As promised...here's a partial update on the latest news.
Ride!
Yikes!Yes, you're right, I haven't posted in a while.
Sorry about that.
Actually. No, not so sorry.
I'll post something decent soon I promise...including:
While Flo and I were waiting for our lunch yesterday, 2 old dudes were on the table next to us having a conversation about something
Old Dude 1: blah blah blah transformational change...blah blah
Flo (loudly): He said "transformational change" daddy!
Me (reddening): Yes, he did honey. It's not polite to listen to other people's conversations though.
Flo (loudly): What's "transformational change" dad?
Me (quietly): A tautology honey.
Flo (indignant for no apparent reason): He said a tautology dad!
Me (to stunned old dudes): Errr...Sorry.
I am the mudder!
We're trapped in a cage!
Come on. Up this mountain daddy!You've probably heard about the BNP membership list being leaked online....interested?
Wikileaks...I love you!
Yes I am on a bit of hiatus from the blog. Got a fair bit going on at the moment, but none of it of interest to the internets (at least not all of it and not now anyway).
I've been mighty annoyed with work recently; it seems that to do anything (e.g. restart a server) I have to attend 2 meetings (to get clearance), get someone to write a detailed instruction sheet (and I mean like "...and then press the [ENTER] key..." detailed) or write it myself, get that "validated" by an "architect" (from a team called ARS...heh)...and all of this 7 days before I need the work done.
Bureaucracy. Gotta love hate it!
Anyway. Coupla things happened today which cheered me up...
- I got a Sony Ericsson Rika (on trial)...is nice.
- I am apparently known as "the device management guru"...[fingernail buff]...should get that as my job title!
- I found £20 stuck to some wet leaves outside my house this morning (at 6am)
- I am so looking forward to being "The Professor" at Es's birthday party it's untrue
- I have Friday off
Yay!
I spent yesterday sat (or laying) on the sofa in front of a fire alongside Mosh.
Rough.
Flo's got impetigo (the grubber little bugger) so she's being doused with antifungal soap every half an hour and admonished not to touch anyone.
Maybe bedrest?
Or cake?
As Flo told me the other morning.
Another thing I never expected to hear her say is (at the top of her voice)...
BE VERY CAREFUL DADDY! DON'T STEP IN MY PENIS!!!
What she actually meant was that she hadn't quite made it to the toilet and she was worried I'd step in the wet patch on the stairs.
I laughed so much I nearly fell back down 'em.
Let's ride daddy!
Chillaxin in front of the fire (note "cushion wall" so "Moshi wont prickle me")Flo's abed. The tubez are quiet...I should finish the iGoogle theme I'm making (so it makes F11 awesomeness on the AAO)...woOOoOooOOoo....Halloween is in teh air!
So. When I've not been working, pratting around with netbooks, offering my services to PRSC, daddying, painting and generally ranting my way through life I have been having a lovely (if incoherent) chat with a gorgeous "girl" by the name of Jennifer.
Here's a picture of "her" that came with her original mail (that somehow got through my spam-filter despite having an originating IP in Nigeria (I thought I'd ignored the entire country. Bah!))
Teh Hawtness!!Date: 2008/10/23
Subject: waiting to hear from you
To: retaliate_tt@yahoo.co.uk
Hi ,
I really appreciate reading your profile, you
sound honest and caring also. I have found it so
difficult to disclose my personalities to just people
but i guess you going to be different. My name is
Jennifer Marson, i am 5''8 tall and am Caucasian
white, am 28 years old British born in a family of 3 [
Dad, Mum and Me ]. I love listening to music whenever
am upset or angry ... maybe feeling bad about
something. We have a very lovely family full of love
and care.
My dad deals in oil business while my mum work as a
teacher in the high school in UK. I wish i could tell
you more but I'll like you to know am going through
difficulties now as my Dad and Mum are both dead.
