tptb dragoon

Museum Magic

The National Maritime Museum is really cool. Unlike some museums you are not overwehlemed with information, there is loads of space and interactive exhibits, and you are actually allowed to touch things. Oh and you walk there from here via the fish and chip shop.

Nathan kept saying "Wow" and his face tells it all.

Kids' Food

They get all the best stuff although parental controls are sometimes required.

Moving house

Don't like where you live? Fed up with the neighbours? Then just float off somewhere else.

The Wonder of Nature

I just cast out again and had a small knot in my line. Whilst trying to untangle it, not too pleasant at 4 degrees celsius in my pjyamas, I heard this blowing sound. The river was very flat and calm and I looked up and to my delight, about 50 yards in front of me, was a baby dolphin, a porpoise, surfacing every 20 yards or so.

I didn't know whether to get my binoculars or camera or wake the family up first I was so excited. I tried to get a shot but this is the best - you can just make out the head. About 45 minutes later he/she came back but I still didn't get a shot but at least we all saw him/her this time.

Delightful.

Gone Fishing

Dawn is a lovely time of the day and the light changes every few minutes. The view here is out to the right towards Falmouth Docks which are quite busy as this is a very deep water estuary.

I do a bit of coarse fishing from time to time and fancy doing a bit of sea fishing. Inspired by my neighbour who had a couple of rods out yesterday, I got myself a starter kit for £27 and have tackled up, put on a dead sand eel, cast out and come inside in the warm. Most civilised. I am typing this, watching TV, drinking tea and fishing at the same time.

Let it snow

Back home in Barnet, apparently, it's snowing. Nothing major but just a little bit of snow. When I told Nathan he said it wasn't fair. I can see his point of view. Personally though I'd settle for this - taken this morning. It's like a cover off a jigsaw box. Click on it for the full original version.

Now That's What I Call Xmas Lights 2003

Check out these lights.

Posh Dosh

It obviously isn't easy for Victoria Beckham with her fame and riches. The URL of her official website as http://www.victoriabeckham.mu/ one has to assume that the "mu" is pronounced "moo". Anyway, don't bother clicking on the link as it isn't even ready yet. She has decided to stoke the embers of her dying pop career by releasing two singles and asking which one should be in the charts - and then ignoring the answer.

At least one of her singles is probably OK but that is not what sells and I think she is history so should do the polite thing and Shut Up!

In the People Who Should Shut Up! category I have already done Michael Jackson. After his latest TV interview it's a pity he didn't listen.

Mulled Wine

Red wine with cloves, brandy, lemon, oranges - or just buy one of those sachets. Lovely. Warms the cockles etc.. I only ever have it at Christmas which is a shame because I love it.

Chicken and Egg

Which came first? This railing is a long way from a road so who bothered to carry it here? The tree that has grown around it must be 10 years old I'd say but the railings look like they were painted more recently.

Beached

We went off for a quick walk to the beach and around. There was a sole surfer who appeared to have just got his gear for Christmas. Our boys specialised in running away from waves...

...which required a pitstop.

This was followed by dusk descending rapidly along with thunder, lightning and a hailstorm. There's a lot of weather down here.

Inflation is followed by deflation

Inevitably what goes up must come down. On the way to lunch I spotted an inflatable Xmas tree

and Casa Mia had this "nice" display of inflatables

and then by the time lunch was over they looked how we felt

Christening Slip

The slipway that was being built is notionally finished apparently and it was thought appropriate to Christen it on Christmas day. It's a welcome return of The Finger as well.

Trouble is the celebration party didn't turn up on time so we took over and had our own celebration complete with speeches

They did turn up eventually though...

There were about 20 or 30 people there although they were hiding from the drizzle.

Ryan and Nathan had a chance to do some skimming and Ryan found a crab which he was insistent that we eat (we didn't).

First pic

Well there have been quite a few hits today so a Merry Christmas to you all.

We got let out last night to go to a local pub where the Sex Slaves were playing. They play pretty good, lively, electric irish folk music and we had a few pints of guiness and a good laugh. On the way back we found the first of the abandoned decorations. There were more to come later...

