The other news
May. 25th, 2009 09:22 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jadesfireHappy birthday, ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
aeron_lanart!!! Hope it's a good one, hon.
~ Today is a bank holiday and I am at work. There is something wrong with this picture. On the other hand, after spending all Friday lying on the sofa and most of yesterday dozing, I'm actually ready to get some stuff done. And did I mention that my work is awesomely understanding about my health? I'm so lucky on that front, and it's a counting my blessings kind of day today.
~ I'm not going to be around as much as usual for the next few weeks, since we were broken into at the weekend and my netbook was stolen *cries* (as well as our wallets and J's laptop). I will be getting another, just not for a little while, which is going to curtail my online access. BTW, those of you with netbooks, what have you got and what do you recommend?
~ Less surfing might not be an entirely bad thing, since I have a stupid amount of stuff on my writing plate right now, and maybe less time online will mean more words on the page. Anything's possible, right?
~ I am busy every night this week. All with good stuff, but I'm starting to wonder if this is what it's like to have a social life. Weird.
~ Flautists on my flist, how do I play a 'C' without dropping the flute or losing the note? I'm teaching myself at the moment, and right now I can only manage one or the other...
~
~ Yes, you did read right in that table. Because we are a bad influence on each other,greyias and I have signed up to co-write for this year's ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
sgabigbang. That's THREE Big Bangs for me this year, plus the SPN Summer Gen challenge. Bring it on *wibble*
~ There's probably more, but I need to get coffee before my 3 hour enquiry desk shift. Hopefully the students are all in exams or Bank Holidays *crosses fingers*. There's so much to do!
~ I am rather vague today. This could prove problematic.
[I'm just going to keep adding 'ETA's to this as I remember things. By the time Californian folks see it, this post is going to be epic]
~ I made a lemon drizzle syrup cake last night, and it is exceedingly yummy. I meant to bring it to work for those of us slaving away while everyone else is at home, but it's still sitting on top of the bread-maker in the kitchen. It's one of the easiest and yummiest cakes ever, and I've put the recipe under the cut.
Cream together 175g caster sugar (I use Golden, but normal will do) and 125g butter. Add 2 eggs and the grated zest of 1 lemon. Mix until smooth. Carefully fold in 175g self-raising flour, a pinch of salt and 4 tbsp of milk. Scrape into a prepared 2lb loaf tin and bake at 180 for about 45 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
While it's baking, put 100g icing sugar and the juice of 1-2 lemons in a saucepan and heat until the sugar is dissolved and you have a syrup. As soon as you take the cake out of the oven, puncture it all over with a skewer and pour the syrup over. Leave to cool completely before eating.
[Weight to volume cooking conversions can be done here]
aeron_lanart!!! Hope it's a good one, hon.~ Today is a bank holiday and I am at work. There is something wrong with this picture. On the other hand, after spending all Friday lying on the sofa and most of yesterday dozing, I'm actually ready to get some stuff done. And did I mention that my work is awesomely understanding about my health? I'm so lucky on that front, and it's a counting my blessings kind of day today.
~ I'm not going to be around as much as usual for the next few weeks, since we were broken into at the weekend and my netbook was stolen *cries* (as well as our wallets and J's laptop). I will be getting another, just not for a little while, which is going to curtail my online access. BTW, those of you with netbooks, what have you got and what do you recommend?
~ Less surfing might not be an entirely bad thing, since I have a stupid amount of stuff on my writing plate right now, and maybe less time online will mean more words on the page. Anything's possible, right?
~ I am busy every night this week. All with good stuff, but I'm starting to wonder if this is what it's like to have a social life. Weird.
~ Flautists on my flist, how do I play a 'C' without dropping the flute or losing the note? I'm teaching myself at the moment, and right now I can only manage one or the other...
~
| This week | Next week | This Month | Long Term | |
| WORK | Serial POs Receiving Houtschild books Invoices Mooting videos FMP orders Oracle password Non-FMP orders |
Serial POs Finish Audiotour BIALL tickets and details |
Google Books Agreement Any reading for BIALL conference |
|
| WRITING | Pirate!fic NCIS fic for azure_chaosBeta for donutsweeper |
Finish tardis_bigbang |
bau_bigbang "Five Things..." ficlets spn_summergen |
SGA project with perspi Dragon!fic Universal Library sgabigbang |
| OTHER | Email C Update library blog Return EFL book Return library books Linkspam Zoo RLD change Haircut Taste of Britain |
Coffee with AW Email AG Update library blog Pictures to blackmare_9Post to Rusty |
Duke Humfrey's Paperwork for BIALL conference Writing links (?date?) |
Course at ContEd? Website for my stories Flute |
~ Yes, you did read right in that table. Because we are a bad influence on each other,
greyias and I have signed up to co-write for this year's sgabigbang. That's THREE Big Bangs for me this year, plus the SPN Summer Gen challenge. Bring it on *wibble*~ There's probably more, but I need to get coffee before my 3 hour enquiry desk shift. Hopefully the students are all in exams or Bank Holidays *crosses fingers*. There's so much to do!
