Abseil
At approximately 13:00 today, a lot of students - of varying ages - got onto a minibus at North Devon College. I was amongst them. We went to Bideford, picking up more students on the way. Our destination was an activities/adventure centre place called 'PGL'. Tony (our course tutor) drove us and we listened to songs from R.E.M.'s 'Out Of Time' on the way there. I was very nervous, though I attempted to cover this by being overconfident, grinning a lot and talking bollocks.

The minibus passed through a lot of forests and general gladed areas that were rendered quite beautiful in the afternoon sunshine. The sky was clear and the air was pure, and no, I'm not going to write a poem about it.

We all got out of the bus (it'd be a bit silly if we stayed there - we'd have missed the abseil) and Charles introduced me to a man called Tom. "I didn't know that was his name," said Charles after I said hello to 'Tom' (he was rather taken aback). I apologised to 'Tom' and asked if that was actually his name. He said that it was. "I told you," said Charles. Charles likes to joke about things and I, being completely gullible, believe everything that he says. "I know a man who collects caravans," he said, "and he owns a rocket launcher. It's over there." (he points) "You can't see it from here - it's behind that blue house," he adds. "They used it in the Gulf War," he later states, and I believe him. I still believe him - why would he lie? Sounds like it's a totally ancient rocket launcher, too. Are we talking about a SAM site? Does anyone else know that it's there? It's mysterious! And why does this man collect caravans? (shrug) Charles makes everyday life sound like .. like it's not - I think that's a good talent.

"You've got your tee-shirt on inside-out!" exclaimed Charles. I looked and sure enough, the label was on the outside. "I was only kidding," he added. "No, it is inside-out," I said, and I began to attempt to invert my tee-shirt, while standing in the middle of the car park. "Are you going to do that in the open?!" half-exclaimed Charles - "everyone's looking!" I skulked off to a deserted room with a pool table (it didn't skulk) and I quickly inverted the shirt. "THERE." I stated, more to myself than anyone else.

The abseil site was a box-like construction at a clearing in the forest. Pine cones covered the grass around the tower, and I picked some up and threw them (mostly at Charles - I can be very childish). Tony asked us to sit on a bench, and we sat and waited to be called. I talked to a young woman - called Dee - who looked a little nervous. I felt as if I was being asked to attend a public execution. Everyone was quite scared at first; they all shuffled around. I noticed that while the women were chatty and bright, the men were sullen and quiet. I sat at the end of the line - with Charles - and didn't say much. I made some lame jokes about making a will and Charles said something jolly about broken necks.

Someone dared to venture up the tower.

Time passed - lots of time passed - and then the person (I think it was one of the women) emerged from the rope-side of the tower and slowly edged her way out, holding onto the rope. There's a ramp on the outside and you put your feet on it and lower yourself down until your body is almost horizontal - all the while you are held by two ropes: one is held by one of the abseil supervisors (I don't know what they're called) and the other is fixed and runs through a loop that holds it by friction.

When my time came, I stood on the second 'landing' of the tower, inside a cross-hatched area. I was instructed to stand in this area and wait until I was called. My heart was beating very rapidly and I began to do breathing exercises to relax. Tony taught us how to do this: in through the nose, inflate the chest, pause, exhale slowly. This relaxed me but let's face it, I was still going to be scared shitless, no matter how relaxed I was!

A man and woman helped me sort the ropes out and checked that the gear was okay. I stood on the edge of the platform, on a ramped area. With my feet fixed on the ramp (glued there, it seemed) I held the left loop - very tightly - and the right rope even tighter. "Let the rope go," said the woman. I was thinking, "WHAT??? Let the rope GO? Are you kidding? I'll plummet!" - but no, I didn't fall - the friction of the rope stopped it from moving, although it did shift a bit and I began to tilt further backwards. "That's it," they said, "now you can start moving." - and I gradually stepped down the side of the structure. I watched my feet. I was not aware of anything except the rope and my feet, going stomp, stomp, stomp. This is a sound that I am familiar with from my nocturnal walks. Stomp, stomp.. and soon enough, I was down - walking on soft grass again. I heard whoops and applause from the rest of the folks. "Well done, Lex," someone said. I was shaking slightly but I was glad that I'd done it, and I wanted another go - so I went back and did it again, and again, and again, and I tried some jumps and attempted to walk back up the tower. I was a bit annoyed with myself that the more I thought about it, the less I enjoyed it (whoops.. innuendo alert..) - or rather, if I didn't think about it, my mind stopped trying to analyse it and I just had fun. I think I learned a very important thing there.. although I don't know what it is (Lex joke ).

