| Short and Sweet |
[02 Jul 2009|08:27pm] |
It's been ages since I posted anything. Not for lack of things to write about, but due to lack of time given dog shows, Tara's birthday(*), gardening, bbqs, mother-in-law's birthday, Zak getting injured (and recovering), Tara being ill (and recovering), collar making, friends visiting, visiting friends, and the unending war to delay the inevitable victory of entropy(**).
I was therefore surprised to find I have nothing booked for this weekend. Did I forget to note down an engagement? Or is there really nothing happening? In which case, would anyone like to meet up for an impromptu pub night/party/whatever on Saturday?
(*) - Tara's now four, and in a fortnight Cisco will be fourteen. Where does the time go?
(**) - If anyone knows of a decent roofer who can repair/add flashing where needed to stop leaks, I'd be very grateful for an introduction...
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| Champion |
[07 Jun 2009|08:54pm] |
Tara went lure coursing again today, winning the deerhound final by half a length.
This wasn't the closest of Tara's races - she won her first by a nose, according to the judge. I wasn't in a position to see, so had no idea who won'd until we asked. By the way, the natty red collar Tara's wearing is so that people can tell the dogs apart. One grey hairy running at 40 looks much like another, so they wear wide wool snoods in red or white. In a three dog race, the third dog goes naked, as in the final.
There was a certain amount of joshing about a crossbred beating all the pedigree deerhounds present, but all in fun. They seem to really like our monster, and I kept being told how great it was that she'd taken to coursing so well. I'm so proud of her, and Tara loved every minute of it, of course.
Zak stayed at home - his leg isn't up to walking up the hill, never mind racing. He didn't seem too upset at being left behind. Alfie was with us, but slept through all the excitement.
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| Mr Clumsy Strikes Again |
[06 Jun 2009|04:44pm] |
Zak was running around in the woods at Beecraigs this morning. At some point he collided with something. We've no idea what, and he didn't even yelp. When he came back to us, I noticed a bit of blood on his wrist, which Claire checked and declared it to be "not too bad". We popped Zak on the lead and took him home, by which point the skin had started to split. One trip to the vet, a general, and several stitches later, and Zak is sporting a natty camoflage bandage, a sore head, and wobbly legs. He's currently sleeping on our bed.
Tara's been very cute about the whole thing. I took Zak to the vet, and when I returned without him, she was quite distressed. I gave her some pork strips to distract her, while Claire and I went shopping. We came back via the vet, collecting Zak. When we got home, Tara didn't want to see us, rushing straight over to Zak, and licking his muzzle affectionately. People are always asking if the dogs get on okay. Oh, yes.
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| Do As I Say... |
[02 Jun 2009|07:34pm] |
You can tell how seriously they're taking the European elections around here by the near complete lack of bits of card tied to lamp posts. I noticed one for the first time today, brightly printed on plastic-coated, completely-unrecyclable, non-degradable board. It was for the Green party...
To be fair, maybe they could reuse it for the General election.
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| A Great Lesson |
[01 Jun 2009|06:01pm] |
When I was a child - maybe eight or nine - one of our tasks at school was to keep a record of news. Each weekday we had to write about what we'd done the previous evening, illustrated by a crude drawing. After a few weeks of this, the teacher had one of the girls read out her entry for the previous day, a colourful description of three or four activities. This, we were told, was what we should all be aiming for, because the teacher was fed up with reading "Last night I had dinner, watched telly, and went to bed." Watching TV was dull, we learnt, and admitting to it got you shouted at.
I suppose the teacher's hope was that this would encourage us to spend our evenings doing something more interesting, just so we would have exciting tales for our news the next day. But I was an English kid in a Scottish school, and did well in exams too, so I didn't have too many friends, and on a rainy Tuesday evening telly sounds a good passtime. So I did what any other sensible child would do, and made everything up. My news reports were better received, and I wasn't the only child doing this. Indeed, sometimes we collaborated. I remember Jonathan (a kid I otherwise recall nothing about) and I spending about three weeks describing the progress we were making on the remote controlled airplane we were designing and building. He was in charge of steering, I did the propulsion. We didn't trust the other kids, so they too were assured of the project's reality. Eventually the risk became too great, and we reported our improbable creation's maiden flight, which ended in the craft crashing into the Knapps Loch, where it sank without a trace.
