So, I’m feeling grumpy today. Just am. Not sure why. And then I go and stupidly read an article in on the BBC News website about most babies being born at 4am. You can read the article here and I’ll be taking quotations from it.
Four o’clock in the morning is the time most babies are born spontaneously in England, with the majority arriving between 01:00 and 07:00, a study shows.
So, four o’clock is the “average” of 01:00 and 07:00. Is that how they worked this out? I’m not sure. I’m probably not going to read the original paper but it does seem a strange thing to say. Assuming that spontaneous births are reasonably random the actual number arriving at 04:00 would be quite small and the variation could be little.
While planned C-section births tended to happen on weekday mornings, births after induced labours were more likely to occur around midnight.
This makes sense. C-Sections in the morning to then make sure everyone is fine during the time when the medical cover is best. Inductions probably happen at that time because they are started in the morning and it takes that long for the effects to show. These are not surprising figures and make utter sense.
It’s this next bit that turned me into a rage.
Overall, more than 70% of births took place outside regular working hours.
And
The researchers said there could be implications for staffing of midwives and doctors, with only 28% of births taking place between 09:00 and 17:00 on weekdays.
So, an event that is reasonably random is spread throughout the day? About thirty percent of births happen in a time frame covering roughly 30% of the amount of time in a day. THIS IS WHAT WE WOULD EXPECT. The working day covers 1/3 of the 24 hours in a day and the number of births in that time period is about 1/3. This sentence made me swear out loud in our staff common room earlier today, much to the ammusment of my colleagues.
Within this communication I essentially told you that my NAS Drive had died and I was reasonably convinced I had lost my data but had a plan to get it back.
I had originally thought I could plug the hard drives into a Sata socket and the PC would be able to read them. It didn’t. This was because they were in a RAID configuration and also Linux so I would need the iOmega NAS to be able to read them.
The data recovery software did manage to find half a terabyte of data but as I explained this wasn’t formatted well and the file names were missing, because the files were RAIDed. This was my last resort really. I have spent a LOT of time arranging the files into a decent directory structure and using decent naming conventions.
Next plan was to order exactly the same enclosure as the one that died and hope I could put my disks into it and it would read them for me to copy the files over to the new NAS drive. I found one on eBay but lost that auction at the last moment because I was busy at that time and my phone didn’t notify me. I was gutted about this.
So, I ordered the next best thing. A complete iOmega NAS drive the same as the one which died. There were no more enclosures on eBay. This was costly. However, it arrived and was as described.
The tricky bit now was wondering whether it would read my existing disks with the data, try to format them or just die in the process. I decided an order of operations which minimised my chances of data loss.
Turned of new Synology NAS.
Turned on new (but not quite) iOmega NAS. Plugged it into the network and tried to communicate with it without installing the CD based software. This worked.
I then called the iOmega NAS the same thing as the dead one. It was running a lower version of firmware and this bothered me slightly. The interface was different. I then turned it off.
I installed ONE old HDD into the second hand enclosure and turned it on while connected to the network. My plan was to try and log into the device before it decided to automatically format my data-filled drive.
Nothing happened. Just some flashing lights.
Next, I tried both old HDDs in the new enclosure and hoped. Once again . . . nothing.
I was quite distressed at this moment. The new enclosure wasn’t reading the old HDD at all and I didn’t think I would get my data back. Then I had an idea. Maybe, just maybe, the old iOmega enclosure would power up? I was convinced it was the power circuitry on the board that had died. I mean there was smoke last week.
So, I thought. I’d plug the new power cable into the old box with the HDDs just slotted in to see what would happen. The fucking thing only went and started and seemed to run just fine. I have no idea what happened last time. I don’t know what the smoke was. All I had to do now was hope that the old enclosure would survive for long enough for me to get data. In all it took about three hours to transfer everything to a HDD inside the PC. Then I had to transfer everything to the new NAS drive. This was quicker as I think it has a far better read-write rate than the old box.
So, the data was restored and I now had two copies.
I had formatted a plan. The Synology is to be the main NAS and storage centre in the house. I have also installed one of the HDD from the old enclosure into the PC and it will have only NAS drive data on it. I can used an FTP program to sync that once a month or so. This way I have a separate copy of the NAS data in a useable format. The next thing will be to get a large capacity USB memory stick and create a shortcut in in the new NAS so that whenever it is inserted into the USB port the NAS will automatically back itself up.
So, ultimately what happened:
Old NAS died (?) with smoke and then refused to power up.
Synology works really well with excellent data transfer rates.
New iOmega NAS works and is currently surplus, being an older model.
The old enclosure might be serviceable.
