Mind Mapping

Not much blogging this week.

I've discovered some open source "mind mapping" software - Freemind so I've been playing with this.

At first I wasn't sure that it would be of any use, and probably just an interesting exercise. I've found that I can use it as a structured "To Do" list, annotated with notes and a selection of symbols.

It only took half an hour to figure out how to "drive" the software and I was away.

I've found it useful at work today, since I've built up a pictorial representation of all of the tasks that I've got 'on my plate' at the moment, how they link together and where they're at. The next time that the boss asks me what my workload is I'll just print off a copy (or publish it as HTML).

I've also built up a 'DIY' jobs to do map for home - a somewhat sprawling network of uncompleted tasks!

I reckon that it's useful for keeping notes and track of anything that has a loose structure (or where the structure is not known in advance) and is subject to a lot of change.

Bank Holiday Weekend

Had a fairly uneventful Bank Holiday weekend.

I was in work on Saturday night, applying datafixes to the system. This was only a four hour job so I was home by 20:30.

Much of the rest of our time was taken up with more Macfoolery:
1) Setting up NeoOffice. This is free open source software based on OpenOffice, but with more regular improvements targeted specifically for the Mac.
I use OpenOffice for Windows and find it perfectly adequate for my needs.
Novelist Supermum is a more demanding user however, and was unhappy with the way it tracked changes, comments and notes. She's ordered a copy of Word for Mac.
2) During trying out the above we discovered that:
There is no DEL key on the Mac. Solution - Use Fn Backspace.
There is no right mouseclick on the Mac (we did know this, obviously as there's only a single mouse button. We didn't know how to obtain the equivalent functionality in an application). Solution - Use Ctrl Mouseclick.
3) Seeking out, downloading and installing the latest printer drivers for our ageing HP psc 750 printer/scanner. Printer is still stuttering and stopping. Need to understand how to access and troubleshoot the printer queues in Mac OS X. Perhaps I should just get down to the Unix shell and use lpstat?

Sister phoned me on Sunday to check that I'd got the Birthday card she sent me earlier in the week and for a general chat. Chatted for half an hour, but was cut short by having to deal with Samwise who had gone to the toilet in his underpants (He's still got L plates when it comes to remembering that he's no longer in nappies - but he's getting there).

Entertained the hobbits with two trips to the Aztec play area.

We bought Spiderman 2 on DVD, and then sought out a copy of Spiderman 1. Looped through both a couple of times - the hobbits were only really interested in the action sequences. Samwise liked "The Green Gobbler Upper" - he refused to say "Goblin" for a while. Frodo's favourite bad guy is Dr Octopus - I got grabbed by pretend robotic arms a few times afterwards.

Typical Bank Holiday weather on Monday. First of all a hailstorm. Later a downpour with a single flash of lightning and a rumble of thunder.

Blogging before bed. Back to work tomorrow. It's half term, so I'm going in early so that I can get back sooner to assist with unruly children.

Get on your bad motor scooter and ride...

I'm in work for a Saturday evening release. Tonight my view out of the office window is hundreds of bikes and bikers queueing for the Isle of Man ferry. Must be that TT race time of year again.

Apple Mac Airport Extreme Wireless => Inventel Livebox Orange ( Wanadoo ). WEP Key Problem and Solution.

Novelist Supermum has invested her book royalties in alien technology. Therefore I'm rapidly gaining experience as an alien technologist whilst we set the glowing white device up with everything she needs.

Some advice for getting an Apple MacBook fitted with an Airport Extreme wireless card to connect to an Inventel Livebox wireless broadband router (as supplied by Orange, formerly Wanadoo).

Here's the Orange help for this type of connection.

At the point where it says type your WEP key into the 'Password field' - your AirPort password is your WEP key which you'll find on a sticker on the base of your Livebox)

I found that I was getting connection errors.

The solution was to simply place a $ sign at the start of the WEP key in the Password field !!!!

