Something Weird

I'm trying to work, but my laptop is doing something weird. It's thrashing the disk and everything is going ridiculously s l o w l y. It took about 20 minutes to update my virus definitions. I can type in notepad, but the letters seem to come out about 5 seconds after I tap the keys, which is fun. I'm not completely tech illiterate, but I'm at the office and therefore I don't have admin rights to anything. I suspect it's trying to back up over the network, but I can't stop it.

It has been positively eons since I wrote anything here. I broke up for Christmas on 22 Dec, and I really haven't had time to sit down at a keyboard for more than about 30 seconds since then. You'll be pleased to know that the festive season went well for me and my family. I received many good things including a harmonica, a shark-skin wallet, soap making kit, and a ukulele. Actually I bought the ukulele myself, but I used money sent to me by my aunt, so technically it was a Christmas present.

My brother bought us a bread making machine. We've been talking about buying a bread making machine for months but never actually made a decision. It's great though. You just chuck stuff in the bucket and press the button and out pops fresh bread. You can even set the timer so that it arrives just as you wake up or get home. We've made three loaves so far (but no fish).

Hey look at that, whatever my laptop was doing, it appears to have finished. I should do some work. Actually, no one else is in my cube, and the office in general is distinctly quiet. I may defer work for another few minutes.

I just reminded myself about soap. Remember I made soap from dangerous chemicals at the end of November? Well it's ready to use now and it really works. I was quite surprised at how good it actually is. I was slightly scared about trying it because I did use caustic soda and you really wouldn't want to apply that to any soft pink bits. However, I'm pleased to say that the trial run was successful.

I've found an awesome ukulele site for people learning to play here. That link probably won't be of interest to most people come to think of it. I've had the instrument just a few days and I've already managed a few chords. My aim is to play this. I'm working on the assumption that my fingers are about half the size of the Big Kahuna in the video, so it shouldn't be a problem for me. Maybe I'll post a video when I get good enough. Or maybe I'll be so embarrassingly bad that I won't.

Ukes seem to be quite cheap. In my local music store they start at around £15, but they also have them for £25, £55, or about £100. I went for the £25. I considered the £55 model, but came to the conclusion that if I turn out to be crap at it, I just wasted £25. On the other hand, if I'm good at it, I can still go back and get a better one.

I have more to write, but I really should pretend to work.