2010 — 13 February: Saturday
In the end I decided to stick with the radio rather than a film. And do the dishes. And check through yet another iteration of a chum's website before it goes "live". And just generally potter. And be told about this tasty looking server. (Thanks, Brian.) Beats anything I saw in PCWorld, trust me. There was a glass of Scotch involved at some point, too. Plus I'm now teetering on the brink of deciding to do something about clearing out Christa's wardrobes. She told me before she died, most unsentimentally, to "stuff everything into black bin bags and drop them off at a charity shop". Sounds like a plan to me... It's just taken me a while to get the round tuit.
So, time for some shuteye ahead of the morning ritual of "stuff the crockpot" while listening to Sounds of the 60s — good job I'm not a creature of habit, isn't it? G'night, at 00:09 or so.
It's a good job...
... I'd finished with my veggie chopping knife before learning what a fine chap Archbishop Vincent Nichols is. Recall my mild observation the day after Christa's funeral that I would not, and could not, wish to inflict the disease that killed her on my worst enemy? I think I may just have found a worthy exception! (Source.)
My second cuppa will no doubt curb my murderous thoughts. Maybe the holy chap can be encouraged to take a brief holiday break in Helmand province? And then get some first-hand experience of NHS compassion?
Go figure!
An interesting graph:
It's 10:40, an interesting crockpot is nicely stuffed and simmering gently. I expect breakfast will be next. There's some sunshine around, but it's only +1C out there.
Hi, Mr Postie
To paraphrase the sublime Kai Lung: How is it possible to suspend topaz in one cup of the balance and weigh it against amethyst in the other; or who in a single language can compare the tranquilising grace of a DVD postal delivery with the invigorating pleasure of witnessing a change of tax code notification from Brenda's band of bank robbers?
I mentioned "Mimzy" (aka "Mimsy were the Borogoves") just a few days ago. Imagine my surprise to see that it includes a Roger Waters music video! I live in some hope of enjoying the other two titles, too — it may be fun watching Colin Firth as an old flame of Rupert Everett as the headmistress of "St. Trinian's". And at less than a tenner for the set... Mind you, the approximately £1 per week net increase from Brenda next April is dwarfed by the £56,000,000 Euro Lottery winner :-)
Laugh or cry?... dept
I've long been aware of Swift's "A modest proposal"1 but, somehow, I'd managed to miss his satirical "Advice to Servants" (Dublin, 1745), in which he advised housemaids on how to strike the best bargain when their sexual favours were solicited by their masters. Source and snippet:
At all costs, Swift urged, the eldest son of the house should be avoided "since you will get nothing from him but a big belly or a clap and probably both together".
It reminds me of a cartoon in Playboy magazine many years ago featuring a young chap stretched out on an examining couch and being approached by a doctor (wielding a fiercesome-looking syringe) who is saying "My word, Senor. Sunburn, the clap and Poison Ivy all on your first day in our beautiful country. You are unlucky!"
On that thought, I note that it's 13:27 and I appear to be starving hungry. Kitchen here I come.
Just as I was about to start my munching I got a call from dear mama's next door neighbour. He suggested I call the Aged P to reassure her that he's not exaggerating when he tells her that the cost of some help in the garden would indeed be the £50 or so that he'd estimated it would. I called her, though I knew it was going to be a fairly futile exercise. Mama feels, of course, that £50 is outrageously expensive, out of the question, and that she can't possibly afford2 this. During our usual (that is, surreal) conversation she informed me that "none of the family visit". I was a little hesitant to point out that — at 93 — she has simply outlived the rest of her clan, but maybe I was wrong to as she spontaneously told me she would be glad to be dead.3
Perhaps I should get today's Archbishop on her case?
Finally...
... my "tax affairs" have simplified to the point where I can actually understand them. One pittance of a pension (from IBM) against which the standard tax-free personal allowance for people under 65 is applied before Brenda's tax thugs assault and batter me. One pension (from an annuity I bought with my non-IBM AVCs) taxed at the basic rate.
The emergency tax code is set each year and is a number followed by the letter L. The number is the basic Personal Allowance (£6,475 for the tax 2009-10) divided by 10. The emergency code for 2009-10 is therefore 647L. 647L also happens to be the tax code you'll get if you are entitled to just the basic Personal Allowance but in this case it is not an emergency code and you will receive the right amount of tax-free pay.
Guvmint. Don't get me started.
What do you mean, "control freak"?
I smiled all the way through this, by a different Richardson. Source and snippet:
In my head I have a carefully ranked list, with things I do well at the top, and things I do badly at the bottom. About two-thirds of the way down, between making trifle and rewiring a plug, is "showing a woman the night of her life between the sheets". I would no sooner go clubbing and pick up a woman for sex than I would run on to the pitch at Old Trafford and start showing off my keepy-uppy skills.
I remember the banks reassuring us that debit and credit cards were infallibly secure. I remember being told that 4-digit PINs made them even more secure. I remember being bombarded with propaganda about the ever so infallibly secure nature of "chip and PIN". What I don't remember being told is: We never said chip-and-PIN was completely infallible. And from there, I also went on to learn that one of this week's security patches actually fixed a bug that's been present in all 32-bit Windows systems for 17 years. (Furthermore, "fixing" it has introduced a number of XP users to that unlovely BSOD.) The irony is that it's buried in a 16-bit Virtual DOS Machine subsystem. Recall that QDOS (bought by a certain Bill Gates back in the day, and developed into MS-DOS) stood for "quick and dirty operating system".