Archive for January, 2008

Beadle is no longer about

Thursday, January 31, 2008 21:43 3 Comments

So the prankster who spent all of his life winding other people up has now passed on. I was never that much of a fan to be honest, but can’t help but notice that twenty years ago, whenever the TV news was ready to announce that “somebody famous has died”, that for the most part [...]

This was posted under category: Life, Media

From Sophos To Spam

Wednesday, January 23, 2008 0:44 3 Comments

I’m a regular reader of the Sophos Labs’ Blog where I get to be kept informed about latest virus threats, email chain letters and the like (this last through regular reviewing of Sophos Labs’ Most Recent and Prevalent Hoaxes). And two things struck me today. Firstly, that someone has written a trojan (for the non-techies, [...]

This was posted under category: Scams & Spams, Technology

2008: Year of the Browser

Tuesday, January 22, 2008 0:38 3 Comments

I’ve been contemplating what is going to happen in 2008, and assuming that my plans for world domination from a secret nuclear hollowed-out volcanic Pacific base continue to be thwarted (partly owing to the fact that I don’t as yet have a secret nuclear hollowed-out volcanic Pacific base), I thought instead I’d give a run-down [...]

This was posted under category: Standards, Technology

And I thought Newcastle were bad…

Monday, January 21, 2008 20:47 4 Comments

Just imagine a purely hypothetical scenario where some of your colleagues are returning to work after their first game in a new five-a-side football league for employees of your organisation. Innocently, you ask how they got on, only to be met with rather flinty looks and the information that they had managed to lose by [...]

This was posted under category: Local Interest, Sport

It had to be said…

Sunday, January 13, 2008 0:54 21 Comments

Bogota museum celebrates lazinessBBC News I was going to go, but in the end I couldn’t be bothered…

This was posted under category: Media, Oddities

Clarkson = knacker

Saturday, January 12, 2008 0:40 4 Comments

Jeremy Clarkson published details of his bank account, sort code, and even told people how to find his address. He did this to prove that the loss of 25 million HMRC Child Benefit data records was a “fuss about nothing”. All you’ll be able to do with them is put money into my account. Not [...]

This was posted under category: Media, Scams & Spams

Cardboard Cats

Friday, January 11, 2008 0:40 35 Comments

We’ve got two cats. A very big ginger one called Einstein — who is good at sleeping, eating, sleeping, disappearing for a couple of days at a time, sleeping and eviscerating small animals, and a big grey one called Darwin — who is good at purring extremely loudly (I’m not joking – sometimes you can [...]

This was posted under category: Life, The Pickards

Why does water melt snow?

Thursday, January 10, 2008 0:49 22 Comments

And I don’t mean warm water, I mean water at what must presumably be around freezing point. To explain what I mean, consider the following scenario. There is a sudden snowstorm, lasting about half an hour. If the ground was previously wet (e.g. it had been raining earlier), the snow will melt. If not, the [...]

This was posted under category: Life, Science

The Balding Sword Of Damocles

Wednesday, January 9, 2008 0:10 2 Comments

aka “Taxi for Allardyce?” I’ve watched Newcastle play a lot of crap football over the years. In fact, mostly, I’ve watched Newcastle play crap football — badly — over the years, with a couple of exceptions during the Keegan and Robson eras, so why should I expect any better? Firstly, the fact that the team [...]

This was posted under category: Newcastle United

Facebook vs Web Snobbery

Tuesday, January 8, 2008 0:38 4 Comments

Many people I know — generally a bunch of relatively well educated and IT literate people look down somewhat on “social networking applications” such as MySpace, Facebook, Bebo and all that sort of stuff. The Blognescenti would rather carefully craft their own posts through some blogging engine (ideally not blogger) and serve them up to [...]

This was posted under category: Blogging, Technology, The Pickards