Index | Reply

Home News 27th June 1998

So it's a month since the last Home News. In the last month, we have rebuilt the Datak office, purchased some nice new kit, including a 400MHz Pentium II running on the latest BX motherboard with 10ns SDRAM and a 19" Iiyama 450. It was also a month in which I heard that all Southern Life systems had been trashed by Momentum, and I guess that means that the last vestiges of Cobol and Ideal programs with WRITTEN-BY TRICKY RICKY DICKY in them will also go to that big electronic tip in the ether. I take it that LIFE is now also going to die, and that all the year 2000 problems have been solved with a single stroke of the delete key. What of Vantage and the many millions of Rand poured into it ? Sad really.

Maggie has also started her job, and looks forward to her first paycheque in four years in a few days. Well, first paycheque which is not from Datak. Nicky has been getting regular envelopes stuffed with money from her paper round which she does on a Thursday. Tarryn is still jobless, but is milking the new pocket money system (£5.00 per school credit). Me, I'm still prostituting my mind and skill, unfortunately nothing more base than the basic, visual 5 type.

The office is looking neato, and the lure of working in a nice new environment, with fast machines, fast internet access and software galore is keeping me up WAY past my bedtime most nights. Pooped is not the word, bloody exhausted is more like it. Still, it must be fun or something, because I keep going back downstairs for more. Apart from the fun of building, swapping and rebuilding the Datak hardware, and then reinstalling most of the software after whipping the systems of Win95/98 and installing NT4 everywhere, I have also been having slightly more relaxing fun playing Close Combat 2 on the zone (http://www.zone.com). I am on the Case ladder (user name Ricky), but as I am yet to beat anyone (I have played about 15 games so far), I am still on position 640. I had some games against a top ten player (downunder_2, an Aussie I guess), who whipped me real good.

I have tried playing Nicky, Tarryn and even Maggie to try and hone my skills, as the AI for Close Combat 2 is pretty simple to beat, but Nicky doesn't like the way her men bleed, Tarryn just thinks "It's not fair", and Maggie doesn't like it when her troops tell her "You're Mad". Sigh, nothing for it but getting chewed up in public I guess. Alan, fancy a few games ?

AOE (Age of Empires), is still played occasionally, but again, I have to give so many concessions to the girls for them to accept the challenge, that it turns the game into one of building pretty cities rather than mortal combat. I hear that AOE II has been delayed until 1999 now - sad.

The mobile is back and alive, but without it's stash of numbers, which have been lost forever. Isn't technology wonderful, a few button pressed while you are trying to relieve the boredom during the mid session interval of a snooker match between Ronnie O'Sulivan and John Virgo and "poof", gone.. I was just seeing how the PIN facility worked, when before you could say "now what was that number I just entered", the phone was declaring "SIM error" and Vodaphone was saying "what's your credit card number, you need a new SIM". Sigh. Ronnie took the piss out of some poor amateur who had won a one frame battle with the master. He (the amateur) broke off in a fairly tight break. To which Ronnie responded by smacking straight into the reds, waiting for four or so balls before the poor sod missed a shot, and then cleaning the board. Talk about contempt. He also won the Jon Virgo 7 frame match 6-1. JV's trick shots at the end were ok, but overall we were left with the feeling that snooker is best watched on TV, and not from the back of the Southampton guild hall.

The web site has been improved quite a bit, and all visitors who have not been for a while are encouraged to make a return visit and sign the guestbook.

Red Monster (BMW) is still cooking me and freezing Maggie, but Wiggens BMW (or now Scothall BMW as it has been bought out) has promised a new heater unit box thingamie by the 29th of this month. In the meantime, I am relieved by the slightly cooler weather.

We had a braai at our place last weekend to enjoy and celebrate the summer weekend. Most people think that summer lasts for a few months - not in England it doesn't. Anyway Dave, Brenda, Alex and Holly, Graham McR and Debbie R came and it was about midnight before the day of sunshine, Heineken, Cape Wine, Webbered food and Nicky and Tarryn music came to an end. While on the subject of "music". Does anyone know "what she gonna look like with a chimney on her", because there is some crazy song asking this very question and I think if I am able to find the answer and email her - maybe she will STOP. As for "I'm a Barbie girl in a Barbie world...", the less said the better really.

Q. OK, so where's the elephant when you need it.
A. \\HOOLIGAN\DATA\RICKY\HOME NEWS\ELEPHANT.TXT

That one wasn't so funny I guess, so here come some more...

Q: Why did the elephant take geometry?
A: The algebra class was full.

Q: How do you get down from an elephant?
A: You don't, you get down from a duck.

OK all, have a good July....

Ricky Chalmers

Last 5 Visitors

© 1998 - 2009