words escape me).
I guess I am happy again, although rather impatient. I think I'll wait
until at least tomorrow. Hopefully the money from the shares I sold
will be credited to my bank account by then so I will be rich - RICH
beyond the dreams of avarice ! Well, enough for a few pints anyway.
|
06.00 BST
|
|
Weather - strong winds, still dry
|
|
If
I had been inclined to get out of bed and come down here to the PC at
02.30, I could have described an interesting dream. Now it is too late
and most of the detail has evaporated. The dream was most probably
inspired by the wierdness of reading "Through The Looking Glass" (which
I have now finished), and did feature red knights, or maybe red kings
and queens, although red buses would seem to have featured more
prominently. As I recall I had to get from Hammersmith (or it could
have been Beckenham) to somewhere in North London by bus. Instead of
meeting lots of strange characters, like Alice did, I met lots of
strange web pages as I tried to download various timetables and
pictures of prominent features on the route. One part of the dream
seemed to dwell on why I needed to take bus route 225 as it seemed to
take a rather bizzare route to my destination. I can't remember where
the 225 runs in real life, but in the dream it zigzagged around the
east end of London, and seemed to cross the Thames several times in
places where there are no bridges. I am sure that I was dreaming
something similar to this again when I woke up a little while ago. I
maybe could have remembered that last dream if my priority hadn't been
to get to the toilet.
It seems to be
dry at the moment, but there was a little splash of rain late yesterday
evening. The main feature of the weather is the strong blustery winds.
I gather that the wind will remain strong for a few days now, and that
heavy rain is on its way. It is too dark at the moment to assess the
amount of cloud, but as the day begins to lighten it looks very grey.
My main priority
for the day is to call in on Patricia and see if I can find out what
went wrong on Friday night. Maybe, if I am very lucky, we can arrange
an after work drink sooner than Friday, but I am not optimistic.
|
Sunday 12th September 2004
|
|
06.30 BST
|
|
Weather - bright and clear
|
|
It
looks as if it is starting off as a nice day weatherwise. The sky is
almost totally blue with just a few wispy clouds, but my first look at
those clouds showed them to be very red as in "red sky in the mornng,
shepherds warning". At least the wind has dropped. It was very blustery
yesterday evening, although there is still some wind this morning.
I
have been reading "Through The Looking Glass" and it is a very weird
read indeed. It is difficult to know if I am enjoying it or not. It is
certainly interesting to come across the original words to many short
quotations that are in common use. It is odd to think that it is a
childrens book. Maybe at a simple level it is just enjoyable nonsense,
but from an adult perspective it seems just too drug inspired, and as
such, it is hard to get your head around it while in a serious state of
mind. It was interesting, and perhaps worrying, to read the foreword
where Lewis Carrol's life was described. It seems very dodgy to me. By
modern day standards I am sure he would be branded a paedophile as he
does seem to have had a rather unhealthy obsession with young girls.
But then again most hysterical headlines today suggest that most
paedophiles are after young boys which is even more inexplicable than
going after young girls.
Today I have
very few things I must do. Buying some cat litter is a high priority. I
ought to tidy up a few more off-air recordings, but beyond that I will
either be very bored, or make something up to do as the day progresses.
|
Saturday 11th September 2004
|
|
07.30 BST
|
Weather - dry, bright start to the day
|
And
so begins another day. A Saturday. A day when not much really happens,
but otherwise very similar to any other day. It is the anniversary of
9/11, but as every Englishman knows, nothing much happened on the 9th
of November, so we'll conveniently ignore it here.
To add to my
grief yesterday I had an e-mail from NTL saying they could no longer
accept card payment for this NTL internet account. They had me going
for a little while. I was thinking that it was another case of
"insufficient funds", but a bit later I suddenly clicked that it is
probably just that my card has been renewed after the old card expired.
So all I have to do is to enter the new expiry date from the new card.
I have yet to confirm this, but will do so once I go online.
I
think much of my entertainment for today will be reading. Yesterday Taz
gave me a copy of Lewis Carrol's "Through The Looking Glass".
Apparently it is a very weird read, and is hopefully the right book
that was the inspiration for Jefferson Airplane's "White Rabbit" - a
very fine song! [One pill makes you larger, One pill makes you small,
and the one that mother gives you, don't do anything at all, .......
Remember what the dormouse said, Feed your head etc]
|
Friday 10th September 2004
|
|
21.20 BST
|
|
Weather - high humidity and occasional rain
|
|
Almost
as soon as I had finished writing this morning it started to rain. It
didn't last too long and the day has been mostly dry. It feels as
if the humidity has been very high today. Even a moderate amount of
effort has left me feeling very damp. After a large indian takeaway I
am feeling very hot, and I am sweating a lot. I hope I am able to
cool off before going to bed. I Think I will be going for a fairly
early night, tonight. After a small run of late nights I think I
deserve an early one.
