I can fix... my Chromebook

Wednesday 28th May 2014. 23:49

Today, I received delivery of the replacement screen for my chromebook that I ordered of ebay. That's rather swift delivery, bearing in mind I only ordered it Monday (I think).

So, £29.03, free postage and a 'how to' film on youtube and I now have a fully functional Chromebook again.

I did try installing Ubuntu onto it, so that I could get Celtx to work with it, and be able to use it when I don't have an internet connection (Celtx provide an in browser service call Celtx Edge, but of course this doesn't work when you don't have an internet connection).

I managed to install Ubuntu fine enough, it was just that I couldn't seem to get Celtx to install and load. I gave up in the end.

It may be that the Celtx isn't compatible with the version of Celtx I downloaded and installed (after following another 'how to' video on youtube), or it may be that there's something else I was doing wrong. Either way, I abandoned that idea. It's not like I'm away from an internet connection that often.

Celtx, the awesome script and novel writing tool.

I'm just creating other procrastinations, reasons to not write.

During my messing around, I did discover that the Novel writing part of Celtx now works on Celtx Edge. I don't think it did before.

Anyway. Helen came up last night. She was originally due to come up during the day, and we were going to meet in Cosham and have some food at a pub. Helen works from home as a travel agent, and this means that sometimes she can get delayed dealing with a client's booking.

Not like I'm in a position to criticise anyone else for working odd hours, or staying later than they have to.
UKIP at the local council and European elections, and how the other parties are fairing. What we both like, dislike and are frightened by in the recent turn of events.

When we weren't saying how worried we are by the fact that a lot of people seem to have voted for a party that they know nothing about, or have any understanding of their policies, and how this has historical links that do not bode well for society.

This got us making a jokey comparison about the whole in Europe / out of Europe debate, and how there is a stark irony about the Scottish Independence vote (due September this year), - wanting to leave one union in order to agree to rejoin another. In our normal way, we couldn't stay too serious too long.

We started to explore the idea of what would happen if Portsmouth decided to have a referendum on independence, on leaving the United Kingdom.

We ended up thrashing out some plot points, and a whole manifesto of policies of the party that would supposedly push for this.

The scarily funny thing seemed to be how plausible despite being completely ridiculous the whole concept and the policies were. Perhaps there'll be more on that later.

I'm sure I'll also want to put my two pence worth in about the rise of UKIP. Suffice to say so far, that I decided that I would do something about representing the kind of Britain I believe in by joining a political party. This is the first time I've ever done this, but do feel that I am naturally drawn to the common sense sort of policies of the Liberal Democrats. As is typical of me, I want the best of both worlds, left and right, because I do feel that we can't have a fair society if we do not have a strong economy, but that there is no point having a strong economy if our society isn't fair.

I do believe in people's strong responsibilities for the wider community and themselves, and society as a whole, and how they are the best at deciding and designing their life and their destiny. Personal freedom, and responsibility, duty go hand in hand. I also feel that unless we design our society to include and engage people, they won't be involved in politics.

Help those that need help, make decisions based on fact rather than with idealogical motivation. A society of tolerance, and freedoms - where there are more roads to travel than walls to keep people in - that's what I want.

Out of the depths of despair...

.... you come across some successes, and grab them, as seldom as they may be, with both hands and hang on like hell for dear life.

It's been another tough week, in so many ways. Within an hour of my shift finishing today, I felt pretty much invincible. Not only had I managed to resolve two particularly tricky customer complaints, but I also manage to 'negotiate' the tricky situation that had been brewing all week with Chloe wanting to spend some more money on yet another gadget from ebay.

12 year old ebay addict ? Maybe.

Taking those in reverse order, I'd spoke to Chloe's mother in the week about how we were both worried that she'd yet again wanted to buy something new (a radio controlled hover car). Having sold her old netbook a couple of weeks ago, the proceeds are burning a hole in her pocket. Not unexpectedly, her Mum is urging caution, and saying that she can't spend that money, and needs to set it aside. Chloe, reacting like an apprentice teenager saying that it was 'unfair' and that her mum was being 'out of order' not letting her spend her own money.

Apparently she'd even said that she thought that if she took her mum to court she would win, as it was her own money. Bless her, she is her Father's daughter. Her poor Mother.

In the end, a deflected suggestion that I go halves with her, and let her have the damn thing as an early Christmas present, we eventually stood our ground and agreed that if she really wanted it, should could have it for Christmas, but would not have it early. More decries of 'unfair' and 'out of order' followed, but eventually she succumbed to the reasoning that getting it in two months time is still better than never having it at all.

