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Well, Mlle Nights and I, after a brief argument about what film to see, had a thoroughly enjoyable evening of cinematic treats and culinary delights. She's now sodded off back to Paris by train, and I'm waiting for my family to get in here. Although they're staying in a gîte, because I live in a box. But it's a nice one - apparently it, too, has an open fire. It snowed here last night, and there's a Christmas film on TV. I am, as Glenn Miller put it (I think), "In The Mood" now.
CfK
[Phil] On R4 3pm, but we won't be home by then, so will watch it on BBC2 at 5.30pm whilst chinging our way through min spies.
But, as always, do check your own listings guides because here in Scotland programmes are moved by up to four days either way (or dropped entirely) to accommodate the world's worst soap opera (yes, worse even than Gute Zeiten, Schlechte Zeiten) and Rupert Bear in Gaelic (which is actually quite good fun).
[rab] thanks
[All] Anyone got any plans for tomorrow?
[Phil] Playing with my new toy.
[Raak] I think I'm too out of touch to know what that is - I suspect some kind of computer though :) Have fun!
Oh, and may I be the first on this server to say "Happy Christmas Everybody!"
Oh, and may I be the first on this server to say "Happy Chingmas Everybody!", now that the sound of sleigh bells has officially overtaken JC as the dominant Festive icon.
[Phil] 30" display, and a 4-core Mac Pro under the desk. It makes Second Life spectacular.
[rab] There was me thinking it was the sound of tills!
[Projoy] You've hit the nail on the head. In two hours today four of us took x pounds. Our best ever Tuesday was Boxing Day last year, when we took 10% more (over 11 hours). Our 3rd best Tuesday was 44% less than roday's x. Merry Ker-chingmas to you all :-)
Merry Christmas all. The parents bought me a shiny new laptop which I am VERY happy with, as the old one really was on its last legs. However, I've decided to donate the old one to Emmaüs, a charity around here that takes in old stuff, makes it new and gives it to people on low incomes. Rather in the spirit of the season, I thought.
Good on yer, nights. I'm liking your work. A question: Do ageing laptops have 'legs' or even 'last legs'? Answers on a postcard please.
[Chalky] My laptop had legs, but they broke off.
laptop rookie
[Raak] Really? Yousee - I've never actually owned one. In fact have only used a laptop twice - once at work when the desktop blew up and once at penelope's house when she and I posted in the Pilg Game in OMC to announce our return from RugbySuperPilg 2004.
Another laptop rookie
Haven't got one. I've got a wireless, though, and you can get the Radio Luxemburg on it.
back from the frozen nortth
I drove from Dunkeld on the Tay back to Lincolnshire today, and saw SNOW in the Pentland Hills, and again on that bit south of Dunblane to just where the hills end at Gretna on the A74. And what's more, the lovely windy miller was bumped off his flight back to Amsterdam from Edinburgh airport this morning, but got a replacement ticket to fly back at tea time from Humberside airport instead. So I had his lovely company on the long drive home. He also got a 250 euro compensation, which was nice, especially as I was driving home past Humberside airport anyway.
Argyll was lovely, but it ain't half bloody dark in the mornings. And stormy at nights too - the bedroom window looked out over the Atlantic, with Mull just off to the right.
Thank goodness. The family have buggered off again back to the UK - I love them, but they're deeply irritating at times. Now to rub my hands in glee at the prospect of a New Year's Eve in Paris. Fireworks from the Eiffel Tower? Oh yes.
NYE pyrotechnics
Oh, they are pretty and probably bring out the child within but, oh, what a waste of money. I understand that when in Sydney someone lights the blue touchpaper for the NYE bash it is the culmination of efforts expended at the expense of many sponsors. This is all well and good but, to be honest, I can't remember the name of any sponsor of any previous display. I don't think that the people involved were being philanthropic so plebeian level deduction tells me that they wasted their investment.
I suspect that I'll come across as some sort of curmudgeon but I'm not like that really. While the money spent on these exercises of excess is probably small, imagine the difference a few million quid or dollars could make if that were invested in something like rescue services, paramedic equipment or, God forbid, even some sort of research into the whys and wherefores of everyday life. *folds up soapbox and leaves*
Postscript: The leaves became caught up in the soapbox due to the amount of hot air generated by your correspondent.
[Dujon] "research into the whys and wherefores of everyday life"? Until that point, I was agreeing with you, but that sounds like a bigger waste of money than fireworks to my untrained ear.
I did say "God forbid", Phil. ;(
No. That makes me seem flippant. Surely, though, those who spend money on advancing their public profile (you like that? It's PR speak.) would be better off putting such funds into something that matters. We have a couple of helicopter rescue services in my neck of the woods; everyone knows the NRMA and Westpac choppers and appreciates them.
[Dujon] Yep, so many things do seem to be largely justified by accountants, rather than common sense, or a sense of "what's right If the sponsors of said pyrotechnics provided transport and viewing platforms for those with learning difficulties, say, rather than just paying some money to be associated with a fun event, I think their names and products/services would be better remembered.
When I try to advance my public profile (honest, I do), I spend my money on an event, and organise it myself, and then try to get the advertising for free through media coverage. Even if the event only breaks even, the knock-on effects of repeat trade and wider awareness are worth the effort and expense.
OK, Phil, you can put away the sarcasm. I admit that I did get a bit carried away and for that I apologise, though I do not resile from my original premiss.
It's been 2008 for a few hours now so I shall wish you all the best for the new year. Peace?
Eeek, I wasn't being sarcastic.
I think those sort of events with forgotten sponsors are part of a much bigger picture - pride in a place, a sense of community, and a general drawing-together of efforts. And no matter how desperate the need for support for a helicopter ambulance service or a hospice, a proper sense of community precedes all. London, or Sydney, or Budapest, or Oban all need to be nice places for people to live in order for businesses and services to prosper there. I think a few fireworks on New Year's Eve are part of that process.
Happy New Year!
I've just done a couple of minutes of googling, so I don't know how accurate these numbers are, but it seems as if the order of magnitudes are that there were around one million spectators in Sydney, and that the fireworks cost about AUD600,000. I think it is a reasonable bet that those spectators would almost all have been willing to give up at least 60 cents for the pleasure of watching the display, and that the average willingness to pay would have been much much higher.* So it sounds to me as if it was actually a very good use of resources, and not a "waste of money" at all. (This is separate from the question of whether the corporate sponsors get a return on investment; I'm simply asking whether the firework display was a worthwhile use of resources, and if the numbers I saw are right -- or even off by a factor of 10 -- I think the answer is clearly yes.)

