Category: Commentary

Meggan is now 4 months old and this week has my parents Wedding anniversary so it’s going to be busy.

We also booked our holidays. Lesley’s cousin is getting married and we’re taking the opportunity to do a little touring. It’ll likely be an entire week without an internet connection which has me a little spooked.

Here’s the agenda.

Thurs 8th
Ferry 7am Arrive about 11am, go to hotel, go to Ambleside and Windermere and if necessary Hawkshead. Windermere because of Lakeland Plastics, Hawkshead because of the clothing people there. Can’t quite remember why we’re going to Ambleside. We’ll be staying in Kendal. We really should pop up to Grasmere since we got married there.

Fri 9th
Go to Oxford, depending on time getting there either check into pub in Woodstock or go straight to BBQ (2 to 5 pm, may have internet connection..WooHoo!) I doubt we’ll get the internet – it seems that not many people are as pro-Internet as I am. When I visit my parents or the in-laws it’s like an internet drought. I’m probably addicted but I don’t see it as a bad thing.

Sat 10th
Wedding, Lesley is going but as Meggan is under 18, she and I are probably going to go visiting. I may pop down and see Simon and drop the Printer Server off to him. That all depends of course on where everything is and whether he’s free…. Again staying in Woodstock

Sun 11th
Still staying in Woodstock no other plans as yet, could go to our friend Nikki’s or into Oxford or to one of the various Organic garden places depending on where they are. It’s a Sunday so our options might be limited – I wonder if John Lewis’ is open on Sunday – that would make life easier.

Mon 12th
Possibly go to see Nikki and/or Gary. Nikki is in South London and Gary is out by Southampton. Hmm…do we have accommodation booked for this night? I dunno. I think we might be staying in Glastonbury which probably means arriving really late.

Tues 13th
Staying in Glastonbury and trying to visit most of Cornwall. At some point we want to visit the Eden Project.

Wed 14th
Back up to lake district and staying in Kendal again. Going via Bristol and visitng Janine and of course, if we have time, IKEA. This might be the better day for the Eden Project.

Thurs 15th
Ferry at 12pm, arrive back 4 pm-ish and home!

Day 1

Went to bed “last night” at about 02:00.
Woke at 05:00, got up, got ready, got Meggan ready and was down at the Belfast Docks for 06:15. We loaded onto the Seacat and tramped up to First Class with literally the bare minimum in tow. Once there we had breakfast and coffee.
The ship pulled into Heysham Dock at 10:45, having made pretty good time. We unloaded and headed North for Kendal arriving at the Crooklands Hotel at just around noon. We were told the rooms weren’t ready so we went into Boskins Carvery for Lunch. One portion of Dill-flavoured Potato Wedges, one Cheese with Baked Potato and salad and a large slab of pate with toast and we were all set. Also took the opportunity to give Meggan her first solid feed at lunchtime. We’ve been giving her solids for the past few weeks at 6 pm.

We returned to the Reception at 1 pm and a rather snotty receptionist informed us we would have to wait more and to return to the lounge – we declined as the lounge smelled a little too smoky. So we sat for about 10 minutes until we could go up. There was then a mad flurry to get the bags out of the car and into the room and then jump back into the car again to go shopping.

First Stop: Lakeland Ltd and Booths, Windermere
Sort of a kitchen appliance shop that Lesley loves. I wandered around the store with Meggan while Lesley thumbed through the bric-a-brac and settled on a few items. Then we went round the corner to Booths which was listed in the Soil Association magazine as being “organic” but came out pretty disappointed – as far as we could see it was actually less “organic” than your run-of-the-mill supermarket.

We then drove further north and performed a circuit around Ambleside. Ambleside is the nicest of the towns in that immediate area although I really like Keswick. We didn’t stop however as we just needed to round the top of Lake Windermere and pop over to Hawkshead which has a local brand of “country clothing” with the same name. Sadly Lesley didn’t get the shoes we were looking for but we did have some very nice ice-cream and I was pretty surprised when she gave Meggan a taste of the chocolate ice-cream. Meggan was wary at first but I swear she acted like a chocaholic five minutes later. I fear we have created a monster.

We then headed for the Newby Bridge Ferry back to Windermere. It’s a 10 minute boat trip and only costs £2 but it is picturesque and saves driving all the way round the lake again. We then headed back to Kendal and out to Crooklands. We fed Meggan again with home-made carrot and onion puree and headed down for some dinner ourselves. It was pretty busy with a very large party of German rourists taking up most of the restaurant. We were sat beside a table of 8 and one of the women kepy trying to play with Meggan but she wasn’t interested which is odd as usually Meggan is trying to look and smile at people all the time. After about 10 minutes she warmed to the woman and gave her one of her big wide smiles with her big blue bright eyes.

