emchi.co.uk

Now isn’t that telling? The BBC news website uses Movable Type as it’s blog engine… Now if only they’d do something about the load time so I could post a comment… if I can’t get it to post, and anybody is interest, the blog entry can be found at http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/technology/2008/03/talking_to_sir_tim.html.  The comment I was about to post is basically “Tor of Cism” is an anagram of “Microsoft”…

Reading between the lines, Tim Berners Lee uses a Mac Laptop, he sees Microsoft as part of the problem, not the solution and that we’re heading for an impase on the internet in less it becomes a lot more open.  Well that’s just my take on what the blog post said.

I wish the post had been a bit longer, and I’m bound to miss the TV segment. 

Somebody please remind me to post something about Google spidering information, for some reason I’m getting tons of hits (quality over quantity here), following this post (over 70 in an hour is un-heard of on this blog) and the one about Huf Haus… You lot (yes the ones that read down beyond the first paragraph), are probably thinking I’m another boring blogger… you’d probably be right there.

UPDATE If you would like to see the map in full, please go to this link http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/bsp/hi/pdfs/17_03_08_webmap.pdf When printed out, one of the commenters on the BBC blog is absolutely right, the Tor of Cism is right in the middle of Mordor, exactly where it belongs I would imagine.

My body seems to attract illness like it’s going out of fashion.  Anyway, can I just say that the medical experience in Wiltshire is about a hundred times better than the experience in London.  For starters the drive to the surgery is through lovely winding country roads to the next village over, then the practice building is a big newly built place with a chemist on site.  The doctor was, dare I say this for fear of vilification, English… He took a lengthy medical history and was very pleasant.  Oh and he even used that alcohol gel on his hands before examining my stomach, something that they never did in London.  Asked about my asthma and said that I could make an appointment to have a review even if it was less than the recommended time between my last appointments.  I was very impressed with the level of service.  They seemed to have more time for people and are less harried.

I’m not about to get into a massive diatribe about the politics of NHS doctors, nor to the point where I had to complain about the treatment by one in London.  Everything about the surgery in London seemed over-stretched.  No time for appointments, no time to see anyone when you do get one, no communication, rude receptionists that sit behind glass partitions.  It was like a war zone.  I’m sure from the kinds of people sitting in the waiting area at the surgery in London the staff were tired of what they were seeing and the treatment they got from people.  The new surgery is a polar opposite. No glass on the receptionists desk, polite and friendly staff who had a smile for you, and more time with your doctor.  OK so the surgery did seem to be filled with more affluent people but why should that make any difference?  Why people feel it’s acceptable to treat someone who’s trying to help you badly is beyond me. 

Anyway, I’m now on the sofa, having done my shopping (online), emailed a couple of people and now going in search of my sheepskin boots to keep my tootsies nice and warm.

Firstly can I just say, if the RIAA and other nazi money grabbers want people to stop downloading things illegally, they should make more things available through legal channels to download.  I downloaded Emotional Technology by BT a couple of weeks ago, and have listened to it non-stop for the last two weeks, it has everything I need to keep me focused at work.  So I thought, what else has this guy done? ’cause I knew I had a couple of his tracks on some old Gatecrasher and Cream CD’s.

So off to Amazon I go, just to see if there’s anything on there that I had missed, and I found a whole cache of CD’s.  Only they weren’t cheap.  I know that iTunes, my download engine of choice, had very few BT albums available for download, practically none in fact. So what is a girl to do? If I want music, I want it pretty immediately, not have to wait almost a week for Amazon or Play to cough up my CD’s.  Play’s now doing a download service but theirs had less of a selection than iTunes did. 

So I ended up getting one of the albums through another site, I question it’s legallity, although I have paid for the music, and downloaded it through proper channels, I suspect it’s probably dubious.  So far it hasn’t let me down on the ability to download music I haven’t been able to find through iTunes. 

I like some odd music, I’ll openly admit that a large chunk of what I like cannot be found through mainstream channels, I use Audio Jelly occasionally to find what I’m looking for, but my tastes are normally a bit too mainstream for it.  Can you see the irony? To eclectic for iTunes, too main stream for Audio Jelly.  I’m sure that if I were able to buy music from iTunes in the US I’d have no problems whatsoever in getting what I want most of the time.  However just like most things I’m unable to purchase and download stuff from US sites.