* I'm using "willingness to pay" in a technical sense here: think of it as meaning that an individual is equally happy having $x and not seeing the fireworks, on not having $x and seeing the fireworks. Other boring economic discussion available on request.
also, what pen said.
also, s/order of magnitudes/orders of magnitude :-)
also (and even though I am multiposting, can I point out that this is apparently only because everyone else is too hungover to speak) I want to make it clear that my comments are not intended as criticism of Dujon or Phil. Dujon's comment, and I think Phil's as well, were only addressing the question of corporate sponsorship of public events. I did pick up a more general sense that they were questioning whether firework displays themselves were worthwhile, but that may be my misreading, because it is certainly not explicit in their comments.
I am *not* hungover, merely hard at work writing the first of three features this week. And sneaking a look at this year's holiday diary - I get a long weekend off in two weeks' time!
[CdM] Rest assured, I love public firework displays. My take on the matter was simply from a "what am I getting for my money" point of view for the sponsors. For example, I sponsor a football team, and the benefit for me is that they drink in my pub every Sunday afternoon (as well as when they present trophies, celebrate promotion etc). I more than get my money back from that. I presume an awful lot of corporate sponsorship results in so-called freebies, like a hotel room with champagne reception etc and a fantastic view of the fireworks.
Pretty much
[CdM] Close, old chap. Like Phil, I enjoy the displays when I bother to watch them.
I've been pondering on my original comment and am thinking that maybe I've got things wrong. Before I comment further though a little research is required.
I'm baaak
From: smh

"Peter Hawkins and Linton Besser
December 31, 2007

The city's $4 million New Year's Eve party on the harbour will not be hampered by bad weather this year, with mostly clear conditions forecast for the celebrations."

The same source (possibly CdM's) quotes AUD 600,000 as the cost of the fireworks. I do wonder though if that costing includes the expense involved in siting the beasts, programming and installing the computerised control system and the eventual dismantling of same.

If the quoted figure is correct (i.e. ignoring my comments) it means that the State (or city) expended 3.4 Million AUD in supporting the function. Media comments claim anywhere between 1 and 1.5 million people turned up in the city to watch the spectacle. In effect that's 1 in 3 of the whole population of Sydney. Yeah, right.

I popped onto the official NYE celebration site ( sydney ) to check out who was who. Slide down to the bottom of the page. I wonder if any of those organisations are recompensed or are simply expected to turn up and factor the event into their annual budget?

Right, I'm putting all this rubbish behind me and flying from Cootamundra to Bendigo. Tally-ho!
Well, even if you went with AUD4 million as the cost and 400,000 spectators, you would have a cost of AUD10 per person, which is less than the cost of a movie ticket. We have a lot of evidence that people were willing to spend a great deal of time getting somewhere to see the display, waiting for it to begin, and traveling home afterwards. Was it worth an additional AUD10 on top to those people? I'd still put my money on yes.
hny
Hello and happy new year to all. Wandering around John Lewis's end-of-year "Clearance" (they're far to posh to have a sale) we notice they're offering a temporaray "special purchase" 300 quid reduction on a sofa we've been lusting after. The bastards.
One difficulty, apart from the possibility of an unexpected major purchase, is that we're also thinking of getting a cat and it's not clear the two will be entirely compatible.
[rab] Better that the cat does damage to the £300-cheaper sofa than the full-price version, shurely? Get both. You know you want to.
Scratching decoys
[rab] Are you already catty? If this is your first mog, the following anti-scratching tips may be useful: Cats are very discerning scratchers. They will start by destroying the most valuable soft furnishing in a room, then working their way through the remainder in descending order of value. You may be able to decoy them by the following options:
one: a toy 'cat pyramid' - very popular with kittens, this is a cardboard pyramid covered in carpet, usually with a hole in the side so the cats can climb into it, and often with a ball on a string or something tied to the apex. This may (not guaranteed, natch) give a young cat hours of pleasure and become their preferred scratching station.
two: a plain old scratching post. These can be quite luxurious, and may also act as a suitable distration.
three: a really nice (small) real wool rug. If this feels nicer on the little cat's paws than the sofa, then there's a good chance they'll scratch that instead. Needs to be the softest, most luxurious rug you can find, of course. These are cats we're talking about here, after all.
four: Declawing. Cruel. Please don't.
five: Claw clipping. Generally just results in the cat making larger holes when it scratches rather than pinpricks, so probably pointless. six: Luck. Some fabrics tolerate scratching without any great visible effects. Once you have got them scratching somewhere acceptable, the battle is largely won, because that spot will become scent-marked and they'll tend to use it in preference to anywhere else. Mostly – so you'll still need to keep half an eye on them. But if they become accustomed to scratching somewhere you don't want, or if they don't have an official scratching location, you have to watch them constantly and it's a war of attrition that you will slowly lose.
[Simulposted with Simons] Such is the contrary nature of felines that we know it will ignore all the IKEA furniture (of which there's lots) and scratch only the legs of the nice chair and (potentially) sofa. On the other hand, if it keeps the mice at bay I'm happy.

We think we'll have to let him/her into the living room only when we're there, have nice moggy scratching posts in the back bedroom (both of our bedrooms are at the back, but the name has stuck...) and let himher out into the garden during the day where there are real trees and bushes and things. And water-pistol aversion therapy has been quite successful I'm told.

We're not yet sure what kind of cat we'll be getting. We're currently researching the options. My preference would be for a toilet-trained kitten going spare from a loving home that we can teach social graces, rather than some rescued hell-cat with a dozen ASBOs to its name. The latter do have a talent for looking particularly cute in the adverts though...

In other news, it's just started snowing in a Hollywood at Christmas kind of way.

[Simons] Thanks for the advice btw.
Ooh, don't count on the animal making a special trip to another room just 'cos it wants to sharpen its claws; remember, they're lazy as well as contrary. A sacrificial rug or toy cat pyramid in the living room is probably still a good idea.
Saw this recently and thought it might amuse:
The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English will become the official language of the European Union rather than German, which was the other contender. As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that English spelling had some room for improvement and, as a result, has accepted a 5-year phase-in plan that will become known as "Euro-English". The 5-year plan will be implemented as follows:

- In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will make the sivil servants jump with joy. Also, the hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up konsiderable konfusion, and keyboards kan be manufactured with one less letter.
- In the second year, growing publik enthusiasm will be anticipated, when the troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like fotograf 20% shorter.
- In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible. Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have always ben a deterent to akurate speling. Also, al wil sertainly agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag is disgrasful and should be done away with.
- By the 4th yer, people wil be mor reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th" with "z" and "w" with "v".
- During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining "ou" resulting in a more sensibl riting styl.

By ze end of ze fifz yer, zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis; evrivun vil find it ezi tu understand evrivun els and ze drem of a united Urop vil finali kum tru bekos ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze forst plas!

