Halfway through writing the last post, Firefox crashed. I mean, badly crashed – dead, no option to screengrab or copy and past the text out of the dialogue box – just plain gone. And I thought ‘crap, there goes the 3 minutes I spent typing that post, I’m not going through that again’ — or words to that effect.
Hereusment, Firefox’s new ‘restore session’ feature not only reopened the browser tabs I had open, but also somehow restored the text into my web interface.
Fabuloso.
It’s a thing of greatness. The reality is, no matter how stable your machine is (and even if you use a Mac or Linux).. there’s a chance that your machine will crash at some point. And that restore function will save your ass. Looks like Microsoft will be playing catch up with IE again… (although FF 2.0 is still not Sharepoint compliant ;( nerts).
Had to call the Odeon filmline last night. I’m sure their voice recognition technology is awesome, but we just couldn’t get the damn thing to understand the name of our Cinema. After some struggle and experimentation, we were finally able to get the film-times we were after out of it… but it was not what you might call a smooth interaction. And I’m not sure Miami Vice was worth the trouble.
I’m all for new technologies – my technophile status generally goes uncontested – but in this case I would have preferred a touchtone option. Or even (shock, horror) a person.
I’ve just expanded my MP3 player family with an iPod video 60GB and am extraordinarily pleased with it. Selecting the 4GB of music for my Nano has been slightly tedious, and whilst I still love the Nano — it is great to have the chunkier iPod with all of my music on it.
For longtime readers, I still maintain my principles against Apple: the lack of functionality of the iPod compared with other MP3 players is annoying — why can it *only* deal with Quicktime video? Why can’t it play back other file types? Why can’t it record audio? Why doesn’t it have an FM radio built in? Why doesn’t it… etc.
The answer, in almost every case, is to help Apple make more money by selling own-brand accessories. Clever business model – but annoying for me. Made even moreso by the fact that no-one has, as yet, come up with an MP3 player that competes with the iPod on sleekness and interface.
Come on, you guys!!
Be interested to see what Zune looks like when it comes out, although I’m anticipating that the first generation of ‘full screen’ video portable entertainment hubs is going to be mediocre as hell. We’ll see…
If I’ve not returned your call recently, I’m very sorry. Orange seems to have stopped delivering the ‘new voicemail’ notification to me, so I’ve discovered big pools of messages weeks after they’ve been left.
Argh. Anyone know how to get this sorted, short of calling customer support? Can’t quite face that amidst all the other life-admin…
First, from my Mum. She went to a reading at a bookstore in KL where she met [[Shashi Tharoor]], a candidate for the post of Sectary General of the UN. She had him sign a book – and insisted he write “best, Shashi, the future Secretary General of the UN.” Shashi initially refused but my Mum persuaded him that if he believed in himself, and wrote it, then it would happen. And so he did it.
See what happens; I’m going to try to give my mother credit for putting the UN secretary general in power if he gets it.
Second, from my cousin David (for the comedians who have been asking, no, his surname isn’t David) – who was travelling on the Northern line the other day. Someone asked him if the train was going to Morden – to which he replied “Morden likely,” and promptly started laughing so hard that he had to get off the train.
Things have been ludicrously busy for me lately. Lots of interesting evenings out but have missed the boat on writing about them (blogs are such transient things…) and not sure there’s much left to write about at this stage, other than the fact that I’m quite tired and looking forward to trying to make some quiet time – but may not for a little while yet.
Maybe I should just admit that I’m not going to get too much writing done this summer and get some one from here to sit in for me for a little while. Areas of blogspertise: technology, PR, trivia, comic books. Actually, probably will get some offers… But no, never surrender!
People just seemed to have gone nuts this summer with parties, etc. My sister thinks I’m having a quarter life crisis, which may be true. I’ve only bought an iPod: but maybe that’s what you get for this one, and the sports car only comes with the mid-life crisis….
Went to see Pob’s band in Putney last night. Was fun – they played some good songs.
I want a band. I don’t suppose I’ve got a London based drummer, bassist and/or singer reading this, do I? I bring some highly average rhythm & lead guitar to the mix, along with moderate enthusiasm and middling skills on the triangle.
No, I didn’t think so.
But there’s something inspirational for me about going to gigs. I should go to more – might actually get around to writing some lyrics to that song I was working on about two weeks ago…
I’m not big on shopping myself, but if you are… check out the Visa Diaries. Kate Howe is examining how your shopping reflects your personality, in some sense — as she tells “tales of life and love” through Visa receipts ;).
Me? I hate shopping. Buy everything online that I can. Not sure what that says about me :P
My closest school friend, Roy, gets married this week, in a three stage ceremony, part two of which I had the privilege to attend at his family’s place in the country yesterday. Was a very moving affair — Roy’s sweeping passion for his Transylvanian bride, Cristina, and his moving speech — and the best man, Roy’s brother Nicholas, delivered a very funny, obviously passionate tribute. His parents were also clearly proud and the whole afternoon was extremely pleasant.
Also hilarious to catch up with Will, another old school friend, and to meet his lovely American wife for the first time. Also had the privilege to catch up with Peter Farquhar, our legendary english teacher from days gone by. All were on excellent, ebullient form – Will cracking jokes about vampires, garlic etc., and Peter engaging and reflecting with everyone with the genuine interest and sincerity that has helped him maintain close friendships with so many of his former students.
Slightly worrying that quite so many of my friends are tying the knot at this stage; but I’m adopting a ‘que sera, sera’ attitude to that aspect of my life…!
Just finished reading The Insider, [[Piers Morgan]]’s memoirs, after having it recommended by loads of people at work as an entertaining read (thanks to Dan A for lending me the book in the end…). It’s also been difficult to concentrate on any of my other ‘to-read’ books else in the recent heatwave.
I hate to say it, but it was extraordinarily entertaining.
Of course, Morgan comes out of it looking good — he claims to be trying to paint an honest picture and therefore his mistakes are highlighted in the book… but many of his observations, as he relates them, make him out to be ridiculously prescient. I suspect hindsight had something to do with those.
But the anecdotes about and around the newsroom were fascinating; the degree of influence and power The Mirror wielded under his stewardship is downright impressive. As is the ridiculous namedropping he performs on every page of the book — to the extent that there is a ‘cast of characters’ at the back — people, you would assume on picking up the book, that Morgan knew or interacted with in the time he is recounting in these memoirs (1994-2004). The fact that this cast includes ‘Adolf Hitler’ suggests to me that the publishers perhaps did not feel Mr Morgan had quite enough celebrity friends after all…
Whichever way you draw it, there’s some impressive achievements in there, and some good stories. A book worth reading.
Armand David's personal weblog: dadhood, technology, running, media, food, stuff and nonsense.
