Managed to stay indoors long enough today to put the finishing touches to Pinky's new website, or rather wedsite, haw haw.
It's like summer, it's so balmy. I keep remembering the year it snowed in April, however.
I got a quote from the roofer for renewing the spouting -- £430, yikes. That's for new cast-iron spouting and straps, however, plus for the fascia to be rubbed down and repainted. I'll call him to talk it over, but I assume I can't have plastic spouting on account of it being a terrace -- the spouting runs right across my place and Jim & Rosemary's, so it has to match up I guess. If the quote includes VAT (17.5%) I'll say yes, I think.
30 March 2003
28 March 2003
:: crayzee dog
Bertie had a very confusing walk today: I went into town to visit Kate and Calum in the afternoon, thinking I had plenty of time because I wasn't starting work until 6pm. But I forgot to factor in the rush hour! I don't do rush hour ... I'm always driving against the flow. So argh, here I was stuck in amongst everyone crawling home after work. Finally got back with five minutes to spare to walk Bertie before heading back INTO town. So I barrelled into the house yelling for him and he staggered downstairs bleary-eyed from his bed. I wouldn't even let him have a bite to eat, just leashed him and dragged him straight out the door.
I let him off the lead as we rushed up the path into the big field up the road. But lo and behold, who should be in the field knocking his football about but Daniel, the boy next door. Bertie obviously thought, "Aha! So this is what the big rush was all about!" and raced over to see him off. Daniel is used to Bertie -- he's been barked at before -- but this was extreme. Bertie ran round and round and round, building up a head of steam, then charged at Daniel full speed, before screeching to a halt and barking hysterically. He's too scared to get close, but he's a big muscly dog and he is LOUD. Added to that was all the mad running and leaping, and the fact that I couldn't catch him or shut him up or otherwise control him ... oh boy.
Finally Daniel shrugged and headed off down the track that leads to his back yard. Bertie calmed down enough for me to catch him and I dragged him home. This was the confusing part for him -- damn! I did what you wanted, why are you so cross?
Calum is doing well, by the way. He has more than one heart defect ... the narrowed aorta is the easiest to fix, but he's also got dodgy valves that will need complex surgery later on. But he's soooo cute! He's feeding well and putting on weight and looks fine.
Another nice sunny day today, but the haar has closed in tonight.
I let him off the lead as we rushed up the path into the big field up the road. But lo and behold, who should be in the field knocking his football about but Daniel, the boy next door. Bertie obviously thought, "Aha! So this is what the big rush was all about!" and raced over to see him off. Daniel is used to Bertie -- he's been barked at before -- but this was extreme. Bertie ran round and round and round, building up a head of steam, then charged at Daniel full speed, before screeching to a halt and barking hysterically. He's too scared to get close, but he's a big muscly dog and he is LOUD. Added to that was all the mad running and leaping, and the fact that I couldn't catch him or shut him up or otherwise control him ... oh boy.
Finally Daniel shrugged and headed off down the track that leads to his back yard. Bertie calmed down enough for me to catch him and I dragged him home. This was the confusing part for him -- damn! I did what you wanted, why are you so cross?
Calum is doing well, by the way. He has more than one heart defect ... the narrowed aorta is the easiest to fix, but he's also got dodgy valves that will need complex surgery later on. But he's soooo cute! He's feeding well and putting on weight and looks fine.
Another nice sunny day today, but the haar has closed in tonight.
26 March 2003
:: great posters
Link courtesy of Anthea: some wonderful anti-war posters.
In other news: yesterday I gave the shed doors a second coat and did the back door blue as well. While I was on a painting roll I did the big step outside the french doors -- tile red, not blue. It's all very tidy out there now. I also phoned a roofer about the spouting and he came this morning to have a look. He's going to replace the whole stretch of spouting and repaint the fascia underneath. As he pointed out, it's the only time the fascia gets a good paint so it's worth doing. It feels good to be getting all this work done -- I want the place to be shipshape.
I didn't do a lot else on my day off. The garden out the front needs a good seeing to, and it actually needs watering too. The weather has been astonishingly pleasant for the time of year. Last year it rained from February through to, don't know, October or something, and I've known it to snow in April. Today was almost summery, I was out in my shirt-sleeves. Back to the garden: I haven't tried out the flame-throwing weedkiller Faye gave me for Christmas -- maybe next week. Saturday I'm determined to go on an anti-war protest; Friday I start work early; and tomorrow I'm hoping to visit Kate.
In other news: yesterday I gave the shed doors a second coat and did the back door blue as well. While I was on a painting roll I did the big step outside the french doors -- tile red, not blue. It's all very tidy out there now. I also phoned a roofer about the spouting and he came this morning to have a look. He's going to replace the whole stretch of spouting and repaint the fascia underneath. As he pointed out, it's the only time the fascia gets a good paint so it's worth doing. It feels good to be getting all this work done -- I want the place to be shipshape.
