(Chalky) Not just a girl thing, but I wouldn't deny they're better at it.

Very well. I grieve a missed opportunity, but I think Mlle Nights is probably going to kill me if she gets wind of all of this.

[nights] pen & Chalky are certainly the experts. They've been looking after me for years ;)

Quick question: What would you do about over-amorous neighbours? I'm pleased they're having a good time, but they're having it rather loundly.

[nights] Compete.

(nights) If my experience is anything to go by the activity is self-limiting. I used to briefly hear them nextdoor and sniggered to myself about the rabbit-like duration the process occupied in their case. As a result of this they have two delightful kids whose needs leave them bereft of libido. So the answer is: Nick their French Letters, or whatever they call them over there.

[nights] Record their sessions and set up a web site selling them?

[Pen] That's what Mlle Nights suggested. Plans are afoot.
[Rosie] I believe they're just known as letters here.
[Raak] Erm... probably not a market for it.

]nights] Break into their apartment and put local anaesthetic in the baby oil?

Break into their apartment and set up the recording equipment. You'll make tens of quid.

[nights] I'd suggest registering loudsex.com, but it's taken already.

[Raak] You're the second person today to direct me there. I might have to start reading it full time.

Breaking the lull, is anyone doing anything good this weekend? I've just had my first *proper* lie-in in my new house. Yum. Now... housework. And maybe shopping for a washing machine.

I'm driving to Canberra, again. It's a three week stint there this time. The rest of the weekend has been filled with trying to get my computer to work. The computer that all my experiments etc have been done on, over the last three years. The one I need in Canberra. The one that didn't turn on on Thursday.

I'm going to rest AND take moderate exercise AND take anti-inflammatories AND just make do with paracetemol AND try not to carry anything AND carry on as normal. That way I'll have followed all the advice for dealing with lower back pain.
How did I do that? In the hotel gym, probably the rowing machine. This exercise is no good for me.

[flerdle] argh!

Housework, cinema last night, lie in this morning, laundry and now a bit of marking I forgot to do on Friday. I've had worse weekends.

Having been feeling that I wasn't using my mobile phone enough to justify the monthly outlay, I called up the operator who offered to reduce the rental fee to £0 a month with still enough minutes and texts included to cover my typical usage. I'll believe this when the first bill comes through...

The washing machine arrives on Wednesday. No more hand washing, hurrah!

[rab] How did you manage this, which operator, and what is their number?

[rab] Get rid of it, you obviously don't need the infernal machine. I have had the dubious pleasure of using one for my business. My experience was that customers were happier to leave a message on my answering device rather than 'phone me on the mobile.

(pen) I hope you still wash your feet.

[CdM] Indeed. We found that the hard drive was ok, so that was extracted and made to work with a bit of voodoo. I owe frogstar, big time. Now the computer is not only headless (no monitor, etc) but bodyless (no actual "machine"). It works, is the main thing. And a full current backup is now sitting at PaulWay's place (thanks and more thanks!).

Now I have to do actual work. *sigh*

Well, more strike action on the rails in France. Just as the new, improved Eurostar opens from St Pancreas. The timing is perfect, wouldn't you say?

Washing Machine Blues. They delivered it yesterday. Brilliant. I connected it up, and ran it on a 95 degree empty cycle, as recommended. It leaks. The deliverymen scuffed the drainage hose as they brought it in, making a water-sized hole. So I called the shop this morning, they put me onto Hotpoint's customer service, where I spoke to Smug Tony, who offered me an appointment a week on Thursday for a machine I didn't damage, and which I haven't yet been able to use. Not acceptable, I told them. I said I would talk to the shop again and get them to take the machine back. 'But the shop has handed this matter over to us,' said Smug Tony. I pointed out that Hotpoint customer service wasn't proving to be any use to me, so I would reserve the right to talk to the people who sold me the machine.
So I called the shop again, and insisted I was a very unhappy customer, and would they please give me a new washing machine before the weekend, and take the old one away. They're coming tomorrow afternoon. :o)

(pen) So that's what the ex-prime minister is up to these days. Glad you told him what's what.

More on the action - the university I work at was evacuated today because someone set fire to the curtains in the lecture hall where a meeting of students on whether to strike or not was held. I don't think these kids know what they're doing, really.

Goodness, what a long sentence. What is everyone else doing for the weekend?

(nights) I'll tell you tomorrow.

[nights] Thinking about Kalman filters as feedback controllers, control systems as an alternative to utility functions, and artificial intelligence as a doomed enterprise; and on Sunday, attending a memorial service for someone I knew a little and admired a lot, and cursing the railways for not having run a reliable Sunday service from Norwich to London at any time in the last twenty-five years.

Freelance voiceover work tomorrow morning and afternoon. A meal with boyf and friends in evening. Work on show all of Sunday, except for a short break to go see a concert with animations at the Barbican.

[nights] Rosie is celebrating his birthday.
[Rosie] Happy birthday!

(CdM) Cheers. There is a remark in MCiOS but you beat me to it.

Work from now to 2.30; watch daughter play in wind band this afternoon; work/karaoke/work from 5pm tonight till 1am-ish. Brass band rehearsal at 8:30am, ready for Leicester Brass Band Festival contest at 11am, then work, write quiz, read quiz at 9pm, work till midnight, get up at 6am for dray, then drop down dead.

Went to pub, bought beers all round. Fluttered eyelashes at mate's wife who'd said "Gosh, are you really?", tried to pull Polish barmaid by saying "Dobre wieçor" before ordering, as usual. Came home, went Morniversing and will now practise that sodding Beethoven sonata, thanks to Yamaha and headphones. Not a bad life, to be honest.

[Rosie] A belated birthday wish, sounds like it was a rather good one. I'm still not sure if I have a workplace to go to on Monday, so I'm staying near a phone in case anyone makes a decision. They probably won't though.