I might have just blown the fuse in the old power supply.
Enclosures aren’t meant to die, HDDs are.
This incident has caused me over a week’s worth of stress and worry.
I hope my new backitup plan will work. I’m working on two degrees of redundancy, I might include a third with cloud storage.
Perusing a website for a castle I noticed that they organise sleep-overs or rather not-sleep-overs in the most haunted room in the castle.
Muncaster – spooky photo
Apparently there’s a scientific team based at Muncaster Castle who investigate paranormal activities. Now, I will admit that paranormal claims should be investigated. I am happy to dismiss them out of hand but I also think that these things should be investigated. Claims of things moving noises heard should be tested. I very much doubt there will ever be any true evidence towards the existence of ghosts. Back to the team investigating Muncaster.
I can’t find anything about who they are or what they publish. Nothing. Oh well. It’s a great piece of marketing by Muncaster who charge about GBP500 for a night in the castle for six people.
I guess scientific research means a team put loads of cameras and measuring devices around the castle. I don’t think these are necessary as people claim to have felt real effects of ghosts so sensitive measurements shouldn’t be needed. The effects of ghosts should be obvious. But “researchers” look at more and more sensitive equipment which means they are more likely to be affected by noise in the measurements than anything else. This noise will be held up as evidence of tiny effects of the supernatural.
As I’m heading to the castle today I’ll let the three of you who read this know if I see anything I can’t explain.
I downloaded the T&Cs for the ghost vigil and I was amazed at point 12:
12. Please note that stories about the Tapestry Room are not fabricated or “made-up”. On occasion very strange
things seem to happen in that room at the dead of night.
This is almost Trumpian in its language and use of quotation marks. Does the castle renege on its part of the contract if these stories are not true?
A while back I looked at a BBC News page about the Great Wall Of China. Actually it’s not a news item, it’s more a magazine piece with no bearing on the current world. You tend to see lots of those these days. Anyway back to the point. In our current civilisation we have all these marvellous cultural treasures dotted around the world:
Great Wall Of China
Egyptian Pyramids
Stonehenge [great?]
Colosseum
Taj Mahal
Chichen Itza
We, as a modern “sophisticated” tribe, look at these buildings in wonder and awe. We think they are entirely fascinating. But I suggest a change to this. Most ancient economies and quite a few modern economies and powerful nations were built on slavery. They were built on possession of humans and treating humans like shit.
These buildings and modern economies should have some sort of statistic applied to them to reflect the pain and cost of human misery that went into their creation.
The Great Wall Of China
20% of the country’s population was forced to build it. Many people died during its construction, due to the heavy work, a short time deadline and difficult conditions
The first result on the web doesn’t even mention numbers. The next result:
While the great wall was in construction over 1 million people died in the making of the wall
There seems to be a great number of results in a search that also use the “more than 1 million” people died making the Great Wall. Some sites don’t mention slaves some do. Some sites mention “population forced to . . . .”, well that sounds like slavery to me. Add into all this the human misery associated with such a large scale project and relocation and the Wall seems an awful lot less glamorous and even fucking ugly. Perhaps it should be renamed the Great Wall Of Death.
Egyptian Pyramids
I have read through a number of pages and I can only find reference to 10,000 workers who may or may not have been slaves. Whether there were deaths or how many there were due to construction is unknown. Records weren’t kept. I suspect that industrial working practices weren’t that great so deaths would probably have been common. We should rename them The Great Pyramids Of Oppression.
Stonehenge
This monument was honestly included as a giggle. Although impressive it’s not as impressive as the others in terms of age, size and deaths. This is another artefact for which deaths in production can’t easily be counted. These are to be renamed the Stones Of Speculation.
An estimated 100,000 prisoners were bought back to Rome as slaves after the Jewish War. Vespasian had a limitless work force. In the building of the Colosseum the slaves undertook the manual labor such as working in the quarries at Tivoli where the travertine was quarried.
There are no references to numbers of deaths or the emotional cost and general distress to the workers. Obviously the Colosseum is now considered a magnificent monument to the Roman Empire but the human cost in creating this probably doesn’t justify the rapture we hold it in now. Let’s rename this building the Arena Of Death.
Taj Mahal
That wondrous white stone mausoleum in India was built within written historic times and there is plenty known about its construction. But there’s not a lot on the Wikipedia page about how many workers there were and how many died. There’s a single answer on Yahoo which states 22,000 people worked on the building and thousands perished. This sounds within the levels of plausibility. We could legitimately rename this one Monument To Sadness.