Though ... before my dad died ... we never been happy
with each other. I've been having a problem with my
Dad who i live with but right now due to our
differences, i have left the UK after the death of my
Mom in United Kingdom. My Dad works with Oil
Contractors in UK and Africa include some parts of the
Asian and American. I work with my father as his
personal auditor and we move around for his contracts
where-ever he is awarded.
My first boy friend, Paul Smart, absconded with my
dad's money which was kept with me after a completion
of a contract in EAST London,UK. When my boy friend
got absconded with the undisclosed sum of $US dollars,
this brought the first broke up between me and my dad,
cos he thought, we have the deal together, but not
knowing that I'm an innocent about this. So my dad has
been harsh and tough against me about this.
Then when I perceived all his behaviors towards me
and the bad acts of his newly gotten wife, i decided
to leave U.K to meet a friend in Lagos in west Africa
whom have meet during our stay there for a contract
with N.N.P.C. I left because my dad have been
treating me bad and stopped me from working with him
even having any access to his assets, and i felt no
where to go than to leave UK. Now, I'm in need of your
help, have gotten the enough money to run myself when
I get to you over there, i want to come over to your
place and stay with you for main time, I don't want to
live here anymore, you know I'm a foreigner here and
it is absolutely dangerous for me here, so that is why
i need your gesture assistance.
How i want you to help me? I have some money, which
I've gotten from an over invoiced Contract
remuneration executed by my dad with some contractors,
so I have taken up the money from the contractors, but
I'm hiding up from the girl I stayed with here in
Lagos-Nigeria, because i might got setup if they know
i have such huge amount of money ($8.5million), so for
me to be more safe and secure, I put this money in a
box and got it locked up with a security code known
to me only, and I deposited the box with some of my
traveling luggage's with a Security and Insurance
Company who render private diplomatic delivery service
and i told them that the two boxes are my traveling
luggage, which I want to send oversea because I'm
returning home, then i paid them up their custody and
security fee.So, I want the box sent to you while i
catch up with you as soon as it is been delivered to
you while I pay you up your Rent charge and a
reasonable amount for compensation, only 25% of the
money in the box to you.
Every arrangement for the delivery is kinda
perfect, I have obtained customs papers for private
freight and there are seals on the box showing that it
is a private delivery and check performed, it is free
from customs checks, it will be delivered at your
door step by the diplomats of the security company,
you do not need to burn out to receive it.
And the boxes have security codes lock known to me
only, only me can open the boxes, except if I tell
anyone the Code, so the Boxes cannot be opened on the
Way of delivery to you. Therefore, I want you to
contact me as soon as possible, so that you can make
the Clearance from the Security Company as the
Recipient of my Boxes. And once the box gets to you, I
will be there with you, then we can open the box
together or i will tell you the code to open it, so
that you can arrange everything properly before my
arrival.
Like I said, I will pay for your rent and fulfill
my 25% promise of the money to you.I have my proof to
make you believe me such as the security company
receipts. I will be very glad and appreciate your
trust towards this and hoping to hear from you and to
meet you in person and that will let me know more
about you . Please, kindly make your urgent response
to my email and tell me what you feel about this so
that we can move on quickly.i hope to hearing from
you.
Thanks,
Jennifer
So. I'm content with a 45 second boot, loads of module customisation and some desktop shenanigans. It seems others aren't, hence KukiLinux (apparently pronounced "cookie linux"...personally I prefer AAOLinux (Ow! Linux)). It looks like this:
Aweseome no?
Awesome. Thanks BoingBoing
I'm indulging in a bit of 419 baiting and so far it's pretty hilarious...I'll post about that soon I should think. Yay I gonna be millionarez!!
I love memes...I also hate the fucking things beyond belief...I might have to keep this rant for later!
There's been the "stuff on my cat" meme.
There's been the "stuff my dog can balance" meme.
O I can has cheez etc but, has there ever been..."cat on my stuff"?
I zapped mosh with some (very very effective) antiparasitic (ain't that a word?) and after the 2 hours it took to "forgive" me (stupid cat) she came back, climbed on my back (and tried to make a bed) and then decided the TV was better. To be clear...the cat sat on my back (so I had to stoop) instead of my lap...and stayed there while I walked around the house (stooped over like a hunchbacked old lady).
