Making the most of a bad day

I am having the day from hell at work. Yesterday my PC blew up (well, good as: a corrupted Last Known Good configuration). I got nothing done all day *and* took a lot of grief from the severe PC support person.

"You are not supposed to haff Netscape". "But I make web pages -- I have to look at them in Netscape". "It is not supported". "I can't believe it was Netscape that broke my computer". "Your profile is enormous." "I know, I've reported it fifteen times at least. Have you ever fixed it? No."

And the day before I bunked off early to go drinking with Mr B and left a lot of things to do yesterday that I couldn't do so all in all today has been shit.

Added to that I am trying to get enetation comments working and they won't.

But a few things have cheered me up. We went out for lunch. And I found this on the Onion: I Would Treat The Girl From The Muffler Commercial Right

Awwww.

joella

Another autumn moment

Left work a bit early today, as I had the car and it was parked in pay and display. So managed to leave while it was still light on the first working day of darkness: a Good Thing.

On the way to the car, I saw a small boy, maybe five or six years old, kicking his way joyously through a huge pile of sycamore leaves that had banked up against a wall.

I used to have a real thing about big piles of leaves when I was a kid. When I was barely not a kid I had sex with one of my first boyfriends in a big pile of leaves under a lamp post. Although disastrous as a sexual experience, it was great fun and we ran home afterwards shrieking with laughter with our pants full of leaves.

So I was watching the small boy laughing and kicking, and remembering the dodgy moments, when a condom wrapper suddenly appeared among the leaves.

Guess I wasn't the last teenager to have that idea, then.

joella

Bugger

Turns out cocoa shell mulch is poisonous to dogs, if they eat a lot of it just after you've put it down. Can't imagine that happening, as we don't have a dog, but I don't feel *quite* as pleased with myself.

joella

Chocolate gardening

Sounds like a Viz euphemism for something not sanctioned by the Vatican, but no.

This afternoon, to ward off incipient daylight saving depression, we planted some tulips (many colours) and some narcissi (white) in our newly beshrubbed front garden.

Then mulched the whole lot with amazing Sunshine of Africa cocoa shell mulch.

It's organic. It's a by-product of the cocoa industry. It helps the soil retain water (much needed out the front of our house). It adds nutrients. It looks much prettier than bark (too municipal), gravel (why have a garden?) or slate (ok for minimalist urban but not edwardian terrace).

And, unlike manure, it smells of chocolate. Really quite a lot like chocolate.

I am very impressed with myself.

joella

You couldn't make it up

On Friday I found a link purporting to be to a video of Adam Ant singing a remake of Stand and Deliver called Save the Gorilla.

But it was in QuickTime, which I haven't got installed at work, and can't install because you have to be a network administrator to install anything useful (most Popcap games seem to install fine...)

Anyway, I didn't quite believe it could be true. But it is.

joella

Beautiful and damned

Concorde's last flight today... it was built down the road from where I grew up and my mum remembers taking me out into the street to watch it do a fly by. It pretty much blocked out the sun.

Ongoing fascination with cyberspace

I was wondering if it was, after all, Thatcher who privatised the railways. A search took me to Transport Blog -- what a wealth of information.

Mr Transport Blog *does* think the free market can provide public services, so we will have to disagree, but I thank him for providing such an incredibly useful site. I think this is probably what weblogs are supposed to be used for...

I poked around for a while and discovered he had a personal blog. Intrigued to find out what kind of person writes a transport blog, I went to visit. Not sure we would agree on much, actually, but was delighted to find a link to the Tower of Bears.

The Tower of Bears is part of Nobody Here, I site I had forgotten the name of but have been looking for for ages because I love Nose so much.

I do love the internet. It would have to be the thing I took to a desert island.

(It was Major's government wot did it, btw. But we can still blame Thatcher)

joella

This just in

Just heard M woo-hoo-ing about this from the front room. Check it out. Un-be-fucking-lievable. BBC NEWS | Business | Network Rail takes repairs in-house.

Can the free market provide decent public services? OF COURSE NOT. Maybe we are slowly reclaiming Thatcher's legacy. Maybe one day we will do whatever the opposite of canonise is to her.

Oooh, can't wait for John Humphreys on the Today programme tomorrow...

joella

Things to do when nursing a cold

#1 - Find your very own Googlewhack. (Basically, a Google search on exactly two words which returns exactly one result).

It took a little while, but less time than I thought it might. See here

#2 - Take more Lemsip and get on with your work

joella

You know you're getting old when...