Chichen Itza
This city in Central America has many buildings and is impressive and a symbol that should ruin the natural superiority that the Europeans believe they have. I can’t find any details on people dying while it was in production or who built it, but apparently it was unlikely to be slaves. The city was used by the europeans to collect slaves though. This place should be known as External Factors Will Kill Your Empire.
These great endeavours of human achievement probably wouldn’t have existed if those in charge at the time had given a shit about the welfare of the workers. It’s pretty similar to these days where the little person has so much to overcome in the face of the repression of their rights.
So people fully understand the place these monuments have in our society they should all be forced to have numbers after their names showing the human cost. These numbers should be placed after everything so we cna get a true measure of what our society does.
A weeks ago I noticed that the Cinema Amp wasn’t outputting sound correctly. I managed to figure out what was causing the issue, I had turned on HDMI control to make it easier to turn the whole system on but that changed the sound field settings. While it might now take three separate buttons to turn the TV on and hear stuff it now all works as it should.
Except for the Surround Back Left speaker.
SBL speak is quiet. It’s not the speaker. It could be the wires? Next weekend I’ll be re-wiring the lounge. Only 9 speakers.
In the room there are nine speakers. These cover the following:
Centre
Left and Right
Surround Left and Right
Surround Back Left and Right
Passive sub fed through the main L and R channels
Active Sub fed by it’s own low freq channel
While playing Gran Turismo Sport, which is rather more than a hobby for me, I noticed that the sound output from the Surround Back Left wasn’t as loud as it should be. Even by changing the channel levels I couldn’t get the sound up to a decent level. SBR was on -5dB and SBL was on +5dB but this didn’t work. It is also a rather unsatisfactory solution.
I have had a few bits of work done in the AV corner. There was a new electricity meter installed and something might have happened when that was fitted. Also, the speaker wires to just the SBL and SBR were reasonably poor quality. Swapping the speakers confirmed that it wasn’t the speakers that were playing up. So I had to face it that either the wires were bad or the amplifier was broken somehow. The cheapest of these to investigate is the wires. While I was at it I decided to tidy up all the AV corner and give it a clean at the same time.
While out at Lakeside earlier today picking up some cakes I popped into Maplins which is slowly closing. I think they have gone in to administration but I did think I might find some cheap wire. I came out of the shop with plenty of wire for a very cheap price, about 10% of what it’s worth. I also bought a hard shelled case for use as my “Range Kit”.
Maplins’ loss is my gain
When I got home I decided to fix the whole problem of the speaker. I knew this was going to take at least ninety minutes. Getting into AV corner isn’t the easiest and everything was going to come out.
AV Corner
So, all the kit was removed. Everything was dusted and then the two cables to SBR and SBL were replaced and connected to the correct ports on the amp. Once that was done the system was tested using the speaker test tone and to my (slight) surprise the whole system seemed to be working correctly and also, most importantly, SBL was working properly. I had fixed the system.
Not really wired
The above picture has the amp and ONLY the speakers, TV ARC connected and a line out to the Sonos system using the phono plugs. After this the 4 HDMIs needed to be connected along with the 8-port switch and networking cables.
Not tidy but functional
Once it’s all in the cabling at the rear of AV Corner looks like the above picture. I know it’s not pretty but I don’t have access to the rear of the devices and so it’s all kinda chucked in and then left. If I could I would have a tower system and then very neatly wire the whole thing while looking directly at it.
Investigations done. If not speaker then next easiest test is wires. Bought new wires. Fitted them. Speaker all good. I’m quite happy.
This communication is subtitled 1300 because this is communication is number 1300 that has been published. I’m proud. There are more to be completed, they are sitting there in draft form, I will get around to them one day soon.
A few communications ago I wrote about the energy consumption of different cars. I thought I would try and give some perspective to this. Now, I haven’t done the mathematics at this point and so will be writing this as I go. I don’t know what the results are going to be.
My car, Bora Horza Gobuchul, uses 50 kWh of energy, roughly, every 100 km I drive. Given that my insurers believe I drive about 10,000 miles per year that’s a grand total of:
8000 kWh per year
Let’s see how much this costs in fuel alone. 10,000 miles is about 200 gallons of petrol, which gives, at prices of £1.20 per litre, £1,080 per year on fuel alone.
I have a small Victorian house. While it is small it has poor thermal efficiency. It has brick-thick walls with no cavity insulation and is draughty. I do have a chimney balloon in one of the chimneys and the other is boarded up. The bathroom and kitchen stick out the back and are cold all year.
A Year’s Energy
I use gas for heating, hot water and hob cooking. I use electricity for some heating and then appliances and light. As the graph above shows I used 10.5 MWh of energy in the house last year [assuming the meters are correctly calibrated]. This cost me £840 for the year.
