Fail

The Gorse Fox was up early to catch the train to Brighton. The Silver Vixen, kindly, gave him a lift to the station. He was delighted to find that the trains were almost deserted. It did become evident, however, that the only people not wearing masks were the indestructible youths who were just "too cool to care".

The Gorse Fox strolled down to the Churchill Mall and wandered round to the Apple Store. He was greeted by a phalanx of Apple-droids and security guards. He paused. Had he stumbled through a wormhole into the protests of Portland, Oregon? He concluded that it was unlikely. There was no lingering smell tear gas, no graffiti, nobody (that he could see) being beaten with batons or nightsticks, and nobody being bundled into blacked-out vans for rendition or reprogramming. On the whole, it was unlikely that the idiot Trump and his goons were interested in the Apple store in Brighton.

A hand was raised. "Do you have an appointment?" the Gorse Fox confirmed his appointment and the time and begged forgiveness for being early. "We need to take  your temperature, sir?" The Gorse Fox was expecting this and started to bend over (Apple do tend to be thorough). He was delighted to find, however, it was a reading taken from his forehead. He was cleared. Being early, however, he was told to go and get a coffee or wander around until 09:35. Tugging his forelock, he backed away and wandered into Costa.

At 09:34 he returned. The phalanx of droids closed in again. "We must take your temperature". The Gorse Fox was expecting a rigid adherence to process, but when he explained they had already done this and sent him away for a coffee, they relented. He was instructed to stand on particular spot and not move until a droid came to collect him.

On time, the droid arrived. He asked what the problem was. The Gorse Fox explained that, as it said on the note the droid had in front of him, the MacBook needed a new battery. (The Gorse Fox knew this because he followed the Apple instructions to review the status of the battery). The droid plugged in the machine and ran some diagnostics. He looked up. "This MacBook needs a new battery" he concluded. (Sherlock would be amazed by the cleanliness of the road behind his horse and cart). "Yes" replied the Gorse Fox, that's what I said on the work order. "We do have to check" said the droid. Fair enough. He returned to his iPad. He tapped away for a few minutes. "We don't have one in stock" he said. "Isn't that exactly the point of me specifying the problem when I book the machine in? That way you can ensure you have stock." "No" he said we don't work like that.

Clearly.

The Gorse Fox left the MacBook with them to fix and he would collect it once complete. This will probably be next week, some time.

Frustrated he walked back up to the station. Droves of scantily dressed people were streaming down the hill from the London train. Clearly, with the good weather forecast, they were intent on having a day at the beach. The Gorse Fox climbed into the railway carriage just as the doors closed and the train set off. An hour later he was walking home from Bognor Station.

Strange

It seems strange getting on an early morning train again. The Gorse Fox has a quick trip to Brighton to get the battery replaced in his MacBook.

Nudge Nudge, Wink Wink

We had plans for the day. Soon after eight they had already been changed. Urban-Cub wasn't feeling well and was unable to join us on our little jaunt.

We obviously had to wait until the Ocado chap had dropped off the week's shopping but then the Gorse Fox started to load the car. Some 74 trips later we were ready. The car was rammed full. Every sliver of storage space was occupied. Ellie was loaded into her car seat and the Silver Vixen and Gorse Fox set off to the wilds of Surrey (with a couple of unscheduled potty-stops along the way).

The plan was to meet up with the Gorse Fox's little sister and young Trevor. We had chosen the Winkworth Arboretum as a spot that was about equidistant from us both. It took about an hour, but just as we started to unload the car the Gorse Fox's phone rang. It was the bank. His recent letter regarding the elaborate hoax they had set up (asking him to phone but not answering) had achieved results. He not only got a formal apology (also sent in writing) but they dealt with the original query there and then, over the phone.

Fully laden, like mules in the gold rush, we struggled through the car park and into the Arboretum where we met up with J&T. After a comfort break, we wandered off along one of the more accessible paths until we found a lovely spot in the dappled shade of some huge trees. 

We set out the picnic blankets, retrieved the food hampers and settled down for a lovely couple of hours of chat and play. It could not have been a more perfect afternoon. Great company, gales of laughter and Ellie at her most sociable and playful.

Eventually, it was time to move on. The hillsides were too steep for the buggy, and the wheeled cart that we had with us (the Gorse Fox didn't check with the rest of the wagon train). This precluded us from going down to the lake or seeing the Azalea Walk. We strolled back to the entrance and settled down for scrumptious ice cream before heading back to car park to load up. (The Gorse Fox had intended to pay some sherpas to help get everything to the car and get it loaded, but in the end discovered that they had the afternoon off.

The Gorse Fox's sister has a new car, so we had an opportunity to see the pearlescent, silent, approach of this futuristic vehicle. She's only had it since Monday, but loves it to bits.

Watch out

Well that was a peculiar day.

We were all up and about at our usual times, and the Silver Vixen went, with Urban-Cub and Ellie, to Urban-Cub's storage unit. It was time for a bit of tidying in order to make room for a new purchase (more on that in a minute). They were gone for several hours and managed to make a lot of space available by stacking and packing things differently.