I have to admit I am feeling fairly
very depressed tonight. I was supposed to meet Patricia for a drink
after she finished work today. One of us stood the other up, and I
think it might have been me. It was fairly obvious that Patricia was
working late tonight, and she may not have been able to spend much, if
any time in the pub, but I am sure she would have looked in to see if I
was there. From the pub I am able to indirectly see the entrance to the
school. I can't actually see into it, but I can definitely see someone
putting on the padlocks when they close up for the night. After waiting
in the pub for an hour I went out and checked the door was unpadlocked.
It still was so I bought another pint, and continued watching to see if
anyone came out. Halfway through that pint I had to go to the toilet.
That was the only time I left the door unwatched. When I finished that
pint, and after waiting a total of 1hr 40min I went out to check the
door again and saw that it was padlocked up. So I reckon through the
weakness of my own bladder I stood Patricia up. I am disappointed that
she did not hang on just a few minutes to see if I was around, but she
may have thought that I would not have waited for so long for her. In
fact I would probably had waited until closing time if I thought she
was still in the building and might join me for 5 minutes. I think I
ought to go in first thing on Monday morning and apologise to her.
|
07.40 BST
|
|
Weather - bright but cloudy
|
|
Last
night was a pretty good night, and I don't even have a hangover! It was
the latest in our (roughly) bi-monthly get togethers for old radio
pirates. Although I don't have a headache this morning, my guts do feel
a little precarious. They seem to be gurgling quite a lot. In theory
they are empty after unexpectedly getting the runs an hour or so before
I was due to be picked up by Ivor to be taken to Barming. Things were
really touch and go as to whether I was stable enough to face a long
car journey. Fortunately one last dash to the toilet, just as Ivor was
still about 5 minutes away, seemed to be enough.
After
last night it seems that Iain wants to start a new custom. He was
ribbed many times over the course of the evening about having to don a
blond wig for some filming. The filming was the reconstruction of
setting up an FM pirate transmitter in the woods after dark, for
Patrick's documentary. The wig was part disguise, but mostly to give a
younger, more 1970's feel to the video. I am not exactly sure who first
decided that Iain wearing a blonde wig was funny, it may have been Pam,
but the joke seemed to run all night. Now Iain thinks it is his turn to
nominate someone to be ribbed all night. I can't see that this will be
a custom that will catch on too quickly.
 The
wig in question can just be made out in this rather over-compressed
picture taken at the video shoot for the reconstruction of a medium
wave pirate transmission being made in the very early 1970's/late
1960's. It is being held by the actor in the middle of the picture. The
actor to the left of him is holding a black coloured wig. The actor to
the far left is probably holding yet another wig, but it is hidden
behind him. (The other two are Patrick, resting his arm on his camera,
and Bob, Patrick's brother-in-law, and the director and editor of the
documentary).
Having seen the wigs in action twice now, I find much of the novelty of
it has passed, but it evidently amuses Pam and several others quite a
lot.
I have just realised that there is a higher quality version of this picture already on my website. You can click the picture for a better view, or click HERE for the page with the whole series.
For yet
another morning I feel rather tired, and may well go back to bed for a
lay in once I have finished here on the PC. It was past midnight when I
came in last night, and initially I did not feel tired at all. I was
just buzzing after a good night out. So I sat down to watch some TV. It
turned out that UK Gold 2 had the best programmes on offer, First there
was an old edition of Have I Got News For You. It was one of the last,
possibly the last one that
Angus Deayton ever did after he made the front page of The News Of The
World with the prostitute and drugs scandal. That kept me very amused
until the next programme which was Red Dwarf. That too was one of the
funnier episodes, but unfortunately I managed to fall asleep while
watching it. Having missed a big chunk of the middle of it, and only
seeing the last few minutes through the fog of partial sleep, I decided
that I was very tired and went straight to bed where I was asleep
within seconds of my head hitting the pillow. I guess that was
something like 01.30.
So that brings
me to today. I have no plans for this morning, but during the afternoon
I will probably be going over to see Taz for a few hours, and then I
have to rush back for the best bit of the week, the time I having been
longing for all week - my after work drink with Patricia. Who would
ever think that you could get so much pleasure from just 30 - 60
minutes in a pub, but it seems I can.
|
Thursday 9th September 2004
|
|
07.10 BST
|
|
Weather - bright and sunny
|
|
I
appear to have a bit of a hangover this morning. As last night was a
Wednesday night I was drinking with Iain and Howard in The Ram.
Normally Kevin would be there as well, but it seems he has been dumped
on with an excess of work after being off on holiday last week. So he
has been saving up all his energy for our night out with the old
comrades tonight in Barming. meanwhile I have a small, but definite,
headache combined with a more general feel of lethargy. I am not aware
that I had any unusual amount of drink last night to explain the
hangover, but I am very aware that the price of beer has gone up to a
disgusting £2.20 for a pint of ordinary Youngs bitter. I think we
will be having discussions as to whether it is worth still drinking in
The Ram. Sometimes it seems worth paying over the odds for a quiet pint
in an uncrowded pub, but last night there was a football match on that
generated more drinkers, and much, MUCH more noise.
