You find out who your friends are when you've got no toilet

There aren't many scarier DIY jobs than removing a lavatory, especially if it's the only one in the house.
This is a task that I've had to do a couple of times, but this time, as we needed to clear the bathroom of everything that could be removed ready for the plasterers, we knew that there would be no opportunity to refit it for at least two days while they did their stuff.

Luckily for us, our neighbours were kind enough to offer us "unrestricted access to their facilities".
This was a considerable refief, so that's a big "Thank you" to them.

It could have been so much worse...

Ask a stupid question...

I've just been doing my "Civic Duty" by filling in the 2011 Census form.

Is it just me, or is Question 19 a bit poorly thought out?

If the answer is "Not at all", how likely is it that I can read and understand the question?

Good News From All Over

Once in a while, you hear some good news.
This is particularly pleasing when it comes along against the background of general misery and drabness that seems the default setting for a lot of people at present.

I'm very happy to pass on a couple of bits of news that are, for me at least, cause for celebration.

Oddly enough, I received the second good news bulletin via the bearer of the first bit of good news.
Pretty much on the same day that "Rage Against The Lymphoma" blogged that she has had the final dose of chemotherapy in what has been several months of extreme unpleasantness, she gleefully announced the birth of her sister's baby boy, who just happens to be my newest great-nephew.

So congratulations to Mr and Mrs Realmenwritelongcopy, "Hello" to Jonah William and thanks Rage' for spreading all the good news.
 

Not a stereotypical stork

Oh yes, I nearly forgot. Jonah weighed 8lb 10oz.

Another five minute job. Yeah, right...

Thanks to the peculiarities of my shift rota, I had a day off work last Thursday and as the weather was so spring-like. I decided that I really couldn't get away with spending all day dossing in the house.
"I know what I'll do", I thought. "I'll have a look at the pressure washer and see if I can sort out that leak that Blight-of-my-life mentioned last week.

The pressure washer spends most of its time at the farm where it has a tough life cleaning up after the horses, so after a leisurely breakfast, I nipped up to the yard to fetch it. Once I'd got it back home, it soon became clear what the problem was. Where the hose pipe that supplies water to the machine is attached, there is a plastic threaded coupling that screws onto the metal inlet pipe. Over time, this plastic coupling has been repeatedly overtightened and the thread has partially stripped. Given the sort of damage that the poor thing had suffered, I wasn't too confident that it would refit securely, but I thought it was worth a try.
After only a short battle, I'd got it all back together and it seemed as if it might work.
I connected a hose pipe  from the garden tap to the repaired coupling and plugged the electrical power cable into a mains socket in the kitchen. I switched on the power, turned on the water and...
...nothing happened.

There was no water coming out of the garden tap.

Once I'd turned off the water at the rising main, it didn't take too long to determine what was wrong.
With the water supply safely cut off, I removed the tap and discovered a displaced rubber seal in the valve which prevents water from the garden hose siphoning back into the supply pipe. It must have been damaged during the ridiculously cold weather we had in December.
I decided that it would be easier to replace the tap, rather than to try and bodge the valve.

While I was picking up a replacement tap at Wickes I decided to also get a replacement for the leaky, in-line stop valve for the pipe that feeds the garden tap, as this may have contributed to the frost failure of the garden tap.

Plumbing:
I've never looked up the dictionary definition, but it won't be complete if it doesn't mention hours of frustration, swearing, seeping compression fittings, cursing, skinned knuckles and that insidious feeling that even though you've checked your work for leaks a dozen times, as soon as you turn your back it's going to explode and leave you ankle-deep in misery.

In the end, I think I only had to refit the new garden tap twice and in-line stop valve three times before I was happy that there weren't any leaks from any of the joints. Even so, by the time I'd finished, I'd used up all the available daylight, most of my patience and several dozen metres of PTFE tape.

Having fixed the garden tap, the only task that remained was to test the repair on the pressure washer.
So I plugged the pressure washer in and turned on the power, connected the hose pipe to the garden tap, turned on the tap and switched on the washer.
"It works!", I exclaimed, as water blasted out of the spray nozzle.
"Bollocks!", I cried, as the hose union fell off and water gushed all over my feet.

I guess that this is what artists call "a work in progress"...

