2012 — 22 December: Saturday
The jaunty Prokovief1 can't really disguise the fact that it's pouring with rain out there this (early) morning, thus putting the dampeners on our cunning, albeit tentative, plans for a walk today. Our next 'window' is Xmas morning itself. Still, we're past both the shortest day and the end of the world. Again. As usual.
I find it amusing...
... though not very, to hear that an archbishop (York, in this case) is sending out an Xmas message decrying the cuts in UK Armed Forces. I have a suspicion that one of those oft-overlooked commandment thingies bangs on about not killing. Presumably this doesn't apply2 to the more 'militant' brands of this bizarre (some might say "vile") faith- rather than evidence-based belief system. Might is right, and all that.
No intelligent life here, Mr Spock. Let's move on. Is it time for breakfast yet? I also have my next crockpot to stuff...
Tsk, tsk (1)
My very first Windows Explorer crash under Win 8 Pro, but it was a doozy. A nasty, first-time-ever, collision involving the "Edit metadata" subfunction of Poikosoft's CD ripping suite. I have used this literally thousands of times previously without incident. Time for tea! Oops. There it goes again, on exactly the same three files. Move along, please, nothing to see here. Yet if I drag and drop the files into the tool's window it works fine. It's the right-click / open with... that hangs. Then, when I shut the Explorer window, away goes the Windows desktop for the two seconds or so that it takes to realise that a crucial bit of the OS has gone AWOL and needs to be brought straight back.
Tsk, tsk (2)
I've now made eleven separate attempts to install an optional Microsoft driver update for my HP LaserJet printer since early November when I put Win 8 Pro on to BlackBeast. The most recent being just a couple of minutes ago when it seemed that the driver had been refreshed on the "Update" site. (It was now dated 17 December which is obviously a more recent build.) Result? Big, fat doodley-squat (or words to that sort of effect).
If my printer didn't seem to be working fine I'd probably be quite annoyed by now :-)
Phew! That's the letter "J" done and, as it were, dusted. Time to start thinking about my evening meal. It actually stopped raining an hour or so back but is mighty soggy out there. The buckets Christa had me buy and place (half-buried in the pea shingle) on the site of the pond are all now over-flowing. [Pause] Yum; that's better. (Chicken casserole.) But I was wrong — it's raining again. What a perfectly delightful time of year it is, to be sure.
Speaking of which...
... I was thinking as I prepared my meal: do I actually miss Christa more at Xmas? In fact, I don't think I do. Of course, there's a constant background 'awareness' of her absence that is just that: constant. But I've learned to live with it, I'm coping with it, and (unless my mind goes into the horrible neural meltdown that dear Mama "lives" with) I have no doubt that one day (long from now, I hope) I will simply die with it.
So much for Intelligent Design, heh? :-)
Until then, I have an almost infinite amount of world-class pottering around I wish to enjoy so, if you'll excuse me...