Month: June 2003

Waitrose do these things called "pains circe". That’s not a French nickname for the M25, but instead a rather handsome and trendy looking loaf of bread that is circular in shape with a hole at its centre. I’ve never bought one before, prefering smaller roll-type things or the occasional baton. However, as I was seeking some bread to go with my salad and duck pâté with champagne and truffles (yes, it tastes as good as it sounds), I thought to myself:
My! That’s a rather handsome and trendy looking loaf! I’ll buy one!
Verdict: it’s huge! I put it into one of the bags they provide, and the handle broke. I’m eating it now, and I’m only a third of the way through, and I’m stuffed.
There you go. Today’s exciting bread story.

Right, everything is fixed at last. However, I seem to be having problems accessing my email. Sigh.

Apparently the engineer will be here shortly. Yay!

Mind you, BT have got nothing on the Bangladeshi Telephone Board.

Phones still off. Grrr.
BT have said that I may see an engineer today. I’m not sure I like the fact that the engineer may be here. I’m not best impressed.
Neighbours have had their analogue residential line phones fixed already. But my business critical and more expensive digital line has still not been repaired, with no definite time scheduled for an engineer to call.
As you might imagine, I’m not best pleased. But as BT have a local monopoly at the moment, with no cable provision in this area, what can I do?

Grayblog: parody or boring. You decide.
Meanwhile, gratuitous link to Audi Olympics, which is entertaining.

I’m having one of those days where nothing much seems to be going to plan. I’ve been running around and haven’t been very productive. Much time has been wasted over the matter of the phones (still waiting for the BT engineer), the nursery’s PC (the persistent problem it suffers – it keeps resetting itself – power supply problems?) and the lack of dialling action on my laptop’s modem (may have to contact Dell about that, but not this week, as far too much to do).
Tonight, I’m going to go home and just flop on the sofa and do nothing.

I can’t seem to get my laptop’s built-in modem to work. What am I doing wrong?

Oh great. PFE’s phones, all of them, were knocked out by last night’s storms. Marvellous. God knows when I’ll get an engineer out.

When I was in California, I saw literally miles upon miles of rows of grape vines, so this news story doesn’t surprise me, particularly as my hosts Geoff and Maureen told me that most of what we could see had been planted within the last couple of years.