Category: Technology

Yet another wet day – 3 January 2024

Posted on by Zogman

Admittedly, the rain wasn’t constant. We did get some respite in the short dry spells.

There may have been dry spells, but there wasn’t much light to go with it. I know, I should be grateful for the fact that the rain wasn’t constant like it has been, but just a little bit of sunshine would help a lot to relieve the awful dullness. That’s the thing about January, it is terribly dull.

Scamp was out in the morning to visit Isobel. She had done something to her front door and couldn’t get it to lock, but the maintenance man was coming to fix it and Scamp went to have a blether with her while she waited. The door was easily fixed and the bloke showed Isobel what she was doing wrong. It’s sometimes the simplest things that trip us up.

While she was out I was fighting with the printer. I was working my way printing out the calendars and everything was going well until it suddenly failed to pick up the paper and reported a paper jam. The paper wasn’t jammed, it just couldn’t find it. I told it so umpteen times, but it just wouldn’t listen. Printers are so cantankerous and so pig headed they just refuse to accept that it’s THEIR fault, not ours. Eventually I got fed up arguing with it and turned it off. When I started it again, instead of loading a dozen sheets I only gave it six and asked it to print pages 1 to 6 inclusive. It did that. Good, it was seeing sense and behaving. Then I loaded another six sheets and it went on strike again. This time I read the riot act to it, warning it that I’d been looking in Amazon for a new, better behaved printer and if it didn’t mend its ways it was going in the skip. That finally got through its thick plastic skull and it printed off three lots without a whimper. After that I gave it a pat and allowed it the rest of the day off. I might return to the fray tomorrow.

After lunch I wandered round the house looking for things to photograph, but couldn’t find anything until after dinner I remembered the teasels that were drying out in the back bedroom. I don’t know if you’ve ever lifted a teasel, but if you do feel the need, wear thick leather gloves because those thorns on the stem are lethal. Anyway, after a fair few test shots of the jaggy seed pods, I took four shots of the teasels with the camera on a tripod and with the magic of Photoshop managed to get almost all of the apprentice porcupine in focus. Technically it’s called focus stacking, but you don’t need to know that, do you?

We watched the New Year Bakeoff, Hazy, and we enjoyed it. We had already watched the Christmas one. I think the New Year one was better. Also, Hazy, I opened the tin of coffee and made a cup of espresso with it. Very nice indeed, and no need to grind, either. Thank you both for that.

Oh yes, and on the subject of coffee, if the weather improves tomorrow we may go in to Glasgow, just for a walk and maybe a coffee and a cake.

Now that’s Dancin’! – 2 November 2023

Posted on by Zogman

A more successful day on the dance floor.

We spoke to Hazy in the morning and heard about Neil’s return to school and his new inhaler that makes a noise. A simple idea that sounds (no pun intended) like it will work! It was good to hear that they hadn’t suffered any damage from the gale force winds they’d had recently. Also good to know that Hazy and Simonne are willing to compare and contrast some holiday homes for next year. Hopefully they will find a good one!

Later I started the ‘new’ computer and after entering my password only about ten times, I think I’ve ticked all the required boxes at last. Touch wood, it seems to be settled down now, still the same operating system and version as it was before the crash, and it’s unlikely that I’ll try installing the update again. I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s because I’ve used the external SSDs to drive the computer that causes a conflict with the software the update is trying to inject into the system. If I want an update, I’ll have to do it the long way which takes about four hours. It’s not worth it. If it’s not broke, don’t fix it!

We drove to Glenburn Community Centre for today’s tea dance. Quite a small group to start with, then more and more folk joined in. We managed two tracks of Waltz Nioli and although they weren’t faultless, they were pretty good. We even did a couple of Joy’s Walz later in the afternoon and it was looking good too. Best of all, we managed two tracks of Quickstep! Something I’d never have thought I’d do. That was all down to a combination of Scamp’s and Kirsty’s teaching. Thank you both. These successes were won at the loss of the sequence dances. I just couldn’t get into the rhythm of them. Similarly, the Salsa we danced was pathetic. We used to be so much better than what we danced today. Still, progress was made on some hard stuff!

Back home I went for a walk, even although it was almost dark. I did get a couple of photos which were just presentable and no more. One heavily edited one made PoD. Along with it on Flickr are a couple of photos from Fannyside from last week. They’re much better.

Scamp and I are hoping to speak on the phone tomorrow to someone about the complaint we’ve made to the Ombudsman. It looks as if things are moving there.

Other than the above, not much planned for Friday. Scamp may find time in her busy schedule to meet June, Ian, Shona and Isobel for coffee after FitSteps.

