Rails update

November 15th, 2008

It’s that time of year where I get my online orienteering system out of mothballs ready for the next JOK Chasing Sprint. My first task was to update the application to the latest Rails 2.1.2 which proved to be harder than I had anticipated. I’m used to working with enterprise software where it’s a given that you can’t break users’ existing applications.

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QE2 sightseeing run

November 12th, 2008

In honour of the QE2 departing Southampton for the last time (it’s heading off to Dubai to become a floating hotel), we decided to do the Itchen Bridge run last night with the minor variation that we crossed to the south side of the bridge to join the hordes looking out over the water to where the brightly illuminated QE2 was berthed. If we’d been a bit more prepared we should have started running half an hour later as, when the fireworks started to mark the ship’s departure, we were already on our way back up the Avenue.
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Going: heavy to waterlogged

November 9th, 2008

691It being a reasonable distance away, we’ve always avoided the Hants Cross-Country race at Goodwood however, having nothing better to do, we decided to head along on Saturday. We went to Chichester beforehand but, other than a quick sprint round the outside of the cathedral, we spent most of our time in Priory Park. Just off the main road, this is a nice place to get away from the crowds for a picnic lunch and it had a great playground for Emma. Chichester struck me as a pleasant enough Cathedral city and it looked like a good place for some good old-fashioned high street shopping.
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Back to the streets

November 4th, 2008

Tuesday night runs returning to the streets of Southampton this week and, in keeping with tradition, we started with a round trip taking in Lordshill Sainsburys. There wasn’t even much debate as to whether we should run it clockwise or or anti-clockwise (the latter won). We had a bumper turnout, breaking in to double figures for the first time in a long while. There was quite a spread in speeds – hopefully those at the front didn’t mind waiting once in a while and those at the back didn’t feel like they were being dragged along the whole time. Generally I’m happy to pootle along in the middle somewhere and take a break whenever I’m given the chance!
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Waterlogged Burley West

November 3rd, 2008

688Although Sunday proved to be largely rain free, the previous day’s downpours had left Burley West pretty sodden. I found the M21L course pretty untechnical even by New Forest standards. There seemed to be a preponderance of long legs where straight (sticking to dry land where possible) was best and then ending at control sites near very obvious features.
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Pumpkin first

November 1st, 2008

685I’m not sure quite what it says about my upbringing but my only previous experience with pumpkin lanterns involved lots of carefully curved pieces of cardboard, a foil lining and a flashing bulb! Consequently, this was my first attempt at carving the real thing. I enjoyed myself and Emma became interested at the point the candle was lit! We hadn’t realised that placing it outside our front door was a signal for the trick or treaters to descend though. Actually, we only had one group come round – it just happened to contain seven very greedy kids! One definite plus point for the vegetable pumpkin was that it was dismembered and disposed of the following day – the cardboard version sat on a shelf at home for over twenty years!

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XP upgrade install under VMware

October 31st, 2008

I’m currently in the process of moving everything from my loan Thinkpad to my shiny new T61p. I thought that I’d try and make a cleaner divide between work related and personal applications by putting the latter in a VMware image. Having just disposed of an old desktop machine at home, I had a spare Windows XP Pro licence to use for the purpose. Unfortunately, I have an upgrade CD and when it came to the point in the installation where it asked for the old Windows media it refused to recognise the Windows 98 CD I had. I started to get suspicious when a Windows NT CD also didn’t work. After searching around the forums I bit I eventually discovered that the installer doesn’t realise that you’ve swapped over the CD. The secret is to take the original CD out, hit Enter, and then when it prompts you again, put the new CD in.
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Day off

October 28th, 2008

682I had an enforced day off work when the nursery refused to let Emma in with a bout of conjunctivitis (although interestingly the information we got from the nurse included guidance from the Health Protection Agency that eye infections were not a reason to exclude a child from school or childcare). Emma and I made the most of the opportunity (and sun) and headed over to Manor Farm Country Park for much of the day.
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