It’s Friday!

You know what's even more annoying than having two equations that don't give the same answer? Having an equation that does, then realising you've made a mistake and have to alter it. Argh.

Google announced yesterday that it plans to float on the stock market. I hardly know anything about business, but it seemed like at a minimum they'd have to start doing things in a more business-like manner, which could reflect on their so far laid-back attitude. Then, however, I read this. Most amusing. The article says that Google's filing document has 'some delightful zingers that come close to giving Wall Street the middle finder.' For example:

Google won't be issuing estimates as to their earnings, because "Many companies are under pressure to keep their earnings in line with analysts' forecasts. Therefore, they often accept smaller, but predictable, earnings rather than larger and more unpredictable returns. Sergey and I feel this is harmful, and we intend to steer in the opposite direction."

As well as their age-old motto: "Don’t be evil. We believe strongly that in the long term, we will be better served—as shareholders and in all other ways—by a company that does good things for the world even if we forgo some short term gains."

I like this attitude Also, the 'exact value of its planned offering is $2,718,281,828'. Recognise that? I admit that I didn't. Unsurpisingly, Wall Street isn't overly impressed by all this. Aaggh, it's something different! Aaaghhh!

Got any plans for the bank holiday weekend? I'd normally have gone to see Kate, but I can't move around much atm. I've got 25% of my OU assignment left now, so hopefully that'll be sorted by the end of tomorrow. I'll finally be able to stop panicking about it, then. Should I treat myself to City of Heroes at that point? Tempting tempting tempting...

dumdumdumdumdumdumdumdumdumdumdumdum dum dumdum der DUMdee dee de da DUM!!!

I'm thinking that when I've finished with this assignment I might treat myself to City of Heroes. Yeah, it's either expensive or just pointless, as you either have to pay monthly, or only play for the first free month you get with the game. But come on, you get to be a superhero!!!

This is number 4, Nailcia Road. And this is Andrew, the computer consultant who leads an exciting double life! For when Andrew sees a cat and slaps himself with a herring, an AMAZING TRANSFORMATION occurs! Andrew IS WANDWAVER!! EVER ALERT FOR THE CALL TO ACTION!!!

If you know me at all, it may not come as a huge surprise that this appeals hugely. Thing is, you can't yet buy it in the UK (and maybe not ever, as they currently have no plans to launch it in Europe), so I'd have to get it online. Same price, but you don't get a manual, map or the box, which I suppose I can live with. Seems a bit of a shame, though.

I have this fantasy of all my friends getting a copy and us forming a superhero league to fight crime and wear cool outfits (currently sans capes, sadly). This is highly unlikely to happen, but hey, I'm good at nagging

Shiny Happy Nuclear Reactions

I spent all afternoon working on my OU assignment, which consists of various questions regarding stars and their associated properties. One question asked me to calculate the radius of a binary system star via two different methods: one using data from an eclipse of one star by the other, and one using the temperature and luminosity. It took me a while to get the data into a reasonable format and figure out the equations. Eventually I plugged in all the numbers...and got two very different answers. Ugh. I hate that. Now I have to start from scratch and figure out where I went wrong. I'm still not particularly with it and seem to be progressing much more slowly than normal, which is irritating as it's due in a week tomorrow. Once this question is complete I'll be 50% done. I can't believe I used to do this kind of thing three times a week. How the hell did I ever get a maths a-level?

Many Graphics Drivers

The below is long, complicated and you don't need to know it. Your time could undoubtedly be better spent. Read on at your own risk.

A few weeks I ordered the components for a client's PC from overclockers.co.uk. The graphics card was a Geforce FX5200. I had a two week deadline to get it all built and ready. After a couple of days the client changed their mind as to the graphics card, so I sent an email to overclockers explaining that I needed to change the card to a 5700 Ultra, and would it be best, given the time constraints, to order this card separatly then return the original?

A few days later I got an email with an RMA no. Not what I'd been after, but whatever. Easter had got in the way, so it was now the Wednesday before the Saturday deadline. I ordered the 5700 Ultra from overclockers on the Wednesday morning, aiming to get the details sorted out later. By Thursday lunchtime they hadn't shipped, so I ordered a card from Tekheads, who always despatch blisteringly fast. Both cards turned up on the Friday and I ended up using the Tekheads card as it had more features.

Last week I returned the two cards to overclockers. I made the mistake of not sending them an email to confirm what I'd done, which was a bit silly. This morning what arrives on my doorstep? Not, as you might expect, a 5700 Ultra, but a Geforce FX5200. With a delivery note saying "Problem description: corruptions. Desired action: replace".

So bum. That's what I say. Bum.

