Quick Dry

I'm not sure if there is a Guiness Book of World Records category for tumble drier purchase, but if there is I want to submit an entry.

Our tumble drier broke last night. We've had it 21 years and it goes and fails on us.  Actually the drier itself is fine, but the bit which makes it stop was broken. We found this out after it had tumbled a bunch of clothes for three hours. Ooops.

Anyhoo, having been told in a couple of shops that they didn't have what we wanted (I reckon the bigger the store the less chance of it actually having the thing you went in for) we found a place that did. So we swooped. Into the shop, pick it up, take it to the till, pay for it, less than five minutes.

And it works. And it stops. Wonderful.

Pinball

We were driving back up to Hull today and I was listening to BBC Radio 2 (not a thing I do lightly - unless Terry Wogan is on). They have this feature where people get to pick their favourite tracks. This week it has been Harry Shearer, who is one of the voices of The Simpsons (he does Mr. Burns, Smithers and a whole bunch of others).

And one of the tracks that he picked was Pinball by Brian Protheroe. One of my all time favourites.  Got the single in the loft. What are the chances?

Of course as soon as I got home and on line it was time to try and track down the track. Google and Ebay have provided me with links to his new home page and a cheap copy of his greatest hits. And Napster now have one of his albums on there as well. Amazing.

(Oh, and you really must hear his track "Never Join the Fire Brigade" as well - wonderful stuff)

Good Weather for Ducks

On holiday today. Went to Slimbridge, a duck sanctury. On the way there it rained. And I mean really rained. We were driving through flooded roads and everything. Real frontier stuff. I was almost wishing I had one of those horrid 4x4 type cars that some people think are cool.  Almost, but not quite.

When we got there the place was pretty packed. Lots of little kids in shiny (but not for long) wellies. Lots of parents looking out of the restaurant window at the driving rain and wondering what on earth to do for the next three hours. As we walked in they announced our arrival with a fire alarm. Which was nice, and did make the queue for the food a lot shorter.

Fortunately, and for reasons that I can't fully explain, the weather brightened as I ate my baked potato with cheese (and very nice cheese too) so after our meal we were able to go out and take some pictures of the birds. I was trying a new "down and dirty" technique with the photographs which involves holding the camera very close to the ground. Makes the snaps a little more interesting.

Some birds (no idea of the names)

Some Flamingos (pretty sure on this one)

Probably ducks, and pretty big ones too

New fave shirt logo

New fave shirt logo
Originally uploaded by RobMiles.

Goodbye Mark

A few weeks ago Mark Johnston of Microsoft told us he was moving on from the Academic beat and going into to something to do with development. Very sad. Microsoft people do move around within the company rather a lot, it is just the way they do things.

We have worked with Mark for quite a while, definitely one of the good guys, and it will be quite a wrench to see him move on. Anyhoo, best wishes for the future Mark.

As a mark of respect I have sent him a set of "24 Top Trumps" cards.  There is no higher honour.