They arrived home and Urban-Cub and Ellie did a fairly quick "volte face" and headed back out to see Cousteau-Cub and leave some stuff with her for storage. The idea was that Urban-Cub  would then call the Gorse Fox when she needed help with the new purchase.

It was while she was gone that the Silver Vixen realised that she wasn't wearing her watch. She is a creature of habit. The watch is taken off the charger and put on the wrist as she gets out of bed. It was not on said wrist. The Gorse Fox helped her search but then the call came in from Urban-Cub - she was ready for the Gorse Fox's assistance. He leapt in the car and headed for Fishbourne where she had bought an expensive glass table and four chairs from a very nice couple for a very small fraction of the original price. The Gorse Fox helped dismantle and load the cars then we headed to the storage unit to tuck the new purchases away.

We checked the cars. There was no watch. 

We asked the assistant. No watch had been found.

Urban-Cub and Ellie got involved. There was no sign of the watch. 

Back home "Find My Device" wasn't even registering the watch. We came to the conclusion that it was out of range from the phone. This meant it must be at the storage unit or in the car as they were the only other places the Silver Vixen had been. Armed with "Find My Device" we headed back to the storage unit. It took a while for the watch and phone to recognise each other but with a deft press of a button on the phone, the watch started to ping. Finding it was the next task. It was bit like a destroyer with a sonar target trying to home in on the submarine. I took a bit of delving and searching but we eventually found it inside a sealed plastic crate.

That was a relief. The Gorse Fox had feared a new watch would be needed. 

Released

Urban-Cub and Ellie had plans. They were meeting up with one of Ellie's friends in a local park. That left the Silver Vixen and Gorse Fox to their own devices. The Silver Vixen pottered and completed the weekly shopping list (for the Gorse Fox to submit to Ocado). The Gorse Fox returned to the study.

As he said yesterday, he felt the new code was nearly ready for prime time. He spent a couple more hours tidying it, refining it, and testing it. Then he packaged it all up and released it. It's been a fun couple of weeks but it's time to let it go.

The Gorse Fox checked his tax account again today. The payment hasn't yet been transferred to the correct account. It was a bit optimistic to think it would happen overnight.

Big yell from downstairs a little while ago. Ellie had tripped and managed to smack her herself on the ground. She's feeling very sorry for herself at the moment having caught her upper lip, her forehead, hand, and foot. Oh well! it's all part of growing up.

The Gorse Fox is off out this evening. He's meeting up with the Arun Amblers committee to discuss how we move things forward with the football. It will be nice to see the others (at a 2 metre distance of course) after so long.

Keeping on top of things

It has been a day of "keeping on top of things". The first order of business was to accumulate all of our detritus ready for the trash recycling guy. Unfortunately, he couldn't take it there and then, but he gave us very competitive quote and will sort us out next Monday.

Urban-Cub had put our old recliner on Face-Ache's Marketplace. We had had a couple of false starts, but today a South African couple living in Wittering made contact, offered the full price, and came along to collect it. Finally, we have it out of the way.

The Gorse Fox checked hi online tax account. It claimed that the Gorse Fox still owed a sum of money. The Gorse Fox had, however, paid this off a couple of weeks back. It was time to give them a call. It took about 20 minutes to actually get to speak to someone, but he was very helpful. He tracked down the payment. It had been applied to the Gorse Fox's wrong tax account. He would have to escalate to get it switched to correct account, but assured the Gorse Fox that it would be sorted. (Once it is, it should significantly change the amount of tax he currently pays on his Starfleet pension).

Meanwhile, the Silver Vixen has been trying to get started on preparing some new patterns for her next sewing project.

The Gorse Fox also spent some time on his code. By now the primary focus is tidying things up. The code is nearly ready for prime time, but the Gorse Fox wants it to be an exemplar of how code should be written. Hence the tidying up.

Das what?

We had a lovely evening with the Silver Vixen's cousins in Brighton. Lots of chat and lots of reminiscences. We also had a take-away Indian and their unsurpassed hospitality.

This morning was a quiet start until the chappy arrived to talk about the replacement of our deck. It was quite fruitful and he will be providing us with a quote in the next couple of weeks. Let's hope it's not too extreme! Whatever happens, it will be October before he could hope to start.

The Gorse Fox spent some time in the study. His code had reached a point whereby he could share it for comment. Needless to say he got some comments back immediately. The most puzzling of which was the fact that it had emitted some error messages in German! The Gorse Fox doesn't speak a word of German so isn't sure where the blazes that came from. It gives him some this to look at in the morning.

Urban-Cub went to collect Ellie late this afternoon, so now we are all back together.

Coming along

It's been a productive morning. The weather is wet and windy so there no excuse to get involved in anything outdoors. 

The Gorse Fox retired to his study and dived back into his code. There is some genuine progress being made now. The code successfully reads through source material, strips comments, then parses what's left through a little analytical engine. The results are collated and formatted for output. All of the mechanics of the program seem to work, the only outstanding development is the expansion of the analytical engine to cater for more cases. That will take a while as the Gorse Fox has to determine how each case can be identified.

