I am not a linguist, nor an expert on gender. I'm just trying to muddle my way through this confusing world the same as anyone else. The English language is adaptable. We'll happily bodge words together to make new ones, verb our nouns, and grammar-flex to the point of breaking. It's a fun language! English is (mostly) genderless. The French have le chat and la table - because cats are boys and tables are girls, apparently. In Portuguese, the boys are "os meninos" but the girls are "as…
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We've had our new solar panels for 6 months. Here's how they've performed over summer. 3,361 kWh Generated 2,445 kWh Exported ===== 916 kWh Consumed Despite working from home every day, using laptops, monitors, microwaving lunch, we only used about 5.5kWh of solar each day. About 72% of our summer generation was sold back to the grid. According to our electricity provider, in those 6 months, we imported 992kWh of electricity. So the solar panels reduced our energy bills by 50%. That…
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When carefree Nyles and reluctant maid of honour Sarah have a chance encounter at a Palm Springs wedding, things get complicated as they are unable to escape the venue, themselves, or each other. It's almost impossible to review this movie without giving away the twists and turns that it takes. Just know that it is deeply funny in unexpected ways. It stars the cop from the TV sitcom and the mom from HIMYM (look, just accept that they play the same characters) and has a bunch of "Oh!…
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It has been over a year since I cancelled my Cloudflare account. They keep emailing me and haven't taken me off their marketing lists despite repeated requests. Their CTO told me he would investigate, but nothing changed. Their Data Protection Office hasn't respond to my requests. Cloudflare do not appear to respect the GDPR. I've escalated this to the highest levels of Cloudflare, but they just don't seem to be able to take any action. This is concerning. Terence Eden is on…
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As part of my silly floppy artwork, I wanted to find a retro computer font. Then I remembered that there's a 1960s Doctor Who serial with this beauty. The War Machines is a cracking slice of 60s sci-fi. It's very groovy. But what font is it? It isn't Westminster. The W is completely wrong. And the letter T is mirrored. Westminster has a surprising and interesting history. It isn't Data 70. Which, in any case, was released a few years after the episode. Time travel is complex though. …
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I couldn't find a simple guide to this - so these are notes to myself. Create a file called myVPN.xml: <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?> <AnyConnectProfile xmlns="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/encoding/" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/encoding/AnyConnectProfile.xsd"> <ServerList> <HostEntry> <HostName>My Work VPN</HostName> …
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I read this wonderful article about the invention of the rice cooker and, because I am easily influenced, bought one. This is the YumAsia Panda Mini. It seemed to hit the sweet spot for physical size and price. For £80 you get a rice cooker, steamer, and utensils. Makes enough rice for 2 people. Although, when full, we felt like it was more like for 4. Depends on how hungry you are. It's pretty easy. Measure out rice. Measure out water. Hit button. Wait for the machine to go beep. Eat …
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I get a lot of random Twitter DMs from attractive women who are desperate to make friends with me. I usually report the obvious spammers. But a few weeks ago, one nearly slipped through the net. The woman was wearing a military uniform - a proper one, not a sexy Hallowe'en costume - and was asking a fairly sensible question of me. But something didn't sit right. Usually, these accounts have stolen photos and random names. But the name of the account matched the name on the uniform! A bit…
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Way back in the mists of time, the UK had a Cable TV service called Rediffusion. It had a long and noble history, but has been defunct for the best part of 40 years. All technology leaves scars on the landscape. And Rediffusion was so popular, that it had junction boxes built into the walls of houses. When we moved into our new London home, I spotted this junction box hidden behind a plant pot. That's a Rediffusion JB 134. There is no information about it on the web. Although this somewhat …
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I can't think of a concise way of wording this. I have three monitors. Each has the same resolution - 1920x1080px. But each one has a different physical size - 61 cm monitor, 39 cm laptop, and 48 cm monitor. Here's my problem. When I move a window from one screen to another, the window changes size. It contains the same number of pixels, but it has different physical dimensions. Here's one window, stretched across all three screens: As you can see, the blue bar is a different thickness …
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I wrote this before the pandemic. I chickened out of publishing it because I was working for NHSX at the time. Some of these things have come to pass. Some are yet to come. I'll never forget the look of horror on my professor's face when I told him I didn't think his university course was good value for money. I was in the first cohort of UK students paying tuition fees. A massive £1,000 per year. A group of us had gathered to complain about the poor quality teaching materials on a specific …
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Most human societies have rituals. One popular ceremony is of the young person being made a member of the tribe. For some, it is at the start of life - a Baptism or Christening. For others, it is when the child becomes an adult - Bar Mitzvah or Ritusuddhi. Most societies have marriage ceremonies - to mark the transition into a new stage of life. Houses are blessed, leaving for university requires a party, graduates get a silly gown and certificate. Finally, Death demands a wake. Rituals are …
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