Yesterday did
not go quite to plan. I had a phone call at around 09.00 asking if it
was OK for me to change the time of the interview with the adult
learning people (actually a quango operated by Ofsted) from 15.00 to
12.00. I agred to that and just before midday I went off to see what it
was all about. Three of us had been selected to represent previous
students and we were interviewed together. I am sure it was a
politically correct selection of a black man, a woman and an old man.
With no prior discussion we all agreed on several main points, and had
no disagreement with a few individual points raised. The first thing
that we all did was to sing Patricia's praises. I had a personal
mission to do that, but it was very nice that the other two did it as
well. The other thing that we all readily agreed on was that the I.T.
support for the course was lousy. The woman has a slight bias towards
the lack of phone support for phoning employers (there was only a
single line available shared between the students and staff). While I
wanted to have a complete rant about the very poor computer facilities,
but had to just say that I thought it not good enough. (As a side note
: at the end of the course we were given a questionaire about our
thoughts on the course. It was, allegedly, anonymous, but my
handwriting is pretty distinctive. I used up over half of the back of
the sheet to explain in detail how their computer support could be
easily, and cheaply improved. If I had gone on much longer it would
have turned into an estimate and tender for the work.)
I had mentioned
that Ivor was supposed to be coming down to Catford to buy a new coffee
making machine. After that we were going to meet up for a quick drink.
It never happened. Ivor was tied up with work and/or clients and it has
been put off for another day.
A couple of
other things happened yesterday. I finally put the wheels in motion to
sell some shares, and I expect to be "rich" again sometime towards the
end of next week. I went to my appointment with my New Deal Adviser.
That was a waste of time. He was running so far behind schedule that it
was just a five minute chat instead of a full blown interview. The only
other thing of significance I did was to apply for another job. I am
hoping that this one will be far more accessible than bloody Hainault,
although its location was described rather vaguely as Croydon. Bits of
Croydon I can get to fairly easily, but others I would need a
helicopter to get to.
My plans for
today are fairly simple. I will shortly go and have a lie down after
all this writing (perhaps with a painkiller). Then later on I will get
ready to go out for tonights drink. In between those times anything
could happen. A trip to Tesco is a possibility, but beyond that I can
think of nothing.
|
Wednesday 8th September 2004
|
|
07.00 BST
|
|
Weather - clear and sunny
|
|
That
interview, yesterday, got my mind buzzing. Or at least part of it did.
I had to describe how a piece of circuitry worked and I think I made a
bit of a hash of it. I don't think it was my fault as I am suspecting I
was not given enough information, and what's more, I am not so sure
that the engineer who was testing me knew exactly how it worked either.
I woke up at 02.00 after my subconcious had processed all the
information. I think I stayed awake for another hour as I considered
all the possibilities. After that I had some very strange dreams about
the place. In the dream I went back there today and actually did some
work while still waiting to find out if I had the job. Some of the
dream was about being taken to various nooks and crannies, all with
strange code names, where we could have a fag.
Today
promises to be a bit of a busy day. It seems that Ivor and Iain may be
visiting Argos, in Catford, to buy a new coffee making machine for
thier office. So some sort of quick(ish) drink in Catford is on the
cards. Then at 15.00 I am to attend and interview with some chaps from,
I believe, The Department Of Education (or some similar official body)
who are doing a survey/audit/???? on P.D.C. the firm who ran the
Gateway To Work course I was on recently. I will be giving
Patricia a glowing report because I genuinely believe she was doing a
good job, but I do have some constructive criticism about the rest of
the company. In particular about their I.T. setup. Once that is
finished, or even before if necessary, I have my next interview with my
New Deal advisor at 15.45. After that the day is my own again.
Taz had invited
me out for a drink at The Marquis Of Grandby pub where she will be
watching a football match on their big screen. As much as I like Taz,
and enjoy her company, I draw the line at watching football with a
rowdy bunch of football supporters. It will be bad enough having to
endure the small crowd who will undoubtably be watching the same thing
in The Ram tonight. Maybe I'll invite her to The Ram, but I expect she
will decline as she would probably prefer to be amongst her football
fanatic friends.
|
Tuesday 7th September 2004
|
|
20.30 BST
|
|
Weather - night after a hot sunny day
|
|
It
has been a rather long day, or at least that is what it feels like. I
finally got confirmation about my job interview just 5 minutes before
going in to sign on, and then 10 minutes later while I was signing on!
I was first phoned by one of the secrataries at the agency, and then by
the man dealing with my case. The interview had been set back to 13.30,
but that did not bother me.