The static discharge when I turn the box on or off does not seem to make her do much else than apparently double in size...she looks confused when I do though..
Stupid cat.
If you haven't, read anything you can find by this dude.
And then think about things for yourself!
Flo sucks her thumb. It's fucking up her mouth.
It will stop!
We had a great weekend though...representational pictures will now follow.
We also worked on our monster chasing in the park.
In the process of getting my now sub-40-second booting awesomized AAObuntu netbook (acer thing) to talk nicely with the currently slightly-bricked phone (which will be truly usable as a phone _with features_ soon...honest...one day,srsly).
Angry about my boiler being iffy...I have to keep bleeding the entire system.
Busy being "the paperboy" at work (basically, I ask somebody to fill out a form, add the projecty bits and check the techie bits, send that to someone else (copying in about 100 people) who also checks it, sends it back (and hopefully valid!) Then I send it to someone else, who sends it someone else (and hopefully returns me a "we have it" from them), who magically tells someone (who I was talking to originally and knows what is going to happen and to be honest doesn't even need to be the one doing the work because we've already told them how...and...wait...) that they have to do something [passim]...Anyway, 2 weeks later something gets done. Awesome!
Now running late for FOUND @ the 'fini.
Arse.
Ahahha. Hahahaha. Nerd.
OK. You didn't get that joke. Probably. Unless you are Tek (did you get it?). Maybe...
I have been told to tell the internet (and only a fool thinks "the internet" reads my blog. Foolz! :) about "The Game".
I started this post a while ago...and I believe this is either "coaching" or "grooming" in terms of blogging.
The Game*, is a game I play with Flo. And in my head...with myself. It's like onanism, but with no touching...Wait, did I just mention touching myself and my daughter in the same paragraph? This is all sounding so wrong...
Psychologists and other people, the latter generally more intelligent than me, probably invented this game. But for now, it is my game.
We have 2 subjects/players: A and B.
A: Food to eat?
B: Bacon
A: Eggs
B: Cabbage
etc.
e.g. Word association games....if you say something that doesn't fit the category the person who chose it gets to change it.
[cont]
A: Popcorn
B: Macdonalds
A: MAJOR FUCKING ERROR!!!
A: Rivers of The World!
A: Amazon
B: ebay
A: Fail!
When I play on my own, it's:
A: OMA Management Objects and their publication status?
B: CP, FUMO, SCOMO, DiagMon, SC
A: And?
B: Agh you fuck!
...
B: LaWMO
A: And?
...
B: I fucking hate you!
Then, also...
A: Every Queen album in chronological order?
B: Queen, Queen II, Night at the Opera or maybe Day at the races....or that other one.
A: Haha ha. Wait...
But you can also awesome it up:
Me (after 15 minutes of "animals on a farm", "things i can see with my eyes", etc and so much traffic-noise neither of us can hear, seeing a sign for some kind of cinammon donut snack thing): Simian Bums?
Flo: Monkeys bottom.
Me: Pardon?
Me: Flo?
Flo: You mustn't say "bum". Not in this area. [indicates path, road, M32...sits on hands and pretends to go to sleep]
Me: ROFLMAO!
Me: What should I say Flo? Flo? Flo?
Flo: Parts of monkeys.
Me: [?..]
Flo: I can see a pollution!
That's where we went this weekend.
Pleased!
Uncle Joe has provided some tat's.
We did some gardening also...
And put some makeup on.
And some shades
Yo! Dat Sushi?
Off to "fetch some firewood"....apparently
Goddammnmn this acer is fuckin hot with the quiet fan mod in place....mind you it was pretty hot beforehand, so hopefully it's just down to the general "a laptop is not really a laptop, you shoud put it on a table in front of you" thing, and my legs are just fouling up the vents, etc.
I have some mint video and pictures.
They will follow...
This is a rain hat!
