Episode: 3312
Title: HPR3312: COVID Doldrums
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr3312/hpr3312.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-10-24 20:42:15

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 3,312 for Tuesday, 13th April 2021.
Today's show is entitled COVID Old Rims.
It is hosted by Dave Morris and is about 71 minutes long and carries an explicit flag.
The summary is MRX and Dave Morris have a chat over mumble in these drying times.
This episode of HBR is brought to you by an Honesthost.com.
Get 15% discount on all shared hosting with the offer code HBR15.
That's HBR15.
Better web hosting that's Honest and Fair at An Honesthost.com.
Hello everybody and welcome to Hacker Public Radio.
Today is a chat between myself who's Dave Morris and MrX.
Hi MrX, how are you doing?
Hi Dave, doing fine, thank you very much.
It's nice to catch up with you again after our first 33 minutes of trying to get
flamin' mumble to work with her for that.
Mumble seems to be a strange and wonderful beast.
You have to sort of make sacrifices to it or something to make it work.
I don't know what you have to do.
But yeah, we all fall down the nasty mumble hall from time to time.
Yeah, it's strange because it seems to be the order of which we're connected,
you know, we're taking this thing.
Sometimes I could hear Dave, sometimes I couldn't and it was really bizarre.
The same thing as I tend to use, if I use mumble, I tend to use it on the table.
It's convenient but for better quality, I'm using mumble in the PC here and the audio quality,
this end of Dave's audio is really, really clear.
So, I was telling Dave that I'm forced to use Skype for business
in a regular basis and I can say this is far better quality, you know.
Yeah, isn't that strange?
Yeah, it's a great thing, mumble is a wonderful thing.
I don't think enough people know about it, there you go.
So, we have been planning to do this since about, I don't know, last year.
We last actually got together to talk on August 23rd,
the third, according to my notes here.
Last year.
That was far back as that.
Yeah, it doesn't feel that long, does it?
But then time is a bit bizarre in this pandemic,
but we'd been thinking of doing this before Christmas and, you know, and things.
Yeah, it's just just really hard to, to get called,
donated to do these things.
It is in the east, what is it?
What's that to?
One of the audio book clubs have talked about that story of what it times as they are
or something, that was one of the scenes at the, yeah.
The author had it times as they are.
Yeah.
The famous I've seen that all over and over, you know.
Because it is really bizarre, the situation we're at all in, you know.
Although the strange thing is that, you know,
had you been an expert in that field, you too?
Well, I'm surprised it hasn't happened already, you know.
Yeah, I keep listening to podcasts where they suddenly pop up stuff about
the plague in Roman times.
What was it?
The Justinian plague, which was a bribonic plague, but, you know, they were all,
you know, we were talking about how they coped with it and how they dealt with it and,
and, and all that sort of thing, you know.
And we're not knowing what caused it, it made, made life a lot difficult.
But, you know, still quite, quite a thing.
Yeah, yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's really strange.
I, I think I've maybe mentioned this before, but I had a, a,
a new scientist article on my desk that I read.
It was that bird flu outbreak that happened a number of years back.
And it was like a double-sped thing on, on, on, on the, on the bird flu pandemic.
And, uh, it was how to protect your family.
In fact, and I've got to hear, because I, I, to bring it home, I've to empty,
clean my desk out.
So some of my desks, I've been decanted and brought home that I think about it.
And I just, I just kept finding it and kept moving it from place to place,
because I thought, one day, this will come in handy.
And of course, it's not coming in handy.
Well, of course, one of the things they said was, you know, um, they said, you know,
it might, well, how is the word that, you know, there is some mileage
to perhaps getting, uh, should a pandemic happen?
There might be some mileage in, in getting, uh, getting the, uh, infection
firsthand as long as you survive it, because at least at that point,
there by health service available to, to deal with that.
I thought, I didn't do it in just that week.
Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
So it doesn't quite apply to the, uh, this COVID thing,
though, does it?
No, no, no.
Because, uh, the, the side effects can be quite devastating in, in many cases.
But, yeah, you can see where that thinking's come from.
Yeah, well, I think it was slightly tongue in cheek, but if it was really that
bad, if the health service fell over completely,
then you would be the lucky one who was, who's, uh,
who'd been seen in hospital first, you know, the first one's,
would be the lucky one, really, you know, but, uh, yeah, yeah,
quite interesting, uh, outlook, you know, I do remember that particular, uh,
point, and I thought, well, that's, that's kind of interesting.
It used to be the case when I was a kid that, um, if anybody got chicken
pox, there was a tendency for, for parents to go and take care,
take the kids who hadn't had it yet, or, around to visit them.
So they would catch it as well.
Oh, wow.
I'm sure, and because it's a fairly trivial disease, mostly,
although it can turn into something really nasty,
if you get it, get it in a strong form.
And of course, you always get shingles as a, as a consequence.
Right.
Uh, well, not always, but there, there's a very, very strong chance that,
you know, 50 years down the road, you're going to end up with shingles.
So, yeah, if you're going to avoid it, then so much the better.
Oh, yeah.
I mean, I think that was a not, um, was a not things in the media about, about
people having covered parties and stuff so that they could catch it and get it out of the way.
Super thing, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
I do remember this in, in a vague way.
I don't think it ever happened to me that, that, uh, I was taken some time to,
yeah, it's time to catch your chicken pox.
Yeah.
No, but they talked about it.
Wow.
Yeah.
I know.
So yes, so we've made a list of all these things that we were, we might want to talk about.
And we, we've got, uh, in fact, we started with Christmas and new year.
Or did I start, I think I started this one.
No, there was an earlier one that we, we rejected because things got out of date, I think,
and we were just going to comment about Christmas.
Yeah.
I think, I think, yeah, I mean, I, uh, we had been tempted at the end just and I had my own sort of,
we notes sort of thing and then when, when Dave shared a note with that with myself,
then, uh, of course, uh, it allowed me to sort of be a bit more focused and,
so I, so I kind of sent, so I arranged mine in the summer of, uh, orders, I think.
So yeah, so yeah, go ahead.
How was, how was Christmas in New Year for, for you then?
We don't make much of Christmas to be honest.
My, uh, my son and his girlfriend disappear at Christmas because her parents are very, very,
very keen Christmas celebrators and so he always reckons,
ah, right, well, I better go and, uh, you know, hang out with the family.
And so he says, says to me, your dad's okay if I come in after Christmas,
and he says, yes, fine, no problem.
So we, we have a, we usually have to get together on Boxing Day.
26 if you don't know what Boxing Day is.
I don't think that it's not, not a name in America.
Um, but anyway, it's, uh, so that's what we did this year.
Made an interesting meal, which turned out to be extraordinarily difficult to make
with just me doing it.
All right, no, I don't know, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm not, we need to imagine doing that.