Hello all, back from Paris with only a small hangover. Happy New Year 2008 to all and sundry - hope it's full of laughter, sunshine and cake.
being catty
[rab] I suspect that it's the luck of the draw. I have two moggies and have attempted to get them to use two varieties of scratching devices. Neither of the cats took to either of them. One contraption was a pole (wrapped with rope) the other a flat, foldable, unit covered in a lighter grade of rope. Good luck.
going on a bit - as usual
I have to confess - before I did the sprogging thing, I was a cat obsessive so can fully understand the 'desire to acquire' cat-like ness. All I can advise is .... whatever you wish them to do - they will graciously and very politely do the opposite ... and whatever direction you may want to send them [ with the best possible intentions] they will go the other way with a beguiling manner encompassing charm, purposefulness and intention, which sumply leaves you in a place whre you simply wouldn't even deign to complain. Adorable little hussies, each an every one of 'em.
'sumply' is a fine word - but as you can proberBly guess, was a bit of a misstype.
sumply - in the manner of a sump; L. sumpus, some cat.
Cats are shifty, evil, nasty pieces of work. No-one has ever had one as a pet. Millions of cats have had humans as servants, though.
Well, I've never had much time for dogs - so there you go.

I was wondering if one of the US Presidential Election experts (Projoy, CdM?) could explain if there's any reason why the Republicans and Democrats have their first nomination quasi-election thingy on the same day. Presumably there's nothing in the rules that says that candidates have to be nominated in anything like a similar way, let alone at the same time. Is it simply to try and prevent one party getting more press attention than another?

[rab] You just made me google the answer to that, cos I didn't know, but according to this page, anyway, "there was a mutual decision in 1976 between the parties to hold the event [the Iowa caucuses] on the same day because they understood the need to make it a heightened media bonanza of sorts."

There has been some change this year because the Republicans moved their caucuses in Iowa forward to 3 Jan. It was only after that decision was made that the Democrats decided (presumably for reasons of not handing momentum to the GOP race coverage) to move theirs forward also. The two parties do indeed use separate caucusing methods in Iowa (I think the Republicans do secret ballots, whereas Democrats tend to use the non-secret "go stand in the corner of the room relating to your candidate" solution. There has been quite a bit of shuffling this year of the primary calendar, mostly with different states jostling to put themselves earlier on in the process. I expect this drives up the cost for the candidates.
+)
*eats curry at her desk and waits for someone to say something*
hmmm, curry
Mmm... absence.
ramblings
My brain was definitely on half-cock yesterday. Today, it seems to be on full-power again, with no discernable reason why.
As an aside, it's mild and windy here today in Grantham. And instead of being the last person on my cul-de-sac road occupied by mostly pensioners to put my bins out onto the roadside this morning, I was the first. Hurrah!
Bins
[penelope] The last time I managed that it turned out that I was putting them out on the wrong day. Something about holidays and skip-days, I don't know. Everyone hated me because the bins got knocked over, either by their kids or by the backwash from a passing vehicle. Great neighbourhood. Not.
Communal refuse collection for the building. It's magical.
In it to bin it
[nights] Yes, we have that too, due to the sheer density of people living in the area (4 storey flats). The downside is that it means there are big wheely-skips on the streets, which don't do a huge amount to improve the look of the place. Preferable to bin bags being ripped apart by birds, though, which would be the alternative.
shhhh!
shhhhushes
I was going to say, (before I whacked the wrong key) I'm really busy today...
Reynard
(rab) You can't leave binbags out round here because the foxes just rip them apart leaving the rubbish scattered everywhere. I had thought of splashing a little white spirit around the inside hoping the smell would put them off but the foxes will probably evolve rapidly into actually needing the stuff to stay alive (cf. Warfarin, now a dietary essential for rats).
Yes, but my bit of town looks like shit 93% of the time anyway, so it's not so much of a concern.

On the way back from rehearsals this evening - well actually the pub after rehearsals - I was charmed by the man who got on the bus and was absolutely mystified that he had to buy a ticket. The driver and our interlocuter went back and forth on this one for about three stops, before the gentleman found the 1,30€ needed. And then got off. Marvellous.
[Rosie] So long as you don't use dogs, it's still perfectly legal to hunt and kill foxes.
Tally-ho
(Phil) So it ought to be. I am the least likely huntsman, thinking it distasteful to set one animal against another but I was very much against the ban purely on libertarian grounds and after all it's only bloody foxes, which are pests. I find it staggering that some people in the suburbs actually leave food out for them, which is a bit like leaving food out for the dear little flies and wasps. I do feed the dickybirds but they are a Good Thing.
Extinction
[Rosie] The quantity of species that became extinct long before intelligent bipeds trod this earth is simply staggering. I think our impact is over-rated and, unless we don't believe in evolution, we should stop saving species that obviously don't have the necessary means to survive on their own. Also, I wholeheartedly agree with you on the matter of the naïve townsfolk who put food out for the most wiley of scavengers, so that the cute little feckers don't have to go and find food for themselves. I wouldn't mind getting rid of a few robins at the moment - either that or persuade them somehow to shut the hell up at night.
Thinking about birds
(Phil) Robin problems? Bar them. Employ crows.
Robins calling
They switched to singing at night because modern noise pollution is so bad during the day that they can't hear themselves chirrup. If you want to Do Something about that, you'll probably have to join the Black Ops Arm of the Noise Abatement Society.
Puzzled about Rats & Warfarin
I was aware that rats were growing immune to many poisons, but this is the first I've heard about them needing a blood thinner to survive. Which begs the question: If warfarin is now an essential dietary additive for healthy rats, why don't we simply stop giving it to them?
(S M) I think the story is true though there's a possibility it may be a scientific urban myth. Without Warfarin the rats presumably will rapidly evolve back to what they were before the introduction of this substance although a number will perish in the process. Something more subtle is needed.
Rats
Dad always swore by a cricket bat during the bad old days.
I see idiots have dropped by (see elsewhere)...
Hmmm
Not my day. A casual chat over coffee led me to realise that flights I was booked to take next week have been withdrawn. The service email got swamped by spam, and though they tried to call me, it turns out they did so on my old office number during the Christmas vacation. Ho hum. The original booking was perfect: nice leisurely departure, direct flight out to a meeting; meeting finishes, evening flight back, airport easily makable after the end of the meeting. Then I could go to a course I was enrolled on the next day. Now, the outward is early morning, involves a change at Birmingham. Then I had a choice of either leaving the meeting before the session in which I was scheduled to speak, or missing the course. I went for the latter in the end.

And now these guys show up.

