Archive for December, 2008

Babysitting

December 20th, 2008

I’m babysitting at the moment.

I’m over in our K8’s house as she has some business to attend to.

I did an inventory, just in case I should lose anyone or any thing accidentally.

One budgie – Check.

One cat – Check.

One kitten – Check.

Two guinea pigs – Check.

One dog – Check.

One granddaughter – Check.

One grandson – Check.

One TAT – Check.

Hold on a minute…..   A TAT?  What the fuck am I doing babysitting The Accidental Terrorist?  Isn’t he old enough to look after himself?

No.  I suppose not.

Everyone and every thing is asleep now, including TAT.  Except for the kitten.  The damned kitten is trying to climb into my beard.  And when she isn’t doing that, she’s digging her claws into my leg, and having a swing.  It is painful.

Who’d be a Grandad?

*sigh*

Commanding Linux

December 19th, 2008

Are there any Linux nerds out there?

The reason I ask is that I found a PC or something on The Other Fella’s laptop.

I came down this morning and found that he had left it on all night and I could run all his programmes.  One of them was a little program called Putty.  I assumed it was something to do with holding Windows together, but it just displayed little things like ‘[root@server /] #’. 

Now I haven’t a clue what it was, but I tried typing in various things like ‘who are you’, and it told me it was ‘root pts/0’ which was very helpful!

I tried typing ‘what are you’ but it started to get violent.  It said ‘-bash: what: command not found’

Then it occurred to me to try some of those Linuxey things, so I tried CHMOD.  That seemed to do something because streams of letters and words shot up the screen.

I played with CHMOD for a while, but it’s a bit boring.

I tried CHOWN.

That did strange things but that was boring too, and anyway, I had to go out to meet someone.

They were the only two things I had seen The Other Fella use, so does anyone know any interesting things I could try out?

I wonder if there are any games on it?

Preparing for Christmas?

December 18th, 2008

I was down in the shop yesterday.

The girl there was having a bit of trouble with my credit card [apparently Lithuanian credit cards can be tricky?], and while she was fiddling with it, she chirped up “are you all prepared for Christmas then?”

I could have thumped her, but I need somewhere to buy my tobacco, so I didn’t.

“As ready as I’ll ever be,” I replied, and left it at that.

But what am I supposed to prepare?  I just don’t understand this mass hysteria about one day.

I like Christmas, but in the traditional sense.

It is a day for relaxing with the family, and spreading a bit of love.  To me, it is a Christian festival, but it is also a celebration of mid-winter where the days at last begin to get a bit longer.  It is a time of burying the old year and looking forward in anticipation to the new one.

So what the fuck is all this about buying, buying, buying? 

I am all for tradition.  I put up my wee tree, and throw up a bit of holly and ivy.  The house looks nice when I do that.  It helps to hide the blood stains on the walls.

But I am also prepared to reject those traditions that don’t suit me.  I’m not that fond of turkey, so why the hell should I lash out a small fortune on a bird that I am going to have to eat and not enjoy for many days?  It doesn’t make sense.

We do, of course, exchange presents.  That is fine, but we don’t go overboard.  We don’t place any emphasis on the monetary value of presents but more on the thought that goes into them.  I would much rather a lump of wood that acts as a pipe rack to a state of the art surround sound 120 inch plasma television.  Well, maybe I wouldn’t but I’m not going to break with tradition.

I apologise to all those furniture stores, mobile phone companies and perfume people who are so desperate to  get me to part with senseless wads of cash, but you can all fuck off.  I refuse to spend just for the sake of spending.

My one concession to Christmas is to lay in a couple of kegs of Guinness. 

Just in case.

Yes.

I’m prepared.

Head Rambles Manor on the air

December 17th, 2008

I was having a quiet morning here, when the bloody Meeja turned up again.

I am sick of television stations and radio stations arriving on the doorstep looking for interviews, so I told them to fuck off.

But then I noticed the interviewer.

As TAT would say – “Grrrrrrr!”

I invited them in.

Of course they ran amok running cables all over the gaff and blowing fuses, but while the crew were installing the equipment, it gave me a chance to “interview” the interviewer.  She was gorgeous.

Our K8 picked a very inopportune moment to call around just then, so I told my new friend to interview her instead.  She hadn’t much choice, so she agreed.

It was a live interview, so I went out into the garden while they were doing their stuff.

One of the neighbour’s cats was perched on the window sill, so I shot him with my air pistol [I don’t like killing animals], and the howl could literally be heard throughout the eastern half of Ireland. 

When the interview was over, I went back in.  They weren’t very pleased with me and my feline exploits but I didn’t invite them here.

I haven’t a clue what they interviewed K8 about.  I don’t really care.

I have the interviewer’s email address,

and phone number.

A long wait

December 16th, 2008

Today is a momentous day.

The troubles started last week.  Someone broke the toilet seat.  I didn’t do it, and Herself claims she didn’t do it.  Sandy isn’t heavy enough so we are blaming Minnie Pig.

Actually, I do vaguely remember a strange cracking noise last Tuesday night after that lock-in down the pub, but my memory is a bit hazy about the whole night so I may be mistaken.

Anyway, the seat has had a big split in it, which could act as a rather nasty vice and could clamp the arse of anyone who sits on it.  I don’t know how Herself has been managing, but for the last week or so, I have been – how shall we say? – abstaining.

The Accidental Terrorist was passing by the hardware store in town this morning and he bought a new seat.

It’s quite fancy.  It’s wooden though it doesn’t seem to have any splinters in it.  Yet.

I have just fixed it on.

It has been annoying me for a week now.

I have been dying to get it fixed.

The relief was enormous.

toilet

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