I mean, I, I think I can manage beans and toast and stuff like that, you know,
with, you know, the cooking, unfortunately.
The, yeah, the concept of it was great and easy.
You know, if you ever get into, into cooking complicated things, um,
the, the coordination of it all so that it all comes together at the right time is
difficult and it always throws me.
I have to say there was one time I did a family meal,
which was a series of curries, you know, uh, it was a curry-based meal,
but I had about six dishes and you had to start this.
The first one the day before and the second one, it took so many hours and the third, you know,
and so I wrote this complicated spreadsheet that showed that a time order.
So start this one at this point and put the thingy on the, you know,
I still got it.
And I look at it and think, wow, what an earth as I'm thinking.
Oh, I do like that's incredible.
Well, yeah, that's amazing.
It's, it's funny, I can appreciate that because, you know,
when I put a frozen chicken thing in the oven and the chips, I've got to go at a higher temperature,
you know, I bring it up to full temperature, put the chips and then I put the chicken thing
in a drop temperature down in the last 10 minutes, bring it back up again and then that
when you get it all cooked evenly, not soggy, weight chips, which I wouldn't say who does that,
but I have had meals like this, you know, as before.
Yes, yes, that's where you need two ovens, isn't it?
Yeah, this is it.
So I said to the guys, did you enjoy that?
And they said, yeah, yeah, but I was incredibly late with it.
And they said, tell you what, let's do it again.
Well, and we'll all join in and do it as a joint effort.
You know, we each have a particular thing we're going to do.
So, so New Year's Day we did that.
And it was, that was a lot of fun actually.
It was great fun.
You know, everybody had their own task and we were, we did trip over one another a little
because my kitchen's not very big, but it was, it was, it was a lot more fun than just having
the one person slaving over it all, you know, so yeah, yeah.
So yeah, that was that, that was actually quite a highlight.
I mean, the content of the food was, was less than the fun of actually doing it together.
Yeah, yeah, well, because we, we have a, I was joking about our caravan kitchen because
it's, it's pretty small as well and we're kind of going to, to put up to each other.
But it's as good when you just splat the, the, the tasks and, you know, when it comes to cooking,
I'm quite happy to help out, but I need, I need, let's say, a sense of direction.
I'm rubbish at cooking on my own, but I think I also think we're a bit too exact
and things, you know, say, well, you can just start things together, you know, yes, yes,
there is definitely that my kids laugh at me because I am a real stickler for cutting things up
in nice, organized regular fashion and stuff, you know, my carrots have to be sliced and like that too.
Cubed and, you know, as always, if I'm measuring with cannabis to make sure they're all the same size,
I've never reached that stage, but, you know, it just looks better if they're all
absolutely quite agree. Yeah, yeah, I know exactly where you're coming from.
They laugh at me for doing this, so I try not to, not to do too much of that type of thing.
That's very good, that's very good. Yeah, I think, well, of course, I mean, although I,
well, it's very, very real now that we have things like, you know, frozen chicken and chips.
Well, I think what I've tends to do, just got this, this recipe where you, it's potatoes and you
and I can't tell you because I didn't, I don't make them, so, but it's, you've got this recipe,
it's potatoes with the skins and you sprinkle, I think what, you obviously run them under water
and the secret is to dry them off on a towel and then you sprinkle seasoning on it and you cook it,
I'm not sure how you cook it, is it? I'm not sure, but the point is, I think part of it is that
the seasoning makes it look like it's golden brown, but it looks and tastes like a chip,
and yet it's not good any oil and I don't think, so it's really healthy. And, you know, I mean,
we eat a lot of, it's mostly vegetarian dishes that are made from scratch, sort of thing.
So our diet has, and last year or so, you know, greatly improved, but to be fair, we haven't eaten
a lot of frozen things and stuff for many years, I think Prattak, we did a lot of, you know,
when you call them crop pot type meals, you know. I haven't done one of those for a long time,
actually, but yeah, I like to, I like to just come up with, well, get clues for new meals from
from YouTube and whatever, and having a little experiment with them and then maybe do them as
something for the family, those are fun things to do. Well, yeah, I was just saying to my wife,
today I was saying, you know, I was explaining the likeness to recipes and open-source software,
I think it kind of went in one year now at the other, so to speak. Oh, yeah, you know, you
shared it, because she was talking about the recipe, she made it, it wasn't quite like the one,
it was, it was based on such and such, but she modified it, I said, well, that's what you do,
it's all for, oh, right, okay, glazed ice, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, hello, hello. I've actually been
watching, there was a time I used to go to the Far East fairly, fairly often, and quite like
Asian food, and I've been watching a series of cooking stuff from a Korean person who
on YouTube, and they do sort of small, small quick meals and stuff, but there's one of them was
how to make fried rice the easiest way, and the thing boiled down to the fact that if you
take some pre-cooked rice and put it in a bowl, and then you break two or three eggs or something,
depending on how many people you're serving, into it, and just mix the whole lot together, so you
end up with this sort of eggy, eggy rice, and you chuck that into a pan and cook it, and slowly,
and then gradually the eggs sets around the rice, and it's probably, it would probably make somebody
who makes fried rice as professionally, absolutely horrified, but it actually works out quite well,
and I made that for my daughter, the other week, and she thought it was fantastic, she really enjoyed it,
so those sorts of things where you think, oh, I could adapt that, and put this down in the other end,
and end up with something that's nice, and it worked out for once.
That's how it's really good, so what you just do, we boil it, and I walk off of it as,
and just, just like, all right, I must say that to Mrs. X, and see if she'll cook something
like that, or you can have her go myself, I suppose, if I'm going to do this, you know?
I like turning these things into written recipes, because my memory is so awful,
I can never remember what I did last time, so it's an early stage of recipe,
but I'll be happy to share it if you're interested.
Yeah, yeah, by all means, yeah, either pop an email or whatever, you know, that would be good.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, so yeah, so things like that are quite fun, so yeah, it's an interesting voyage
coming up with new ideas, or, you know, finding a new idea, and then working with it,
or developing it a bit, or that type of thing, you know? There's loads and loads of sources
of information too, or if you hunt around the internet.
Yeah, yeah, I always, my wife's always looking at videos, she has to be thinking,
I don't know, I just can't, I don't know, I just can't quite get, I certainly enjoy eating them,
you know, but I'm just not, I don't know, I know what I'm saying, but I'm just not
got the confidence, I think that's part of the reason is, oh, I think I'm going to make a
amazing sort of thing, but, you know, I don't know, it's just when these things, I guess,
everyone's different, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's, you need to be prepared for failures,
I mean, sometimes things go completely wrong and it's horrible, usually I'm making for myself,
and if it's really horrible, then, you know, I probably won't do it for the family,
so it's, you know, it's, it's, it's an interesting, quite a fun thing to do, I find.
