Week of 28th June, 2004

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Monday, 28th June

We've had the visit from the electrician - a bit late, but that's OK when he fixes the problem. Which turned out to be NO EARTH AT ALL - there was no connection from the house earth wiring to the supply cable sheath, which is the canonical source of safety earth in UK. A metre of 10mm earth cable (green/yellow sheathed) fixed that, so we are now safe.

A bit substandard, though - apparently, the water pipes are supposed to be bonded together, and to earth. How old this rule is, I don't know, but I would have thought that a builder would have known about it. This suggests that the rule is recent - 6 years or less. Also the consumer unit (aka fusebox) is out-of-date (severely - like 20+ years) and needs replaced.

These works aren't covered by the maintenance contract, but there will be a quote in the post in a week or so, I gather.

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Tuesday, 29th June

Yesterday's electrical works shut all the computers down, including King. When I restarted him, I had to manually start S@H - that's not in the inittab, yet. For that matter, neither is ntpd - which provides a source for automatic time setting on computers within Semi-Detached Bedlam.

Katy complained this afternoon that Armadillo wouldn't connect to the Internet. An hour or so's reinstalling (and no success) later, I realised that Katy had left a cable dangling into the sitting room, and Jane had pinched it in the door when she put a minded child down for a nap. Disconnecting that pinched cable brought everything back up. I complained, and was told that it was my fault(?)

I've told Katy to derig the cable when she goes to bed - but she takes no notice. Jane takes no notice - when she wants to put a child down for a nap, she does it, and to the devil with anything in the way.

Overtime tonight - a half-shift. I'm working tomorrow, and a full night would be too much.

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Wednesday, 30th June

I didn't reinstall the HP printer on Katy's machine yesterday, so I got shouted at this morning. In fact there were 2 shouts - the other one relates to a CD I ordered for her through Amazon Marketplace at the beginning of May. It's still not here, but the CD of Haydn piano sonatas I ordered by post on Monday is. That last counts as very good service - return of post, if you please.

The Amazon order has been chased, by e-mail, but no reply yet. I wonder if the shop (it's in UK) has a 'phone number? Must look it up, if BT's internet directory inquiry service (DQ) will allow such a generic query - company name only, no post town or postcode.

<pause>

And they won't - some form of locality information is required.

To h*ll with it - I'll reorder, from another 3rd party supplier.

<pause>

Done. Don't deal with Amazon marketplace dealer Collectable Records - from feedback on Amazon, they either respond by return or never. There is no in-between. I got the "never" response.

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Thursday, 1st July

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Friday, 2nd July

And, of course, after I wrote that comment on Wednesday, Collectable Records posted the CD, and it arrived today. It's only taken them 2 months.

We've had the quote for the electrical upgrade - something in excess of UKP400. I'll do it, it's needed done for some time, but not for a month or so - after probate, I think. And that may well be soon - perhaps as little as a month. I spoke to the probate people earlier this week, and they're quietly hopeful that things will happen fairly quickly.

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Saturday, 3rd July

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Sunday, 4th July                           Independence Day

For the U.S. of A., that is.

More overtime tonight, another half shift - I'm on the 10 o'clock Ingest shift tomorrow.
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