Such unbelievable stories passed without comment. I'm not sure what I learnt from all this, nor why I mention it now.
***
These days, my life is far too busy without inventing new bits for it. The past weekend was spent in the pub, at the beach, at the dog show (Alfie got 3rd in "Golden Oldie", largely 'cos Claire ended up carrying him round the ring when walking proved too much for him), and picnicing in Holyrood Park. I'm now a fine shade of red, and looking forward to cooler weather.
Tonight would normally be roleplaying night, except at the moment I'm burned out as a GM. I've been finding it harder each week to psych myself up to run the game, and should the game not happen (always a risk when players have lives) the loss has upset me more than it should. So I'm taking a break till I can get my head together. We've still got friends coming round, but for social rather than gaming reasons. I should probably post this before they arrive.
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| A Virtual Post |
[30 May 2009|12:34pm] |
Increasingly, my friendships are virtual. I live far enough from even my local friends that I won't bump into them while shopping or walking the dogs. A trip to the pub is a large enough expedition that there's no option of popping in for a quick drink on the off chance that someone interesting happens to be there. (There are closer pubs, but not that friends frequent...) So those I keep in touch with are those who invite me to their parties, but mainly those who blog and those who email me. It's why I keep this blog - I'm well aware that for most of you, these little ramblings are your only contact with me. Heaven knows what view this gives of me. Hopefully more Gaiman than Adams...
The upside of a largely virtual relationship with the world is that it leaves me better prepared for friends moving away. (And it's no coincidence that as I type Sarah is on a one-way train to Bristol.) The shift from largely virtual to completely virtual is small, and requires little more effort on my part to sustain the friendship. New friendships, with little or no real-world basis, are also readily pursued in the virtual world, needing little more than enthusiasm and a common interest or two to blossom into something just as real as those forged down the pub.
The biggest problem with virtual friendships are that the tools are largely crap. Email remains the king of person to person, blogs a means for talking to the world. Livejournal, blogspot, et al provide the tools for easy blogging, but reading blogs needs specialist software if you're going to follow more than a small number. (Livejournal's "friends page" is awful - the single biggest reason for people falling out with blogging. Getting a proper feed reader is essential.) Facebook's recent change has made it completely unusable by me. I only visit there to play Mousehunt these days, and anyone trying to use Facebook to contact me or invite me to things is likely to find I don't notice. Twitter's insane character limit means that no one is using it to say anything interesting - I've signed off.
In short, if you want to keep in touch with me, read this blog, email me, or write on your own blog - I'll read it, even if I don't comment. Or, you know, invite me to the pub. That'll work too...
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| Fool Me Once... |
[23 May 2009|06:43pm] |
If you're reliant on the public spending money, misleading them is very, very foolish. If you've lied to me once, why would I trust you again?
This afternoon, we took the dogs to Traquair medieval fair. We knew there'd be no problems - website says "dogs allowed on lead", photos of previous years show dogs in attendance. Got to the site to find a large sign saying "No Dogs". I rather angrily explained that we'd driven for an hour and a half 'cos the website said dogs were allowed. The kid at the gate told us we could leave the dogs in the car, and that he couldn't get hold of anyone senior. (He did try.) They're getting a rude letter, and a bill for the three hours of time they wasted and the petrol used, to be donated to the charity of our choice.
Instead, we went to Kailzie Gardens, had a gorgeous burger and chips in the courtyard, then walked the dogs round the walled gardens. Well worth a visit, if you're in the area. The photos on their website don't do it justice.
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| And Relax |
[21 May 2009|09:41pm] |
Of course, when I've got lots I could blog about, there's no time to blog. So, here's a quick run through of some of the highlights since we last spoke.
