10 Ways to be more green

There’s really no excuse to be wasting energy nowadays. Microsoft, of all people, have a quick and handy guide to things you can do to reduce your company’s carbon footprint and electric bill at the same time. Go to it.

Copied from the article which is roughly here.

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More coffee

Private Sub btnSomething_Click(ByVal sender as Object, ByVal e as System.Eventargs) handles btnSomething.Click
btnSomething.PerformClick()
End Sub

I’m thinking that’s not the correct implementation of a recursive function

Good News

I have just found out that a paper I submitted for publication in Computers & Geosciences has informally been accepted (whatever that means). The paper describes a geostatistical optimisation technique using anisotropy ratios for predicting directional variation in remotely sensed imagery. Watch this space for the formal acceptance!

Complications

I think I might be overcomplicating my PhD thesis. A section of Chapter 4 goes as deep as 4.3.1.1.2.2.

What did I miss?

I’m going to try and round a few things up here, seeing as I’ve been too busy in the last little while to post here.

News stuff

I haven’t mentioned the bombings. And I don’t intend to, other than to say that a) I don’t agree nor condone them, b) I’m not surprised they’re happening and c) we should expect some more. On a related note though, something connected has royally pissed me off. The shooting of the innocent man. The man repeatedly ignored Police warnings, and armed Police shot him. Simple. The people who are calling for the necks of the officers involved, saying that it’s outrageous, saying this and that should all shut the hell up. Tony Blair and the chief of Police publically apologised for it. Why? Yes, it’s unfortunate that he turned out to be innocent. But the Police are operating under extremely difficult circumstances. And they did their job. What if he had turned out to be a bomber, and they hadn’t shot him? And another 20 innocent people lost their lives? It makes me mad. So well done to the boys that shot him. And yeah, apologies to his family, but he had it coming. Sounds callous I know. Fuck it.

Small pleasure

I got my first Google adsense payment. I’m not allowed under their TOS to disclose the details of it, but I will say, that for what is essentially free money (I had the website anyway) it’s a real pleasure to check your bank balance and see a not inconsiderable amount of money in there, for no extra work. So thanks to Google. And thanks to the people who clicked the ads.

Personal guff

Well it’s all go round here. I’ve been busy. I’m still working 3/4 nights a week as a doorman, but only for another 2 weeks, because I’m moving to Guernsey to write my PhD thesis. I’m moving into the house next door to my folks which will be good because I haven’t spent any real time with them in the last 6 years. So I’ll be close, but not actually living with them. That means it’s all mad round here as I’m packing up all my stuff and sorting the house here out to move out there. I’ve moved out of my office at Uni and already sold my big TV, my couch, and hopefully my beer fridge. So I’m still looking to let go of my Dolby Digital surround kit. I’m also considering selling my beloved Honda CBR600 FX as I can’t take it to Guernsey with me. I’m aiming to get the first draft of my thesis written by the end of September, with a view to submitting before Christmas. After that I’m travelling, Long Way Round style.

A sphincter says what?

The average man will get his hair cut roughly once every 2 months. At an average cost of £10. I haven’t paid anyone to cut my hair in 10 years. So aside from the £30 or so quid I spent on clippers, I reckon I’ve saved myself nearly £600 (not to mention all that money saved on shampoo). Interesting.

I’ll try my best to update the other sections of this site soon, I have some movie reviews to do, and I really ought to update Fingers.

Frightening behaviour

I’ve always kind of known it, but last night frankly confirmed it. There are a lot of fucking idiots out there in the world. Alright, not exactly ground breaking news. But after what I saw last night, you’ll maybe think again.

It was a busy night at work, but it all went smoothly. I leave work, and I’m in the chicken shop getting some dinner. I order, and decide to wait outside where it’s a bit cooler. There are a few drunk people milling about, the odd lunatic, the odd “blatantly just pulled” couple. As I’m watching the world pass me, a car screams up the road. Not unusual for Southampton I think.

Except for when it reached the set of traffic lights, about 50 yards up the road. It screeches to a halt. I’m thinking it’s missed the red light. All of a sudden the passenger door flies open and a woman is thrown out of the car, onto the road. The car accelerates away, with part of her still in the car. The car disappears up the road, with only the screams of the woman to be heard.

I legged it up the road to find out what was going on, if she was alright, etc. She is, but in shock. Hyperventilating a bit. Fortunately the worst of her injuries was a cut finger and a few grazes up her arm.

I spent the next 4o minutes trying to talk to her, find out what I could, finding out if there was anyone I could call, and finally getting her in a taxi. The whole thing could have been a lot worse. There was a point at which I thought she was actually under the car when it drove off. It turns out it was the ex-boyfriend driving and doing the throwing, but I couldn’t establish why he’d done this.

Regardless. How much of a fuckwit do you need to be to throw a woman, hell anyone, out of a car into the middle of the road and then drive off, leaving them there, alone, in shock, at the mercy of busy city traffic at 3am?

Coincidence shmoincidence

I work in a nightclub which traditionally does not get a lot of trouble. We only tend to get trouble when the “wrong” sort of people are out. When I say wrong, I won’t mince words. I mean the townies, the pikies, the chavs, the wankers. We don’t tend to let them in, but from time to time, on occasion, they slip through the net, and get past us.

Last Wednesday was one of the “biggest” nights we’ve had down there, with respect to the amount of trouble we had to deal with. Quite a lot of drunk people, and two big fights that resulted in us having to get physical and quite liderally throw people out the door (and at one point be involved in a fight outside). In fact, in the year or so that I’ve worked there I’d only ever have one person take an actual swing at me. On Wednesday, it happened twice. (Fortunately I was a lot quicker than them, on both occasions, and they didn’t get me).

Anyway, the link here. Big night in the club, lots of fighting, lots for us to do… on the same night as Oasis played a gig in Southampton. Big night, Oasis concert. Oasis are chavvy wankers, we had a load of chavvy wankers. Coincidence? I think not.