We're off to Brighton to see the Silver Vixen's cousins and aunt this afternoon. A curry may be involved later!

Talking of Brighton, the Gorse Fox has arranged to have a new battery fitted in his MacBook next Friday. That will mean an early start to get to Brighton in time for the appointment with the "Genius Bar" at Apple.

Garage banned

It has been a mixed day. The weather has been lovely (as you would expect in this part of the country - though forecast is very Welsh for tomorrow and Sunday). The morning started with the realisation that a part of the Gorse Fox's little coding exercise could be done more efficiently with a slightly different approach. This meant reworking a chunk of the code. The Gorse Fox started that this morning, got distracted, and then finished it just now.

As for his distraction, the Silver Vixen and Urban-cub had decided that they wanted to tidy one end of the garage. This is where the Silver Vixen keeps some gardening bits, the Gorse Fox stores his tools, and we accumulate rubbish that needs to be taken to the tip. He had to help. He had to make sure the right decisions were being made! It took a couple of hours, but it's done now and we have contacted a company to come and dispose of the detritus.

The Gorse Fox also took a trip to Sainsbury's. He was delighted to find that everyone therein was adhering to the facemask requirement, including the staff. There are so many idiot poseurs on social media claiming they can't wear one for fear of infringing some civil liberty or t'other. In practice, it seems that most of the people in our area think that social responsibility is more important than their personal preferences. One responder on Face-ache said she couldn't wear one because he glasses steamed up... well the Gorse Fox has worn glasses since he was 11 years old and has learned that you have to adapt and if you wear the mask under the glasses they don't get affected so much.

Tape measure and space pressure

Today has been filled with little distractions. We started the day with the usual Ocado delivery and that was followed by some admin. It was time for the Gorse Fox to write back to the Insurance company and explain that it is no good asking for us to phone them if they aren't going to answer the phone.

Again, the Gorse Fox spent a stupid amount of time trying to find appropriate accommodation for a short break with Urban-Cub and Ellie. Clearly, we have left it too late for many of the prime spots. Our disappointment is eased by the fact that we have just heard that the cattery has no availability for the week that we would wish to travel, so that's that.

The Silver Vixen has had an idea about an incredible storage cabinet for her sewing and all its paraphernalia. This ended up taking a great deal of time as we measured and pondered various locations. Most of the preferred locations just wouldn't work as they were too small or just not suitable. There is a Plan B, but the Gorse Fox isn't sure whether the Silver Vixen is really convinced. Nothing is likely to happen until the New Year anyway, so we have time to think about it.

Booking

There has been some press recently regarding diners who have booked to eat at some venue or other and then failed to turn up. This is unconscionably bad manners and damages the establishment where they were booked. The Gorse Fox has a solution to this (assuming breaking their legs with a baseball bat is likely to be frowned upon). A deposit should be taken on a credit card, their name, and their phone number should be recorded. If they are a no-show, they should be immediately put on a "not welcome list" that is shared across all the establishments in a 10-mile radius. Additionally, the full value of a table d'hote should be charged the against the credit card.

Right, that's that sorted.

The Gorse Fox was irritated to see that a petition has been raised to oppose the development of new homes to the west of our development. This is something that the Gorse Fox feels strongly about, so he commented:

Our population is growing and our demand for homes is growing. Our population has grown by 17 million since the 1950s, (9 million since 2000). Families are not like “nuclear families” of the 1950s where they stayed as a unit until each child left to get married and often accommodated elderly parents. Young adults want to leave and get their own homes. Families break up and one family unit may become two or more - each requiring a home. People are driven to live where they can afford and where they can get to their place of employment. Young couples need homes in which they can settle down. 

We have a conundrum. Everyone wants a home. Nobody wants it developed near them.The government has made it clear that there is a quota of houses that must be built in each area. Councils have little or no latitude to change that. 

I think that if I am living in a nice area, or nice development, and oppose further much needed development then I am being hypocritical and anti-social. What I would lobby for, however, is to ensure that adequate infrastructure is put in place to ensure that any new development improves rather than blights our area.

He expects his views will be contentious!

Much of the afternoon has spent looking through web listings. We thought it might be nice to have a week away somewhere with Urban-Cub and Ellie (and possibly Cousteau-Cub and the Coventry Hobbit). Selecting a suitable location with suitable accommodation has proved difficult. Indeed, at this point, though there is a "possibility list" there is nothing you could construe as a shortlist, let alone a decision. No bookings so far.

Chugging along

It's been a lovely day, weather-wise. Warm, sunny, but the odd clouds to give some relief. Urban-Cub and Ellie went out to Arundel to meet with some friends in the park and were out until early afternoon. The Silver Vixen was doing some dead-heading in the from garden and chatting with the neighbours. The Gorse Fox was back at the code-face.

Progress on the code is slow but it's very deliberate and very considered. There is still a way to go, but the Gorse Fox feels that he's making excellent headway. (It's a good job this is very much an intellectual exercise as opposed to being something that is required). He should be able to get another good run at it tomorrow.