One of the reasons that I had so many tries is simply because various people were trying to video my attempts and certain people (no names, Charles and Jo!) had some trouble with the video recording function on my mobile phone - thus, I kept having to go back and try again. It was great fun, although I wish I didn't think about things so much. Everyone else was brilliant too - it wasn't just me up there. I didn't get to see Charles' descent as I was inside the tower. I saw him go by and I attempted to poke him with a stick through the gaps in the wooden slats, but I was too slow.

Later I had a large Chinese meal and threw pork balls at the gulls.

THE END

Hellos go to Tony, Jo, Paula, Lesley, Claire, Nevets, Dee, Charles.. who have I left out? Many people. I'm terrible with names.

P.S. I'll post pictures here, if it is technically feasible.
07:53 PM GMT on 02-Apr-07 [link]

Hot dog
The following text is from the IRC log, which is a sort-of personal diary thing: it's split into short paragraphs because IRC is line-based and I tend to type very long sentences.

That was fun. I walked down to the road and off to the right, towards Larkstone. Looking across at the park, I noted that Larkstone Cafe & Sports Ground is still closed. I am waiting for it to open again; I like it because it's quiet there, the food is good and the staff are pleasant.

I walked to St. James' Park and across to the harbour, past the smelly lobster pots and kids on bikes. I walked up Fore Street to the High Street, withdrew £20 from an ATM, and walked down to the seafront again. I planned tomorrow's activities and decided not to get up incredibly early, but to wake up when it seems right - and not to rush (see later).

At the seafront, I visited 'The Three Ms' and bought a jumbo hot dog, to take away. They'd set up a cooker at the front of the shop for this, and I completely missed it. Sigh!

Armed with my jumbo HD, I set off for the Sunspot and got an Appletise. While I was in TTMs, I looked at their restaurant prices, which are obscene: typically £6 for a basic meal, with typical meals (we're talking bog-standard stuff) costing £7. Outrageous prices for the tourists, I guess.

There was a Hockings ice-cream van and I was going to get one, but changed my mind as I was occupied eating the hot dog and drinking the Appletise. I concluded that hot dogs are pretty good value, if you take them away and don't eat them in.

A dog came up to me, attracted by the smell of food. Its owner shouted at it. "Come here!" bellowed the man, as if his dog had committed a very grave error. It was the equivalent of 'leave the strange man alone!' - the note of outrage in the man's voice, as if the dog should have a strict social code, was quite comical.

Many teenagers were riding bikes, and the kids had skateboards. I watched the sea - a vibrant blue-green foamy tide with white breakers - and thought about the 'plunge' tomorrow, when I'll be abseiling from some high place. Let's hope that I make it (that joke is wearing thin now!). On the way back I walked over St. James' Park again and reminded myself that it'd be a good place to have a small picnic, one day. It's not far from here.

Tea!
03:48 PM GMT on 01-Apr-07 [link]

Camera stuff and BT
Yesterday was fun: I went into town, had an overpriced (£5.20!) ham salad, walked around the seafront and drank a can of Cherry Coke. Then I walked back to the flat and spent the afternoon getting the old low-resolution Logitech Quickcam working.

(Skip forward a paragraph if you want to avoid the technical stuff)

With the old system, the camera was on the webserver, so it was just a matter of getting a script to regularly take snapshots and move the resulting image over to the webserver's document directory. That changed when I implemented a system to only take a picture when the webcam page was viewed, and I added brightness, contrast, refresh time controls and a one-line 'short comment' feature. The new system changes it all again, with one computer taking the pictures and sending them across to the webserver. The webserver also sends commands and settings back to the 'camera host', which then modifies the video parameters. I'm happy with the state of the camera system: there's the live camera if people want to look at the harbour and sea, and the Quickcam for folks who are more interested in what's going on in the flat.

Things are gradually getting back to normal - whatever that is - after I moved out and then moved back again, three days later. That messed up everything and I had to sort out loads of paperwork with the council, the DWP, the estate agents, SWEB (electricity), SWWB and lately, British Telecom.

