Yippee

We are all running around the house with smiley faces because this morning the Postie delivered a letter telling us that Luella has been offered a place at Dog Kennel Hill Primary school. This is fantastic news because it is thought of as the best primary school in the area. The ofsted report for 2006 marked it as "outstanding" with grade 1 passes in every area. To be honest, we didn't really think we stood a chance in hell of getting a place there, and still don't quite understand how we have. Ellie is pleased, but mostly because her friends will be there. We are going out to buy some fizz. Yippee and Hurray !

Just Say No To Drugs

As some of you may know, just over a year ago, on Easter Sunday to be precise, I took 2 Ibuprofen tablets and promptly went into anaphylactic shock. 20 minutes later I was in the ressusitation unit of Winchester hospital, with a few tubes sticking out of me and a nice bunch of flowers. And so today, just over a YEAR later, the NHS finally got around to giving me an appointment at the allergy clinic in Guys hospital. A nice lady there told me that I must never take Ibuprofen or any kind of non steroidal anti inflammatory drug again, or I might die. Brilliant eh ? I've got a couple of adrenaline pens and a form to fill in so that I get a special MedicAlert badge to wear. And I have to tell everyone that I am allergic to NSAIDs and how to use an epi-pen. So, in case you need to administer a life saving shot of adrenaline to me or anyone else, heres how you do it....
Take the pen and hold it in your fist so that both ends are free. Remove the grey safety cap from one end . Push the other end into my thigh until you hear it click and me shout "Ouch". Count up to ten. Remove pen. Call ambulance. Buy flowers. But no White Lilies please. (the funeral flower)

Snow White

A while ago we were contacted by a photographer who specialises in creating childrens "fantasy portraits". She was wondering if Luella would like to be transformed into Snow White, and of course we agreed. She would have to come and be photographed at the studio, then the photographer would photoshop in the background, and generally fiddle with the image till it looked just right. And so today, a nice big parcel with the finished prints arrived in the post, and here they are. Luella is absolutely chuffed to bits. If you want something like this for your kids, contact Lorna here.

Horribleness

On the way back from greasy cafe this morning, (where I enjoyed double bacon, egg, chip, beans and mushrooms), I bumped into Monica who is the barmaid who was serving me drinks last night. She was laughing as she approached me, which is always a bad sign. Apparently I was drunk when I arrived, and fell over at the end. In between, I had a pair of flaming lamborghinis, a long island iced tea, and a couple of mojitos. Back at the house, everything was nonsense - wines and fizzes, vodka, cognac, and even green chartreuse. Horribleness.Horribleness.Horribleness.

Friday Night

Still trying to figure out if I fell over or someone hit me.

In The Night Garden

We are all currently transfixed by the latest kiddie madness from Ragdoll productions - Makka Pakka, Upsy Daisy, Igglepiggle, the Tomliboos, the Haahoos, the Pontipines, the Pinky Ponk and the Ninky Nonk - its utterly bonkers in a sort of catatonic, surrealist, hippy trippy fruitcake kind of way. Get your fix daily at 11, 2 and 6.20 pee emms on Cbeebies. Oh, I nearly forgot, there's lots of farting sounds too. Brilliant !

LazyTown

Years ago, long before the pitter patter sound of tiny feet entered our lives, we used to travel the world, seeking out those far flung places where we could lie aimlessly on tropical beaches - careless, oblivious, often obliterated... Days would pass by and pretty much nothing would happen - "What day is it?" I would ask, "Don't know, don't care, fancy another Mekong on the rocks ?" would be the answer...

Occasionally, driven by pure guilt, we would "do something", take a boat/raft/elephant/scooter/taxi and go somewhere, go and see the thing that everyone was supposed to go and see, but soon enough we would be back in the hammock lazing the days away.

These days, I spend most of my time wiping things.

I think it's about time I planned a holiday.

The Colour Pink

In general, I have never been very fond of the colour pink. It seems to me that if you took all the pink things that exist, and made them a sort of moody red instead, then the whole world would look slightly better. Now this may seem a bit extreme, but the trouble is that I have a four year old daughter who has an obsession with pinkness and it is really ruining the decor. Every time I look around the house there is some dreadful pink thing lurking in the corner and it is doing my head in. Pink dolls, pink dresses, pink toys, pink books, pink pink bloody pink - I hate it. It really is a foul colour, and it should be banned everywhere. The only exception I can think of, is when it is used in the sex industry.