I think I missed it.
rab's Trip
Well where's the fun in that? You are supposed to get the only available flight that puts you in the night before your event, a train ride away from wherever your meeting is to take place. Said train should break down, stranding you overnight somewhere with no accomodation so that you have to sleep on the (open-air) platform where you get molested by stray dogs and policemen. When you get to the meeting you should discover that your powerpoint slides have somehow been erased from your laptop, at which point your wireless connection should pack up. The return journey should see you travel by coach and hovercraft and deliver you into the arms of a UK customs official who is going through a bad patch in his or her personal life. You should return home after 15 hours of point-to-point commuting to discover your pipes burst approximately one hour after you departed.

On the other hand, you are changing at Birmingham.
Actually, crisis averted. Having rescheduled my course, I realised that a different airline could offer me direct flights at better times, and for a few quid less than my original ticket. So, back on the phone to get the original ticket refunded (which I must make sure actually happens), and less cost to the taxpayer.
Flight
[rab] All's well that ends well, then.
Not a criticism of anyone here, or anyone at all really, but I do wonder how many air/car/train/hovercraft(?)/coach miles of unnecessary travel to and from meetings are covered per annum. Also, how much money is spent on travel and accommodation that could be done much more cheaply with minimal discomfort to the person (who is, after all, getting paid to travel in many cases).
Business Travel
[Phil] As a fully paid-up member of the business tralling set I have had those thoughts occasionally, but, if you do it all the time then the level of comfort becomes a significant issue. You'd sleep in a capsule hotel for one night, but not 4 nights a week for 6 months.
Also, speaking for myself and most of my colleagues, my traveling is almost exclusively outside normal office hours, so I dispute that I'm being paid to travel. I think there are a lot of myths around this area.
That's 'travelling set' of course.
On the travel theme, how do people commute to and from work/university/knitting lessons?
I personally dislike travelling, particularly on my own. Most of the meetings I go to involve a bunch of people getting together from all over to present talks to an audience. Although this can be done by videoconferencing, much of the most useful time is that spent discussing with individuals in ad-hoc discussions etc. I think that could well get lost without the physical presence. I get paid the same whether I stay put or go somewhere. Also, this all being paid by your (and my) taxes, means that we always have to go the cheapest, most unglamorous way possible.
(INJ) You are being paid to travel, it presumably being a part of your job specification, unless you're self-employed. (nights) Car, once I'd got one (1965). Distances 2, 27, 10 and 6 miles.
[nights] Lots of jobs, several parts of the country involving several house moves. It goes thus: 1. Walked, then car 1.5 miles. 2. Ditto. 3. Car, 10 miles. 4. Car 1.5 miles. 5. Car, 17 miles. 6. Walked 600 yards. 7. Car, 20 miles. 8. Car 11 miles, then 2 miles (I moved). 9. Car 2 miles.
Oh, [nights] Walk, 2 miles.
Shuffling along
[nights] For many years around 50 miles - 80 Km - each way but these days a leisurely stroll of around 10 metres from the kitchen to workshop.
(rab) What, even when it's chucking it down? (everybody) My niece and her hubby commute respectively to Cardiff and Swindon, from Chepstow. This is among the reasons that CO2 emissions are high, and will carry on getting higher. Should I tell her? She claims to be Green-ish, after all. At least they don't fly.
Carbon Footprint
Currently - a quarter of a mile into the city centre. Takes about 6 minutes. *smug green face*
When I was doing a proper job, then that would be a train every day. Now I'm freelance, it's that occasionally plus a lot of lying in bed, thinking.
[Rosie] Well, I don't own a car. There is a bus, so when it's totally dreadful I might get a bus. But for the rest of the time, I have an umbrella.
travel
[Rosie] My job specification says I have to do 5 days of 7.5 hours each (as if!). My base location/normal place of work in tax terms is about 45 minutes away. I am currently working some 3.5 hours away from home, am still expected to do the same number of hours once at the client site and get no extra money. Where's the payment for travel in that?
[INJ] Blimey. No wonder you go walkies whenever you have some time off.
I am currently juggling TV companies' and radio stations' requests for t'interviews. And then I'm off on hols to Holland tomorrow :oD
My commute is even shorter than Dujon's: 6m from kitchen to office. Music lessons are reached by tram. Tram or train to the city, or bicycle are the other ways I usually get around.
[INJ] Do you get paid travel expenses? If not, I'd be having a word with my employer, if I were you. Also, are you really out of the house for 15 hours a day (presuming you take 30 minutes for lunch), 5 days a week? Also (Take 2), do you need to be at the client site for all of those hours/days?
My commute these days is a flight of stairs. In my last few jobs it's been: a flight of stairs; a flight of stairs; 27 miles each way by car; 30 miles each way (1 mile by car, the rest by train); 8 miles each way by bicycle; 20 mins walk; 17 mins walk; 25 mins walk etc.
For several years at one time in my life I had a 60-mile each way commute. Now it is 18 stairs.
(That's 18 stairs each way, mind you.)
[INJ] Please ignore the apparently aggressive style of my previous post to you (which was unintentional). In fact, just ignore the whole thing, as it seems rather silly now. I was NES (Not Entirely Sober) at the time of writing.
[oblig]
[flerdle] Six miles from kitchen to office? How big is your house?
casa del tardis
[Tuj] If I were to tell you, I'd have to kill you.
I should contribute. Bus for ten minutes then tram for twenty, then feet for five. This is why strikes throw me so - I live out in the suburbs, and while it has its advantages - calm, nicer people, very few sirens - if I want a late night, or to go and see Mlle Nights on a whim, it's a touch difficult. I keep on having dark thoughts about buying a car...
[nights] I can understand going to work on a bus, going to work on a tram, but going to see Mlle Nights on a whim is new to me. ;-)
tired old yolk
[Phil] I prefer to go to work on an egg.
[Phil] No bother: I didn't read the first message until after you'd posted the second. To clarify: I get travelling expenses, but not payment for time spent travelling. Also, given the distance, I don't commute, but stay away for the week (and, yes, I do get my hotel bills paid). However, the situation in the past, and with many of my colleagues now is that a couple of hours travelling time is regarded as normal and is unpaid.
Do I need to be at the client site all that time? NO! Does the client agree? NO!
Vin de pays d'expenses
Regarding payment - one certainly doesn't get paid extra to get up at 4 or 5 in the morning to sit in an airport for three hours.
[rab] Hmmmm....if it's required by your job, and you're not on an hourly rate, then yes you do get paid to do that, but not paid extra. Or perhaps, if your job didn't require you to do that, you wouldn't get paid so much? I'm just arguing for the sake of it really, so don't take any of this to heart :-)
[Phil] Oh you must try it. But I'd rather you visited someone else's girlfriend...
Hello everyone,so lovely to see you're all still here. Last posted a couple of years ago, (then got new job, husband and baby, just about remembering who I am again). Have just had first glass of wine in about 18 months, so apologise now for the possible poor standard of postings!
[Ella] Congrats! And welcome back! I haven't noticed anything untoward yet.
[Penelope] Thank you! And on the horrendous errors front; there's still time :)
[Ella] What pen said!
Ella! How nice to have you back with us :-)
[and Ella] Please come and join my Animal Vegetable Mineral Abstracty thingy - it seems to be taking a bit of time....
*waves from Paris*
[Ella] Nice to see you again.
Good news: just received my first official rejection letter from a major U.S. periodical. I feel like a real writer now. =)
[J] congratulations!
Yawn. Another quiet night.
[nights]

