2009 — 6 March: Friday

Yippee! Pension day. I've left the PVR watching the rest of the first part of the drama about the CIA. I've only just realised it's a repeat, though it was first shown a couple of weeks after Christa died, so I had many more important things to deal with back then. Anyway, time for tonight's picture of Christa, from late in 1980 in Old Windsor. She was in the process of settling Peter for the night:

Christa in 1980

Seems to be pretty cold out there again, though the barometer has climbed slightly. G'night at about 00:10 — I'm tired.

Unaccustomed as I am...

... to early nights, I actually remained up (watching a nice BBC4 programme about touring Britain, including Durlston, Padstow, Polperro) until I was basically swaying with fatigue. However, a combination of my inner alarm clock1 and bright sunshine roused me about 40 minutes ago. It's 08:54 and I've exchanged emails on the thorny topic of automated footnotes and pull quotes with the sheepish one downunder. I shall have to re-examine my copy of "DOM Scripting" at this rate it seems.

First joke of the day: "Laughing while driving a car can be an offence." How else am I expected to react to other drivers? Well, it's 09:51 and the next crockpot is locked and loaded. A Bach cantata is (I find) a perfect accompaniment to veggie slicing and dicing. The initial cuppa has been zapped and is gently steaming by my side. When the appetite recovers I shall undertake my serial cereal, but first the serial about neural activity. (The Decisive Moment, by Jonah Lehrer.)

Later

A quiet day, so far. Much scanning,2 some (recent) lunching, and a re-tuning of the satellite radio to World Radio Network for a different set of international news bulletins. It's no longer freezing, though there are some fairly hefty-looking clouds around. I shall be joining my main co-pilot somewhere for afternoon tea later on. Now, I wonder where Mr Postie has got to — not that I've been ordering any Blu-ray discs (of course). It's 13:55 and NPR has crept onto the WRN schedules. Three envelopes... SkyHD+? No thanks. Dell? No thanks. DigitalUK? Better have a look.

Rowridge

Where did I put my (re-)tuning fork? Come to think of it, will I even notice if terrestrial Freeview disappears for a while? I should have the Freesat PVR safely installed by then. And have finished replumbing the LNBs across the two dishes (with luck).

Get thee behind me, Satan!

Damn! The new Mac Mini looks extremely tasty. Sadly, my intended companion in afternoon hard (tea) drinking crime has had to proffer me a rain cheque (bringing the week's total to three) so I'm now making do with Tchaikovsky having managed to catch quite a lot (but not all) of Alec Roth's work-in-progress, "The Traveller". Still, I'm now on the letter "D".

I have to say — at 21:21 — that a heavy day's scanning doesn't make for an interesting diary page, does it? The latest crockpot was tasty, though. And I rather think I've just missed QI. I've been listening to all the extras on one of the "Hitch-hiker's Guide to the Galaxy" boxed sets of CDs as I scan. Good choice.

  

Footnotes

1  Only too aware that it's time to stuff another crockpot after several days break from that food solution.
2  Just coming to the end of letter "C" (Cyrano de Bergerac), in fact.