Then back to the room. Meggan fed with another bottle and then refused to sleep so we set her in her cot and cleaned bottles while she sang to us. I got a bit of it on camcorder. It’s now 21:33 and I’m in bed. We have to be out of here by 11 tomorrow and it’s a 200 mile drive to Oxford. Good night, sleep tight.

Day 2

Woke at 7 and was breakfasted and packed to go by 9 am. We drove down the M6 through Birmingham, stopping at a Services near Stafford around 11:30. We made pretty good time and pulled into Woodstock around 1:30. Not too bad for a 200 mile journey. We had all of the bags out of the car by 2:30.

We went for a walk around the village to look for some last minute clothing items but there wasn’t much pickings – still – Lesley bought a shawl and bag and almost bought shoes. We did see a furniture and antique shop however that had some exquisite tables and chairs. WAY too expensive of course. Which reminds me – we popped by an estate agents and LachLene (sp?) Manor is for sale. Looks to have about 40 rooms and frankly with the price of houses around here you’d need to be a multimillionaire to even consider it.

The accomodation, The Punch Bowl, isn’t the best. Lesley says there’s a smell of smoke wafting up from the bar below the room but I can’t smell it. She’s worried that Meggan’s baby lungs will be affected by it so despite carrying the travel cot over in the pouring rain, Meggan is in with us tonight.

We (Lesley, Duncan, Elizabeth, Robert and Anne) ate in a local pub which seemed better appointed for food and had a cheeky cheery australian guy behind the bar who, for some reason, just doted on Meggan. It was sort of weird.The pretty barmaids (also australian) didn’t seem interested at all – times have changed I guess.

I’m wondering what the weather will be like tomorrow – today was pretty awful with a heavy downpour and a long thunderstorm. While Lesley enjoys the wedding I’ll be spending the time with Meggan – I’ve no idea what the day will bring.

Day 3

On Saturday I went down to Marlow and spent the day with Simon and Fiona. Meggan was pretty well behaved and I also got to check my email! We got back pretty late and Meggan was pretty unhappy about being in a car past her bedtime – it’s sorta cool that she can be fussy like that.

Sunday was a different matter. Duncan and Elizabeth offered to take Meggan for the day as they wouldn’t see her for the best part of a week after that and Lesley and I headed first to John Lewis (which was fun) and then off to West Wycombe and the Hell-Fire Caves. The Caves…well, they were interesting enough but seemed to be just caves and there wasn’t very much coverage of the more salacious goings-on at the Club. I think the family are trying to play that down and paint Sir Francis as being a statesman and responsible land-owner. John Lewis was more fun – they have some awfully nice furniture as well as a few games that I wanted. I got summoner (which may only be Classic … bleh!), Sacrifice (which I know is OSX compatible) and MOH:AA (which isn’t for me!).

Which then brings us to Monday. We checked out of the pub and essentially flew down the M40 to the M25. A quick change of plans and we were heading for RedHill to see Nikki and Zara. Zara is now a year old and certainly has her mum’s good looks. Nikki was looking, as ever, radiant. It’s weird thinking that she’s married, a mum and going to Portugal to live in a couple of years. We then pounced on the opportunity to visit my aunt Patty in Worthing. By sweeping east we visited the Long Man of Wilmington and then past Brighton to Worthing where we stayed for tea. My cousin James, who was with us last year while on a work placement and Matthew (whom I’ve not seen since he was about 2) were both there as well. Pat was looking great and showing off her cool little car. Lovely little beast – I’d love one myself but it’d never make it down our lane!
We stayed til almost 9 pm including taking a quick walk along the promenade – neither of us had paddled in the English Channel and due to the tide being out we didn’t get a chance this time either but it was nice to see Pat and the boys.
We then had a two and a half hour drive to Glastonbury and we arrived at 11:30 and went straight to bed.

This morning so far we’ve fed ourselves, fed Meggan, Lesley has washed some bottles and we’re just deciding what we’re going to be doing with the rest of the day

Day 4

We first went to see “Big Dick” at Cerne Abbas. It was quite a drive as the roads are slow and winding here but it was quite impressive. Like the Long Man we didn’t walk up as so many of these things are only really impressive from a distance.

Next, we indulged Lesley’s “River Cottage” fascination and went for a drive through Dorset, stopping only at Bridport where the shows Farmers Market is held. There was lots of pointing at secluded cottages and wondering if that was THE River Cottage.

