Category: Uncategorized

Bob Park strikes again. Quoting his regular source who’s working on the new ‘grandson of Star Wars’ Missile Defense (sic) system:

You have to set priorities in this game, the goal is to deploy. Management feels testing threatens to divert us from that goal.

I love this approach! Don’t worry whether the damn stuff works or not (hey, if there’s a real attack it’s highly unlikely to do any good anyway) – just get it out there so the DoD has to finish paying for it.

Well, that’s interesting. My Mac is capturing video at the moment, so I’m browsing from my PC. In Phoenix (minimal Gecko/Mozilla browser), I typed ‘quernstone’ in the address bar. This would normally add ‘www.’ to the front and ‘.com’ to the end. Instead, I end up here.

Huh?

This originally contained in a post to uk.comp.sys.mac, but someone suggested I should archive it.

It’s easy to tell the nationality of a touring cyclist from the way they load their bike:

• Front and rear panniers, neatly packed – British.
• Saddlebag and tiny front panniers, ancient bike – hard-core British.
• Huge pile of stuff over back wheel – Dutch.
• Huge pile of stuff over back wheel, plus rucsack – German.
• Glamorous bike, no panniers, luggage in accompanying car – French
• Very glamorous bike, no panniers, luggage in accompanying sports car – Italian.
• All other combinations – New Zealander.
• Sheltering in bus-stop – American.

…to which Sak Wathanasin added:

• Turns up at start in Mercedes with personal mechanic, masseur etc, then goes like the wind – Belgian.

Sak also noted that some Americans really do cycle. Even if it’s raining. Fair point – I don’t claim to be reasonable or accurate. Especially not reasonable.

Hmm. Something a bit weird happened there with one of the Perl libraries running this website. For about a month. But I’m back now.

So… what’s happened in the last month? Christmas at m’darlin sister’s with the family including nephew Stanley; we cooked ‘…and all the trimmings,’ since Kate and husband Matt are vegetarians; actually, come to think of it, I’ve had a turkey-, mince pie- and cake-free Christmas. Cool; New Year with Daniel and Mary was fun; and today mum and dad moved into their new house. And I went back to work, with six weeks to rehearsals. Eek.

Quiet Christmas at home, then.

You?

There’s a couple of guys on uk.comp.sys.mac who seem to have me quoted in their sigs. This is mildly disturbing since it’s vaguely traditional to quote people who are dead, which I aitn’t.

Now, one of these chaps has recently posted a reply in a thread reading simply ‘see sig.’ I’m not sure if that means I’ve contributed, or not.

Either way, I suspect a discussion of software agents is just around the corner.

There’s a fascinating story going the rounds, (including ths version at the NYTimes – free registration required), on Google’s increasing ocean of information about the world’s population. Remember those stories about the National Grid folk reading the Radio Times to predict likely kettle usage? Similar stuff, only much more fine-grained.

Fascinating, if not slightly scary in a ‘big brother’ sort of way. Be careful what you search for.

Speaking of The Prisoner, I’ve recently finished waded my way through the whole thing on DVD. It is – as you will know if you’ve seen it – completely barking. McGoohan is at once impossible to take one’s eyes off and unwatchable, and the whole endeavour makes very nearly no sense whatsoever.

Fantastic.

As I sit munching on a loaf of the The Village Bakery’s Baltic Rye (Latvian recipe, rye mixture, molasses & caraway), I realise just how much I like bread. Particularly these whacky Eastern European breads. Village Bakery stuff is available from Safeway and Sainsbury’s, if you’re lucky – look particularly for Rossisky and Borodinsky.

A deliciously barking story about Terry Waite, a pair of clogs, and a somewhat circuitous delivery route. Incidentally, when Waite returned to the UK after his hostage ordeal, he took up lodgings in the peace and quiet of his Archbishop’s old College – Trinity Hall, Cambridge. He was given a simple room in South Court… complete with bars on the windows.

In Glasgow’s Sauchiehall Street today – a European market. Bizarre sausages, preserves, cheeses, bulbs, even a clog stall. Tremendous, if not weirdly like being trapped in The Prisoner.