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Today's the day that the project I have been working on went live. It's also the day that the teddy bears had their picnic, and I hope they had as much fun as I had. NOT.

I obviously totally miss the point of computer systems. There I was thinking that they had to work, had to be useful and had to be "real neat" (actually I know that that is mainly my perversion). I was totally wrong. They are actually pawns in a much more entertaining game called scoring political points off each other. In fact the worse the system is or fits together the better it seems, because then you can score bonus points by digging up some old "I told you so" or "in your requirements" or "where is the request for that". Different game entirely, and one who's rules I have never fully appreciated or bothered to understand. Pity, because ncaExplorer.exe is "real neat"...

On to more entertaining news...the BMW saga continues. It's service on Friday at non-BMW dealer Parchment Garage identified a leaky radiator which needs replacing and a fused wheel alignment nut/bolt/thingie. I guess this resolved the ongoing saga with Wiggens-BMW with an

overheating Red Monster and a worn set of Yokohama's. I guess they missed the spray of water coming out of the radiator and just gave up adjusting the alignment and moved on to working out the invoice instead. So it needs to go back on Friday for a new radiator (150 ukp) and to try and sort out the alignment. A new set of Uniroyals (spell checker wants to change this to Urinals, but I think I will stick with the Uniroyals thanks, a Urinal on each corner of the BMW will be taking the piss a bit) will also be installed.

The weekend passed pretty uneventfully. I did by fatherly duty and didn't go to Nicky's "dance" extravaganza. Maggie and Tarryn went and are still recovering. This modern dancing and me are just not compatible. About as compatible as the 32Mb DIMM and my IBM 730 work computer really. How's this for a joke. Back in April I write a sarcky letter to my "project manager" (in quotes to reflect that this is a job title, not something that he actually does. In it I demand an upgraded

machine, with an extra 32Mb or RAM and an extra 2Gb disk. Yesterday (yes that's 30th June), I get a phone call from "PC Procurement" (again in quoted to reflect the fact that they seem to have trouble procuring anything but a dose of flu) saying that my memory upgrade as arrived. Despite the exact specification which I gave them, they deliver me a 32Mb DIMM not 2 16Mb SIMMs. Sigh. I guess it will be sorted out well after I have left...

The Datak Lan (Chatterbox, Tomcat and Hooligan) are going well, and pretty much everything is now working excepting the NT domain and all the other stuff like SQL Server and Exchange. Tomcat was a real pain, with a last minute decision on his part to start hanging and giving funny abends in the middle of the Win95-OSR2 installs. I finally resolved the issue by re-tuning the motherboard and going down to 70ns memory settings. Do EDO Simms get slower with age ??? Why would it suddenly start hanging on the faster settings. Anyway, it now works and has finally overcome all its problems with the 1.5Gb of bad sectors.

I took the mountain bike on a ride along a fairly muddy bridle path on Saturday. First time in a while and I was fairly puffed at the end of it. The rain held off for most of the weekend, and I was able to dent the chalky ground enough to "plant" the remainder of the roses and the honeysuckles. The hill still has a punk hairstyle with a band of grass/weeds which we (read Maggie) still hasn't been able to mow.

Saturday was shopping for shoes for Nicky day. Yes, a whole day is required. It first starts with an illusive search for a shoe shop which some friend found some nice shoes in. You know, the one which begins with an "R", and is opposite another shop which she can't remember the name of...she thinks... After that futility has gone on for some time, we start the walk from shop to shop identifying all the shoes which we don't like, or which are just "sad...dad". Then we can return to an arbitrary number of the shops where she though she quite liked a shoe, but she can't quite remember which shop or which shoe. We eventually left Southampton with two pairs of shoes, one pair for Tarryn also.

Yesterday Maggie and the kids went to a sale at Debbenhams, 20% off and then another 10% for being account holders. So a bit of madness set in and we now have another dinner service (that makes 4), this time a Denby Marrakech set which looks excellent and which we have been umming and aaring on for some time. Unfortunately it doesn't fit into any of the cupboards, but at least we have about a weeks worth of crockery before we have to wash up.

This week the builders should replace the damaged doors and brick up the bathroom window which the YWWCBVSB used to get into our house. If they try again, all I can say (in the voice of "a fish called Wanda") is .."disappointed...". The insurance claim also went off to Norwich...here's hoping that a cheque comes back with all due haste...

