Loneliness

There are different kinds of traveller. There are those who travel in groups, companionable; and there are those who travel alone. Perhaps, as the year's turning approaches, I need to acknowledge that I belong in the latter category. Maybe it has to do with the way that I relate to people - always trying to help, not good at accepting help - in a group I always seem to be the loser.

Well, say something, then

Don't know if I'm all that excited about flock. It feels a lot like FireFox, with a few extras - like this blog editor - which is nice. Wish it had a 'source' view, though.

To-day is my last working day before Christmas. The children finish school to-day, so I get to take Thursday and Friday off (wife will take two days off in January under a similar pretext). So I really, really want to finish off smoothly. No crises, please.

Impressive

I'm using Flock to post this entry.

200th post

I wish that I could quote verbatim what somebody wrote in Woman Alive (I may do in a future posting). Roughly, it was that perhaps one's eternal future doesn't depend entirely upon whether or not one has signed up at the back of an evangelistic booklet. Turning it upon its head, perhaps it isn't entirely fair for the authors of books exhorting one to evangelise everyone in earshot to suggest that if we don't, these people are destined for a Christless eternity. Maybe God is able to exercise some common sense.

What led me to a similar viewpoint was the following observation. The most vociferous proponents of aggressive evangelisation - what happens when someone close to them dies. Do they say "tough, my dad's gone to Hell". No, strangely, God speaks to them, to say that somehow, their dad (or son) is going to be OK. My father died, about 8 years ago. He was a churchgoer, but not a believer. According to what I've been taught, he is lost. Yet, he had integrity; I would even say goodness. I have had no special word from God to say that he's OK. Instead, I am going to revise my view of the world, and throw out what I was taught, and say that "yes, he is OK". And many, many more are going to be OK. Not because they've been persuaded to sign up to an evangelical manifesto. But, dare I say, because God loves them. As they are.

One Year Bible

Son has a temperature. So, to continue from a previous entry - The best laid schemes o' mice an' men / Gang aft a-gley - the CCLASP Christmas Party will be attended (from this family) by just wife and daughter. Indeed, father and son will miss church (quite glad not to have to cross the picket line again). No update, then, on the rector's plan to get members of the congregation to read through the bible in a year - following Hodder's Bible in a Year, rather than Tyndale's One Year Bible, unfortunately. I say, unfortunately, because there are more additional resources for the latter, such as versions for the Palm. I must admit to mixed feelings about the project - to read through the whole bible in one year, one has to devour too much (in my opinion) in each day - a recipe for spritiual indigestion. So it's difficult to find the 100% enthusiasm required.

Going nowhere

 
And this is what they want to bring back! 

Wee, sleekit, cow'rin', tim'rous beastie, no more

A mouse, probably a fieldmouse, or possibly a vole, had the temerity to nibble some chocolates which wife had stashed in the garage; a trap was duly set last night, and by this morning had claimed its victim.

A word, by the way, on chronology: the entry previous to this one belongs properly earlier in the sequence - the immediate response to a difficult time getting the children to bed.

Order

Trying to get the children to sleep - tonight's order (son's story, SnapShots, daughter's story) wasn't a success. Suggest next time start with SnapShots.

Foam swords

 
Are better than real ones ... 

Substitute

Was wanting to document our staff Christmas lunch, but all of the photographs are of other people (because I took them). So here's a picture of the decoration atop one of my computers. 

No advertising

So Nick Robinson at the BBC has a weblog. But with a reference in the text to "the kind of software employed by millions of weblogs around the world", it would have been courteous surely to have placed a "powered by" link somewhere. But I had to download the RSS .xml file to find that it had been generated by TypePad (not surprisingly).

The ultimate accolade?

Mother Goose included a song by Fischy Music.

Having to decide ...

... which blog/s to update. This one seems perpetually on the back-burner.

Our heating seems to be OK. Thinking that I should write a letter to Scottish Gas to say how much we appreciate the work of their engineers. A setback yesterday morning, when the radiators were still cold-ish - turning the heating off and on brought them to life.

Christmas shopping this evening ...

A cold night

My turn to be at home when the engineer calls; he's replacing a part, which is, I reckon, good news - hopefully the problem will be fixed.