(Skip forward another paragraph if you want to miss my BT rant!)

I am happy to say that I now have Call Minder and Caller Display working on my home phone, so people will get to leave a message instead of the phone just ringing. I was quite annoyed to find that BT had been charging me rent for these services, even though they had not been provided - so I put in an official complaint. I also complained that when I wanted to notify them that the services were not working, I could not get through to a human being! I was put through to the automated fault-reporting system and this always forced me to do a line test: when the system calls back to say that the line does not show a fault, you can then choose to speak to a 'customer service advisor' - who then connected me to someone else, who dropped the line - so I had to start all over again. In the rare event that you get to speak to a live person, you should count yourself very lucky if you get someone whose speech is clear and who is not talking to you over a crackly, faint and unreliable connection. I wasn't happy with BT charging me twice for line rental either - however, I feel that over the years, I've got some feeling regarding how BT operates behind-the-scenes: their call centre staff are stressed and overworked, their technical support staff are hidden behind layers of bureaucracy - preventing them from doing their jobs properly - and it's all overlaid with a happy image of a caring, sympathetic company whose customers are perpetually laughing with joy at the brilliant service that they get in their carefree, sunny, shiny lives. To their credit, the call centre staff are often people with real personalities and a sense of humour who often do their darnedest to sort the trickiest problems out.

The days are getting longer, the clocks have gone forward and it's light in the evenings now. Thus, I am venturing out of the house a little later each day, and it's very important for me to go out or I get stuck in the flat and go into 'hermit mode'. I must remember to go and see my grandmother, who only lives a few miles away - so what's my excuse? I don't like to leave my 'operations base', I think. Several times, Charles (friend of mine who was on a course that I went to) has asked me to dinner, and I nearly always turn him down. The main reason is that I feel uncomfortable when I am in someone else's territory. It's a control thing. Also, the transport makes it difficult - buses.. groan. Shall I rant about buses now? No - 'nuff ranting.

Hello Elly and Nigel! If you're reading this, could you let me know? In fact, if anyone at all is reading this, write me an email (contact details on main page) and tell me, eh?

Almost forgot to say: THEY HAVE FIXED THE 'CLATTERING THING' - one .. er.. can't say 'manhole' - er.. 'personnel maintenance access point' fixed! I called North Devon District Council's environmental health department - or 'My Devon' as they are now nauseatingly known - and the message got through.
01:17 PM GMT on 01-Apr-07 [link]

Nokia 770

I've bought another one! Yes, I had one, but I sold it on EBay. As I recall, it was at about Christmas time that I heard about the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet. I had a Nokia 770 and I was fairly pleased with it, but its slowness was getting annoying and when I read that the N800 had a faster processor and twice as much RAM, I emitted a 'whoa!' sound and ordered one instantly. I figured I'd need to sell my 770 to pay the bills, and this I did. It was bought by a man who works for ARM Ltd., the folks who design the processors for many mobile devices, including the 770.

N800
A few weeks later I read a review of the N800 in Linux Format. Nick Veitch writes about the 770, "I liked that it was just a big rectangular brick. The screen worked fine; the stylus was a little quirky, but usable when a finger wouldn't do. While the addition of stereo speakers to the N800 is nice, the camera may be useful and the battery life is definitely worthwhile, it seems that something has been lost along the way. The N800 may be more 'mainstream' for Nokia, but I think I'll still be packing the 770 for those dangerous Linux Format missions."

After I read those words, I decided that I'd really like to have my 770 back. Sure, I had a nice new N800, but it was so new I didn't dare use it and it is currently sitting in a drawer. I don't want to use it in case I accidentally damage it. This is a problem for me: I buy something and I am so protective of it that I just want to look after it and not actually use it for anything. Thus, things usually stay in their box for a long time until I have the courage to open the box and tentatively look at the device.

I put in a bid for a Nokia 770 on EBay. Having found one that looked to be in good condition and whose description stated that it was practically unused, I put in a bid - and won it! I am sitting here now with the 770 in its pouch, and I've installed the latest Internet OS release on it and have added a lot of software so it is now very usable: in my opinion, the 770 is usable out-of-the-box but really comes alive after you've added more games, skin customisation utilities, media players, VNC viewer, VNC server, X terminal and, of course, an ssh server!

