Disposable Society

A few years ago I bought a cordless drill/screwdriver from Focus, a big UK DIY chain. It’s a 24v model CCHD24 made by a company called Champion and it’s served me very well. Now the battery is failing to retain a charge and I want to replace it. The problem is that I can’t find… Continue reading Disposable Society

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What the Hack – The sequel

I can’t believe it’s four years ago that I went to What The Hack at Liempde in Holland. Now it’s almost time to dust off the rucksack and check out the tent in preparation for Hacking At Random. Anyone fancy tagging along? It’s fun, honest!

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Motorcycle Road-Tax Petition

I’d love to see a lot more names on this Government petition. Why on earth should motorcycles be exempt from tax relief for non-polluting vehicles? In summary: Changes to the law mean cars emitting less than 100g of CO2 per kilometre travelled would be exempt from paying Vehicle Excise Duty (road tax), while motorcycles are… Continue reading Motorcycle Road-Tax Petition

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The age of the bus

For the younger generation, the title of this is based on an old series of advertisements for British Rail, their slogan was, “This is the age of the train”. Thought I’d better clear that one up. :) Fuel prices being what they are at the moment and the associated costs of actually owning a car… Continue reading The age of the bus

ATM Perils

Yesterday (30th June) I used one of those nasty ATM machines that charges a fee to withdraw my own money. I don’t like the concept but sometimes the convenience outweighs the charge. What I didn’t realise until now is what happens when they go wrong. The charge on the machine in question is static (£1.75)… Continue reading ATM Perils

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Moved the Blog

Today I moved my Blog from it’s old address blog.bananasplit.info to its new address of blog.stmellion.org. The old name still works for the time being but hopefully over a period of time my few readers will make the switch and Google will notice the change. By then I might have moved to a different village,… Continue reading Moved the Blog

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The Ex Factor

A couple of years ago I got hooked on a series of The Apprentice and wrote a Blog Entry on it. At the end of that series I felt a bit disappointed with the outcome as it wasn’t representative of the skills the participants had demonstrated throughout the series. Now I find myself feeling the… Continue reading The Ex Factor

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Public Transport

Travel is a necessary evil of my job and having spent a number of years ploughing up and down the arterial motorways of England I have recently turned to public transport for the majority of my trips. One of the most noticeable aspects of using public transport is the prohibitive cost of it in comparison… Continue reading Public Transport

Holidaying in Iceland

Iceland has held a fascination for me ever since I read Desmond Bagley’s book Running Blind. In it a retired British spy called Alan Stewart is chased across Iceland leading to descriptions of huge glaciers, waterfalls and geysers. I’ve read the book so many times that the pages have started to fall out and it’s… Continue reading Holidaying in Iceland

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Registering with Technorati

Posting the following link appears to be the best way to register my blog on Technorati The other option is to tell them my username and password. Hmm….. Technorati Profile

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More calls for censorship

This article on the BBC website highlights the latest attempt at Net censorship. This time the “good cause” is banning sites that provide information on suicide as kids are killing themselves. I could take the opportunity to rant on about suicides being the result of our draconian laws on euthanasia but that’s another story. I’m… Continue reading More calls for censorship

World Cup 2006

England just got knocked out of yet another World Cup following a penalty shoot-out. This time England only scored 1 out of 4 which is a poor result even for a team that are hopeless at penalties. Of the World Cup matches I’ve watched, the actual football and the footballers seem to only be partially… Continue reading World Cup 2006

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Need a new Television

Move to new house is less than a week away now and there are so many things we need to buy. Near the top of my list is a decent LCD television. I looked at a few in Comet and Currys today and based on asthetics I like the LG and Sony products. Sony models… Continue reading Need a new Television

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Television Licensing

Here in the UK we are required to hold a TV license if we operate a receiver. The actual wording on the TV Licensing website is: If you use a TV or any other device to receive or record TV programmes (for example, a VCR, set-top box, DVD recorder or PC with a broadcast card)… Continue reading Television Licensing

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Hauppauge WinTV Nova-T-USB2

I bought one of these gadgets last week. Installing it under Windows was a doddle and the Linux set up wasn’t much harder, although it did need a kernel compile. The result is a lovely clear picture on my LCD monitor and a good choice of channels. There is however one fairly serious oddity: Approx… Continue reading Hauppauge WinTV Nova-T-USB2

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2006 Bonus

Just got my FY06 bonus notification.  £2,032 before tax which actually resulted in my net pay for the month being £1226 higher than usual.  I think this equates to about 5% which is half what I was expecting.  I should of course manage my expectations better.  Nothing like a bit of uncertainty whilst trying to… Continue reading 2006 Bonus

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The DeVinci Code

Of Dan Brown’s four books, The De Vinci code certainly wouldn’t rate as my favourite. I liked Deception Point best, with Angels and Demons coming closely behind it. I’m really not sure what it is about De Vinci Code that has made it such a phenomena, but nobody can dispute that it’s one of the… Continue reading The DeVinci Code

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