You would think with the Internet being a global phenominon that the TV stations and music distributors would do more to open up their boarders.  What do they want 17 pieces of identification before you can pay and download something that you would otherwise be forced to download illegally?  I read the other day that BBC is opening up it’s iPlayer to a global audience, well I think I did, I hope I wasn’t dreaming it, so why can’t the US stations do the same?  There’s a demand, so why can’t these people supply, rather than jumping up and down about people downloading illegally.

I would happily pay a season pass fee to download what I want, at the end of the day, it either doesn’t get shown, or I get moaned at for watching what I want occasionally.  So to download it and watch it from the privacy of my Mac would be fine for me. 

Anyway, I had orginially intended for this post to be about the BT album I downloaded over the weekend, it’s brilliant, not quite as good as Emotional Technology, but still as mellow and uplifting as it.  It’s called ECSM in case any of you are interested.  I have to say I love the first track, it reminds me of some of the Spy Game sound track, haunting vocals with an ethnic twist to them that are chilling yet also soothing at the same time.

So with an awful lot of help from R (i.e. he did most of it), I have two new Leopards sitting in the flat.  When I say Leopards, I mean two Mac Leopard installs.  Can I say for the record, for all those windows lovers out there, what a joy upgrading Mac’s are and how effortless it feels to have changed.  I won’t even get into how quick it was to format the additional hard drive that was installed… hmm 3 partitions, under 30 seconds to format… do I feel smug? yes, and so I should.

For years the Mac has been the poor cousin to Microsoft Windows.  Users were berated and frowned upon, for many people were indoctrinated into believing that using a Mac meant you had to miss out on so many things.  Now I personally feel you are missing out on so much if you don’t have a Mac.  iLife and iSync to name a couple.  They are the epitome of plug and play, no spending hours scratching your head trying to get something to work, just plug it in and off you go.  I have software that allows me to use my mobile phone (a Sony Ericsson) with my Mac, when I say use, I mean, send text messages, make calls, synchronise address books etc, and all through Bluetooth.

I spent years re-building Window’s PC’s, I can even remember one such machine taking a total of 56 hours to upgrade because it’s inflexibility to recognise a floppy disc or USB device at start up.  Not a problem with Mac’s.  In goes the DVD, a few clicks (really, very little to choose from when you install, four options in total) and away it goes.  When it’s finished installing it asks you if you’d like to import your data with a variety of options.  Simple as.

So far Apple have built upon an already amazing system by simplifying the tools and adding what you really need in an operating system, easy to use little tools.  I would say 80% of people who use computers don’t have a clue what makes them tick.  They want to plug in the machine and just get going.  Obviously if you buy a machine off the shelf then it’s set up and ready to go.  However scratch the surface on windows and the options are endless, and often the bain of a systems administrator or a support person, it’s the “do you want fries with that?” culture gone mad.  The Mac OS is like dining in a Michelin star restaurant, the waiter just knows you’re going to want a good rich red with your steak au poivre.  This OS just knows what you want before you want it, and provides it without pomp and ceremony.

When I have more time at my disposal without having to stop to work feeling back into my hand and shoulder, I’ll explore in a bit more detail and report back.

Warning… this post does not contain a rant.

So I got to the doctors this morning for my fortnightly asthma check (yes apparently I do have asthma), only for the nurse to still be mystified as to why I’ve STILL got a cough after 8 months. It started badly with me having to give a recap of the situation,

1. The sabutimol doesn’t do much
2. Yes I’m on steroids
3. No they’re not tablets
4. 100mgs or two puffs morning and night
5. No I’ve not had an x-ray.

She recaps and recalls everything (she’s a lovely nurse). So now we’re up to 200mg’s or whatever mg representations four puffs makes up. She said I should have been on that from the start. Anyway she says I need an x-ray. OK not sure what for. Would love to know. Take the slip and go to the hospital.

So I thought I’d go get it done today, didn’t have anything else to do except take the bitter taste of defeat at loosing the job I’d been offered due to red tape (getting a job can suck sometimes). Anyway, off I plod to the hospital, only to remember half way there that I had no change in my wallet, or at least I didn’t think I did but couldn’t check because I was driving.