A Xmas Romp

We went on a walk today which was the same as earlier this month - see this entry and subsequent ones. It started off with the ferry as usual and a special mention for ChriSteve whoever they are

I took quite a photos this time including chains, shoes and cow pats...

From the ferry we could see our place (down the bottom with the white railings)

I noticed that Derek wasn't entering into the spirit of things with these brown leatehr brogues. Hardly wellies or walking boots. He only fell over the once.

At least the signs were clear.

The scenery was good


There were some lovely textures (some even in focus) especially if you like cow pats



Of course there was the odd sign or two

The following sign was obviously referring to low flying swans

And the family seems to enjoy it too

The end. Thank you for viewing.

Half a Dog

To add to the collection of funny dog signs, I submit this which is the bottom half, or business end, of a dog.

Home Assembly

I have done a lot of home assembly of furniture this year so it was nice to leave some of it in the hands of my Father-In-Law, Derek, and Ryan. Being an experienced tool worker and quite bright meant that the job was quite trivial for Ryan.

Erika (sister-in-law) "helped" as well.

Rose bowl

Through the round window today. They don't make windows like this any more. I'll have to traipse across town to check out the building later.

There's many a slip

between cup and lip. Not sure what that means. However, it is a Slinky Link (tm) into the slipway a few yards from the house that is being rebuilt.

As you can see that caterpillar digger thing is going to struggle to get through the gap. I'm not sure what the Cornish wheelbarrow is for either:

The Christmas Day Conundrum

Will I blog on Xmas Day? Will you read it?

Answers later this week.

Meanwhile Christmas begets New Year which begets resolutions. I have an early one:

NYR 1. I will cancel my gym membership

This will save me £45 per month and cause me less irritation for not using it.

Xmas Holiday

Well we've arrived in Falmouth. We had a good journey down and Ryan only decided to throw up about 5 minutes from our destination which was decent of him. We had a lot of trouble with getting our furniture delivered but it's here. OK the settee is the wrong L shape and the coffee table has a 3 inch hole smashed in the top but I'm not being picky.

We went out a got a Xmas tree which is my first ever real one. I had to carry the iron base all through the centre of Falmouth and the boys helped me get the tree from the square. All good gun and you can see wer'e almost set now: I have my laptop, the tree's up and Ryan is playing The Simpson's Hit and Run which is a great game.

On the street where you live

Irving Berlin wrote "I have often walked, down this street before. But the pavement never stayed beneath my feet before. All at once am I, several stories high, knowing I'm on the street where you live". He must have been on something.

On the street where I live, however, they are obviously planning improvements to our lives by laying underlay beneath the pavement. I have looked for gripper rods but can't see any. It is comforting to note that my street gets abandoned detritus along with everybody else's.

"They", by the way, are TPTB - The Powers That Be.

Don't be fooled

These innocent looking people are nothing of the kind. They are vicious street hastlers who want to interrupt your daily lives. Join CUP and stamp this sort of vermin out.

Light Fantastic

I can't claim that any of my pictures on here are better than a rating of about 6 out of 10 although I recall a picture of organic carrots that I like quite a bit. You can search for random pictures on here (there is a link on the right to this and other little tools as well).

However, for some really good pictures, check out the Sensitive Light blog.

Redness

It's Christmas and it's also Carole's Birthday - she's on the right. Red is the order of the day apparently.

As are cheesy grins

The Xmas Party

Christmas, as well all know, is an over commercialised excuse for having fun and here is Roy joining in on the actvities with the hat he wears most of the year anyway.

We went to Jongleurs in Camden Town and it was good fun although the comedy wasn't as good as it good have been (have a listen).

A few more random piccies....

The Wisdom of Homer

Homer, of Simpson fame and not the Iliad, says:

"Marge. It takes two to lie. One to lie and one to listen".

I suggest you bear this in mind for the next opportunity when you are in a tight spot.

Awards

School encourage the children in all sorts of little ways with certificates and awards. Nathan just got one for turning up. "Excellent attendance". My kids are obviously high fliers.