The Exchange Server here seems to have gone belly up, so I am resending this Home News via my ISP. You may eventually get the original copy sent on Monday, just don't hold your breath...

This weekend it rained, and rained and rained. If you were watching the tele, and were trying to avoid the embarrassment of the Rugby in South Africa, you would have seen the frustration of the Aussie cricketers at Lords. The weekend was largely taken up fetching and carrying the kids in

the rain to and from Music and Dancing, watching Tarryn and St Bedes boat racing down the Itchen in the pouring rain. Enjoying the Parliament Place summer braai, in the rain and walking in the woods of the Itchen Country park, in the rain.

The only bit of the weekend not spent outside in the rain was spent watching the Aussies and English not playing cricket in the rain. Watching the tennis not being played in the rain. And watching England win the European athletics, in the rain. I also attacked the stability problem with Tomcat, and solved it. 1.5Gb of bad sectors on a 2Gb drive was bound to result in an occasional crash now and again. What did the "Yobs With Wirecutters But Very Small Brains" do, kick it ? Anyway that drive will have to be donated to a school or something. I have used one of the 5Gb Maxtors as an ample replacement. Now I must just install Win95-OSR (Win95B) on Tomcat so that I can access it...

The Rugby on Saturday cost me a fiver and a severe loss of face. Come on guys, what are you playing at... Tarryn is away for the week, hopefully without the rain, at Seaton, a coastal resort in Devon. She, and her whole final year of St Bedes are going to spend the week on outdoor activities, fossil hunting, ab-sailing, archery, orienteering and generally having fun. She also conveniently forgot her piano books this morning to avoid having to practice during the week (there is a piano at Seaton).

On Toys Acquisition, we bought a nice big fireproof, YWWBVSB proof safe. It now holds the Chalmers/Data essential backups, the valuables like cameras, video cameras, passport, birth certificates etc. as well as the removable hard drives (when we go on holiday again). I just hope they don't steal the safe, or that we don't forget the very forgettable combination. I have a strange problem with Chatterbox. It has a neat ATX-TX motherboard which has incredible power control. I can turn everything off after a specified time/series of times, including the Chip, the Chip fan and Disk drives. The problem is, that after powering it off, it sometimes powers itself on again. Now normally I would leave it on anyway its suspended state, but it is a bit freaky that you can switch it off, check that everything is powered off, play with the mouse etc. Check five minutes later and it's still off. Check a bit later and the bloody thing has decided that it wants to play again, and has powered itself on.

This week's Home News has been seriously delayed due to a lack of tapping by Ricky's fingers on the keyboard.

We are going to be away for the next two weeks, first learning to sail a 32' ocean yacht in Falmouth and then putting it all into practice by "sailing" a canal barge through the Brecon Beacon National Park in Wales. Needless to say we are all looking forward to the next two weeks

and have been getting ourselves into the nautical mood by taking baths, washing the dishes and standing outside for prolonged periods in the rain which is the British Summer.

The kids enjoyed their weekend Guide Camp in the rain and the two sad git parents enjoyed themselves at home, playing on the PC's, and painting the downstairs loo. Actually I am not sure whether it was painting the downstairs loo or Maggie putting blond highlights into her hair - both came out yellow. I helped the process along by pointing out the paint in the hair and commenting that "it looks very nice dear", and then went back to a battle with the pesky Yankees who were trying to invade France.

Tomcat got a new 21" Iiyama, as a swap out. I complained that it was not as clear as I would expect, but the new one is just as bad, so I guess it wasn't the screen's fault after all. Hooligan got a new 7.1Gb Diamond Max drive and a PS/2 MS-Mouse and the CD-Rack got 6 more blank CD-Roms (they have gone down to 20UKP for 6, so I just had to buy some more). Chatterbox is still not talking to the Ensonic MIDI Keyboard, not even powering it on. The 32UKP MIDI junction box, while looking very nice stuck to the wall, helped not a bit.

Red monster is having an excursion with me here in Cardiff, it's nice to have a decent car for a change. I test drove a new MGF (latest MG sportscar), which was good, but not inspiring. I don't think I will last out the year without buying a BMW Z3 - they just look to sexy. Well, after the Nissan Sunny, I guess a Robyn Reliant (3 wheeler car for those South Africans not exposed to the delights of Reliant) looks sexy.

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