Michael's Meanderings

I really was going to post more frequently this year but....
Last Bank Holiday I went to see Iron Man 2 at the local cinema, it was fun, but not great (but at least as good as the original movie.)

This month I've been dealing with my yearly appraisal. The hardest part is that it's half self assessment. I find it very difficult saying anything about myself, let alone bragging!

My mini media server has had it's disk fail, So i've bought a usb 1TB disk to copy all the data on to. It only cost £60 a few years ago it would have been thousands of pounds, or even "science fictional!".

I've also caught the Torchwood Virtual Season 3 which re-writes the S3 story such that CoE didn't happen. It's just finished so I had the whole thing in a three week period (rather than weekly over 13 episodes).

Last Thursday I walked to Forbidden Planet, first visit in weeks, but it was sunny so the exercise was good, bought 4 books.

I took the day off on Friday and went to Brighton in the afternoon. did a small amount of shopping and read on the beach. Considering it was a Friday it was quite crowed, nice and sunny. I thing walked along the promenade to Hove, staying on the seafront till reaching the King Alfred Centre. Then north looking for the station, near which is my chiropractors office. Got there early for my appointment, but not busy so I was squeezed in and then home.

Sunday D left for the US early. He's going to be traveling all over and has a website to document his journey. I went to the matinee performance of the Price of Persia at my local cinema. I was the only one there which was cool. A very Indiana Jones meets Jason and the Argonauts.

And so we are up to date!

I've continued to suffer from cold / flu / asthma so I finally visited the Doctor last night. She said I'd probably had a mild viral infection exacerbated by my asthma, I need to increase the use of my inhaler by 4 times and it should resolve. It already seems to have had an impact.

At the end of October Ubuntu 9.10 Karmic Koala was released and I've been playing with it. It seems to be faster starting and is easier to install on SD Cards and USB sticks. The Netbook Remix is also much smaller and easier to install too.

I've been trying to move material from my old 486 running MS-Dos 6.22 to more up to date storage, and have so far managed to recover some of my original digital pictures from a now defunct Casio QV-10, they were very small and grainy but at the time...

I have decided to reduce my book buying. This is because I was unable to pay off all my credit card bills for the last two months, a large chunk of which were Amazon and Forbidden Planet. Since the 6th October I have only bought 3 books, not including ebooks or books ordered prior to this point. This doesn't mean I haven't got anything to read as I do have a large too be read pile. This has been successful as I was able to pay off all my credit card bill this month.

Last Thursday I had my yearly appraisal, which boiled down to "must improve performance" ;-(
This was followed by going to The Hawth theatre to see Fascinating Aida which was great, for those who haven't heard them they, are a bit like a female version of Flanders and Swann!

My copy of Fledgeling by Sharon Lee & Steve Miller arrived in the post yesterday, I had already read it as an ebook, but it does complete my Liaden collection.

Recently the trains have been delayed and they have been particularly bad over the last couple of days. This morning due to cancellation and delay I got to work an hour later than intended.

This evening I have a Science Museum Tour booked. Details to follow later!