Zapp!

I went to Quasar, a laser shooting game, with the cubs and scouts yesterday. It's terrific fun and easy to get totally into it. nathan, centre, is one of the smallest and youngest but managed to be TopGun on our team. I then took them to a party to celebrate. Don't tell their Mum!

Light Wars - update

The Light Wars Competition has got off to the usual start but we won't let that put us off. Here is my entry - it's an 8 foot blow up Santa Claus.

Here is another entry:

Search me

The second most popular search code that people use, and inadvertently trip over this blog with, is "liberty wiress". Firstly, how come that finds this blog? Well on the complete month of July 2003 page I refer to "liberty" in one entry and "wiress" in another. I meant "wireless" when I wrote that but never mind for now.

So if you are one of these people and come across this entry can you please tell me what you are looking for? Because you are not alone. Nearly 9% of searchers coming to this site do the same. I love stats, donlt you? I have gone searching for "liberty wiress" and have discovered:

i. Simplex Wiress and Cables have been buying Third Liberty Bonds.

ii. There is some Windows software or something from Liberty Alliance which creates a Wiress Desktop - another spelling mistake?

iii. JCB International are in Liberty Square Bulding, Wiress Street.

Google gives just these 3 entries plus mine. Except I have now fixed the page so that will disappear soon but this page will appear in it's place.

Or maybe these are all spelling mistakes? Certainly typing in "liberty wireless" produces a lot of results.

So, the challenge is to come up with a popular spelling mistake that will drive traffic to a totally useless blog entry.

Seasonal Anagrams

I do like the occasional anagram - have a look at the anagram category for some earlier ones. So I thought I'd bring a "Merry Christmas" to you all:

A Chris - try me Mrs - For all of you who know Chris and Helen
It's Cream Myrrhs - all round at the christmas table perhaps
Sty charmer rims - the porno version of Animal Farm perhaps?
Chris sty rammer - see above
Chris, try me rams - enough of these
AM cherry trims - see above but with a razor and no animals
Sir! Try my schema! - Plan B!
H stirs my cream - who is H?
Harry misc terms
Miss March, retry - calendar girl of the year show
Try simmer chars - we don't like our tea too hot
Racism myths err - they really aren't true
Smirch my raster
Mrs, try sham rice - cheap Inidian restaurant
Christ my arse Mr! - told you it was cheap
Marry richest Ms
Smirch marry set - stay single

One man's misery

is another's pleasure. I got an emergency call to go to lunch with a good friend of mine today and so off I popped. Andrew is part of a property business called Keats. A rival set up in the same area a short while ago and kindly called themselves Keatons. A fantastic marketing idea which didn't please the Keats office greatly. So it was a small pleasure to find an abandoned Keatons sign on the way to a Keats lunch.

Lonely glove

As you may know Funky Dave collects pictures of gloves an other abandoned items. So here's one he can add to his collection. Actually I see quite a few pairs of gloves on the tube but these are in pairs so, I assume, not so lonely.

Where's The Fire?

Hoepfully the fires of old were small affairs that you could take your time to put out.

Light Wars

You have probably got a street near you where this stuff goes on. Promoted by the electricity companies who are falling on hard times are the street wars of shame where normal, shy retiring people battle to have the most rediculous Xmas display going. I love it although I have almost crashed my car whilst rubber necking. The problem is how to take a photo of them? Here's my first sad attempt.

Anyway, its that time of year so I thought we would have another competition. Send in your photos of rediculous over the top Xmas displays and you could win a candle. Yes a whole candle. The only rules are that it you must take the photo and it can't be of your own house.

The talk of the town

Somebody posted links to the story of the day, Saddam Hussein's capture, this morning. I immediately got dressed and went shopping figuring this would keep the shops empty for a bit. On returning I was getting the carrier bags out of the boot when the woman across the road spoke to me. This is unusual in itself as her and her husband, Sir Bernard Audley, live securely behind their sliding gates and this was only the second or third time in the 7 years she has spoken to me. She was beaming as I waved hello to her and shouted "They've got him. They've arrested Saddam". I thought she was going to do a little jig. Her husband used to work in the Foreign Office I believe so they were probably doubly happy. It takes something like this to get them to talk to their neighbours.