We got back to Glastonbury at about 5 o’clock and went for a walk through the town. Most of the shops were shut but it was nice waking through. Glastonbury has the alternative vibe through it but at the same time it is a normal town. I wonder how it reconciles them – I’m guessing that it doesn’t. The newcomers with their alternative lifestyles must be a sore point for the residents. Even the owner of our B&B is a Reiki and Indian Head Massage practitioner. It’s too easy to poke fun, so I don’t. Maybe cept in private.

In truth I wish that chakra-cleansing or spirit-washing or whatever these people do actually worked – or I believed in them working. Being able to just blame all my troubles on a grubby chakra or a proliferation of foul-smelling gremlins would ease my mind immeasurably.

We finished the evening with Meggan being wide-awake and me having a thumping headache that turned into a blinding headache. I slept for nearly 12 hours.

Plan for today is a spot of shopping in Glastonbury then head up to Bristol for lunch, meet Lesley’s friend Janine, pop into IKEA and then head up to Kendal to the hotel for the final night of the holiday.

End of holiday

Well, we did all that and also popped across to Blackpool to see the Illuminations. We didn’t stop – just wanted to eke a last bit of fun out of the holiday. We then had to beat the retreat to the hotel in Kendal which was locking its doors at 11 pm and we had to drive at breakneck speed just to get there.

As it happened, we managed. We were asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillow and woke early to pack the car and get along to the boat so we could be home. The rest is just administrivia. We spent the evening just bumming around the house. Tomorrow I return to work and yeah I’m pretty depressed about that.

I’m reading catalogues. Man, how boring.

I have to do up budgetary costings for extra fibres for some of the work needing done. At £20 per fibre, the costs quickly mount up especially when you need more than a hundred of the buggers.

And of course, the rain is coming down heavily reminding me that we’re at the height of summer for Northern Ireland. I can hear it thumping off the roof and there’s a chill draught coming in from outside.

I miss dancing a lot. It’d be nice if Lesley had any tolerance for it but she doesn’t like dancing or discos.

Tonight has been an “80’s Weekend” on MTV and it’s such a blast from the past. Listening to bands like Poison, Iron Maiden, Whitesnake, Def Leppard, Guns’N’Roses really brought a lot of memories back.

I had different friends then, I even looked different (very skinny, stupid big hair). I went to see bands play live (Kings X, Bon Jovi, Aerosmith, Black Crowes, AC/DC) and thought I had attitude. I didn’t of course – I was too shy for that. I don’t even have attitude now – just arrogance – which on the surface is much the same but in no way cool.

I think it was compounded by popping onto the Friends Reunited web site and seeing the number of people from my class there. I miss some of them but frankly I’ll never get in touch. I don’t think I was a big hit in school. Too different.

Bought some CDs yesterday. Got home and noticed ONE of them had the “Will not play on PC/Mac” notice. Sure enough it wouldn’t play in iTunes and certainly wouldn’t import. Resolved to take it back to the shop. Tried another CD. It also wouldn’t play or import. I felt a bit let down as the latter definitely had the CD logo. Tried the third disk – not only played but imported fine. Fourth one also worked fine.

I’m more than a bit hacked off now. One of them had the CD logo which is meant to imply a standard and no warning that it wouldn’t work. The other was my own fault – but I was too busy paying good money to notice.

The really annoying thing was that I opened my DELL craptop, downloaded WinAMP and played ALL of the CDs fine – admittedly it was a very recent update to WinAMP. I still, on the other hand, couldn’t encode them using any MP3 encoder that I could find. That makes the CDs next-to-useless for me. I never carry CDs around – I MP3 them and listen to them on my laptop.

And I’m allowed to do that – it’s called Fair Use. I don’t supply my MP3s to other people, I don’t copy my CDs and give copies to other people. Under the guidelines for Fair Use I’m permitted to make a copy of the CD for personal use.

If I wanted to I could still output the CD to tape and give copies of the tape to all of my friends. It would be highly illegal but I’m technically able to do that. It’s the big bad scary Internet and techno-savvy music-thieves that the record companies are targetting.

It’s possible to defeat the copy protection using a marker or a post-it or a bit of tape. But that means going to some lengths just to get a CD that I own and music that I have legally licensed to work in my Cd player.

As a matter of principle I’ll be returning the two CDs that do not work in my CD player as they are sold as Compact Discs yet do not conform to the Compact Disc standard. I don’t believe that I should be assumed to be a thief just because I use a computer.