Strong The Power Is

I discovered today that ICQ 4.0 came out last week. It's a replacement for ICQ Lite rather than ICQ Pro, as I imagine the former has proven more popular. I only downloaded it today, and so far it seems a bit odd. For a start, one of its major selling points is a term the ICQ website is plastered with: Xtraz! A new dentists opened in Dorridge recently and the sign boldly proclaims the name: Briter Smiles. Call me a snob, but both of these things irritate me. It's not big and it's not clever. If you don't know how to spell, you won't notice. If you do, are you supposed to be thinking "Hey, those guys spell phoetically! How unique! I'll certainly be buying their product!"? [Andrew takes a (nother) pill] Apart from grammatical foibles, ICQ 4.0 has an improved message window in which you can see an image the other party has chosen. Can't think where they got that idea You can also invite the other party to join you in a game, or send them a greetings card. There's also the welcome return of the birthday reminder, which before I started (then stopped) using Outlook, was an invaluable feature, particularly when combined with the greetings card option. Cheap? Me?

I've been running ICQ and MSN for a fair while, and am increasingly, despite my best intentions, using the latter. I started with ICQ years and years ago and do feel a kind of bizarre brand loyalty, but MSN is just so damn quick and easy to use it's slowly drawing me away. Sure, it doesn't store the history as well, the user info isn't as comprehensive, it presumes to know your status if the screensaver conks out and it shares excessive information regarding the status of your chat window, but it has a certain charm...I feel like Anakin Skywalker between Episodes 2 and 3. I know it's wrong. I know where I'm heading. But there's nothing I can do to stop it.

I've also been playing with the Opera 7.5 beta which, contrary to my previous witterings, is quite good. I'll elucidate later this week, most likely. I only mention it because while trying to solve a problem earlier, I looked up 'opera 7.5 freeserve' in google, and what was the first result? Me! Now I feel all paternal.

I'm feeling pretty crappy atm so am going to collapse in front of the tv for the rest of the evening. I've got various phone calls to return, a huge OU assignment due in next Friday and a writing project that's been sitting around for two months, but I can't face any of them.

Did I Miss Anything Exciting?

Sorry for the lack of postage yesterday, but I do have a good excuse this time. On Friday afternoon I went into hospital for an operation due to some pain I've been experiencing. It's of a rather intimate nature, which I'm thinking is probably all the information you desire I had the operation at 1700 on Friday and was due to come home on Saturday morning, but developed complications in the night. I essentially started bleeding internally, which while not as bad as it sounds did mean I had to have another operation yesterday afternoon. The doctor saw me this morning and I'm happy to say that everything is now sorted; I came home just before lunch. I need to take it easy for a couple of weeks (and try to avoid going up too many stairs!) and I'm not allowed to sign anything legally binding for 24 hours

Going under aneasthetic is an interesting experience. Both times I tried to remember as much as I could before falling asleep, but that isn't much. After the first injection I felt myself getting drowsy, then there was a funny taste in my mouth. A second injection sent a numbness crawling up my arm, which I remember getting as far as my bicep. I kinda like the idea of being knocked out while people fix you. Having had operations before I knew I wasn't going to be allergic to the anaesthetic and die, so it wasn't particularly worrying. You go to sleep, and when you wake up, everything's done! Kinda, anyway.

So I'm going to be resting up for at least a few days. I'll be working from home like normal, but can't really visit any clients for a bit. I'm under orders from Kate not to do too much work, which is great as it means I can catch up with the various free-time activities I've been falling behind on recently. So did I miss anything exciting? Anybody get engaged / have Nod's baby / fall out of a tree onto a helpfully malleable old person?

It’s Friday!

A few years ago there was a trailer at the cinema for a film called 'Lucky Star', which looked intriguing. It had Benicio Del Toro as an apparently incredibly lucky man, and it seemed that the authorities were after him. The film never materialised, so I looked it up. Turns out, there is no film! It was all a Mercedes advert, indeed 'Lucky Star' is a reference to their logo. Hmph, it looked quite good from the trailer! I remember years ago hearing about a website on which people tried to make extremely good trailers for films that don't exist. I looked it up, only to find it was pretty rubbish. Still like the idea, though.

AOL See Sense

You may have noticed my opinions on AOL, but even I have to admit that this can only be a good thing. Opening up their email should help with a fair few problems I come across.

Cookie Cutters

A few days ago there was a report claiming that most computers are infested with spyware. From my experience I'd agree with this. Any family with kids generally has at least one instance of 'livesexcam' running. I'm not sure where that particular gem originates, but I'd guess it must be one of the p2p programs. It's too prevalent to actually come from porn sites, I think. However the report's claim of each computer having an average of 27.8 instances of spyware is perhaps OTT, as it seems many of them are tracking cookies.

Now, I know that privacy advocates will claim that these are directly sent from the centre of hell to wreak a terrible tribulation unto the Earth, but frankly I don't care about them. They don't actually do any harm and compared with other examples of spyware that could be installed they're relatively pleasant. Why do people get so worked up about cookies, anyway? Credit card companies, shops, banks, phone service providers, television services - they all track usage in a far more identifiable fashion, but you don't hear people continually complaining about that. Just seems like another example of 'the internet is evil' to me.