Hi all - Alice on trip next week.

Just in case you thought I had forgotten about this wonderful blog!

Been trying to upload a video over the last week or so and, as you can see, I have failed miserably. It was fairly funny, I will have another go in a week or so. Got this new bit of software you see, to go with the camcorder - no, I shall say no more. You will have to wait until I figure it out before you get the results!!!

Footie, Euro Championships, this last week has also fairly dramatically eaten into my spare time. But that's my fault really. Don't need to watch do I???

Argyle's fixture list tomorrow. Just thought I would throw that into the blender. Not sure if we will have a team this season. Things are not looking good. We haven't even kicked a ball yet! The two kids killed in the RTA with our goalie puts it all into perspective though.

Al is off on her adventure week tomorrow. Photo's of her packing above. Val is a bit protective but she agreed the snipers rifle wasn't a good idea for a bunch of 10/11 year olds - but she was only just persuaded!

Seriously though, that nutter known to all who frequent this blog as the "red writing bit" is at it again. He now has the piece of kit shown above. No stopping the lad, I reckon the swan mentioned a few postings ago should be a bit careful. Ah well, over to HR for his take on it all.

"Hi all, the project is finished and all I have to do now is test-fire her and hope she neither explodes nor falls to pieces ! The job was a real test and a challenge so I learnt and re learnt a lot (it had its mishaps) but the end product is fine. I just need to tidy up the solder that runs out from under the mounts and she should look lovely."

Mad as a hatter, but don't tell him because he really doesn't know and I would not want to hurt his feelings!!

Blue Skies is noticeable by his absence. He was a busy bee so we won't blame him. Equally Leon has been earning his crust with little downtime. Hope all is well with you both.

I think Microsoft have been tidying up vista recently. My screen saver now works, one of the many updates I assume. Also my mouse works with this blog now. I reckon they have put in a fix for the wireless mouse. It's nice to have some of the stuff back that I took for granted with XP. Now how about giving us "Works" instead of the crap version on Vista, of course I could go out and purchase the software for £80 or so!! Yet again I had that with XP. In fact with ME I also had PowerPoint that appears to have disappeared as well! More expense less value, still I suppose that is what we get when we put all our PC eggs in one large Microsoft basket. I suppose they need the cash after all they are really unsuccessful aren't they.

Ah well, stop moaning and get down to watch the footie.

Al out on Dartmoor from tomorrow, so watch the weather forecast folks.

HR's bits

"I went to an event at Belvoir Castle near Grantham at the weekend and my team won the "Maxim Gun" race on both days ! for a combined age of 151 thats not bad is it !

We had to go over an obstacle course then strip the maxim (72kg) and carry it back across the course then assemble, drag back to start and dry-fire it. I had the main gun once it was off the "trolley" and scrambled under the "plastic" barbed wire with it under my arms; closely followed by the other two with the ammo box , armoured shield and trolley!

When I approached one of the team early on saturday morning and asked if he and the other new chap could come over and we would all be taught to strip the gun ,prior to racing with it ,he said " you can`t say that to a 50 year old!" so I just replied " You can if your 54!"

It was a great weekend and I avoided the vodka on saturday night ! meanwhile at home I am now in possession of all the bits required to modify my rifles and am happily refreshing my engineering skills as an ex Instrument Technician. I have an ex-SS telescopic sight to strip and then remove the mounting-rings.They are soldered in place so it will require carefully aplied heat. Then later on I have to drill and tap holes in the rifles, to accept the sight mounts !

It scared me at first, but basic principles will see me through.

I am really enjoying it and testing them on the range will be the icing on the cake.

Glad to hear all is well at your end; that hallway looks ace.

All the best xxx"

Thought I would let HR have his own post today. The last picture of him and his lads, they aren't wearing iniforms!

Thought you may be fed up with my tales of woe about how technical items appear to be picking on me, so thoug a little bit of normality would do you all a bit of good. Couldn't find any normality amongst our group of friends so thought let HR have his 15 minutes of fame!!

Championship playoffs in a 45 minutes so I am off in a sec. You all look after yourselves and keep the comments coming!

I am a prat

Just realised that I used the same photo album as a previous post. Better luck next time as I don't intend to do that again tonight. Ah well!!

Buddha Day

Hello one and all and Happy Buddha Day to you all.

As usual life has been busy here at 122, but in a nice way I hasten to add. As an example I am sitting here with Mike Oldfield's Voyager playing on my iTunes whilst downloading Hergest Ridge into iTunes. Later I will connect my iPod and update the music library.