 

What a fun day! – 1 November 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Yes, sarcasm again.

Today was dull, wet and occasionally windy. A good day to spend almost all the morning planning what I was going to do with the iMac and almost all of the afternoon finding the plan didn’t work. Macs big selling point has always been that they are really easy to work with and forgiving. Not mine. It simply refused to boot and came up with a friendly message telling me that it had restarted because of a problem and that I should press a key, any key to get it to do it again. If it wasn’t for the fact that it’s made of aluminium, I think I’d have set it on fire. However, it wasn’t as if I was going anywhere with rain lashing the windows, so I had a plate of Scamp’s excellent Potato and Leek soup.

I did wander out into the garden for the few minutes it was dry in the afternoon and grabbed a few shots of leaves and the flowers that are still growing in the garden. When the rain restarted, (just like the computer) I came back in and rejoined the fight against technology. I reread my notes on how to boot an iMac using an SSD and then watched the video by Andrew Tsai again to find where I’d made my mistake. Found it and dealt with it with just enough time to drive up to the British Legion for tonight’s dance class which would include Tango and Quickstep with the possibility of a Waltz thrown in. We actually did quite well in the tango thanks in no small part to Scamp’s lesson in the late afternoon. So well, in fact that Kirsty, who runs the class, praised us in front of the whole class on the way we synchronised our kicks and flicks! Embarrassing, but in a good way. We managed the simple steps of the quickstep and also added in the optional fancy steps. We didn’t really get a chance to dance the waltz, but we did a couple of rounds of the floor when the rest of the folk were putting their jackets on.

Back home I followed most of Mr Tsai’s instructions to the letter and surprisingly it worked. It took about two hours to go from a black screen to a colourful screen showing Elgol in all its glory and most of the software back in place. Thank goodness. I was really starting to believe it was a goner this time.

PoD was one of the five photos I took today and it’s a leaf from a Gooseberry. Bush. No sketches, because Inktober is over for another year.

Tomorrow more rain is forecast but we may go for a drive somewhere in Paisley and with a bit of luck there will be tea and teabread!

Tinkering – 12 October 2023

Posted on by Zogman

Today I started tinkering about with the innards of the iMac.  Not a clever thing to do.

<Technospeak>
There is a new version of Lightroom just out and I fancied installing it, but my operating system is too old.  I could have just wasted an hour of my time by installing it on the SSD that runs my system, but being a cautious individual where these things are concerned, I thought I’d install it on a backup instead.  It didn’t work because of the technique that was used to build it in the first place.  So, I found a way to use Carbon Copy Cloner to install the system from my working SSD into the backup disk.  That almost worked after an hour of watching a white line crawl across the screen.  I found a fix and that made everything work.  So at this point I had two SSDs, both running the same old system. Now I needed to install the new system, called Monterey for some reason, into the backup SSD (I did warn you.  I did put the <Technospeak> warning up).  After the same hour and a bit it got stuck and so am I.  I am thankful that I didn’t attempt to upgrade the working SSD. At least I have one working drive.  I’ll have another attempt tomorrow, because I think I have cunning plan.

To Be Continued …
<\Technospeak>

Scamp and I went shopping after that.  We both needed our meds from the chemist and Scamp was dropping off used clothes for the Salvation Army, then we went proper shopping on a small scale, just bread, milk and stuff for dinner, plus a bag of doughnuts for me and a packet of rasps for Scamp. Lunch was soup and it was very good.

Later in the afternoon I drove to B&Q to get a bulb for the fridge which thankfully is working fine now and we can even see inside it!  Then I went for a walk in St Mo’s and got a pretty good shot of the sun coming through the trees and that became PoD.  So, morning wasted on tech, but afternoon a better prospect.

Dinner was a hashed up, but perfectly satisfactory chicken and prawn paella. I had another half hearted attempt at fixing the mess I’d made of the SSD, but I was running out of time.

Prompt for today was Spicey (not how I’d have spelled it) and I sketched some of my fiery hot looking chillies for it.  Great chillies that came from Jan’s Vans in Portree, believe it or not!

We may be going dancing tomorrow … in a church of all places.  Only for oldies, none of those under 65 whippersnappers allowed in. My main worry is that we’ll be the youngest dancers there!

 

 

Out for coffee with Val – 10 October 2023

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Up fairly early … for me.

Set off to pick up Val just before 11am and we drove to Costa. Not the Costa I was expecting to go to, but eventually we found the right one of the three Costas in Cumbersheugh. Sat there and drank coffee, ate cakes, discussed kitchens and showers. Then found that we had both bought the exact same dishwasher. First one for Val, third one for us. After an hour and a big bit it was to take Val home. We should do this more often and we will do this more often if I have my way.

