2008 — 8 August: Friday
Tonight's picture is from 1980, and shows a spot of Mother-Son bonding going on. I note I currently still have a bit more hair than my son did at the time!
Christa and Peter enjoying the moment
G'night at 00:04 or so.
Is that a...
... crockpot I see before me? Waiting to be stuffed? Yep. Duty before pleasure, therefore. It's 08:55 and somewhat moist out there. Not the overnight torrents that were forecast, however. Time for tea, too.
Monsieur Le Crockpot, he is stuffed. Brekkie is ready. A second cuppa, too. So next step: pleasure! In this case, installing and grappling with the newest toy from Mr Amazon, which arrived this morning. With it, I shall attempt the task of controlling the bulk of my A/V system. It's my sixth universal remote control, and my second Logitech device. And it's busily charging its little fusion power pack downstairs while I re-register with the Logitech website, 'fess up to all the makes and models of kit I have, and tell it how everything connects to what. Endless hours of fun and frolics ahead if the previous device is any guide.
Nothing is sacred... dept.
It seems two of the letters1 in the recently published collection of Noël Coward edited by Barry Day were accomplished forgeries by an interesting lady called Lee Israel. The New York Times Sunday book review reveals this, as it reviews her confessions "Can you ever forgive me?" (Source.)
You can't keep a good story down... dept.
Back in 1994 I updated a little book I'd written for IBM (CICS: a light2 hearted chronicle). In the entry for 23rd September 1977 I wrote:
American beauty queen Joyce McKinney appears in court at Epsom, accused of kidnapping a Mormon missionary and holding him prisoner in a Devon cottage. She denies the charges, declaring "For the love of Kirk (Anderson), I'd have skied down Everest in the nude with a carnation up my nose."
Not much to do with CICS, but it tickled me. On 12th April 1978, the lady jumped bail and fled to America, passing through Heathrow disguised as a deaf mute. Today, she's back in the news. The Guardian gleefully informs me that "the predatory beauty queen of 1977 has matured into the pit bull-loving 57-year-old of 2008" who has just had her pit bull terrier cloned by a team of South Korean scientists. (Source.)
Time remains on the wing...
It's 13:16, the lunch is just about cooked and fit to eat, and the first remote control activity has been successfully defined and implemented (and tested) on the new controller without having to pick up any of the original remote controls. Apart from the minor detail that the amplifier got set to "Ext. input" as well as "TV/DBS" — the former over-riding the latter. And it seems I have to define a "post-activity" set of equipment actions, too, to leave them all back in a defined state. (Switching items on and off is one of the hardest bits, oddly enough.) But I've already got considerably further than I managed with the previous Logitech, which was also an advance on its predecessors.
And the barometer has been twitching steadily back upward, too. It's dry, but dull and overcast. Right, time to go eat my food!
Ever learning...
What's so neat about Microsoft binary digits is that lots of people are motivated to improve the base product. Inserting USB sticks and watching drive letters come and go, usually randomly, is now a thing of the past. (Software fix here. And useful info, too.)
Asides to Christa
It's 18:02 and I've been enjoying a cuppa, sniffing the crockpot, and generally taking things easy after a typical Friday trot into town. I bought just the one book, too, about (well, actually called) "How to stop your doctor killing you". It's by Vernon Coleman, who's been advertising his wares in the back pages of Private Eye for what seems like years. This is the first time I can remember finding one of his titles in the shops. He has some pretty trenchant criticisms of the "cancer industry" although that's a bit late for you, my love. <Sigh>
The Ikea building is rapidly taking shape immediately behind Staples, with Borders, Argos, and so on on its other side. Meanwhile the local ambulance unit near Debenhams has been demolished. I didn't walk far enough to see if the Friday market is still setting up at the end of the High Street. And the bank there that we had our mortgage with has just announced its first loss in 40 years. Oh, and I bumped into my last IBM manager and his wife in John Lewis; they were contemplating an upgrade to their present TV but (in my expressed opinion) not going for a big enough screen. Personally, I wouldn't bother with full HD at 42" if I proposed to sit 3.5m away from the screen...
Now it's 18:58 and time to dish up some of my tasty mixture. Yum!
Right, dishes done. Surplus food cooling to go into the fridge. I've been reading the Logitech Harmony One user manual quite carefully, and it's now time to listen to (the late) Ian Richardson reading "Shadowlands" and then it will be time to go and watch him in "Private Schulz" with the (also late) Michael Elphick. I'm on episode 3... Schulz has just been parachuted into wartime UK to spend £2m in forged £5 notes. And I've just ordered a real blast from the past: Rock Follies — I expect it will only mean anything to those of a certain age. I remember Christa and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Rula Lenska, Julie Covington, what's not to like? (When we had a pair of white lab rats as pets for a year we called them the little ladies in homage.)
Oddly enough, Ms Lenska was also in episode 4 of "Schulz" tonight — Koestler strikes again.