When I looked at the TV yesterday evening, it was a news item about how this was the busiest day of the year for British Gas. Just a wee bit annoyed when the engineer said to a lady whose boiler had broken down - "if you have it regularly serviced, then this won't happen". I can tell you that our boiler is regularly serviced, by Scottish Gas.

Fair enough, though. But why is it that more boilers break down when the weather is coldest?

Still a ragamuffin

It isn't easy to keep journeying on.

It's natural, isn't it, to experience, to some extent, ups and downs. I'm not really talking about mood swings, more just being honest. Life may be a steady climb, but the way that we feel about life seems to have a rhythm of its own. And, when blogging enters the picture, then I have to say that the urge is strongest when feelings are at their lowest. Which is a shame, because anyone reading the blog will think - this person's always down. Not necessarily - perhaps this person blogs when he's down - and just gets on with life when he's up.

Feeling a bit powerless just now because for the second time this week, my wife has had to call Transco because she smells gas, and then she has had to call Scottish Gas to do something about it (it seems that there is a problem with our boiler). Unfortunately, for this to happen once is (sort of) acceptable. Something went wrong, it got fixed, life goes on. But second time around, there is a question - something went wrong, it didn't get fixed, how do we know it will get fixed this time?

Waiting for a haircut

It all depends ...

Still angry, I'm afraid

Thought that I'd try SureFish's daily readings for a week (depending on the availability of time), starting with http://www.surefish.co.uk/faith/daily_readings/08_aug/01.htm.

Looking back

The word 'positive' has figured significantly in my reflections on Thursday's funeral. I was told, as I waited to go in, that the note in the newspaper had said 'no mourning', and began to feel conspicuous in my black tie. The only person who cried was a 6-year-old granddaughter. I think that the feeling was that the person who had died had lived a good life, her final illness had been mercifully brief, and the purpose of the funeral was to say a simple farewell. The service was taken by her most recent minister, who spoke well. It was attended by two other ministers, which I think says something about her genuine support for the church, also that of her husband, who died about two years ago.

Words become inadequate. I apologise if anyone is reading this who knows the people. I tend to use this blog to think aloud, and am not really able to apply the sort of care to what I write which I would like to. There is a rawness to this blog, which means that maybe I shouldn't be putting it somewhere it can be read, except that the whole point is that I am trying to make some of my thinking public.

Weary

Always, but to-day, especially so. Life seems to have taken a downward turn. The Inland Revenue replied to my yearly update regarding Tax Credits that we owe them £700. Horribly mean, especially when they don't tell you how they calculate the result. And last night, a friend phoned to say that a mutual friend had died, and the funeral is this afternoon.

As it happens, the place where the funeral is taking place is not far from where I work, so I'm planning to go. I hate funerals.

I'm listening to the slow movement from Bruckner's 3rd Symphony.

Graffiti - history

I liked Graffiti, as it was implemented on the Palm III and the HandSpring Visor. Each letter had a distinctive shape, loosely based on its paper form. With practice, entering text using Graffiti became fast and reliable. But with PalmOS 5 came Graffiti 2. The letter shapes approximate more closely to how they would be written (in lower case). But on the Tungsten E, the process is unreliable. It seems to work better on my Zire 31, which uses a later version of PalmOS, so maybe the software needed to be fine-tuned.

In an effort to find a way to communicate with my Tungsten E, I installed TealScript, which is a third-party character inputter (for want of a more elegant description). It works better than Graffiti 2, but not, in my opinion, as well as Graffiti. Possibly the problem is with the Tungsten hardware, which seems to desire a firmer hand than I would like to give it.

We do have something I can use, with which, I suppose, I should be content.

Hurrah

I was beginning to think that AvantBlog wasn\'t going to let me log back in. I was reading recently about people who use their Palm-based PDAs (or smartphones) to create blog entries of 1500 words or more. How do they do it?

Anyway - Graffiti - Palms came with it - it was, I reckon, the killer app, because it meant that you could interact with a small device without a keyboard. But it had to be learnt.

To be continued ...

Eye of the storm

Trying to stay calm - detachment.

Explanation

What was supposed to be distinctive about this blog? I would write the entries on my handheld computer - in those days a Handspring Visor - hence the blog\'s title. The Visor has been replaced - I now, mainly, use a palmOne Tungsten E - it has a colour screen, a rechargeable battery, and more modern software. On the whole, though, it isn\'t necessarily better, and I have found myself occasionally sneaking back to my old faithful. Increasingly, though, the older device has had difficulty talking to newer computers (synchronising), and yesterday I decided to retire it.