Last weekend was frantic. On Saturday we moved Chris from St Andrews to Edinburgh, for which he rewarded us with pizza from a lovely little cafe in the middle of St Andrews, which I will probably never be able to find again. Their pizza was very good though. Then, up early on Sunday to walk the dogs, before we took Mum on an RSPB bird-watching cruise of the Forth. Lots of gulls, auks, terns, etc. - some of which I can now tell apart at a slightly more sophisticated level than "puffins are the ones with the stripey bills". In return, Mum bought us Sunday lunch at the Two Bridges. In the afternoon we accidentally took the dogs to a horse show. We didn't know the show was being held next to the woods where we often walk - you'd think they'd have put up some notices. We let the dogs have a run in the woods, then walked along the edge of the show. The dogs behaved well, and there were some gorgeous horses, including a beautiful, black fillie whose rider was putting her through tricks to keep her under control. I'm not looking for a horse (I'm not, I'm not, I'm not) but if I were, she's the sort I'd want. (At one point the fillie rode close by us, and Claire loudly declared "there's your favourite" to the rider's obvious delight.) After all that, we visited Mags & Phil in their gorgeous new flat for dinner. The boy can cook.
This weekend's not looking a lot quieter. Traquair medieval fair on Friday & Saturday, Linlithgow Party at the Palace on Saturday & Sunday, and Bo'ness Victorian Street Fair on the Sunday. Dunno how many of those we'll get to. We'll see...
***
I've just finished Bill Bruford's autobiography. (Drummer in Yes, King Crimson, Earthworks, and a whole host of ensembles with the word "Bruford" in the name.) He concentrates on the personalities and the business, rather than the specific music, so worth reading even for those who aren't interested in the bands involved. Reading it has me even more convinced that the jazz ensemble is the best model yet for an RPG group. Basically, in jazz the composition provides the chord progression and the melody, but the real interest comes from how the players improvise chord substitutions, and melodic and rhythmic variations. This seems a strong parallel to how role-playing works. Viewed this way it becomes clear why so much rpg theory seems deeply unsatisfactory to me - too much of the theory is being written by the composers, not the performers.
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| Alfie |
[15 May 2009|09:32pm] |
Alfie was handed in as a stray one year ago. At that point, he desperately need medical, surgical treatment. Only the prompt action of Greyhound Gap saved his life. Now, he's sleeping peacefully, having enjoyed a walk in the woods this afternoon. Alfie's annual check up was earlier this week, and while he has problems, they're under control, and he's basically in good health. The one exception is his eyes - the cataracts are getting worse, and are now affecting his vision. He's not blind yet, but that's something we may have to face in the future.
There were a lot of people involved in getting Alfie to where he is today. The couple who spent three months nursing him back to health, the vets - both down south and here, the charity that paid for his treatment, and everyone who raised funds for that charity. Claire and I spend a lot of time working with such charities in our own small way. This is why. A happy dog story makes it all worthwhile.
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| After the Party |
[11 May 2009|10:52pm] |
After the party, we've found a few bits left behind - a blue fleecy top and a cat badge. If any of that belongs to you, let me know...
The party went well, with a surprise appearance by the sun. We'd spent part of the afternoon at the Linlithgow dog show, getting soaked and wrestling runaway marquees, so I really didn't expect cooking outside to happen. (We did stay at the dog show long enough to enter one class - Best Sit/Stay. Tara and Zak were stars, patiently waiting in the pouring rain just 'cos we asked them to, and getting first and second places.)
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| Busy Doing Nothing |
[08 May 2009|08:03am] |
Officially, I'm on holiday at the moment. We've been using home as a base for day trips, so lots of eating out, walking dogs, watching wildlife, meeting up with friends, and generally being far too busy to work or blog. Monday's return to normality is going to come hard.
Tomorrow's the BBQ. If the weather stays like this (which seems likely, I'm afraid) it'll be an indoors barbeque. It'll be fine - we've got a huge cooker. Also, I'm unlikely to be online tomorrow - maybe first thing. If you need to contact me after then, my mobile is your best bet. If you don't have my number, ask today or get it from someone who has it.
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| BBQ Reminder |
[04 May 2009|07:16pm] |
Just thought I'd quickly remind everyone that the birthday BBQ is at our house on Saturday. We were planning to light the coals about 6ish, though you're welcome to turn up any time after about 4.
See you then!