I get to the hospital and groan at not evening having £1 in my wallet for the rather cheap parking prices (£1 for an hour hospital parking is cheap if you ask me). So I’m scratching my head and rummaging in my bag thinking I’m going to have to leave and come back again. There was a parking attendant there, so I asked if there was a cash machine in the hospital, no he says, how long are you here for? I said I hoped no more than an hour as I was getting an x-ray. So he says, go on, don’t worry about it. You could have struck me down, it’s not often you see such kindness from parking attendants (don’t get me started on the hitlers that patrol our street). My cynicism thought I’d have a ticket when I got back, but no I didn’t.

I also thought the x-ray would take ages, but again, in and out very quickly. Praise goes to the staff, and the lovely new hospital in Orpington.

Now I’m placing bets on the x-ray shedding no light whatsoever on what’s wrong with me (and me either in denial or thinking there’s actually something else wrong with me).

I have paper cuts all over my hands… it comes from helping to stuff 2000 envelopes with invitations… what i wasn’t expecting is the damage it’s done to my back and neck. The osteopath says it’s a direct result of stuffing the envelopes… great.

Anyway, someone in the office who shall remain nameless is going to get a smack in the gob before the end of the week. It’s not just me who’s noticed that the person in question is a twunt. I think if they spent a little less time sticking their nose into everyone else’s work, started working on their own then they might get something done.

I know they say delegation is a sign of a good manager, but really, there’s delegation, then there’s palming off your work on others because you’re unable to do it yourself. The idiot in question falls into the palm off category. He wines like a dog to get people to do the work, then he displays false gratification in the knowledge that he’s palmed work off on someone else. I’m told I don’t ask him nicely to do things. I mean seriously, I’m doing the idiot a favor by asking him for information to put it on the website. Mind you if it’s not on there, and he’s the one who’s supposed to give it to me and doesn’t, I still get the blame.

Well, I’m going to sign off, there’s a re-run of CSI with Lady Heather in it that I’m going to watch followed by Scrubs… which reminds me, the trainee has started calling the idiot “JD” I could have up-chucked at the thought. I really can’t believe other people can’t see through his bullshit!!

So I got one of those new Starbucks cards today. You know I work with computers I like my cup of coffee… only the super boffins at Starbucks aren’t really on it at the moment… You can’t do anything with your card if you use an Apple Mac running Safari or Mozilla… talk about dumb!

It’s been a while since I’ve posted so I thought I’d drop in with a quick update. What have I been upto? hmmm well other than being a huge slave to the grind stone I’ve done the following:

1. Been to the Mac Expo. What a let down, still I came away with a set of Shure headphones, muchos nice.
2. Found I like Shish Tawol and Taboleh from Marush on Kensington High Street
3. got new lenses for my glasses, I can see again!
4. Working… still the blasted website is up and my boss’ hate it, and nothing I seem to do is good enough.
5. Found a new game for my mac, Chinese thing, very good.
6. Read lots of books. Jane Eyre being one of them. Still haven’t finished Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell
7. Bought an Xbox 360, not for me of course. It was a present.
8. Done lots of people watching on the tube. I will save that for another post at some point.

I’m wondering if it’s me, or if author’s just suddenly get bad? I’m talking about works by an author that you’ve previously loved, and perhaps do, but when they bring something new out, it’s just awful, like they’ve lost their readability? So far, to think of it, it’s only happened to two authors.

The first one, I had the displeasure of meeting, wish I hadn’t, the guy was so far up his own arse it’s a wonder he didn’t have someone else there signing books on his behalf.

The second one… I don’t know it seems like she started scrapping the barrel to bring plots back to books, and once the main character’s mission in life was gone, it seemed like it just wasn’t worth her writing books anymore… I should have realised when the spin off series she started writting was utter drivel, to give up and find someone else to read.

I finally finished, after a week of trying, to read The Constant Gardner by John Le Carre. Good book, if not a little hard to follow in places. It seemed like an awful lot of thought an effort with an anti climactic ending… c’est la vie.

I was planning on getting home and writing something about the article in F1 magazine regarding Michael Schumacher’s fall from grace (great read, would recommend it, it’s what I’ve been saying should happen for years). Anyway, my day at the beach watching the Margate airshow was interupted by the news that my mother has died. For those that know me, know I have a somewhat tempestuous, or should I say had, relationship with my mother.

I’m a little numb to be honest, I’m not as broken up as I probably should be in knowing that a parent has died. Is this normal? Should I be feeling like this? I really don’t feel very much. I felt worse for my aunt who found her and who’s had to start the things that you go through when someone dies.

I know this isn’t the kind of thing that should probably be blogged, but I just don’t know what to think so writing it down might help.