Kates Journal

I was about to post about my plan, which I shall do in a minute, but I was distracted by reading emilydm’s post about going skating. Years ago, years and years ago, when I was but tinysmall, and my friends were similarly sized, my dad used to take us to a skating rink in London. I’ve no idea where, which has always saddened me slightly, because I’d love to go back.

But it’s almost certainly been modernised.

I remember it being “world of the 70’s”, the clearly British but American-’themed’* diner attached at one end of the rink, tinny music playing, some kind of stage-esque curtained thing at the other end of the ring (what in god’s name was that for? So they could put on stage shows while-you-skate? I can see why that might not have succeeded), Black and very worn rubber matting and the battered looking rink boundry with it’s chipped and broken paint.

It was enormous fun, circling the rink, in the 70s atmosphere (despite it being the mid 80s), the slightly run-down charm bringing back even earlier youthful fun in Hemel’s AMC Bowling Alley (which was demolished when I was pretty small and was a similarly 70s building – but that actually only just made it into the 80s).

The nice thing about these memories is the warm fuzzy family feeling. Remembering my dad taking me out onto the ice holding my hand, getting me started and then me flying off Hockey-Skater style, while my sister with her Ballet-learned grace would float round the rink.

It’s one of those…slightly melancholy nostalgias, perhaps it’s better that I can’t go back, it’s probably been either closed or drastically modernised; as is the wont of these places.

There is one place from my childhood I’d love to go to – the REX 1&2 – now known as The REX Cinema – this place has survived the ravages of time – in my youth it was a ratty but glorious piece of Deco artwork. I saw few films there – being as my dad was generally of the opinion that it was cheaper to wait and watch it on TV – something I sadly do out of financial distress rather than desire. I cherished that place, but never imagined that it would be saved – the Sad REX 1&2 sign lingered in my head. But now saved and restored, it’s a place I quite definately want to go and visit.

Anyhow, enough of that. Plans. Or specifically, the Laptop plan.

I had this idea – see, I want a new laptop. The Dell CPi that Lauren gave me has been soldiering on pretty well, really, given that it’s 8 years old, has a processor it doesn’t support in it, and is held together with a plate of steel, extra machine screws through the lid casing, copper mains-wire glued in with epoxy resin to support the cracked and damaged case and has a 4 key which is pops up because it’s lost part of it’s clipping mechanism. Oh, and it’s killed the 2nd new battery I gave it and about it’s 5th battery overall in that time.

Oh yes, and the screen connector is held in with cardboard because the bit of metal that ‘holds’ it in is bent, and too weak for the job.

So all in all, the fact it works at all is pretty impressive.

I do have other laptops. Kathryn gave me her old Clamshell ibook – which I was planning to fix and use, then I discovered that you can’t get a faster processor for it, or faster memory, and it’ll probably be slower than my 450Mhz Dell. It would, however, run OSx, which I kinda want. But it does need stripping down because the power connector is borked. And it only runs at 800×600, which is kinda painful these days.

The other laptop, the Powerbook G3 is even slower (233Mhz) – I did get a 300Mhz upgrade for it, but it doesn’t work with the Powerbook for reasons which the company (who instantly refunded my money on being told it didn’t work) informed me are obscure and strange, but there are, apparently laptops Apple made which are ‘finicky’.

The HP Laptop was sent off via freecycle to aid a kiddie in her schoolwork.

So 3 laptops, all of which aren’t entirely well.

So hence; the idea: Sell the whole damn lot of them.

More specifically, fix them all as well as they can be fixed. Flog the G3 with the Clamshell’s hard disk (because the Clamshell’s hard disk, is, iirc, bigger than the G3’s). Flog the Clamshell with the Dell’s hard disk having fixed it’s power connector. See if the G3’s memory upgrade that I bought before discovering that the processor upgrade didn’t work will, uh, work, in the Clamshell. Put the HDD I bought for the G3 into the Dell and flog it.

Unfortunately, I suspect that this won’t net me the amount I want. The G3 Clamshell appears to be the most valuable; the G3 Powerbook running in second. Looking at the value of Dell CPi’s? Distressing. Though there weren’t many working ones on e-bay. I was vaguely looking in the sense of ‘maybe it’d be worth loads more in a new case with a new battery’ but no. The poor bloody thing is valueless either way.

Ah well.