Anyway, last week this flowery thing suddenly burst into bloom here in the Mews. It is very nice, especially when you look at it really closely, but I still think it would look better if it came in another colour. According to my mate James, it is some sort of geranium that is native to the island of Madeira, which probably means that it grows wild there. I have a nightmarish vision of an island covered with millions of tiny pink flowers, miles and miles of them spreading out as far as the horizon. For me, it would be enough to bring on thoughts of suicide.
For Ellie however, it would be as near to paradise as she could ever imagine.

The Grand National Result

Bollocks.

The Grand National

Don't forget to get yourself down the bookies and have a flutter on The Grand National - always worth wasting a fiver on an each way bet...

never won anything yet but this year I am backing Dun Doire and Bothar Nar..

Goowaan maa saaan...

More Easter

Easter weekend - chocolate - easter egg hunt - roast lamb. We also went to Paultons Park which is a sort of adventure park for kids. Everyone had a great time, especially Oscar who is fearless. Ony thing worse than the food was the price they charged for it- £3.45 for a slimy hot dog in a wet bun. On Saturday we went to Billy Smarts Circus which was a little disappointing, mostly east european acrobats - what happened to the lion tamers, balancing elephants, puppies leaping through hoops of fire etc ? Those darn animal activists have spoiled my fun again...

Easter Breaks

It's all fun and games this week with Alison flat out busy and me looking after the kids. Yesterday I managed to dislocate Oscars elbow whilst trying to stop him from falling down the stairs, and after god knows how long waiting in A&E yesterday afternoon and this morning they now think he may have a fracture as well (something to do with a swollen fat-pad)... On top of this I have a dozen clients all wanting thier Macs sorted out pronto. Still, on the upside, Oscar was delighted to see a crane (he loves cranes) arrive in the mews this morning to lift Jeremys' piano from the first floor balcony and off to the repair shop.

Processor Speed

It's no wonder we need to upgrade our computers on a regular basis. Not only are chip companies regularly releasing ever-faster microprocessors, but new research has revealed that modern CPUs actually lose megahertz over time.

This startling conclusion follows a five-year research programme carried out by the Illyria University's Information Technology department.

"Five years ago, we activated a dozen new, freshly-purchased systems," said Computer Science Professor Asteio Artikolos. "Since then we have measured, on average, a 10-15 per cent reduction in the machines' clock speeds over that time. It's as if each machine's stock of megahertz were somehow leaking away.

"Each year, we have added new, faster machines. Not only have these seen a similar reduction over time in the number of processing cycles available each second, but the rate of decrease is greater than older, slower microprocessors."

So far Artikolos and his team have been unable to explain the phenomenon. One possibility is that the effect is related to the time dilation effect discovered by Einstein. Any moving body operates on a different temporal frame of reference than a static one, said Artikolis. As processors are clocked higher, so their transistors move more quickly, altering their apparent speed when measured by benchmarkers in a state frame of reference.

"It's certainly the case that many computer users notice a decrease in performance over time," Artikolos told Register Hardware. "A machine that seemed incredibly fast on the day of purchase seems torpid within three years. Traditionally, this was blamed on reduced free hard drive space and the increased memory requirements of software updates. Our research suggests a more fundamental problem, one that centres on the very way modern microprocessors operate."

Artikolos' findings pose an interesting question: where exactly are all these megahertz ending up? More research, he said, was needed.

Intel was unavailable for comment. AMD, however, claimed to be well aware of the problem and to be already designing processors capable of working beyond the limits of Einsteinian mathematics - with a negative temporal displacement facility built in.

"It's why all our processors appear two years ahead of the other guys' stuff," a spokesman said.

MDF

One of my favourite building materials is medium density fibreboard, otherwise known as MDF. Over the last few weeks we have been making some progress with the house and have been concentrating on finishing the hallway and stairs. A couple of weeks ago we clad the ceiling in the hallway with oak faced MDF and it looks very classy in a kind of seventies nautical sauna way. There are a couple of light boxes recessed into it which I made with white melamine faced MDF, and they too look fab. Today we got started cladding the stairs with another very interesting MDF variant made by Fibracolour - it is basically MDF which is solid black throughout its thickness - it looks like welsh slate and even has little flecks in it a bit like you would find in slate. Going to seal it with Osmo PolyX Oil which is absolutely the best stuff for sealing wood, easy to apply, easy to repair, and pretty much bulletproof. Have just ordered a grands worth of floor tiles for the hall, kitchen, loo and bathroom. Looking forward to seeing it all come together.