I didn't do a lot else on my day off. The garden out the front needs a good seeing to, and it actually needs watering too. The weather has been astonishingly pleasant for the time of year. Last year it rained from February through to, don't know, October or something, and I've known it to snow in April. Today was almost summery, I was out in my shirt-sleeves. Back to the garden: I haven't tried out the flame-throwing weedkiller Faye gave me for Christmas -- maybe next week. Saturday I'm determined to go on an anti-war protest; Friday I start work early; and tomorrow I'm hoping to visit Kate.
25 March 2003
:: yikes
This just in:
Nature strikes back, I guess. Imagine, an epidemic of the common cold sweeping the planet.
Another lovely spring day, just right for painting the shed doors. They're finished, hurrah! Brian the builder phoned to see how I liked them & I gave them high praise. And now they're blue! And finished! I'm all fired up now, and will dedicate many more days off to DIY projects. First off though, is to get the spouting fixed. It'll start raining sooner or later and I'm tired of the back yard filling up with water.
I'm on the late shift tonight, here until 2:30am or so to get the latest war news in the paper. They're printing the final edition and we "slip" pages in on the run. Our front page picture is of a US tank with "Apocolypse" [sic] stenciled on its gunbarrel. I hope not...
ATLANTA (AP) – The mysterious and deadly flu-like illness from Asia that has stymied health officials around the world appears to be caused by a new variety of a common cold virus, US health officials said.
Nature strikes back, I guess. Imagine, an epidemic of the common cold sweeping the planet.
Another lovely spring day, just right for painting the shed doors. They're finished, hurrah! Brian the builder phoned to see how I liked them & I gave them high praise. And now they're blue! And finished! I'm all fired up now, and will dedicate many more days off to DIY projects. First off though, is to get the spouting fixed. It'll start raining sooner or later and I'm tired of the back yard filling up with water.
I'm on the late shift tonight, here until 2:30am or so to get the latest war news in the paper. They're printing the final edition and we "slip" pages in on the run. Our front page picture is of a US tank with "Apocolypse" [sic] stenciled on its gunbarrel. I hope not...
23 March 2003
:: cute!
Andrew and I went to see baby Calum in the hospital yesterday and he's gorgeous! Kate emailed today to say they were discharged this morning and he's doing fine. He didn't have to have surgery after all, though I gather it's not completely ruled out in future -- his aorta is a bit narrow apparently. Kate is very glad to be out of the hospital -- the neonatal unit is in the new one, and it's a strangely barren place.
After visiting Calum we headed north, to Tentsmuir and had a long walk up the beach, a little picnic and then back through the forest. Bertie was in heaven, it's one of his top places. Andrew has never been to St Andrews, so we stopped there and had a look round, then had a wonderful curry dinner at Balaka, a Bangladeshi restaurant. I had an Afghani lamb dish and it was subtle and rich, delicious to the last morsel.
A bit of madness through the meal was that we kept trying to text Andrew's cousin Grace, who we were to meet for drinks later on. Eventually she called, but the reception was bad and we kept getting cut off. So I switched the phone off, and we made contact later on. They were in Callander! Grace was tired after a long energetic day and begged off drinks, and we were pretty tired too so that was ok by us. We headed home and I managed to get slightly lost by dint of following two cars in front of us -- they ended up driving down a farm track! But we got home at about 9pm and collapsed on the sofa with a beer and the TV remote. Sooooo sophisticated!
Today I dropped Andrew off at his aunt and uncle's in Edinburgh and took Bertie for a walk in the Braid Hills, another top place. Lots of interesting new dogs, dog-friendly people, lovely weather and a stream to drink out of. Among the interesting dogs were two unusual sight hounds, a pharaoh hound and one I've never heard of before, a sloughi, a North African hunting dog. They were both lovely, and their owner and I had a great chat. Bertie wanted to play, but the sloughi was confined to a harness due to having once broken his neck (!) and the pharaoh was too delicate.
Next stop was the pet supermarket, where a voice said, "look, it's Bertie!" It was the owners of Shadow, Bertie's greyhound girlfriend. He's a legend in his own lunch-hour is Bertie, a well-kent face.
And now I'm at work, where we're very much on a war footing. I'm working my usual hours tonight, but for most of the rest of the week I'll be on a late start and late finish. Then on Friday I have a nice early start -- 2pm -- so I can start work on the Scottish election results. (The election's not until 1 May, but I have to make sure we have the right coding for when the results come in on the big night.)
I haven't been on any anti-war protests since war broke out, but if there's something on this week I'll go if possible. Pretty horrible news so far, so many "friendly fire" deaths, including a journalist. And then there's the US administration's outraged reaction to film on PoWs being paraded in Baghdad; what about the pictures of Iraqis being marched off after surrendering? Not to mention all the photos from Camp X-Ray...
After visiting Calum we headed north, to Tentsmuir and had a long walk up the beach, a little picnic and then back through the forest. Bertie was in heaven, it's one of his top places. Andrew has never been to St Andrews, so we stopped there and had a look round, then had a wonderful curry dinner at Balaka, a Bangladeshi restaurant. I had an Afghani lamb dish and it was subtle and rich, delicious to the last morsel.
