Car Servicing
Posted: Thu 18 October, 2007 Filed under: Customer Services, Weirdness 1 Comment »The other day, I had to take the car into the garage for a couple of things – nothing massive, just a replacement headlight bulb, and a check into some squealy noises in the power-steering.
In the end, the car was in the garage all day, as I was at work. They did the bulb, checked for the intermittent noise, and looked at some other stuff.
When I went in to the garage to collect the car and pay the bill, I was fully expecting a bill for £80-£100, what with time, materials and the like. My estimate of what the bill would be was hugely wrong – awesomely, impressively wrong.
The bill actually came to – are you sitting down? – 95p. Needless to say, I didn’t bother paying it by credit card…
Windbelt
Posted: Wed 17 October, 2007 Filed under: Green Leave a comment »I think that this is a fantastic idea – basically, it’s just a micro-generator in a similar vein to a wind-turbine, but far simpler. It’s not going to power a city, but it’ll power small appliances, such as replacements for kerosene-lamps and the like. It could even be used to charge laptops, phones etc.
More importantly, it’s simple, easy to maintain, and doesn’t have all the extra necessary maintenance and infrastructure that a wind-turbine farm would require.
Absolutely brilliant.
Twenty Years On
Posted: Tue 16 October, 2007 Filed under: General Leave a comment »It’s hard to believe that it’s twenty years today that the “Great Storm” hit the UK.
The BBC also has an interesting piece about the efforts to save trees should the same happen again at the Sheffield Park Garden.
You can still see the effects, when you visit gardens in the area – although you have to know now what you’re looking at (or were looking for, if that makes sense) – and to me it’s still surprising just how long-lasting the effects of that one night are. I know I shouldn’t be surprised by such things, but well, I am. Hey ho.
Rugby Final
Posted: Mon 15 October, 2007 Filed under: Cynicism, Thoughts 1 Comment »So, England are in the final of the Rugby World Cup, and play South Africa. For once in my life, I actually ended up watching both games – and bearing in mind my comprehensive lack of knowledge, as well as being aware of being supposedly “unpatriotic” I have to say, I think England are going to receive a serious kicking next Saturday.
To me, the South Africa/Argentina game on Sunday was a far ‘better’ game than the England/France one, and the gameplay by South Africa was far better than England. Now OK, I realise that “points are points” regardless of how they’re scored, but England currently seem to rely primarily on penalties and drop goals rather than the tries and conversions that are (in my novice opinion) the ‘bread and butter’ of the game.
South Africa relied more on tries and conversions, and knocked up the points accordingly with four tries, and four conversions – although admittedly they also scored from three penalties. England scraped through (until the last five/ten minutes) with a scrappy game where they scored one try, no conversions, and two penalties. In the earlier game against Australia, all the England points were through penalties.
Maybe I’m naïve – it wouldn’t be the first time, when it comes to sport – but to me, South Africa currently seem to be playing a more rounded game of rugby than England do, and I suspect that may influence the result next weekend.
Of course, I could be wrong too – again, not the first time- and if so, I’ll be the first one to say “I was wrong”.
Moving posts
Posted: Sun 14 October, 2007 Filed under: D4D™, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Photography Leave a comment »I’m in the process of changing some things on D4D™ Primarily, I’m going to be taking the “photography” posts out of here, and moving them over to my portfolio site. For the moment at least, I’m not going to be ‘photoblogging’, but I am going to be doing a blog (although probably not a daily-updating one) on the site.
In general, I think it’ll make sense to move the posts for that over to the portfolio site, and maintain some separation between D4D™ and my other stuff. If nothing else, it’ll add some more content to the portfolio site, which makes sense and may (over time drag more people there.
I may also move some of the shots stuff there, which is part of the greater “D4D™ redesign/rethink” idea that I’ve been chuntering about for a while. It would make sense to move things about, as there’re whole sections that I don’t update at all, and perhaps would if they were easier to do – despite the fact that that’s a pathetic reason, considering I’m a techie, and could do it all easily anyway. But all the same, moving it all into something more sensible makes sense.
So anyway, yes, some (if not all) of the photography stuff will be heading over to the portfolio site over the next week or so, and then photography-based stuff is more likely to sit there than here.