WAKE UP!

shhhhhhhhhhhh!
I am surprised by the intensity of my loathing of Gillian McKeith tonight on telly. She is the most tasteless, boorish and annoying silly moo.
Then why did you persist?
I am quite sure that I have missed some entertaining programmes over the years but, these days, I do tend to pick and choose what I watch (as opposed to sitting in front of the damned thing 'flicking around').
Gillian 'not a real doctor' McKeith
[pen] it was my turn to buy the Sunday newspaper for our usual afternoon crossword get-together in the pub - we generally do the Mail on Sunday general knowledge one because it's quite challenging and good for sharing. Anyway - on the front page was THAT woman who had already stated that "every woman hates their bum" - [er, actually, NO - not true - I quite like mine]. So she's now promoting the Great British Bum Diet. Needless to say I refused to buy the paper and we had to do the Times crossword instead.
Love your bum
(Chalky, pen) Ignore it; it's actually an elbow diet.
un-elbow-like bum
I prefer the advice from here: The Health Institute for Nutrition
[Chalky] Do I detect the presence of a "Millenium Project" reader?
Ouch, me eardrums. Not even been to a gig.
Millenium Project & Eardrums
[Sierra Mike] You mean her?
[nights] Wassup chuck?
[Chalky] No, you. The author of the MP website used the "Not a Real Doctor" middle name for quacks too. The congruence was striking.
[Sierra Mike] Aaaah. Now I see :-)
Tom & Jerry
Having been accosted by a mouse whilst wiping down the stove on Saturday night - silly thing was hiding behind the recycling and would have gone unnoticed had it not decided to dive for the cover of its bolt hole whilst I was still in the kitchen - we set a trap baited with a peanut butter/Waitrose Biscuit for Cheese canapé. Amazingly the stupid thing didn't notice the suspicious enclosure and #1 has been dispatched. Presumably there will be more. In the fullness of time we still intend to exercise the nuclear option (Codename: Tiddles) but are still building up the necessary kit and looking for someone who'll supply us the goods.
little blighters
[rab] Bait. That's the only way to do it. I had an infestation in my flat (which was a conversion of 'the poor house' - ie the workhouse into six flats) and I caught 11 or 12 in traps, then got fed up of the traps going off while I was relaxing and watching telly. So I called in the council who put down bait everywhere in the building and we got rid of the whole lot. If you have them, the other flats will have them too - am I right in thinking you have a flat in a fairly old building?
Bait
Um, if they take the bait and then die somewhere inaccessible you'll have to put up with the smell while they decay. If you can't cover everywhere they might be, and/or can't access the places where the blighters might go to die, I'd stick with putting traps in the areas you can access and view it as a long-term war of attrition until Project Tiddles comes online.

Best approach depends on your house design. How well-ventilated it is and such. Bait worked badly for us (at my orkplace) because the mice died in inaccessible places and smelt. Plainly pen didn't get that problem, but we did.

Neither poison nor traps will ever get them all, of course; making sure they can't get to any of your food is the most reliable way to make them lose interest.

Squeak
Well, just about everyone in Edinburgh has mice. The majority of the buildings are 3 or 4 storey tenement flats constructed around 1900. Chances are the blighters moved in during building and have been endemic ever since. I'm also sure they can get between buildings if they try hard enough so if you were going for the total obliteration approach, as pen suggests, it might not be enough to restrict it to just one block.

I work on the principle that since they have access to a range of habitats we need to make ours as inhospitable as possible. Unfortunately, the age of the joinery is such that there's gaps and holes everywhere so getting these all mouse-proofed would probably cost more than moving to somewhere that's in a better state from this point of view. On the plus side, the number of poos I've found has been pretty small, which is suggestive we're not getting more than a few visitors. But if we catch more than four or five it'll probably be time to have a chat to the council to see if they have any wholesale slaughter solutions.

Bluebottle season
I dealt with my infestation during spring. The smell lasted about a week, after which I got two hatches of bluebottles every day for a week or so. I used elementary biology to interpret what had happened to the cadavers.
Mice
I got infested once (well, my garage then basement then house did). I tried humane traps to no avail (They came back faster than I could transport them to another place). I tried spring traps to no avail (they proved expert at getting the bait without suffering a crushed skull). Then I reluctantly put down glue traps (which require one to figure out a humane way of ending it for the trrapped animal). When I caught and euthanised my eleventh or twelfth mouse I gave up and called in the pros, who put down some sort of poison with the singular property of making the doomed mouse very thirsty. I was advised to check the bath before showering each morning. That did the trick eventually. I imagine they died in the crawl spaces, but I didn't notice any smell. Perhaps the corpses mummified and now await discovery (whereupon they will doubtless put a curse on their discoverer). I don't think I'd waste time with traps if it happened again.
[SM] That sounds very similar to the situation at my old flat; I tried traps and poisons, none of which worked. But then Dave came round and dispensed the hard stuff, and never a squeak after. But that was a modern flat, and filling the holes with expanding foam was straightforward. After our first visitation we called Dave in straight away, and it took him three attempts to get rid of the first batch; and expressed doubts that given the way the plumbing had been done in the kitchen that he could offer anything like a permanent solution.
SM being Sierra Mike, rather than Simons Mith, in that instance.
I caught one of the little dears in a humane trap some weeks back, also using peanut butter. He died in it anyway, for reasons that aren't clear to me. He was only trapped overnight, perhaps six-eight hours, so it presumably wasn't hunger or thirst. A broken spirit, perhaps?
[Dan] peanut allergy?
Mice
I've dealt with mice in two properties - each time by setting half a dozen traps at a time, baited with cheese. On each occasion they'd given up visiting within a week, and a dozen or so deaths. Perhaps the smell of mouse death lingers in the air?
One bit of information I was given at the time was useful - a mouse can get through a hole the width of a pencil.
Of Mice and McKeith
Clearly the solution is to stop jabbing those pencils into the walls. Or at least stop pulling them out afterwards. A pencil blimey. I bet those mice don't hate their bums... [Chalky] Maybe she meant that every woman hates her bum? I say why stop there, obnoxious pseudoscientist that she is...
[Phil] I couldn't resist it. Google reveals 65,500 Results for 'Can a mouse squeeze through a hole the width of a pencil?'. (0.44 seconds) Amazing stuff.
[Chalky] It's worse than that!
Clicky
[Dan] Murderer! You done for that animal with your inhumane "cholesterol trap". :)
Well, #2 has yet to be caught. I can't believe for one minute there was only ever one of them, so either this one's cleverer or less intrepid. Let's keep on the lookout for those poos.
[Raak] eeek! For a real treat why not try our Speciality Cappuccino flavoured with rodentessence and topped with bright pink froth. Chocolate sprinkles [mouse droppings] optional
[Chalky] I only just spotted your reply to my eardrums complaint and can't for the life of me remember what the problem was.

