1. In keeping with my new header ... this coming Sunday is Sea Sunday in the UK. I love the sea, but it is easy to forget its dangers, the loneliness of life as a sailor, and the importance of ships and those who sail in them to this island nation. According to this article from the Catholic Herald, 95% of goods and products used in UK are brought in by sea. Our Lady, Star of the Sea ... pray for sailors and their families.
2. Computer decisions to be made. The iMac that A-Next-Door fixed for me is playing up again ... it is less than impressed at being forced to pretend it is a MacBook. The only way we could get it running without the boot disks - which I am sure are in a safe place somewhere! - was to clone the contents of the MacBook hard drive onto the iMac. This worked fine for a while, but now it is refusing to recognise iTunes, Mail and various other useful pieces of software. Hopefully all it needs is to be reset to factory settings and discover once again that it is really and truly an iMac. I paid a visit to the Apple Store to ask advice, and it seems I have three options: (1) lug the computer into the Store where they will reboot it all for no charge; (2) buy replacement boot disks from Apple Support for a modest fee; (3) upgrade the operating system for a rather less modest fee. Option (3) would mean that I would have the right software to run an iPad ... but can I justify upgrading a computer that we are possibly going to replace next year? Decisions, decisions ...
3. I played with an iPad at the Apple Store ... and it was just as yummy as I thought it would be (though a little heavier) ... and I have a birthday with a zero in coming up ... and ... well, you can see where that line of thought is going!
3. I like spiders. Really. The fact that all UK spiders are harmless probably helps, but I am perfectly happy sharing my space with them - and this despite having a mother who loathes them with a passion. Angel and Star, on the other hand, hate them. Tevye and I went for a walk late on Wednesday and came home to find Star fast asleep in our bed, driven from her own room by ... :::shudder::: ... the presence of a small spider. What did I do wrong?
4. My favourite daft news story of the week: Bag-jacket beats Ryan Air luggage charges. Ryan Air and other budget European airlines sell flights for ridiculously low prices, but the flip side is that they charge high prices for carrying luggage other than a small carry-on bag. This reporter, however, discovered that there are no rules about clothing, and decided to wear his luggage!
5. I have no idea why it took me so long, but over the last couple of summers I have discovered the delights of varnished toe nails. I'm not big on varnished fingernails as they always chip, and I hate chipped nail varnish, but hate even more having to constantly renew or touch it up. Toes, however are different - the varnish lasts better (and in any case I don't notice the odd chip that far away from my middle-aged eyes) and they lend themselves more adventurous colours. Today's colour is Fancy Fuschia (very pink), and my current favourite is Boots No.7 Stay Perfect in Vivid Violet which matches the purple clothes phase I'm in. (Aside: Since I read Reading Lolita in Tehran last summer, I am truly grateful to live in a society where I can paint my toenails any colour I like and go out in public with bare toes without risk of punishment.)
6. Cherub has only six more playgroup sessions left to go. She is rather rueful, muttering "I'm going to miss playgroup!" on a regular basis. Hopefully she will enjoy school just as much.
7. Star was helping to bag up debris while my brother cut the hedges round our back garden at the weekend ... until she got distracted by the pink plastic rubbish sacks she was using and appeared in my bedroom dressed something like this (think pink and without the wings). Bin bag chic, anyone?
Friday, July 09, 2010
7 Quick Takes: 9th July 2010
Read more quick takes at Conversion Diary
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1 comment:
Kathryn,
I knit for the seaman's church Christmas at Sea: http://www.seamenschurch.org/christmas-at-sea It's based in the US, but I suspect there may be something similar in your neck of the woods. Before I began doing it, I never considered how nearly all of our goods are transported by these people in what must be a dangerous and lonely job.
We spent some time in Phoenix Arizona when Gracie was just a baby, and I lived in desperate fear of scorpions. I covered her crib/cot with mosquito netting, shook out every item of clothing, searched anything she might come into contact with, as the little nearly-invisible ones are the deadliest. I was nearly manic about it. When we got back to Pennsylvania, I never feared another spider! What can it do to me in comparison with a scorpion, LOL!
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