A bit of madness through the meal was that we kept trying to text Andrew's cousin Grace, who we were to meet for drinks later on. Eventually she called, but the reception was bad and we kept getting cut off. So I switched the phone off, and we made contact later on. They were in Callander! Grace was tired after a long energetic day and begged off drinks, and we were pretty tired too so that was ok by us. We headed home and I managed to get slightly lost by dint of following two cars in front of us -- they ended up driving down a farm track! But we got home at about 9pm and collapsed on the sofa with a beer and the TV remote. Sooooo sophisticated!
Today I dropped Andrew off at his aunt and uncle's in Edinburgh and took Bertie for a walk in the Braid Hills, another top place. Lots of interesting new dogs, dog-friendly people, lovely weather and a stream to drink out of. Among the interesting dogs were two unusual sight hounds, a pharaoh hound and one I've never heard of before, a sloughi, a North African hunting dog. They were both lovely, and their owner and I had a great chat. Bertie wanted to play, but the sloughi was confined to a harness due to having once broken his neck (!) and the pharaoh was too delicate.
Next stop was the pet supermarket, where a voice said, "look, it's Bertie!" It was the owners of Shadow, Bertie's greyhound girlfriend. He's a legend in his own lunch-hour is Bertie, a well-kent face.
And now I'm at work, where we're very much on a war footing. I'm working my usual hours tonight, but for most of the rest of the week I'll be on a late start and late finish. Then on Friday I have a nice early start -- 2pm -- so I can start work on the Scottish election results. (The election's not until 1 May, but I have to make sure we have the right coding for when the results come in on the big night.)
I haven't been on any anti-war protests since war broke out, but if there's something on this week I'll go if possible. Pretty horrible news so far, so many "friendly fire" deaths, including a journalist. And then there's the US administration's outraged reaction to film on PoWs being paraded in Baghdad; what about the pictures of Iraqis being marched off after surrendering? Not to mention all the photos from Camp X-Ray...
22 March 2003
:: what a week
So I went to London with zero sleep, trained our writers there (who were grateful), wandered the streets of Soho and Chinatown marvelling at how crowded, dirty and rushed London is, ate a big bowl of noodle soup with char siu, then went back to Edinburgh. I was quite spaced out a lot of the time and tended to fall asleep any time I sat down. Once home I pretty much just crashed, after a hot bath (fell asleep in that too).
Next day I had my appointment with the radiologist, the sidekick Dr Ingram. Turns out the fibroids haven't shrunk much at all. She wasn't surprised, given that I hadn't suffered much pain. No pain, no gain! Or no shrinkage in this case. So I may be looking at having another go at embolisation or giving up entirely and having a hysterectomy. Depends how the symptoms develop. Sigh.
Then I had coffee with Faye, who's now settled in at Pennicuik. Her new employer is the worst person she's ever met in her life, apparently -- very autocratic and rude. But the hours and pay are good and it's a lovely spot.
That evening Bertie arrived back from his Dunfermline mini-break and appeared to not be overjoyed. To say the least. I think he'd like to be Colin and Jenny's dog, though Colin swears he wasn't spoiled. Huh. After walking him I was shattered so it was a bath and early to bed for me.
Yesterday was mainly spent cleaning, changing sheets and grocery shopping. Yes, a visitor! Andrew arrived last night just as I was starting work, and he's staying until Sunday. Today we had a chat-fest catching up on every little thing while I painted the new shed doors with primer. I wanted to get that done before it rains & today was lovely and sunny.
In between all this busyness, war has broken out. Tonight I was meant to come in at 6pm and work through until 3.30am. So I'd done the painting and Andrew had headed off to town and I'd had lunch and was just gearing down for a couple of hours of rest and relaxation when the phone went. It was my boss, telling me to come in at the usual time, 4pm, as they weren't going to do late editions. Oh, ok. I quickly changed and walked the dog and rushed in. Then they changed their minds and now I'm here until 2.30am. Sigh. Luckily Andrew was able to walk Bertie tonight.
It was horrible watching the missiles raining down on Baghdad on TV tonight, the whole thing is awful. But there's also something sinister going on elsewhere in Iraq. Turkey is sending troops in to sort out the Kurds. The Kurds have an autonomous area in Iraq and have suffered massively under Saddam's regime. They're the ones he gassed that time; they've also been tortured and shot. There were reports of them being pleased about the US assault, because it will get rid of Saddam. But I think they've maybe been sold down the river -- I'm afraid the Turks will be just as murderous. The reports say the US is against the Turks going in, but I'm not sure I believe them; the US I mean. I think there was probably a wink and a nudge.
Next day I had my appointment with the radiologist, the sidekick Dr Ingram. Turns out the fibroids haven't shrunk much at all. She wasn't surprised, given that I hadn't suffered much pain. No pain, no gain! Or no shrinkage in this case. So I may be looking at having another go at embolisation or giving up entirely and having a hysterectomy. Depends how the symptoms develop. Sigh.
Then I had coffee with Faye, who's now settled in at Pennicuik. Her new employer is the worst person she's ever met in her life, apparently -- very autocratic and rude. But the hours and pay are good and it's a lovely spot.
