computerised archaeology

computerised, a photo by The original SimonB on Flickr.

OK, so I'm prepared to share that picture purely because rooting around in an old and presumed lost links folder I found this:

Way Of The Rodent Linky

Which is where you will find a bunch of old articles I wrote for an online computer magazine and may provide those of you desperate for more of my words with some form of consolation while I try and think of something new to say...

Things just seem to go wrong

Having replaced the washing machine just after Christmas, in the last couple of weeks we have suffered from a dead dishwasher, dead telly and dead broadband and I've also had terrible toothache and lost the offending gnasher (first casualty in the war against empty gums which I talked about a couple of weeks ago).

Any one of these could have been coped with on its own, but arriving in close proximity was not fun on the old stress levels. And although replacing things (well, not the tooth!) has been expensive we did at least have cash in the bank so haven't got thoughts of repayments to dampen the future.

So, the old JVC 36 inch CRT has been replaced with a really rather nice Sharp 40" LED/LCD flat jobby. Having been generally unimpressed with "New" screens in shops and other people's homes I am pleased to say that with a bit of tweaking on the settings I have got this one to produce a nice, balanced picture with the colours at a suitable level of restraint. And as Mr Murdoch is now giving us a free box and free installation there is a man coming to upgrade us to Sky HD on Saturday. We decided after the trauma of having to upgrade the TV we may as well get the most out of it.

The dishwasher, hoever is more of a pain. After the old one died (taking our electricity with it, praise be for trip switches) we ordered a nice new one (Ariston, with a stonking great reduction on it from the same local firm as did us a good deal on the telly). They happily delivered but refused to install as it needed a hole cutting in the cupboard under the sink as this has larger connectors. When this was resolved and turned on the new one began chucking water all over the floor in minutes. Not good. nothing to do with loose pipes, this is a genuine fault with a brand new appliance. Fortunately they concur and are sending another one this week, but not quick enough for our liking. And the hardboard under the lino has warped with the soaking. Grrrr.

The tooth turned out to have shorter than average roots in a bit of bone that has eroded more than anywhere else in my mouth, so had to go. Annoying as it was otherwise perfectly healthy and unfilled. Still, pain all gone and I can eat crusty bread again.

Now the broadband signal has died. 20 minutes on the phone to India last night proved it is nothing to do with our router (or my reserve ADSL modem), micro filters, extension leads etc so definitely a BT problem. Wonder how long they will take to fix that.

And another funeral of a colleague tomorrow.

Not a happy bunny right now, so hopefully better news next time!

In the way

I was going to write something deep and meaningful tonight, but I'm just getting too much "help" from tawny here.

Another time maybe.

Things to read

So, why have I decided to come back into the blogsphere just now?

Well, I've spent the last five years reading other people's words after getting fed up with trying to think of my own. Gradually the need to waffle on again has overtaken me and adding the occasional comment to the other blogs I read hasn't fulfilled that need, so here I am having a go a the real thing for myself once more. Hopefully someone, somewhere will get some enjoyment out of reading this along the line.

Some of those other blogs have been talking about magazines recently (see for example David Hepworth and five-centres) and that got me thinking about the ones I have pored my way through over the years.

There were always magazines in the house when I was growing up. Mum favoured My Weekly and Family Circle while Dad was a subscriber to National Geographic and also had some relating to his job as an Electrical Engineer. There were also two others we had all the time, but I'll come back to those later.

When we first got our ZX81 (and probably beforehand during the decision making) the Computer Magazine made it into our lives. Sinclair User was the first, to be followed in time and as the computer changed by Your Spectrum/Your Sinclair, Crash, Computer & Video Games, ST Format, Edge, Mean Machines, Mega, Games TM and Retro Gamer. I have subscribed to some of these over the years, and bought others off the shelf religiously every month but now find I read no computer or gaming magazines at all.

Music mags had a stronger hold on me, with Q, Kerrang, Raw Power, Sounds, NME, Mojo, Vox, Classic Rock, Rock & Reel and even Lime Lizard holding my weekly or monthly affections from time to time. But, as with the computer ones, I have stopped buying music magazines at present. I will still dip in when there is something particularly tasty on the cover or something I want to hear on a covermount CD but there is just too much out there and not enough time to consume it for me to be a regular reader right now.

So what do I still get month in, month out? Well, just SFX and Death Ray (and that one is a bi-monthly publication anyway). I've been buying SFX since the first issue and just can't seem to stop. Same with Death Ray. Even if I do only read half of most issues these days. Too many articles on films and tv shows I'm just not interested in, but enough wheat within the chaff to keep me going.

