2009 — 5 October: Monday

I can tell by the way I'm yawning that it's time for sleep. But not before another trip in the Time Machine back to the 1960s to visit Christa and her parents.

Christa and her parents in the 1960s

It really would have been helpful if she'd written more details on the back of some of these ancient family photos. Too late now, of course! Time (00:01) for bed. I have an early date with a crockpot, and some further plum stewing to kick off, too. (I'm a bit worried about the batch I did a couple of hours ago.) G'night.

Woken by a...

... very welcome phone call from my friendly plumber, with some advice that I'd gladly take if the radiator valves weren't so sure they don't want to twitch. Still, he'll be round to see for himself tomorrow morning. Meanwhile, there's rain to be admired and a crockpot to be stuffed. And, I admit, some unusually early radio to accompany this. It's only 08:48 even now.

Another equation to worry about:

Water + 7 days = Mosquitoes

As revealed in "Bites of passage". How come, by the way, was it that Enoch Powell blocked the introduction of the smear test for early signs of cervical cancer? And some people still revere the chap. (Harry Evans is chatting about his [not Powell's] memoirs on the steam radio.)

One of my gad-flies has a new piece out, but I shall save him for after lunch as, by some strange process, it is already 13:33. And just about finished with the rain. The local tip beckons to me.

The kindness of (not) strangers

Crikey! Not one, but two, invitations to break evening bread this coming Friday. Luckily, the second set of inviters [which includes my birthday-plus-one twin] are willing to shift by a day. How's that for flexibility?

Files in the cloud

I've just registered with, and started playing with...

Ubuntu One

Looking good so far. And, as far as I can see, rather simpler than the Amazon web services cloud storage facility I signed up for about three milliseconds after my last PC disaster. Thanks, Brian.

Later

It's 20:45, the evening meal was very tasty, the film "FAQ about time travel" was enjoyably silly, and now I'm listening to a BBC Radio 4 item on the difficulties of educating youngsters for the work place. I tried "Emma" in hi-def, briefly, but have some more important tasks ahead of my plumber's flying visit tomorrow. Including totting up some finances.