Apologies to BT: The Speaking Clock is Correct

I'm starting to realise what it's like to be Boris Johnson. This is the second time I've had to publicly apologise in a month.

My previous post, stating that the Speaking Clock was four seconds fast, was not entirely correct. It appears that although the speaking clock messages that I was getting on our telephone system at work have been incorrect, the BT Speaking Clock service is running perfectly.
The most likely culprit for this peculiar problem probably resides somewhere in the telephone system of a third party communications supplier.

Some very helpful comments from one of my long-suffering followers, drew my attention to the fact that our telephone network is no longer a strictly BT operation, so it was quite likely that some third party complication could have nadgered the normally reliable service.
I also had a chat with a chap from The Greenwich Observatory. Although he explained that they are no longer "The Keepers of Time" at Greenwich, his assessment of the problem was in line with Jon's explanation.

Apparently you can effectively buy a speaking clock device for your telephone network. This uses a radio timing signal, broadcast from Anthorn in Cumbria, to keep it locked to the correct time. Unfortunately, if your speaking clock box loses the timing signal, it continues to operate but uses its own internal quartz crystal oscillator to keep on time. If this oscillator isn't running at the right rate, the thing will gradually drift off.

It's plausible that this is what's happened to the rogue speaking clock which I was using.

If it does get sorted out, I'll let you know, but until then,
"At the third stroke, it will be time to make a grovelling apology to BT... PIP...PIP...PIP"

The Speaking Clock is 4 seconds fast

Yesterday I discovered that the BT Speaking Clock was approximately four seconds fast.
But before you rush to your 'phone to check, remember that it is not a free service. I don't want to encourage anyone to increase the income of BT whilst proving the inadequacy of their service.

I spent a fairly frustrating time trying to report the fault, but as anyone who has tried to report a problem using an automated, multiple choice 'phone reporting system will appreciate, as soon as you have a problem that falls outside the normal options, you are snookered.
Eventually, I managed to negotiate my way through the various layers of, "Press one for Billing, press two for Broadband, Press three if you are losing the will to live...", until I was speaking to a human being.
I knew that she was almost certainly not the right person to deal with this particular issue, but I hoped that she might be able to contact the appropriate department.

It did not go terribly well.

Although she was not actually rude, her reaction when I tried to report the problem was somewhat terse. I explained that I realized it was not really the sort of fault that she would normally be resposible for dealing with, but as there appeared to be no other way of getting in contact with the service provider, I was hoping she could either pass the message on herself or refer me to a more appropriate department.
Her response was, "What business is it of yours to tell us that the Speaking Clock is wrong?"
"Well, it is a service that I'm paying for, and it's supposed to be reliable... and not four seconds fast."
"How do you know it's wrong?"
At this point, I decided to keep it simple.
I could have explained that as I was in the Control Room at Jodrell Bank, I had access to two independant Global Positioning Satellite Clocks and our own on-site Atomic Clock, all of which were telling me that the Speaking Clock was wrong.
Instead, I just said, "I checked it against the Greenwich Time signal "pips" at 9 o'clock, broadcast by the BBC. And before you ask, that was the analogue service, not digital."

Now I have no idea whether this has been passed on to anyone in BT who is interested or capable enough to sort it out, but at 7:45 this morning it was still wrong.

I'll let you know when it's been corrected.

 

The "Station Clock" at Jodrell Bank

Let's try not to get caught out...

Back in the early days of this blog, I posted about a particularly memorable occasion, when Blight-of-my-life and I were stranded by snow, on the edge of Dartmoor. As the weather forecast is threatening us with the first snowfall of this winter, it's time to check that my Emergency Kit is all packed and ready for any journeys in bad weather.

Now I don't want to give the impression that I'm some kind of survivalist or apocalypse-watcher, but just taking the trouble to carry a few extra things in your vehicle can make a major impact on your comfort and wellbeing if you are unlucky enough to get caught out by freak weather or some other transport disfunction.

The occasions when I have been least well prepared for being stranded have always been when it was cold, so here's what I try to ensure that I've got with me when I'm driving during the winter.

