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Below are the most recent 19 friends' journal entries.
| Tuesday, January 5th, 2010 |
taimatsu
|
7:35p |
|
emperor
|
6:39p |
the definition of fun...
...does not include cycling home in moderately-heavy snow-fall. It stings my eyes, makes visibility difficult, and the road surfaces hazardous (even the semi-main roads on my commute had snow on them, despite the gritting). Still, I made it in one piece! |
emperor
|
10:59a |
Christmas decorations...
Poll #1507466 Undecorating
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 95 When should Christmas decorations be taken down? When are you taking your Christmas decorations down this year? |
| Sunday, January 3rd, 2010 |
j4
|
9:12p |
Ten Years Asleep
Happy new year! So, that decade meme. A few points before I start: 1. It's surprisingly hard to reconstruct the LiveJournal-less years, and surprisingly hard to reconstruct some of the actual events even from the years with a LiveJournal (I do seem to write an awful lot of rubbish, don't I?). 2. I've not gone into details about all the relationships because I don't know to what extent other people want to forget things, particularly since most of them are now in other relationships too; the only ones I've mentioned are the ones which I'm fairly sure are public knowledge. Shout if you want me to delete anything. 3. It's surprisingly hard to find any kind of narrative thread. I did some stuff, and then did some other stuff. (I guess that's life; maybe if I spent more time on it I could turn it into a real story, but then it'd be a grillion words long and nobody would read it.) It came as quite a shock to the system, though, after 19 years in full-time education, just how little structure there is to life when you're not subject to the tides and terms of a school or university. I think that's one of the reasons I wanted to go back, if I'm honest with myself; I still like being able to divide the year up into terms and holidays, though I'm starting to find my own kind of rhythm to things in addition to that. 4. This is long and boring and I don't really expect anybody other than myself to be interested in it! There's no easter-eggy tickybox-poll at the end to see if you did read all the way through, I promise. So, here goes... ( 2000: studying, romancing, examining, defecting, working )( 2001: Perl-munging, driving, househunting, singing, drinking )( 2002: moving, festivalgoing, blogging, driving, engaging )( 2003: driving, disengaging, quitting, fiddling, volunteering )( 2004: temping, crying, webmastering, escaping, loving )( 2005: moving, raining, working, eating, singing )( 2006: meeting, twittering, moving, returning, rethinking )( 2007: jobhopping, geeking, engaging, running, spodding )( 2008: running, queueing, marching, planning, waiting )( 2009: wedding, running, homeowning, protesting, sparkling )And now here we are in 2010, continuing to potter along through life. I've done a lot in the last 10 years; I've done next to nothing in the last 10 years. It all depends where you're standing. Either way, though, it's a lot of coffee-spoons. End of a decade: it's nothing special. |
lnr
|
4:25p |
Bikes and Birds
Today we set out to see if we could follow NCN11 all the way to Stansted Mountfichet, where it apparently runs out. On the way (and before we set off) we did our best to make a start with our copy of the Usborne Spotter's Guide to Birds, which was a present from mum (she gave us each a copy, and kept one herself).
NCN11 review: much better than expected. It has some of the usual flaws (trying to use the pavement on busy stretches, with dismounts for side roads, and some slightly long detours) but once it got to Hinxton it was actually lovely, with some great single track roads, and the one big detour was a lovely route so well worth it, and probably only added a couple of miles. It needs a better route between Shelford and Hinxton really we were wondering if it's the ford/mini-bridge at Duxford that puts them off the Little Shelford/Whittlesford/Duxford route instead.
It's been an absolutely gorgeous day, even if a bit cold. Cold enough that we found there were a few places which still had snow on the road, never mind icy puddles, and one tiny one-track road had a 100m section which was basically ice the whole way across the road. We got off and walked up that bit! Totally beautiful though, and we had a lovely time, and got to Stansted Mountfichet just 15 minutes before the hourly train home, which couldn't have been much better timing!
Route map extracted from the GPS here: http://www.bikely.com/maps/bike-path/2010-01-03-NCN11. Almost exactly 25 miles.
And here's the birds we've seen:
- Blackbird
- Blue tit
- Carrion Crow
- Chaffinch
- Common Gull (maybe)
- Fieldfare
- Goldfinch
- Grey Heron
- House Sparrow
- Magpie
- Moorhen
- Pheasant
- Robin
- Rook
- Starling
We're fairly sure we saw both rooks and crows, given a good look at legs and beak with the binoculars, and the crows being in pairs and the rooks in larger groups. The gull I'm less sure wasn't a Herring Gull though: from a distance it's hard to tell size, but the book describes the common gull as being more northern, but sometimes southern and inland during the winter, and doesn't mention the herring gull coming inland, which is what made us initially decide that's what it was. Herring gulls score fewer points though, so I suspect since we saw several more later on that that's what they were. The fieldfare was definitely a treat though, since I don't think I've seen one before, and from the drawings it couldn't really have been anything else: the pale front, rich brown back and grey head were very distinctive.
Brilliant day out.