Fast broadband

This is fun. Providing you have wickedly fast broadband like me and get a result like this (11906 kb per second) of course. Actually, I know I can get even faster speeds when my connection isn't being shared with the 6 other computers on my network as it is at the moment. I'll try again later on when the chaps in the office have all shut down and gone home. Do your own speedtest here... and see if you can beat me , ha ha.

Pat Rae

Pat Rae is a delightful lady who lives in a higgeldy piggeldy house somewhere behind the Horniman Museum in Forest Hill. She spends her time making sculptures, paintings, drawings and prints which she is currently exhibiting at a little gallery in Northcross Road. If you get a chance, pop in and see her - she's jolly nice and you might even buy a pot or painting or something.

Farkin Agents

I wandered past this delightful view on the way home from Sydenham woods on Sunday. OK, sure the agents are vying for business, put this is taking the piss. Isn't there a law against this sort of thing? If i lived opposite I would sneak out in the middle of the night and chop the lot down. I mean, just count them... fourteen - it's utter madness.

St Patricks Night

Last night I went to see the Cosmic Sausages do Saint Patricks night at the Page 2 pub in Nunhead. I was so full of spaghetti Bolognese when I arrived that I could barely drink my Guinness, but I persevered and after a while it started to go down quite quickly. Wasn't long before the Irish contingent started singing along and soon enough the foot stomping and shrieking started. It was a good night out, and I even had my arse felt up by a couple of old dears.

Jedi

Alison got back from Morocco yesterday, and was bearing gifts as usual. We now all wear djellabas whilst slobbing around at home in the evenings. The idea will wear off soon. Mine is black and when I put it on I feel like saying "May the force be with you". Here's a picture of Oscar in his.

Re yesterdays broken laptop: The hard disk still won't spin up.

Last Chance

A mate of mine delivered an iBook to me yesterday that was making strange noises and displaying a flashing question mark at startup. I asked him if he had a back up of the drive, because I know that sound quite well and it almost always means terminal hard drive failure. Fortunately, he had backed up not too long ago. Tried all the usual things and a few others. Drive definitely dead. So I dismantled the laptop which is a bit scary and eventually ended up with a pile of bits, about 30 tiny screws, a magnet, assorted bits of plastic but most importantly the drive itself. Fitted the drive into an external enclosure and tried to fire it up. Still dead as predicted. One last chance.. I have put the drive into plastic bag and put it in the freezer for the night. I still don't expect this to work because I don't think the head is jammed, but apparently, the freezing process causes a the drive head to contract slightly and can release an otherwise kaput disk. Will report back tomorrow.

Consolation

Am surviving thanks to a bottle of homemade Hinton Ampner Apple Brandy, kindly donated by mate Dom.

Update - 20.30hrs - Luke, who has just been to the pub, came round with a spare Guinness for me (still in its pint glass) - nice one.

Luxury

Poor old Alison is hard at work again, this time staying in the Noire d'Ivoire, a riad in the heart of Marrakech. Meanwhile, back in London, the highlight of my week was when Oscar decided to do a pooh in the bath - whilst sharing it with me and Ellie. We even had the spa jets running. It was horrible. Seriously.

On a lighter note, did you know that:

Most lipsticks contain fish scales.
All polar bears are left handed.
A cockroach can live for 10 days without a head.
Women blink nearly twice as much as men.
An ant always falls over on its right side when intoxicated.
Right handed people live, on average, nine years longer than left handed people.

Suck On This

A Coca-Cola Campaign from the mid eighties that went horribly wrong, when someone noticed a hidden picture painted in the ice-cubes - a woman performing "an oral act". Unfortunately for Coke, the campaign was already all over Australia at and had to be withdrawn... click here to see the artwork

QR Codes

QR codes ? What the hell are they ? A QR code is like a barcode but can hold loads more information. With a simple application installed on their phone, users can take a photo and watch the code convert to real text or direct them to other content. OK, so the practicality is what? Well, quite a few things actually. Imagine, you're given a business card with a QR code on it. Snap it and all the donor's details are instantly inputted into your phone. No mess, no fuss. McDonald's have QR codes on all their food wrappers so that patrons can photo and then view the nutritional info on the phone(yeah right!). Loads more innovative uses are springing up all the time... how long til it reaches the UK (given that there are already English versions out on the web)?
You can read more here or click here to make your own.

