Earthling

I'm not awfully sure we had postcodes in those days. I'm talking 1963-67. If there was apostcode, I don't know what it was.

Didn't have a touring van, but my parents had a static caravan at Aberavon during the early to mid-60's, when I was 10 -14 years, thereabouts. We spent most weekends there during the spring/summer and Sept-Oct. Quite near to your neck of the Principality, Gareth. It was a lively old place then, the camp-site was in between the Sandfields housing estate and the oil-refinery (whatever it was). I can remember the Afan Lido being built, along with various pubs/clubs along the seafront. Miles of clean sandy beach, sand-dunes, sunshine, dirty Bristol Channel, Beatles songs on the fairgound juke-boxes, Rolling Stones, Swinging Blue Jeans et al. Occasionally, we'd drive into Swansea on a Saturday evening to the cinema.......that's where I saw 'Zulu' for the first time. I looked on Google Earth the other day and the campsite was gone, the refinery (whatever it was...gone), and the housing estate overflowed onto what was the campsite. Everything changes, nothing stays the same forever.

retrevo.com do a service manual for it. I haven't looked at it because it's a 'Type your e-mail address here to download etc' and I don't want my e-mail address spammed. Might be what you need.

Saturday.....spent the day with grandkids, kids and ex in the garden where I used to live before we split up. The ex cut my hair. BBQ, mojitos, beer, then went home and watched the England-Norway game, fell asleep (thankfully, as it turned out, I hear) on the settee almost immediately after the start of the second-half. Woke up in time to go to bed Sunday, had a couple of hours in my garden listening to the morning session of the 2nd Test. Sunday afternoon/evening, more grandkids, more BBQ, more mojitos, more beer. Probably like most places, gorgeous cloud-less sky, bright, hot sunshine wall-to-wall, morning til night. Back to work this morning, a fetching shade of lobster, in most places.

.................no.

Let me think.....................

First of all, cables are an integral part of any kind of 'man' activity. Don't try to hide them.......enjoy them, decorate them, make them a feature, buy different coloured cables for each device, get electrofluorescent if you can. A multitude of cables, to the UNTRAINED eye, looks like a mess. We have trained eyes. We know they're essential, and that each cable has it's place on the Great Patch Panel of Life. Second......is the wife allowed in there, and if so, why? Third......where's the fridge/drinks cabinet/beer cupboard? When I wanted to convert a room to 'Mine', the wife gave me an ultimatum. 'Me or your work-room', she said........the rest is, as they say, history.

Does your chewing-gum lose it's flavour on the bed-post overnight?

Marmite, definitely.

Tend not to have music or radio in the office, (if we did, it would probably be 5Live, which I listen to at home more than I watch TV) but I have an old D520 laptop in the storeroom/workshop with iTunes on it. Mostly listen to 'World Music'......Barra Barra by Rachid Taha is one of my favourites, Etran Finitawa, Ganga Giri, Deep Forest, Hindi Zahra are others. Otherwise, anything from the 70's, 80's, 90's with a beat of beat that makes you move your feet. MY 70's folder is about as big as my 80's. My 90's folder is a little bit smaller. My 2000's folder is considerably smaller. An awful lot smaller. Hardly any in there, in fact.

Virginmedia, been with them for four years in my current place and for seven years before that in my old place. Never many problems, and they're always related to some major Virgin work, like the present speed upgrade. As soon as they finish tinkering with the local UBR's, I'm going to change to the Premiere collection.

You took the words right out of my mouth. (Meatloaf 1977)

That, in a nutshell, is why I got the first train out of Wales. Grey, dull, overcast skies, rain, coal tips, it was just too.......monochrome, like living in a black and white TV. Desperately proud to be Welsh......proper Welsh from a valleys mining village....... but live there? Nuh-uh.

I think it's his principles rather than his politics which are being lauded. Can't say that about the current crop of power-hungry, unprincipled bunch of n'er-do-wells, scallywags, cheats, frauds and thieves we get to choose from these days. Signed Disgruntled Taxpayer of Herts.

I wish I'd read this before I walked over to the main block, IN THE CHUCKING IT DOWN POURING RAIN, to fill a sink etc.

Just emptied a sinkfull here too..........anticlockwise. Guess that's another urban myth quashed.

Oh well, another 76 weeks or so (see other thread) and I'll be finding out for myself.

Unless, like Rabbie, you happen to live in the southern hemisphere, in which case a southerly wind will be bringing cold Antarctic air. And the water will go down the plughole the other way round, so I'm told.

My retirement, my countdown, my units.

Don't know why I chose weeks.....I guess it's because I can see a tangible reduction every week. I actually write it on my board as 'wks.days', if you get my meaning....e.g 76.1 And I'm counting down because I've had 42 years in this wonderful world of IT (DP as it was then), the last 38 or so in some kind of Tech Support role, the last 6 in a Tech Support role here in this place (enough to make anyone want to retire early) and I'm nearing the end of my tether......life-cycle.......sell-by date.......call it what you will. I'm near the end of it, anyway.

Not at all. 76 weeks exact today.

Strange that I should take time out from what I've been engaged on the last four days, to read this thread. I'm currently documenting our network/domain/my job, as my co-tech has just realised I'm serious about retiring in 76 weeks and 1 day, and also that he's not taken a blind bit of notice of anything for the last five years, and doesn't know some of the most fundamental of fudamentals. I'm putting in everything I can think of, apart from a Disaster Recovery Plan, as that was supposed to be one of his assignments two or three years ago. Didn't get done. So there's my answer.....Everything, every last thing you can think of, no matter how trivial it may seem to you.

All I would add to all of this is that, at the end of the day, it's not a democracy. You're going to be held responsible for the dept, so you'll be making the decisions. End of.

I could use my Imagemasster, that formats to US DoD standards (or something), but I get more out of whacking a nail through them.

MY upgrade is due April - July. Waiting patiently.......