This past week

I have been investigating Windows Home Server, which seems very nice, and Vista's network performance, which is absolutely abysmal. The latter has taken the bulk of the week for very little result.

Plug 'Vista network slow' into your favourite search engine and you'll see that I'm far from alone and you'll see all the things I've tried.

The Book Thing

Shamelessly stolen from Kim du Toit.

Which [type of] book do you irrationally cringe away from reading, despite seeing only positive reviews?

Philosophy. I simply find it extremely hard going. Plus Plato's Republic in the original Greek was not exactly the ideal introduction.

If you could bring three [fictional] characters to life for a social event (afternoon tea, a night of clubbing, perhaps a world cruise), who would they be and what would the event be?

Thraxas, Gandalf, and Granny Weatherwax.

You are told you can’t die until you read the most boring novel on the planet. While this immortality is great for awhile, eventually you realise it’s past time to die. Which book would you expect to get you a nice grave?

Atlas Shrugged: I just cannot get into it.

Come on, we’ve all been there. Which book have you pretended, or at least hinted, that you’ve read, when in fact you’ve been nowhere near it?

None. Like Kim, however, there are books which I've only read in translation when I could have (at the time) read them in the original.

As an addition to the last question, has there been a book that you really thought you had read, only to realise when you read a review about it/go to ‘reread’ it that you haven’t? Which book?

Again, none. That said, there are books which I've re-read and seen in an entirely different light. Most recently, the Harry Potter books after it was revealed as a Christian cycle. Additionally, there are books which I wish I had the intellect to understand better, like Sun Tzu's Art of War.

You’ve been appointed Book Advisor to a VIP (who’s not a big reader). What’s the first book you’d recommend and why? (if you feel like you’d have to know the person, go ahead of personalise the VIP.

Sun Tsu's Art of War. It's just so deep, but it's short and will set them thinking.

A good fairy comes and grants you one wish: you will have perfect reading comprehension in the foreign language of your choice. Which language do you go with?

I'm really torn here: part of me says Latin so I can reread everything I read at school and more; the other part says Chinese - there's a whole mountain of literature there.

A mischievous fairy comes and says that you must choose one book that you will reread once a year for the rest of your life (you can read other books as well). Which book would you pick?

Dead easy: Tolkein's Lord of the Rings

That good fairy is back for one final visit. Now, she’s granting you your dream library! Describe it. Is everything leatherbound? Is it full of first edition hardcovers? Pristine trade paperbacks? Perhaps a few favourite authors have inscribed their works? Go ahead-let your imagination run free.

Whatever else it is, it's circular with a ladder that can go round.

Deep fun.

Having been ill over Christmas, I'm trying to get my old job back and wrestling with migrating my email - all 250,000 items - from PMMail 2000 to Pocomail. On th former, I'm waiting for people to get back from holiday; on the latter, we shall see.

Merry Christmas

I'm just back from my brother's family in Scotland where we celebrated Christmas. But everyone was struck down with colds. I've still got one.

My nephew and niece were angels. Most of the time. :)

The Daily Kitten

Much kitten goodness here.

E-mooning!

We all know those cute little computer symbols called "emoticons," where:

:) means a smile and

:( is a frown.

Sometimes these are represented by

:-)

:-(

Well, how about some "ASSICONS?"
Here goes:

(_!_) a regular ass

(__!__) a fat ass

(!) a tight ass

(_*_) a sore ass

{_!_} a swishy ass

(_o_) an ass that's been around

(_x_) kiss my ass

(_X_) leave my ass alone

(_zzz_) a tired ass

(_E=mc2_) a smart ass

(_$_) Money coming out of his ass

(_?_) Dumb Ass

Best Science Blogs

Seems Bad Astronomy and Climate Audit are neck and neck for the Best Science Blog.

Looking at the other awards, I'm going to find this one useful. I think next year I'll be voting for Misty for that.

Today, I am mainly

Today I am mainly doing the ironing. I'vegot a month's worth to do and I've left it too long.

This evening, I shall be going to the fireworks show. I'll walk; hopefully, I'll manage to lose some of the weight I've put on recently.

Party!

I went to a wonderful party at the weekend, hosted by my friends Karin and Roland. Good company, good food, good wine; for what more can one ask?

My great great grandfather

The Ditton Doctor.

Pretty girls!

Adverts for Rigid Tools. :)

The day I tried mead

I used to quite like mead, but I hadn't had any since my student days. Anyway, I was given a bottle. So, some time later, I got out a tankard and poured myself a glass. And took a long pull. But this was no ordinary mead: it was more honey wine - 13% alcohol! It was not the long refereshing drink I had expected. Still, it tasted very nice.

Today I shall be...

sorting paperwork.

Deep joy.

Pictures from WW1

My grandmother was a doctor in WW1, first in Leith and then in France. I've scanned some pages from an album she kept. All done by her patients.

The Postmodernism generator

Click here for postmodernist rubbish.

I've been humbugged!

This is gettting distressing.

I think a lawyer's trying to steal my aunt's estate

Obviously I can't go into details here but I'm seriously worried.

This could be expensive

My car's in for a MOT and major service and I was expecting a bill of £300-£400. But there's an additional £200 for broken shock absorbers, £50+ for a tyre, and the gearbox is leaking. That last could be majorly expensive, just when I don't need to be spending money.

Flippin' heck!

ǝɹǝɥ ǝʎ ʞɔı1ɔ.

So I went to bed at 03:30

Almost dawn!

Anyway, I'd finished watching Cliffhanger on the TV and went to check my email before going to bed. And shortly thereafter felt slighty nauseous and smelled gas. So I went round the house and checked everything. I hadn't left the oven on or anything. But the smell was still there. And outside. So I rang Transco and we went through the usual palaver. An engineer duly arrived at about 02:30 and found nothing. But the smell had gone. He left a bit after 03:00

We reckoned it was fuel - or something else - dumped by an aircraft.

Still, going to bed at that hour is not fun. I must be getting old...