Playground

The Gorse Fox took Ellie to the local playground this afternoon. She was a bit shy at first as their were other children there, but soon joined in the fun making friends with a girl called Alice who is four months older. The Gorse Fox got talking to Alice's Nan and Mum. They were astounded at how articulate Ellie is and how wide her vocabulary is. The Gorse Fox suspects this is because she spends so much time with adults.

Smug, again

The Gorse Fox has been struggling with a coding conundrum. The thing is that the problem must have been solved within the underlying coding language. He wrote to some of his gurus and asked if they had any clues. He received various replies but the one that matters was that received from Mike, the original author of the language itself. He used to work for Starfleet and the Gorse Fox considers him more of a distant friend than just an old colleague. He offered the Gorse Fox the original source code that handles the issue. It was written in 360/Assembler, but that's no problem for the Gorse Fox. In fact, when the code arrived, it provided a pleasurable hour or so just reading the code and remembering what a clean and crisp language it was.

Why is he feeling smug? In the code that he has already written he decided on a strategy that was very different from the code he had been updating over the last week. He decided he would break the code that was being examined into clauses and work on each clause separately. (The old code worked through the source character by character). When the Gorse Fox started to review Mike's code, one of the first comment block explains his strategy for parsing the code... he does it clause by clause. That made the Gorse Fox's day!

He still has a huge amount of research and thinking to do, but he feeling positive.

Wind up

The Gorse Fox has been the victim of an elaborate wind-up. We get travel insurance through the bank and, as a result of some recent health issues, we have had to take out a supplement. The supplement is about to expire and this needs a renewal. The travel insurers thought it would be funny to send him a letter reminding him that the upgrade was about to expire but in order to renew, he had to phone them. This is where the wind-up kicks in. When the Gorse Fox tries to phone the number given he's told how busy they are and unless he is travelling in the next three days, he should call back. This joke started last week, and he has fallen for it several times since. This time they took it a stage further and offered to call him back. Yeah! like that happened!

Football

The Gorse Fox received a call from Krakatoa Jack. It appears that Worthing have started playing football again, and have been playing for several weeks. Also, there has been a separate session for the older community up at Highdown. Jack suggested we should go along a watch, then decide what Arun should do. The Gorse Fox, as much as he wants to play, still thinks it is a bit premature. Particularly so as infection rates have increased significantly in Worthing over the past week. The Gorse Fox declined to offer for this week but may go and watch the following week.

Most of the day has been spent fighting through a maze of logic problems as the Gorse Fox starts to redevelop the code from scratch. He doesn't underestimate the effort that went into the original code, but feels there must be a significantly better and more elegant way to handle it. As one user put it "it is brutish in its approach". We have also managed to find a number of obscure test cases that it just could not handle.

Nice win for Spurs this afternoon (3-0 over Leicester).

Ellie is back from Pistol Pete. It's always so nice to see her cheery little face as she gets back. She is always so excited to see Urban-Cub and the Silver Vixen and always has a chuckle with the Gorse Fox over some bit of grandpa's silliness.

Booked

A short break in Devon would be nice, though the Gorse Fox. With a Wedding Anniversary (47th) coming up next month - it seemed like a good idea. He raised the idea with the Silver Vixen. She leapt at the idea. The Gorse Fox phoned the Victoria Hotel in Sidmouth and 5 minutes later we were booked into our favourite Stateroom.

Sorted

Quiet Saturday

It was quiet. It was so quiet. Ellie is at Pistol Pete’s for the weekend, and Urban-Cub was away in Crawley overnight. We emerged gently as we woke. It was so quiet.

The Silver Vixen has spent most of the day at her sewing machine making a dress. The Gorse Fox spent the day at the code-face. A bug had to be tracked down, and proved elusive. It was eventually crushed, mercilessly.

The problem with debugging other people’s code is that it triggers a whole lot of “what-ifs” regarding coding technique. This drove the Gorse Fox down another path and he is now several hundred lines of code into a new program to replace the original. Needless to say, it is not straightforward. If it was, the original authors of the other code would have got it right. There’s still a long way to go, but the advantage of lockdown is that it affords time to indulge in the pleasures of life.

Progress

The Gorse Fox had the temerity to write to Virgin Holidays yesterday. He was very upbeat and polite:

Hello,

I am sure you are immensely busy, and I do hope you are keeping safe in these difficult times.

On 28th April you cancelled our holiday to Jamaica, offering a voucher and various rebooking options. I declined these and filled in the online form requesting a full refund. Since then I have heard nothing. There was no acknowledgement (though I have kept a copy of the form).

Reading on the Facebook Group it seems that people are seeing their invoices amended to reflect the pending refund. I have not seen this, and find that now, I cannot even get online to see my account/invoice.

Please can you confirm that I am in the queue for a refund, and some indication of how much longer I may have to wait would be appreciated.

