Life and Vincent: 08/11/2009

Saturday, November 14, 2009

A Wunch of Bankers

(The title refers to the Spooneristic collective name for Bankers that a merchant banker told me many years ago.)

Even with a busted Sky+ Box, I can get online. But apparently my bank's computers (and possibly some others) can't cope with the ultra-wet weather, and they crashed for much of the day. It was impossible to get a balance and many people couldn't withdraw money. I had to go into my branch, where I expected them to be inundated (sorry!) with customers, but luckily I was at the tailend.

The weather has been a bastard today. Some places had winds of up to 100mph. The local river is in full spate. Time to snuggle up with a warm Vincent. Or preferably a hot one.

Tune up

I subscribe to WebUser magazine. I suppose you could say it's a useful and topical magazine put together by keen amateurs - at least that's how it reads. Preferable to the professional mags that assume you can reprogramme a network in three minutes.

This half-month it gave a tip that I actually got round to trying out. It applies to Vista, and allows you to switch off the 17,952 programmes that start up automatically with your computer whether you need them or not.

Just click the Windows button at the bottom left-hand corner, and type "MSConfig" - with capitals - in the search box. It will appear at the top of the screen. Click on it, in the box that appears, go to Startup, and disable the things you don't think you need. Don't do too much at first. I'm sure I'm not alone in not knowing which of these programmes I definitely need at startup, but I do know a few that I don't need every time I log on.

When you've done, the next time you log on Startup will be quicker. The more you disable the quicker it will be. And if you disable something you find you need, you can just re-enable it!

Sex Club

And no one offered to let Bobby join. Or me.

Friday, November 13, 2009

Wet but Wonderful

It has barely stopped raining today, some of it really hard. After taking Beano to the vet's first thing to check on how he is after last week's dental, I went to the river to feed the ducks. The river was very high, and the ducks' favourite bank was under water. By the time my loaf of bread had gone, I was as wet as they were. So I trundled along to the shopping centre to dry out. I ended up in the cafe in Marks and Spencer for my lunch. It was getting busy, so I shared a table with an elderly lady. We got talking, and didn't stop for an hour and a half! She was fascinating. She was German, and came to England in 1948 after marrying a British serviceman. She had worked for Robert Maxwell when he was a new immigrant and starting his first business, importing German-language scientific magazines using an old banana warehouse in central London. The smell was terrible, and the staff thought that there must be dead rats under the floorboards, but it turned out just to be rotten fruit!

At 4pm there was a party at school to celebrate the impending retirement of the school administrator. Lots of colleagues past and present were there, the food was fantastic (Jane, the science teacher is a great cook) and though she doesn't leave till next week, Mary had a wonderful send-off. She has been a tower of strength for so many for so long.

Oh, and horror of horrors - her replacement doesn't start till January!