That evening Bertie arrived back from his Dunfermline mini-break and appeared to not be overjoyed. To say the least. I think he'd like to be Colin and Jenny's dog, though Colin swears he wasn't spoiled. Huh. After walking him I was shattered so it was a bath and early to bed for me.
Yesterday was mainly spent cleaning, changing sheets and grocery shopping. Yes, a visitor! Andrew arrived last night just as I was starting work, and he's staying until Sunday. Today we had a chat-fest catching up on every little thing while I painted the new shed doors with primer. I wanted to get that done before it rains & today was lovely and sunny.
In between all this busyness, war has broken out. Tonight I was meant to come in at 6pm and work through until 3.30am. So I'd done the painting and Andrew had headed off to town and I'd had lunch and was just gearing down for a couple of hours of rest and relaxation when the phone went. It was my boss, telling me to come in at the usual time, 4pm, as they weren't going to do late editions. Oh, ok. I quickly changed and walked the dog and rushed in. Then they changed their minds and now I'm here until 2.30am. Sigh. Luckily Andrew was able to walk Bertie tonight.
It was horrible watching the missiles raining down on Baghdad on TV tonight, the whole thing is awful. But there's also something sinister going on elsewhere in Iraq. Turkey is sending troops in to sort out the Kurds. The Kurds have an autonomous area in Iraq and have suffered massively under Saddam's regime. They're the ones he gassed that time; they've also been tortured and shot. There were reports of them being pleased about the US assault, because it will get rid of Saddam. But I think they've maybe been sold down the river -- I'm afraid the Turks will be just as murderous. The reports say the US is against the Turks going in, but I'm not sure I believe them; the US I mean. I think there was probably a wink and a nudge.
17 March 2003
:: I must be mad
It seems logical now, but I suspect that 12 hours from now I'll be regretting it. The big fly in the ointment was the phone message waiting when I got home last night. It was the builder, saying he couldn't make it on Thursday, would it be ok if he came this morning instead? Well I didn't get the message until 1:30am, so it just had to be ok. He said 8:15am but didn't actually arrive until 8:45, so hurrah, an extra half hour's sleep.
But no more than that, because my bedroom's at the back and the guy is drilling and sawing and so on. I phoned work to check the time for my flight tomorrow morning, so I could order a taxi. The flight's at 6:10am; the taxi firm says check-in's an hour before flight time in these terror-stricken times, so I ordered the taxi for 5am.
So then GW Bush decides to make his statement at 1am UK time, presumably ordering the attack on Iraq to begin. That's normally our fifth edition deadline, so they made arrangements to "slip" pages (change them during the print run) after that until 3:30am. So either my colleague or I has to stay until 3:30am. I figure if I leave work at 1am I'll get barely any sleep anyway, so I may as well be here. Then I'll go home and have a shower, ready for the flight to London.
See? That's logical, isn't it?
Bertie's off in Dunfermline already, enjoying a mini-break with Colin and Jenny. He'll stay tonight and tomorrow night, and I'll get him back on Wednesday evening, after my appointment with the radiologist and a coffee date with Faye. That's great, because it means I can have a really good sleep tomorrow night, without having to get up and walk the dog.
The shed doors are looking pretty good. The joiner is a lovely bloke, very smiley. He was very taken with Bertie because he grew up with a racing greyhound as a pet, a "blue" one (gray actually, but it's called blue). He didn't completely finish before he left because the builder left him with bathroom handles for the doors -- which of course only lock from the inside. "All right if you're living in there," he said. And of course there would be the added advantage of the "engaged" sign. He's coming back tomorrow to fit the right handles, and then I'll just have to varnish or paint them and they're finished! He's sealed all round the jamb with silicon gunk so they're good and weather-tight.
But no more than that, because my bedroom's at the back and the guy is drilling and sawing and so on. I phoned work to check the time for my flight tomorrow morning, so I could order a taxi. The flight's at 6:10am; the taxi firm says check-in's an hour before flight time in these terror-stricken times, so I ordered the taxi for 5am.
So then GW Bush decides to make his statement at 1am UK time, presumably ordering the attack on Iraq to begin. That's normally our fifth edition deadline, so they made arrangements to "slip" pages (change them during the print run) after that until 3:30am. So either my colleague or I has to stay until 3:30am. I figure if I leave work at 1am I'll get barely any sleep anyway, so I may as well be here. Then I'll go home and have a shower, ready for the flight to London.
See? That's logical, isn't it?
Bertie's off in Dunfermline already, enjoying a mini-break with Colin and Jenny. He'll stay tonight and tomorrow night, and I'll get him back on Wednesday evening, after my appointment with the radiologist and a coffee date with Faye. That's great, because it means I can have a really good sleep tomorrow night, without having to get up and walk the dog.
The shed doors are looking pretty good. The joiner is a lovely bloke, very smiley. He was very taken with Bertie because he grew up with a racing greyhound as a pet, a "blue" one (gray actually, but it's called blue). He didn't completely finish before he left because the builder left him with bathroom handles for the doors -- which of course only lock from the inside. "All right if you're living in there," he said. And of course there would be the added advantage of the "engaged" sign. He's coming back tomorrow to fit the right handles, and then I'll just have to varnish or paint them and they're finished! He's sealed all round the jamb with silicon gunk so they're good and weather-tight.