Extra Clothing: The Land Rover heater is notoriously feeble, so I tend to wrap up warm for normal driving, let alone when conditions are at their worst. To supplement this, I carry a spare long-sleeved thermal vest and thermal "long-johns", woolly hat, gloves, spare fleece and a water-proof cagoul. Another wonderful bit of cold weather clothing are salopettes. I wouldn't normally have bought these, as I don't ski, but I picked up a pair of these quilted over-trousers from a charity shop for a couple of quid.

Footwear: The sort of shoes that are comfortable or practical for driving may not be awfully good for trudging about in snow, so I keep my walking boots in the vehicle. If you can find space for a decent pair of wellington boots, they 're also handy if your journey is disrupted by flood water.

Nesting Material: A lot of drivers keep a car-rug or blanket in their vehicle, but I prefer to carry a sleeping bag. If you can't get home and have to sleep in the car or camped on some good samaritan's floor, a decent sleeping bag can make life much more bearable.

Food & Drink: Although it is recommended that you should keep a few energy snacks in your vehicle; dried fruit, nuts or similar, I usually don't carry these. The thing that will really cheer you up if you're stranded in the cold and/or darkness, is a hot drink. Just the act of brewing up will raise your morale, so I carry a small camping stove, methylated spirit fuel and matches. I keep a few tea-bags in a zip-loc bag, a sachet of instant hot-chocolate drink and I also try to pack a tin of soup.
Whatever you choose to drink, don't forget to take something to drink out of and keep a plastic bottle of fresh water in the car; (It's difficult to make tea without water)

Warning: It's a very bad idea to use a camping stove inside a vehicle. They are intended for outdoor use only. If the possibility of accidentally setting fire to your car isn't enough to discourage you, bear in mind that your stove will produce carbon monoxide and this can kill you.

Other Stuff: Rules for what you must carry in your vehicle vary from country to country, but even if it isn't compulsory for you to carry a First Aid Kit, a decent flashlight, a tow rope and a high visibility jacket, all of these are worth considering.

And finally...
Don't forget to keep some toilet paper in your vehicle, sealed in a polythene bag to keep it dry. If you ever need this and you haven't got any, you are heading for misery.
I'll not elaborate, just trust me on this.

 

An apology to neighbours and fellow road-users

Yes folks, it was me... and I'm very sorry.

Driving home on Tuesday evening, I made a bit of a tactical error. I had reckoned that I would have sufficient fuel to get from work to the local Tesco filling station, where I could make use of a "5p Off, per litre" voucher when I filled up with diesel. As you will no doubt have realized, this was wrong. Like an idiot, I chose to not only ignore that little orange fuel light on the dashboard, but I also decided that the increasingly insistent whine from the rear of the vehicle, as the fuel pump struggled to slurp up the dregs in the fuel tank, wasn't a sign of impending trouble.

About half a mile short of the filling station, the inevitable happened. Without a single warning splutter, the engine simply stopped... just as I arrived at a roundabout, in the middle of Macclesfield in evening rush-hour traffic.
Fortunately, once I'd switched on the hazard warning lights, I was able get out and direct the traffic around my stricken vehicle. With the traffic moving (comparatively) freely again, I dug out the 5 litre can of diesel that I carry, and poured the contents into the tank.

Those of you who are familiar with diesel engines will know that putting fuel in isn't normally all that is required to get the motor going again if it has run out. A tedious operation, known as "bleeding", is usually called for. The fuel feed lines to the engine are progressively uncoupled, then fuel is pumped through from the tank until air has been purged from the system and fuel is flowing freely. It's a fiddly and filthy operation, even under the best conditions, so I was very relieved when, after giving the starter motor a serious work-out, the engine burst into life.

So everything was fine again. All I had to do was drive the remaining half mile to Tesco, fill the tank and then trundle home.
That's when the burglar alarm decided to kick off.

I'd just got rolling and had merged into the traffic flow when the piercing, 120 decibel siren began screeching from the engine compartment and my hazard warning lights began pulsing like a demented disco. As I was under the illusion that the burglar alarm system had been disabled some while ago, I was rather surprised at its sudden, miraculous resurrection. I was also wishing that I had kept the little radio transponder that controls the alarm on my key ring, instead of consigning it to the bottom of a drawer in the sideboard at home.
I was forced to drive the final few miles home, accompanied by a ghastly, pulsating din, a frantic lightshow and the puzzled looks of everybody within ear-shot.
I could almost read their lips as I passed. "What does that twat in the Land Rover think he's doing..?"