However, there are a few problems. The unit has been damaged: it has scratches on the screen and there's a chip of plastic out of the base, near the microphone. The screen has obviously been used a *lot* since there's a little circular series of scratches near where the 'Enter' on-screen keyboard 'button' would be. This is in spite of the seller stating that it's 'almost new'. I cannot prove that the unit was despatched damaged - such damage may have occurred in transit, as the box was bashed around and was torn and about three days late being delivered. I will now have to spend extra money getting the unit repaired, and I am really broke - my bank overdraft is almost at the limit and I owe British Telecom £250 and the water board £850.

I'm a geek, and my hobby has branched off in directions that I never would have believed ten years ago. I am not earning anything from it though, and these devices need a lot of expensive maintenance. It's time to think seriously about what this all means to me, and whether I can sell anything to pay the bills. I very much don't want to (sell things, that is).

SL5500
P.S. I'm back on the medication - antidepressants (Citalopram).
08:37 PM GMT on 18-Mar-07 [link]

Coffee
[I was at the café when I wrote this]



Gotta laugh, eh? Loads of bills came in earlier this week, and I've got so little money that BT and the water board will probably be banging on my door, demanding cash. If Brooknet disappears again, it probably means that BT cut the phone line. Alternatively, as happened earlier today, it could just be that I decided to move the DNS server to another room. I needed to find the UPS, then the cables for the UPS, then the network cables and the blah blah blah..

Erm. Can't remember what I was going to say now. Hello sandwich. Salad sandwich and wotnots. Gotta go - lunch is served.
01:57 PM GMT on 16-Mar-07 [link]

Star Wars Galaxies
Hey folks, I'm on Star Wars Galaxies. I play a Wookiee called 'Yseipoi'. After being on Second Life for so long, I find RPGs a little limiting, though I know that it's a game, not a simulation. I'm so tired I can't concentrate on that or anything right now. I don't like whining constantly about how bad everything is around here, but it's part of the reason that I started moving house and then decided to move back three days later. I call it 'the clattering thing': it's a water board meter inspection cover or something. It's just to the left of the white line in the road, and cars coming from the right go over it regularly, making a loud 'KER-CLUNK' sound. It's slowly got louder over the time that I've been here, and now I can't sleep. It gets into my dreams whenever I try to sleep, and I can even hear it in the kitchen, which is farthest away from the road. Thus, I sleep on the bus, in restaurants - anywhere I can. I think I understand why my neighbour (downstairs) likes to turn his music up quite loud - just to drown the sound of the thing out.

It's a shame I can't just go out into the street and, I dunno, just concrete the thing over or something - but there are firm laws in place to ensure that one cannot take matters into one's own hands and instead, I have to go through the ponderous laws of this society. I suppose I should start with North Devon District Council, who will perhaps eventually notify the water board and the Highways Commission, who might eventually resurface the road. There are so many of these things, though: there's one a few yards down the road. How many more people are kept awake by these clattering annoyances?

The sad thing is that without these things, Ilfracombe might actually be a nice place to live - if you take out the poverty, drug problems, alcoholism and depression that its inhabitants regularly suffer. I'm sure there are happy people here - maybe the ones who can afford to only live here part of the time and don't have to suffer the typical Ilfracombe winter which I keep going on about. As darkness falls on another day in this town, I reflect that there is beauty in the countryside, the sea, hills etc. but it's ruined by the people. Yes, it would be a great town without the people.

Sadly, none of you readers - if there are any! - can reply as I've disabled the posting system after the blog was repeatedly spammed. You can email me (email address disguised - in phonetic alphabet notation - to prevent more spam) if you spot any litigiously-dubious stuff that you want to complain about.

Breakfast time.

Almost forgot: happy birthday Dad! I called you and texted you - wasn't sure which number to use. I hope you like the odd present that I got you: a DVD from topofthestops.co.uk, showing many scenic bus stops with music. I wish I'd got one for myself now - I like bus stops as I spend a lot of time standing at them. Some are better than others.

