Yesterday we got another couple of fence panels painted – only about another 85 to go. (We started off with 97 to do, and it’s a shitty boring job, but it’s going slowly)

One fence panel, half done

The wood is very dry, so it’s sucking in the treatment as soon as it’s applied. Probably means we’ll need to do a second coat at some point, but I need to get the lot done first.

Every night, I go up to the chickens (AKA The Girls) and lock them up for the night. It’s a routine, and as such Hound now has it in her head. If I don’t do it, she gets very stressy, and won’t settle until all The Jobs are done.

Last night I was going to do some shopping, and had put Hound in the car. I then went up the garden to put The Girls to bed. Herself warned me at the time that I’d have to go back up there when we got home, because Hound hadn’t seen me go and do it.

Lo and behold, we got back at about ten PM, and Hound wouldn’t settle until I’d gone back up the garden. Any time I moved she’d dash off to the back door, and wait expectantly for me to go up and put The Girls to bed.

I still don’t quite know who’s in charge in our household – whether it’s Hound or Us. In her head we’re definitely both the pack leaders telling her what to do, and also the sheep who need to be told what to do…

With the May Bank Holiday we get another long weekend – and a much needed one, all things considered.

Even better, I’ve got a three-day working week next week, as we’ll be off down to Malvern for a weeks holiday on Friday.

I don’t know what we’ll get up to in Malvern – well, except for visiting Malvern Show, which we’ve already booked the tickets for – but it’ll be good to have the time off.

And in the meantime I’m going to aim at catching up on some sleep, and getting some writing-type bits done for the week while we’re away. Because I’m sad like that.

One of the things that’s always irritated me about Herself’s iPhone is the piss-poor battery life it gets in everyday use. She has to recharge hers pretty much every day, which after a while just gets depressing. After all, it’s a step back to when I had my first digital mobile, back in 1994 (an Orbitel 902, if anyone cares) which needed charging daily. Since then my phones have gone up to being charged about twice a week at most, so going back to daily charging was always going to be a bit of an arse.

As a result, when I got my iPhone, I also ordered a Mophie Juicepack Air, which is an iPhone case with a built-in battery pack, which pretty much doubles the usable time of the iPhone. And of course me being me, it’s in a bright purple. You can get other colours, but once I saw the purple there wasn’t going to be any other colour that worked.

It’s taken nearly a week to get here, but it arrived yesterday and is in use now. And so far I’m damn impressed with it.

Battery life is definitely extended, it’s been easy to fit, set up and charge, and all told so far it’s a nice bit of kit.

A further review will follow in the next couple of weeks, I’m sure.

I have to say, O2 are very impressive when it comes to delivering upgrade phones.  I ordered the iPhone on Sunday afternoon, and on Monday it arrived at the office.

Of course, as I wasn’t in the office on Monday that made it a bit more awkward, but it was here on the desk when I came in on Tuesday, which meant that last night was spent setting it up, getting everything sorted and taking data etc. from old phone to new phone.

So far it’s all worked pretty well. Moving the contacts over is a piece of piss because I use Zyb, which is an online storage for contacts. Sync from old phone to Zyb, get the Zyb iPhone app and download from Zyb to new phone. That’s it. (And before any fanboys start piping up, that’s been easy because of Zyb, not because of the iPhone)

So yeah, it’s all OK so far. Set up the things I need, and I’m sure some other bits will get set up in the coming days.

But will I turn into an iPhone evangelist/obsessive? Somehow I doubt it. For a geek/techie I’m really not all that evangelical about technology in general. It’s a tool, not a belief system.

This Easter break has been (and still is) very confusing for me.

For the first time in far too long, I booked time off wrapped around the Easter break, so I’ve actually also had off the Thursday before Good Friday and today.

As a result, my brain has absolutely no idea what sodding day it is. The return to work tomorrow is going to be epically painful, as I’ve no concept of whether it’s Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday. I’m sure I’ll settle back into it, but it’s going to be very strange.

Additionally, I’ve actually caught up on one hell of a lot of sleep over this time off, and getting up again at half six tomorrow is also going to be pretty painful. Again, I’ll be fine with it – but after nearly a week of later starts, it’s going to be a very strange day all round, I think…