So, I suppose maybe we should, we can go off topic, we'll talk about Christmas in
a year and we have several things to do. So, tell me about your Christmas in a year.
Well, it was, it was quite quiet, I mean, usually, I usually, well, we used to, we used to
all get together and visit, come to our house, you know, my mother and my wife's mother and father,
and, but I think these days, they tend to just, you know, my wife goes to her mother and father,
and I go to my mother, so, of course, my mother can live their own, so, I suppose to speak,
and you can, you can, you can, you can bubble, and so, my, obviously, my, my, my,
I've got a brother, he, he normally comes up for Christmas, but obviously, under these circumstances,
he didn't come up, but, so, and I couldn't, I think, usually my, my brother tends to help out with it,
with the cooking, well, he's quite a damp hand at cooking, and I have a bit of conscious that,
I didn't want to leave all that, my mother and I, that does, you know, I can, I can help out and
you know, blah, blah, blah. So, no, no, it's no bother to us, we're supposed to keep it really simple,
I mean, so happy, happy beans and toasts, doesn't it, and fancy, but you know, we've got, she made a lovely
traditional, Christmas meal with turkey and stuff, and all that stuff, and, are, uh,
the, the, the, the, the, um, the, what do you call it, it's the, uh, or a trifle, trifles with, with,
with, with, with, um, loads of cream atop, and, and marshmallows, of course, to die for you,
that's good. Well, that sounds great. Yeah. I've never made one of those, my mum used to,
used to make trifles all the time. I know there's sort of basic principle that never done it myself.
But, uh, yeah, yeah, it might be something, yeah, might be something that my lot would like.
Yeah, so I mean, so, it's quite, I, I felt like I a bit, a bit, a bit, a flantic, um,
up, up, and, you know, up to the Christmas sort of thing, and then, then there was the rat
at the release when I had the break and because I was working from home nobody really took any holidays
so consequently there was a big release of holidays at the end of the year and so I ended up
I was at three or four weeks something like that was a lot of days anyway so it was really nice
to get a chance to unwind and whatnot and yeah and the fact when I was doing the upgrades
on my on my devices which I was in the shows that I did well I mean I think when I first did
the first one I felt I was still kind of a bit hyper from from from from working whatnot
so it took my ideas with this sort of calm down so but that was good and I was glad to get my
this was up to date but it's actually a flaming nuisance you know it just takes so much time you know
so that was good to get that out that way I was glad about that really yes yes it made some good
shows to some some interesting problems yourself there yeah yeah it was good it was good fun I
I'd like to get more chance to do a bit more back into you know use a computer but I just
that time is so so difficult so I get to get in the time really so so shall we move on to the next
topic and then that I think we've got that title pandemic yes yes it's so much to say about this
I think it's really I've gone on and on about this in various contexts so I'll probably keep it
fairly brief I I'm just because of my age and the fact that I've got various illnesses I've just
been keeping low all the time you know but I did get my first vaccination very very recently
in the beginning of February or second of February so I'm hoping for my second one before too long
by end of April maybe that sort of time I think I haven't heard when yet but sure I'll get to
know and into you course so that's it's nice you know from the point of view of oh I'm probably
less at risk now so you know it's though I haven't really started changing I'm doing very much
well we're still a lot down the way yeah yeah yeah we when you when you when you I don't know
just see things going to my head when you say I haven't changed yet I'm thinking you know I had
I had this image of, you know, like a wee wolf looking for hairs in the back of your hands
and I was thinking, you know, it's grown up, I have to get in the back.
No, that hasn't happened. No, no, no.
Well, it was the, I had the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine, which is built around a chimp virus.
So yeah, definitely hairy backs of hands, it's just a cold virus that chimp's get that
way, it doesn't bother us. And the thing has been genetically engineered to produce the
anti-gen that causes immune system to get busy and protective from the coronavirus.
Yeah, indeed, indeed, indeed.
Well, I think all of my immediate family, apart from me, have all had their vaccines.
So it's just just waiting for me to get my first one. I don't think it will be too long
now. My sister-in-law, she's got vaccinated, I think, last week and she's slightly younger
than myself, maybe a year or so. She's down in England, so, you know, they've got different
areas of doing different things, I guess, but yeah, I'm looking forward to it.
I guess I would imagine I might need to travel a little bit further because it does seem
like the, depending on your age, that if you're, you know, by a certain age, the time
keep it local to where you are. I mean, my mother had to go to, she went to a GP, which
obviously, that's quite a good thing, you know.
Yeah, yes, I think anybody over 80 was being being vaccinated in the local health centre
in Scotland, I think that was the thing.
But the 70 to 80 bracket all have to go to some central point to get back. So I went
to the Edinburgh Conference Centre, which I've never been in. Huge place, and really, really
well organised, it seemed to be quite an impressive way there today.
Right, right, very good, very good. Yeah, yeah, as you add, I don't know, I just need to wait
and see where, where I'm getting sent, I'll be glad to go, whatever, you know, I'll feel
a bit strange because obviously we're all staying very, very local at the moment, you
know, you can't go outside your regions. So that's a thing that I wasn't, I didn't know
what would happen work-wise, but I was a bit concerned about should it be called into
work, to work in the office, basically, because I knew Christmas was coming up and I was
planning to obviously visit my mother over Christmas. I know that wasn't recommended, but
I was thinking, well, if I haven't been absolutely anywhere and I haven't, I mean, I'm
not even mean to the shops. We do kind of click and collect it. It's a drop off service
for people who don't know, you go to the shop and you open your boot and load the groceries
and close it and drive off again, so you're not even going into the shop to pick up your
groceries, it's all done online, so really not mixing with anybody at all and doors, so
I figured that was pretty safe, you know. Yes, yes, sounds like it, sounds like it. I mean,
it's good to have recommended ways of behaving so that you don't accidentally go and do something
that's dangerous, but once you've got the general principles of this thing, then I think
you can use your own knowledge and understanding to know how to behave, you know.