I dredged this arcane advice from a forum on the 'net, but can't for the life of me remember which one to acknowledge this.

The reason behind this is that the livebox is expecting a hexadecimal WEP key (as is printed on the livebox) whereas the Apple Mack Airport software / card is using a decimal key. Putting the $ sign in front of the WEP key in the password field tells it that a hexadecimal key has been entered.

All working fine now.

Asuka II

Currently at anchor in the Mersey, in view of our office window is a Japanese cruise liner - the Asuka II. The picture came from the internet as I don't have anything to take a photo with right now.

The new landing stage is nowhere near finished yet, so a couple of ferries have been requisitioned to ferry the Jap tourists from ship to shore.

The first wave has landed and is charging towards the Beatles Museum with a cry of Banzai!

Birthday Meal

Off out for a meal with Novelist Supermum tomorrow night to celebrate my Birthday. Grandma Gandalf is baby sitting.

Hopefully we've found a restaurant that doesn't have Sky TV. Hopefully there'll be enough staff on who don't have an interest in the football match that's going on in Athens. Hopefully we'll get some decent service.

Yellow Ribbons

We've had a few ITN van's and reporters outside our local library recently, which over the past week or so has had hundreds of yellow ribbons and balloons tied to the railings and trees.

It's becoming a local focal point for the Find Madeleine campaign. Her grandparents and friends of the family live in the area.

I've seen some pictures of the missing girl on the climbing frame in the "Linda McCartney" playground at our local park.

Last night the yellow ribbons had spread to the railings on the main road, and to the lamposts and trees all around. The two lamp posts at the entrance to our street have yellow ribbons on them.

There's some green ribbons and balloons too - I'm not quite sure what the significance of these means. Good old wikipedia tells me that in Canada it's a symbol for missing children so presumably this is true of some other countries too. Hopefully it's got nothing to do with some of the other possibilities that wikipedia provides.

A crowd of about 200 people had gathered when I arrived home at 19:00. I went to see what was going on at about 19:30 - apparently it was a vigil, which meant prayers and people playing acoustic guitars.
I stopped for a few minutes to take a look, then left them to it. One of the community policemen didn't half give me a funny look - perhaps they're keeping an eye out for pervs - hopefully I don't look like one.

Met a neighbour on the way back who'd gone to take a look just like me - although he seemed a bit nervous about going over. I don't think that anybody minded.

Luckily it didn't go on all night (that would have been a difficult complaint to make). I suppose that this gives people who are feeling helpless something to do an some sort of focus.

I've heard a lot of people making judgements about the parents being too tight to get a child minder, and leaving the kids alone whilst they went out. With hindsight it looks like a stupid thing to do - but I've done similar things when staying at a hotel myself, albeit at a family wedding.

I took both boys to see the ribbons this morning on their way to school / nursery this morning. I explained to them what they were about and made sure that Frodo at least could tell me his name, address and phone number in case he ever gets lost. I'll have to get Samwise to practice the same.

I really do hope that they find her, and find her alive before the public interest and sympathy wears off.

Fine Art

A pal of mine who lives in Cornwall and paints pictures for a living has sent me an invitation to a private view of an exhibition in a gallery in Bristol.

Unfortunately it's a bit far away, and on a Thursday night, so I won't be able to make it - however I've now got a nice glossy pamphlet showing the paintings - which is nice.

I've just checked out the Innocent Gallery website and found a few more paintings.

Great to see that his selling price has gone up - looks like he's doing well. I'll have to drop him a line to thank him for the invitation.

Spider Man 3

Food at Tso's (all you can eat Chinese Buffet) followed by Spiderman 3 at the FACT Cinema last night.

Our decision not to take Frodo to see this was right (the rating is 12A) - too violent and scary for a 5 year old - (although nothing I think that the average 8 to 10 year old couldn't handle). So I guess that his first cinema experience is likely to be Shrek 3 when that comes out.