~ I am rather vague today. This could prove problematic.
[I'm just going to keep adding 'ETA's to this as I remember things. By the time Californian folks see it, this post is going to be epic]
~ I made a lemon drizzle syrup cake last night, and it is exceedingly yummy. I meant to bring it to work for those of us slaving away while everyone else is at home, but it's still sitting on top of the bread-maker in the kitchen. It's one of the easiest and yummiest cakes ever, and I've put the recipe under the cut.
Cream together 175g caster sugar (I use Golden, but normal will do) and 125g butter. Add 2 eggs and the grated zest of 1 lemon. Mix until smooth. Carefully fold in 175g self-raising flour, a pinch of salt and 4 tbsp of milk. Scrape into a prepared 2lb loaf tin and bake at 180 for about 45 minutes, or until a skewer comes out clean.
While it's baking, put 100g icing sugar and the juice of 1-2 lemons in a saucepan and heat until the sugar is dissolved and you have a syrup. As soon as you take the cake out of the oven, puncture it all over with a skewer and pour the syrup over. Leave to cool completely before eating.
[Weight to volume cooking conversions can be done here]
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 01:18 am (UTC)Too true. The entire cast could end up as sea slugs for all we know. *g*
As for Netbooks, beware, TL;DR
After struggling and prevailing to install a new OS, I do recommend mine, mainly because it has a nearly full size keyboard, which is wonderful. And now that I have Windows XP on it rather than that really bad distro of Linux, it boots up and is ready to go in less than thirty seconds. However, the battery life on my particular model is atrocious (I get maybe an hour and a half unplugged. I probably need to tweak my power settings.) I think the battery life has improved with the newer models, but it gets very hot. (But that seems to be common with HP laptops, as I can attest to after owning three.) It looks like the Compaq variant (http://h10010.www1.hp.com/wwpc/uk/en/ho/WF02a/321957-321957-3832385.html) is popular on your side of the pond. I'm not sure if it's a different PC, or simply a rebranded one.
Even though I hate their marketing team right now, all of my research shows that the Dell Minis (http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/products/category.aspx/inspnnb_mini?c=uk&cs=ukdhs1&l=en&ref=lthp&s=dhs) are fairly solid machines.
And I've never heard of this one before today, but Asus has just released some sort of Supah Eee Machine (http://uk.asus.com/products.aspx?l1=24&l2=164&l3=0&l4=0&model=2912&modelmenu=1), that's big on HDD space and expandability. If the price is right, I might suggest going with that one. It seems both portable and decently powerful.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 07:37 am (UTC)*g* Highly adventurous sea slugs. I suspect the Asurans are Starfish...
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 12:00 pm (UTC)I wonder if that makes the Wraith leeches?
Although I might see if I can put Ubuntu over Linpus Lite, just so I can look at something pretty instead of the hideous desktop.
What are the system requirements for Ubuntu? If the Acer can run it no problem, I'd say that's probably a good way to go. (And Ubuntu seems to be the user friendliest distro from what I can tell.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 12:30 pm (UTC)...just so we're clear, I'm not writing 40,000 words of The Adventures of Team Sea Slug. Not even for you :P
There's a good forum with support for newbie Acer users, so I'll have to see how easy it is to change the distro. Apparently it's a nightmare to switch to XP, but a nicer Linux would save a lot of headaches. Alternatively, I can get a refurbished Dell for about £250.
Decisions, decisions...
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 01:20 pm (UTC)But they could save
The Universethe Seven Seas--slowly. V.e.r.y.s.l.o.w.l.y.Decisions, decisions...
What sort of activities/things do you see yourself needing/wanting to do on it? That might help you narrow it down more.
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 01:24 pm (UTC)What I want it for is kind of the problem. I want to surf the internet, watch videos and write. That's about it, and in theory Linux does that, but I hate the Open Office Writer and the way it screws with formatting. Linux laptops are so much cheaper, but it'd be nice to have a simpler life. *sigh*
This could take a while ;)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-05-26 01:41 pm (UTC)But they have heart (http://www.turner.com/planet/movies/ma-timov.html). And sluggy teaminess. Or teamy slugginess. Or... oh, nevermind.
This could take a while ;)
Hahaha... I hear you on Open Office. I haven't been able to articulate what about it I don't like, but that could very well be it. It just feels... weird to type in.
You could go with a Linux laptop (for affordability) with the aim for upgrading to a system/OS that you like. (If you happen to have an old Windows XP installation disc, you can probably reuse it to go XP if that's what you want. Or Ubuntu... but I think it may be a tad more resource intensive than XP)