Drove home via Tesco to get some fruit and veg and a slice of brie which, along with a few slices of our own apples and a generous spoonful of honey made the filling in a brown bread sandwich for my lunch. Scamp had already had her lunch while Val and I were blethering.

After lunch and with the sky seeming to clear, I went for a walk in St Mo’s with the A6500 having a shot of the 85mm. The close ups the pairing produced were good, but the surprise was the way it handled a long shot across the pond to catch a bloke on his phone, sitting on the Living Lounge seat nearly half a mile away. I later enlarged it and it’s ready to be viewed on Flickr. It didn’t get PoD, that went to two spiders on a web.

Scamp offered to help me get more of the workload finished at a sensible time by making tonight’s dinner which was her signature Prawn & Pea Risotto. Best one for ages, Scamp!

Today’s prompt was “Fortune”. I tried to draw a Fortune Teller’s view of a crystal ball. I thought this would be a fairly easy sketch to do. How wrong I was. The left hand was fairly easy, but have you tried drawing your right hand with the pen in your left (reverse that if you’re left handed) It’s impossible. I even tried photographing my right hand and sketching from that with only slightly more success as you can see here. If I’d only had a crystal ball I could have seen the mess I was going to make!

It’s Scamp’s turn to go out for coffee tomorrow with June. I might try to update the laptop to Monterey. That’s where it happened, you know! Google it!

A Toy off the Rack – 6 October 2023

Posted on by Zogman

A new, well, nearly new lens.

So, I slept on it, as I said I would, and decided to add the Sony 85mm f1.8 to my armoury.

Scamp was out in the morning to go to her FitSteps class. I phoned WEX in Glasgow and asked the lady to put the second hand Sony 85mm f1.8 lens aside for me and I’d be in to collect it in the afternoon. When Scamp returned from her class, just over an hour later we drove in to Glasgow.

First we went to John Lewis to have a serious look at fridges, freezers and fridge-freezers, the trio we’ve been mulling over for the past week. I don’t think either of us was fully committed to the idea of a combined fridge and freezer. If one part of it breaks down, does that mean the other half dies with it? Scamp seemed reluctantly resigned to an undercounter freezer and separate fridge. The two of them were sitting beside each other in the JL basement, like Tweedledum and Tweedledee. We were really looking for a Goldilocks fridge. The ones on show were either too big or too small and she wanted one that was in the middle of the height range. Eventually,Scamp spoke to an assistant who very helpfully went away and returned with a model number for a fridge that was indeed the nearest thing to a Goldilocks. Now we need to find a picture of it, or better still, somewhere that has it in stock, because JL in Glasgow didn’t have one.

Feeling we were another step forward, we left JL behind and walked up to WEX, checked the lens I’d play tested yesterday and paid my half of the money. Of course I immediately knew that I’d made a mistake as the Buyers Remorse kicked in, but I just ignored it. I had a toy off the rack.

Coffee in Nero on the way down a Sausageroll Street that was being chopped up, dug up and generally destroyed in ‘improvements’. They’d even cut down most of the trees. Sometimes I fear for the sanity of these urban planners, other times I know they are all just morons.

I had a look for a new raincoat to replace my old faded blue one that’s not as waterproof as it used to be, despite being proofed regularly, but didn’t find anything that impressed me. Heavens some of them only had two pockets. TWO? What use is that to me?

Drove home and that was when the rain started and it’s still raining. It doesn’t look like I’ll get a chance to try out the new toy until at least Sunday. Heavy rain predicted for tomorrow.

Today’s PoD was one of my regular shots of the changing face of Glasgow. It seems that every month there is another change to the skyline. Some are for the better and some are not. I think the call it progress, but I’m not sure. Anyway, after a bit of jiggery pokery again, I had a photo that looked interesting.

Today’s Inktober prompt was “Golden”. It’s my wedding ring which, over the years, has been chopped off my swollen finger, soldered back together and then chopped and soldered again to make it slightly smaller to stop it from falling off my finger. It’s definitely Golden.

Tomorrow rain is predicted, lots of it. We may go out for lunch and not discuss White Goods.

Just Chillin’ – 3 October 2023

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Today we went in search of more white goods.

Scamp and I prefer to see our intended purchases with our own eyes, rather than believing the hype the so called reviewers give us. Nor do we really believe the photos we see in online adverts. So we took our own eyes with us to Currys in Bishopbriggs to find out what they had in the way of freezers, fridges and fridge-freezers.

