If you have read any of these things that I have tried to write you will realise a goat picture is a yearly event.

Today was a trip to the local county show. A really nice hot day with no rain until 8pm by which time we were well on the way home.

There's something familiar about these shows which goes back to my childhood and some innocent excitement at the local carnival. I guess that's an age before video games and the Internet when the local army band and home made floats made everyone happy.

Country shows are like that. The culmination of the farmers year raising stock to show, producing honey or just taking a day out in the sun to look at the latest tractors and pass time with neighbours.

This show is early in a season that reaches out to September. It doesnt have that laziness you feel in later shows when the crops are gathered and people need to take a day out after all the work of a long hard season but it does being people together; farmers and neighbours; town and country; children and animals.

I guess in a world of pre-packaged, ready frozen, instant meals it's good for us all to see a little of the real world and what food production is like.

Posted by Mark at 11:35 PM | Permalink

I was watching the excavation of a plane on the TV today. It's a story which happened in World War Two but has taken all this time to come to light. Indeed simply getting the right permisson to excavate has taken 16 years. The reason for the excavation ? Well it was of the plane which may have saved Buckingham Palace from destruction.

The story of Ray Holmes is here.

Posted by Mark at 11:26 PM | Permalink

There's a reasonably new shopping development close to me which has brought new shops and new places to eat.

It's also brought new beers which is why, after a meal a bunch of us went into town to an upmarket Indian to drink Dutch wheat beer.

Korenwolf makes a change from the local wine bar where we normally drink Hoegaarden, which I think I prefer. It was a good night and we say out in what is close to pavement cafe society where I live.

It's nice to be out again with people and shows that I'm getting out more and into a more normal pattern of life......

Posted by Mark at 4:09 AM | Permalink

Stabbing my hand last night whilst removing an avocado stone didn't help my mood today. Neither did the last of sleep, up late watching BBC4 signed repeats of programs.

The most amazing was the story of Project Orion a mad idea to make a spaceship as large as an ocean liner powered by nuclear explosions. Strangely, there are still people who believe in this idea and want to see the project through.

I managed to get Gallery installed today and it's setup with a few albums. After a trial of a time with chained and ZIP I got it upgraded to a version which works with Mambo. More of a struggle is getting Gallery to talk to MoveableType so that I can add pictures as when I want to my blog.

Something fixed, something else broken. My video. After months of not taping things there seems to a be a glut of things I want to see. Trying the video and a few tapes and it seems is given up the ghost. So, do I replace it with another tape device or go for a DVD recorder. I must admit I'm tempted by the Philips DVDR70 device. Maybe at last an end to all those bulky tapes...

One plus point is that the local council replaced missing re-cycling bin, stolen two weeks ago. Although I hate to do it this one needs the house number painted on it. Parochial I know but this is the second one that has gone walkabout and I intend to keep this one for a while....

Things are going well with my site. It's almost complete in terms of structure, just needs more content and photographs and a daily update to the blog.

It's a long weekend this weekend. I may go to the local County Show and see the animals....

Posted by Mark at 11:25 PM | Permalink

At last I have finished. It's taken all day but I have the pictures I took when my friend Mara was over finally finished. Now I just need to start on Richard's birthday which a mere 100+

In fact I'm off to see them later for Thai food, me as a climbing frame and late night listening to Bob Harris on Martin's old valve radio.

Posted by Mark at 6:14 PM | Permalink

Today for the first time in ages I have actually been busy. Not a perceived busy but a list, goals and things achieved. Coupled to that I've done new things, learnt new things and listened to new things.

As far my site goes I have added in an export from my Outlook calendar, which comes really from my Ipaq. It means if you need to know where I am there's a failry good chance it will be on there. I've also setup my forums and started to add in some topics and posts. I'm using phpBB and need really to add in some of the better hacks such as events, birthdays, cash and file uploads. This really isn't to support my own forums but so that I can test them ready to roll them out to one of my online projects which has some social background to it.

I've built those forums but they need the hacks and then the content added into them but they are well underway.

I've also added in the Docman component to Mambo and started to build a file library. I need to work out how to overcome the 2Mb upload limit from the ISP as I don't seem to have access to php.ini. Anyhow, a support call is in and I'm waiting back on them.