So, once again. I apologise.
Furthermore, I promise to not to allow myself to run out of fuel and cause traffic mayhem in Macclesfield, and I promise to sort out the burglar alarm system on my vehicle.

Normal service will be resumed, as soon as...

In the words of the song, "You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone"

We're suffering from the sudden absence of internet at Cyber Mansions at the moment and it is surprising just how irksome this is. Luckily, I still have access to the web at work, but domestically, we have been hurled back in time to the 1990's. The level of inconvenience varies and is wildly subjective. Blight-of-my-life is probably most put out at being forced to start watching weather forecasts on the TV instead of getting up-to-the-minute local forecasts from the Met Office, whereas I find the severing of contact with "Steam", where I have saved positions in a number of games, pretty annoying.

The cause of our exile from the cyberspace is "Mr Belkin", the wireless modem/router. ...and before you ask, Yes, I have tried turning it off and back on again. The computer can see that it is connected to an unidentified network, but no amount of instruction manual driven behaviour has any effect.
It is bereft of life... an ex-router.

To compound the misery, the offending unit is the heart of our domestic Wi-Fi network, so this has curtailed games of "Carcassonne", which I have been playing on my iPod, against a mate of mine in London. I've also had to reorganise our printer, which would normally be networked wirelessly, so that it is temporarily shackled to the PC with a USB cable.

The one good thing about the demise of Mr Belkin is that it has forced me to make a decision to change over to Virgin Media. I'd been seriously considering changing from our current set-up of BT 'phone line and Orange ISP, but the usual, "Well, it's OK, so why bother changing?" kind of mind-set had prevented any decisive action.

So, now we wait for Sir Richard Branson's elves to come and reconnect us with the internet by the magic of optical fibre...

Sculpture: What's that all about...?

It's often tempting to dismiss contemporary art as self-indulgent nonsense. Sometimes it seems that all that an artist has to do, is cobble together a collection of odds and ends, stick it on a plinth and then give it a pretentious name. They then just sit back and wait for some gullible sap to pay them a ludicrous sum of money for it.

In spite of the feeling that in some cases this may well be true, I actually quite enjoy seeing contemporary art.
Even if I can't shake off the suspicion that the artist is just taking the piss, sometimes the thing that they have created can be so visually arresting, beautiful or downright unsettling, that I'll give them the benefit of the doubt.
Actually getting a really close look at a piece often reveals a level of care and detail that isn't obvious from a first impression. Yes, I enjoy looking at some of this stuff.

A couple of weeks ago, Blight-of-my-life and I went to Chatsworth House, to the fifth annual "Beyond Limits" exhibition of sculpture. From mid September to the end of October, Sothebys put a selection of sculptures on display in the grounds of this stately home, so for the price of entry to the gardens you can wander around and see some outstanding bits of art in beatiful surroundings. Seeing the works set against the background of the autumn countryside was a particular treat. It didn't do any harm that we picked a brilliantly clear day either.

Here are a just a few of the pieces.

"Leftover" : By Zadok Ben-David

 "Butterflies" : By Manolo Valdes

 

"Eve" : By Richard Hudson

If you fancy a look at some of the others, the Parwich.org site is well worth a visit..

Oh, and by the way...
...if you think that  this splendid chunk of bronze looks familiar, then I'm afraid you may be as sad a case as I am.

 

"Cubo 1" : By Arnaldo Pomodoro

  

Borg Cube from Star Trek: "Resistance is futile..."

Another close call

It's been an unusually fruitful week for "Good News" stories.

The dramatic rescue of 33 Chilean miners after ten weeks trapped half a mile underground was as impressive as it was unexpected.

I've lost count of the number of times the news has featured stories of groups of miners, from China to Canada, who have perished following some underground catastrophe. Even when the stranded workers have been detected and are known to be alive, launching any kind of rescue or even establishing an emergency supply of food and water simply takes too long. The signs of life dwindle and the silence grows until all hope fades, the inevitable press statement is delivered and the pit-head crowds disperse.

This time it was different. The men, who I was sure wouldn't survive, confounded expectations and all came back from the darkness.