From all that you may gather that my dead iPod has been replaced and I am now back, and ahead of the point I had previously reached I may add, to filling it's rather large memory with some rather nice sounds.

Each morning I can be found wondering along to work with the iPod stuck in my ears. Lunchtime out comes a book, a bag of fruit and on goes the music. I have realised this is the way to stop people approaching with those fatal words "I can see you are at lunch ....". A little my fault for staying at my desk but why should I waste precious reading, eating and listening time moving elsewhere?

Val was at the head medics yesterday and the head chappie agreed that all seems to be going well. He said she will be on the pills for at least six months but probably longer. Val told him it was OK with her until the end of time if required, better a couple of pills a day than go through that nightmare again. We have our fingers, and everything else possible, crossed that we will not be visiting the dark place again.

So, summer is a coming. My PC is behaving itself up to a point. It would have been nice if Microsoft had road tested Vista properly before using the buying public as a test ground. All sorts of strange things like the screensaver will not work with a microsoft wireless mouse, made by the same company you think they might have spotted that and at least sorted it out. They still haven't actually should anyone from Microsoft get around to read this!

Another strange thing is that my cursor won't work in this main bit of the blog if I use the mouse. Strange but true! I have to adjust the text size then tab down to get to write this wonderful prose.

I have just had an example of womanly wiles. You may not realise it but I have been away for 15 minutes or so. Val shouted up just now asking if I would like a cuppa, celebrating that things are fine health wise and she can lift a kettle at the moment I, of course said yes please. Subsequently she shouted telling me my most welcome cuppa was awaiting in the kitchen. I dived down and whilst walking past the backdoor where previously mentioned female was sitting having a puff I heard the question "Do you have any fags in your secret store?". You see, when she is not well muggings here is dispatched to get the horrible bloody cancer sticks. My motto in life is be prepared especially if you are going to be asked to go out in the cold and wet to purchase something you hate with a vengeance.

Val went to yoga today with sissy Silvia. Therefore she is knackered. This is understandable given the health situation. So that simple question translated into man speak is "I am out of fags, I know you hate them and I know I used your secret supply two days ago. But I have been to yoga and you know how good that is for me from a health point of view. I am not a gibbering wreck at home but can't make it down the shop now so you had better go down and get me some fags because you know if you don't I will turn into a raving nicotine desiring monster before the night is out". The really good thing is that the young lady down the shop asked me for ID. So I feel really cool now.

Well it is now 8.30 and Val has just come up saying she is heading to bed. Waking the dead is on in half an hour so she must be knackered. She will V+ waking but it does mean I have about an hours worth of telly I can watch!!!!

I will say goodnight now and hope to be back with some tales from 122 sooner next time. Certainly not tomorrow when I will be taking over the front room for that first time all English teams European Championship final. I think I will go for Man Utd.

I will try to put some piccies of Al's "do" over silv's at the top of this post. If there are none there I didn't do to well!!! Success, I have just had a sneak look!

Where have I been?

Hell's teeth. Yet another period of disruption at 122. Is there no end???

Before you get worried all is well health wise. It is just that my technical bits and pieces are picking on me. You are aware that my ipod died on me. You know, the one with over 2,500 songs on it!!!

What IS he worrying about I hear you say. All the tracks will be in his iTunes folder. Yep they were. That is until I took my PC back to PC World as I had had enough of it deciding when it would work rather than me. I am the human in charge after all! That's how it work isn't it?

Took the naughty PC back last Sunday and as a punishment the Tech Guy wiped the hard drive and re installed. He did ask me before doing it, but that doesn't change the result does it!!

Why didn't the silly chap do a back up I hear you saying. Guess what, I did. I felt quite pleased with my cleverness until, just chatting to the Tech Guy (actually he was called Paul but Tech Guy sounds pretty cool and I am so easily impressed - he probably is still called Paul actually).

Any way there we were chatting and I mentioned that I had backed up and just needed to press the right button when I got home with my now repaired PC. He looked at me with that look that people in the know reserve for those pitifully ignorants standing in front of them. "Is yours a mirrored back up?" Now strangely enough I actually knew what he meant but that still didn't stop the shiver going down my spine. Oh dear.

I had a think about it and when I got home ran the backup making sure I didn't replace a file already on the PC. This meant that my iTunes folder didn't back up as I wanted. I have just re installed my "Yes" collection. The Floyd,Beatles, ELP, Styx and Deep Purple along with the MP3 files which I make into albums are all back where they belong. Only about 800 odd CD's to go!!!!