After signing on
at the job centre I had a little time to waste before the building
society opened. So I took the opportunity to call in on Patricia. I
have to say she was looking very lovely wearing just a plain white
blouse (as well as trousers etc !!). We had a bit of a chin wag and I
did my little good deed for the day by carrying the water heater
upstairs to be refilled, and then back down again. By that time the
buiding society was open and the first of her pupils were coming in. So
I left her to it after first confirming that she was happy for another
after work drink on Friday.
By midday I
left to go to my interview. It took even longer to get there than I had
first estimated. Door to door it must have been approaching 1hr 20
mins. I really would prefer not to have to do this job, but if offered
I will have to take it even if I quit again after a month. The
interview went well and I quite liked the senior engineer. He is a bit
of an old school engineer and I think I could work with him fairly
easily. Best of all though is that he smokes. The company itself has
fairly strict rules about smoking, but he assured me that if I was
discrete there would be little problem. In fact part of the interview
itself was conducted over a fag at some picnic tables they have out
back. The work looks fascinating, but it is just a damn shame that it
is so far away.
Once the
interview was over I headed back to have a drink at The Herne. The
whole crowd was there - Ivor. Iain, Max, Ruth and Paul. Unfortunately
Ruths boyfriend was there too so I couldn't thank Ruth properly for
thinking about me last Friday and sending the worried text message to
me. Max tried (and succeeded) in making sure I was no longer depressed
by giving me a big wet kiss when I got there. I think I ought to have a
bout of depression more often !
|
06.20 BST
|
|
Weather - dry but very gloomy.Breezy
|
|
It
feels like nighttime still. It is not very light out yet and the sky
looks very cloudy, but the forecast was for sunshine today. The last
few days it has taken until mid morning for the sun to break through.
So I guess today will be similar.
Just before I
woke up I think I was dreaming. The dream seemed to have a rather odd
twist about it from the vague impression I can remember from it. I was
searching for something on the internet and came across an interesting
porn site. Well, I thought it was going to be porn, but it seemed to
show a recipe for bangers and mash. I felt very irritated that it used
three pages to describe how to cook three sausages - one page per
sausage. These three pages were essentially identical and took a long
time to load. The next page was a very long winded explanation of how
to make mashed potato, and then finally there was a picture of the
finished meal. It was obvious that this picture had been scanned in
from an old edition of a comic - probably The Beano circa 1964. Quite
why I should have thought it was a porm website I'll never know as I
woke up at that point with a strong desire for some old fashioned
sausages. Sausages seemed so much nicer once when they had all sorts of
now forbidden ingredients like offal and other leftovers.
So far I still
have not heard if my job interview is still on for midday. I was
supposed to get a phone call last night to confirm it, but it never
came. Time is now running out. I have to sign on this morning and will
be out until at least 09.30, and possibly even later. To allow myself
plenty of time to get to the interview I would prefer to leave around
10.30. That only leaves an hours window to get the yes or no. As far as
I can guess the chap in the agency does not start work until late
morning, and presumably would not be phoning me until he is at work. If
I have heard no news by, say, 10.00 I think I will phone the company
directly to see what they know.
|
Monday 6th September 2004
|
|
18.00 BST
|
|
Weather - mostly bright, sunny and hot
|
|
As
I write this I am waiting to be phoned back about a job interview
tomorrow. It will be (should be) at the company in Hainault - the one I
just know will employ me because I will hate the journey so much! If I
get offered the job for real I have little choice, at the moment, but
to actually go for it. Maybe I had better sign up with a doctor so I
can get prescribed some happy pills to make the journey to, and from,
work comfortable. Perhaps I will get used to the journey. Time will
tell.
Today has been
fairly boring. I have listened to a good sci-fi radio series - The
Silent Scream - and found that it was the second part of a trilogy. I
had previously heard the first part of the trilogy without realising
that it carried on. Each part of the trilogy is actually in three parts
itself. The first episode of the third part of the trilogy will be
broadcast on BBC7 this coming Sunday. I will then have to wait for the
following two Sundays to hear the final conclusion. It could be a long
wait.
My
cunning plan to sell some of my shares came to a grinding halt today
when I discovered that the form I was going to use expired back in
2002. I am now waiting for my bank to e-mail me back with what services
they can offer. Their website does have a share dealing section, but it
is way too complicated for what I want to do. I started wading through
it and found it is really for setting up a stock portfolio and being
able to track inverstments to buy and sell at the merest whim. All I
want to do is just plain sell a block of shares. Tomorrow I will visit
a couple of my building societies and see what they have to offer. 10
years ago The Woolwich (I think) had just a simple form to fill out and
send off with the share certificate. The proceeds were then paid
directly into my savings account. That is the service I want, but
appears not be available from my bank. So now it is a race to see who
can get my custom first. The bank or building society.
|
06.30 BST
|
|
Weather - early morning murkiness
|
|
It
looks rather grey outside at the moment, but according to the weather
forecast it should be a bright sunny day. Maybe it will be once the sun
is properly up. Yesterday ended up as a very hot and sunny day. I spent
much of the day with no shirt on as it was so hot and stuffy indoors. I
managed to catch the BBC's "Countryfile" long range weather forecast
yesterday. The prediction is that this whole week should be mostly
sunny and warm with the highest temperatures at this end of the week,
and the temperature dropping a few degrees by the end of the week. It
sounds like ideal beer garden weather.