16 March 2003
:: speechless
'Talking fish' stuns New York
So what do you do when you find a talking fish? You kill it and sell it, of course.
So what do you do when you find a talking fish? You kill it and sell it, of course.
14 March 2003
:: tinkering
I made some minor changes to Pinky's latest website -- as well as putting the extra shell in, I've added her headshot and fiddled with the picture-gallery page.
Today is truly spring -- warm, sunny, just wonderful. So wonderful I rushed out and tidied the garden up a bit. As well as a spot of weeding, I swept the back yard, cleaned up the dog poo and put some more stakes in to keep Bertie off the extremely feeble onion patch. Only half a dozen plants are still struggling to grow, the rest have been trampled. The garlic is sturdier, it's growing like nobody's business, and the blackcurrant bushes I transplanted are looking brilliant. Spring! I love spring.
The builder says the joiner will probably come next Thursday. He'll give me a ring on Wednesday to confirm. Yeah, right.
Today is truly spring -- warm, sunny, just wonderful. So wonderful I rushed out and tidied the garden up a bit. As well as a spot of weeding, I swept the back yard, cleaned up the dog poo and put some more stakes in to keep Bertie off the extremely feeble onion patch. Only half a dozen plants are still struggling to grow, the rest have been trampled. The garlic is sturdier, it's growing like nobody's business, and the blackcurrant bushes I transplanted are looking brilliant. Spring! I love spring.
The builder says the joiner will probably come next Thursday. He'll give me a ring on Wednesday to confirm. Yeah, right.
13 March 2003
:: dogsitting deluxe
Colin is going to mind Bertie while I'm in London. I thought he could just pop in to walk him at some point in the middle of the day, but no, he's taking full advantage of the opportunity for some quality dog time. So Bertie's being collected on Monday night (after a key exchange at work) and will possibly stay over until Wednesday -- this is because Colin's partner Jenny is away on Tuesday too, and won't see Bertie unless he stays over another night. Yes, he is that popular.
:: btw
I did sign up to Abelgratis and got my free webspace. Haven't done anything much with it yet though.
:: wedding blues
Someone else is having a wedding, I've got the blues. Waaaaah! Liz and Ken are getting hitched and I'm not there, waaaaah! I've got a copy of the ceremony though, so I could always get up at 6.30am (or is that 7.30am?) and read it out loud while drinking champagne and crying. My wee niece! I remember changing her nappies and now she's all grown up! Sniffle, sob. Yes, I know she's been all grown up for at least ten years, but she's getting maaaaried!
So that's Saturday, kiwi time. Sigh. I hope everyone has a wonderful time, and I also hope there's a video. Sigh.
Back in Britain, life is pretty frenetic. I got a letter today from the radiologist, Dr Gillespie, saying I hadn't turned up for the appointment with him on the 5th. Uh? But then they'd realised the appointment letter had been sent to my old address, so they've made me a new appointment for next Wednesday. This is to look at the latest scans.
Also next week, I'm to go down to London for a day to train the staff at our City office in the new software. Timetable: finish work at 1am, drive home, sleep for five minutes, leave home 6am or so to catch plane at 6.40am, battle through London traffic to office, train staff, have lunch, battle through London traffic to airport, fly home. This is on Tuesday. I'll have to get someone to mind Bertie for the day. It was supposed to be my day off, and I was meeting Faye for lunch but we'll have to put that off until Wednesday, which is now my day off. The day I have the appt with Dr Gillespie.
No sign of the joiner, I bet he wants to come on Tuesday. Or Wednesday.
So that's Saturday, kiwi time. Sigh. I hope everyone has a wonderful time, and I also hope there's a video. Sigh.
Back in Britain, life is pretty frenetic. I got a letter today from the radiologist, Dr Gillespie, saying I hadn't turned up for the appointment with him on the 5th. Uh? But then they'd realised the appointment letter had been sent to my old address, so they've made me a new appointment for next Wednesday. This is to look at the latest scans.
Also next week, I'm to go down to London for a day to train the staff at our City office in the new software. Timetable: finish work at 1am, drive home, sleep for five minutes, leave home 6am or so to catch plane at 6.40am, battle through London traffic to office, train staff, have lunch, battle through London traffic to airport, fly home. This is on Tuesday. I'll have to get someone to mind Bertie for the day. It was supposed to be my day off, and I was meeting Faye for lunch but we'll have to put that off until Wednesday, which is now my day off. The day I have the appt with Dr Gillespie.
No sign of the joiner, I bet he wants to come on Tuesday. Or Wednesday.
12 March 2003
:: back to the minutae ...
Today and yesterday I finally got the quote for the shed doors sorted out and cleaned the carpets. Whew. The quote for the doors was £275. I had been hoping for £300 but expecting more, so I was thrilled it was less. That's for everything -- two fire doors cut to size, new "stannards" (jambs, I think), locks fitted, the lot. The joiner will probably do them Thursday or Friday. He will start at 8am. In the morning.