And then there's the Radio Times. This, along with the TV Times up until the listings market got de-regulated and we onlyhad to get one, has been the staple magazine of my entire life. I cannot remember a time when Tuesday evening wasn't spent ploughing through the listings to see what we might want to watch next week. The arrival of the Christmas double-issue, presaaged by a couple of weeks of early publications, is still one of the highlights of the year. Even if the amount I actually choose to sit down and watch shrinks on an almost daily basis, knowing what I have to choose from (or choose to avoid) is one of those things I just have to work out. Every Tuesday.

Well, the new computer seems to be working pretty much OK. Now I've delved in to the settings, resurrected some bits I cunningly copied across to the network, re-installed all the extra fonts I need to actually do my job and so forth. OK, so I can still only print from Windows to one of the numerous printers I am supposed to be able to access (and yet they have got the DOS printing side of things right without being prompted) but otherwise all seems reasonable - they even managed to keep my Zip drive working. Plus the new keyboard is very nice to use, the mouse is optical and rather swish (and again they managed to provide one with a wheel rather than me having to dig out my old one) and the monitor is a very tasty large flatscreen one. Which I wouldn't mind at home quite frankly. All in all it has made coming back here after four days away almost tolerable. That and the choccy biccies Gary provided after his day trip to France on Saturday and the cream scone related to Danny's birthday a couple of weeks ago (luckily he bought the cakes today - they haven't been hanging around since the actual date...).

Of course it turns out that we have also lost access to one or two programs (including our main public transport database) as they aren't Windows 2000 compatible. Reckon someone screwed up there, but not my problem.

Finished off the weekend last night by watching American Beauty. A very good film. Not 100% sure if I grasped all of it but I did enjoy the majority which I understood. I can certainly see how it ended up winning shedloads of Oscars and BAFTAs and other awards. The I had one of those nights of fragmented dreams (installing a stair lift at Ma & Pa's house, going to a party dressed as one of the girls from the Rocky Horror Picture Show, shopping and other bits) that just leaves you feeling totally flummoxed in the morning.

Well, that wasn't too bad as hygenist visits go. At least she thought my mouth was in pretty good shape and I don't need to go a few more times before it is safe to do the surgical bits. So that has saved a quid or two. And I've got lots of strange interdental brushes of assorted sizes to be playing with from now on. Groovy teeth a step closer.

Met Joan in town on my way back and we had another monday lunch in Puccinos (and I had another New Yorker!) and then came home to a nice surprise - a cheque from Ma & Pa which will cover about half the cost of the work. Nice. Any other contributions gratefully received.

As I write this the PC is approaching halfway in downloading the latest version of Norton Anti-Virus. Seems the version I have is no longer supported and I need a new one. Which would be OK if it wasn't a 35Meg download. Which is likely to take at least another hour yet. Why didn't I just go to PC world and by the latest edition? Will I ever learn? Still, this way should be cheaper (thank the Lord we don't pay per minute for internet calls) and anything is better than the worry I went through before when we did catch something nasty.

Have now started reading the first Darwin Awards book as compiled and annotated by Wendy Northcutt. Always good for a laugh at the stupidity of others. And it was cheap in the Waterstones sale.

We managed to watch two films last night, both of which made stunning use of computer graphics in their own way. First up was Stuart Little 2. I admit I was sceptical when we watched the first one, but find I can recommend them both highly. The characterisation is superb and the animation even better so you really can believe in the little fellow. And of course the sort of bubble the Little's inhabit just makes it all the more joyous an experience. Not that I want them to keep milking the bandwaggon (is that possible?) but I wouldn't say no to more if they can keep the quality up.

The other was Tron. The graphics there blew me away 20 odd years ago when I first saw them and in many ways still do. OK, so technology has moved on, but they just feel right for the period the film inhabits. And even the plot didn't seem as stupid as memory had painted it to be...

Of course neither of those explains why I then went on to dream about tracing the graves of long lost relatives, visiting a bunch of Libraries and taking photos of trains. But then should I expect them to?

Not much else to say other than I'm glad I'm not at work again. These four day weeks could get to be quite a bargain.

Paranoia strikes! IT have rolled out a new software tracking system across some (read all of us so far) PCs in the council today to see what we've got installed. I have of course got stuff on this one they didn't put there - although nothing has gone on recently. The thing crashed out with illegal operations when it tried to run this morning though so we will just have to wait and see what happens. I'll get Richard on the case next week...

And we have decided that to avoid confusion, new boss Chris will henceforth be known as Sonic. Due to his Hedgehog style spikey hair. I'll have to fire up the emulator over the weekend and capture some suitable images to use in the future.

Today I am planning to spend mostly over the road sorting out Dove Street. Its a tough and dirty job but someone has to do it. Plus it means being away from the desk, the phone and the all-seeing eye. It also means that if the general consensus is a yes, I'll be prepared to indulge in an offering from Alberts this morning to start off with a warm lining. Got to keep the insulation levels up after all. Of course what I really want to do is go home, catch a couple of hours sleep and then goof about on the Cube. That will have to wait for tomorrow instead.