Yesterday was a
sort of boring day. The time passed fairly quickly, but I was forced to
watch a lot of TV for amusement. UK Gold were showing a whole bunch of
"Porridge" and "Going Straight" episodes so at least much of it was
quite amusing. I would have preferred to do something more
constructive, but the heat helped ramp up the general laziness that can
still take over on a Sunday. I did do a couple of things that were
worthwhile. I washed all my white t-shirts, and also spent some time
flushing out and refilling my printers colour ink cartridge. That was a
brief bit of fun. I decided it had to be done as full colour printing
was getting so erratic after re-filling the cartridge 10, or more,
times. I don't know if it will keep working for long, but it is
printing nicely now (or was last night). It was a very messy job and I
ended up staining my fingers yellow like a 100-a-day heavy smoker. One
interesting discovery came out of all that messing about with ink. When
printing from Linux, and choosing photo paper as the print medium, I
can get quite reasonable photo printing on ordinary paper. It is still
not as good as when using real photo paper, but the results are not too
bad.
I have not yet
mentioned that I went back to bed yesterday morning after the 07.15
entry. I did not wake up until something like 10.00. The knock on
affect of this, and it was made worse by the general heat and
stuffiness yesterday, was that I did not get to sleep until gone 01.00
this morning. This means I am feeling tired now and will almost
certainly try to grab another hours sleep soon. I must try and get to
sleep early tonight or I will quickly get into a cycle of late
nights/late mornings.
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Sunday 5th September 2004
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07.15 BST
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Weather - sunny start
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Yesterday
was a very hot day. I felt very hot when I went to bed and did not
fancy getting under the covers so I slept on top of the bed. I woke up
earlier feeling freezing, and yet when I then got under the duvet it
felt too hot again. I'll shortly be going back to bed again and will
probably try and get back to sleep half under, and half outside the
duvet. Although I went up to bed before midnight it was not until gone
02.00 that I went to sleep. I had decided to listen to an old radio
tape from around the year 1982. I specially selected it as it was
recorded while heavily drunk just after a disaster in my love life.
Until I heard it all the way through I remembered it as having been
inspired by Marion (or more specifically, the lack of Marion). In fact
I think this particular tape was inspired by someone else, and was
maybe not as good as the morbid programme I had recorded after trouble
with Marion. I had not intended to really hear it all the way through
as it was 2 hours long, but I had played some excellent, if slightly
depressing, music on it. So I stayed up and listened to the bitter end.
While it was playing I decided to read through some old letters from a
fan who called herself Julie Patchouli. We had a love affair entirely
by post. I never ever did get to meet her, but it seems we may have
unknowingly seen each other in a Croydon pub one night. It is so
tempting to believe that life was better then, but obviously there were
still times when life was total shit.
It took a
little while to get to sleep after hearing some of that emotion loaded
music, but it happened in the end. There were just a couple of songs
that affected me in particular. Each having maybe just a few lines that
I latched on to. Even what became the official closedown record, Mike
Rutherford's "At The End Of The Day", has certain lyrics that when
heard in isolation turn it from a beautiful lullaby, into a song that
grabs the heart strings and pulls them taught. That is why I originally
chose it, and kept on playing it. "Ahh life! Don't talk to me about
life.....the first million years were bad, and the second million years
were bad too. After that I went into a bit of a decline".(Marvin).(In
point of fact - when I wrote "that maybe I'll get my reward in the
afterlife" yesterday, I should have added "oh no, not another one!")
All these
references to The Hitch Hiker Guide To The Galaxy, all out of context,
and often slightly misquoted to suit my moods, are evidently caused by
the excitement that will be happening soon on BBC Radio 4. THHGTTG
finally returns after an absence of 20+ years with the "tertiary
phase". This continues from where the last series ended. Amazingly
Douglas Adams (who wrote the whole thing) appears in the new series
even though he died some years back. There was one character he wanted
to play so he recorded that part in anticipation that one day the
series would return. It all kicks off on Tuesday 21st September at
18.30 on BBC Radio 4.
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Saturday 4th September 2004
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19.30 BST
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Weather - hot and sunny
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It
has been an "interesting" sort of day. I have been playing agony uncle
to someone. It was hard work and not a little depressing as well. The
mind boggles why I was picked for this task. After all my love life is
hardly worth writing home about ! I think I have helped though. Mostly
it was just by being there and listening. I think this story is set to
run for somewhile yet. Maybe I'll get my reward in the afterlife,
although it will probably only be at Milliways (The Resturant At The
End Of The Universe)[only fans of The Hitchikers Guide To The Galaxy
will get that one].