The carpet steaming worked reasonably well, especially in the hall. I might have another go at a couple of other patches. While I was at it I cleaned the floors downstairs too and did all my laundry and ironing. The house is gleaming! Apart from the bits I didn't dust.
Last night I went to see Far From Heaven, which I loved. It's set in the 50s and it's done just like a 50s movie, with stilted dialogue ("Say, Pop, guess what I did at school today?) and fabulous clothes. But unlike 50s movies it deals more honestly with attitudes to race and homosexuality. I read and heard a lot of opinions on the film before I went and didn't really agree with any of it, though they were all different. I think a lot of younger people can't understand that the main character isn't just a repressed housewife who realises how empty her life is. She's like the chairman of a highly successful company who discovers the CEO's been embezzling it and they're going bankrupt. Women back then were trained to be housewives and she had it all: stunning big house, two lovely children (boy and girl, polite and obedient), handsome, successful husband. She was a star, featured in the society pages, her dinner parties were fabulous. Then she discovers her husband's gay. He gets "treatment" and for a while, everything staggers along as normal, until he falls in love. The other strand is that meanwhile, she's finding that the gardener, a kindly fellow, is a good listener. But he's black. She's tremendously naive, doesn't realise that it's all very well for her to play at being liberal, treating him like any other person, but for him it is actually dangerous. It ends up with her being the talk of the town for being seen going into a restaurant with him, and with him having to leave town because the scandal kills his business. Also, his young daughter is injured by boys taunting her about her father. The thing is, they never even kiss -- a touch on the arm is enough to provoke disgust and horror in onlookers. Even her best friend is disgusted, more so than by the revelation about the husband's gayness. But it's not like the character, Cathy, is even very PC by today's standards: she never stands up for her friend, for example. When he grabs her arm during an emotional scene in the street and a passing man yells, "Hey! Hands off boy!" she doesn't say a word in his defence. When the NAACP comes calling, she gets her black maid to sign their petition for her. I thought it was a wonderful film, lots to think about in it.
The carpet steaming worked reasonably well, especially in the hall. I might have another go at a couple of other patches. While I was at it I cleaned the floors downstairs too and did all my laundry and ironing. The house is gleaming! Apart from the bits I didn't dust.
Last night I went to see Far From Heaven, which I loved. It's set in the 50s and it's done just like a 50s movie, with stilted dialogue ("Say, Pop, guess what I did at school today?) and fabulous clothes. But unlike 50s movies it deals more honestly with attitudes to race and homosexuality. I read and heard a lot of opinions on the film before I went and didn't really agree with any of it, though they were all different. I think a lot of younger people can't understand that the main character isn't just a repressed housewife who realises how empty her life is. She's like the chairman of a highly successful company who discovers the CEO's been embezzling it and they're going bankrupt. Women back then were trained to be housewives and she had it all: stunning big house, two lovely children (boy and girl, polite and obedient), handsome, successful husband. She was a star, featured in the society pages, her dinner parties were fabulous. Then she discovers her husband's gay. He gets "treatment" and for a while, everything staggers along as normal, until he falls in love. The other strand is that meanwhile, she's finding that the gardener, a kindly fellow, is a good listener. But he's black. She's tremendously naive, doesn't realise that it's all very well for her to play at being liberal, treating him like any other person, but for him it is actually dangerous. It ends up with her being the talk of the town for being seen going into a restaurant with him, and with him having to leave town because the scandal kills his business. Also, his young daughter is injured by boys taunting her about her father. The thing is, they never even kiss -- a touch on the arm is enough to provoke disgust and horror in onlookers. Even her best friend is disgusted, more so than by the revelation about the husband's gayness. But it's not like the character, Cathy, is even very PC by today's standards: she never stands up for her friend, for example. When he grabs her arm during an emotional scene in the street and a passing man yells, "Hey! Hands off boy!" she doesn't say a word in his defence. When the NAACP comes calling, she gets her black maid to sign their petition for her. I thought it was a wonderful film, lots to think about in it.
9 March 2003
:: reality check
So there I was fretting about the builder still not having given me a quote for the shed doors let alone fitted them, and about the as-yet-uncleaned carpets and a myriad other minutae, when Andrew rang with some terrible news. His friend Kate, the artist we stayed with in the Western Isles, has had her baby -- a wonderful event of course, but Calum was born with heart defects that mean he'll probably have to have surgery in the next couple of weeks. He's in an incubator and is doing a bit better now than when he was born (on Wednesday I think) -- he had quite bad breathing difficulties that have eased. He also has a couple of other physical problems which may be minor or may be symptoms of a syndrome of some kind. Everyone at the hospital has been wonderful, but Kate and her partner have been on a real rollercoaster ride, hoping and praying that all will be well in the end.
Lots of positive thinking, good vibes and prayers please, for Kate, Robbie and wee Calum.
Lots of positive thinking, good vibes and prayers please, for Kate, Robbie and wee Calum.