Inside Currys it was like walking down a canyon, not that I’ve ever walked down a canyon, but it was what I imagined that would feel like. Great towering monoliths on both sides of us, nearly all the same shade of grey, probably the ubiquitous Space Grey. They had big freezers, small fridges and fridge-freezers with various different arrangements of fridge and freezer. They even had an AI fridge-freezer! I don’t think I’d feel comfortable with an AI fridge watching me every time I went in to get the butter. Would it know that I keep my Toblerone on the top shelf and only allow me to have one triangle each day? Would it count how many blueberries I put into my porridge? It’s a scary prospect.

We were just on a recce mission today. No money changed hands, no card was tapped and no PIN was typed in. Today was just about looking in the most convenient white goods (or should that be Grey goods) store to get an idea of what’s out there and would it fit into the available space. We got some answers and a whole lot of confused messages from Currys who seem to stick any bit of paper on an article and then presend it’s the God’s honest truth. Like the fridge that was labelled as A++ for efficiency, but on another sticker as E for efficiency. Personally I’d give Currys a Z for efficiency.

Scamp left to go shopping in the new M&S food store and I went to browse the ‘toys’ in Currys. I wasn’t really considering buying anything other than an SD card reader, but I did have a play with the iPads until I saw the price of them. That’s when I left without the card reader I’d come to buy.

We drove home through an improving weather picture and had a late lunch back home, discussing what we’d seen in the shop and thinking that we might go to John Lewis tomorrow to see what they had in the store.

The weather was looking a lot better with a fair amount of sun so I took my A7 out for a walk in St Mo’s. That’s where PoD came from. It’s just three trees with the low sun shining through them, but it was quite effective. Low viewpoint, low sun and an ultra-wide angle lens.

Today’s prompt was Path and I tried painting and sketching in ink but finally settled on a daft wee sketch that was done in about fifteen minutes. Easiest is best, sometimes.

Tomorrow is going to be wet. We don’t have any plans, but might go visiting JL to see what their chilling boxes are like.

Two new cameras – 15 September 2023

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Well, not exactly new, but not been used in a very long time, so maybe nearly new.

<Technospeak>
Scamp was out keeping fit in her FitSteps class and I was looking for an SSD I’d misplaced. I eventually found it, but not where I thought it would be, and in the process I came upon two old cameras I hadn’t used in a very long time. One, the E-PL1 is really ancient at 13 years old and beginning to show its age. The other, the E-PL5 is 11 years old and still going strong. Both are based on the four thirds system where the proportions of the length to the height of the images is in 4:3. Both have much smaller sensors than my full frame camera, and for that matter my APS-C camera, but today I got them both working and producing some decent images. The E-PL5, especially, would make a decent pocket camera with a couple of compact lenses. I was quite chuffed with that Friday morning’s work. Not sure Scamp agreed. She’d much rather they were consigned to the bin, but she doesn’t get a vote in the photography stakes!
</Technospeak>

Lunch was a Piece ’n’ Banana each, then I went out to get the makings of tonight’s dinner which turned out to be a disaster. We’d made it last week and it ended up a claggy mess. Tonight the result was the same although we had the correct ‘Skin on – Bone in’ chicken thighs and were using paella rice instead of orzo. We hardly ate any of it and settled for a bag of M&S puffy crisps instead. I think we’ll just cut that page out of the magazine and burn it. Such a waste of good ingredients.

While I was waiting for the oven to warm up so that I could start the Disaster Dinner, I watched two blackbirds and a starling stripping the rowan berries from the tree in the back garden. What was I thinking? I had no PoD and here was not one, but two perfect subjects. But alas and alack, when I returned with the camera, they had gone. I waited a while and when they didn’t return I put the chicken in the oven to roast. Then I saw a thrush wandering around the garden, possibly scrounging the rowan berries the other birds left behind. I didn’t think twice and took a series of shots on an old manual focus Tamron 70-300mm (that’s long) lens and with a bit of work in Photoshop, ON1 2023 and Lightroom that became PoD.

After we shared the washing up we discussed plans for tomorrow because it’s a Saturday without an early rise to drive to Brookfield. As usual if and where we go will depend on the weather. I might even take one of my new cameras!

Lucky 13th – 13 September 2023

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Not very lucky, though!

The Dishwasher Man arrived right on time and started by asking when we last cleaned the dishwasher. I told him we’d run the cleaner just the other day, but then he cut me off and showed us the muck that had gathered round the seals, especially at the bottom. This he said was the probable cause of our problem. And, give him his due, he got down to it with a scrubbing brush and a bucket of water and by the time he was finished the inside of the dishwasher was shining. He pressed the start button and after about five seconds the “Check Water” light came on. An hour and a half later he admitted defeat and told us the problem was most likely in the PCB at the head of the machine and that meant it was time to replace rather than repair. We paid him his call-out fee and I knew Scamp was aware of the path this conversation was taking and had been teaching for prices for a new dishwasher.