There have been
a few minor good things that have happened today. This morning I found
that Tesco's were doing a BOGOF [buy one, get one free] offer on blank
CDRs. They were only in pancakes, without jewel cases, but at an
equivalent of 16p per disk they are quite good value for money,
although not as cheap as some specialist internet suppliers can manage.
Another good thing was that I had some income today. A cheque arrived
with my BT shares dividend payment. I am now a glorious £8.64
better off than this morning !
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06.30 BST
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Weather - cold and clear
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Today
has not got off to a good start. I came downstairs to find that Nelly
had been sick in the hallway. Some of it is still there now. I removed
the worst of it, but the sight of it made me want to puke myself. I'll
have to finish clearing it up a bit later when I am feeling less
sensitive. It is not the ideal task to do just a few minutes after
opening your eyes in the morning.
My next
disappointment will be that I don't think I can spare the money to go
for a drink with my old Mastercare comrades today. I would like to see
them, and I am sure they would like to see me, but I have to prioritise
my budget allocations (Orwellian newspeak for "there ain't enough cash
to do everything"). My first priority for cash must be next Thursdays
drink at Barming.
Fortunately I
should have plenty of money on my Tesco club card, and so a spending
spree on such things as cat food, and baked beans, will be my main
entertainment for today. When that is done I will do one, or both of
two things. I have plenty of radio recordings to go through, and a
non-working PC to repair or scrap. A further task may be to take
another look at my Epson Stylus XL Pro printer. I haven't mentioned
this printer for many months. Perhaps not even this year. To recap - it
was given to me ages ago as almost, but not perfectly working. After a
little clean up I got it printing but with one really annoying fault.
It would seem that the main drive roller has either a dent in it, or
more optimistically, some contaminant stuck to it. The result of this
irritating fault is that every 4 inches of print (it is an A3 printer)
has a feint bar across it where the paper momentarily changes speed as
the lump on the drive roller passes by. The last time I had it apart I
could not work out an easy way of getting to the main drive roller, but
a few months back I had a smaller Epson printer open and that
gave me a few ideas about how I might be able to get deeper into the
mechanism. I'm not sure if it will be that similar, but it gives some
sort of hope. After a bit of a clear up the printer is now on top of
the pile again and just begging to be looked at again. It is only a
minor project, but I might just get around to tackling it today if no
better distractions come my way.
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Friday 3rd September 2004
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18.30 BST
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Weather - hot and sunny
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Today
has been an odd sort of day. I am still not perfectly happy, but I have
heard a few things that have put some of my troubles in a different
perspective. It is a bit like an analgesic for the soul. It doesn't
cure those troubles, but helps to deaden some of the impact for a
while.
I haven't
actually done anything with it yet, but I have found out about selling
some of my shares. I own shares in four companies and each is worth
different amounts of money. It is a hard choice trying to decide which
to sell. The smallest value would keep me going for a short month.
While the largest amount would keep me going for several months. If I
knew how much longer I would have to wait until I am in paid employment
again it would make these decisions so much easier.
I think I have
invented another new saying - a micro date. That is what I have just
had with Patricia. It was a slightly more sombre drink than last week,
but still very enjoyable. She has had a very tiring week at work, and
her commitments meant that it was only supposed to be very short
meeting this time, but it stlll lasted for about 40 minutes. What is
more she is committed to another session next week. It will be a long
wait, but it makes me happy that she seems to really like these little
drinks together. This time there was even something that could be
mistaken for a micro amount of romance to our meeting. In fact it was
just a matter of practicality. Initially she declined a drink as she
did not intend to stay for very long, but the chance to unwind for a
little while proved too strong for her. We ended up sharing my pint. It
is silly little things like that, that convince me we share some sort
of a common bond. It will be a very sad day when events conspire to
stop these little after work drinks. I am only too aware that it is
coming one day, and that darkens my mood even as I think about it.
One other thing
that happened this morning provided a little cheer. Ruth sent me a text
message to enquire if I was OK. I was touched by her concern. Maybe my
exit from the pub last night was a little more dramatic than perhaps it
was intended to be. I guess I'll be back to The Herne sooner than I
expected, although I don't know when. Maybe next week, when all the
kids are back in school, we can have a more relaxed drink together.
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07.30 BST
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Weather - thin cloud, weak sunshine
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I
still feel a little edgy after yesterday, even though it all seems
rather hazy now. I think my chief concern is lack of money. Wasting the
money on the monster kebab stuff was actually a foolish thing to do,
although it served its purpose at the time. I have enough cash left to
buy a couple of drinks tonight, but I am not sure where I will find the
money for tomorrows drink with my old Mastercare friends. I am hoping
for a little cash, at least £10 for parts, from Jodies mum for
putting the new hard drive in their old PC. Maybe she will offer some
money for the labour as well. I am pretty certain I will not get that
money in time for tomorrow, but maybe I'll get it in time for next
Thursday when it is the next old pirates drink. I really must sort out
selling some shares today. I meant to do it last Friday, but never got
around to it after being slightly put off by the impending bank holiday.