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| Originally Claire's Idea |
[24 Apr 2009|08:15pm] |
When I get a spam phone call, I no longer rant at the person calling, nor do I hang up, nor report them to the TPS. None of these work, and all leave me feeling stressed. Instead, I simply say "oh, could you hold on a moment" and put the phone down, next to the nearest speaker if there's music playing. Then I go back to whatever I was doing when the phone rang. After a couple of minutes I go back, and if they haven't hung up I say "sorry about that, who did you say you were? Uh huh... Uh huh... No! Don't bring that in here! Sorry, back in a minute..." and repeat. Today, I got someone to hold on for over ten minutes. My best yet! Maybe she really likes "Selling England by the Pound", which was today's hold music.
Not only does this technique leave me less stressed, but all the time the person is on hold with me they can't be bothering some other poor sod. A small wave of goodness spreads out from me, making life a little better on average for us all.
(And, yes, I'm on the "do not call" list, for all the difference that makes...)
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| Four Bloody Numbers |
[23 Apr 2009|08:15pm] |
I loathe server moves. The company we rent a server from have decided to move to a new data centre. In some ways this makes sense, but it involves two lots of downtime, and changing the IP address. The first phase of the move was this week - changing the IP address. So, yesterdayI got a call asking for the server's root password. Er, no. Instead, I asked them to tell me what they needed changed on the server, and when, and I'd do it. I got the new IP address, and agreed a time to make the change - 9am this morning.
I made my changes (most of which they couldn't have done - they don't run the name servers, for instance) and as soon as I changed the IP address, the server disappeared from the net. I gave it a while for the routers to catch up. No joy. So, phone up. Short argument with a guy who claimed they didn't do that kind of support, before claiming he hadn't understood what I wanted, and passed me to the guy I spoke to yesterday.
Turns out the engineers had decided I was going to do everything - routers, firewall, the lot. How they thought I'd do that without the passwords, I don't know. So the engineers hadn't done anything. Anyway, my contact went off to sort that. He called back, to tell me it was all working. I got him to hold on while I checked. Ping, tracert, ssh, email - all failed. Didn't seem fixed to me. More umming and aahing, and it turned out I'd been given the wrong IP address. And without a working address, no way I could connect to the computer. So, an engineer had to be given the root password and sent to physically change the address. Meanwhile, I was sat watching for the server to reappear, so I could change the password and check the history files. Aargh!
Anyway, we're back online. There may have been the odd email gone astray, though. If you haven't seen a reply from me (or Claire), sending again might be a good idea. I'm kind of hoping tomorrow will be considerably less stressful.
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| Piracy |
[17 Apr 2009|03:55pm] |
So, owners of the Pirate Bay have been found guilty of, basically, piracy, and sentenced to one year in prison. This seems both predictable and reasonable. There's not many crimes where you'd get as little as a year for deliberately messing with millions of quids worth(*) of other people's property.
But that's not the point I was wanting to make. I'm wondering what the difference between the Pirate Bay and YouTube is? I mean, is it just that one's a couple of Scandinavian punks, while the other is a major American corporation? What about the record companies that "forget" to pay royalties to their artists? How about when Apple "accidentally" uploads music on to itunes? In other words, how much is this about ensuring revenue flow to the creators (which I approve of) and how much about stopping newbies shoving on to the bigboy's turf?
(*) How to value IP? A minimal approach would seem to look at the production costs. TV shows costing $1million per episode are increasingly common, and anything under around $250k is considered cheap. That's why the BBC is so keen on Red Nose Day, etc.
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| And so to bed |
[12 Apr 2009|10:12pm] |
What an exhausting weekend. We walked dogs with friends Friday evening and today, and spent most of yesterday at Mum's for a family dinner. It's getting kind of scary how quickly the kids are growing up. I don't feel old enough to have a little sister with a teenage daughter! The dogs are exhausted from all the exercise - Alfie hasn't even got out of bed to have dinner. I'm soft, so he's laid on his bed, with his head in his bowl, chomping away.
I've managed to give the lawn its first cut of the year. Normally as soon as I think of mowing, it rains. Today, I rushed out to cut the lawn as soon as I thought of it, and finished a good 45 minutes before the cloudburst.
