Back in 1995, I was a software engineer for Ingres, working on the OS/2 port. A merchant bank had a serious, intermittent, non-reproducible problem and Computer Associates kindly bought me a ticket to New York to go and help them. The ticket was an open return. I thought ‘That’s nice. That’s so I can extend my stay for a lovely weekend city break with my wife’. The truth was that it was an open return as I was staying onsite until the problem was resolved [ PH was right. I am naive ] ...

The more observant among you will have noticed the addition of a StatCounter button to the sidebar. The available StatCounter metrics are quite basic as the hosted Wordpress blog is limited to the HTML (not the Javascript) version of the tracking code. So advanced features like path analysis and keywords are not available but the reports do include domain information, breakdown of unique and returning visitors, visit length, pages per visit and browser metrics. ...

Been using Emacs for years but still learning M-x sort-lines M-x delete-trailing-whitespace I knew about the first command but not the second. Very handy to tidy up an ugly SQL*Plus spool file.

I don’t know whether this is genuine but, if so, I am gravely disappointed that I missed it. I wonder if Smith was in the same state as his infamous (incoherent) appearance on Newsnight after John Peel’s death.

In response to Chelsea’s recent acquisition of Michael Ballack and continued pursuit of Schevchenko, Manchester United are widening the search for a world class striker to replace Ruud van Nistelrooy. Damn. We so nearly got him.

Oh no. The first pictures are starting to circulate. Stop it. Stop it now. Please stop it.

Dear Reader Apologies but it has indeed been a long time since my last post. The reason for this enforced silence was that my cruel owner had me sectioned under the mental health act for the last 6 months. He maintained that I was a dangerous, paranoid schizophrenic with delusions of grandeur. He was wrong of course. My only sin was to continually argue with my owner’s intractable assertion that I was merely a blog. I continually and furiously disputed this and was prepared to die for my cause. ...

With apologies to Mr. Kipling (who does bake exceedingly good cakes) and Tele Savalas ‘If’ - a poem by Arsene Wenger of North London. If UEFA had changed the rules of football for all games played on 17 May 2006 If the referee hadn’t been a Barcelona supporter If the idiotic, Norwegian linesman had been allowed to officiate and flag the first goal offside If Lehman had still been on the pitch, he would have saved both goals If D’Artagnan had been allowed to stay on the pitch If the Barca goalkeeper hadn’t tipped Lundberg’s shot over the bar If poor Thierry hadn’t been so tired, he would have definitely scored that goal ...

Oracle ‘A’ lister and Scottish football fan, Doug Burns, was celebrating last night as he hoisted the inaugural ‘Champions League Bingo’ trophy aloft in an Edinburgh pub. Burns commented: ‘Obviously I am surprised and delighted to win this cup. I had never played before but the cliches just kept on coming. It was unbelievable. I was in a noisy pub and I had to ask the bar staff to pump up the volume and my friends to stop talking but it was worth it’. ...

Referrer traffic from TailRank. Nothing too remarkable about that but an absolutely fantastic opportunity for a Viz style subject line. Finbar Saunders