More news: they're finally demolishing the Cliffe Hydro. I've got used to seeing this ugly 80s-looking building, and finally they are doing something about it. The place lay empty for many years, and then someone torched it and the pigeons moved in. A few weeks ago, they started working on it (the people, not the pigeons) - an asbestos-removing van appeared, and roadworks and a single-file traffic light system were installed. If I took a time-lapse video of the work they're doing on it, it would show it slowly being deconstructed from the top down. Whatever they put in its place, I hope it's more successful. That place seems to have distilled the sadness of all Ilfracombe's inhabitants ... Gordon Bennett, here I go again. I bet you folks are counting the hours until the doctor puts me back on the antidepressants.

My favourite song at the moment (this is childish, I know): The Sundays' 'I Won', from the album 'Reading, Writing and Arithmetic'.

An update on an old blog entry: on 05-Oct-2004, I wrote an entry called "Sweet 'n' Sour" which mentioned how one could find any Somerfield store from their website and how Spar didn't have a store finder. This is because Spar is run as a network of franchises or 'RDCs' (Regional Distribution Centres). Appleby Westward Plc. runs south-west operations: www.swspar.com.

Their site is very slow; if they have a store search system, I didn't find it, but then I gave up waiting.
06:40 PM GMT on 11-Mar-07 [link]

Winter
It's been a long, cold winter. I've been stuck in the flat for three days and I've missed appointments and meetings. I am on a nocturnal sleep pattern: I wake at 18:30 and I typically go to bed at 09:30 the next morning. Sometimes I go to bed later and usually I get up a bit later each day.

Since I haven't been to the shops, the food's running out and the milk is almost gone. Luckily, I made some bread and it came out okay - I was fretting as I don't have the measuring cup necessary to get the exact amounts, so I guessed and was lucky.

Today is my last chance to go into town and I can't afford to miss it. Yes, the daylight will hurt my eyes, and yes, there will be noise and people - but I have to go. I think that the longest that I've spent in this flat is a week without contact from the outside world; I think it might even have been longer. I must stop doing this. In retrospect, I think that deciding to stop taking my antidepressants was not a good idea. Ever since that time (January 1st) I've gradually gone back to being a Marvin The Paranoid Android-type person, have felt as if the world is oppressive, noisy and hateful, and it all seems to be directed at me, personally. I like a bit of melancholy, but this is something else. I ask myself though, why do I need antidepressants? When did this all start? It's got to be my sleep pattern that did it - 23 years of messing with my circadian rhythm. Bleh!

I want to walk around in the sun and go to Larkstone Gardens. There's a café there and I like to drink tea and listen to the birds singing. I miss all that. As I said, the winter seems to have gone on for a very long time. But never mind, eh? Chin up, mate! Spring is just around the corner. I will stay busy by adding stuff to this web server and making general improvements to things.

Done: Greymatter, PHP, cgi-bin stuff. To do: webcam, videos for Elly.
01:29 AM GMT on 09-Mar-07 [link]

Monday
Hello from the Orange room, where I appear to have slipped even further down in my chair, so I can just about reach the keyboard as I peep over the top of the table. I think that my body must be slowly turning into a dense gravitational mass as I eat more and exercise less. Eventually all that will be left of me is a point gravitational event of infinite mass, and the rest of the universe will be sucked into it. Sorry.

A man on the radio is talking about the poisoning of an ex-KGB man who said a few things that annoyed Putin and his bods, who are called the FSB - an acronym that only means one thing to me: 'front-side bus'. It is strange that such a poisoning should occur now, as it seems to hark back to the famous poisonings of the late 70s, with its poison-tipped umbrellas. Where did they get the thalium from? I think that thalium is used in laboratories for radiation tests.

My dad's sold his cottage in France and had bought a place in Kent. I visited Kent in March, for my dad's birthday.

Random news:

1. There is the chance of an outage soon as I haven't paid the telephone bill.
2. I haven't seen a spider for a long time and I wonder where they've gone.
3. I miss West Down, even though things were crazy there. I dream about Easterground a lot.
4. I spend a lot of time at Cafe 152. I may as well plug them:

152 High Street, Ilfracombe, North Devon. (01271) 864936. Opening hours are 09:30 - 14:30'ish. Please call and order a baguette. If you live some way away, delivery might take a few days so be sure to order something that will stay fresh. I have not yet asked Sue (the proprietor) whether she will accept orders from abroad.

5. I've registered a silly domain name.
01:33 AM GMT on 20-Nov-06 [link]