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hugh grant

on my way to work this morning i met foppish celebrity Hugh Grant. He got out of a car near Harley Street and was hobbling over to a parking meter, obviously in some discomfort (looked like his back was giving him jip).
I asked if I could take his photo and he said “oh don’t please”, which i took to be a negative. i left him in peace to go about his day.
I guess I could still have taken his photo as he is a ‘celebrity’ and therefore public property, but I decided that was a bit cruel.
I did a quick search for Hugh Grant and Back Pain and it appears he has suffered from back pain before. I should have shared some of my stories of Chronic Pain with him. We could have bonded over some Gabapentin (or something).

hodgeheg

a sniffly spikey creaturey thing
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extreme weather in the dining room

we’ve a friend staying with us at the moment who works for the met office. he’s an expert on extreme weather and is in demand at the moment for radio interviews a-plenty.
Here he is broadcasting live to the country from our front room.
It’s weird listening to him downstairs speaking on the phone, whilst also listening upstairs to it broadcast over the Internet and simultaneously recording it in another room over the cable TV network. I love technology.
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His next gig is Radio 4 at 8.45am this morning. Here
are his last words from the Today program. Note the massive pause before the final word. Classic. (File
is 42KB MP3 file, use something like Winamp to play it)

2 pieces of quiche and a ham sandwich

some pubs have peanuts or crisps on the bar. my local pub has something much more appealing. two pieces of quiche and a ham sandwich. they looked like they had been there for a while.
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sadly there was no starfish activity this evening.

resize that browser

spotted this on TummyMonsters
cool thing. go to a site. replace the URL with javascript:resizeTo(800,600); and there you have a resized browser window.
great if you are working on a big monitor and want to check what a site looks like on a smaller monitor.

Sony DSC-P71 windows driver

I don’t know about you but I’ve scoured the internet looking for drivers for my Sony DSC-P71 cybershot camera. [SEE UPDATE AT THE BOTTOM OF PAGE]
In the end I gave up and tried to find the original disk. Half an hour later I found the driver disk. If others are interested, here are the drivers:
(now moved to Driver Guide to save my server some bandwidth) You may need to register, but it’s free.
If you have Windows 2K you want to install the USB Update (15KB) after you’ve installed the main driver. this was sourced from the sony website.
This driver allows you to access the memory stick in your camera as if it was an extra drive on your PC. An ideal way to drain your batteries !
Not worked out how to use the camera as a webcam in this mode. Suspect it’s not possible. Sony say their cameras aren’t decided to be used as webcams on their online FAQs.
Whilst downloading the file, why not have a quick look at the rest of the blog or leave a comment to say where you are from ?
If you find the driver useful then be thankful. you can thank me by saying “hello” and smiling at three strangers over the next few days.
If you have any problems accessing the file, let me know !
UPDATE: you could also try this bit of the Sony site for the Windows 2K and Windows ME drivers which might work on WinXP and 98 respectively (maybe!)
LATEST UPDATE: Sony now host these drivers on their own site. go here or start on the sony front page then go to the Support / Download drivers section. i’ve recently found them here (including a TWAIN driver)

a good day to work from home

it looks like another hot day today. news reports say the trains are going to be bad again, so i’m glad i’m working from home today. no aircon at home though …
i checked my local station online timetable and it’s currently (7am) showing train times from 5pm yesterday. this happens when the trains are so delayed they don’t know what to put on the boards. oh dear.

square golfing umbrella

according to the stats, someone found this website by searching for ‘square golfing umbrella’.
so here it is, your official square golfing umbrella blog.

castor congestion

i saw this tonight near harley street. another congestion charge busting device parked up in the street:
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basically, it’s the smallest type of vehicle there is ie a wheel. here it is presented in castor form. it’s a little small, so i have enlarged it here:
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fishing does not make you happy. i know that now

in the paper this evening: story of a man who caught a dead fish and pretended it was something it wasn’t. his love of fish ruined his marriage. he’s has therapy and everything. his best quote:
“fishing does not make you happy. i know that now”

oops my train just melted

commuter misery promised for journeys home tonight. seems trains are to run slow because it’s too hot according to the BBC news.
it’s times like these when people turn to the church. their cool interiors are ideal for days like these. Though not ideal for transporting people from work to their earthly home, they are good at pointing you to your spiritual home.

dangling

following the table dancing of a few days ago, arjan has decided to prove he can go from one side of the room to the other by dangling from the roof.
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grrl radio back on

i love internet radio. it’s a great way of finding out about new bands etc. i’ve bought several albums after hearing stuff or being reminded of bands on Grrl Radio
Welcome to GRRL

You may need Winamp to listen

Ballerina Surprise

Much thanks to our friends the Newells who surpassed themselves with Birthday goodies (albeit 3 days late!). Here is a picture showing the beautiful ballerina pen holder that Tony and I give to each other every present-occasion (Xmas and B-days). You can also see the rather neat card and a bit of the fantastic drawing produced by Catherine and Anna.
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how not to BBQ

our friends paul and liz came round for lunch today. we were a little tight for time as jane, esther and kezia are off camping in the Gower for a few days.
I was in charge of barbequeing which was a very bad idea. I didn’t put enough charcoal and the heat ran out half way through the cooking. actually, we didn’t even get halfway through. I put some more charcoal on and the skewers caught fire and bits of mushroom fell all over the place.
result: much late and burnt food (better than early and raw).
BBQing is a stupid idea anyway. we all understand how ovens and grills work (or at least someone in our house does). idiots shouldn’t be left in charge of fire. i proved that 🙁
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canal work

esther and kezia played with their Brio Canal set this afternoon. Lots of water everywhere and much pumping of the lock pumps. there is lots of energy in kids and we should work out a way to harness it. i’m sure we could power our house from them both.
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holiday club finale

it was the last event in the tent today, marking the final final end to the Holiday Bible Club. It was a fantastic cloud free morning and the band played well. i’ve nearly perfected the art of jumping up and down whilst playing bass.
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esther’s feet in a bucket

esther was in a foul mood as she had slightly grazed her foot in a non-dramtic skooter incident.
i proposed she put her feet in a bucket of water. this proved to be no end of fun and she soon cheered up.
therefore, my advice to you is this:
if you are feeling blue, put your feet in a bucket of water.
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trilakes

i took the girls to Trilakes Animal Park today. It’s a funny place but has some really nice lakes and random animals wandering about. There was a particularly attractive cockerel on a bench, but when I went to take a photo of it my camera informed me that i had forgotten to load my memory stick. d’oh.