Gosh, I really need a quija board! I've still got all the quija pieces, but of course I lost the board so I can't play the game any more.

I went to a seance on Thursday night, as it happens. It was good fun, and we managed to contact the spirits who played around with some objects on the table, banged it a few times and then buggered off. All in the name of scientific research of course.

Meanwhile, my ongoing battle with Jerry continues. I was always suspicious that the bait hadn't been taken and in fact all it did was make him tiptoe more lightly around the kitchen. Confirmation came after I scattered a little flour on the floor, expecting to find ickle paw-prints in it the next morning. Sod that - he came and ate the whole bloody lot! So the snap traps came out, and again he's proved himself to be a canny bugger and has steadfastly avoided them (despite one of them fitting snugly inside his entry channel).

It turns out that the right thing to do is to call the landlord's agents, who have a dedicated mouse man who'll come out, do a thorough investigation and block up all the hole. So this should all be over soon I hope...

[rab] Have you not considered Tom ? Have you a friend with a moggy you could borrow ? One night would probably dod the trick.

Dr Mouse is coming to visit at lunchtime, so we'll see what he does.

Dave's squirting stuff in my holes as we speak.

[rab] That's more than I wanted to know.

Dave was fab! Tracked down all the mouse activity, and took the belt and braces approach of sealing their entry points and slapping down not one, not two, but three different types of bait. He does a repeat visit next week to seal up the one remaining hole (which is there to let anyone out who might have been hiding in the airing cupboard) and laugh in the face of dead rodents.

there were little trays of rat poison on the floor when we moved into our house. they're still there. I'm not sure if this is good or bad.

I won't be e-pilging this evening, I'm going to an open mic night because a friend of mine is going to get up and do some damien rice and some of his own stuff. my housemates and I will sit at the back and clap supportively, or get rat-arsed, one of the two. actually probably both.

rab ] I am assuming that that isn't the same Richard Wiseman who is head of the Legal Department at Shell ? I met him once - very nice chap, but looked like he had been washing himself in money.

[st d] How does someone look when they have been washing themselves in filthy lucre? Pretty grubby, I'd expect.

[st d] I'm guessing not.

(rab) Your "ongoing battle with Jerry" makes me think of those old farts (and not-so-old farts) who cannot accept that WW2 ended some time ago.

It did? Blimey.

I have just accidentally tipped coffee over a particularly hated job bag containing piece of work which I have taken a week and a half longer to complete than I should have done, purely because I don't like doing it. This makes me believe that malevolent forces exist on Wednesday mornings. Unfortunately the coffee also went over my leg.

oops.

[pen] Have you noticed how coffee expands when freed from the constaints of a cup/mug? One knocked over mug of coffee can flood an entire desk, soak into reams of paperwork and fill a couple of drawers.

.. and possibly does the most damage when deftly tipped over a computer keyboard where it completely disappears!

[pen] a job bag, eh? Reminds me of my student hols when I worked on a geriatric ward ..

sorrysorrysorry - I'm just talking shite, as usual

And remember that if you do spill coffee on your desk: save the phone and the papers before worrying about the keyboard (keyboard £20, phone £200 if it's a clever one, papers probably several hours of your time).

I think job bags exist to protect their hated contents from coffee. The papers within are only soggy along one edge. The coffee in my keyboard was soaked up by all the crumbs already in there. My phone was protected by a layer of papers. In other news, I was taken out for lunch today by my boss. And no, I'm not about to lose my job :o)

Scientists have observed that coffee is 20-30% more spillable than tea.

[rab] can you quote your source?

R. A. Blythe (2005) Private communication.

Pen] He lies. Check out so help me God.

I am currently in a bidding frenzy on ebay for a batch of whopping great blue, football-sized Agapanthus flowers with which to beautify my garden come the summer, when I'm having a Birthday Garden Party. I also bought some other stuff this morning, and I should win another one this afternoon for violet Surfinias. I just had to tell someone - no-one in the office is interested and it's soooo exciting.

[pen] It is exciting when it gets to the last minute and you are still the highest bidder. I was outbid twice in the last 3 seconds on one occasion. Selling can be frustrating though. I had 8 people watching one item and I only got one bid in the end.

Hmmm, should I bid on those Surfinias . . . . .

[Boolbar] Don't you dare!!

The blue Surfinias are mine, MINE, ALL MINE!!! mwahahahahahahah!

Surfinias? Are you sure they aren't the Smurfinias - the little blue characters with bleached hair and a funny hat riding a surf board? I suppose they'd still make cute garden gnomes.

[pen] we're excited for you. interior design is a worryingly popular thing in our house. our favourites list on our cable box runs 'sky one', 'UKTV Gold', 'sky sports news', 'UKTV Style' - whu?

The only interior design I did as a student was pinning up posters and checking down the back of every settee in every house I lived in for loose change and valuables. Only ever found forks stuck about with Nuttalls Mintoes though.

pen] I read that as ".. and chUcking down the back of every settee in every house ..." :-)

nights] Exterior design, shurely?

So Rover has come finally to the end of car production. Although I am sad to see an end to 6,000 jobs and all the supporting industry. It has been a slow motion car crash and inevitable as Phoenix tried to maintain the existing levels of mass production. My hope is that the administrators will come to an agreement with someone like Alchemy do build a niche market MG even though this will be with a much reduced workforce.

This weekend will be further decoration of the living room. As background I tune the Freeview box to digital radio, lots of channels but end up listening to 6Music. I tried Q but after hearing The Waterboys for the third time in as many days and accident lawyers, next stop is Kerrang!

You can't imagine the French government allowing Renault or Citroen to go bust or the Germans BMW, Audi or Daimler, can you? So how seriously does the government take manufacturing? Not very, as we all know.