Also, while the work was going on, Hazel had phoned and was waiting for a call back to say we were free again. We spoke for a while and heard about the decision Neil and her had taken about the Deaconship. Probably now what either of them had wanted, but they were being realistic about the situation and giving up the plans for the deaconship was the sensible solution. We also talked about weddings and the need for a new dress and shoes. I say ‘We’, but I mean Scamp and Hazel, of course.

After we’d put the kitchen back together again, we drove over to Coatbridge to see what Currys had on offer. Not a lot was the answer. They had three slimline dishwashers that would fit into our tight little kitchen, with prices ranging from around £250 to over £500. We’d hoped for a better selection, so drove over to Bishopbriggs. After driving through the stupidest signage ever at roadworks we found that we had four choices with roughly the same price range. After a coffee and a bite to eat in Costa that served as lunch we came to the final decision that was a Hotpoint. Not the cheapest, but certainly not the dearest! Hopefully it will arrive some time on Monday. Until then it’s basins and soapy hands!

Tonight was the new dancing night and I was actually looking forward to it. The practise sessions at home over the last week had helped greatly. Before we got started a girl came over and said “It is you!” She had worked at the office in the school and for some reason, her name jumped into my head. We talked about folk we had known, some good ones, some not so good.
The dancing tonight was the final part of the four week set of Waltz Nioli and with at least one tricky bit, may need more ‘home schooling’ to get it polished up for next week.

I didn’t have very much chance to take photos today, so today’s offering of PoD was a sunflower growing in a pot in the back garden and living up to its name!

Tomorrow Scamp is meeting Mags for lunch and I’m hoping it stays dry enough for me to get some decent photos.

Dunfermline – 5 September 2023

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After a short discussion we headed for Dunfermline for a day in the sun.

Scamp had a dentist’s appointment this morning, but only for a checkup.  I had an appointment with a dishwasher.

I thought while Scamp was out I could have one more try at clearing out whatever was clogging up the outlet from the sump of the dishwasher, because I was sure it must be the exit pipe, not the inlet.  But before that I thought I’d try the machine on a different program, a short wash.  Maybe something was clogged in pipework connected to the program we’d been using.  It worked! It went right through the wash and rinse cycle without any mishaps.  When Scamp returned, it was just finishing the program.  She suggested we do no more to it and go out for the day.  That’s when the short discussion took place in the kitchen with the carpet rolled up and tool all over the worktop.  We were going to Dunfermline.

Drove over the Kincardine Bridge to Dunfermline and parked in a space in the park.  A place I haven’t been in for years, but it was a legal parking place and there were spaces in it while the main parking area was full.  We walked down to the Peacock cafe in the park. This cafe sells the worst coffee I’ve ever tasted.  I once watched the woman making a latte and a flat white. Both had exactly the same amount of milk and coffee in them! Either they were both lattes or both flat whites, but neither of them was a coffee.  It must be a change of staff today because Scamp said her latte was quite strong. I opted for tea and it tasted like tea.  Yes, it must be new staff, things are looking up!  We both had a scone with butter and jam and that’s when things went a bit skewiff. The scones were suffering from soggy bottoms.  Maybe the woman who used to make the coffees was now doing the baking!

We left the cafe and went for a walk round the glasshouse which isn’t always open. The heat in the glasshouse was quite oppressive after a short time inside.  I got some photos of the flowers, using the same lens and camera as yesterday, but being more careful to check the photos. Next we walked round the formal garden which seemed to be mainly roses and Echinops which Scamp thought were just past their best. I knew she was desperate to deadhead the roses and any other plants that needed the chop, but she was a visitor today, not a gardener.

We left the garden and walked into town for lunch in Wetherspoons. Fish ‘n’ Chips for Scamp and American Burger for me. Both were small portions but the cost was small too, so no complaints there. A quick scout round what used to be a bustling shopping arcade, but which is now a collection of second hand tech shops and pound shops.  Much like most of Scotland’s retail areas these days.

Drove home and managed a seat in the garden for a while Scamp with a G&T and me with a Guinness.  I’ve happily switched my allegiance from Guinness to Brewdog stout, and after drinking that Guinness, I know why.  Try it Jamie, you might like it.

PoD turned out to be a mono conversion of a Hogweed seedhead in the park in Dunfermline.

Tomorrow I’m hoping to meet Alex in Glasgow for a photo-walk and Scamp is off bargain hunting. Dance class at night in Cumbersheugh!