Enjoyed Spiderman 3 on the whole. We weren't too close to the screen, but I found my head darting about trying to follow the rapid action scenes.

There were a lot of shaking camera "steadicam" effects - perhaps to help hide the CGI.

Some critics had complained that there were too many villains. I didn't think so. The only downside was that it took a while for "Venom" to fully appear, which was fairly quickly followed by his demise.

I did think that they could have cut back on the slushy scenes - far too many of them and too long for most people's liking.

Also Mary Jane - is she fickle or what? The super_geeky PP should dump her and go for the skinny foreign girl who lives across the corridor - she's much more his type.

There were a few laughable plot events - the sort of corny coincidences that you'd expect from a comic.
I give it a 7 out of 10

White Van Man

Hired a "transit" van today (oops! look at the time - yesterday) and took the wrapped and sealed roof panels that have been stashed in my back garden to the waste disposal facility in Huyton - I had a pre-arranged appointment for this, since the panels are cement-asbestos.

The blokes who were sitting around on the gate were extremely helpful. I think that one of them was trying to prove that he was fitter than a younger man. He said he was 58, and that too heavy was a state of mind. He helped me lift all of the roof panels and rubble sacks into the disposal container.

This took two trips. I finished off by taking a pile of wooden beams and old drainpipes to a more local tip at Otterspool - then a quick dash over to Frodo's school to pick him up.

Frodo was well pleased with his ride in the van. I couldn't help thinking that we were short of the old guy who sits at the window for the traditional "three men in a van" configuration.
(Middle aged chap driving, young lad in the middle, old boy by the window. If they see a hitchhiker they all stick their thumbs up at him and drive past).

And the winner is...

Serbia won it - thanks to the Eastern Block Alliances Voting Consortium.
A dreadful ballad sung by a female Lou Costello lookalike.

Ukraine came second (shame).

UK came second last, Ireland came last - no chance of having to host it again.

Wogan quotes of the night:

1. (On appearance of Russian voting representative) "Hello Mrs Putin".
2. "It's been a wonderful, wonderful evening." "Well not musically, of course".
3. "Is that a traditional Serbian cucumber you've got there?"
4. "Arguably the most memorable music you've ever heard in your life".

Eurovision Song Contest

It's that time of year again when we traditionally crack open a bottle of wine and sit down for a good laugh in front of Eurovison Song Contest

Yes, we've got to be some of the only people in Europe who actually admit to watching this.

France's Les Fatals Picards were trying (and succeeding) to be funny. They were all wearing pink, the drummer had a pair of angels wings protruding from his back, and the bald guy with the position of "man with no talent"*1 ran in circles around the stage with a fake cat strapped to his neck.

Russian entry - Girls Aloud in school uniform. (I feel the need to quote Zirk, a lecherous egg-shaped alien featured in Axel Pressbutton - "Hubba hubba hubba").

Ukrainian Entry - probably the most camp entry this year - Verka Serduchka looked like Christopher Biggins in a Star Spangled suit - with a massive silver star on his head. This one's probably going to get our vote.

Bulgarian entry - loads of atmospheric wailing and drums. Kind of liked this one, but then I am polishing off the wine.

All of the belly dancers in the Turkish entry are British!

The UK entry is appalling - but then we don't want to win it, and fork out the bill for hosting the event next year, do we?

None of them are as good as last years winners - Finland's Zombie Death Metal band Lordi (first time we've helped vote in a winner).

It's voting time, so we've voted for the Ukraine.

Finland has never hosted the event before, so they've really gone for it. To entertain us whilst they're adding up we have 3 Goth Metal Cellists, a man swallowing a flourescent tube, some cycling trapeze artists, a man spinning inside a metal ring that's not attached to anything and Darth Maul juggling fire sticks.

Now they're announcing the results. This bit's great. Old political alliances and regional disuputes are reflected in the voting year after year.