1 March 2003
:: doors
The builder came this afternoon and after a bit of tooth-sucking over the non-standard size of the doors, said he could get a couple of fire doors and cut them down. They''ll be completely flat and plain, so they won't look as nice as the originals did when new. They'll do the job, though, so I'm not fussed. He's going to quote me for new locks as well -- I figure I might as well have locks on them. If he gets everything organised and the quote is ok by me, they'll be done some time the coming week. Yippee!!
:: on a roll!
Today I finally managed to track down a joiner to come and look at my shed doors. He's coming tomorrow morning (or later this morning, as it's now after midnight). I'm stupidly thrilled at the prospect of having new doors on the shed and have all kinds of plans for improvements. I'm also excited at finding someone who seems keen to work for me. Mind you, I didn't talk to the joiner himself, I talked to his new boss, who has a building firm. The builder himself is booked up for the next seven months. Anyway, he says fitting new doors and surrounds sounds straightforward and no trouble. Hurrah!
Then I made an appointment to get my hair done. My hairdresser is also terribly busy, but the receptionist booked me in for his lunchhour, next Friday.
Then I went to the DIY shop and got a carpet-cleaning gizmo to fit on my wallpaper steamer. This is because I couldn't find anyone to clean my carpets. The only carpet-cleaner who even answered his phone quoted me £140 in a very grumpy way and then said he probably wouldn't be able to get the stains out. This is without even seeing the carpet! I pointed out that his Yellow Pages advert said "stain removal a specialty" and that made him even grumpier. The steam-cleaning attachment cost £16 and doesn't come with a grumpy man attached. It's worth a try, I guess. Actually the stains don't look too bad, though I might have another go at a couple of them with the Carpet Rescue spray before I let loose with the steamer.
At the DIY shop I also bought a nice stainless steel garden fork. I've been making do with a spade, but I really do need a fork. It's lovely.
The other major DIY event looming is that I've decided I really must paint the livingroom. I changed the red sofa covers for the natural ones the other day (the sun has started streaming in through the french doors) and the wallpaper now looks really horrid. I'm going to do it pale green, same as my old flat. The natural sofa looks great, very swish.
It must be spring that's bringing on this great burst of activity. If it's not raining tomorrow I'll get out into the garden and do some tidying up.
Then I made an appointment to get my hair done. My hairdresser is also terribly busy, but the receptionist booked me in for his lunchhour, next Friday.
Then I went to the DIY shop and got a carpet-cleaning gizmo to fit on my wallpaper steamer. This is because I couldn't find anyone to clean my carpets. The only carpet-cleaner who even answered his phone quoted me £140 in a very grumpy way and then said he probably wouldn't be able to get the stains out. This is without even seeing the carpet! I pointed out that his Yellow Pages advert said "stain removal a specialty" and that made him even grumpier. The steam-cleaning attachment cost £16 and doesn't come with a grumpy man attached. It's worth a try, I guess. Actually the stains don't look too bad, though I might have another go at a couple of them with the Carpet Rescue spray before I let loose with the steamer.
At the DIY shop I also bought a nice stainless steel garden fork. I've been making do with a spade, but I really do need a fork. It's lovely.
The other major DIY event looming is that I've decided I really must paint the livingroom. I changed the red sofa covers for the natural ones the other day (the sun has started streaming in through the french doors) and the wallpaper now looks really horrid. I'm going to do it pale green, same as my old flat. The natural sofa looks great, very swish.
It must be spring that's bringing on this great burst of activity. If it's not raining tomorrow I'll get out into the garden and do some tidying up.
28 February 2003
:: wed site
I've spent most of the day working on Pinky's new website -- I've been working on it for just about a year, I think, and I just needed to sit down for a few hours and get it working smoothly. It doesn't look quite the way I wanted it to, but I'm quite pleased with it. I hope Pinky and Suzanne like it.
Otherwise I just walked Bertie a couple of times and had dinner. I went to Blackness, because (oh, this is so dumb!) I got a kilo of carrots for 10p at the supermarket last night and thought the carthorse might like some. Ahem, she did. When she saw me standing by the fence with a carrier bag she actually galloped over, which freaked Bertie out completely.
He got a snack later on though, when we met an elderly gent who used to race greyhounds and now has a portly Westie. He also had a bag of really tasty dog treats in his pocket. I thought Bertie might abandon me, he was so taken with this man. It was mutual!
Otherwise I just walked Bertie a couple of times and had dinner. I went to Blackness, because (oh, this is so dumb!) I got a kilo of carrots for 10p at the supermarket last night and thought the carthorse might like some. Ahem, she did. When she saw me standing by the fence with a carrier bag she actually galloped over, which freaked Bertie out completely.
He got a snack later on though, when we met an elderly gent who used to race greyhounds and now has a portly Westie. He also had a bag of really tasty dog treats in his pocket. I thought Bertie might abandon me, he was so taken with this man. It was mutual!
25 February 2003
:: should I stay or should I go?
I'm seriously considering moving to another isp. There are a lot of reasons to move on; but there are equally compelling reasons to stay.
