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WebSphere ESB 7.5 Preview

Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

As announced about a month ago, WebSphere ESB 7.5 is due to be available at the end of this week. Having presented on the subject at Impact, I felt I should provide a little more background to some of the new features described in the announce letter. Time permitting, I’ll cover some of the topics in further details once the product has been released.

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Smashing AGM

Sunday, May 8th, 2011

932Friday night was the orienteering club AGM at Fleming Park leisure centre. I picked up trophies for Christine and myself and Philip Cooper gave an entertaining presentation on his orienteering travels (or, to be more accurate, his actuarial travels with lots of orienteering tacked on) followed by a quiz which netted me a bar of chocolate. The flat roof of the building meant that Philip was nearly drowned out by the sound of the long overdue rain hammering down. When the meeting ended I made a dash for the car and it was only as I drove away that I heard the tinkling of glass from the rear windscreen…

A note on the front windscreen explained everything: “I am so sorry, my little son broke your windscreen by a stone.” This was, however, a very honest chap as it also gave his name and phone number. The following day we therefore had the windscreen replaced under the car insurance and the errant boy’s father has promised to transfer the excess to our bank account. I didn’t offer to return to him the stone that was still resting on our parcel shelf! Other than the sound of glass tipping back and forth when the boot is opened (it will eventually grind itself small enough to come out the drainage holes we were told), everything is now back as it should be.

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Longdown RR10

Wednesday, May 4th, 2011

Tonight was the first RR10 of the year in which I’m eligible to run. The course at Longdown isn’t a favourite – I don’t mind the undulations, the rutted paths or the tree roots but I do dislike the tight zig-zags and the clouds of midges waiting at the finish. I had no idea how fast to run having only raced once so far this year and only recognising a couple of faces lined up at the start. I probably started faster than I would have done had I not failed to notice my watch was displaying metric rather than imperial! Generally I was pleased with my run though. My legs didn’t suffer any of the tiredness I’ve experienced in past years and I was able to push it right to the end where I cross the line in 11th place.

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May Day Fayre

Tuesday, May 3rd, 2011

929Yesterday afternoon Emma and I went to the May Day Fayre at Cranbury Park Estate. It was billed as the last ever although I never found at why. We had great fun, taking all of the attractions. Emma’s favourite was the Punch and Judy although I suspect this was largely because she’d seen only ever come across it before in a Paddington book! At least Emma wasn’t scared off by the crocodile or the skeleton as were some of the children. I’m not sure any of them really appreciated Mr Punch hanging the hangman though!

Second favourite were the “children’s races”. Emma joined in a race with a random selection of girls and got off to a slow start, not realising when they were meant to go. She later reported to Christine that she had won the race! She then followed this up by saying that all of the children had won, by which she meant that they had all got a lolly at the end! Roll on the competitive sports at school…

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Birthday bike ride

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

926For my birthday we cycled over to Hillier Gardens through Ampfield Woods and had lunch there. Christine had the hard job of pulling the cycle chariot containing Duncan which she prefers to having Emma on the seat on the back. I think she was just glad that we don’t live somewhere with real hills! Having the chariot inside Hilliers meant we could cover more ground than when Emma is walking so we actually got to see some of the gardens (in particular the colourful display of rhodies) in addition to the usual tour round the magic carpet and the tree house. At the latter Duncan was showing off, climbing up the 8ft scramble net single-handed. It certainly tired him out – he slept all the way home.

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Back to Fleming Park

Sunday, May 1st, 2011

923On Saturday we were back to Fleming Park for more orienteering – this time one of SOC’s Summer Series events. I took Emma and Duncan round the yellow where the major challenge was navigating past the playground and sandpit without coming to a complete halt! It’s also only just occurred to me that Emma walked round – in last year’s series we never made it all the way without the aid of a pushchair. With the inclusion of the old municipal golf course it is an interesting enough area but not particularly big. My 4.1km light green course criss-crossed the map several times and it still only took me just over 18 minutes to get round. Sadly we left the event amidst much crying as there wasn’t time to revisit the playground as Emma was due at a party in the afternoon.

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Royal watching

Saturday, April 30th, 2011

920I can’t claim that Royal Wedding fever was rife in the Currie household. Emma was mildly excited due to the whole ‘princess’ side of things but probably wouldn’t have noticed  if we’d just gone out for the day. As it was, we settled down in front of the TV just as the groom departed for the Abbey and watched until they were in the church. The photo is a bit misleading as Duncan wasn’t really glued to the screen. He was probably only standing there to try and get other people’s attention. Emma seemed to enjoy wathing all of the different hats going in to the church.
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Maze-O

Friday, April 29th, 2011

914Thursday night is usually Christine’s running night but this week we though tag along – partly so that Emma could see them doing their silly walks for the warm up, but mainly so that the rest of us could go to the orienteering club’s Maze-O event, also at Fleming Park. Quite what the general public made of the 15 or so people dashing about in a 5 metre square sea of red and white tape I do not know. It worked quite well for us though. Duncan got to hold the Emit brick. Emma and I then navigated around the maze shouting to Duncan when we reached a control. He would then just plough straight under all the tapes, punch the control and wander off again!

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