Hello, Middle Age.
[nights] Never mind. Middle Age comes to us all - but I must admit - it's really bloody annoying most of the time.
As some wise person said, growing old sucks, but it is better than the alternative.
Both good points. However I feel especially aggrieved about what this all means for me, as I'm not yet 25.
*ducks flying objects which always seem to materialise every time nights' age is mentioned*
I was interviewed by Jim Naughtie on the Today programme this morning. It was absolutely terrifying. It was at 6.52 in the morning, when all sensible people would have been asleep. I think I was too.
Oh, and #2 has crawled out of the woodwork. A small thing, very actively tried to escape the (humane) trap.
[rab] I just checked it out on Listen Again. The item on New Zealand accents? So, how does a physicist get involved with that? Do I sense the words "spin glass" in the background?
RabRadio
ooh, I must have a listen. All I do is set up these interview thingies... just trying to track down a rogue woodlander right now for one of the regional BBC stations who wants to talk to 'someone'. And firing off feature ideas to BBC programmes...
Early starts
I've often marvelled at the coherency of interviewees on the Today programme, or (particular) Five Live's Wake up to Money, which is at 5.30am. Rather them than me...
[Raak] Yes. That's the one. Involvement via knowing a suitably numerate (or semi-numerate) linguist. No spin glasses as such, though voter models are relevant.
Rising at the crack of Dawn
I get up at 6 on the days I have to be teaching at 8. And those days are rubbish, except when I can watch the sunrise from the tram. That's rather nice. On the other hand, that department is on holiday from next week, so I get a week of lie ins until the following week, which is my department's holiday. Wheee!
Huzzah for our beloved leader!
[rab] as a matter of (professional) interest, how do you alert the media to an interesting academic study? Was it published somewhere?
[pen] Traditionally, you would have a big-bang type discovery published in Nature or something like that, and their press team would do the business.

This case is a bit of an oddity - the work's been going on for years and has been presented in various forms at conferences, referred to in somewhat specialist publications and so on. Our press office got wind of it, I explained the situation, and it was generally felt that cos we were submitting a paper (which could take a couple of years to complete the review/publication process) and presenting it at the same time at the main linguistics conference in the US, it was reasonable to put out a press release. I was expecting it to go unnoticed, but was picked up by Radio New Zealand, the New Zealand Herald (front page), the Telegraph, the Glasgow Herald (page 5, above the fold), BBC Radio Scotland, Today, BBC Radio Wales and the World Service. I'm shattered, and generally want now to crawl under a stone.

[rab] Noooo! You were great. I guess it must be difficult to explain mathematical modelling to laymen, and for a presenter to pick up the gist of a study involving lots of people over several years and squeeze the right questions into a five-minute interview. I guess you're dealing with a lot of variables, but you summed it up pretty well. If I do my job properly, I get to put a lot of Woodland Trust people on the radio, and usually guide the presenter into asking the right questions: "You might like to ask why XXX happens, and what it means in the long term" etc. I didn't realise universities had press offices and the fact that it got picked up by so many publications means yours wrote a good press release and sent it out to the right media, with a view to possibly attracting the interest of potential funders...
[pen] The press officer I spoke to - for about an hour - is an ex-journalist, so he distilled it into a newsy-sounding story. (The version on the BBC website is basically the release verbatim). The presenters' briefs/scripts seemed to be cobbled together through informal chats with researchers/producers a few hours ahead of broadcast. 'Twould have been nice to have seen a copy myself beforehand, but I guess you can't have everything.
You're right about funding though. Probably the most useful thing about all this is that I can stick it all in the case for support to demonstrate interest beyond stuffy academia.
yay rab!
[rab] Cool interview and work - well done, and well explained. New Zealand is nice and small, making it a lot easier to study than its behemoth of a neighbour, even though exactly the same process happened in Australia (albeit some half a century earlier) and it's been developing in interesting ways ever since. I'd be interested in the publications to date, if you've got a list somewhere. I have an interesting documentary about the australian accent, too, if you're interested.
[flerdle] So that Google doesn't link my uni page to this one, perhaps I should suggest you type my name into the venerable search engine, click the first link (at least, the first link in our part of the world), and towards the bottom of the page you can find a link to the relevant preprint. I heartily recommend the books by Gordon and Trudgill if you really want to get into the details of the empirical data, as opposed to our modelling.
Trudgill rings a very faint bell. But well done you - I enjoyed the interview.
[nights] He is one of the more notable names in dialect research, especially in the UK; it would be hard not to have heard of him at some stage if you've looked into this field much.
[rab] Thanks very much.
Ah yes. I did a study of dialect changes amongst adolescents for A Level English Language. It was good fun. Got an A and everything.
Ah, A-level English Language. How long ago it seems now ;)
A level English Language didn't exist when I were a lad. I had to make do with English Literature, and I failed that. So now I don't read much. But I do write for a living. :oD
Pass the flat cap
English Language "A" levels? Comes from having so many furriners in t'country. When I were a lad, everyone just knew 'ow t'speak proper English wiyout paper t'prove it.
[SM] Ah, but at the time it was the perfect complement to A Levels in French and German, enabling me to have a thorough understanding of my own language before I grapple with others. Don't quite know where I went wrong...
(nights) You need Latin. Only with that can one get to grips with the meaning of such terms as fellatio and cunnlingus and begin to enjoy life to the full. You know it makes sense!
Mea culpa
Spot the typo.
Rubble and squeak
Was woken at 1am by the most almighty scratching and clattering noise from behind the skirting board in the bedroom. I had to decamp to the spare room to get away from it. Dave, our friendly neighbourhood pest controller (who will probably be able to retire on our flat), thinks he's worked out what's going on. Next door is having its bathroom renovated, which has probably disturbed a habitat, so they've decided to move in to ours. What we're hearing is probably the removals. The bait has been lain!