And as a matter of interest my mouse will not work the cursor in this blog publishing tool, bet it's because it is wireless - microsoft need to pay attention to the consumer a bit more, did you know the microsoft screensaver will not work with a microsoft wireless mouse!!!

And my bloody Kodak software doesn't play so I have to look at that. My ethernet network will not allow Al's computer to play either. No idea what other fun I have in the coming weeks.

My iPod is being sent to me this week so I will probably be in tears by the end of the week.

By the way, hope all is well with you lot. Although I suspect all is not well in some places. But you will hopefully let me know if all is Ok or not at some point comfortable to you.

I am now going to watch Doctor Who providing the V+ worked, it normally does - but who knows.

Managed to upload. More to follow!!

Long time no see

Where have I been I hear you asking.

Firstly an update on Val, she is getting on swimmingly, a few nervy periods now but very much improved. Hopefully these pills will do the trick. obviously this has taken up a fair bit of my time recently!

On top of this you will recall that I was the proud owner of a new PC. Getting to grips has been a fun time. I still haven't got things running that I thought were going to be a plug and play thing. Strangely the screensaver refuses to play. I know Vista is different - but not that different!

Tha main gripe is that the local connection I wanted is not playing the game. I have had an extra ethernet card installed as I don't do the mechanical bit for new pieces of kit. Any excuse will be taken by the manufacturer and store to avoid responsibility for any problems!

So, PC World installed the extra card. I have finally got the PC the recognise that there is a card there, it just doesn't agree that there is a plug plugged in - there is as I can see the damn thing. Yep I made sure the ethernet wire is OK, just in case that's what you were thinking. I intend to have a go at my old machine over the weekend, if I have time, as it connected to the other end of the wire. Time will tell as they say.

On top of everything my new ipod (got fed up and treated myself) has decided not to play. Turned it on this morning and it was slow waking up, then one earphone was playing really really quiet. Didn't have time to mess about as I was workbound so had a look tonight. Dead as a dodo. Rang Dixons on-line and had to go through hoops and press about 15 different buttons only to be told that they could not connect me and then I got cut off!! Who decides that this is good customer service! They might have made this sale but don't they realise that nowadays the victim, sorry customer, just gets on-line and tells anyone who will listen? When I checked their website it says that lines close at 6pm. So why don't they have a message that says "sorry we are closed" instead of ...... aaarghhhhh!!!!!

The mighty greens have messed up big time. Al and I have been going out and have a season ticket for next season, but the last few games have been painful. Failing to win against 10 men after being 1-0 up. 2-0 up with 15 minutes to go and conceding with the last kick of the match to lose 2 points. It's very frustrating being a football supporter.

On the bright side. Photo's above. Al is now 10 years old (double figures already). We have a super family get together (Val's side), was meant to be at our place but Val had a downturn, Silv stepped into the breach like a good 'un. A super time was had by all, Al is deeply into family so was chuffed to bits.

Just looked out me window and Al and her mates, Jazzy and Karis, are in the back court making up dances. We got her a game on the Wii that is a singalong with microphone type game. They haven't stopped using it since the 16th. Every evening we have the sound of youthful voices echoing through the house.

Ah well, they have their music and I have Paul Rogers doing a bit of the rock / blues pounding out from my PC. Lovely.

We have had a comment from one of Cheryl's friends, just a short and sweet - go for it Benita
"Love the hallway!Painted mine white yesterday after several yrs of not getting around to plastering just covering it up at least so it looks more cheery.Al and Cheryl have popped round for a cuppa. All the best Benita and Dave"

You know I said there would be pictures up above. Guess what, the tech curse has struck me again. There is an error that blogger has to sort. So sorry folks no piccies this time. I just hope this post makes it!!

We now have a computer suite

Sounds good doesn't it!

We have purchased a new computer so now have two in what was my study. Al renamed it to computer suite as, using her logic, in school if there are two or more computers then it is a computer suite!

It has been a nightmare setting this machine up. We were sold an incompatible monitor, so not off to a good start. As you may know Val hasn't been well so I wasn't able to devote the time I wanted to setting the thing up.

PC World replaced the monitor after I took the CPU box and Monitor back and showed them.

I have had problems since which I think may have arisen from the numerous times I switched the machine off at the "on" button rather than correct switch off. Very difficult to switch off correctly without a monitor!!!

My next problem is working out where this machine keeps it's photo file. Have just downloaded Kodak easyshare and connected the camera so I know there is at least one photo in there - just can't find it!!

Have to keep this picture less and short as it is now midnight and this will be the earliest I have got to bed since Sunday night!!

Hopefully normal service will be resumed fairly quickly!