Perhaps in a subsequent entry I can discuss the mysteries of Graffiti 1 & 2, and TealScript.

Retiring the Visor

The eponymous Visor will have to be retired. Sad (and annoying,
because Graffiti 1 on aged hardware is still, by a significant
margin, the most efficient, and reliable way to enter text
on a Palm-based handheld. But TealScript is better than
Graffiti 2 on my Tungsten E). But the Visor no longer synchronises
reliably.

Irony

I am not good at communicating. In many ways, I am afraid to communicate. I have learned that the easiest way to lose friends is to say what you think, which happens not to be what they think. So, I resort to saying what I think in a blog (some of the time). It doesn't matter if you disagree with me, because I didn't count you among my friends in the first place (except that at least one of you I do count as a friend, and I apologise if what I have written seems unkind). My point is that here I will try to say what I mean - if you can handle this, then please stay.

Still

Thinking of something to write.

Are we there yet?

This entry is being composed on my HandSpring Visor (thanks to AvantBlog). And I can\'t think of anything to write!

Home alone

The family are on holiday - I\'m left behind. A bit sad.

This is exciting

But, sadly, all there is to-day to blog about is reaction to yesterday\'s bombing of London. And how tired I am.

Deeply impressed

But how to edit? Via the forms manager!

Like

This.

It works!

Amazingly. But what happens if I want to write more than one entry between synchronising?

AvantBlog

Maybe this is the way forward. Blogging, and then synchronising

(almost) nobody reads this

So, with apologies, what I write here may not be terribly interesting.

Can't get away from yesterday's events in London. Grief, anger, despair.

Probably a hogweed

Garden 050611 001
Originally uploaded by Glaswegian.

I tried to uproot this plant, but it was too strong. I've cut it down.

Just screaming

Where nobody can hear me.

Proxy blog

IMAG0019
Originally uploaded by Glaswegian.

This is just a staging post, I'm afraid.

Building a PC
0f course, we don't really build the PC - we reinstall the operating system. A watched kettle never boils, they say.

Make Poverty History
Child-friendly? Safe?

Struggling

Through - too much detail ...

Worse than depression

...

Depression

Hard to get away from it ...

Frustration

Splutter ...

Nightmare

Or rather, daymare.

Just checking in
- from mo:Blog

Carberry - through a glass darkly ... 

Admin rights

Possibly a complex issue - but not, I believe, being approached fairly.

Suppose I try to be a bit fairer, and try to work without my normal account having admin rights. Out of the question on my main machine, but theoretically possibly on number two. So, built the machine; logged in - and I'm not an admin. The advice is to set the local administrator password so that people can install programs (etc?). But I don't have sufficient rights to set the admin password. End of experiment.

Using TealScript
It's 3 o'clock in the afternoon; I'm trying to use TealScript to compose an entry. It's slow(ish), but less prone than Graffiti 2 to produce gibberish. I could find myself liking it.

A day on the desk

Blogging my work - how do I do it? On two levels - the technical (which, of course, doesn't appear here) - and the personal (which would be out of place in a technical journal).

It's 09:51 on a Tuesday morning. Tuesdays, I'm on the desk (a helpdesk - providing answers (!) to computing questions) all day. It's a hard slog, but it gets it over with.

Spitfire

DSCF0013_edited
Originally uploaded by Glaswegian.

A lovely aeroplane - fearsome at the same time ...

A long haul

Just spent two days solid on the help desk ...

Dragging myself away

I've worked steadily through to-day - trying mostly to tidy up - so that when another push comes, I'm ready. I know that I haven't 'done' much - but I think that I have - really.

Getting organised

Although improving the organisation doesn't show an obvious return in terms of people 'done', it has to be done, and makes me feel better.

Checking in

Spent the morning rebuilding my PC. Profile problems may have really been PC problems.

Trying to count the disasters

Hannah caught Matthew's hand in the shower door. I am tired, and angry, and I have to be up at 5:45 to-morrow morning. I am trying to make a habit of talking to God every evening before I go to bed, but I am too tired, and angry, to pray.

Rose

Rose
Originally uploaded by Glaswegian.

Taking time off from mowing the lawn to let the world see how pretty is our garden ...