But what does that mean? I always think that rules are there to stop stupid people doing stupid
things, you know, it can't cover all of the actualities. You might be following the rules,
but doing something actually quite risky and likewise, you might not be following the rules,
but it's pretty safe. I think that sounds reasonable. We certainly, the early stages,
because my kids don't live with me, we were keeping apart, you know, just sort of talking to
on another on the phone or on telegram or something like that, not actually meeting up,
but then we stopped and had to think about it and thought, I think we can, we, and there was
always talk about bubbles at that point, you know, as long as you're careful about what the
likelihood of infection people you're associated with is. Well, this is it. I mean,
it depends what the people you're associated with. I mean, if they're meeting lots of members
of the public, then obviously it's slightly more risky, but if they're not meeting very many
people either, then it's, this is it. Yeah. Well, both of my children are one still working on
these MSC and computer science, but it's all remote, so he's not going anywhere. My daughter
finished her MSC and she's job hunting at the moment, and of course, that's all remote as well,
so interviews conducted over over Zoom and that type of stuff, you know, so
going anywhere. And my son's girlfriend's a doctor, well, she's about to be, you get a full,
full doctor's license, whatever you get. Sometimes this year, the working at a medical centre,
they're so careful, amazingly careful, you know, so the likelihood of being exposed to anything
there is very, very low indeed, I think. Yeah, yeah, this is it. Yeah, I mean, yeah, so it's
so it's very sensible indeed, so yeah, that's good, that's good, excellent. I mean, you've got
to draw the line somewhere, I mean, you need to sell love, you know, so it sounds very sensible.
Yeah, yeah. Yeah, the, the second jab thing, I see your notes here about the, the second jab
is the one you need before you, you can be sure that you've got the full effect of the
yeah, but in some cases, some people get a really strong response from it and end up feeling
quite ill for a couple of days, but it seems to vary hugely with person and vaccine, I think,
to some extent as well. Yeah, I was watching a Horizon programme just to the day with my mum,
Chris, I was, oh, sorry, let the button go there. So I was at my mother's and she was watching,
she's, oh, I kept this for you, I was a Horizon, things we know about COVID, and so they say the
couple of things that stood out to me was, so we don't, they didn't know how long the vaccine
protects against virus spitting, but it's like to protect against serious illness for a good
long time longer than they maybe even think. And then they said something about the 12 weeks
between the jobs which they're doing in the UK, because at first they didn't know whether that
was really, the hunch was, I think that's the way the UK seems to have played things on the,
on the, on the balance of probability, we think this is likely to be the case, we don't know for
death in it, but we'll, we'll, we'll take the risk and, and, and, and, and, and, where other
countries have said, well, you know, until we get there for this, we're not doing X, Y, and Z,
we've been lucky and, and, and these things have panned out the way we expect, we expected, you know,
but they were saying that the second job, this, you know, I'm up, you'll own what maybe more
about this than me, but that man of sounding was the second job, doesn't provoke a stronger response,
is that the first job produces a good response and poor responses, but by waiting 12 weeks for
the second job, the, the poor responses die away, and you only get the good responses, which
gives you a better protection or something to that effect anyway. Yeah, I saw some, some discussion
about this specifically with the AstraZeneca vaccine, which, which has had further testing since,
since it first became available, and the tests seem to be indicating that the, the level of
response in terms of the likelihood of infection is, it ramps up from the first one, you know,
I think there's something like 22 plus days, starts to, to climb up into the sort of 70 percent,
what do they call it, efficacy, which is an odd, odd word, but I think it means that you
quite a high level of protection, and then if you, well then if you get the second one,
and there's a good long weight for your immune system to, to sort of consolidate what it's,
it's, it's learned about these, these proteins and stuff that's been injected with,
then you get a really good up to 84 percent response with the, with the second one. So it's both
the second one and the delay seem to, seem to improve it. So that's essentially what you were saying,
I think, wasn't it? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So, so yeah, it's, I think it's a little bit of serendipity
there, that I think the reason the gap was added was because they weren't sure about the supply.
So, yes, yeah. And we're trying to make sure they didn't use up the, all of the supply on the
second dose, but, but I think in fact, it's turned out to be quite good, good strategies.
Yes, but for all, for all the mistakes I've been made, I think we've been quite,
lucky with a number of outcomes, but yeah, essentially, because I said here that, I think the,
you know, the UK's got among the worst death rate in Europe, sort of thing around about, I think,
there's certainly over a hundred thousand deaths, and it was interesting I was, I was reading a book,
it's a kind of body book, and I've actually got it from a mother in law, sort of, it's on my Kindle,
and it just, it's been going through all the aspects of the human body, and it's very fast,
and I wasn't sure when I got there, because how much I'd enjoy it, but you can pick it up and
put it down, sort of thing. I'm not a big reader anyway, and I'm talking about all sorts of things,
and they got on about, to pandemics and fortnoten. I see this was written in 2017, I think,
so we didn't know anything about what's going on just now, but they were also going on about,
I think was it between 2017 and 2010, I can't remember if it was around that time period,
but anyway, they were talking about how the reckon that this, you know, the Britain, as among the
spends a bit, but among the least amount of money on health care, although we actually have
quite good outcomes, considering all of that, you know, we're getting done good value for money,
but I think the reckon that the cuts that I've had come in between, I think was 2010 or 2007 and
2017 were avoid, the reckon that I could possibly up to 120,000 premature deaths, so yeah, yeah,
so it's just, you know, just what can I say, you know, just, it's just crazy, and it's not like,
well, I could go, I could go, I could go, I don't know, I don't know, I'm a better stop here, I think.
It's, yeah, I think the one of the lessons to learn is that politicians running
pandemic responses are not always the best, the ones that don't listen to the epidemiologists who
predict these sorts of things quite accurately, other, definitely. Well, as you'll know, people in
the UK will have heard, was it said, you know, some, some of these said, was it wrong, I mean, I won't
quit, was it, I might be nah, was it not, something about not not listening to experts, it's
where we've fed up listening to experts, I can't be there, it's exact quote, but there was some
quote about, you know, we've fed up listening to experts, I think I summed to that thing, well,
that's that's why you make a, I'm not sure if you do that, you know. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's,
yeah, it's a ridiculous thing to say, I could terrible to think so, I'll just go and see a plumber,
it's, it's, it's, it's, it's a subject we should maybe walk away from a plumber. I think,
I think so, I think so. So, I'm just going to say that, from a personal point of view, I think
it seems to be getting, I feel like more, but more difficult coping with the lockdown, I find it
quite easy for a good long while, but I'm finding it a bit more difficult now. I haven't been
into work since, I think it was last November, something like that. And home working, I find that
quite stressful. I think that things, things, you know, I think, well, everybody has some to speak
to not just from one company, but other places as well, that things are starting to go wrong. I
remember when, when they started talking about this, they were asking, you know, they were all very
conscious here, mental health and all that, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. But the thing was that
after a number of months went by, it was all kind of forgotten about and, you know, it's, it's
at later stages, it started to keep in the difficulties. And on top of that, because, because,
actually, I'm not a lot of people retiring. And I'm having to take on more responsibility.
