…grayblog…

Author: graybo

  • Hello Amsterdam, my name is Fernando

    I’m off to the Netherlands this afternoon to visit a trade show in Boskoop tomorrow. I’ve got a few meetings lined up with the great and good of European and American horticulture – a real encouragement to find that, after two and a half years of doing this, the biggest companies now make a point of talking to me at these events to see what I have to offer them. When I started out it was more a case of me banging on their doors and saying "hey! talk to me!"
    My mum is coming over to keep H company. H is worried about being on her own whilst 18 weeks pregnant. I’m not sure that there is really anything to worry about, as the pregnancy has been running smoothly of late (just the usual tiredness to contend with and the fact that none of Hels’s clothes fit anymore), but if it reassures H then it’s fine by me.
    Maybe H needs practical help looking after the cats. We’re cat-sitting for the in-laws at the moment, and it isn’t something that I plan to repeat as she (Kitty, the in-laws’ cat) persistently picks fights with Monty and Treacle who are so soft and mild-mannered that they don’t know what to do (other than be frightened).
    I really should mow the lawn before I head to the airport. Nah, it can wait.

    More exciting blog entries soon, kids! Blimey, this is getting boring, isn’t it? perhaps it’s time for another one of those long airport rambles?

  • Science funding

    Harold Evans on the US government’s attitude to science. Worth reading.

  • Never iron your cat when wet

    Bob’s Guide To Cat Owning. (Possibly LSFW).

  • News

    Mo Mowlam, RIP. I can’t see the PM not turning up for this funeral. But he never fails to amaze me, so anything is possible.
    Madeleine Peyroux "disappears" – probably to go and hide for a few months after the quite dire performance she gave for Top of the Pops the other day. She’s got a voice, for sure, but she doesn’t seem to have stage confidence judging by that showing.

  • Cheese, but with leather elbow patches on a tweed blazer

    Have you noticed that the Open University is becoming more trendy these days? The OU is responsible for the Coast series on BBC2 which has been quite interesting. But I think they have trumped that with their Ever Wondered About Food? series that started last night on BBC2. It is lively, visually attractive, full of interesting facts, gorgeous food, a little bit of science and, best of all, good recipes. We’re going to have a go at their variation on macaroni cheese.

  • Cricket trivia

    Scotland have a pace bowler in their team named Yasir Arafat. I now have a mental picture of chap running in to bowl with a black and white dishdash fluttering behind him.

    In other cricket news, I’m enjoying the current match between Middlesex and Sussex. I would imagine that Middlesex supporters are enjoying it rather less.

  • Women! Pah!

    Victor Meldrew Michael Buerk says that women have too much power in society, citing the increasing influence of women at the BBC.
    Hmm. Let’s just do a quick headcount of all the female presidents and prime ministers around the world. And also the female company directors (increasing, but still a minority). Yes, more products, policies and thinking are geared towards the needs and wants of women, but I don’t feel like an "unemployable sperm-donor making the house look untidy" yet (although Hels might think otherwise).
    EDIT: Buerk "bonkers" according to Anna Ford.

  • Low ebb

    We’re all at a bit of a low ebb around here. Both H and I are pretty exhausted by work lately. Add to that the stress of the whole Boiler Incident and the parlous state of our finances and the result is that spirits are pretty low. And don’t forget the painfully slow progress on the sale of Hels’s flat, which is still dragging through interminable legal hoops.
    Even the cats are brassed off as they are currently having to share the house with an intruder as we cat-sit for the in-laws – something that I always felt was a bad idea and has proven to be difficult as their cat is a foul-tempered sourpuss who will take any opportunity to threaten or clobber our two (who would quite happily ignore her if only she kept to herself).
    So, any suggestions for how to lift spirits? A seriously large cash injection would definitely help right now.

  • Working environment

    During the rather pleasant warm and sunny weather that we are experiencing at the moment, my company moves to its summer office – the table in the garden.
    working outdoors
    I have to shuffle around as the sun (apparently – pedants!) moves across the sky in order to keep the laptop screen in the shade of the canopy so that I can see what I’ve typed, and every now and then I get a cat wandering across my workspace. But these are small prices to pay.

  • More plumbing

    It’s fixed. Our man collected the part we needed this morning by arranging to intercept the courier at a motorway services at 7.30am. So top marks to him. It was all fixed by 10.30, although I had to drive to Crawley to fetch a key needed to refill the thing before I could switch it on.
    But hurrah! Hot water! Baths! Showers! No more bad smells!
    (No money either – very skint now).