What's tipping me towards change at the moment is that Easynet's webmail, which I use when I'm at work, has developed some kind of intermittent fault; it's possibly at this end, ie to do with the firewall or whatever, but Easynet's techs are baffled.
So I'm using another webmail service (hushmail) in the meantime.
The webmail problem is just the latest in a line of problems. None of them alone is enough to persuade me to give up on Easynet, but en masse they're getting pretty irritating.
Like when I discovered on uploading the famous helicopter photos that I'd exceeded the 10Mb size limit on a website I'd previously believed was unlimited. Easynet very generously upped the limit to 20Mb -- which I notice from their website is now what they're limiting all users to. It's too complicated to go into here, but the kerfuffle meant I had to move my site from the hockadilly.co.uk "free domain" back to the clunkily-named easyweb.easynet/bja domain, where apparently I can still have unlimited space, doled out in grudging increments. So that makes having a free domain name fairly pointless (though I still have an index page there). Another irritation about that whole business was that there are two different methods for moving files around; FTP for the easyweb space and Microsoft webfolders for hockadilly. Why? Just to annoy me, I think.
The other reason for going is that by today's standards, Easynet is reasonably expensive. It's £12 a month and I pay for phone calls on top of that when I connect. By contrast, I could get 50Mb of webspace at Abel Gratis free, and they offer a bunch of techie stuff like my own cgi-bin, PHP, MySQL and ASP to boot, plus they allow e-commerce on the webspace, which Easynet doesn't without an extra charge (or so I was told ... their website implies that it's jim-dandy). Also, Abel's tech support is on a local rate call, which is something you have to watch out for -- some isps charge 50p a minute for support.
Abel is a Scottish isp, it has a lot of other services with varying rates. But I'm a tiny bit dubious, mainly because it's a small firm and if it goes belly-up I'll have to pack up my tent and move on again.
Another option is BT. Their Openworld Anytime account seems pricey at £16 a month, but you get 50Mb of space and you don't have to pay for connection for up to 150 hours a month. And I wouldn't be on that much. Oh, I've just checked my last phone bill and from 20 Nov to 12 Feb I was only online for about 20 hours in total. Hmmm, I might be better to go for no monthly charge and pay for my connection on the regular local rate. I'd still be saving a bit over Easynet though, and I'd be able to go online a lot more without worrying about the extra cost.
The reasons for not moving are that I'd have to change my email address and website url (though this blogspot address wouldn't change) and go through all the palaver of moving the site and informing everyone of the change. What a pain! But it's starting to look like a worthwhile effort. Having the blogspot makes it all a bit less hassle.
What's tipping me towards change at the moment is that Easynet's webmail, which I use when I'm at work, has developed some kind of intermittent fault; it's possibly at this end, ie to do with the firewall or whatever, but Easynet's techs are baffled.
So I'm using another webmail service (hushmail) in the meantime.
The webmail problem is just the latest in a line of problems. None of them alone is enough to persuade me to give up on Easynet, but en masse they're getting pretty irritating.
Like when I discovered on uploading the famous helicopter photos that I'd exceeded the 10Mb size limit on a website I'd previously believed was unlimited. Easynet very generously upped the limit to 20Mb -- which I notice from their website is now what they're limiting all users to. It's too complicated to go into here, but the kerfuffle meant I had to move my site from the hockadilly.co.uk "free domain" back to the clunkily-named easyweb.easynet/bja domain, where apparently I can still have unlimited space, doled out in grudging increments. So that makes having a free domain name fairly pointless (though I still have an index page there). Another irritation about that whole business was that there are two different methods for moving files around; FTP for the easyweb space and Microsoft webfolders for hockadilly. Why? Just to annoy me, I think.
The other reason for going is that by today's standards, Easynet is reasonably expensive. It's £12 a month and I pay for phone calls on top of that when I connect. By contrast, I could get 50Mb of webspace at Abel Gratis free, and they offer a bunch of techie stuff like my own cgi-bin, PHP, MySQL and ASP to boot, plus they allow e-commerce on the webspace, which Easynet doesn't without an extra charge (or so I was told ... their website implies that it's jim-dandy). Also, Abel's tech support is on a local rate call, which is something you have to watch out for -- some isps charge 50p a minute for support.
Abel is a Scottish isp, it has a lot of other services with varying rates. But I'm a tiny bit dubious, mainly because it's a small firm and if it goes belly-up I'll have to pack up my tent and move on again.
Another option is BT. Their Openworld Anytime account seems pricey at £16 a month, but you get 50Mb of space and you don't have to pay for connection for up to 150 hours a month. And I wouldn't be on that much. Oh, I've just checked my last phone bill and from 20 Nov to 12 Feb I was only online for about 20 hours in total. Hmmm, I might be better to go for no monthly charge and pay for my connection on the regular local rate. I'd still be saving a bit over Easynet though, and I'd be able to go online a lot more without worrying about the extra cost.
The reasons for not moving are that I'd have to change my email address and website url (though this blogspot address wouldn't change) and go through all the palaver of moving the site and informing everyone of the change. What a pain! But it's starting to look like a worthwhile effort. Having the blogspot makes it all a bit less hassle.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)