Sorry about the rather poorly updated blog. I’m tired. Work is very busy. I’m experiencing something that I haven’t for a while: I’m actually enjoying work.
Bizzarre.
Just chilling at the moment and listening to some of the cool music I’ve bought recently.

Sorry if you’ve been looking for piglet.no-ip.org. It’s been down- not due to a failure, I hasten to add. The *very* old Pentium 150 that hosts this site is reliable, as is the Debian GNU/Linux OS, and the other very old machine that firewalls things. At short notice, we had a visit from the damp-proof course injection people on Tuesday, which meant I had to down the site on Monday night, in case they needed the power off. Tuesday was hugely busy at work, (with some out-of-hours work too) so the site has been down until now.

We’ve spent a really nice weekend: Saturday afternoon and evening near Ashbourne at The Dog and Partridge which is a very agreeable pub, and today has seen us actually do some more Geocaching on the way back through Staffordshire for a change, instead of not doing much besides the (very) rudimentary housework or slobbing about generally. Feel a lot better for it too. Thoroughly relaxing, apart from the 4×4 driver who saw us doing 60mph, thought ‘f–k it, it’s only a Polo’ , and then pulled out. Nice.

I’ve spent the last two evenings (or at least some of them) looking at a PC for a friend’s nephew. Problem as reprted: internet connection no olonger working. They’d already taken it to a PC shop somewhere that said winduhs windows wanted reloading.
That’s one approach, but here’s the actual problem:
1. The modem seems to be [expletive deleted] (but I’m not absolutely sure yet).
2. The 3 virus infections and 263 assorted pieces of spyware, malware and pr0n dialler software.
The internet really is no place for the curious but inexperienced person with a windows PC is it? All this stuff is well evil. It installs (often shipped along with some downloaded software like kazaa), and proceeeds to really bugger things up. This PC took about 20 minutes to start up fully.
It’s about 90% fixed now, but how long for? My windows PC is clean, but then again, I know that if ‘The Gator Information Network’ offers me some crappy piecxe of software, it won’t be anything I’d like.

It might be nice for Morecambe to get mentioned for something other than the recent tragedy involving illegally employed cockle pickers, or the general decline it was noted for.

I actually really like Morecambe. It’s British seaside, with some really nice buildings from the two boom eras (the 1930s and the late 1800s) of the British seaside. It *is* a bit rough in places, but there’s quite an effort to improve it.

The real jewel, architecturally, is the Midland Hotel, whch brings me eventually to my point.

I love Art Deco and 30s buildings in general. What good ones are there (and if they’re near the West Midlands, all the better). I know about some of the London ones (eg Hoover, Daily Express), but what about elsewhere?

If you want to see more about the Midland, look at the twentieth century society’s site. It’s due to be the subject of a Granada TV show later this month too.

The new job seems great. Lovely surroundings, a nice place to work, and, as another recent departee from my previous employer noted ‘Indoor Plumbing’. (OK, this comment is a little unfair, as the lack of the same is due to building work), but hell, it’s funny.

The really embarrasing thing about going to any half-decent sized record shop these days is the other customers in the ‘Metal’ section. It has to be a decent sized shop to have a dedicated metal section of course.
I’ve got nothing against teenagers, unless they’re disco-dancing to Linkin Park, but it’s embarrassing buying music next to them. For all concerned.
Anyway, must go. I’ve got a Korn hoodie top to find……

piglet.no-ip.org has been down again today, for a short time, because I’ve had the sparkies in to do a couple of small jobs, and my spare-room datacentre doesn’t have a UPS. I’m capable of doing the work, but I’m just too damn lazy I think. More and more I eschew DIY in favour of PSE (pay someone else). This meant that some other bloke got to lift floors and chase out walls while I read my ‘Far Side’ books. I’d just never get round to it.

Not ‘between jobs’ as in ‘I’ve been sacked and haven’t found anyone dumb enough to employ me’. Yestardays beerfest was due to the fact that I’ve now left the employ of The University of Wolverhampton after not quite 4 years. A very mixed experience indeed. I’ve worked with some really clever people there, and as with anywhere else, some erm….. less talented people. (and if you’re seeing this page from the referrer logs, then yes, you are one of the former!)
One really nice thing was one of the really clever ones saying I should keep them in mind should I need an assistant :-O at my new job, which starts on Monday. I’m not ‘between jobs’ for very long.

For reasons I’ll go into in another post, yesterday I consumed an unusually large amount of alcohol.
*But* I haven’t had a hangover today. God alone knows how. Lunchtime was a just a sociable five pints, and the evening added at least the same again, and a warp-speed bus journey from Wolverhampton to Walsall. Not quite the beer scooter effect, as I was at least concious (and indeed able to operate a phone well enough to slur at my better half).
I’ve noticed though, that even then I hadn’t drunk enough. I can’t have done, as I woke up thirsty at 3am. I do think that I’ve managed to find the best pub in Wolverhapton city centre. The Posada has heavy rock music, decent beer, and no discernable tossers, which is a big plus on many other pubs.