A mixed bag

Countdown to the holiday has begun though I am not yet de-mob happy. That will happen around 10.30 am on Thursday, I expect.

So, four days in the office, followed by a day of cricket at the Oval on Friday, leading to being reduced to bumming around at the weekend - the trip to the air show at Duxford has been cancelled, rather irritatingly, since I had ruled a number of alternative activities out and rearranged my holiday arrangements to go. Now I find that I could have made a NWO ref meeting then after all, but in all probability shan't make the revised date a week later, which was always going to be dodgy.

Ten days fubar-ed by a last minute change of plans made from beyond my control. On the plus side, I do get to save £50 in expenditure. I could still go to Foxton for the weekend, which would be nice, but I suppose the time would be better used getting some laundry done instead (wouldn't want to dump on the elderly mater).

Anyway, a week today I shall be swanning off to Shropshire for a week - again delayed because of arrangements made for the now aborted Duxford trip, but since the ancestors will be at the coast on the assumption that I shall be elsewhere, there's nothing now to be done.

I can see this week is going to be one of those.

I came into the office full of enthusiasm to get a bunch of jobs done and find myself thwarted at every turn. Time to take a deep breath and try to start again this afternoon - hopefully with better results.

And this evening.

Hmm. First thing is to track down the landlady and pay the rent, I suppose. And the gas bill. And all the odd sundry little things she likes to charge for. Irritating, but overall still cheap.

And then I have to lug an old mattress down three flights of stairs, and a new one back up. This is not a hard task, but it is a pain since mattresses are notoriously unmanoeuvreable. Still, mustn't grumble. A mattress I can sleep on without having to bend myself around the bit where the springs have poked out, or the mysterious collapsed bit will mean a far better night's kip all in all.

And to top off a generally mixed bag of oddities, I left my favourite fedora in Marlow yesterday. It's not lost, but neither is it available to me for at least a couple of months. So again, Bugger.

Ooo. Must stop: coffee.

A mixed bag

Countdown to the holiday has begun though I am not yet de-mob happy. That will happen around 10.30 am on Thursday, I expect.

So, four days in the office, followed by a day of cricket at the Oval on Friday, leading to being reduced to bumming around at the weekend - the trip to the air show at Duxford has been cancelled, rather irritatingly, since I had ruled a number of alternative activities out and rearranged my holiday arrangements to go. Now I find that I could have made a NWO ref meeting then after all, but in all probability shan't make the revised date a week later, which was always going to be dodgy.

Ten days fubar-ed by a last minute change of plans made from beyond my control. On the plus side, I do get to save £50 in expenditure. I could still go to Foxton for the weekend, which would be nice, but I suppose the time would be better used getting some laundry done instead (wouldn't want to dump on the elderly mater).

Anyway, a week today I shall be swanning off to Shropshire for a week - again delayed because of arrangements made for the now aborted Duxford trip, but since the ancestors will be at the coast on the assumption that I shall be elsewhere, there's nothing now to be done.

I can see this week is going to be one of those.

I came into the office full of enthusiasm to get a bunch of jobs done and find myself thwarted at every turn. Time to take a deep breath and try to start again this afternoon - hopefully with better results.

And this evening.

Hmm. First thing is to track down the landlady and pay the rent, I suppose. And the gas bill. And all the odd sundry little things she likes to charge for. Irritating, but overall still cheap.

And then I have to lug an old mattress down three flights of stairs, and a new one back up. This is not a hard task, but it is a pain since mattresses are notoriously unmanoeuvreable. Still, mustn't grumble. A mattress I can sleep on without having to bend myself around the bit where the springs have poked out, or the mysterious collapsed bit will mean a far better night's kip all in all.

And to top off a generally mixed bag of oddities, I left my favourite fedora in Marlow yesterday. It's not lost, but neither is it available to me for at least a couple of months. So again, Bugger.

Ooo. Must stop: coffee.

To sleep, perchance to dream...

I have just wrassled an old mattress downstairs and a new one up.