*1 This is the guy who dances, vaguely provides backing vocals, may occasionally tap a tambourine etc. examples are Andrew Ridgely, Linda McCartney, Bez, that bloke from Frankie goes to Hollywood, the chap in Soft Cell who wasn't Marc Almond...

A Walk In The Park

Working late tonight, because I spent this morning going on a nature stroll in the park with Samwise' pre-school (that's a nursery school for us old-fashioned folk).

Despite having a group of about 20 very noisy 2-3 year olds charging around the park we managed to spot several magpies, fed some geese, ducks and pigeons, saw a moor-hen and terrorised a squirrel.

Samwise was looking for ants, peering through a large magnifying glass. I think I'll hold back on showing the burning properties of a magnifying glass for a while. He switched to a pair of binoculars, with which he managed to spot a kite trapped in a tree. Well and truly stuck, no way could anybody get it down.

Headed for the picnic area to discover a gang of green-clad park rangers moving the benches around. We'd all sat down at one bench, and were about to move to another when they carried it away almost from underneath us to a spot further away.

They then came back for the bench that everybody was sitting at - only to be told by several irate parents and nursery-school teachers to go away and move the bench when we'd finished with it.

Cup of coffee and a sneaky Kit-Kat (so the health conscious kiddies couldn't see us scoffing chocolate). Then off to the Linda McCartney playground for swings, slides and roundabouts, before heading home with a tired Samwise.

Weather was just right for us, so quite a pleasant morning before work. Tipping it down now.

Imaginative Play

Work went OK yesterday and the system is up and running well.

Got back home to find Frodo and Samwise charging around the house brandishing guns fashioned from lego bricks and waving a small battery powered torch/radio. "We're Superhero Explorers" said Samwise.

The game changed to "Monsters on the ceiling" - inspired by Saturday night's Dr Who episode, and then finally "Pirates looking for treasure".

I pointed out to Pirate Samwise that he didn't have a treasure map. He went off to find a Pirate Activity Colouring book, which Pirate Frodo coloured in to make the map.

Pirate Frodo's bed became the pirate ship. I had to board it, sink it and capture Pirate Samwise in order to get them to bed.

Bank Holiday Weekend

Meant to do much - as usual did very little. Spent some quality time with the hobbits. Went shopping. Did sod all in the way of DIY. Started filling out the long and complicated forms for a claim we can make for extra cash for Frodo.

Speaking of extra cash - since Bank Holidays are the time when the system is least used at work so this means that we can take the opportunity to earn some overtime at double the usual pay rate, and take the thing down for an overhaul.

I'm in for a 9 hour stint tomorrow.

No doubt the hobbits will be thrown at me when I get home - "These are your children!", "Bath them and put them to bed!".

Frodo's Latest Assessment

We finally got the report from the Paediatrician for Frodo's latest assessment, which took place last month.

Decision's were made in the meeting which we agreed with, and should help get Frodo into the school that can help his language difficulty most.

Unfortunately the Dickhead Paediatrician chaired the meeting. He hasn't seen Frodo himself for three years, fobbing this off to another doctor when he forgot to arrange an assessment.

Now he muscles in making assumptions, inaccuracies, and trying to suggest drugs that aren't suitable for Frodo's condition. He has put his own spin on the report to suggest that Frodo has the problem that his favourite drug company can address. He refers to reports from two or three years ago, rather than the recent findings. Worst of all he writes a different conclusion to that which was agreed between himself, the Educational Psychologist and Speech and Language Therapy.

The report is full of spelling and grammar mistakes, contradictions, inaccuracies and other holes. It looks like he was probably chased for it, since it was overdue, and has completed it as a rush job.

We blasted a letter off detailing what was wrong with the report earlier in the week, copying the Headmistress of the school that provided Frodo with a one to one teaching asssistant last year. We think that she has set off a few rockets, so it looks like this one is on the way to being sorted out.

Novelist Supermum is ranting about this too.

Tonight I have been mostly...

...painting an outhouse door.

What colour?

"Black! black! black!"