Guess Who?

In a rare game of hide-and-seek we find someone looking for the golden snitch and someone hiding underneath the desk

But who is it? Read on...

Yes it's your friendly techy Roy! Who would have guessed?

Anagrams of life

Views are interchangeable with Wives

What is this?

There used to be an entirely average TV program called Ask the Family (which has been axed according to this very informative website) hosted by that famous comb-over Robert Robertson. Not the Nine O'Clock News did a skit on it where the families were all chartered surveyors. One round of the program was close up photographs of everyday items and you had to guess what the item was.

So here's mine. The difference here is that you're not on TV, I don't care whether you guess it and it's not a close up. It is very famous though.

Read on to see if you were right...

It's the clock at Waterloo under which thousands of people have arranged to meet at one time or another.

Rugby

I suppose I should at least mention the rugby once and so here it is - the Web Ellis Cup being paraded by a few of the England team at Twickenham along with the usual awful sounds

A Visit to the Dentist

I am not a great fan of the dentist. In fact there was a gap of about 12 years or so between visits until a couple of years ago when a giant filling fell out. Karen is a very nervous patient as well but plucked up courage to go and found a nervous patient-friendly dentist so I chose to go there. They can be really irritating though. Here's what they do:

My last appointment was a year ago and I booked an annual checkup for this December. They have changed it twice during the year. They rang my mobile twice, my home once and sent me a letter reminding me about the appointment. They have changed their name to "The Perfect Smile" - cringe.

They have kept me waiting quite a while which is always a wind-up of course but it's even worse when you are scared. This time I took a book and sat down...and was seen within a minute. The dentist prodded around, took two unnecessary xrays (he took the same ones last time) and tried to sell me £5,000 of work that I rejected a year ago. I was only in there a few minutes - definitely less than 10 minutes. And the charge? £45.

So, I have to book a year ahead and I say "You're not allowed to change it more than 4 times." They get the joke. "They" is Kat. Kat Woman is how Karen refers to her. She thinks she is so efficient but she is so wrong. Then she offers me a glass of wine. It's getting near Xmas I guess but it's only 9:40am. So I do the polite thing and say "OK Thank you. That would be very nice". "Red or White?" "Red please" "Oh good - I don't think we have got any white. Urrm Caroline can you open that bottle of red - I'm no good with corks". "You aught to practice more" I say. "Oh I am vary good at pouring and swallowing" Kat says with a straight face. Kat is about 30, slim, long dark hair. Probably a 2 pint job. I like to be agrreable, or leastways to agree, so I reply "I bet you are". Not a flicker.

So I sit down and have my plastic tumbler of red wine which was very nice. Read my book for 10 minutes and take my leave. "Don't tell Karen" Kat warns, "She'll have my guts for garters". "An interesting concept I respond and we do th emutual Merry Christmas bit and I leave and laugh and laugh all the way home at the bizarreness of it all.

The moral is you should go to your dentist! It can be fun!

Chop Chop

It was a Very Windy day yesterday but the sun shone and it was very pleasant, if a little bracing. Not a day for sailing although I did see one small yacht out with its sails well reefed in or whatever the expression is. I'm a fair weather sailor I have decided and prefer capsizing small dinghys in the warm Meditteranean Sea and not the freezing English Channel (or Penryn River as seen here).

Spelling Bee

Is spelling important? I think it depends on the circumstance. If I spot a spelling mistake or typo in the blog I generally fix it but it's not that important. If I was publishing something then I'd say it was of great importance. Where kids are concerned it is surely even more important though. Ryan got this first aid certificate tonight and it covers things like someone "beeding" to death - presumaby after they had sashed their wists - and people who suffer an "ashma" attack - probably from working down a coal mine.