Somewhat closer to home, I've just found out that my nephew Dan had a rather close call last November.
He's a medic in the Royal Army Medical Corp and has been serving in Afghanistan. While on patrol in Helmand Province, his group were ambushed by insurgents and took some casualties.
I can barely imagine what it must have been like, but in spite of sustained enemy fire, Dan and another of his team were carrying out an emergency tracheotomy on a wounded comrade, attempting to restore his airway. During the course of this technically demanding surgical procedure, Dan's helmet was hit by enemy gunfire.
A bullet punched through the front of his helmet and out through the back. Astonishingly, the bullet passed close enough to the side of his head to scorch a furrow through his hair without breaking the skin.
In spite of this, he carried on with the operation until they were able to get the wounded man airlifted out of the combat zone.

You can read the newspaper article on the Northamptonshire Evening Telegraph website

For his courage whilst carrying out emergency surgery under such extraordinarily perilous conditions, Dan has been awarded  the Military Cross.
This honour is granted in recognition of  "an act or acts of exemplary gallantry during active operations against the enemy on land".

There is a sad post-script to this story.
In spite of all Dan's efforts, the injured soldier subsequently died of his wounds.
Sometimes it seems there's just not enough good luck to go round.

It's curtains...

Bearing in mind that I've just returned to work after a couple of weeks holiday, you could be forgiven for expecting me to be relaxed and full of mellow good will. Unfortunately, instead of an uplifting and whimsical post about all the lovely things "wot we did on our holidays", I'm going to subject you to a brief rant about dry cleaning.

 [Oh dear... Where's everybody gone?]

We don't normally have much need for the services of dry cleaners, but after a lot of muttering and deliberating about whether to ignore the fabric care label on the living room curtains, Blight-of-my-life decided it would be more sensible to get them dry cleaned than risk bunging them in the washing machine.
After a few 'phone calls, it became clear that there is a surprisingly wide variation in the cost of getting curtains cleaned. To make things slightly more complicated, some shops quote for cleaning by weight of material, while others quote based on the size of the curtains per square metre.

After a only a brief struggle, the curtains were down, weighed and measured. A few calculations on the back of an envelope and it became obvious that the best deal could be had at one particular shop as long as the cleaning was priced by the square metre.

The curtains were duly bundled into the car, then while I suffered the mind numbing tedium of washing all the curtain hooks, runners and rails, Blight sped off to the dry cleaner's.

When she returned, she was not happy.
"Well, that was a complete waste of time."
"Why? What went wrong?"
"I've had to bring 'em back. They're still in the car"
"But why? Why wouldn't they clean them?"
"They couldn't take them because their computer's not working."
"What? I didn't realize that the cleaning was computer controlled..."
"It's nothing to do with the cleaning. It's the computer they use to calculate the cost of cleaning that's faulty."
"Couldn't they just work it out with a pencil and paper, like you did? Or even a calculator... It's only multiplying the area of the curtains by the cost per square metre, isn't it?"
"That's what I told them," she said, "but apparently they have to use the computer to do that. They're incapable of calculating area"
"But that's completely stupid."
"It's worse than that. They said they'd give me a price to clean them by weight. They weighed them and quoted me forty quid more than it would be by area."
"Bloody hell... No wonder you brought them back."

So there you have it.
A shop staffed by people who cannot multiply two lengths together to work out the area of a curtain.

Not all the muppets live on Sesame Street...

Another way to confuse chuggers

I'm not a great fan of "chuggers". Although they almost always make extraordinary efforts to be polite and cheerful, there is something rather unpleasant about being waylaid by an earnest young person clutching a clip-board, who tries to engage you in a conversation as a prelude to signing up to donate to their good cause.

It is not a job that I would want to do.
I'm sure that spending the day being ignored, avoided or abused must be a soul destroying experience. Not only are these people less welcome on a busy shopping street than that bloke miming getting out of a glass box, but they have to wear a hideous tabard as well.
I don't like what they have to do for a living but I have some sympathy for their situation, so I don't consider it fair to be rude or unpleasant if I get tagged

There are much better ways of making an encounter with a charity mugger a joyful experience, as I discovered yesterday afternoon.