And it's, it's, it's, it's quite stressful. And then, of course, you're living on top of one
another and, you know, the house is getting all cluttered, you've got stuff flying all over the
place. And you can't find it in the beginning, beginning the morning, you know, by 10 the days
over where you've got plates and dishes lying everywhere, you've got things strewn all over the
place. It's just, it's a nightmare, you know? Oh, yes, yes, yes. I know that feeling well. Yeah,
and I know it's, I was talking to my daughter about this recently and she, I think we both agreed
that, that somehow we seem to have lost motivation. It was really hard to, to generate enthusiasm
for things. I think it's partly because you're just in the same environment doing pretty similar
things a lot of the time. And, and you really need to get out of it for a while and do, do something
different somewhere in a different place, if possible. You know, so it's, I think that, that's,
that's part of it. In fact, she and I have been going for, for walks to, to, we're two times a
week at the moment, but maybe we're aiming for three just to, just to go out for a bit, just in
the locality. And, you know, we can chat as we go. But it's nice enough to, to go and have
a little bit of a walk by itself, but if you, if you're walking with somebody, it makes it a lot
more fun, I think. Yes, yes, absolutely. That, that, I think that might be helping both of us to,
to do that. So, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I, I,
for a companion, we do go walks quite a bit. But my, my mother, I, I was, she's also known, but, I think
she goes out, maybe not every day, but most days for a walk, and it must be harder for her. But I do
visit her a number of times during the week, which I'm sure that must help. But, um, yeah, I mean,
other, other advantages. I've, I've got written down here that I was, uh, glad that I didn't need to,
to drive during all the bad weather, because we had some horrendous weather, didn't we? We had some
pretty grim snowy weather. Yeah. I know. I, I was very glad not to have to drive in that as well.
Yeah. Yeah. That, that, that, that was an advantage. Uh, actually, um, it just felt like everything
you were trying to clear the path, uh, just more stuff, uh, came in. It's funny. I was looking
on YouTube, but, uh, there was a chap from Canada, and even the, the, the, the, the, the, the,
the class snow shovel, a snowblower type thing. It's like, it's like a, it's like a lawnmower for snow,
you know, and it's, and if you get battery powered now, so you just, quick it up your drive and just
chucks it over the side, I thought, that's a great idea. I know, I know, I know, I have a problem
with mine, actually, because the way the houses are built around here, they're, they're fairly close
together. This is a standard sort of British estate with some, some houses are, are detached as they
call them and, uh, but some are semi detached with this or two houses stuck together with the
communal war. Um, and anyway, they're, they're pretty, pretty well packed together. And I've
got a driveway that, that is moderately long and it goes in between the two houses for half of
its length down to my garage. Ah, yeah. So when it's full of snow, there's no way to put the snow,
you know, the, when it's light, you can shovel a line across it and put that pilot the snow you've
moved in front of you and then go further again and do the same, but gradually the pile builds up
until it's massive. But usually I try, if there's not too much snow, get that to a point where I can
then move it to the, to the right where the, where my front garden is, I just chuck it on there.
But, um, we had, we had, I don't know, about as much as six inches of snow at one point.
It's certainly a lot of snow. Yeah, it must have been something like that. You know, and,
yeah, and you're being in mind, I mean, I'm out in the sticks, you're in the middle of, um,
you know, you're, you're in, in, in the area sort of thing. So it's, it's going to be, uh, it's
usually, you know, but, but what's that this way? So I was pretty bad.
I'm up a hill, which I think might make it a little bit, but it was not very much up a hill,
but, uh, sort of part way up the, up the Pentlands hills. And, uh, so, you know, I think,
I think it can be a little bit more snowy here. Right. Right. But, uh, yeah, I don't know, whatever.
But, um, yeah, it was, I, I was thinking it would be great if I had a sort of small wheelbarrow
or something, I'd fill that up and then move it. Yeah. But, and a snowblower wouldn't do me a,
a huge lot of goodness. You can make it blow forwards and then go back, go into the snow you've
just blown in order to, to move it. Yeah. Well, we've got, uh, a good long, uh, driveway as well.
And there's bushes either side, and there's like a fence and then bushes. And so it, it,
probably wouldn't blow high enough to get onto the bushes and we just fall back down again.
So it probably wouldn't work for me either. And the movement I've roomed to, to get past the
cars. So, um, yeah, I mean, if you're, uh, you know, living in Canada and you've got to deal with
this thing all the time, then it's, it maybe is a, is a, a good thing. But I think, I got myself
a number of years back. It wasn't that many years ago, uh, a snow shovel, you know, the kind of,
kind of flat plastic thing. And yeah, great. There's so much better than a normal shovel, you know.
Absolutely. I've got three of these things. I've been trying different models over the years.
You know, there's this sort of one which is just a sort of plastic flat thing, as you say.
And that's fine. But if you get a lot, if the snow's heavy and wet and you get a lot on that,
it's really hard to control because it doesn't have a, have a handle. Yeah. That's my pull.
That's what I've got. I can, that's my complaint on that one. And of course, actually in the,
I end up hot, my rest because I've got, I've got bad dress, anyway,
partly to do with that. It's fine stuff. So, uh, that can, can cause me an issue. I must have
it. I've got, uh, I've got a shovel that was, uh, sort of sold as a snow shovel or as
somebody for clearing out a stable or something. So you scoop up all the, the, the straw and that
type of stuff with it. That's okay. You can certainly get more, and it's got a proper D-shaped
handle at the end, you know, so you can control it a bit better. But it doesn't scoop as deeply.
And of course, the plastic and they, they, they don't, they don't last a lot. Well, yeah. I can
remember, I was a, last time there was really heavy snow and there was a, I don't know if there
was a while ago where, uh, these snow shovels were, uh, in very short supply because everybody wanted
one, you know, and so we, I think I kind of, but for some reason, we got one, um, just before it all
kicked off and we felt so lucky, you know, and, and, and yeah, that, I mean, there were a completely
sort of, every shot, you know, across the land that was, yeah, but anyway, yeah, we've had this
for a number of years and it's, I'm amazed it hasn't got cracked or broken, but it's been all right.
So that does a job, which was a main thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I've often thought it would be nice
if you could get one made of, of thin sheet steel or something, you know, like, uh, in fact,
I saw, I saw, um, a stainless steel sink in a, in a skip lay, and recently I was thinking,
oh, I could probably saw that in half and make a shovel. Oh, yes. I didn't, I didn't do it.
Just thinking something like that, you know, take off all the extraneous bits of metal and put that
on a handle and that would be, that could be quite good actually. But when we were in holiday,
I was in one of these, uh, we local shops, uh, I had a mungly place and they had these, like,
many snow shovels that supposedly fold up to using your car. Oh, yeah. And I thought, oh, that'll
be handy. So I, I got it and I've got it in my car. Well, actually, I think now it's actually in
in the, in the whole cupboard, but it's, it's got this, this nut thing where you, you release it and
it telescopes open, but telescopes open about two inches, so it's no worth the bother, you know, it's
a complete joke. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's, it would be nice to find the, the ideal thing for,
we're doing this. That's a nice, yeah, anyway. I was just going to say that, um, it's just,
you know, talking about choosing something slightly, but about the staying positive and all that.