Anagrams

toenail is elation

Farms

When following public footpaths you often end up walking through farms. This particular farm had the standard extremely muddy entrance by the gate and Paul, who for some bizarre reason wore new brown suede shoes, was deperately trying to avoid the mud. We walked up and the cows and bulls just moved away from us. Paul entered the field in the middle of them wearing a bright red jacket. This is Not a Good Idea. They started gathering round him and two randy bulls did what only they know best to two lucky cows. Paul ran for it and the cows ran for him...but luckily they gave up.

Don't wear red rags in a field of bulls. It's obvious isn't it?

Risk of Triangles

If you see a pair of right angle triangles, make sure you don't fall between them.

Short on space

In one of the coves we walked around there were "no parking" signs and, always annoying and uncalled for plenty of "no turning" signs. The signage leaves something to be desired:

No repetitive keyboard injuries

TV presenter fanatics only

?

Natural Beauty

I have been walking around parts of Cornwall and the following shots were taken in and around St. Agnes. The first picture has an accompanying sound file of the usual low standard.

The scenery was spectacular...

Bowl

As this is a holiday home we have had to make several trips to wonderful places like Matalan and Trago Mills. Trago is just like that story I read as a kid of Dearman's and Cheapman's store - it's like the latter. Piled high with stuff that changes every week. But like all products these days, they have to put warnings on to protect ourselves from, urrrm, ourselves. This bowl is very cautious - it says "Do not consume" on it. Thank goodness it said that as I was feeling like crunching my way trhough a glass bowl. And I am not going to put my goldfish in it now either.

Its curtains

I brought some curtains down but of course the guys put up pieces of cardboard instead. Sorry for the small photo bit is hopelessly out of focus.

Traffic Calming

The councils call speed-ramps "traffic calming" which is justa big wind up. In Flushing they use more interesting methods than ramps though - concrete bollards and massive, partially hidden anchors. Cunning.

Walking to Freedom

I have been posted down to Falmouth again, this time with 3 mates for a walking weekend. They bought the beers and I think the fridge looks very healthy. Much healthier than we all look this morning.

Erratic Driving

My Dad used be one of Britain's small shopkeepers and have a motor spares shop at Apex Corner in Mill Hill, London. The shop is still there today although sadly he isn't. He was always looking to make money out of things and when we used to walk the dog we used to look in the hedges for hubcaps. These were all metal, polished press on hubcaps and not the plastic throwaway items you get on today's cars. Of course they all had dents in so weren't worth much and we had to spend ages polishing them.

So I can't resist noticing hubcaps lying around and this one is down a flight of about 50 steps, round the corner and neatly parked. But how did it get there?

Through the keyhole

Imagine a nasally whining american voice - LLoyd Grosman in fact. "Who'd live here?" etc. Of course it's our friendly technobiker Alex. What a tip. I am sure it's a health and safetu matter. Just think what his mind must be like.

Initial Problem

Initials are everywhere which can lead to misinterpretation especially if you a BMW driver. He/she must have thought m/c stood for My Car[parking space] or Manic Chauffer or similar. However I thought it stood for Motor Cycle. Still they knew when to stop - when the side of the car hit the concrete.

Perhaps he thought his car looked this

Links

I am running a stats program and tells me interesting things like which sites are linked to my blog. Today I noticed www.freenudecelebrity.net/paris/ was there. I have no idea why. In the interest of research you understand, I logged on to see if I could see a link but there was nothing to be found. Strangeness indeed.

Cooking up Trouble

As you may recall I have been programming and I am doing this on my laptop so I can continue on the tube in the mornings. Programming is a very time consuming passtime. My programs often have loops that go on forever but I can always tell - these loops cause the processor to work very hard and so the fan turns itself on to cool it down. What a clever little feature that is.

Technicians

Wonderful people technical guys. Take Alex for example. Please. He's got this nice light for his bike with rechargebable batteries. He couldn't find his charger (like someone would steal that?) so he went in search of a replacement from the stock room and, because it had the right fitting, he plugged it in and set fire to it. Never mind the voltage, just zap it. Unfortunately I haven't been able to bring you tht nauseating smell of burnt electrics but if you want to try it out just contact me and I 'll Alex to come round and fix something for you.