You realise you work with people who don't know what a ra ra skirt is

You find a hair growing in a place that didn't have a hair before

You spend all day convinced that it's 2002, and suddenly get freaked out by the date on your emails

Your little sister is about to turn 30

*sigh*

joella

Last night a Beechams saved my life

Not literally, you understand. (But neither did the DJ).

There can be few things lonelier than being alone in a Premier Lodge with a lousy head cold.

I knew I wasn't *really* ill, and there were sympathetic people on the end of the phone. (Do mobiles have ends?). I was warm, and comfortable, and had enough paracetamol.

But still. It's enough to make you thank your lucky stars that you have a home to go to, and thank them even more when you get there.

Which doesn't explain why I felt the need to drink a bottle of red wine when I finally did. Perhaps it's to block out the memories of the Hello! magazine I bought at Glasgow airport (being ill = allowed to buy celeb mags, but doesn't quite {unless *really* ill} block out the shame of doing so).

joella

PS Does Rachel Hunter really think we think her tits are real?
PPS Although the same person, can Jack Ryder ever be as good looking as Jamie Mitchell?
PPPS That poor Iraqi boy with no arms meets David Beckham... quintessential 21st century moment, no?

Feeling small

Well, Harcourt Arboretum did the trick -- acers in autumn just can't be beat. And then we had dinner at Loch Fyne, which was mighty, er, fine.

S went to the aforementioned party and didn't come home til QUARTER TO SEVEN. That's rock enough for three.

But I'm glad I didn't go because I was already coming down with something which has now fully descended. There is snot everywhere. My head isn't working.

And to top it all I'm in Scotland. Not a bad thing in itself, far from it (stayed last night with my friend A, who fed me trout caught by her neighbour from a loch...), but I'm supposed to be working here and I can't think at all.

Am also a long, long way from my bed. Though there's one waiting for me in a Travelodge somewhere. Might go and find it for a bit.

Bleat. Snurfle. Meep.

joella

Party dilemmas

There's a party on tomorrow night. The host and hostess are imaginative and well-organised, and all the signs are there that it should be a night to remember (or remember the early part of, at any rate).

But I don't think I'm going. It's been a shit couple of months chez nous, what with most of downstairs out of action, the rest of it covered in dust, and every conversation involving a decision. It's not that we haven't reached consensus in the end, it's just that we seem to have approached every situation from almost diametrically opposed positions (and when there's three of you, that's fairly weird). It's been grim.

We need some time out of the house, but I don't think a party is it.

I am thinking something involving trees (maybe), it being autumn, and then some good food somewhere.

Also I have a large premenstrual spot on my chin. Don't want to meet anyone glamorous looking like this.

But not going to a party... that feels weird.

joella

The joy of words. And technology. Together.

Remember when email was exciting? When you got as excited about a new message as you used to do about getting post at university? (When there was no email, and there were no mobile phones, so people actually used to *write* to each other?)

Early email was fantastic. And often it was about fantastic new websites, and you would rush off to look at what wondrous development 1996 had come up with.

And one of them (maybe not in 1996, but certainly by 1998) was the Plumb Design Online Thesaurus. It was mentioned at the training I went on last week so I checked it out again, and damn me if it isn't just as fabulous as it was the first time round.

I just investigated the FAQ -- it was indeed first released in 1998, and you can still use the original, now known as the Classic, version.

Rock and roll.

joella

Stress with a clear conscience

I'm not a big chocolate eater, but there are certain situations (and certain times of the month) when something dark and sweet is required.

So I keep a bar of Darkly Divine in my desk drawer, next to my oatcakes, my lemons and my tampons.

Days like today, I appreciate my ability to provide for myself in advance. And it's Fair Trade (of course), so I am doing good in the world as I comfort eat.

joella

A tale of two hangovers

The first one was mine. I was staying with the lovely R&J in Brixton in between two days of training in London.

The first day was great, I learnt some interesting things, wished I'd done it six months ago but still. I left happy. It was a beautiful afternoon, and I walked from Temple to Tottenham Court Road to have a drink with an ex-colleague and generally felt quite the metropolitan girl (though admittedly most of them aren't clutching a sweaty A-Z).

But then I had to get myself to R&J's. They live very near Loughborough Junction station, and I had directions, so I felt pretty confident. Last thing to do was get a bus four stops from opposite Brixton police station.

Arsing bastard London bus drivers. Do they want to help you? No they do not. The first bus I got on was, in fairness, the wrong bus, so I got off and went to another bus stop.