So, loosely speaking, the amount of energy I have used to transport me and a 1.5 tonne car around is about 30% more than that I’ve used to live in my home. Considering the time I spend in the car is minimal compared to my house this seems a poor deal. Granted, my car moves around relative to the Earth but this just goes to show how much energy is needed for transportation.
The costs turn up the following figures for comparison:
House £0.08 per kWh
Car £0.135 per kWh
I think it’s time to start voting Green. We also need to start a massive system to change societies need for personal, inefficient transport. There needs to be a cultural change and it needs to start now. It’ll take 20 years to change behaviours and it’s quite likely already too late.
I made it to the South Foreland Lighthouse yesterday in weather that can be described as atmospheric [as can all weather, literally]. There was sun, rain and some haze. France could be seen at times but not all the time. I don’t have a picture here of the light house so you’ll have to imagine what it’s like but the tour was interesting and, once again, I find myself amazed at how ingenious we humans are.
St Margaret’s Bay
The lighthouse was built to warn seafarers of the dangers of Goodwin Sands where over a thousand ships lay wrecked. It is also the first place that an international radio transmission was made, by Marconi, of course.
Dover Harbour
The light turns by the use of food to human energy turned into potential gravitational energy. A large mass is raised by hand and the energy contained within that turns the 3 tonne light system as it drops. The lighting system floats on a tub of mercury, this reduces the drag to manageable proportions. Remarkable.
There is a tea house and also a cottage attached to the lighthouse. The guide mentioned that the place was quiet and normally they are very busy and the lighthouse is packed.
Essentials
Being here made me realise just how busy the Dover Straights are and how much traffic moves through the port.
Count Them
And so, as we prepare to leave the EU, this fine town of Dover voted OUT but will find itself fucked over as our incompetent Government fails to secure the best deal for the security and economy of this country.
Also, I managed to get this far without mentioning Nazis.
Sometimes, just to irk my ire, I sometimes have a look at the Daily Mail Online. I have a bad habit of reading the headlines on newspapers whenever I go into a newsagents and that often leads me to distress as it’s clear to see the agenda that the mostly right wing press is pushing to those who still read these pieces of shit. Every now and then I glance down the front page of the DM online edition just to see what the world’s most popular website is saying.
Not since 1970
This might seem to be an innocent headline given the toxic racist bullshit the DM usually peddles but there’s more to it than that. This headline is DESIGNED to reinforce the idea that a system of measurement when Britain was GREAT is still in use by some and the baby boomer generation should be proud of using Fahrenheit. Let’s be clear on two three fronts:
Fahrenheit hasn’t been used by the Met Office since 1970. Get the fuck over it you old arseholes.
Baby-boomers are the ones who have taken the most from this country and then fucked it over for the younger generations.
The younger generations are slowly getting their shit together and are going to take over. I can’t wait.
Have a look at news headlines and see the derision placed upon the younger lot by the old.
Time
The front page version of this headline had CAN’T in block capitals. As though reading a clock with hands is something that people SHOULD be able to do.
WHY?
This generation spend absolutely no time looking at analogue clocks so why should we expect them to be able to use one in an examination hall? Have a look around railway stations and airports. See any analogue clocks? Nope, didn’t think so. This headline is there again to push the idea that any change from the values of the baby-boomer generation are bad changes. GTFOI.
[apologies for irks and ire which mean roughly the same thing]
A friend mentioned recently that he was thinking of buying a Nissan Leaf 2.0 and it got me to thinking what the running costs are. For this communication I’m not worried about purchase or servicing costs so this comparison isn’t a very good one but it is somewhere to start!
My car, Bora Horza Gobuchul, is a petrol/electric hybrid. Just your standard hybrid NOT a plug in hybrid. So it’s battery is charge either through regenerative braking or excess energy being produced by the engine, when at a standstill for example. My average fuel consumption rate is 55 mpg. Current petrol costs are about £1.20 per litre. This means my current driving costs are:
£6.20 per 100km
This is a variable though. The price of petrol is subject to many factors and changes constantly. The mileage achieved driving Bora Horza Gobuchul depends on how well it is driven!
The Nissan Leaf 2.0 is currently the latest ALL Electric vehicle developed by Nissan. It is a plug in car and so runs using electricity only. The manufacturer claims a range of 168 miles and a battery capacity of 40kWh. My current electricity tariff charges me 15.3 pence per kWh and the driving costs for the Leaf are:
£2.26 per 100km
The Tesla Model S claims a range of 220 miles with a battery capacity of 60kWh. This produces a driving cost of:
£2.59 per 100km
This comparison is VERY basic. It covers just the cost of charging the vehicle. I have not taken ANYTHING else into consideration but I am quite surprised at how much cheaper the electric cars are in terms of cost per 100km for driving. This alone would tempt me greatly if I had a garage where I could park my car. However, somewhere, a space, to park my car every day next to my house is my current dream. That is what happens when you live in a crowded Victorian street.