Happy daughter. Happy ex-wife. Good bit of parenting and standard setting. Joint operation. Job done. (until, of course the next crisis comes up). There had been some drama and crisis at the weekend about how things were going between Chloe and her Grandparents, who live next door to her. She had been rude to them, and used some colourful language. A bit of peacemaking, listening, understanding and then talking with her Mum seems to at least not made things any worse. For my part the explanation that treating her Grandparents, or parents like that isn't acceptable, no matter what she feels they did, and even so, if she wants to get them to change their minds and treat her differently, is shouting and swearing at them the way to do it? She's clever enough to see that it's not.

As shameful, cringeworthy it may be hearing that these things have happened, I'm pretty sure I said some choice things to my relatives over the years, and although I feel like I had more respect for them, I knew where the boundaries were but was resolutely determined to push them, not just a little, but with a full sized jump kick to the head.

Hopefully, whilst maintaining that this behaviour is unacceptable, getting Chloe to see that there are much more effective ways of getting what she wants will be a better way of getting her to chose the right way to be, and to treat people.

As for work. The things that are difficult don't get any easier. After all, I really do think that I would be in the wrong job if I actually enjoyed the things I'm talking about. I am being necessarily vague about some things that I have to do, as this is entirely proper. Some times it is hard to do the right thing. Doing the wrong thing is really, really, easy.

Now, to resolve that broken friendship.....

SOLD

At the second attempt (after being screwed over by some arse from Nigeria) Chloe's netbook has sold on ebay. Sadly not in time for her to have part of the money to take with her on her school trip to France. I think I've done a rather good job of packaging it up..... Just need to get myself in gear and post it off on Saturday.

The Magical Mystery Tour

Today, work was, well. Rather work like. Apart from the distinct lack of people in (some off sick, some on holiday) it was unusually quiet - at the start at least - for a Monday. It did get busier later on in the day, but that wasn't until after I'd had my bit of mini drama with Mike.

Every now and then his mickey taking crosses the line, and he seems to be fixated on winding me up to the point where he wants to watch me cop. That's normally annoying enough (annoying that a colleague would do that, annoying that I would react that way, that he's able to 'play' me in that manner), but today he did it in front of the rest of the managers in the zone. In the end I got tired of it and asked him to back the hell off. It all sounds a bit vague, and maybe a tad overly dramatic. Behaving like a premenstrual teenager. Not cool.

Not really something I ever claimed to be. Still I managed to get my point across without swearing, or raising my voice. Much.

When I finally got to the end of my day, without any other dramas. I walked to the bus station, knowing that I needed to get home before the man from Asda turned up with my home delivery. So eager was I to catch the bus home when I got to Havant bus station, that I ended up getting on the number 23 that was traveling the wrong way. I realised this as we went past the college and into Leigh Park, and by this point had figured that even if I got off the bus, the next one that was going to be going back the way I wanted, was the one that I was on, when it made the return journey part of it's circuit.

Luckily I had my Kindle with me, so was pretty well occupied during my little trip. It's quite a nice thing to do, be on the bus as it goes round. Maybe I will try it one day, to get away from any distractions. Just sit on the bus and go round and round, doing some writing. After all with my week pass, it wouldn't cost me anything more than I normally would have to pay out anyway. Hmmm...


Chloe had put her netbook up on ebay (well, I had for her), and we'd both gotten excited about someone that had taken the buy-it-now price of £100. Chloe is really eager to get the money so she can spend some of it when she goes to France at the end of the week. I had a suspicion that something didn't quite ring true, when they contacted me by email. Initially giving a UK address for shipping, but then, when they said they'd completed payment (which they hadn't) they then supplied a Nigerian address.

About as Kosher as a bacon sandwich.

T - 30

Script Frenzy

30 days and counting (down) to Script Frenzy. An email from the Offices of Letters & Light (or organisation that runs the madness) reminded me that 'the frenzy' is fast approaching and I don't have one iota of an idea that I can develop into a 100 page script.

Remembering how crap it felt last year, when I wrote Retro Rocket (and succeeded in the 100 pages written during April target. Yay !) and didn't really have a plan, and how that nearly ended in failure, I wanted to make sure that I avoided that this year. When I'd entered National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) I had also neglected to plan, and elected for an organic free form approach to the writing. I just sat at my desk, and let the ideas poor out. Good, bad or downright terrible.

Having not succeeded with NaNoWriMo and only managing something like 17,409 words (when I say something like, that's the exact figure) I don't want to repeat the failure.

Fail to plan. Plan to fail.

So what does this writer do when he doesn't have a plan (can I call myself a writer ? - someone check that one out and get back to me) ? Post-its. Yes post-its. Those non-recyclable yellow gems that turn any flat surface into a 'brain storming wall'. Now that it's my wall I can stick post-its up with gay abandon. (Heterosexual abandon just doesn't work so well). 

