intelligent people doing stupid things

Saturday 18 July A beautiful, sunny Saturday morning but instead of sitting in a field in Hook Norton, drinking real ale, laughing, chatting rubbish and analysing the football season with my mates, instead we enjoyed a long overdue visit from my wife’s hairdresser. She is self-employed and a mobile hairdresser. We opened up the garage door and prepared chairs, black bin liners (to avoid using her capes) and an extension cable for her hairdryer and clippers....

July 20, 2020

the curious case of the 'More' tag

I am not sure I like this increasing but irritating use of the ‘More’ or ‘Sensitive Content’ tag on Mastodon. From a cursory glance, I can’t even see how to add it from the Web interface. I’m not sure whether it’s enforced by the Mastodon instance or actively selected by the user. I presume it’s the latter. Microblogging to supposed to be short, snappy and spontaneous. I understand why sensitive media content might merit another key click (to protect the children) but if you’re posting about politics, I’d really rather see all the content in one fell swoop and then I would feel free to choose to ignore it....

June 11, 2020

in praise of MiniDLNA

Five years ago, I purchased a Roberts Digital radio for the kitchen. Mainly to listen to the radio but also this device could play music from Spotify, a USB stick or act as a UPNP client. As I already had the Plex Media Server set up which had a DLNA option, this looked attractive. The setup worked pretty well apart from one minor glitch. And, like a dripping water tap, or the endless, harrowing screams of a baby played on a tight loop in an American interrogation facility, any minor technical glitch can’t simply be ignored....

June 4, 2020

rendezvous with strange man in mask

I anxiously coaxed my wife out of the door to her work trying not to raise her suspicions. My stomach was fluttering as I had an important early morning meeting. To fully prepare, first, I chose my mask. I had two options; a flesh coloured creation that resembled a one bosom bra or a more sinister black model. I tried the pale pink mask but as it, err, masked my nose, mouth and chin, it made me resemble a burns victim who had endured time consuming and expensive reconstructive surgery which had either failed or was still ongoing....

May 21, 2020

Netflix lockdown list

There’s nothing worse than yet another lockdown Netflix list. Sons Of Anarchy Heard about this series from Linux Outlaws many years ago. Jax Teller is a very handsome man. I am convinced he is the bastard son of Kurt Cobain and Brad Pitt. A decent series about biker gangs in California that inevitably features gratuitous violence and goes through peaks and troughs (the season when they went to Ireland was very weak)....

May 19, 2020