Tongues

This is Jenny and her friends Libby and Shona who I happened to bump into last night. Jenny is a very nice girl with limited piercings and a pleasant nature. Libby is a riot with maximum piercings, a bad taste in drinks (double chartreuse finished me off) and this strange habit that girls have of sticking their tongue out at cameras.

CUP hits the TV

Did you see Room 101 yesterday evening. Hosted by Paul Merton with his guest Ross Noble. Ross has apparently joined CUP but I wouldn't know as I still haven't got a sign up script. His particular angle was clipboards which was especially appropriate as Paul Merton was sitting there with one at the time.

Ross is right though. People with cliboards are officious and overbearing: "Excuse me, can you spare me two minutes of your time to help Shelter - the Charity for the Homeless" with the implied "You'd better you proletarian bastard or you will rot in hell" simply left unsaid. They then tick off varous things and umm and nod and shake their heads. If this happens to you, and it shouldn't as you should have quoted the CUP mantra and moved on, then grab the clipboard and see what they are writing down. Then ask them some personal questions like "How much did you give to charity last Tuesday, what's the average velocity of a swallow (African or European - I really don't mind), do you like Busted" and see how they like it.

Send 20% of any money they donate to you to CUP.

Money Scam

You've all probable receive the bank transfer scam email or fax before. Typically it starts out:

YOU MAY BE SURPRISED TO RECEIVE THIS LETHER FROM ME
SINCE YOU DO NOT KNOW ME PERSONALLY, THE PURPOSE OF MY
INTRODUCTION IS THAT I AM MR. JOHN MOYO. THE FIRST SON
OF MR. JAMES MOYO WHO WAS RECENTLY MUDERED IN A LAND
DISPUTE IN ZIMBABWE.

I confess I was hoping to receive a lether soon in order to wipe down my motorcr. It really is tragic about his "mudered" father. Maybe he meant "mullered"?

It continues:

BEFORE THE DEATH OF MY FATHER, HE HAD TAKEN ME TO
JOHANNESBURG TO DEPOSIT THE SUM OF US$20.5MILLION(
TWENTY MILLION FIVE HUNDRED THOUSAND UNITED STATES
DOLLARS )

If I did this then my kids would have "mudered" me and wouldn't be sending poxy emails like this. Check out the scambaiting site on how to wind these people up.

He ends:

I HAVE TWO OPTIONS FOR YOU,

Well I have a few options for him (including telling him how to get capslock off) but I won't go into those just now.

FIRSTLY YOU CAN CHOOSE TO
HAVE A CERTAIN PERCENTAGE OF THE MONEY FOR NOMINATING
YOUR ACCOUNMT FOR THIS TRANSACTION, OR GO
INTOPARTNERSHIP WITH ME.I HAVE MAPPED OUT 5% OF THIS
MONEY FOR EXPENSES AND 15% OF THE MONEY FOR YOU,SO
THAT 80% WILL BE FOR MY FARMILY INVESTMENT. ALSO GIVE
ME A CALL IMMEDIATELY YOU RECEIVE THIS MAIL.

Well thanks. He does leave his no.: 27-73 318 1653 (in S Africa) so why not give him a call?

Programming blues

Accountancy is an inexact science which may be a surprise to some of you. It seems obvious that figures should be manipulated acording to a precise set of rules and a provable result achieved. In practice this doesn't work as the "rules" can be interpreted in many ways on occasion. There is a similar story to programming whereby I am writing little utilities for this blog and that means I am using a windows machine, a unix machine and maybe 5 or 6 different packages at times. Regardless of any bugs or transient problems that may be present, what really screws life up is me. Yesterday's little problem was that I worked on one piece of code and a piece of code elsewhere stopped working. It took me an hour to fix it (avoid the problem) and then I slept. This morning it 2 minutes to discover the real cause - which was a single space. A single lousy space. Well, I haven't programmed in many years and I can see how things have really come on in the programming world - except in this example of course. Still, it remains immensely satisfying to me to write code so I shall persevere.