Take care and stay safe

Having seen the hassle some people are having, he was delighted that this email received a full and personal reply this morning. All points were addressed and we now have a target date for our refund. The Gorse Fox is quietly satisfied that, as usual, a gentle and polite approach gets much better results than sarcasm, threats, anger and so forth.

(Talking of refunds, the second and final instalment of the refund of the State Pension came in this morning).

Windfall

The day started much as any other. Being Thursday, we expected Ocado (now that things are settling back down we have regained our usual slot), and Urban-Cub and Ellie had plans to meet up with the Princess and her brood at Fisher's Farm. It was all very routine.

There was a clatter as the post was pushed through the letterbox. The Gorse Fox didn't take a lot of notice. Most of his correspondence nowadays is via email. He was surprised therefor to find two letters addressed to him. Both were from the Department for Work and Pensions. He idly opened the first, expecting it to be a simple statement. Oh no, this was no simple statement. This was the sort of statement you would get if Carlsberg did DWP statements with M&S. 

It appears that DWP had been underpaying the Gorse Fox ever since he retired. They have just spotted it and will reimburse the difference. That was a result. He checked his bank. A payment had been made, but not the amount mentioned. The Gorse Fox phoned DWP and checked he wasn't dreaming. No. It was for real, and because of the amount they are paying it in two instalments so they didn't have to go and get separate authorisation.

An email arrived. It was HMRC suggesting the Gorse Fox should look at his Personal Tax Account. Sure enough they were very quick off the mark and had already calculated how much tax the Gorse Fox should have paid on the little windfall and said that, as a result, he had underpaid and please could they have some of their money back. The Government giveth and the Government taketh away. The Gorse Fox is not complaining. He is still gazing at a healthy pot (and that's nothing to do with weight-gain during lockdown).

With this money burning a metaphorical hole in his pocket, the Gorse Fox (always a romantic) suggested that he take the Silver Vixen out. So it was that we spent 30 minutes finishing the last few bits of shopping in Sainsbury's before coming home for lunch.

While thinking about money, he decided it was time to write to Virgin Holiday again, and to write to VIP Attractions in Jamaica. The latter promised a refund in 90 days... it has been 113 so far and no refund has appeared.

The rest of the afternoon was spent looking at a selection of paving slabs and tiles, trying to get some ideas for the back garden. We have a chap coming to give us a quote next week and it would be useful to have some idea what we want first!

That went well

Urban-Cub and Ellie were out for the day.

The Silver Vixen had her usual Zoom Pilates session throughout the morning, and spent much of the afternoon on the phone to a girl friend.

The Gorse Fox was left alone to play with his code. He finally got the cross-referencing program working properly and identically on each of the Windows, Linux, and Mac platforms. He went  back online to the forum where he asked his initial question and explained that we had found an old bit of code and the Gorse Fox had reworked it to run across all platforms (and, incidentally, sped it up considerably). Putting his head above the parapet may have been a mistake. There is now a steady stream of emails from people requesting a copy. Fame at last!

Sorted... well not quite

The code that the Gorse Fox has been working on has thrown up a surprise. It creates an intermediate work file. This file is then processed by the "sort" command in the host environment. The problem is that the sort on MAC and on Linux come up with totally different sequences. This, apparently, can be a by-product of the "Locale" setting. In this case, however, both are set identically. The Gorse Fox thinks that it may require Plan B, or C. One of which is to internalise the whole process so it is handled with Rexx, the other is to write a cross-system sort that uses an identical sort sequence (which he really doesn't want to do).

Tomorrow should be fun!

Getting Stoned

Urban-Cub and the Gorse Fox had a plan. Being Tuesday we were going to get stoned. It seems only reasonable after such a long lockdown, So it was that by mid-morning Urban-Cub and the Gorse Fox were separating the cobbles that had been in bleach for the past few weeks, then rinsing them with copious amounts of water and flushing it away down the drain. It was a long job, and even now we have only done about half of the total. Those we have done, however, have come up really well and there's no vesting of the old green slime visible on any of them. They are as good as new.

When we finished that we emptied the rill (again) and cleaned it out ready for the replacement of the stone when the other half are complete. It was a good, if messy, morning's work. 

After lunch the Gorse Fox took Ellie down to the local play park so she could let off steam on the swings and slides... and give Urban-Cub and the Silver Vixen a little respite.

Cross-platform

What a lovely day this has been. The weather has been perfect and we have all got on with different things.

Urban-Cub and Ellie headed up towards Crawley to meet with a friend in one of the parks. Unfortunately, Ellie managed to fall and graze her elbow and whilst trying to milk it for as much sympathy as possible, she virtually forgets about it as soon as she's distracted.

The Silver Vixen had her hair appointment. The plan was to get her colour re-done and start the process of reshaping the style. It can't all be done in one go as it is dependent on some parts growing longer. It does look very nice already... and the hours spent this afternoon with the hairdresser (her at home) were well worth the effort.