Apparently we did a good job of flushing out the ones in the kitchen with our trap - three in the end, and none for nearly a week. Removing the panel under the units, Dave remarked "Missed one" and picked up a cardboard mouse by its tail. At least the source of the slightly musty smell has now been explained.

[rab] Have you been making up all these rodent stories these past weeks, just as an extended set-up for the title of that last post?
Our entire building smells of roasting meat. Great, now I'm hungry.
[CdM] I wish. We plucked up courage to return to our bedroom last night, and it seemed to be a clatter-free experience. Looks like Dave was bang on the money.

It was quite odd - I said: "my wife saw running feet behind the skirting board there", pointing to a wall in the bedroom. Dave immediately went into the bathroom and fumbled around the pipework. I'm sure this guy must have been a mouse in a previous existence...

Finbar Saunders
[rab] Why don't you just ask this "Dave" why, when you mention mice behind your skirting board, his first instinct is to fondle your pipe.
robbin29605
1234567__765432129605
pope findling
[Sierra Mike] Your last three words may have triggered the imagination of the following poster :-0
It's a bit of a shame our main influx of new players these days only play one move and then vanish into the ether again. I mean, where's the stamina?
One hit wonders
Orange MC has had a fair flurry of spamtastic attacks recently too, for those of you who are mornogamous.
Followers
[Tuj] It appears that Chalky is on to you, old chap.
[Duj] I'm trying to figure out what you mean, and I just can't. Have I missed something?
[Tuj] Duj will explain ;-)
[Duj] You know me too well ;-)
In other news - it's my birthday today. All being well - hope to have landed safely in Dublin by 9.20 am. Hope the stalled AVMA has been solved by the time I return later in the week.
[Duj/Chalky] *remains confused*!
[just Chalky] I'm pleased to be the first here to wish you a very happy birthday, and enjoy the Emerald Isle =) I may have to take up the AVMA gauntlet for you, but I'm not that good at it...
Stalking
[Tuj] No harm meant, sir. It is merely my interpretation of Chalky's "the following poster".
Happy birthday, Chalks, a witch with prescience though you be. ;-) I am advised that Dublin is a fair city and worth a visit whether a birthday treat or not. I hope that you find it so.
Ah, following not preceding, I see
[Duj] Gosh, I'm easily confused, aren't I!
*waves from Dublin*
Chalky] Happy birthday - have a glass of the black stuff for me!
Parslow puts York on road to Wembley
- Times headline from the football section today. Will there one day be a Wembley MC server then?
Shhhh! We're applying for Lottery funding and everything
Glad I was awake at the time....
[penelope] Next time your miller gets in at 00:58am, ask him not to drop his super-sturdy clogs quite so heavily :-)
[Phil] Right ;-)
Actually, the epicentre was under a village much closer to my mother's house, in Ludford on the Lincolnshire Wolds. It woke me up, though - everything on the dressing table rattled, and I thought someone was at the foot of the bed, shaking it. I think I might have dreamed it was the Dutch miller trying to remove his clogs...
Upgrade
Just upgraded the server... this site at least still seems to work.
*looks around*
[rab] Oooh, nice :o)
[pen] I was sitting at my computer at the time, conversing with an Australian when it happened - it was rather startling with the doors and windows banging and rattling. In fact, it was hard to tell when it stopped...i couldn't tell if it was me or the earth shaking :-)
Hello there - I'm going to do a little upgrade, so I'll turn posting off for a short while. Hopefully not longer than 10-15 minutes.
Done
Seems to have worked.

p> It doesn\'t mean you can do anything you couldn\'t do before, incidentally...

Oh bollocks.
I'm sorry I'll read that again
Seems to have worked.

It doesn't mean you can do anything you couldn't do before, incidentally...

But if you do notice any oddities be sure to let me know.
Hidden textI've upgraded php4 to php5 and have found one place where the two seem to behave differently so far.
The whole of the internet and computerkind is against me today. It has just taken me four hours to make a media outlets search. The process should take about 20 minutes. Hmmph.
Oddity
[rab] On posting to the Limericks game, the move was posted ok, but this appeared at the top of the page:
array(3) { [0]=> string(3) "" [1]=> string(39) "Wore clogs that war werkelijk te groote" [2]=> string(4) "" } Warning: Cannot modify header information - headers already sent by (output started at /var/www/rab.org.uk/server/STEAM/HtmlRewrite.php:376) in /var/www/rab.org.uk/server/Rou.php on line 122
And something similar again on posting this.
Just done the same to me in Limericks. Perhaps it likes not the Dutch?
And here, so not the Dutch.
[Raak] Oh dear...
Wherps
Left in the debugging information...
A pox on Barclays and its unco-operative PinSentry system.
[pen] Hmm yes, it can be frustrating that. Mostly works fine for me, but I don't really want to carry that gizmo between work and home ever day in case I need to do some banking. Still, work is forcing me to ditch Barclays so I won't have to deal with it soon.
Is this some kind of card-reader thing? RBS introduced one of those and it's one of the reasons why I'm switching to the Halifux. (That and I get to spend my wife's shoe fund on beer).
Card-reader thing?
Natwest sent me one of these sometime last year. I am an active on-line banking user, but have never needed to use the thing once. Don't even remember where I put it.
php and your trade secrets
[rab] You drive this site with php? Do you use a framework of any kind or have you done the whole thing from scratch? I'm also impressed with the clever "hide" widget-thing. Presumably done with javascipt? The reformatting on display and hide is very clean on my browser. It must have taken some work to prevent it to screwing up the markup when it opens up. Do you pull it off with clever CSS trickery? Sorry to sound like a kid after consuming a large coke and 99. This stuff is like sweets to me sometimes.
Cardies
[rab] yes - it's a security measure that ensure that you are the right person to access the account as you need the card, its PIN, the gizmo, and the log-in details to get in to the account or set up a new payment. Not a bad idea all in all, but a bit of a pain sometimes.
[SM] As it said at one time on the front page, this site is powered by STEAM which is a few php scripts I threw together over a few wet Sunday afternoons to handle the stuff. It's all basically straightforward stuff, apart from the hide widget which is done by Javascript. The hardest part of that was to get it looking sensible for people who don't have Javascript enabled. Not much CSS trickery - although even then the old version of IE made a pig's ear of it.

[GIII] Whereas I think it's completely over the top. They already ask me for some user name that I can't remember, random characters from a password and a secret code. The card-reading gizmo has removed the one thing that made online banking useful - the fact you could access it anytime, anywhere. (Very handy when you're travelling).