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Just for the record

I suspect that Google Gulp (http://www.google.co.uk/googlegulp/) is an April Fool.

Let's start blogging again

Quick and simple - brief thoughts.

It's been a while

Why am I angry? Because Helen chose this morning's team meeting to launch a criticism of us all over the time it took to resolve a certain user's problem.

What is the answer? Seriously?

Home computering

Fitted a new (PCI) graphics card; it doesn't seem to have made any difference to Micro Flight, but Trainz seems to have improved. There may be a problem with the Open GL drivers - which could explain the lack of success with Micro Flight.

Ultrasoft Money

Doing an upgrade - running a file called 'pomo42' - deciding which modules to install - memory space is tight on the Zire 31 - but deselecting the Reports module doesn't uninstall it - now I've deleted it from the Zire 31, but left it in the Tungsten E.

The Peter Principle
Surely documented elsewhere; how I long for the kind of job which allows you to achieve competency, and just get on with it. I suppose that every job has its challenges.

Grandma

She told Lesley that she needed some help. She wanted me to call round after work on Friday.

Then it was decided that we would call round as a family to-day, so I came straight home on Friday. Now, she doesn't want us to come to-day; it has to be to-morrow.

We are not willing to put this visit off again. Should we?

Division of labour

If I am to achieve adequate throughput in my job of talking to the team leaders, I cannot also be the person who is responsible for making sure that the Active Directory is ready for the machines to be built into it.

Meeting the Biology COs

Was - to share information; is to be - to tell them how it's going to be.

The Big Move

Our current approach is confusing something which is desirable (the move to the Managed Desktop) with something which is unavoidable (the move away from Bio-Srv0).

Micro Flight Log 002

How exactly do you (effectively) reduce the number of terrain vertices?

Micro Flight Log 001

Tried to improve performance - currently running at less than 15 fps - reduced terrain vertices/? to less than 1000 - it didn't seem to make any difference to performance - increased them back to what they were / max - didn't seem to improve the view, particularly.

How important is the Managed Desktop?

In a world of the tsunami, war in Iraq, poverty, AIDS, does it matter whether people have a managed desktop?

We need a Big Bang because ...
... services are shared - large, distributed groups of people (everbody?) need/s to move at once.

Priority
Work has not delivered - security, satisfaction, sense of achievement; am I being ungrateful?

The Managed Desktop

Consult with colleague/s.

Start thinking practically

What would a 'big bang' involve?
- uninstalling the Novell client
- uninstalling any applications which run from Bio-Srv0
- removing
- printers queued via Bio-Srv0
- connecting to SciEng1
- home directories
- team space
- printers

Blogging towards freedom

Step by step.

Desperate. Stuck. We need to find a way forward and upward. We need to be honest.

(1) There is no way that 1000 Biology PCs can be moved to the Managed Desktop by Easter.

(2) I haven't a present for Uncle Eddie, or for Granny.

(3) Attending the Men's Prayer Breakfast would mean not walking to the shops to buy bread, or cooking breakfast for myself and the kids.

(4) I can't afford to buy a decent portable CD player.

That'll do for now.

Christmas Day
Joy, excitement, adrenalin, respect, plenty, initiative - a few of the positives to emerge to-day.

Christmas Eve
What is 'the meaning of Christmas'? Is it that we have just turned a corner - the winter solstice? The longest night of the year has passed - but only careful measurement will reveal this truth.

Or are we remembering the birth of a baby boy - an apparently insignificant event, but which would prove to have been the hinge of history?

Boy?

The CCLASP Christmas Party
Tired, tired, tired ...

Not really wanting to party, party, party ... but here I am ...

Marking the passage of the years - we were here one year ago, little imagining what was about to hit us.

Confidence
I feel like a fish out of water; in a bar, on a Sunday afternoon, waiting for a waiter to bring me a coffee. And waiting for the party to return from the pantomime ...

It's been a while
More than one way to maintain a blog. There is much to be said for updating regularly. But why not have one blog which relies on opportunity? It only gets updated when something interesting is happening, and the regular blog is inaccessible. Or nothing is happening, and writing the blog defeats boredom.

Waiting for a PC to build. Too much to do to-day, but this is the priority. Trying not to become too stressed.

Meadowbank fireworks 

As it says on the tin

I'm writing my thoughts (laboriously) on a HandSpring Visor (deluxe).

