Week of 1st January, 2001

Last Week

Monday, 1st January

I got to work on the installation of the new radio/CD player in Hopalong, today. The physical side was easy, even the cabling, since the old unit had ISO standard connectors, as does the new one. This meant that after changing the DIN 'E' style mounting sleeve, the unit just plugged in and worked.

Or at least the CD did - radio reception was conspicuous by it's absence. I proved that the fault was the 5 metre extension cable that runs from the motorised aerial to the radio. Trouble is, that cable is woven into the structure of the car - it's the original one, and is about 12 years old. I'll have fun extracting it and putting in a replacement, which I don't have yet. Tomorrow.

Back to Daynotes


Tuesday, 2nd January

Sure enough the aerial cable proved to be a pig to change. The old one was well loomed in, and proved impossible to extract, so I followed the route with the new cable, which involved much bending and stretching on my part to reach some of the more obscure places.

Eventually, I'd got it fitted, only to find that the 4 metre cable I'd bought was about 60cm too short. Rats! I bought another cable, but the only one I could find was 2 metres long. Then I had to persuade the replacement cable behind a body panel, by trying to use the old as a pull cord. No luck, the cable was well loomed in, and the socket on the end of the old cable just would not pull through.

As I reached this stage, Jane and Katy returned from a shopping expedition. Katy noticed that Sarah and Jenny were watching a video she had been asking about, and asked if she could join in. I just blew up in frustration - all Katy wants to do, it seems, is wear out my tape archive of science fiction TV (this was 'seaQuest DSV').

However, this had a beneficial result - Katy and Jane helped me to thread that cable in. We also tidied up the cable from the transmitting aerial that has been hanging loose for years. Then I buttoned it all up, and sat down for a well-deserved coffee. That cable had taken about 4 hours to fit - the radio less than one.

Back to Daynotes


Wednesday, 3rd January

We have an over-sufficiency of people, compared with machines, these days - which means there's a minor (and gentlemanly) fight over gear to do work with. And the shelves are still full.... including the big re-edit job that has my name on it.

Back to Daynotes


Thursday, 4th January

I made a discovery at work today - one piece of gear has an audio input that is wired out of phase compared to the other input. This is embarrassing, since it means that mono audio will cancel - or at least be very poorly localised.

The kit in question is one set of VHS recorders - we use these for making copies of programmes for subtitling - the company subtitles all purchased programmes  (with the notable exception of children's cartoons - but that's another story). We send out a script and a VHS with a time code on it, and a specialist subtitling house translates the script and times the texts against the supplied VHS. They send us back a floppy disc, which we load onto our system and play out using the time code derived from the transmission tape.

Of course, if the subtitle house can't hear the dialogue, they can't spot texts against it - big problem.

The wiring in this area is fairly insanitary - the VHS's are semi-pro machines, with unbalanced phono audio inputs, but the rest of the area wiring is balanced screened. There is no proper unbalancing - they saved too much money. Balance-to-unbalance boxes run UKP60-odd per each, and we need 8. Must agitate for this to be sorted - probably a matter of swapping two wires in a punchdown block, but I couldn't find it in dim light at 11 PM. Maybe there's a chance to get it sanitised, since we've just got new time code reader/inserters (which read the timecode and burn the numbers into the picture for people to read).

Of course, this was prompted by a 'PJ' (private job). I'd never have found out about it in the normal run of things.

I got two weeks worth of re-edits done today, in between line feed recordings for tape delay and/or repeat. Mind you, there are normally more such feeds, but the Christmas/New Year break seems to have got longer across the pond.


Jane is taking my mother down to Swansea this afternoon. She will return Saturday.

Back to Daynotes


Friday, 5th January

I managed to get the snafu over mobile handsets partially sorted today. I've not mentioned this before, so a bit of background is in order.

We decided to get Katy a mobile 'phone for Christmas, having seen an advertising flyer from BT Cellnet, which implied that for a one-off payment of UKP99 we could get a second 'phone on Jane's account, with 200 minutes a month of airtime at no further charge (the 'Group Net 99' tariff). Sounds good, especially since the flyer implied that these minutes are usable at any time Cellnet-to-Cellnet. An inquiry call to Customer Services seeed to bear this out, so we ordered.

Immediately after ordering, we checked on the tariff details - just in case. And of course, everything we'd been told was wrong - the minutes are off-peak (evenings and weekends only). No way to unorder the 'phone handset - but the 'phone slave said, 'no problem, just send it back'.

Then we found a tariff that supports inclusive, anytime minutes, and ordered another handset, on that tariff (Net 50).

Last week, I discovered that the second handset was on the Net 99 tariff, so I requested a tariff change. That is still pending as I write, since 'the Accounts people have a backlog after Christmas'.

Comes now time to return the unwanted handset. I need a bag for this, but I had to play telephone tag, and fight call queueing systems to order it. It took me an hour, but the bag is on it's way (about 10 days...)

Back to Daynotes


Saturday, 6th January

Jane returned to London this afternoon, after a rather tiring trip - sun glare from behind made things rather uncomfortable.

In the evening, just before I set off for the company Christmas party (called a 'Twelfth Night Party'), our neighbour brought back a rather bedraggled Tom, with a gashed rear paw. We washed it, and secluded him, in hopes of it healing naturally. I then had to wash blood spots out of my only long-sleeved white shirt. I normally wear short-sleeved shirts, but they don't work with a tie, under a double-breasted suit jacket.

Back to Daynotes


Sunday, 7th January

The party was a good one, a slap-up meal (much better than my old employer's party last month, nouvelle cuisine that it was) and a disco - not as loud as some, I'm glad to say. A cash bar, not free unfortunately, but I wasn't drinking alcohol after the meal - it was 20 miles each way, and the cab fare would have been extortionate. Rooms were bookable (it was in a hotel and conference centre) but UKP65 for a single room struck me as a bit steep too.

Back to Daynotes

Next Week