And, uh, my wife shared this thing about, um, you know, suggestion that you come up with three
things at the end of the day, sort of thing, end of each day, uh, three things that you think you
were, you were, you were, uh, that's three highlights or maybe things you're grateful for or
something like that. And when we're trying to do that, I think that that probably does tend to help
test to keep listening to you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, that is quite good. I've actually, um,
tried to make, uh, sort of, to do list type of thing every day and then then work through as much
of it as, as I can, you know, being realistic about it, you don't have 20 things on your to-do list,
but there was a nice PR show a few weeks ago by Yirun from the Netherlands. He was talking about
a thing called task warrior, which is, yeah, yeah, it's, um, I actually, um, a couple of months ago,
actually, now I think, but anyway, I, I'd used task warrior back in the day and, uh, I just
couldn't go on with it very well because anyway, I think it was me rather than task warrior,
usually is, but, um, I thought, I'll have a go at this again. See, if I can use it properly,
you know, so I have been, and I've been, um, getting it to, uh, to, you can put stuff in like, uh,
you know, whatever. I can't think of anything off hand, but, you know, you'll put in tasks, um,
the recurrent ones and, um, and it will, it doesn't alert you, but if you go and ask it,
what's, what's on today? It will show you where you're supposed to have this one finished today,
this one, this one's overdue. Get it sorted and, and it pops up the recurrent stuff.
And I just find that the, the, the, the process of going through that, we're thinking, oh yeah,
I said I was going to wash the floor or whatever it was today and I haven't done it yet. And, uh,
oh, I done it now. Yes. So I can go, go ahead and say task 42 done and, and, and that makes
me feel really good, you know, I think it's similar to psychology. It's really what I mean.
Yeah, yeah. I used to have a, uh, a paper based, I've had too many things on the go,
then I would, uh, would write it down. You can fold, fold, fold the sheet of paper into our cameras,
eight pieces and you end up with a square and you put in your pocket and, and you can, you can,
you can keep that bit of paper to almost disintegrate, you know, because you, because you can fold,
you've got, if you've got eight, the camera was eight or how many bits it's, it's, it's folded into,
but I saw it on a YouTube, um, uh, life hack or something like that. And I found that quite,
quite, quite useful and just ad hoc. You see my problem with that, um, task warrior, I thought,
that's really good and it does sound really powerful and the way that, uh, I think it can do,
like, natural language, you know, just things you can say to it and it, and it works out what you,
what you, what you, the context of what you're saying is something that sounded very clever, uh, and
the idea of just, um, working on the tunnel sounds sound, sound a good, I really like the idea
of that, but the trouble is, is having access to something to, to, to, to, to type it in with,
you know, I mean, I've, I've got tablets, which are always on, um, but my PC, well, it's not on
use during, during the week, it's all un-discnated, so I, I couldn't do that. I don't have a lap,
but a re-old Samsung thing, which takes too long to boot up, um, you know, I, this is my problem,
it's having access to it, that, that's the, that's the doubt it, if I had, if I had some sort of
clamshell thing that I could open and it would just be there, then it would be, it would be useful,
and I think my, that's why I like my, my sign was always to hand, and I, I did try to get used to
using the, the Google calendar, and they, ah, I just couldn't get, so just, you know, I just,
just trying to frustrate and, and, and, and I just, just can go with that toll, basically,
that's what I'm abouting to. Yeah, you're quite right, of course. I, uh, I have a PC on my desk
top here, the one I'm using right now, which gets switched on in the morning and stays running
until I go to bed at night, so, and I'm mostly in the house, you know, it's like, I can easily go to
that and, and ask the task warrior what's, what's going on and what I need to do and stuff, but,
but that's a pretty unusual and unworkable model for, for many people, I'm sure, but I think
task warrior has got a server-based thing, I've, I saw, saw some reference to it, but haven't
delved into yet, so I don't know whether you could be running on a Raspberry Pi and connect to it
from your phone or something. Yeah, yeah. Of course that that, that ties in to change,
breaking the, the, the, the, the, the ordinary, which we're talking about things. But, you know,
I was, I was talking about laptops and notebooks and such like, and, uh, my Samsung notebook is
really getting a bit long in the tooth and, and, I've got, I've got this, uh, this. I've got this
There's voucher thing that I've got to spend and it, it, it, it expires a maybe I can't
remember sort of middle of the middle of the year, something like that and I'm not quite
sure what to spend on.
It's nice thing, as long as it's a long service award type thing and I don't quite know
what used to get a carriage clock or something like that, but anyway, there's, there's voucher.
I don't want to spend on it and I, there was time with the idea of a, of a Chromebook and
of course the beauty of that is you open it up and it was just be there and, and live.
So you could do something like that, but I don't like the idea for all the things you
were talking about, you were talking, I wasn't to just, I was actually listening to your
last show about the, the monthly thing and you were talking to Ken about the built-in
obsolescence and all that and yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean, I agree with all that and the
number of times I use a laptop, I don't need to be instantly on the, the path of this,
this thing you're talking about just now and I was thinking, I know, I think bad, that
does sound quite good as well, so I'm just not quite sure what to do.