We got very dirty today. Mainly as a protest to my heating/hot-water being broken...
I am well busy at the moment. Well busy. My fingers are in a few pies. Some of which are hot, others cold.
Moshi is asleep on the end of Flo's bed. Who in turn is sprawled recklessly on her back, snoring with the quiet childsnore, seemingly overwhelmed by her duvet.
I saw a dead (and very bloated) cat the other day! At first I thought it was a discarded stuffed animal but as the smell impinged on my nostrils, I realised that (what I had just decided might only be a very very fat very sleepy cat) was actually a totally dead, stomach-gas filled, dead cat. On the pavement.
Mind you, at the time, I was walking through what seemed like a cross between a layby, a truck-drivers pissoir, a whorehouse and the main route into town (Lyon).
Awesome. Work trips, eh?
I got so hacked off with kernel/module hacking I've gone back to the Linpus install on AAO. But I'm using it as an opportunity to write a custom "post-install script" (something like Automatix was for Ubuntu)...and a chance to mess with 8.10 (and as I speak, right now, a debian build!) as a USB thumbdrive boot.
Must dash. I want to stuff some spinach with quinoa before bed.
Fucking hippy.
Awesome Book!
Hard to read...
There is nothing more annoying than a laptop with a tricky wifi configuration. Well, there might be but I'll come to that in a moment.
So. AAO (as the new mini-laptop is appropriately named) is now fine. Ish. A bit of jiggery hackery enabled me to move the filesystem from EXT3 to EXT2 (try doing NTFS->FAT32 in windoze!) with a small amount of hassle. There do seem to be some issues with madwifif drivers vs the kernel drivers, so I may upgrade the whole thing to 8.1 (kernel's updated a fair bit in that release) and deal with the many many updates to come.
I think the SSD will be cool with it. If not...then i will get the soldering iron and screwdrivers out and force it to submit to 120G PATA!
I did manage to get "Cheese" on it though...look!
Everything is pretty sorted apart from that wireless issue. Boot is ~50 seconds compared to ~30 seconds, but disk space is better for sure. I've yet to do a proper comparison of "df -hT" on the OOB linpus (I think it was 56% disk used), my "optimised" config (~48%), default ubuntu (~33%), and a "i'm completely happy with that" install (looking at about ~40% so far). Everything is snappy...I've not gone mental with the compiz settings yet and I probably wont. SD cards are working...
Flo had a proper mental on me today!
Having refused to use any other transport than the buggy to get to the farm, which let's face it is not exactly _far_, refused to look at any animal other than the ducks (who were asleep), shouting at aforementioned ducks until they quacked uncontrollably, demanded to see the animals she'd refused to even look at (hands over eyes) until this point, and being allowed to run around with a small boy telling him "you are the pirate and i am prince atchitaka" (which, did actually look like a lot of fun for both of them). Flo asked for some cheesy-brocoli for her lunch.
It was her choice.
Her decision.
I had _no_ influence on it. We went to the farm cafe...they had cheesy brocolli.
When it turned up, would she eat anything?
Would she fuck!
After 30 minutes of her looking at me through her hair (like some kind of emo teenager!) while I ate my burger (they are very very good!) and not answering me, I lost it and told her that if she wasn't going to even try to eat one mouthful then I would eat it all and then I would explode.
I managed to get one forkful of broc+cauli gratin towards my mouth before floods of tears and wails of woe!!
Flo: You-hoo-hoo ate-ate-ate my lu-luhu-luhuhuhu-lun-ch-chh!!
Me: But you didn't want it and mummy told me you had a big breakfast, so I figured it was OK.
Flo: But, i didn't want that!
Me: But you _asked_ for brocolli!
Flo: But I'm sad!
Me: OK. Let's go
[EXEUNT]
Oh wait...non-journaled. Bah...filesystems. Everything except rapid, small file file tingamaduda where you want MurderFS (As I now think of Reiser) should be journaled...except where you have an SSD....anyway EXT2...meh
Also, dropping your only USB CD drive on the floor while it contains the only working boot disq for 8.04.1 version of ubuntunudebiamthing and yer mac-mini refusing to give up the (assumed) blank CD in its drive...that sucks too.