The Gorse Fox has spent the day on the code. Bit by bit it came together. It was soon working on both Mac and on Linux... Windows, however, would be the challenge. This afternoon the Gorse Fox fired up Osprey (the Silver Vixen's old laptop and only remaining Windows machine we have) with a view to testing what had been done. The first hour was wasted because Windows decided to download and apply some updates. Then the Gorse Fox realised he had to install the latest version of ooREXX as the version on OSPREY was well out-of-date. Finally he got to test. A few modifications were needed but by the end of the afternoon the code would run happily on all three platforms. A very satisfying day.

That is better

It's been a lovely day. The weather has been glorious (as you would expect on the South Coast) and we've had a nice day.

The Silver Vixen and Gorse Fox went across to see Cousteau-Cub and the Coventry Hobbit in Chichester this morning and to have a look at what they had been doing in their garden (while enjoying a cup of tea). It was a lovely hour or so and it was nice to see how well they are getting on.

Urban-Cub and Ellie stayed put. Ellie was told that unless she got washed and dressed she was not going out anywhere... and so it was! She refused to get washed and dressed so Urban-Cub refused to take her out. They had a quiet day in the garden, instead.

When we got back from Chichester, the Gorse Fox went back to his study and returned to the code he was sent last night. This, it was said, would cross reference a program and also reformat it to look nice. The Gorse Fox is not worried about the latter (he write pretty programs anyway), but the first bit was what he was after.

It took a lot of work. It was the sort of code that demands a smack round the ear for the programmer. Almost devoid of commentary, meaningless variable names, and a very peculiar structure. The Gorse Fox dug his heels in and started to rip it apart and rebuild it properly. By late afternoon he had a working version. There is a lot more commentary and documentation to write, but currently it does the trick. Tick for the Gorse Fox.

Refactoring

Urban-Cub and Ellie went out for the day. Silver Vixen spent the day with her sewing, finishing off a lovely top for Ellie. The Gorse Fox snuck off to the study.

He spent a few hours tidying up some old code but then got thinking about all of the useful cross-referencing information that we used to get from PL/1 and Pascal compilers. Wouldn't it be nice if we had something like that for Rexx. So it was that he asked on the forum. 

Cyril responded with some code that would cross-reference every word in a file... useful, but not what was wanted. He, Cyril that is, then dug some code out of an archive that sounds as if it should do the job. The problem is that it is Windows-OS/2 only. The Gorse Fox looked at the basic framework and decided that this was worthy of some redesign. He now has several thousand lines of code to rework such that they will execute on MACOS or Linux. Seems like a worthy challenge for the little grey cells.

Result

Well it would appear that our CCTV did help. The Gorse Fox heard from our Neighbourhood Watch lady that the CCTV was forwarded to the Police. The miscreants were identified and the Police attended their school assembly to give them a lecture. The headmistress has also spoken to the lads and sent an apology. Whether it has a lasting effect, who knows? At least the lads will know that they are under surveillance when they are in this neck of the woods.

CCTV

We had a case, yesterday, of some anti-social behaviour. Some youths climbed on the roof of the Community Centre and hurled abuse at passers-by. Then they took over a playground, and then climbed the builder's scaffolding at Sonning Place. Police were called by the Neighbourhood Watch. Our doorbell rang. It was the Neighbourhood Watch coordinator asking if the Gorse Fox had any CCTV footage of the miscreants. He spent a while reviewing what he had, and eventually found the three youths running across the tree and down the road. CCTV has been sent, via Neighbourhood Watch, to the Police.

Jiggling Atoms

Yesterday the Gorse Fox spoke of tickling his little grey cells. He also watched a BBC Archive film from Richard Feynman call "Jiggling Atoms". Richard Feynman is one of his heroes. A truly inspired and inspirational scientist. Anyway, today his tickled grey cells started to jiggle. The work he had done for his "pre-processor" idea had started to bear fruit. Synapses were firing, grey cells were jiggling and his fingers were dashing across the keyboard as he spent the day in front of old code that could be adapted. That's not to say that everything went swimmingly... there were still bugs to drive out, but in general it was deeply satisfying.

You may have guessed that Urban-Cub and Ellie were out for the day, giving the Gorse Fox undisturbed time to code. Also, the Silver Vixen was on the phone for much of the morning and then sewing all afternoon. The Gorse Fox did have a fleeting trip to Sainsbury's to get some cat food. He was pleased to see more people wearing masks than he has done recently. They are still, however, very much in the minority.

Tickling the little grey cells

It's been a very quiet day with the exception of the Ocado delivery. Ellie is still with Pistol Pete. Urban-Cub spent the morning on the phone sorting out various cancellations for services at the old house in LA. The Silver Vixen spend much of the morning on the phone also.

The Gorse Fox squirrelled himself away in the study. There wasn't, at first, a clear objective, but he started to review some code. That always triggers ideas for improvements or even for different techniques. Sure enough it didn't't take long for him to find something into which he could sink his teeth. So it is that he has spent most of the day, so far, lashed to the keyboard while riding out a storm of ideas and experiments. It's been immensely satisfying as all but one of his experiments have worked.

Lazy

It has been a very lazy day. The Gorse Fox hasn't really been sparked into life by any particular task. He spent some time playing with some code this morning. He feels that however good the code is, there can always be some improvement. When he had finished he tidied up his code library and consigned a lot of old code to an archive folder.