My surfing today has been a raid on the Net to build up my image library for websites so I've been gathering pictures PCs as well as pictures of skaters and children in general.

Thanks to BBC6 and BBC7 I've managed to listen to a few bits of classic comedy as well as some cool music so I'm up to date on Los Lonely Boys, Alana Davis and Jen Chapin.

I've managed to eat and indeed would have eaten outside were it not for it being cold and wet, post early summer storm.

A feeble excuse but the patio was wet.

I've cleared a hugh pile of back reading as well as sorting through a load of magazines that I have seemed to kept for ever.

All around a good day - lets hope it stays like that.

Posted by Mark at 9:31 PM | Permalink | TrackBacks (0)

There's two events in the news at the moment with interesting views in retrospect.

Firstly 9/11. There's Commisson hearings going on in New York at the moment to understand what happened. There's no doubt that there were mistakes made. 911 phone operators misadvised some people to stay put causing more deaths, fire teams could not deal let alone comprehend what happend. But it seems to me that a lot of the hate and anger is misdirected. A case in point is how Giuliani has been heckled. "My son was murdered," screamed Sally Regenhard, mother of a fireman who died. Other relatives joined in and the room was in uproar. To what end ? Does it help us comprehend it?

Im sure lessons can be learnt and there is no doubt the world has now changed and we take the the threats, real and perceived seriously.

However, compare this with the recent scenes at the House of Commons. Sure, we prepared against a threat and installed a security screen at a cost of 2 million pounds. But, did we enclose the press ? Or indeed the first three rows of the public gallery ? No. The reason for this ? Well, the first three rows are used for guest of members of the House of Lords. So, was it a suprise when the guest of a member of the House of Lords managed to flour bomb the Prime Minister ? Perhaps not to you or me, but to the people who speant 2 million pounds of my money the answer would seem to be yes.

Posted by Mark at 1:13 PM | Permalink

This sounds ideal :

"Our 18-hour journey from London to the Maldives in the Indian Ocean culminates in a thrilling seaplane ride from the main island, Male."

Sea and sun sounds good but the real draw is how this place is using Wireless Networks.

Two chaps are installing the network which has to reach across both islands.

"This mast is a bit of gift", said Andy's colleague, Daniel Willberg. "It's nice and sturdy and should allow us to get our antenna above the line of the palm trees so that signal gets out to both the islands."

They seem to be doing well :

"It seems to be working well, both around the main island and in the holiday villas right at the far end of the smaller island. In one villa, I even got coverage in the jacuzzi."

What's really interesting is how they see it working :

"With the resort booking system now available via wireless, there are plans to make checking visitors in and out more portable.

Instead of guests hanging around in reception when they arrive, staff with PDAs could check them in as they hop off the seaplane.

It all means that visitors get to the beach that much quicker. Once they are there, only time will tell whether they really will be reaching for the laptop alongside the sun cream and the snorkel. "

Sea, sun and wifi what more can you want ?

Posted by Mark at 11:26 PM | Permalink

Ok I think I have given up on Zempt in favour of w.bloggar. I think I like it, hopefully it won't have the same "sudden exit" issue that Zempt did, but lets see what happens. For now it's nice to be back and writing and even nicer for this to be an early summer evening, sitting outside with the laptop and a warm wireless network.

I feel much more me : I can face food and I'm slowly getting a routine back - maybe even a life back. There's no doubt that the sun is what I need I slept outside today, propped up with pillows and the sunday papers spread around me probably looking like the old tramp that I feel but it was good and it went back to something I used to do, what feels a million years ago. Hopefully this time I won't loose that and I can build on it a little.

I feel the need to travel, to go see places close and far and that will mean taking a camera and facing up to some demons there as well. Exactly how that will work out I'm not too sure but with patience I hope well.

On balance it looks OK, some good, some bad but progress on the whole. At the end of a sunny day that's not a bad thing at all.

Posted by Mark at 8:20 PM | Permalink

Don't tell anyone but Im back....

Posted by Mark at 6:07 PM | Permalink