The real irony is that I always buy CDs if I like two songs or more on the CD. I usually hear the music through Internet Radio stations which use MP3 quality tracks. I can see a time when I can’t buy any more CDs because I refuse to have this copy-protection muck in my possession.

Sometimes you talk to someone for the first time and you start thinking. Then you remember the real world and go back to work.

I don’t want to work – I want to look out of the window. But the windows here are too small and too high up and there’s nothing beautiful outside

On other news –

Meggan still has a cold and it may have gotten into her chest so we’ve got anti-biotics for her. Lesley is, of course, freaked and feeling guilty about working.

The Mac Shop in Northern Ireland will be opening in September.

A lot of people today were told that they won’t be working here any more. It’s going to be a long, cold and wet summer.

So…I turned 30.

It wasn’t a big event. Still had to go to work. Still not a billionaire. Oh well.

We did go out to recently opened Malay restaurant in Belfast (on Royal Avenue) and had a rather wonderful meal – it was sort of a cross between Thai and Chinese – in a good way.

Work. Bleh. What a depressing place. I’m spending too much time trying to get people motivated that I can’t actually get anything done. The guys in Germany are screaming out for some work to be done but there’s a lot of holes in their proposal and I’m not comfortable with just signing onto work without seeing the full picture.

Crucible is a balls-up as well. There’s been some recent recriminations that we didn’t do stuff that fired some people up. I wonder whose fault that was.

NiMUG is comparitively a breeze. 150 separate addresses on the mailing list and growing. Reminds me – I have to get an AppleScript workshop sorted out!

Because of my current WW2 kick, I bought “Saving Private Ryan” on DVD today. I’m guessing that I’ll get a chance to see it while I’m in Germany. I think they have a pool at the hotel so I hope to get a chance to go swimming as well.

My WW2 kick is because of one of my favourite films: The Great Escape: which I have on VCD and DVD. Handy because I’ve watched it several times this year alone. There’s also the RPGs: Reichstar, Gear Krieg, Brave New World, Godlike and the Delta Green Karotechia stuff. On the computer game front there’s Return to Castle Wolfenstein and Medal of Honour: Allied Assault – the latter has just shipped for the Mac so that’s another one for the shopping list.

I’m meant to be attending a graduation this Thursday as well – not my graduation but I’ll be up at the top wearing a suit and a gown and congratulating my students. I’m thinking this might indeed be the last year I’ll teach – the problem being that they aren’t offering the subjects that I want to teach and not on the kit I would use for the subjects. I’ve always gone by the rule that if it stops being fun then stop doing it. You know – do it til it hurts. As the song says, til I’m Black and Blue.

I’ve also got the developer tools reinstalled now that I have my completely silent 40 GB hard disk in the Powerbook. It means that I can restart my “Learn Java in 21 days” course. Note that I’m not expecting to learn Java in 21 days or even 21 weeks but I want to start with something and I’ve an online course to do as well which should help.

It’s so nice having plenty of disk space again. I guess it’ll take me a few weeks to fill this up as I tend to just not delete things. I’ll have to be a bit careful as the summer brings Jaguar and I’ll want to do a nice clean install of it. Having enough room to back up to is always a good idea. I’m using about 12 GBytes right now and that includes 400 MB for the developer tools and over a Gig for a couple of games – both of which can be deleted in a second.

A very good friend of mine asked me one of those questions today.

What things should we look for when purchasing a new computer.? Is lap top better than the desktop?? The price range is from $4000 – $5000 (AUS).? Is IBM better than MAC? etc

A few years ago I’d have been 50-50 on this and talked about the pros and cons of Macs and PCs. These days I’m older and wiser. Reason is that most of people who I advised to buy a PC did go and buy one and those who I advised to buy Macs all bought Macs. From the Mac guys I get an email every now and then with a question or two but for the most part they seem happy. From the PC guys I got dozens of emails and even though I’d not had any part in the actual buying and wasn’t paid for my advice and even said that a Mac would be a better option – they’d gone ahead and bought a PC and were now having problems. I helped them as best as I could until the point where I was routinely spending one night a week fixing PC problems for free.

Time to knock that on the head.

These days I’m more prgamatic. Sure, if you have an application you need that is only on the PC then buy a PC. By all means. But don’t come crying to me for support. I’ll help you but I cost a lot per hour. Conversely it means I now have more time to devote to helping the Mac users in the province and beyond for free.

So why buy a Mac? I’d have to go thru some of the reasons to NOT buy a Mac.

