Nobody there

Now that’s how a journey into work should go.

On the radio this morning, it was posited that only 10% of the working population would actually be going to work today, what with it being Christmas week and the credit crunch and all that. Whatever the actual figure, it is certainly quieter in central London than I have seen it for a long, long time. I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest that the journey in was a pleasure, but it was certainly far from being a trial. There were still seats to be had as far south as Archway and having caught a Morden branch train for once, I was able to slip easily across to the Victoria Line at Euston to find plenty of seats available.

Such is the decline in commuter traffic (I expect it will hot up later as people come to town to rack up their credit cards), that I saw no one with particle accelerators, so the oddness index must be quite low. I imagine that the co-ordinators will have to release a few onto the streets as the crowds build.

Right: I’d better do a bit of work today. I want to leave early today and tomorrow, so I ought to clear some of the stuff in my inbox.

Nobody there

Now that’s how a journey into work should go.

On the radio this morning, it was posited that only 10% of the working population would actually be going to work today, what with it being Christmas week and the credit crunch and all that. Whatever the actual figure, it is certainly quieter in central London than I have seen it for a long, long time. I wouldn’t go so far as to suggest that the journey in was a pleasure, but it was certainly far from being a trial. There were still seats to be had as far south as Archway and having caught a Morden branch train for once, I was able to slip easily across to the Victoria Line at Euston to find plenty of seats available.

Such is the decline in commuter traffic (I expect it will hot up later as people come to town to rack up their credit cards), that I saw no one with particle accelerators, so the oddness index must be quite low. I imagine that the co-ordinators will have to release a few onto the streets as the crowds build.

Right: I’d better do a bit of work today. I want to leave early today and tomorrow, so I ought to clear some of the stuff in my inbox.

Podding along

One of the things I have enjoyed about ripping music to my new iPod is the rediscovery of CDs I forgot I’d got – I knew I had a copy of Led Zeppelin II for instance, but had completely forgotten that I also have Physical Graffiti. On the other hand, now and again I find myself wondering what I have done with CDs (or indeed whether I actually owned them…). I no longer, it seems (unless it is misfiled horribly) own Kate Bush’s The Kick Inside on CD. I’m sure I used to. I know that I used to have it on vinyl, but suddenly I’m not sure.

The other thing is when you realise that a certain CD doesn’t contain what you thought it did. I have cheerfully ignored, for instance, my copy of The Moody Blues Collection because I have a copy of Moody Blues’ Greatest Hits. The two have sat together on the shelf for years, but I have consistently chosen the latter over the former because it is a 24bit remaster with more tracks.

Somewhere down the line I had lost the fact that apart from Go Now the songs do not repeat across the two selections. The selection on the collection includes material from the Edge/Pinder/Thomas era (along with one Denny Laine), while the Greatest Hits, with the aforementioned exception of Go Now are from the much longer and rather more successful Hayward/Lodge/Edge era. I should have known this if I had paid more attention to my own music collection.

I still have just under half of the music collection to drop onto the iPod and then I can start creating play lists and stuff. At the moment all I have done is isolate the classical from the rest. I shall start being a little more clever once everything is there.

Podding along

One of the things I have enjoyed about ripping music to my new iPod is the rediscovery of CDs I forgot I’d got – I knew I had a copy of Led Zeppelin II for instance, but had completely forgotten that I also have Physical Graffiti. On the other hand, now and again I find myself wondering what I have done with CDs (or indeed whether I actually owned them…). I no longer, it seems (unless it is misfiled horribly) own Kate Bush’s The Kick Inside on CD. I’m sure I used to. I know that I used to have it on vinyl, but suddenly I’m not sure.

The other thing is when you realise that a certain CD doesn’t contain what you thought it did. I have cheerfully ignored, for instance, my copy of The Moody Blues Collection because I have a copy of Moody Blues’ Greatest Hits. The two have sat together on the shelf for years, but I have consistently chosen the latter over the former because it is a 24bit remaster with more tracks.

Somewhere down the line I had lost the fact that apart from Go Now the songs do not repeat across the two selections. The selection on the collection includes material from the Edge/Pinder/Thomas era (along with one Denny Laine), while the Greatest Hits, with the aforementioned exception of Go Now are from the much longer and rather more successful Hayward/Lodge/Edge era. I should have known this if I had paid more attention to my own music collection.

I still have just under half of the music collection to drop onto the iPod and then I can start creating play lists and stuff. At the moment all I have done is isolate the classical from the rest. I shall start being a little more clever once everything is there.