Freebies

From time to time I pick up a few old iMacs that people don't want anymore, sometimes they are broken but fixable, sometimes they are OK for basic stuff like email and web. Anyway I have just thrown two in a skip, and have 4 left that work. I've given one to Ellie, and she is already an experienced surfer ( ceebeebies website is her fave), and she is getting to grips with Kidpix and textedit. The great thing about these old iMacs is that the mouse is small enough to fit in a kids hand and only has one button. The mac itself can be set up in "simple" mode, and for the most part you can leave the kids alone to get on with stuff themselves.

iMac number two is going to Lola, and numbers 3 and 4 are up for grabs. They are the first iMacs made - very basic with system 9, but useable..

Question is - who wants one ? Just come and get it.

Tractors

We love em. One day I would like to have my own.

Birthday

It is Oscars second birthday today and we celebrated by having a party yesterday. He doesn't really have any mates yet, so he invited a load of Ellies' girlfriends around instead, then stuffed them full of cake and sweets. He was the perfect host and entertained his guests throughout the afternoon, he even dropped his trousers twice during the Musical Statues game. Good lad.

Pancakes

1. The tradition of eating pancakes on Shrove Tuesday is nearly 1000 years old.

2. The first recorded pancake race was in Olney, Buckinghamshire in 1445.

3. The largest number of pancakes tossed in the shortest amount of time in the UK is 349 tosses in 2 minutes (Dean Gould at Felixstowe, Suffolk, 14 January 1995).

4. The longest race in the quickest time was held in Melbourne, Australia. Jan Stickland covered 384m in 59.5 seconds on 19 February 1995.

5. The largest pancake ever made and flipped measured 15.01m wide, 2.5cm deep and weighed 3 tonnes (Rochdale, Greater Manchester, August 1994).

6. It is customary in France to touch the handle of the frying pan and make a wish while the pancake is turned, holding a coin in one hand.

7. Maple Syrup was originally a sweet drink, discovered by the Algonquin Indians who collected sap from Canadian sugar maple trees and then boiled it to produce 1 litre of pure Maple Syrup from 40 litres of sap.

Late Night Viewing

A very long time ago, in a distant land known as "Art College", there was a weekly film club, where we would all gather and watch strange movies whilst drinking cans of lager. For some reason, most of the films had subtitles, which made for difficult viewing whilst under the influence. I can still remember a handful of them though, "Eraserhead", "Freaks", "Satiricon", "Aino Corrida" were all excellent in their own way, but my favourite by far was Fellini's "Roma". For a few years in the eighties I had a video of it, but that disappeared or got recorded over somehow, and I haven't seen the film since. But then, a few days ago, those nice chaps at Film Four put it on and I managed to record it again.

So the other night at about 4 am, Oscar woke up and vomited in his bed (there's a bug going round) and we ended up, just the two of us, watching Roma whilst munching crisps. Not much point in trying to describe it, there's a review here - If you've never seen it then perhaps you should, you will either love it or hate it. Oscar didn't seem much bothered either way.

Dinner

Today I made a moroccan lamb tagine. Every time I make this dish I do it differently because I never use measurements, and always use different ingredients. Sometimes it's ok, sometimes good, and sometimes it's very good. I should make the effort each time to write down how I make it, so that I can get it right every time.
Todays effort involved frying lamb chunks in really hot oil till till very brown then transferring to a pot. Then I browned off some chunks of carrot, potato, parsnip and shallots, then turned the heat down and added some fresh ginger and garlic, and a big helping of nomades lamb tagine spice. By now the bottom of the frying pan was getting dark and sticky so I poured about a glass of leftover cava in to clean it off, then poured that lot in with the lamb. Next was some cumin, and tin of chopped tomatoes and half of one of those mini honey pots you get at hotel breakfasts. Everything is now bubbling away gently. I might add some chick peas and dried fruit later, but probably not. I make couscous by making a stock with butter, boiling water and swiss vegetable bouillon, then just pour it over the couscous and leave it to soak.