Here’s some great pages on the subject:
http://www.apple.com/myths/
http://www.apple.com/switch/

A lot of the reasons to NOT buy a Mac come down to a couple of really poor ones. The first is usually that the guy saying so is a Windows user and, well, there’s more windows machines out there. He doesn’t know the Mac or if he does he only remembers the little black and white models that came out in 1984 which are still being used around the world. He doesn’t know that Apple were the first computer manufacturer to have a mouse, the first to implement colour on machines and the first with both the floppy disk and the CD-ROM. Ignorance is his only weapon.

The second is a little more esoteric. For some reason, because this guy uses Windows there’s this “urge” that everyone else must use Windows and if you don’t then you’re some sort of ‘luser’. I personally couldn’t care what people use – I’m extremely pro-choice. If you are happy with windows then “Yeehaw”. I’m extremely happy for you. I’d note that I don’t know *anyone* who is happy with Windows. Some don’t mind it but for the most part they are ignorant of the alternatives.

Now…onto the meat of the question. A machine for Aus $4000-5000. Is a desktop better than a laptop. Hmm. I use laptops because I move around a lot and not just for travel. Sometimes I check email in the lounge in front of the TV. Sometimes my IM windows are open when I’m cooking in the kitchen. Sometimes I’m sitting in the car and typing up a letter or a story. Sometimes I’m in bed. I prefer laptops. The portability comes at a price. Laptops are always going to be slower than desktops because of disk speed (disks are slower to conserve on power) and don’t generally have the same cool features. Laptops also cost more.

If it were me I’d recommend an LCD iMac with SuperDrive. It’s not cheap at $4399 but then it’s well specc’ed. The processor is fast despite the fact it is 800 MHz. The MHz rating really has very little to do with the speed of the machine. The iMac is self contained and only weighs about 20 lbs so it takes up very little space and is easily carried about using the neck as a handle. The machine comes with 60 GB of hard disk which can be expanded using FireWire to almost anything. And it has the SuperDrive. A disk drive that can read CDs, burn CDRs and CDRW disks, read DVDs and …write DVDs. This last thing is a big deal especially when coupled with a digital video camera. Edit down four hours of holiday video into 1 hour of highlights with transitions and fades. Add it to a DVD with a slide show of camera stills and you’ve got a little treasure that will play in any commercial DVD player. And as DVD Players are now less than Aus $300, a lot more people have them.

To me that’s a great benefit especially for a family situation. Give the grandparents DVDs of the grandchildren and get DVDs of the grandparents so that you can remember them better in the future – they aren’t with you all the time you know.

At the end of the day I don’t know what she will pick and…well…it doesn’t bother me. There are other benefits to being a Mac user. Macs are easier to use. They last longer as well. There’s extra care taken in making sure they work. No manufacturer is perfect but the percentage of returns for Apple is less than 10% of the industry average. Mac users have a sense of community – for example – there are a dozen Mac User Groups in Australia.

http://www.apple.com/usergroups/find.html

Apple also provide their members with free email, free web space, heaps of free and high quality software. There’s other advantages but a lot of them apply to me in my specific situation. I have the choice of Windows, Linux, BSD and others but I choose to use a Mac. Because, for me, it’s a better machine.

Okay, so I’ve registered the domain and I’m working on the web design for the public image of the new company. Understand that it’s not a career change but an excuse to work on some of the most exciting technologies out there. Instead of closing down buildings and doing audits I’d like to be working with WiFi, XServe, Quicktime Broadcaster, MPEG-4 and a dozen other things that I just find interesting.

Meggan currently has been to the Nursery three days out of the last week and has managed to pick up a cold. It’s so sad seeing a tiny child with sniffles, nose-whistles and a cough. I feel so sorry for her. Wish I could do more but we’re treating her the best way we can. She doesn’t like coughing and who can blame her.

Also….ordered a 40 GB hard drive for my laptop today. It’s a Toshiba model with “Fluid Bearings” which, by all accounts, is meant to make it quieter. It cost a packet and cleaned out my computer slush fund which means the new G4 will take a bit longer. My 20 GB drive should be back from IBM next week so I’ll need to look for an enclosure for it. Seen one recently for $59 which might just do the trick.

And…the dates for Germany are confirmed. I fly out on Monday the 17th and back on Wednesday 19th. Boo.

Meggan slept all night (midnight til 7:30 am) last night which is just amazing to me. I can only hope she continues with this trend.

She’s so good natured most of the time with her delighted little smiles and little bright eyes. If she cries then you know that something is wrong – it could be hunger, it could be a wet nappy, it could be she has wind and sometimes it’s simply that she’s ever so tired and needs a quick cuddle in order to get settled down to sleep. Once you sort the problem out then it’s back to being sweetness and light.

Germany is starting to loom every closer.