I was strolling along one of the busier pedestrianised streets of Macclesfield.
I had just been to the library and as I had forgotten to take a bag with me, I had an armful of books.
I spotted the chuggers in the distance and as I got closer, it occurred to me that the largest book that I was carrying was a similar size to the clip-boards that the sales team were armed with.
I had an idea.

One of the team was right in front of me, but instead of veering away and using traditional evasive tactics, I caught his eye and headed straight towards him.
Before he had a chance to open his mouth, I stepped up and said,
"Hi.", then pointing at the book I was carrying, said "would you like to buy this?"
He hesitated, taken off-guard.
"Er... No. No thanks."
"OK. Sorry to have bothered you."
I nodded farewell and before he had a chance to work out what had gone wrong, I walked on.

Sometimes it's the little things that make life worth living.

I write like...

One of the good folk who follow this blog (thanks again, Mean Queen) was very complimentary about my writing style recently, so when East of North drew my attention to the "I Write Like" site, I thought I'd see what it came up with.

"I Write Like" is a site which claims to determine which author's style your own writing most resembles. All you have to do is cut and paste a chunk of text into the space provided, then click on the "Analyze" button for it to give you its verdict.

"Jolly good," I thought, "I'll try my most recent blog post and see what it makes of that."
As you can imagine, I was really pleased to discover that I write like Douglas Adams.

I write like
Douglas Adams

I Write Like by Mémoires, Mac journal software. Analyze your writing!

Naturally, I wondered if it would give the same answer for other samples from the blog so I submitted another post for scrutiny.
This time I was likened to James Joyce.
"James Joyce! Blimey, how cool is that!", I thought.

Then it all went downhill.

A couple more posts were offered up for analysis and to my dismay they revealed that their style matched that of Dan Brown.
My dreams of being a literary giant were well and truly punctured.

Then, just for a laugh, I analyzed a business document that I had written and the result was...
disturbing.

Let me put it this way. If you were a manager and received a document that had been written in the style of the man described by Stephen King as "the twentieth century's greatest practitioner of the classic horror tale.", how do you think you would react?

Yes, I write like H. P. Lovecraft.

...while the sun shines

We had our hay baled yesterday evening.

The weather has been very cooperative this year, so we haven't had the usual stress of the grass being mowed then watching it laying in the field as a succession of rain storms sweep in and soak it.
Glumly fretting as the sodden crop fails to dry sufficently for it to be baled seems to have become an almost inevitable part of our summer.

This year we've been luckier. The grass was cut in the middle of last week and although we had a bit of a shower on Friday, the sun and a fresh breeze had dried it enough for it to be ready to bale today.

I quite enjoy haymaking.

The weather is generally pretty balmy and because you know you're taking part in a successful harvest, it's a genuinely "feel good" event.
We don't have an enormous amount to gather in, so even though manhandling the bales involves much more physical effort than I'm normally used to these days, it never takes so long that the novelty wears off.

... and as I usually get to drive the Land Rover with the trailer, I cunningly avoid most of the heavy lifting.

"'Ello, I wish to register a complaint..."

It's funny the things that you take for granted.

There was a time when it was pretty hard work to get satisfaction from a retailer if the goods that you had bought were faulty.
If you took something back to a shop, you could generally expect scepticism and even outright hostility from the shop assistant for daring to return an item that had been unfit for purpose.
Getting your money back was often next to impossible even if you had a receipt, the original packaging and the bag that the assistant had put he wretched thing in when you bought it.

The phrase "The customer is always right", was a hollow sham.

I have a feeling that it was this environment and the recognition of the helplessness of shoppers that made Monty Python's "Dead Parrot Sketch" such a perfect creation.
In those dark days before The Trades Descriptions Act, anyone who had ever bought something that was a dud could sympathise with Mr Praline (John Cleese) as he struggled to get satisfaction from the pet-shop owner (Michael Palin).

Thankfully things are much more sensible these days, so the trip to Tesco's to return a pack of five pairs of underpants, was completely stress-free.
The amount that the first pair had shrunk when they went through the wash was obvious when compared with an unworn pair, so the lady at the Customer Service desk didn't hesitate to offer a refund and an apology for the inconvenience

The only difficulty I had during the encounter, was resisting the almost overwhelming temptation to put on a hilariously amusing, high-pitched voice as I explained the problem.

