Kates Journal

So, being a classic car owner, and occasionally driver, I’ve spent a fair bit of time lurking and chatting on classic car forums, and one thing that gets me is that – as a broad sweeping generalisation – classic car owners seem to be very much in the climate change denialist camp.

Any suggestion that you’re someone who feels that the Climate Change theories indicating global warming are correct, and you’ll be commented on by a miriad of people who all feel that climate change is a load of rubbish. These people also seem to fall into the ‘oil will never run out’ camp, or that it’ll run out in a very-long-period-of-time, at least, they appear to.

Fine, okay, let’s put it this way:

Option A – I’m wrong and climate change is rubbish:
Result of following the ‘climate change is happening’ course of action: We spend a lot of money and time investing in new technology, creating new jobs and improving our environment. Old industries decline, and people have to be retrained in new skills or fall out of the workforce. Cities become cleaner, less polluted places. We reduce our dependence on foreign oil, start developing drugs and food technologies that aren’t dependent upon oil. Final result: It’s expensive, and lots of work, everyone lives. Oil continues to lurk under the ground.

Option B – They’re wrong and climate change happens:
Result of following the ‘climate change is rubbish’ course of action: Sea levels rise, vast areas of land become unusable, vast numbers of people are displaced and die. We run out of oil, that means no food (no fertiliser) no drugs (petrochemical derivatives), no transport. We are, in short, screwed.

Given the two options, I’d rather be in camp A which spends money to fix a problem which doesn’t happen. Except that I think it’s a problem that will happen. I’d really rather not be in camp B.

Did not know that such a thing existed to intense desire for ownership in 0 seconds flat.

MONOCHRON – open source retro clock from adafruit industries on Vimeo.

Monochron.

So, I thought it was about time I posted something about our trip to Paris trip – since it was a week ago that we got back, and I’ve finally upload the pictures and sorted them into a sensible order, so here we go… Read the rest of this entry »

So I’ve given this cold almost my entire week off, and I’m still feeling crappy. I’m under strict instructions to rest, which for once I don’t need, because when I stand up or cough I feel like I’m going to fall over, or the back of my head’s having needles driven into it. Which is not fun.

I am, as you can tell, fully able to whine about it though.

Lord knows what I’d be like if I was *actually* sick.

I have singularly failed, as a side point, to achieve anything very much today. I’ve got stuff set up to finally get my passport changed to my ‘new’ name (only a year and a bit old), and might sling off my driver’s licence too. I have, however, watched several films – the last of which (The Borne Ultimatum) served to remind me just how really damn good the Borne series of films is.

The lack of sleep though – that’s been the killer – even the night nurse isn’t knocking me out – at least not for an hour or two. And today the paracetamol’s just taking the edge off the headache – making it difficult to achieve anything. And there’s stuff I want to achieve. The gramophone needles arrived yesterday – meaning the podcast is now within the bounds of achievable. Although I’ve still not picked, or created a theme song. My attempts with garage band left me uninspired – I could just use my creation from the first time I used it which was actually pretty entertaining.

Frankly I also wanted to go up and see how ‘becca’s progressing but I did receive some more photos from Jonathon – she’s got an engine! It’s quite cool in a way, I’ve bought a brand-new minor, essentially (well, apart from some rust lurking in seams that we can’t get to, which hopefully we can keep at bay with bucket loads of waxoyl).

I’m really quite keen to get her back and drive her again – which is a problem because financially we’re running a bit close to the wind as I’ve not received any more of my inheritence, and I was hoping to do a shift or two for the agency this week but have spent it lying on the sofa. Still, it’ll work out okay, I’m sure.

In other news, the builders have declined to repair the ceiling under their ‘warranty’, not that it matters I’m not convinced I’d've let them back in even if they had. I’m now trying to work up the energy to ring my mum’s builder and ask, nay beg, him to come to Slough because I’ve tried so many different builders here and they’ve all. been. shit.

Anyhow, I’m going to get back to doing sod all. I might perk up and write a post about our holiday a bit later – I’ve uploaded the photos here anyhow. They’re in a random order because the scanner at Jessops puts a seemingly random time stamp on the photos and doesn’t put them in order on the disk. I’ve no idea why. It also scans at a pathetically low resolution, but it’s the best I’ve got at the moment.

Olympus Pen* for me, anyone? (Yes, I know, I’ll save up and buy one, but you can always hope eh!).

* I still need to go and play with an Olympus Pen to see if it’s the camera I want. My ‘I won’t buy a new digital camera before we move’ resolve is weakening at 8 quid a throw to develop the film, and with such lousy photo scanning.

How to feel properly unwell:
1) Don’t get off the sofa
2) Place bin nearby for tissues
3) Suck down great quantities of tea
4) Watch TV and surf the net all day
5) When going to bed prop yourself up with as many pillows as you can lay your hands on
6) Be kept awake for a large chunk of the night by a fox(?) waling intermittently (WTF?!)

I’m now, and I think this falls within the definition of resting, going to go and poke through my records to see if I can find a title track for dead bug jumping, since I can’t record the fricking show because I sound like my head is filled with a giant goo ball.

I did have a title track in mind – a gramophone – but I’ve listened to it and it didn’t grab me the way I wanted, so now I’m off to hunt for something else. Nikki reckons I should make something, but she’s assuming a degree of musical talent I’m not convinced I had – although my dinking with Garageband did produce something akin to music.

The unfortunate thing about lurking on the sofa is I’m wont to look at e-bay and then I find…things. The worst thing is a copy of ‘cocktails for two‘ which I’d really like, but is in a batch of 122 78s. I don’t need another 122 78s, especially as some are definately duplicates. Bah.