The Gorse Fox then swapped to the video editor. He has started on a video of Ellie throughout 2018. This is time-consuming as is started with 84 separate video files last nearly 2 hours.  These have to be viewed and trimmed down so that we end up with a palatable 15-20 minutes. He will return to this another day as he's going boss-eyed from editing at the moment.

Ellie has just gone off with Pistol Pete for an overnight stay.

Going, going, gone.

Urban-Cub has been entertaining a friend and her daughter as a play-date with Ellie. (What a good job we built the Orangery when we moved in). In the midst of this, she received a call from her Solicitor confirming that the sale of the house in LA has completed. In the Gorse Fox's experience it's rare that these things go through smoothly so he was delighted to see and example where it went without a hitch.

We just have to wait for the new house to be built... but if that is on schedule she will benefit from the removal of stamp duty.

Fleeced

Sometimes you just get lucky. Certainly, the Gorse Fox didn't feel lucky when Jasper started to yowl in his ear at six-thirty this morning, but once up and on a full caffeine load he settled down (the Gorse Fox that is, not Jasper).

Urban-Cub and Ellie needed to go into Chichester for a card/present for one of Ellie's friends. The Silver Vixen went along for the ride. the Gorse Fox decided to chance his luck and went along to the barbershop. He was lucky, there was no wait. He just settled down while the guy masked-up and 30 minutes later he was surrounded by what could only be described as a sheep's fleece worth of hair. He had been shorn, hair, ears, eyebrows and even parts of his beard had been trimmed, washed and dried. It was a vey pleasant thirty minutes of pampering.

When he got back, he returned to his little coding challenge, or at least, Plan B thereof. This was to emulate the old PL/1 Macro Pre-processor which allowed programs to be constructed dynamically from pre-tested components. The Gorse Fox now has a tested and working version which he will use next time he needs to build a new routine. He will also start to file some useful macros and routines that can be invoked in the build phase by the pre-processor. Very satisfying.

This afternoon he took Ellie for a walk round to the West Meads pharmacy to collect some of the Silver Vixen's medication. Ellie was very good and walked for much of the way (though as it was 4km there and back, we did take the buggy for her to ride when tired). When we got back she wanted to go to the park, but when the Gorse Fox took her there it was clear that there was little or no attempt at social distancing and it was quite busy. He felt it wasn't safe, so we returned home with a promise of another try).

Finished

The Silver Vixen and Urban-Cub headed across to LA to finish the last bits of cleaning at the house. The Gorse Fox was destined to follow, but wanted to stop for some shopping (saffron) on the way. Just before he left home, the Silver Vixen called. The chap from the local barbershop was sitting outside his shop with no customers. Could the Gorse Fox get there in time? He headed off immediately. By the time he got there (which couldn't have been more than 3 minutes later) someone was just settling into the barber's chair. The Gorse Fox had missed his opportunity. He'll have to try again later in the week.

It didn't take us too long to finish up at the the house. The Gorse Fox helped by cleaning the garage, sorting out a light, fixing a venetian blind, and loading the car.

Back home he started on his planned lamb dish. The first problem was finding a cooking receptacle large enough to hold the lamb shoulder. Then he started to try and recreate the Moroccan lamb recipe he had seen on TV. Clearly they didn't show all of the steps as the final product wasn't quite what was expected. He started by creating a mixture of herbs and spices in warm water which was rubbed all over the lamb. The lamb was the immersed in the mixture and covered with chopped onions. This was simmered for three and half hours before being taken out, basted in ghee, then roasted. The sauce was further reduced... but that was the bit that didn't really meet expectations. The lamb was shredded and was so tender and moist, that it was irresistible. He must experiment further, so that he can get the sauce right. (P.S. We do have a huge plateful of shredded lamb that we can use over the next couple days).

Yuk

There is something both disconcerting and deeply unpleasant about being woken at 6 a.m. by your cat throwing up all over the bedroom floor.

Just saying!

Clearance

The whole family turned up. The Silver Vixen set about cleaning, Urban-cub set about cleaning and directing, Cousteau-cub helped pack and shift, the Coventry Hobbit brought a van and shifted and loaded, while the Gorse Fox dismantled, shifted, and loaded. It took many hours but the house in LA is virtually clear now. A brief session tomorrow should manage the last couple of items.

Once everything was loaded into the van we headed across to the storage facility. It was a good job that Urban-cub had switched to the larger unit. By the time we had shifted everything, you would find it a challenge to slide a sheet of paper into the unit. Lugging everything up from the paring area was hampered by the arrival of the family using the next unit to Urban-cub's. They blocked the corridor as they faffed about, and we had to find a more circuitous route to the storage unit. This was not easy as the trolleys we used were very difficult to manoeuver around the tight corners. Eventually, we were done.

Back home we settled for some lamb chops and a drink as Cousteau-cub and the Coventry Hobbit headed back to Chichester having been such invaluable help throughout the day.