Oh... all right then.... here's that sketch again.

Western Digital Passport: Let's really annoy our customers

It's very tempting to go off into a massive rant about this, but I'll do my best to stay calm...

I've just bought an external hard drive to use as a backup for data files.
I decided to get a Western Digital Passport.
It looked like it would be ideal. At 640Gb, it has a reasonable capacity for our requirements and it simply plugs into a USB socket on the PC. As far as the PC is concerned, it just looks like another hard disc drive, so you can just transfer the files you want to back up across to it with Explorer.
So far so good.

I plugged it in, the PC did all the "looking for suitable driver" business and everything was proceeding swimmingly.
Then it installed the "WD Smartware"...

WD Smartware is the Western Digital software that manages the backing up of files and, as such, it is a fine concept. As far as I can tell, it monitors the files on your PC and backs up any that have changed since they were last backed up. Even if the Passport isn't plugged into the PC, the software lurks in the background somehow and carries on looking for stuff that is overdue for saving.
Unfortunately, there is a downside to this seemingly sensible data security scheme. The WD Smartware appears to have clobbered the performance of my PC.
Bearing in mind that I didn't want a foolproof backup regime, simply needing an external drive where I could save data independent of the main computer, this is really very annoying.
If I'd wanted to have software on my computer that slows everything down and prevents me from getting the performance I expect, I'm sure there are hordes of miscreants who would be only too happy to infect my machine with a helpful virus or other malware. I didn't need to pay Western Digital for the privelege of having them cripple my PC.

I'm not the only person that is suffering with this.
The Western Digital Community Forum is seething with posts from angry customers demanding that there should be a way of removing the offending software. Whether anybody at WD will be inclined to give the customers what they want rather than what WD think is good for them remains to be seen.
Until that time (should it ever happen) I'm stuck with what is undoubtedly an excellent bit of hardware that I cannot use thanks to software that crushes the performance of the very machine that said hardware was bought to protect.

...yes, this is just how I'm feeling

Surely, there's some mistake...

I really don't know what to make of this.

A friend of mine works for a Emmaus, a charity for homeless people.
At one of their shops, in Gloucester, they have received a rather odd donation.

It's a small casket of ashes and it bears the inscription "In loving memory, Imogen".

What can possibly have led to this?

The staff at the shop are, not surprisingly, a bit perplexed about how to deal with this item. They are reluctant to simply sell it in case it has been handed in by accident, so they are trying to find out who has donated it, just to minimize any upset or embarrassment.
Long running family feuds have originated in far less dramatic circumstances than the unfortunate loss of a much-loved relative's mortal remains, so for the sake of the friends and family of 'Imogen', I hope that the folks at Emmaus in Gloucester can find the donor.

Goodbye 'Stealthy Ninja'

Yesterday, a small group of us from work, went to the funeral of Rob Kemp, who worked here at Jodrell Bank as a security guard.

Of the people who have patrolled this site over the years, Rob was one of the few who actively enjoyed the amount of walking it entailed.
Having to make several circuits of the site during a shift gave him ample opportunity to observe all the wildlife that we have here. He said that being able to keep tabs on the rabbits, stoats, buzzards, owls and peregrine falcons, made every day less like work and more like a nature ramble.

Rob's sudden and untimely death came as a great shock to all of us who worked alongside him, but our deepest sympathies are with his partner and his family.

Robert Kemp: 1960 to 2010

Nostalgia: It's not what it used to be...

I've had my first "Verbal Warning" that I'm subjecting the good folk of the blogosphere to an overdose of nostalgia.

She was about half way through the reminiscences about my late lamented Austin A40, when Blight-of-my-life enquired,
"Why do so many of your blog posts start with the words 'I remember when...' and  'back in the seventies...' eh?"

She has a point.
I always knew that there was a risk of this happening, but I thought it was a temptation that I'd be able to control. It appears that I was wrong.
It's starting to sound like I don't actually exist in the present, so I need to get a grip and be a bit more "now".

So here's the pledge.

"I will not refer to the 1970s or use the phrase 'I remember when' (or anything similarly nostalgic) for at least six months"

This will probably be tougher than I expect.