Week of 13th December, 2010

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Monday, 13th December

More packaging of movies, and idiot me succeeded in exporting a movie with a 3 sec black hole at the mid-reel join. Luckily the previewer spotted it - this guy is one of the old-school previewers, not the new, 5-day-weekling guys, and he's good.

So I re-edited, and re-exported. One of my colleagues will check the result tonight. This movie airs on January 2nd, and we need a Russian track for it for that transmission. Can you say "rush job"?

What the h*ll have Highwinds Media (Demon's outsourced netnews provider) done to their service? Normally (up until about last week) I get one blast of news posts when I fire up Turnpike, and then extra files as and when they're discovered by the 10 minute polling loop. Now I keep getting "News server busy" and multiple retries - and maybe, if I'm very lucky, an occasional news post. The Turnpike log looks ridiculous.

But then, netnews is very old hat. No-one cares about it, except a few old-timers and traditionalists - regardless of the fact that it's one of the best ways of communicating asynchronously with other people who share your interest. That and mailing lists - and Google and Yahoo have ruined the archives for both e-mail and netnews by web-ifying them.

I've decided that I need a new way of mounting mobile 'phone, satnav and radio transceiver control panel in Nicole. Currently, the Blackberry lives in my pocket, and the AvMap GPS and FT-8900 detached control panel live on windscreen suction mounts. This is more than somewhat obtrusive, not to say quite possibly illegal. So I've been researching dash mounting - and I don't want to drill holes.

As far as I can tell, one of the canonical ways of doing non-destructive mounting of this type is with Brodit Proclips. These devices, custom made for each car, snap into joints in the dash, and can be removed without harm if required. Brodit don't sell to the public, but in the UK Clove Technology are stockists. So today I ordered some bits - a passive cradle for the Blackberry (non-powered, so it doesn't charge the 'phone) which includes your choice of Proclip in the price; another Proclip (for the other end of the dash) for the FT-8900 control panel; a doubler plate to allow 2 devices to mount on one Proclip, and a tilt/swivel mount for the AvMap. The AvMap has a special mounting slot configuration, which seems to be original to a German company called Herbert Richter, and Brodit do a tilt/swivel mount with a Richter fitting on the front. We'll see if it fits.

At some future time, I'll probably replace the Brodit passive cradle with an active one, which would charge the 'phone. But I don't want one that requires plugging in a micro-USB connector, all same Brodit's active cradle does. A Blackberry 9700 has charging contacts on the edges of the case, at the bottom, but I've only managed to find one cradle that uses these - it's by Smoothtalker, in the States.

Oh yes, and my Christmas list includes the Blackberry charging pod, which uses those side contacts. That will likely live by my bed, so that I can use the BB as an alarm clock - which it does, and very well too.

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Tuesday, 14th December

Since we're in the run-up to Christmas - I picked up the tree on Saturday - Jane has been putting up decorations, which mostly seem to be fairy lights. LED ones. In particular, there's a set wound around the banister rail on the lower stairs. That set is plugged into the wall on the landing outside our bedroom, and the cable was run across the floor to the head of the stairs, with a (small) Egyptian rug spread over it to mitigate the tripping risk.

That was yesterday. Overnight, Splodge the kitten decided, in her wisdom, that she was going to chew the cable. Luckily for her, since she succeeded in severing it, it only runs at 24 volts. But one of the three strands is missing about 2 inches of it's length. So Jane wanted me to fix. To do that, I need tools - specifically a set of wire -strippers. And where's my toolkit? Took me half an hour to find it, but after that the thing was fixed in jig-time. After that, I worked out a way to keep the cable out of Splodge's reach - don't need to be doing this more than once.

Splodge is doubly in Jane's bad books, because she also scratched the aforementioned Egyptian rug - a hand-woven one.

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Wednesday, 15th December

It has finally been accepted that Dora is incapable of caring for herself, and she has been allocated a place at a local residential home - not quite as local as we'd like, but close enough. This is temporary, pending Dora's approval of the situation - the which there should be no problem with, since she's already forgotten that she has ever lived anywhere else, and she's very happy.

So Jane and cousin Liz are clearing out the flat. And other than inherited things, there's nothing that shows Dora was ever there - she didn't keep anything of her own. So that work is ongoing.

I have to see about a problem with Hopalong's air conditioner - there's no heat. I had hoped that the problem would be a mere blown fuse - that I could fix. But no, the fan is running, so it's more than a fuse. I'll have to take him into the local aircon specialist - which will mean $hekels. But needs must, especially since it's quite cold at the moment, and there has been snow. Not much here in London, but outside the city, and especially up north, things are bad.

Sarah and Jenny are supposed to fly off to Bulgaria for a week's skiing at the weekend, and Katy flies back to UK a week today. She then has a doctor's appointment, before disappearing to Canturbury with Jane for 2 nights. And I'm supposed to get Hopalong fixed in time for that? No chance - I'm working tomorrow and Friday, followed by Monday and Tuesday. The shift rota has been changed, to ensure that I'm working over Christmas, since I wasn't last year.

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Thursday, 16th December

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Friday, 17th December

Work was work - all FCP, since I'm on earlies.

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Saturday, 18th December

I'm a glutton for punishment - overtime today. Another early. And it's snowing again - quite heavily. 6 inches or so, even in London. When I left - early - the roads were slushy over ice. Not good. Worse tomorrow, I suspect.

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Sunday, 19th December

Jane didn't take Mum to the cafe for lunch yesterday, so I was deputed today. A good outing, although Mum is getting forgetful. But then, so am I.

In the evening, clam chowder, to an American recipe, courtesy the mother of one of Jane's client mums. and very nice it was, too.

 
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