No, it's difficult, isn't it? It's difficult. Yeah, I, I looked at Chromebooks in the
early days when they first came out and a lot of people were just putting Linux on them,
but, but then I think the, they probably got a less, I mean, I'm all to, to being usable,
the next thing, so there's probably people who would disagree with that statement, but,
but they didn't appeal much to me, I have to say, but then I'm not a great laptop user,
I do have a laptop and it gets used, you know, once a month maybe, but it's not, it's not constantly
in use. Yeah, but I think the, the, the, the, the Chromebooks now are a bit different
business now than what they used to be. I'm, I've got a very early, well, I near less Chromebook,
it's now out of date now, my mother, that actually, I've got second hand myself and I,
I should give it to my mother, but it's now since going out, out of date, but, um, I think now that,
as you'll know, they can run, uh, Android apps and they can also run, uh, Linux apps as well
and Linux mode, so that did appeal to me, but, uh, it's funny, I was, I was looking, I thought,
well, I wonder what, because you said to me about, I, I think, Pad, and I, I couldn't remember,
if you recommended the 240 or the 420, so I thought, I wonder what model my mother's got,
so I was actually, I walked down to, to see her today, and, uh, she's got a T62, which is my second hand
cast off, and I said, I said to the, she's got one of these speaker things, so the speaker thing,
which I won't, and say the name of, because my tablet might go daft if I do, but I said, hey,
you know what, um, um, when was the T62 manufacturer something like that? I said, oh,
it was manufactured in 2007, and oh, right, okay, so it's, uh, it's getting on about 2007,
and I said, okay, uh, when was the, the T240 manufactured, and it said, uh, 1999, I thought,
I can't be that one, because actually, even older than my mother's, so that kind of
been more, uh, uh, they was talking about, it must have been the 420, so I asked out, you know,
what was, when was the T420 manufactured, and I said, I don't understand that, I tried again,
and I tried all the different ways, I don't understand that, so I had to get the, the tablet out
and have a look, and it was 2011, I think, actually. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I, I don't really know much about
them, to be honest with you, the reason I mentioned them was because both of my, well, actually,
my two, both my kids and my, and my son's girlfriend had both gone down that, that road, you know,
because there were some really good deals available on, uh, eBay, Euro so back. Yeah, and they got,
I mean, my daughter's machine, uh, is absolutely brilliant for what she needs, you know,
it's small, it's, it's port, well, it's laptop, so it's bound to be portable, two batteries,
it's well-powered, powerful enough for her needs, and, uh, you know, it's, it, I don't know what
it was though, I don't know precisely what model it is, and, um, there were lots of them available,
there probably still are lots of them available from, uh, businesses who bought them, and then
they need to replace them after, uh, sort of, here at a time, and they've become cheaply available
on eBay. Well, I think that, I'm not, I like you, I don't know anything about any of these
thinkpads, I mean, I, I just say years ago, I bought myself a T62, which I gave to my mother,
and, I mean, you know, there's a 13-year-old anyway now, and when I, when I got it, the,
there's a little bit of play on the hinge, and it was like that from day one,
even though the hinge is lovely and stiff and tight, and it still has, um, I don't know if,
where the hinge attaches to the chassis is a tiny bit loose, but it's got no looser,
it's built like a rock, you know, everything just wasn't perfectly on the thing, but it's just,
now getting very slow, consider them, but because I've been, uh, she learns I've been doing it,
and obviously we're just getting fatter and fatter every, all the time, so it does tick off
relative to boot up, and it's a bit wee bit slow. So I just wondered, I mean, the T420, I think there
was ones now, now there may have been, there may have been on eBay, you know, so many days to go,
so maybe that was in the final price, but I was, I was, I think, there's like 80 pounds, 90 pounds,
but, uh, there may be a lot more than that, if you let them go to the final countdown time sort of
thing, so I don't know what they would cost, but yeah, I mean, I, I do like the idea of I think
by the must have met, so I'm, I'm just torn what to do, uh, so that still gives me this problem,
what, what does, what does spend my, I've got, I've got a 400 pound vouchers and nice, nice
problem to have, I must have met by the way. Yeah, yeah, those, those sorts of decisions can be
a lot more difficult, I once found, I'm very good at, not very good at coming up with a solution
to that type of thing, I'm afraid. Yeah, yeah, so, um, I don't know, falling on with it, we're
jumping over the thing, falling on from the technology things, I got to, I got myself, and again,
I feel it's like the guilty for buying it, I try not to buy stuff, you know, but I mean, we all
get hooked into, into the buying new things, you know, so I got myself an electric hand warmer,
would you believe, oh, and that's coming very handy, I can tell you. Well, yes, I saw that, I've never,
the only ones I've ever seen, my daughter was doing the Duke of Edinburgh award,
few years ago, she got up to the final level, in case everybody doesn't know that Duke of Edinburgh
award is a sort of young person's challenge thing where you, you get to different levels of award,
there's a bronze, a silver and a gold one, I think, and you have to do various challenges,
including a lot of, um, things like orienting, she did a, with the group she was with,
she did a walk from Ellipoul in the north of Scotland across to the, the opposite coast on the,
the east, I'm not sure what the area it was, so, you know, long walk camping, et cetera, et cetera.
And she had one of, she had some of these hand warmers that you, you, you put in hot water and
heat them up, and then you click a thing inside the room and releases, releases the heat,
so she found that very useful for herself. Yeah, I mean, I think I've got kind of bad circulation
in my hands anyway, and I've had all kinds of hand warmers, I've got, well, I think I've given
one of these ones that the heat up in the boiling water, but for me, they don't tend to last long enough,
and I didn't think that's what you were going to say. Um, I've also got, um, well, the one,
one of what you were going to talk about was, it was a one where you, it's a sashie, and you,
you take it out the bag, and when air reaches it, it activates itself, and I think people tend to use
them up, up mountainside and stuff, they're like, for serious, the hell walkers, but they last,
you know, nearly the whole day, are that many, many hours, and I think my brother gave me a pack,
which I would never buy myself, because I think it was a physically wasteful, so one off and you
chuck it away, but it's, um, to my mind, it lasts far too long for, for me, I'm not a seashell walk,
I'm not going to go up the mountains for 10 hours, you know, so that wasn't any good. And then
I've got the, I think the, the, the, the best thing I came across was the, the, uh, zippo lighter
hand warmer, and that, that's very good, but, but it's getting it going, it's getting the
wick, it's got a, you know, a catalytic catalytic thing in it, it's, um, sometimes you think you've
got to let it, and it's not, and then sometimes it's lit, and you bump it, and the, the, the, the top
came off and moved the wick, and it cut out, so, but generally speaking, it's, it's pretty good
in that, and you could last it, you can, you can pour as much lighter food than it, or hand warmer
food as you like, and it could last all day, if required, so it's very, very good, but it's,
it's a hassle of, you know, igniting it, and, you know, pouring stuff in,
fiddle under the bed with it, if you're just going to go for a walk, it's a lot of hassle,
where is the electric hand warmer, click on, click off, and that's it, nice and handy that way.
Yes, yes, I think the one my daughter had was just a sort of emergency thing like, you, you,
you had to take one of those, or pair of those, and you had to take a, be the bag, uh, as well,
those types of things were sort of standard issue, right, for, for these types of expeditions,
so, yeah, so it was really, really, and it wasn't even the winter, I think, that she did,
did her last, last walk. Yeah, yeah, of course, I don't know, it's, it's rated that, uh,
10,000 milliamp hours, that the, it's, you can also charge your phone with it and whatnot,
but, uh, I do wonder how long it's going to last, and it tells you, you know, don't,
don't leave it too long without you sort of, or, uh, shorting the life of the battery,
you know, I don't know, to kind of know that anyway, particularly, I knew about not leaving it at
100%, you know, I guess these lipo batteries are, are best, a lot of didn't say in the manual,
but, you know, leave it about 50% charge, if you're going to leave it in, in, in, in, in, in,
at the time, we just, you don't leave it in, in, in, in, at all. So, uh, time will tell whether it,
how, how long it, it, it, it, it lasts, but I've got one of these, um, USB, it's like a read,
a digital display, and it, it, it logs how many milliamp hours, uh, charge it takes,
and, um, it, it, I think it topped out, it, maybe some like 8000 milliamp hours,
so you never get the full capacity from these things, uh, so it's not too bad, you know,
it's, cause, cause, cause it on the sides of it, but, uh, it's pretty much, that's, I'd like eight amps
for one hour, I mean, that's, that's, that's just, just a stound in, you know, it's just the capacity
of these things, so I'm gonna need, no, you know, yes, yes, yes, these, um, lithium-ion battery
things are amazing. I've got several of them, in fact, I was thinking of doing a Raspberry Pi
projector, I wanted to do, you know, set up a camera outside and run it with one of, one of
the smaller ones of those, so you could, you could get them from little for, for just a few
pounds, you know, I've, uh, I can't remember what the rating was, but it should have been enough
to run a small Raspberry Pi for a, for a several days, at least, so, um, and, you know, you said you've
got a, a new Pi thingy, I can't remember what you called it, no, what, what was the Pi thing you've
got with a, here does it, don't match. I've got a Raspberry Pi Pico, which is, um, a different, um,
it's not a Raspberry Pi at all, it just comes from the Raspberry Pi foundation, right? So it's, uh,
it's, uh, microcontroller. It's, it's like, uh, Arduino, in terms of its functionality.