Freedom

Of course today is Independence Day. For those of you who do not understand the historical significance of the day, the Gorse Fox will explain.

It is six years ago today that the Gorse Fox retired from Starfleet. Six years during which he has woken every morning hardly able to believe that he doesn't have to go to work... and is still being paid. Six years where the only travel he has had to do is for pleasure. Six years where he hasn't had to do then moderate staff appraisals. Six years where he hasn't had to deal with asinine project deadlines that bear no resemblance to reality. Six years where he hasn't had to fight his way through the Tube network or the main London train termini. Six blissful years.

(Oh, he should probably mention that it is a holiday in the US also, but they really didn't have to go to that extent)

Saffron

The best laid plans...

Despite the Gorse Fox's intention to get to the Cash and Carry this morning, domestic events got in the way and it was early afternoon before he was able to get away. By the time he got to the C&C it was closed. Pah! He tried two supermarkets on the way home. Nada. He will have to go further afield tomorrow.

Urban-Cub got back this morning and then took Ellie across to stay with Pistol Pete. She left a travel cot behind, which was being sold on Face-Ache's Marketplace... but the buyer never turned up. (The Gorse Fox could forgive this if she turns up later clutching some saffron).

Th Silver Vixen has been sitting at her sewing machine for mucho if the day, and the Gorse Fox is sat in his study. He's been doing a little research to satisfy a "programming itch" that he has. More about that later if he ever gets to a satisfactory conclusion.

Short report

It's been a windy, but pleasant day, without being too sunny or too cloudy. Urban-Cub was up early as she had to get across to LA to greet some chaps from a trash clearance outfit (fully licensed, of course). They came to see the detritus that Pistol Pete had left and quote for its removal. The quote was exactly what she had expected so she told them to go ahead and they cleared the lot, there and then.

She came back for a while, before heading up to Crawley where she was meeting with a friend. She won't be back until tomorrow, so G-Force are on duty. Other than a total melt-down when Urban-Cub left, Ellie has been as good as gold all day.

This afternoon the chappies from Reynolds arrived with the Gorse Fox's new chair. Bizarrely, it seems to make the room look a bit bigger. He must say that it seems very comfortable and he's looking forward to settling down in front of the TV this evening to  see how well it works out.

Not much else to report.

(P.S. The Gorse Fox was wondering where he could get saffron in sensible quantities. Usually you have to buy it with a mortgage and only receive a microgram. It occurred to him that we have an Asian Cash & Carry in the village, so he plans to pop along there tomorrow to see if they have any - at a sensible price. He wants it for a dish he is planning for Sunday involving a shoulder of lamb and a lot of patience).

Stress

Let us just say that Ellie has been at her defiant best today... and then draw a line under it.

Urban-Cub had to go across to LA to finish up some of the last bits in the old house. Unfortunately, that didn't go to plan as it is fairly clear that Pistol Pete hasn't done all of the things that were expected and has just dumped stuff that he doesn't want in the garden and garage, expecting some unknown fairy to come along and magic it away. It was also clear that some of the stuff he was taking, he is no longer taking. The upshot is that Urban-Cub had had to get a larger storage unit and move everything around from the old to the new and make room for the unexpected items. To say she has had a stressful day would be an understatement.

Talking of stress, the Silver Vixen and Gorse Fox went into our local furniture shop and completed the transaction for the new "Stressless" recliner. It will be delivered tomorrow. The question we had to handle was regarding the disposal of the old armchair. Urban-Cub put it on the Face-ache Marketplace for £50. Two hours later it was sold and by early evening it had been taken. (Based on that success we will try and get rid of our old recliner) the same way.

Cousteau-Cub and the Coventry Hobbit popped round in the early evening to walk Tyson round the lake and to see Urban-Cub and Ellie. The Gorse Fox thinks it was just the tonic that Urban-Cub needed.

Stop fidgeting

The Gorse Fox was in need of some more coding but couldn't think of anything new that needed doing. In the end, the best he could manage was a few tweaks to the code he wrote yesterday.

The Silver Vixen, Urban-Cub, and Ellie went out to HobbyCraft this afternoon. They came back clutching various craft bits for Ellie. Their trip gave the Gorse Fox a chance to settle down with some more videos. He started by condensing all of the videos taken of Ellie in 2017 (the year she was born) and several well chosen photos into a new single 15 minute video. That works quite well and is now nestling in the library. He then went to work on the last few unprocessed videos from 2004. These covered a holiday in Tenerife when, for once, both Cousteau-Cub and Urban-Cub were with us, along with Urban-Cub's friend, Tanya. Again, the processing of the video brought back memories and allowed the Gorse Fox to add some extra blog posts for March 2004 (in his private blog).

This evening we have put adverts for a couple of our chairs on various local sites. The idea is to sell them, rather than just ditch them. The plan is for the Gorse Fox to replace his current armchair with a Stressless Recliner as he fidgets constantly when in his current armchair It will be interesting to see if there are any takers. His new chair is reserved and waiting at our local furniture store. We plan to complete the transaction tomorrow.