The next bus driver told me I was on the wrong side of the road, so I got off and crossed the road. The *next* bus driver told me I was on the wrong side of the road. I protested a bit that they couldn't *both* be the wrong side of the road, but eventually got off and crossed the road.

The *next* bus driver waved me down the bus without answering the Loughborough Junction question, but then refused to drive off and started shouting at me for not having a ticket. But I tried to buy one! I said. I want to go to Loughborough Junction!

He shouted at me some more, I didn't understand what he was saying, but he eventually deigned to sell me a ticket, although not to tell me where to get off. But I worked that out for myself.

I was only half an hour late, but all vestiges of metropolitanness had evaporated, and I drank a lot of wine. Far too much wine. So much wine I can't remember going to bed. Not a good idea when you have a training course the next day.

And I felt like I was going to die. I got there early and sat in some gardens with a coffee and a packet of salt and vinegar crisps and hoped these would help.

They didn't. And nor did the fact that the course was essentially 130 powerpoint slides delivered over six hours in a slightly overheated room, broken up with some strange vegetarian nuggets for lunch and several trips to the loo.

But all my own fault. Never. Again. Honest.

The second hangover was M's. His was gained by more conventional means, ie drinking too much in the pub on Saturday night. What was notable was the speed with which it became apparent he was going to have a mother of a hangover, and the fact that he had to take it to our Sunday Neighbourhood Drinks.

The former was odd... he just kind of went. One minute, playing the piano, showing off his website, chatting happily, the next a confused drunk person with a terrible case of hiccups. He fell asleep before his hiccups left and there I was lying next to a man who was snoring and hiccuping at the same time. I've never heard anything like it. Zzzzz-HIC! Zzzzz-HIC!

The latter was just unfortunate. I made him come with me, because Neighbourhood Drinks are scary, and to his eternal credit he did, though he did leave about 20 minutes later to go home and lie down.

I like to think this has improved our cool rating with our neighbours (rock and roll, etc), but I suspect not.

joella

Three cranes do make a sunset

Lock me in an unlit dungeon for seventeen years, and then show me a photo of the sky over Oxford this evening and ask me what month it was. October, I would tell you. Without a doubt.

I am not sure if Color Me Beautiful would agree, but I feel in my soul that I am an autumn person.

Dark blue sky with pink streaks, plus orange trees (optional extra, but achingly beautiful if you get the right species on the right day) -- who could ask for more on her way home?

But there were cranes as well. I am not nearly so big a fan of cranes as M, but they have an undeniable elegance and style, and tonight they were lit up in the bright twilight as if celebrating their own transience.

And as a final bonus, the silhouette of the new mosque appeared against the setting sun as we drove down Divinity Road. Not the obvious Oxford spires, but all the more beautiful for that.

joella

The joys of autumn

1. Scarves. I think I have finally become a woman who can wear scarves. I started to knit one last year, but made an utter pig's ear of it. When my mother came to stay, she took it away, unravelled it, reknitted it and sent it back. It's fabulous.

2. Quince. We have an ornamental quince tree in the front garden. I think what makes it ornamental is the shocking pink flowers in February (one of the joys of spring), but it is also a practical quince tree in that it has loads of quince on it. Thus far we have (shame on us) chucked them, but this year M says he is going to make quince marmalade. Or maybe quince paste, which goes so wonderfully with manchego cheese.

joella

Road trip!

Well, train trip, but I'm excited nonetheless. We're off to Manchester. Please let the train run on time. Please let it not piss down. Please let N&D be well and happy and please let us all have lots of fun.

back on Monday

joella

And in the Darkness...

... turn it up to eleven.

I am really, really taken with the Darkness album. I can't quite put my finger on why. I think it scratches the same itch that Bat Out Of Hell used to when I was a teenager.

Our new kitchen is deliciously, briefly, functional yet spartan. There is a CD player on the floor in the corner. I am cooking, drinking Gewurtztraminer and listening to I Believe in a Thing Called Love.

The rollercoaster's on its way up again.

joella

Arty pants

I do know a bit about art after all! I did this BBC art quiz and I got them all right!

Must count for something, no?

joella

Meg on Blair

I read Meg's blog at meish.org every now and again. I don't know her, but I like how she writes. It used to be at notsosoft.com, which is how I found it: Not So Soft is an Ani DiFranco album and I was searching on it.

Anyway... her post on Blair's speech yesterday is just wonderful.

joella

Bloody turn up, will you

The Ecuadorian government has started a campaign to encourage people not to be late for work.

I thoroughly approve. Can they do that over here? Especially for builders? Mike the kitchen man said they were a shower, and he wasn't wrong.

Grump, grump.

joella