Oh. You wanted some photos...sorry bout that...
Fig. 1: Awesome is nearby!Last night I raped you with Ubuntu.
I am not sorry.
You don't boot quite so fast.
But at least I have a bit more control over you.
Thanks for that.
Pictures later...
Flo: Can I go in the fountains daddy?
Me: Errr. yeah...not these ones though, the one round the corner.
Flo: Eeeeheeeheeheehehhehehh. I said you could and you let me!!
Me: Well we were going there anyway...Let's go.
Flo: Cos that's how we roll! (rolls on floor)
Me: Look! There's the tiny new gorilla...
Flo: Pick me up!
Me: You are up. On my shoulders...look, the new baby gorilla...he's playing!!
Flo: Pick. Me. Up!
Me: You're as high as you can go!
Flo: Pick (blub). Me (wah). Up!!!!
Me: Ice cream?
Flo: yeehe hee heeaa ugh hugh yeag hoor eh eh h...heee hee he heee!
We went to find the golden-lion-tamarind-monkeys...
Much love to Buckle for being "he blows bubbles!" and H, who's now her fave person in the world for handing out ice cubes! Good luck to Esmae's poorly foot...
_I_ am Ben fucking 10!*
You...can be cousin!**
*or Prince Atchi-Fuckin-Tacha....you can choose
** I have no idea what this is about!
This might get a bit random...I'm sort of writing this post in bits as I tidy up and get myself sorted out for the week. Plus, I'm feeling a bit fragmented anyway.
So. #1, the Acer's pretty much sorted. I'm happy enough with the following: gthumb for photo management (gimp for heavy editing), VLC for video playback, Audacious (a WinAmp clone I've used in the past) for music, Stellarium for geeking at the heavens, XChat for IRC (getting and giving tips/advice), VNC to remote control the mac/tv....Doom (I've yet to figure out what's up with Quake3) and various kid games...yadda yadda yadda. I'm more than chuffed. It roolz!
And it proved a talking point today also.
I should explain. Today was the belated joint celebration of Roise and Uncle Laur's birthdays. A huge portion of the "Rosie-side" of the family (as | think of it) and I went for lunch in a lovely pub just outside Bristol. This involved: Ian (Grandad3 as I, perhaps unkindly, think of him), Uncle Laur and girlfriend Logs, Flo and me in one car + Rose, Es, Baboo and Rose's boyfriend in another and Great Aunt Kathleen (she'll hate being called that I imagine) on her bike.
It was a really lovely afternoon, despite the uppity waitress with our puddings, the strange "sauce tray waitress" who would/could not leave her sauces unattended and the occasional piercing wail from Flo whenever something completely harmless (but obviously truly devastating in her mind) happened. Viz: falling over a molehill, someone bursting a balloon etc....the pub had a lovely garden and all the kids seem to mingle well. Most of the time. Well, sometimes....
The adults where basically completely unorganised. I mean that in a nice way....There were also about 6 billion digital cameras knocking around and all in almost constant use. I kept my 8 MegaPixel phone quiet (and also the 5 Meg samsung) and took a quiet shot of Flo singing a song about her balloon (which she later demanded to "pop by jumping"). Kids are fucking weird!
We went for an unexpectedly muddy walk for the rest of the afternoon and got occasionally brambled to boot.
Yesterday, Flo and I went for trip on the little train and stopped at "the caffffff" for a juice and a biscuit before going to the museum for a while and then having a (very delicious) pizza. She spent a lot of time on my shoulders being "Prince Atchitaka riding Hearku" because her new shoes were rubbing a bit. Apparently, when I am Hearku I am not allowed to talk or neigh. That said, my random neighing had been freaking out other passers-by....
I bask in my non-nuclear family...wait, does that mean it's particle physics again? If so, I'm teh anti-neutrino....you can be a strange quark.