Right now I am
going back to bed. I was woken up by the sound of two-stroke engines,
maybe chainsaws, or angle grinders, at 01.30. I assume it was some work
being carried out on the railway. It was from that direction. Once
awake I could not get back to sleep until 03.30 so I am lacking 2 hours
worth of sleep at the moment.
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Thursday 2nd September 2004
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21.00 BST
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Weather - night has fallen
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I
am still pretty pissed off, but I have cooled off now. Several things
have happened since I wrote the last piece. I have been watching
The Bill and that has put things in a slightly different perspective. I
now realise there are people who can write a far worst script than me.
Secondly I am groaning under the weight of a super-kebab experience. I
have totally pigged out on kebab, but that is not the good thing. The
good thing is that I got a free bottle of coke with my takeway. The
unusual thing, and the thing that almost floored me, was that I got a
free bottle of Diet Coke with the meal. Getting some sort of free
bottle is not unusual with a blow out meal, but real, genuine, Diet
Coke is such a rare occurence.... No ! A totally unknown occurance, and
I now feel like a very special person indeed.
I still
feel unsure about drinking at The Herne with Max (etc) again, but
realistically I know it will happen again sooner or later. But for the
moment I am concentrating on having a short, and immensely enjoyable
meeting with Patricia after (her) work tomorrow. Some time in the
future, maybe even tomorrow, she will not be available and I will never
see her again. That will be totally devastating. Possibly the worse
thing that has happened to me this century - maybe on par with the
worst things that have ever happened to me in my life, but I go into it
with my eyes open, and intend to enjoy what I can, when I can, and if I
can. I'll deal with the aftermath in whatever way I am able, but for
now I can see no reason to swap short term happiness for no happiness
at all.
Having
taken a five minute breather, and then read some of this back to
correct some of the more obvious typos, I am not sure that I have ever
moaned so much in this diary before. I am in several minds about it. It
is mostly cathartic to express my displeasure (depression ?) in this
way, but yet I could have said more to portray my feelings better if
only I could articulate many undescribable, negative, feelings. At the
same time I know that this is
only a passing feeling, partly brought on by the booze, and partly just
a cumulation of many odd frustrations. As such I should probably not
bother to write all this down, but it is done now - so it
stays.This is an interesting point. Does it help, hinder, or is it
neutral to know with 99.9% clarity that you are actually depressed
right now? To know 98% of the reasons with total clarity, and to know
that it is a passing fad? Is it, in fact, normal to be able to
dispassionately analyse your own problems from the point of view of a
third party, and come up with suggestions and ideas that a third party
may come up with when confronted with the first party (i.e.me)? Well,
who cares when the majority of my angst will be over when I wake up
tomorrow morning (probably).
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18.55 BST.
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Weather - bright and sunny
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It
doesn't happen very often. but I feel very, very pissed off at the
moment. So pissed off that I have had to leave the pub early and get a
bus home. What makes it worse is that sitting here behind a PC screen
is it almost impossible, perhaps totally impossible, to describe what
has made me feel so low. It all hinges on what I said Wednseday morning
about how knowing someone as a person could be far more important than
what they look like. ( Or at least that is what I was hoping I was
saying). I tried to say this in the pub this afternoon, but
had to resort to saying about being locked in a room with a madman (see Wednesday for any of this to make any kind of sense).
After all the booze, nobody could understand what I meant, and talk of
being locked in a room with someone with big tits or small tits was
just dismisssed as some sort of uncouth saying. I still feel the
original idea was good and to dismiss it so easily seems to
threaten my reason for existance. I am now going to spend some money
that is not mine to order an unfeasibly big takeaway. Sadly it will not
threaten my life, but could easily shorten it. This is not the desired
effect, but it is the best I can do under the circumstances. At this
point in time I do not feel like ever drinking in The Herne again. But
I know that once the beer has worn off I will be back there again
sooner or later. Why am I cursed with seeing beyond the dramatic ? I
really want to punish those who have pissed me off, and yet I know that
it is impossible and stupid. Life should be more like soap operas !
Today, for some of the time, I was sitting next to Ruth. From time to
time I found our arms were in contact. She felt so warm and nice that
it will be impossible to resist such a trivially minor, and yet so pleasant a sensation at the pub for
too long.
I am now about to order an instant heart attack takeaway. I know it won't work, but I will not be put down for not trying !
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10.00 BST
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Weather - bright and sunny
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Damm
and blast ! My NTL phone line has crashed and I am not sure if I can
upload to my website via a dail up connection, via my BT line, and onto
my Tesco ISP. Here goes ...........