The adventure, continued

Of course, it wasn't my intention to remain exiled off-station - it would have been unkind for me to expect my family, worn out by their journey, to trek a further couple of hundred metres to find the car - not to mention the questionable security implications of where I would be leaving the car. So I drove back to the station, the approach road to which was now considerably busier than it was previously. I began to worry whether I would be back in the station in time to meet my train.

Eventually, I reached the barrier guarding the entrance to the short-stay car park. I pressed the button for a ticket, and was greeted with "out of fanfold tickets". There are moments in life when a threshold has been crossed - this was one of them. Eventually I found someone looking vaguely official, and told him of my predicament (shared by the lady driver of the car behind, of course). I went back to the car, and saw that the machine had another button marked "call for assistance". So I did - "intercom engaged". I tried again, and someone answered. "The machine is out of tickets," I cried. "Just drive through," was the answer. "There's a barrier in the way," I bellowed, politely. The barrier lifted, and I drove through.

We were not yet 'out of the wood'. As the lady driver and I realised, we would have difficulty leaving the car park, without a time-stamped ticket. We found a burly, uniformed man who was arguing with a couple who had evidently been caught out by the '£20 for every subsequent hour' rule. He told us to head for the station reception (we would recognise the place because of the goldfish), where our problem would be sorted out. Sure enough, a kind gentleman gave us what I would from then on refer to as 'get out of jail free' tickets. These were simple exit tickets - no need to pay. I discovered later on that this was standard procedure for the situation I was initially facing - if the train I was meeting was late, I could find my way to this office, and claim an exit ticket, which would avoid the £20 surcharge. Perhaps Network Rail should have considered printing this information somewhere that people could read it?

At 18:41, the advertised expected time of arrival of my family's train, I was standing opposite the platform where the arrivals board assured me that it would arrive. A train arrived. The passenegers alighted. My family were not among them. As I fumbled for my mobile phone to call my wife to ask her where (the hell) she was, the phone rang. She told me that they were stuck somewhere south of Kirkcaldy. "But your train has just arrived," I puzzled. Back to the station reception, who told me that her train was indeed stuck north of Inverkeithing, and that the train which I had seen arriving must have been a different train.

The story so far
My wife and children are travelling from Perth. Their train was due to arrive in Edinburgh at 18:14. I was planning to meet them, arriving in the car at Waverley Station at around 17:50. Traffic on the way had been light. I had to give myself time to work out which platform the train would arrive on. I discovered that Network Rail were going to charge me 50p for half an hour, or £2 for an hour. Subsequent hours would cost £20 (not a misprint).

It turned out that the train was expected at 18:41. I calculated that there was a definite possibility that if I waited in the station to meet my wife and children, it would cost me £22. Network Rail, it seems, fines its customers for the late arrival of trains.

I did the only thing I could in the circumstances. I went back to the car, drove out the station, paying 50p, and found a parking place in a side street.

Settling down
This course is all about creating MSIs, and I have access to two computers. One of them I am using as a base machine, the other for doing the packaging.

Trying to be clever, I've told Wise Installer to store the project on a network share, but this causes it to take longer to compile.

Continuing the theme - trees, with buildings glimpsed behind them ... 

Making mistakes
Misunderstood an instruction, which means that I am now running late. Now watching two computers rebuild themselves.

Learning MSIs
Three days - being taught how to package MSIs. 'MSI' stands for Microsoft Installer, and becomes shorthand for the file which contains everything required to install a package.

Lunchtime walk - autumn colours 

Not feeling well
Came home at lunchtime; still not feeling 100%

Not feeling well

Am I ill, or just tired?

There is always the old way ...

Like this

But struggling

This blog

Inevitably, this blog is going to be raw and scrappy. It's recording thoughts as they occur, before they mature, before they've been censored. I may regret what I write here, but that's the point.

Using Plogit

Not feeling good

Nothing to feel good about.

V. tired

How do we proceed? The commonsense thing to do would be to go home and sleep - but that simply doesn't belong in my repertoire. I'm working (!!)

Learning about Active Directory
A new language - what is he saying? So, am I learning anything?

Back again

Needing to open the safety valve. No great issues, just the mounting pressure of many tasks, not of which is quite as simple as it should be. I want to go somewhere and hide.

Crashing through deep water

Every step is harder than it should be.