This works for me, may not work for others.. but you have to go with what works. I have progressed a little from the initial post-it driven 'floating of ideas' to the developing of one particular idea. I had considered using Frenzy (as it appears to be affectionately shortened) to write the first series of Retro Rocket. I have dismissed this as I have not revisited the idea since last April's Frenzy, so the 'pilot' script will, in itself need lots of editing. An attack of the big red pen (or in my case, the impatient pencil) is required. Also with Retro Rocket, I just haven't actually resolved those issues about show direction that had been the stumbling block. It was not answering those questions that I think made it hard to push on with the script originally. It didn't have a plan (return to previous point about planning).

I also discarded the 'man goes back in time to undo the mistakes that cost him his marriage - only to find out that he erases his daughter from existence' because, well, I just thought it was a crappy idea.

Likewise 'man on bus / train that isn't allowed to get off at his intended destination' is perhaps worthy of a short film (about 5 minutes) but I couldn't for the life of me see how I could get 100 pages out of that idea. It may be possible that the idea I have gone for ends up with elements of that. We'll have to wait and see.

Laptop (alternative titles being :- Feedback or Netbook) is the story of what changes occur in a man's life as a result of him buying a laptop (or netbook) off Ebay. The computer contains information that he is not aware of, and also has automatic sign-on enabled to internet chat sites. This draws or drags him into a world that he is initially intrigued about, but as he discovers more is increasingly scared as he gets more and more deeply involved in the things that were happening in the life of the laptop's previous owner.

What does the machine have on it that makes it so important to so many different groups (big business, criminals, government etc) ?

How did it come to be on Ebay in the first place, if it was so important ? (was the previous owner mugged ? Are they still alive ?)

So our hero, if that's the word is forced to try and convince these people that this was not his laptop before, and he has no way of finding out what's hidden on the hard-drive. He has a hard time convincing these people, a succession of organisations or individuals keep tracking him down to convince him to give them what they want. None of them believe him when he says that he's just brought the laptop on ebay. They believe him even less when it gets stolen.

He then has to try and find the laptop, as giving it to the people that want it so badly is the only way to get them out of his life.

This would be as boring as hell as a stage play, and is definitely suited to filming, even something that could be done on a low budget ,and with a bunch of amateur film-makers. (you see where I'm going here, don't you ?)

Let me know what you think, dear reader. Perhaps as I develop the idea, I post those onto the blog ? Hmmm. All this AS WELL AS , The Fatcat And The Grafter. 

This is good. I like to be busy. When I'm not busy I'm sitting at home watching shit someone else has written on TV.  

Step away from the keyboard with your hands up !!!

Having pined on and off ever since my Mac Mini died on me about 6 months ago for the courage, and the money to purchase a new Mac I have narrowly avoided buying one today.

Having looked through flEaBAY, and scrumpymacs and Apple's own reconditioned computer section I had become attached to the idea of actually purchasing one. Not a new, new one, you understand, god knows there's no way I can afford that. (Don't you Mr Jobs ?). But a reconditioned, or second hand mac, is not only cheaper, but better for the environment too. Well that's how I tried to justify it to my accountant self. He wasn't having none of it. He flicked over to his spreadsheet and in a flash, was tutting and shaking his head.

Now look. In an ideal world, the right to own a Mac would be part of the constitution. In a slightly more idealistic world, The United Kingdom would actually have a constitution.

I did make one daring bid on a Mac Mini, which with 4GB or Ram had twice the ummph of the one that died. This bid was quickly lost in a torrent of bids that came in around the end of the auction. In the end said Mac Mini went to a new home, with the new owner paying some £40 more than Spread-Sheet-Simon was willing to part with.

It took me long enough to decide if I want/need a macbook or a mac-mini. Macbooks are much dearer than MacMinis, but you do get more of the Mac experience, having the proper keyboard and screen.

Dammit. Apple, tempting little devils that they are, are offering finance available on new Macs. This arrangement, apparently does not stretch to the machines in their reconditioned section. Boo hoo.

Common sense, and a level head, would tell me to hang fire until the next month is out of the way, when I have that horrible bill from the council to pay, and it will be more of standard month without any big ticket items throwing out all those calculations that Spread-Sheet-Simon is so feverishly trying to compute.

After all, what is it that I intend to do on this new, (new to me) toy, that I cannot do on my Asus netbook, or on my old Packard Bell (this very machine) ? It's not like I need to do any editing any time soon.

I will have to wait.


Until I win the Lottery at this rate, which will be a while, seeing as I don't buy tickets.