Now with added Photos: over on Facebook (public link) |
| Friday, January 1st, 2010 |
lnr
|
6:29p |
Books of 2009
This year I got re-hooked on LibraryThing, and as an approach to gradually cataloging my books I've made an effort to add and review every book I read this year. The result is 64 books finished, and two borrowed ones I'm partway through. Quite a few were re-reads, and a reasonably large selection were children's books, or the total would be rather lower. I shall continue cataloging next year, although perhaps I won't keep up the reviews. You can see this year's selection here:
Books of 2009 |
lnr
|
4:15p |
First ride of 2010
I'm surprised to find that once round the block is nearly 2 miles. Just far enough to test my new Nuvi 550 that Mike spoiled me to for Christmas. And to discover that it really was far too cold for cycling without gloves. And having come back in I've worked out how to translate the data into a format I can import into bikely for a map of where I've been. Yay!
I wonder if embedding works:
Apparently not, oh well, I'll leave this one anyway. |
| Wednesday, December 30th, 2009 |
lnr
|
6:11p |
Mini rant
Dropped a prescription off at the GPs today. We're supposed to leave 2 working days before collecting at the local chemist. The note on the drop-off box this morning said they'd be available next Wednesday afternoon. That's over a week! Now I know it's New Year, but that's only one day of bank holiday. Interlink Express aren't doing deliveries today or tomorrow either, so the parcel I missed before Christmas can't be redelivered until I'm back at work.
In non-rant news Christmas was lovely. Just under a week at mum and dad's, and grandad was staying for much of it, as well as Steph, Dave, Oliver, Em and John staying overnight on Christmas Day itself, and an uncle and aunt and small cousins round on the 23rd too. We might not have done much, but I think we all had a lovely time, and it was really relaxing. (Photos largely contain the baby, so are not public). |
ali_in_london
|
11:37a |
|
ewx
|
11:25a |
|
| Tuesday, December 29th, 2009 |
taimatsu
|
8:08a |
|
| Saturday, December 26th, 2009 |
ewx
|
10:17p |
Wareham
The rain stopped just as we arrived and started up pretty much as
we set off home.
( More ) |
| Friday, December 25th, 2009 |
ewx
|
12:54p |
Herodotus on how to cope with a recession
[2.136] The priests told me that Asychis
succeeded to the Egyptian kingdom after Mycerinus. He built the
eastern gateway of the sanctuary of Hephaestus, which is the most
magnificent and by far the largest. All the gateways have figures
carved on them and countless other marvels of construction, but this
eastern one easily outdoes the others. They said that during his
reign there was a severe financial recession and so a law was passed
that a person might use his father’s corpse as security to take out a
loan. There was a rider to the law, however, to the effect that
the lender also became proprietor of the whole of the borrower’s
burial plot, so that if the mortgagee refused to pay back the loan, as
a penalty neither he nor any other member of his family could have
access on their deaths to burial in the family tomb (or indeed in any
other tomb either). They say that Asychis wanted to outdo the
Egyptian kings who came before him, so he built as his monument a
pyramid made out of bricks, and had the followed words chiselled in
stone on it: ‘Do not compare me unfavourably with the pyramids
of stone. I surpass the other pyramids as Zeus surpasses the other
gods. For I was made out of mud, which was collected from a pole it
had stick to when the pole was plunged down into a lake.’ So
much for Asychis’ achievements. |
| Thursday, December 24th, 2009 |
emperor
|
10:01p |
Merry Christmas!
I'm sneaking in a quick spod before we head out for Midnight Mass. This seems a good time to wish all of my fiends a very Merry Christmas, and happy 2010! |
ewx
|
6:22p |
Tube (2)
I fairly often have cause to go form King’s Cross to Waterloo (and subsequently back again). Usually I take either the Victoria or Piccadilly line and change onto the Northern Line at Warren St or Leicester Square; is one of these likely to be reasonably reliably quicker than the other? Or is there some quicker route still I could take? |
ewx
|
6:19p |
Tube (1)
They are now advertising Google Chrome on the tube. |
|
cartesiandaemon
|
1:23p |
Black Tie Preferred Birthday Party, 9th Jan, Cartesian Heights
There will be a birthday party for me: * Black tie preferred (but optional. fancy dress also encouraged as an alternative.) * At my house (Cartesian Heights, Sherbourne Close, email for directions) * 8pm til late * Sat 9th Jan. (My birthday begins at midnight) * There will be food, drink, etc. Presents not necessary, but drink and snacks helpful. Everyone is invited, but if you're not sure, please email. Other halves welcome. You can also comment at http://jack.dreamwidth.org/607847.html using OpenID.  comments so far. |
|
cartesiandaemon
|
10:17a |
|
ewx
|
12:33a |
Sunglasses
A few days ago I lost my sunglasses. I knew I still had them when locking up my bike, and that I didn’t have them when I went outside a few hours later, but they weren’t in their usual location in the pocket on the front of my jacket and there was no sign of them on the floor or ground anywhere I’d been in the intervening time.
I did without for a couple of days, which wasn’t exactly ideal with the sun reflecting off snow or damp roads.
Then:
( Read more... ) |
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