Regular perusers (both of you) will recall my bus, Buzzy and that he had a slight problem last Monday - well, I just got a call from the mechanic.
Clutch kaput but also gearbox kaput... buggeration...
New clutch is going to cost around 400€; second-hand gearbox around 500€ plus labour.. ouch!
The question I have to put to myself though is: "is it worth it?"
Buzzy, as I have mentioned, is 18 already - so from that point of view the answer is "no".
But, as I have also mentioned, he is a member of the family too - so does that mean a "yes"?
Did I complain down below that I was being called an old softie?
What to do, what to do...?
Wednesday, October 11, 2006
Monday, October 09, 2006
Hello Earth
This is a view of us from Saturn taken by the Cassini probe - that little tiny dot about the size of a pixel under the wider ring is the earth. In the inset you can see a slight protuberance at the top left - that is the moon. A holiday snapshot from 930 million miles away. Stuff like this never ceases to send chills down my spine.
Friday, October 06, 2006
From An Old Softie
免費的擁抱Free Hugs
This is a first for me - posting a YouTube video (it's DEAD EASY!!).
Anyway, having been called an old softie a few times this week I thought I would post this video and see how YOU get on...!
This is a first for me - posting a YouTube video (it's DEAD EASY!!).
Anyway, having been called an old softie a few times this week I thought I would post this video and see how YOU get on...!
Tuesday, October 03, 2006
Regurgification Day
...just remembered - we have a box reserved in one of the "tents" at the Oktoberfest today - which means, sadly, I am obliged to go and drink lots of beer again...
Ho hum³
Ho hum³
Reunification Day
The move went ok... apart from a few minor details: like my fully-laden bus breaking down...
But you can say what you like, our Buzzy is a fine and noble bus. He always manages to get us home or failing that to make sure that any breakdown happens in a not too inconvenient location. This was a case in point. We had just loaded as much of Nicky's stuff as we could jam in and were setting off for her new place. Before we had even covered the first 100 yards and left the estate he was making warning noises, strange grinding banging sounds which I had never heard before.
Knowing Buzzy, I interpreted this as him saying to me:
"look, pal - I know Nicky is moving and it's important and all that but I have a problem here and before we set off and then break down in the middle of the frantic afternoon traffic right near where the Oktoberfest in being held with a bus full to the top of furniture and bags and so on, it might be better to turn back and think of getting a different vehicle on the job..."
So we did turn back and after some hectic phone calls managed to find a company nearby where we could rent a van for 3 hours. So we went and picked it up, came back, transferred the furniture etc and set off again. This time it was all ok, except for the mad traffic, and Nick was quickly installed in her new place.
Then that strange phase started where Nicky was then "home" and we (her mother, sister, brother and myself) were standing around looking awkward and out of place; feeling that we should leave but not knowing how to...
We were sort of saved in the end by having to go to get the van back in time. So off we went...
I just realised that I actually asked her where she was going to sleep yesterday evening! What a stoopid question... (I will let you think about the psychological background implications!!)
"Here..." she said.
So we took the van back and then returned to find a forlorn Buzzy. He's getting towed to the garage shortly, I think to have a reunification of clutch and engine.
Ho hum².
But you can say what you like, our Buzzy is a fine and noble bus. He always manages to get us home or failing that to make sure that any breakdown happens in a not too inconvenient location. This was a case in point. We had just loaded as much of Nicky's stuff as we could jam in and were setting off for her new place. Before we had even covered the first 100 yards and left the estate he was making warning noises, strange grinding banging sounds which I had never heard before.
Knowing Buzzy, I interpreted this as him saying to me:
"look, pal - I know Nicky is moving and it's important and all that but I have a problem here and before we set off and then break down in the middle of the frantic afternoon traffic right near where the Oktoberfest in being held with a bus full to the top of furniture and bags and so on, it might be better to turn back and think of getting a different vehicle on the job..."
So we did turn back and after some hectic phone calls managed to find a company nearby where we could rent a van for 3 hours. So we went and picked it up, came back, transferred the furniture etc and set off again. This time it was all ok, except for the mad traffic, and Nick was quickly installed in her new place.
Then that strange phase started where Nicky was then "home" and we (her mother, sister, brother and myself) were standing around looking awkward and out of place; feeling that we should leave but not knowing how to...
We were sort of saved in the end by having to go to get the van back in time. So off we went...