I think I finally understand why my sleep patterns have been so disrupted over the past few months. The old mattress was infact an old WWII straw palliasse with a Colditz escaper in it. It is the only possible explanation for the exceptionally knobbly and strangely heavy thing that I moved down three flights of stairs. I say I moved it - at times it pretty much moved itself in a sort of Raiders of the Lost Ark sort of way.

Anyway, I managed to get it down to the ground floor, at which point the mysterious and elderly Mrs Z, my Polish landlady, appeared out of the shadows. "Don't leave it outside" she tells me, pointing at my escaping POW (she is 85, and probably has first hand experience of escaping the odd stalag, so it seemed wise to take her advice). Luckily I had decided to wait until it was dark. Actually I waited until after Andromeda which despite last week's diatribe, I find oddly compelling (Mmmm....Lexa Doig... >ahem<). In any case, the upshot was that it was now dark and there were few casual passers-by to watch me manhandling this bloody mattress down the street.

Still, the weight and sheer cussedness of the bloody thing eventually overcame my resolve, and three doors down they will wake up tomorrow morning and find a tatty old mattress leaning at a jaunty angle against their dustbin.

I feel a little bit guilty as I type this, but should I discover that the bottom of the mattress has been cut open and there's a trail of straw across the street, I shall be happy.

For my POW shall have escaped, and in a couple of months, Giod willing, I shall receive a coded postcard and some choccies from Switzerland.

Of course, if it's recaptured, I'll have some explaining to do, for there is a new mattress on my bed, now, and I shall have to explain not only how the old one escaped but how the new one got in.

Appel tomorrow morning will be the first test.

To sleep, perchance to dream...

I have just wrassled an old mattress downstairs and a new one up.

I think I finally understand why my sleep patterns have been so disrupted over the past few months. The old mattress was infact an old WWII straw palliasse with a Colditz escaper in it. It is the only possible explanation for the exceptionally knobbly and strangely heavy thing that I moved down three flights of stairs. I say I moved it - at times it pretty much moved itself in a sort of Raiders of the Lost Ark sort of way.

Anyway, I managed to get it down to the ground floor, at which point the mysterious and elderly Mrs Z, my Polish landlady, appeared out of the shadows. "Don't leave it outside" she tells me, pointing at my escaping POW (she is 85, and probably has first hand experience of escaping the odd stalag, so it seemed wise to take her advice). Luckily I had decided to wait until it was dark. Actually I waited until after Andromeda which despite last week's diatribe, I find oddly compelling (Mmmm....Lexa Doig... >ahem<). In any case, the upshot was that it was now dark and there were few casual passers-by to watch me manhandling this bloody mattress down the street.

Still, the weight and sheer cussedness of the bloody thing eventually overcame my resolve, and three doors down they will wake up tomorrow morning and find a tatty old mattress leaning at a jaunty angle against their dustbin.

I feel a little bit guilty as I type this, but should I discover that the bottom of the mattress has been cut open and there's a trail of straw across the street, I shall be happy.

For my POW shall have escaped, and in a couple of months, Giod willing, I shall receive a coded postcard and some choccies from Switzerland.

Of course, if it's recaptured, I'll have some explaining to do, for there is a new mattress on my bed, now, and I shall have to explain not only how the old one escaped but how the new one got in.

Appel tomorrow morning will be the first test.

Oh the irony

Having read jfs's LJ entry earlier today in which he made mention of the Google Toolbar, I was tempted to take his advice and install.

This I have just done. The bit I was particularly looking forward to is the popup blocker.

Imagine then, my perplexity when a popup popped up having blocked a popup, to tell me about the popup the popup had blocked.

Technology, eh?

Marvellous.

Oh the irony

Having read jfs's LJ entry earlier today in which he made mention of the Google Toolbar, I was tempted to take his advice and install.

This I have just done. The bit I was particularly looking forward to is the popup blocker.

Imagine then, my perplexity when a popup popped up having blocked a popup, to tell me about the popup the popup had blocked.

Technology, eh?

Marvellous.