[rab] Barclays at least has removed the requirement to remember passwords and secret codes. I'm inclined to agree with you however on the travelling point.
[GIII] Ah ok - RBS ask you to scan your card in addition to all the other stuff when you want to do something like, oh, pay some money into an account you hold elsewhere. The not-having-to-remember-your-password thing seems pretty sensible; in fact, the worst thing about one of my online accounts is that the password is easy for me to remember (since I chose it) but the username is some 8-digit number I'll never be able to commit to memory.
Meow
Project tiddles has been installed. The instructions said that she would hide behind a sofa, not want to talk to us nor touch her food. She's generally wanting to be where we are and is wolfing down her food. Katharine's just introducing her to the sofa... let's see how it goes.
Ah no, false alarm - just the coat cupboard. It was a bit of a harrowing trip bring her home. We were going to get a taxi, but with the Scotland-England rugby in Murrayfield all taxis were booked up for three hours! So she had to endure the number 16 bus. She did very well...
[rab] Don't expect to have exclusive use of the sofa now.
Name that cat!
Right - the name that came with our cat is, I'm ashamed to say, Cuddles. We're trying to think of something more appropriate but whilst we can think of lots of great names for a male (Armitage, Jeremy, Theodore, Pooch) we're a bit stuck for a girl. Pictures here.
U2
Don't be too embarrassed, rab, we too have had a recent arrival; it's allocated name was 'Bananas'. When the lass at the vet's advised of such I blinked and said something along the lines of "Ey? Do you run through the dictionary, one letter at a time, to pick out names for these poor homeless creatures?" She laughed and said, "Yes, that's exactly what we do". An image of 'ours' will be found here.
As far as naming goes, it's hard. Given the sly eyes of your new master, the fact that she is indeed a she and looks like she'd eat anything put before her on a platter, might I suggest Salome.
Lousy link, sorry
Try here.
Today we have naming of cats
[rab] Pandora - the all-gifted
cat-naming
With those eyes, and those teeth, I'd go for Bowie.
Marilyn. Manson or Monroe, you chose.
choose...
She's quite cute and cuddly really! Anyway, we got through the first night ok - she better than me. I need to learn to delegate the duty of listening out for strange sounds in the middle of the night to her, since she's much better at it than I am. She seems to be bonding better with Katharine than me, and I think both of us together is a bit much for her at the moment.

As far as names go, we've toyed with Beatrice and Felicity but are still open to suggestions.

Oh, and she did a big poo in the litter tray overnight, so I would say she's starting to feel at home...
(rab) A friend has two female cats called Ermintrude and Florence, or "the E-cat" and the "F-cat" respectively. My cousin had a cat called Katya. What about Llewela? Mine have always been "Puss" or "Pussy-cat" and I suspect the next one will be, too.
Janet's a good name for a cat.
South Wiltshire Weather
I been out. Driving. There be plenty of water and debris on roads after 'first wave' of storms. Hatches are now battened down in preparation for 'second wave' later this mornin'.
Weather?
Yeah, it's a little breezy, but the sun is shining - good old boring Leicester :-)
The clouds in those satellite images (BBC) are an interesting curled shape. I am not surprised that it is a little blowy.

It was 37°C here today at 3:30pm, then down to 23 two hours later. This seems to be a regular pattern, and I think I'm getting the hang of it. Step 1: stay indoors...

(flerdle) Is that a sea breeze cooling it off a bit? Bit of a breeze here, too, 35 mph at least. Heavy rain all morning, a peculiarly featureless and leaden sky, thunder and lightning (not in that order) at ten to two and a bit of small hail. Temperature 6°C. Pressure 962 and still going down slowly.
[Rosie] No, cold front coming through. They sail along the southern Indian Ocean from west to east and flick us with their tails. Animation here
Do any musicians here know any whiz ManuScript programmers (the language for writing plugins for Sibelius (the music notation publishing software))? A friend of a relation is working on a project that is getting rather large for one person to manage and is looking for extra grey cells to draw on. Knowledge of Braille music notation an advantage! I'm not sure how commercial or otherwise it's likely to be.
24 hours later...
I guess not, then.
Sibelius
Er, not off the top of my head, but the Sibelius website technical pages are full of people with a lot of experience and knowledge. A post to the forums there might yield a response.
Cats
The old tradition was to call it 'Trex'. Something to do with Speverend Rooner and looking for the cooking fat... In half the photos it looks like a British Blue. My friend has one called Sybil (Basil died,sadly). What about "Trillian"?
Yes, she's a mog but the rescue centre said she had "some British Blue" in her. Reading descriptions on the web she seems to fit them very well!

We seem to have settled on "Felicity", or "Flisstycat" for short - but we're not sure if she'll get use to it. If she won't shed Cuddles, we might have to make her "Professor Cuddles"...

I think I'm going to be sick :)
My poor old rescued cat is not well, possibly the big C.
do not disturb
I've got a feature to write today. And a press release. Shhhh.
[flerdle] Are you in Melbourne at the moment? I have the school fete this afternoon and it looks like we'll have close to 40° for it. We may only stay for a short while. Adelaide has had 11 straight days of 35°C plus. This looks like it'll be 12 in a row. Poor buggers.
That's Adelaide for you...
[nfras] nah, I cunningly went north yesterday, so I'm hoping it will be back to "normal" (hah!) by the time I return next week. Hope you survive the fete - stay out of the sun!
How adorable
I thought it might interest you - a cute little game of MC broke out today on Fark.com. The link.
[Juxtapose] Brilliant!
I'm giggling at players in Each Move Must Consist of Precisely Eight Words who are currently attempting to pick up the game and move it along...
Softers' Cat
[Softers] Oh shit. How old is the cat?
Were you waiting for me?
Has no-one said anything over Easter? I've been away for five days travelling beyond these horizons, climbed more stairs and ladders in more windmills, and become frozen in the process than I care to admit (oh, all right then - three. Two corn mills and a polder (drainage) mill), seen Zuid-Holland covered in snow and had the plane de-iced before taking off to come home, and still you lot are keeping quiet. What's going on?
*spots the ostrich*
[pen] OK, we're back. What?
[penelope] Your elipsis (four moves back) left us thinking you'd simply popped out to take the kettle off the stove. Everyone was afraid of interrupting you and looking rude.
[SM] oops. And I thought we were all quiet waiting for more news of Softer's cat...
I hope it stands a better chance than Schrödinger's.
*peeks*. Why? It looks fine to me.
[ImNotJohn] I'm not so sure.
Belatedly testing that I can actually post via proxy. Don't mind me. Sorry, was that your foot?
That's quite funky, though going a bit around the houses...
arrow_circle_down
Want to play? Online Crescenteering lives on at Discord