I'm now signed up to twitter as buserian. (grahamrobinson was taken.) Partly this is a disillusionment with Facebook as anything more than a tool for playing silly games, partly because some interesting people seem to be using it, and partly it's because twitterfox makes it actually usable. Dunno how much I'll use it - probably depends if anyone seems to be listening to anything I have to say...
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| Birthday BBQ |
[10 Apr 2009|08:21pm] |
The annual May birthdays BBQ will be held at our house on Saturday 9th May. All welcome. Bring friends, booze, and something to throw on the barbie. We'll probably light the coals about 6pm, though people are welcome to turn up earlier if they wish. Lifts from and to Linlithgow station available all night - last train to Edinburgh at midnight, to Glasgow just before.
Any questions, let me know!
Unfortunately, this year there won't be a bonfire. Someone stole the wood I had stockpiled. Sarah is, of course, devastated.
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| Catching Up |
[02 Apr 2009|09:07pm] |
It's been a while since I blogged, so this one's a bullet-pointed catch-up.
- I'm sleeping better, which means I'm acheiving more, and hopefully am a more generally pleasant person to be around. Having said that, Monday morning was hell, thanks to the whole clock change nonsense.
- I now am the proud(?) possessor of Robot Wars - The Board Game, found in a charity shop in Richmond. It had sufficient plastic twiddly bits to make it irresistable to me. Anyone fancy giving it a go?
- Claire bought me some gorgeous monolithic speakers for the sun room. I got 'em wired up last night, and terrified Zak with the bass rumble they're capable of. Dirt cheap too, so I'm thinking of getting another pair for the kitchen, though I'm not quite sure where they'd fit.
- Other people have been mentioning my birthday, so I guess I should make an announcement. The May birthdays BBQ will be at our place on Saturday 9th May. I'll try to remember to put a proper announcement here and on the Watt Gamers list in the next couple of days. I wasn't going to bother with a Facebook announcement - doesn't seem to reach anyone different.
- Speaking of parties, there seems to have been a general lack of them recently. Also, a lack of people visiting. If things don't improve soon, action may need to be taken.
- We're planning to take the dogs lure coursing again this weekend, hopefully with a couple of volunteers to help with dog holding. I may try to get some video of the youngsters in action.
- Barclays went to the high court to stop me (and you!) reading their tax avoidance memos, so of course I went and read 'em. There is something deeply important missing from these people.
- I thoroughly enjoyed this week's Monday night game. I've been struggling with this recently (partly due to the afore-mentioned lack of sleep) but this week hit the spot with believably evil villains, a decentish action sequence (action being one of my weak points) and a threatened NPC that the players actually cared about.
- Tonight I discovered that I'm the sort of person who gets bored by "Brokeback Mountain" but enjoys "My Super Ex Girlfriend".
Anyway, enough about me. How are you?
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| Lure Coursing |
[15 Mar 2009|06:57pm] |
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Today, we took the dogs lure coursing. This is a form of racing where two dogs chase after a smelly rag attached to a long string and reeled in by a motor. In this case, this all happened in a hillside field, overlooking some gorgeous Fife countryside. The youngsters had great fun. Tara especially wanted to join in every race, bouncing around and trying to pull away from me. The dogs also turned out to be pretty good at coursing. The competition was organised as a knockout - the winner of each race going into the next round. Zak lost his second race, but he was only narrowly beaten by the eventual winner of the non-deerhound group. Tara got as far as the final of the deerhound group before being soundly beaten. We're very proud of both of them, and will return to the chase another time. (Alfie slept through much of this, though he did get a lot of fusses, and seemed quite happy.) Needless to say, all the dogs are now sleeping soundly...
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| Continuum Redux |
[14 Mar 2009|05:50pm] |
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My passing comment about Continuum seems to have caused a little more of a stir than I'd planned. The first thing to keep in mind - when I feel like shit, I'm a bit of a pessimist. My understanding is that there needs to be new blood on the committee to run the Continuum after next, and given who's been asked I'm pretty sure they're scraping the barrel to find that new blood. However, it now seems that even if the whole of the rest of the committee quits without finding replacements (and I've no reason to think that's likely) Darran will just run the con all on his own. Lord knows he's more than capable of doing that, so that's okay after all...
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