I’m aiming for around 300 quid – the cost of an MSI Wind. Why an MSI Wind and not a Apple of shinyness? Well, I’d love a real true honest to goodness apple. But what do I actually *use* my laptop for? Well: Browsing the web, doing my e-mail, doing paperwork, and that’s about it. I watch videos on it when I go on holiday… but, well, that’s really it. So why get a full-size laptop? Why not get something (a) dinky and (b) new – for once. Laptops are not the most long lived items. The Dell keeps it’s long lifespan mostly by being, well, treated quite gently. I don’t open and close the screen much (it lives open), and despite the fact it’s falling apart at the edges… it’s stood up pretty well to the abuse. Anyway, I never really answered the reason why I want an MSI Wind. The reason is, alledgedly it runs OSX really rather well. Apple don’t do a subnotebook (and I’d probably still not be able to afford it if they did) – but I would rather like one, so the MSI wind is currently my plan of action. I wonder if it’ll work.

So getting laptops second hand never seems like the greatest of the great idea. Although if I do carry out my plan and end up laptopless then I may have to consider it.

*If I’m being *really* generous I’ll use the word themed, styled would be going way too far.

So today I feel more or less back to normal. My throat hurts, but the rest of me is pretty much up and about and hunky dory. Not quite so far as Tickedy Boo, oh no, but adequate for most purposes. If I needed to, I’d've gone to work today. I won’t, sadly, be going to Sam’s leaving do – Sam being an ambulance person who’s leaving do is, annoyingly, tonight. I just don’t want to make myself sick for tomorrow – what with our mini thanksgiving (I’ve actually realised we could probably have invited a couple more friends, but in all honesty, +3 is about the maximum that can reasonably sleep here at night)

At any rate, for the impending arrival of ‘the guests’ it is necessary for us to have a bit of a clean and tidy. The kitchen floor and the bathroom floor need sweeping (and the bathroom floor could benefit from a wash). The sinks ‘n stuff could do with cleaning and the lounge needs a pick-up; dust; sweep and hoover. Oh and the stairs – where the grand accumulation of crap seems to occur could do with sweeping. Oh, and the office could do with a once over too.

That makes it sound like the house is s a tip. It’s not, it’s just a little untidy around the edges.

This would all be fine if I were well; but I don’t want to overdo it, nor, equally, do I want to leave it all until Kathryn comes home. So, plan of action is to do about 30 mintues of cleaning to 30 minutes of rest. We’ve done one run through, and produced a larder with no more recycling in it, and emptied all the bins (just in case Pepper (one of Nikki and Kate’s dogs) gets that old urge to rifle through the bins and scatter damp, shredded paper everywhere); I also got rid of another bag of our ‘generic landfill waste’ that we generated while decorating. It’s not suitable for use as hardcore, so rather than beat the poor cars with carrying it to the tip; the council can take it away – one small bag at a time ;)

I’ve quickly stuck one load of washing through, and hung it up. There’s another load I’d like to get through and washed, and quite frankly, I’d liked to get the sheets on the bed through and dried too :)

Next step is to tidy the kitchen, though, I think.

Then the lounge.

Then the office (which will take some time ‘cos there’s paperwork to sort)

Then the bathroom…

And if I get a chance, the bedroom could do with a once over with a broom and a wipe of the horizontal surfaces.

When did I get to want to clean so much? I’ve always been at least vaguely tidy – that’s a complete lie. Since I left home, I’ve always been vaguely tidy. I think it’s wanting to have pride in our house :)

I never did it that much or for that long, but it’s embedded in my soul like some sort of splinter. One that won’t bloody come out.

I’m lazing on the sofa with too much Bass being transmitted by the solid flooring, listening to what unintentionally became a playlist. Because I heard one song and though “y’know, this song would really benefit from having that song after it…” and this was repeated several times. I could happily have sat and made a playlist several hours long…like we did for our wedding :)

Annoyingly I’m not well enough to leap around the lounge in my usual parody of dancing; perhaps I should poke my nose back in to SGN and see if they’re going to need a DJ. I did say I would :)

I’m not sure I’m made for DJing a gay venue though. I’ve encountered essentially two types of gay venue. The cheese venue or the hard-core-dance venue. I play mostly (what I think of as) indie with leanings towards some cheese (and of course, Dracula’s Tango) – so I’m not sure I’d go down that well be that popular.

That and I do tent do err on the side of the late 90’s / early 00’s. Still, it’s fun. If only it hadn’t burrowed deep into my brain such that it can pop out in at unexpected moments.