Just another minor comparison: energy consumed per 100km:
50kWh – Bora Horza Gobuchul
14.8kWh – Nissan Leaf
17.0kHw – Telsa Model S
This just shows the inefficiency of petrol based engines for transport. So, my current plan is: get house with garage, buy Tesla, save the planet.
Foremost, be warned I am struggling with this one. I have spent the last 18 hours wondering what rating to give it. I’m concerned I’m in a bad mood but don’t think so, I’m just puzzled by this film. But first, there are routines to get through.
I went, on a glorious sunny day, to sit in the dark at the Cineworld cinema in [not] Rochester. I now comment on the tide, as the river is tidal, at this point. The tide was in and I took a pretty picture to confirm that. If you look carefully you can see the historic Rochester castle and cathedral.
High Tide Rochester
I rated this film on IMDB and you should read this communication about the scoring system. This is where the controversy starts I think:
So, I should now go ahead and explain my rating and thoughts.
Bad Thing
This film started by playing “Jump” by Van Halen. This is a good song, it’s iconic, but I was instantly reminded that a good soundtrack does not make the film. Suicide Squad was a shit film but had a great soundtrack of classic 80s songs that everyone knows. So, let’s ignore the music.
Bad Thing
I don’t think the voice over was necessary. Films are made better without exposition. Build your explanations into the film, release the details slowly. Make the audience earn the story. Let’s ignore that.
Good/Bad Thing
There were so many 80s cultural references, along with a glaring one from 1991 and Terminator 2, that these were unsubtle. They were rammed into your retina. I guess I missed many as I’m not a massive 80s whore, but my mate Pom would get more. I think he’d like that part of the film. This film is like a greatest hits of popular culture.
An Aside
If pop-culture is the stuff that is popular does culture mean all that upper class shit that critics like? The stuff that isn’t popular? Should that be called culture?
Impressive Thing
The CGI was hugely impressive. We have been at the point of photo-realism for years now and there are many parts of films that are CGI but I don’t think people realise. It’s a cheap way to lend credibility to a film by adding small details. So, the virtual world looked and felt fantastic. Well done [although it’s not outside the realms of technology or new].
Annoying Thing
The avatars of the characters were remarkably like their IRL characters. Their facial features were quite Cameron’s Avatar like. This is probably to avoid the uncanny valley. The oriental characters were played in-game by oriental builds. The large kid chose to be an over-modded large character and the lead turned out to be white kid. They all played their own gender and they all kept their real life features. This was bollocks. It was Hollywood.
More Annoying Thing
All the clan in the game came from pretty much the same area of the USA?? What utter rubbish. The idea that online players in this game would be anywhere near each other was appalling.
While We Are At It
The girl didn’t think she was “pretty” in real life. She didn’t want to meet the lead character. Well, it turns out she IS pretty. All she has is a birth mark that covers here eye. IT’S NOT EVEN A BAD BIRTHMARK. What bollocks, this was very annoying.
Slums
The futuristic slum area was essentially just a trailer park made futuristic. Do you know what? I’m happy with that. I liked it.
VR
There has to be a point where developers decide whether to include force feedback into suits and movement or not. I suspect it will go ahead because: porn. So, the IRL people have walkways so that their movements are mimicked in the game. But, how does the flying and dancing work? What about INERTIA? Why are people in the streets playing the game? Are they walking form one place to another? Can they see the real world while they are in the game? I don’t understand.
Being in a computer game doesn’t give you superhuman reactions. You just can’t run, race, fight, fly, drive at those speeds and still react as a human. It might be that the apologetic is that the game avatars have extra modifications that allow them to react within the game to threats. This I guess is a good explanation but the speed of the gaming and fight scenes along with the driving section was implausible.
Beating The Game
When you are facing a bigger opponent in a game and you are going to lose all your coin why don’t you just quit and leave the game. That makes sense to me.
Story Arc [SPOILERS]
White american kid takes on a corporation with his friends. He gets the girl. Wins riches beyond his dreams and frees the world. Such bullshit.
It was nice to see Hannah John-Kamen again.
Now, I’ve been writing this stuff down I can see that I just wasn’t impressed. Yes, there are great songs and brilliant references to other films but once you remove that stuff the overall story and ideas are just pretty poor.
