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I fixed the cistern in our toilet this evening. For the last few months it has been making a noise like a tuba every time it fills up. Turns out the valve just needed dismantling and cleaning. While I was in there I found an alternative valve insert which the manufacturers had provided in case you have low water pressure. Well, our water pressure is really high, but I thought I’d give it a try anyway. I connected of all up and flushed, and it was an amazing spectacle. It filled the cistern with a deluge of water in about 20 seconds. I decided that the valve probably couldn’t cope with that long term, so I put the old one back. At least I silenced the toilet tuba.

I can see loads of WiFi routers from my house these days. A couple of years ago, mine was the only one.

Oh yes, this post is also a test of the new Skitch Beta.

Uploaded with Skitch!

I’ve got some new glasses! I had my eyes tested in August, and the prescription had changed so little I didn’t fancy spending £200 to replace my old glasses (which I’d had for nearly 3 years). Then about 3 weeks ago, I was using my PowerBook in bed (calm down at the back there! I was designing a website…) and I realised I’d misplaced my glasses. I found them under the PowerBook, with the lenses scratching against the underside. The left lens picked up a big circular scratch almost exactly aligned with the centre of my eye.

I’ve got some new glasses! I had my eyes tested in August, and the prescription had changed so little I didn’t fancy spending £200 to replace my old glasses (which I’d had for nearly 3 years). Then about 3 weeks ago, I was using my PowerBook in bed (calm down at the back there! I was designing a website…) and I realised I’d misplaced my glasses. I found them under the PowerBook, with the lenses scratching against the underside. The left lens picked up a big circular scratch almost exactly aligned with the centre of my eye.

This unfortunate yet hilarious typo was received by a colleague. He’d reported a bug to one of the developers of some software that we use. Her emailed reply was simply:

I have testes and I cannot reproduce.

This is now our standard in-house response to any bug reports.

This evening I went through my log files and identified a load of URLs from my old site which are now invalid, and made them redirect to the new pages.

My 10 most popular articles are:

• Electric rear blind repair
• Rear seat removal
• Door lock barrel replacement
• Ultra-bright glovebox torch LED modification
• Thermostat replacement
• Water pump replacement
• Removing the ignition lock barrel
• Quick fix for M30 engine oil leak
• M30 head gasket replacement, part 1
• Squeaking steering wheel

If you’re reading this on my RSS or atom feed and you haven’t had any updates for a while, it’s because the old RSS and atom URLs were two of the ones that were broken.

I get loads of links from BMW forums such as 7-Forum.com (German) Roadfly and bimmer.info. Hi guys! I might get another BMW one day. Maybe when the second hand price of the E65 comes down a bit.

From the BBC comes a report about various false callouts that the RSPCA have attended over the last year.

My favourite was this one:

A woman rang to say the ‘beast of Bodmin’ had been asleep on her doorstep for 24 hours. It was actually a new telephone directory wrapped in black plastic.

This one was also quite amusing:

A member of the public reported a dead horse in a flooded field, which was actually a large plank of wood.

I’ve switched to Typo, after a frustrating couple of days spent trying (and failing) to configure the Math Comment Moderation Plugin of Blojsom.

For three days in the week, I take my 4-year-old son to nursery in the mornings. Just lately he’s been doing something that gets me very strange looks from the staff.

I say goodbye, and give him a kiss. Then I move away from him, and he throws himself up at me so I have to pick him up. Then I say goodbye again and give him another kiss. When I put him down, he prostrates himself in front of me and kisses my feet.

I have no idea where he got the idea from, but the staff at the nursery must think I rule my house with an iron fist.

“Hi kids, I’m home! Come and worship me, now!”

Finally I have stopped procrastinating, and repaired my broken mouse. The cable must have had a break in it where it exited the mouse, so I’ve shortened it by about 5cm and resoldered it. I know it’s an ancient mouse but it now works again and it’s saved me the hassle of buying a new one. Also it saves it from adding to some landfill site somewhere.

At work I use a Logitech MX1000 laser cordless mouse, and as soon as they do a bluetooth version I’m getting one. It’ll work great with my PowerBook and I won’t need the USB docking station thingy.

Currently listening to: Speak To Me / Breathe from the album “Dark Side Of The Moon” by Pink Floyd. Wasn’t it great to see them back together at Live8?