I just realised that I actually asked her where she was going to sleep yesterday evening! What a stoopid question... (I will let you think about the psychological background implications!!)
"Here..." she said.
So we took the van back and then returned to find a forlorn Buzzy. He's getting towed to the garage shortly, I think to have a reunification of clutch and engine.
Ho hum².
Monday, October 02, 2006
She's Leaving Home - bad back...
Our Nick - seen here enjoying dinner with me many dinners ago - is moving into her own place today!
This guarantees me a bad back but also a wistful sentimental feeling made up of wondering where all the time has gone and foolishly wishing in vain it was all somehow the way it used to be along with being pleased for her that she is making the next step in her life...
Ho hum...
Saturday, September 30, 2006
My Comeback...
You know how sometimes you just sort of don't blog - you think of things to blog about and then think, "ah, forget it..."??
Well, I have been going through a bit of bloggy blues... thinking about blogging this; planning to blog about that ...and actually blogging nowt!
So, just to reactivate my blogginess, here's a joke made up by an old school-mate of mine, a lad who has to be given credit for successfully going through the whole of his formative years in Liverpool carrying the burden of being called Alex DeGier - I mean it's a great name but imagine in Liverpool ...
"wass yer name mate? DeGier...hey dat's de gear dat mate..." and so on and so on...
Anyway, his joke. When I was an SPTTCA (student part-time temporary clerical assistant) in a Bootle tax office in the far-off 70s, I tried to liven up a grey civil servant afternoon by telling them this joke ... they laughed for weeks about it:
A bloke goes into a pub and he sees Vincent van Gogh sitting over in the corner.
"Hey, Vincent," he shouts, "fancy a pint?"
"No thanks," says Vincent van Gogh, "I've got one ear!"
As my dad would have said, it tickles me that one!
Well, I have been going through a bit of bloggy blues... thinking about blogging this; planning to blog about that ...and actually blogging nowt!
So, just to reactivate my blogginess, here's a joke made up by an old school-mate of mine, a lad who has to be given credit for successfully going through the whole of his formative years in Liverpool carrying the burden of being called Alex DeGier - I mean it's a great name but imagine in Liverpool ...
"wass yer name mate? DeGier...hey dat's de gear dat mate..." and so on and so on...
Anyway, his joke. When I was an SPTTCA (student part-time temporary clerical assistant) in a Bootle tax office in the far-off 70s, I tried to liven up a grey civil servant afternoon by telling them this joke ... they laughed for weeks about it:
A bloke goes into a pub and he sees Vincent van Gogh sitting over in the corner.
"Hey, Vincent," he shouts, "fancy a pint?"
"No thanks," says Vincent van Gogh, "I've got one ear!"
As my dad would have said, it tickles me that one!
Tuesday, September 19, 2006
And Speaking of Backs...
Bloody backs! Down with backs!! Backs are stupid!!! Never have a back!!!!
Backs are proof to me that if there had been an intelligent designer (of course there wasn't an intelligent designer but if there had been) then he/she or it was definitely NOT very intelligent.
Yes, I have a bad back. This phase of bad-backness has been going on for the last few weeks... just one wrong move and boing, there it goes... agony!
And you get no sympathy for a bad back.
Every time you get up from your chair and shout "ow!!" your kids just laugh at you....
Even the correct terms for "bad back" are a bloody nuisance. Take lumbago for example.
When I was a kid I always thought lumbago sounded really funny... I pictured a kind of special humbug. I mean the expression just doesn't tell you anything does it?
For example broken leg is pretty clear or sprained ankle but lumbago? What's that supposed to be?
Or look at sciatica, that's another non-name...
"I have sciatica"
"Oh, is that The Who's new album?"
The Germans are a little more helpful. It's called Hexenschuss in German which literally means witch shot... i.e. you have been shot by a witch. That captures the idea quite well.
However in Anglesey (Wikipaedia link) I found brief but nevertheless welcome respite from the physical and mental torture of lumbago. We were walking along the cliffs near Bull Bay and my back was twitching and pinging with pain. We came upon a little narrow wooden bench for walkers to sit on to admire the view. Now I had the idea to stretch out on it and... wonder of wonders... NO PAIN... just a warm sinking feeling of relaxation...
The Druids were pretty big on Anglesey, you know... hmmm...
Anyway, someday I must go back (oh please yourselves)...
Backs are proof to me that if there had been an intelligent designer (of course there wasn't an intelligent designer but if there had been) then he/she or it was definitely NOT very intelligent.