Gargling with salt makes me retch; at least, it fairly frequently makes me retch. On the plus side; unlike the last few days I’m actually feeling moderately human like. I’m very tired from last-night’s hourly (or less) waking up cycle; but the rest of me is feeling more or less back the way it should. I even made it to the shops to get paracetamol and ‘brufen. Of course, while there and feeling astonishingly tired I ended up being the only witness to a (very minor) car accident (car vs car in car park) – and despite trying to escape my guilt got the better of me – and when the cab driver flagged me down and asked if I’d seen what happened (and I had) I admitted it, and in the end gave my name.

My throat does still feel like I’ve been munching on sandpaper tho’, even despite all the gargling.

On the plus side – I spent some time playing with Garageband. I’ve got a whole bunch of jobs that need doing; but playing with Garageband comes first ;)

More accurately, I’m really tired and not feeling great and can’t get the energy summoned to deal with the mounds of paperwork which are accruing. I’ve spent the morning reading and the later morning and lunch time area creating bizzare tunes in Garageband and now, the afternoon’s contined with some Yes Minister and some Big Bang Theory.

One thing which is disconcerting. The EntMac in the lounge has a 500Gig disk in it. 500 Gigs of storage. That should be quite a lot, I thought, when I bought it. It has 60 gig free. I know I’ve got 35 gig to put on it…

This is ‘inconvenient’.

I’m thinking I might have to burn some of the lesser watched shows onto DVDs to clear space on it. But it’s somewhat of a pig, the idea was that the 500 Gig drive’d do to store ‘most all the TV I (now we) wanted. At least ’til we were over in Canada. But it’s getting a little cramped on there. The other thing I ought to do is get rid of some of the stuff which I’ve got which I don’t actually like/watch. I’m saddened to find that as with Monty Python, the Kids In the Hall suffers from the ‘there are plenty of great sketches but they’re interspersed with a greater quantity of not very funny things than I remembered’. Season 5 appears better than Season 2 anyway :)

So that’s my day so far :)

So, I had a busy week planned post nights. Paediatric Immediate Life Support, Manual Handling, and then a couple of days of Agency work before celebrating Thanksgiving this weekend.

Unfortunately, on Sunday I didn’t feel very well – and by the time I got back after my nights… well, I felt like crap. I curled up on the sofa and slept – and I never do that after nights.

And when I awoke I felt worse. I assumed it would be a run of the mill cold – I’d had a sore throat and it felt like it was developing into a common or garden cold, and the day before yesterday I thought I’d hit the home stretch. See, I have a normal-flow-of-symptoms for a cold. Day one – sore throat. Day two – Cold. Day three – Cold and a cough. Day four – Cough. Day five – more or less better. Unfortunately, yesterday, as my temperature spiked as high as 38.6 degrees C (101.5F) and was sitting above 37 Deg C it became apparent that home stretch wasn’t where I was at.

Today I’m taking a more pro-active approach to tackling this cold – well, actually, it’s the sore throat that’s got me attacking it. I’ve been salt-water gargling every half hour – to hour. Last night I was fighting a fever which kept me awake most of the night – Kathryn very sweetly brought me a flannel and some cold water – which I slathered on my forehead. I kept limbs out from under the duvet. I didn’t cover my body with the duvet. I still couldn’t get cool.

Finally, this morning I took a tepid shower, downed paracetamol and ‘brufen and I feel the best I’ve felt for days. Not well, but not so atrocious that the only thing I want to do is lie in a puddle being a swamp-being (emitting a foul smelling fug ;) ). I’m annoyed that I can’t make more money this week – which was my plan – because even if my assault on the throat-soreness works perfectly and I’m feeling absolutely 100% tomorrow I won’t feel it’s a good idea to subject my body to work.

In other news, I’m not sure if I mentioned – but my Grandmother (on my dad’s side) died a couple of weeks ago. We weren’t close (quite the opposite) – I debated whether I should be at her funeral (simply to represent my dad) – eventually siding on ‘no, I’ll send a card’. And had been contemplating that I did need to get out and get a card sent to their address; only to find out that my Grandfather’s died now, too.

It’s weird to know that you’re the last in a line. I don’t know if I’m actually the youngest; my dad never got on with his sister particularly well; and I’ve little recollection of meeting them (ISTR we met one Christmas many years ago). I’m the last Elliott. Well, now I’m a Walton-Elliott, but my point still stands…

It’s odd, anyhow.

I’m very disconnected from these people. Notionally they’re my relatives – they’re my grandparents – but I’ve not seen them for years, and I’ve little or no knowledge of them since what I learnt from them as a kid. And let’s just say I wasn’t that keen on what I knew.

So it’s very odd for them to be gone. What isn’t good is that it appears my sister – who was closer to them – has taken it very badly, and is upsetting my mum :(

Ach. Families, eh.