2010 — 6 May: Thursday
Next thing you know, it's 00:48 and (having updated the Windows version of iTunes) I'm playing a lovely Chet Baker track (from the Playing by heart soundtrack).
I've finished "Father of the Pride" and highly recommend it. But I'm also falling asleep... G'night.
I'm not going to claim...
... an early start, but I've answered half a dozen emails, killed another waspy intruder, and not even drunk the cuppa that's stewed to cool chuck-it-away status downstairs. It's already 10:33 too. But I didn't put my book down until after 02:00 so it's my own fault. (But then, isn't everything I do my1 fault?)
I shall walk down to the sop-to-democracy that is our polling station before permitting myself any breakfast. How that's for civic devotion? [Pause] Done.
Typical! I should have paid my next JLP card bill earlier today while my "24x7" online bank was, well, actually online. Essential maintenance. What a euphemism. I didn't think mañana kicked in quite so long before lunch, and I haven't even had breakfast yet. Having just exercised my atrophied voting muscle, I'm ravenous.
Thank you, Mr Postie...
... for my chance to re-watch last year's variant of Emma, bringing my current total to four (click the pic to see the others):
Emma in 1972 and (twice) in 1996
I arrived shamefully late in life at an appreciation of the staggering talent that was Jane Austen. Christa studied her at university while I had to be content with rivet guns and thiokol. Mind you, she told me she always found Emma to be in need of a good kicking.
Trust The Guardian to have its own evolutionary Agony Aunt. I've just been catching up, as I'd somehow overlooked these fascinating columns.
Polished Chrome
I have to say that the latest Beta of Google's Chrome browser feels very fast. It also imports my settings and bookmarks from Firefox effortlessly.
In other news, why does getting a phone call from the Lib Dems reminding me to vote today irritate me so much when I've already done exactly that? Human psychology is perverse. (Well, mine is, any way.) Let's see if I can persuade my neighbour to come out and play for a bit.
Somewhat later (17:29) I'm skimming Spiegel's views on accountability. Always interesting to get different perspectives. Christa remained loyal to Der Spiegel for many years.
Decisions! Do I gulp down some piping-hot crockpot now (18:52) or do I wait until after Brian has popped in? I think I can last...
Considerably later
After some consummate pieces of Apache2 hacking, Brian has left me with a working-as-I-wanted web server on the newest Ubuntu PC, and the ability to place updated files on it ad lib without having to fire up a sort-of GUI X-terminal session at the XP machine and without having to have any of the desktop clutter on the server. Once Apache2 is configured and modified correctly (that is, to do the things I want it to do — including SSIs, no open directory access, handle files of type SHTML, and so on) then I can simply get, edit, and replace files on the server using WinSCP, just as I currently do2 with the external web server over in Texas that hosts my public variant (subset) of my little web. I think we both learned some useful stuff tonight, and I have to say I am now officially very impressed with the state of Ubuntu 10.4 LTS.
His reward has been to borrow "Father of the Pride". He also regaled me with some horror stories about the new, unimproved IBM in the wake of the recent disgraceful pension shenanigans. I may not like (indeed, I hate) being a widower, but I have no qualms at all about being an IBM pensioner.
Politics is weird
The exit polls some 40 minutes after close of voting are currently suggesting a hung parliament, with Sauron's party (as I think of it) some 19 MPs short of an overall majority. It seems 13 years is long enough for most people to forget the horror that was the 1980s and 1990s. How very strange!