Yes, I have a bad back. This phase of bad-backness has been going on for the last few weeks... just one wrong move and boing, there it goes... agony!
And you get no sympathy for a bad back.
Every time you get up from your chair and shout "ow!!" your kids just laugh at you....
Even the correct terms for "bad back" are a bloody nuisance. Take lumbago for example.
When I was a kid I always thought lumbago sounded really funny... I pictured a kind of special humbug. I mean the expression just doesn't tell you anything does it?
For example broken leg is pretty clear or sprained ankle but lumbago? What's that supposed to be?
Or look at sciatica, that's another non-name...
"I have sciatica"
"Oh, is that The Who's new album?"
The Germans are a little more helpful. It's called Hexenschuss in German which literally means witch shot... i.e. you have been shot by a witch. That captures the idea quite well.
However in Anglesey (Wikipaedia link) I found brief but nevertheless welcome respite from the physical and mental torture of lumbago. We were walking along the cliffs near Bull Bay and my back was twitching and pinging with pain. We came upon a little narrow wooden bench for walkers to sit on to admire the view. Now I had the idea to stretch out on it and... wonder of wonders... NO PAIN... just a warm sinking feeling of relaxation...
The Druids were pretty big on Anglesey, you know... hmmm...Anyway, someday I must go back (oh please yourselves)...
Wednesday, September 13, 2006
Back to School...
Three of the most awful words in the English language if you are a school kid - and just to rub it in they are plastered all over the shop windows in England too...
Anyway in deepest Bavaria it is back to school today - one day later than it would normally have been because the Pope was here. Just why that should make any difference I don't know unless it was a PR attempt to make him more popular amongst the local kids.
Back to school...arghhhh... how I hated it; catching the busses you hadn't caught all summer, feeling itchy and uncomfortable in the new unworn uniform you still had to grow into...and then the smell of the school again - that unmistakable pong of insufficiently aired school buildings... streams of kids eddying up and down the corridors and finally the form room - our prison cell for the year - where we would find out which group of sadists, loonies and misfits were going to be entrusted with our education this year.
It is maybe one of the few "advantages" of being adult - unless of course you belong to that group of sadists, loonies and misfits - that we don't have to go through "back to school" any more.
Well, I'm off to teach a class of dozy business people to speak English... back to school huh? How about a nice grammar test for the first lesson...
Anyway in deepest Bavaria it is back to school today - one day later than it would normally have been because the Pope was here. Just why that should make any difference I don't know unless it was a PR attempt to make him more popular amongst the local kids.
Back to school...arghhhh... how I hated it; catching the busses you hadn't caught all summer, feeling itchy and uncomfortable in the new unworn uniform you still had to grow into...and then the smell of the school again - that unmistakable pong of insufficiently aired school buildings... streams of kids eddying up and down the corridors and finally the form room - our prison cell for the year - where we would find out which group of sadists, loonies and misfits were going to be entrusted with our education this year.
It is maybe one of the few "advantages" of being adult - unless of course you belong to that group of sadists, loonies and misfits - that we don't have to go through "back to school" any more.
Well, I'm off to teach a class of dozy business people to speak English... back to school huh? How about a nice grammar test for the first lesson...
Monday, September 11, 2006
Happy Birthday Harddisk
Listening to the Bavarian news channel yesterday evening in the car, having finally returned to Munich, I heard that the harddisk is celebrating its 50th year in 2006.
Up until 1956 the most moden computers which existed had been using magnetic tape or punch cards to store data...but then IBM came up with a computer which had a real harddisk for data storage.
This new feature was the size of a wardrobe (2m x 2.2m x 80cm) and weighed about a ton but it could store a staggering FIVE MBs!! That's just about one long mp3!
It makes you wonder what they did with such a miniscule memory...
Oh, and the cost for this harddisk with its 5 MBs was a mere three and a half thousand dollars a month (that's to lease it)!
Progress is not always bad.
Up until 1956 the most moden computers which existed had been using magnetic tape or punch cards to store data...but then IBM came up with a computer which had a real harddisk for data storage.
This new feature was the size of a wardrobe (2m x 2.2m x 80cm) and weighed about a ton but it could store a staggering FIVE MBs!! That's just about one long mp3!
It makes you wonder what they did with such a miniscule memory...
Oh, and the cost for this harddisk with its 5 MBs was a mere three and a half thousand dollars a month (that's to lease it)!
Progress is not always bad.
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