History Matters have decided that 17th October 2006 is the day for a
“one off opportunity for you to join in a mass blog for the national record. We want as many people as possible to record a ‘blog’ diary which will be stored by the British Library as a historical record of our national life.”
Here’s my day:
I’m going to work “early” at the moment because one of our sub-contractors is a single parent and has to work around the school day, meaning I have to be at the office in Wilburton for 8:20am. It’s not really a hardship – I only have to leave Willingham at 8 o’clock – but I used to have half an hour after Wendy left for work to read The Guardian. If I’m lucky it’s today’s paper, but the paperboy has been getting late recently so often enough it is from the day before.
I listen to “Today” on Radio 4 in bed, then Chris Moyles on Radio 1 in the shower and with breakfast (Crunchy Nut Cornflakes, orange juice and coffee). Sadly, Chris Moyles is on holiday for two weeks signing copies of his book, Scott Mills is his unlistenable replacement and I’ve tried Wogan on Radio 2 but the music is just appalling, so it’s a CD for now. Paulo Nutini this morning.
The traffic is normal (last week there were accidents on the A14 and M11 and it took me 45 minutes), so I am first to the office to unlock the building. The travelling sandwich van from the nearby garden centre calls at around 9, and creature of habit that I am, I nearly always have tuna and sweetcorn.
I am one of five founders of a Design Services company, essentially a computer hardware and software consultancy, and we currently have 7 sub-contractors working with us. Tomorrow will be our 4th anniversary, and we have just bought our own building which we will be moving into early next month. Some of the day is spent discussing the work we need to do before we move in, and we tell the building contractor to start on extra partitions as soon as possible.
I’m working on a job which involves Windows CE, and a new Board Support Package was issued for the processor module today, so I downloaded that, updated Platform Builder, and re-built the operating system image for the development system and the system board we have developed. That took most of the day.
I did get a new toy in the post, an iCast FM transmitter to get sound from a PMP (iPod) to the car radio. Currently illegal, on the grounds that you might be a very small scale Radio Caroline, but due to be allowed any day now. And the reason I need that is because the new (to me) car I’m collecting on Saturday is too new to have a cassette player, but too old (or too low spec) to have an aux input socket.
Just as I was ready to leave at about 5:20, we had a discussion about a possible product development. It’s a big step for the company, and we talked for a while, so I didn’t get back until Wen had left to work in Willingham library. I stopped there on the way home, because by the time she gets back I’ll be out playing badminton with the village club in the Ploughman Hall.
Home for tea – bread, roast beef, tomato and a little TV – “The Gadget Show” which was recorded last week sometime on Sky+. Then off to play badminton where there was a large turnout so we played short games to 11 points. I won 3 out of 4 matches, so perhaps that length suits me.
After Badminton, which ends at 10pm, and a shower, channel surfed until I found the shopping scene in “Pretty Woman”. We watched that for a while, before retiring around 11:30.