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06.10 BST
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Weather - clear sky. Cold
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Somehow
I seem to be awake earlier than I would have predicted last night. I
did get to bed rather late, last night, after an evening in the pub,
and then watching TV until 01.30. I think I'll probably be grabbing
another hour in bed once I have finished here.
I
woke up from a rather strange dream. It was strange in so far as it
seemed to be about a subject that is totally irrelevant to me today. It
was about travelling ladders. In order to show just what an odd thing
this was to dream about I ought to explain what a travelling ladder is,
or what it means to me. To keep a long story short, I'll explain them
in the context of my dream. They were used in old electro-mechanical
telephone exchanges so that you could get safe access to equipment that
was up to 10ft 6in (about 3.5m) above the ground. In construction they
were like a miniature, narrow staircase that had wheels on the bottom
and was suspended from a short pole that ran along a track at the top.
Also mounted on the short pole was a brake mechanism so that the ladder
could be locked in place. In my dream the track at the top had never
been lubricated which made moving this particular ladder difficult.
There was also a large amount of wear visible where the dry metal
surfaces had been rubbing together. The whole dream seemed to consist
of looking at all this from lots of different angles and making
comments about it. It felt like whole sections of the dream were
repeated over and over again, but maybe with subtle variations. Once,
or maybe even twice, I went and found a large tub of grease, but I
cannot recall ever getting round to using it. Sometimes dreams are
triggered by something seen, or heard during the day, or they are some
reflection on your current mood. After some consideration I cannot even
begin to see any relevance to that dream at all. It seems totally
meaningless, and yet they were the only images I can recall as I woke
up.
After getting
slaughtered in the pub on Tuesday afternoon, and a more sedate drink
last night, I should be off to The Herne again today for an afternoons
drunken revelry. I might try to have a few light drinks in there at
first, and keep away from the devestating Kronenberg for a short time.
On the other hand it Ivor is now back after the holidays and I might be
able to get a lift home from him somewhat earlier in the day and avoid
going too far over the top. It does seem that I have been catching up
on the booze after a 4 day respite. Tomorrow I hope I will be able to
go for one, or maybe two pints with Patricia after she finishes work.
Then on Saturday it will be the first Saturday of the month drink with
my old Mastercare comrades.
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Wednesday 1st September 2004
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06.10 BST
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Weather - clear sky, very cold
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I
left off last night saying that I had to print out the whole of my
August entries so that Max could read them. I tried to do just that,
but the same thing happened as when I tried to print out July - I got
halfway through and the black ink dried up in the printer (the yellow
and cyan inks didn't even start to print). So I re-charged the black
ink cartridge and have left it overnight for the ink to percolate
through. To save the colours being all wrong, and to save on
coloured ink, I will do my next attempt at printing it all in black and
white.
I still feel a
little hungover this morning, but felt considerably worse yesterday
evening. Typing those last few words last night was really hard
work. After I had finished on the PC I slumped down in front of the
TV. I found myself watching a documentary about the history of
pornography. It seemed to confirm one of my own beliefs that most
pornography is only pornography because it is labelled that way.
Superficially that is an obvious statement, but it has a deeper
meaning. What it means is that it is only by putting a label on
something does it become something special. Before the Victorians
invented the word pornography it did not exist, and there was probably
no concept that a nude picture could be anything but just another
picture. In classical times pictures that we would now call
pornography, or even hard core pornography, would seem to have been
everyday items on plain display alongside any other picture (or statue,
carving etc). It is hard to judge the effect that it has on us in these
modern times. I think there are good and bad aspects about it, but
perhaps the bad aspects are worse than we think. On a basic level it is
good that we are not exposed to too much nakedness. It allows fantasy
to operate at maximum overdrive. As a typical male lecher I would
quickly find it boring if all women went round topless. The exotic
would rapidly become the norm and life would be so much duller for it,
and yet that could be a good thing. I can't comment on what goes on
inside the twisted minds of rapists, and other weird people, but I
suspect nudity or pornographic images have little to do with their
actions. For normal people, and I can really only comment here from a
male perspective, it would force people to make the same value
judgements about each other that they ultimately make after a lot of
other mistakes. However it starts, we always end up being friends, or
lovers, or even enemies, based upon personality rather than physical
attributes. In an ideal world we look for both inner beauty and
external beauty, but when you stop and think about it you realise that
the former can enhance the latter, but it does not seem to work as well
the other way round. The ultimate test is to consider whether you would
prefer to be locked in a room with a mad person with big naked tits, or
a sane person with small covered tits. I think I prefer the latter !
Well
that's the philosophical discussion over with for today. I now have to
consider what I will get up to today. So far I have no real answers,
but I did not do the job searches I intended to do yesterday, so I
guess that may be the first priority for the day. After that I think
I'll just make it up as it happens, although it does look as if it will
be a nice sunny day, so I may have to try and work out something that
could take advantage of that.
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