Oh, right. Okay. And, uh, it, these compatible with the Arduino IDE thing that you can use to,
to program it. I haven't actually used, used it yet. I was struggling to get the headers on straight.
I thought I got them on really dead straight, and then I tried to put the thing into a breadboard,
and it wasn't, it was really hard. Oh, yes, yes. That's going to be pretty accurate enough.
Yes, I can understand that. I didn't have a breadboard to hand when I was putting the,
right, a big mistake. So I'm going to have to re, resold them, I think, I think I'd probably put
them lightly into a breadboard, and then heat the whole side, and then, then sort of realign it.
Hopefully. Yeah. Very good, very good. Yeah. That's, that's excellent. Um, good stuff, good stuff.
So yeah. So yeah, there's not a lot to say about at the moment, but you should, you should check it out
if you're interested. Oh, right. You've got plans, but to do something with it, sort of thing.
Yeah. Yeah. I've got, um, actually bought an accessory for the pico, which is a little,
keyboard with LEDs behind it. So it was 16 by 16 keypad thing, and you can plug a pico into it
and get a USB keyboard. I rather fancy the idea of having a USB keyboard plugged into my,
my PC. So you could, I think you can set it up. So it will generate key sequences, or so you can
make it send a whole bunch of keystrokes, or write a program, or something like that, or turn, turn
the sound up or down, or something like that. That was my thinking. All right. Very good. Very,
good. Hi. It's, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's lumped by your own imagination, I guess,
surely. Yeah. I think so. I think so. It's, I don't have a lot of imagination, but
it's, I need to learn how to do this stuff, I think. So it's a, it's an interesting microcontroller.
It's got two cores in it, and it'll sort of talk about running the two in parallel in
interesting ways, which, which sounds, sounds quite, quite fun. I'd quite like to get into that.
I'm not really done. That sort of stuff for a long, long time. So yeah. Yeah. Very good. Yeah. I
mean, there's a thing I, finding, finding a time I find, and, and, as you say, I said as well,
the, the, the motivation is funny, but I kind of, if I heard you say, or somebody said recently,
that, um, that they had this, the conclusion was that the Linux use had dropped by 50% or something
like that during the pandemic. Now, I don't know where, where I've, where I've had that figure
from, but, you know, certainly from my point of view, I could definitely agree to that, you know,
because I, as I say, I can't, I can't get in my PC, and I'm going to do a cat in the
bebother just like that. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know. I don't have any direct experience. So it's,
it's hard to, hard to judge the people I know using Linux a lot, I think, but, uh, and I do,
of course, but my family, you're not interested in, well, it's not strictly true. My family don't
do much Linux, but my son's MSC course requires him to do a fair bit. So he's, uh, he's actually
got into Linux quite a lot, you know, in his, uh, in his course, he's, his course is covering
artificial intelligence and that type of stuff. So, all right. Wow. So fast. The university has,
has virtual servers available for the students, so, and they're all running Ubuntu.
Asked me for a little bit of advice the first few weeks, and then he, then he was way ahead of me,
so that's fine. Yeah. Yeah. This is it. This is it. Yeah. Yeah. I'm really good. Yeah. It's fun.
Yeah. I remember you, you were saying to, to Ken about the, the, the Mars rover using, um,
FFM pickers. That was what Ken said. Yeah. Yeah. That's really good. I didn't even know that.
That's, that's really amazing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I, I use, I've just, I've just kind of,
I was telling, uh, uh, uh, Mrs X about that. And I said, oh, yeah. And of course, I could,
I, I use that to sometimes to do, uh, can, uh, process video as well. And, uh, of course,
it was like, oh, yeah. She has glazed eyes again. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Actually, now I think about
my daughter, uh, daughter is looking to get a job in science communication. That's what her MSC
was in. And she's jobs, jobs are not easy to get these days, but science, science communication
is a, is a booming area. And she's saying, or do you know, I think I need to get into computer
programming. And I'm going, ooh, I have it, because she's not wanted to, it's not needed to get
involved. Uh, I don't know whether she's going to be, um, asking me for advice on, uh, on, um,
Linux and that stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Who knows? Who knows? Yeah. Yeah. Or, uh, or, uh, I don't know,
I'm just, I think, uh, what's that? What is it? I'm trying to remember the, the, the language that
you, you, you, it's not, it wasn't awkward. What was that? I mean, you know, what was that
language that you, uh, you, you, you, you're keen on that, uh, it's, oh, what's it called?
The scripting language I, yeah, most often is probably pearl. Pearl, that's it, yeah. I can't,
I, I, I, I imagine she wouldn't find too much shoes for pearls. I don't, I don't know very much.
Knowing her in her degree, uh, in biology, the student all really needed to learn quite a lot of,
uh, which is, um, uh, a package for doing statistics, but it's, there's a moderate amount of
programming at the level of bringing together bits of the, uh, package in order to make,
you know, to statistical work. Um, right, right. I think to, I think to read the data, I think to
reformat the data, I think to generate statistical methods and sort of stuff. So she, she,
she knows, she knows her way around this type of stuff, but, um, yeah, yeah, very good, very good.
So, uh, I don't know how much, uh, more you want to carry on with us. Um, well,
this list is ridiculously long. Yeah, it does, but we, we're an hour, an hour and 10 minutes
according to me. Yeah, is it? Wow. Hopefully it will trim down a little bit, but, um, yeah,
I'm not happy to carry on. It's, um, we might, it might be, it might be better if we were to, uh,
to wind things down. Yeah. Uh, we could always, uh, trim back the list of stuff and, and check
again in the future. Yeah. I'm, of course, came with, came with like that because I'll get two
shows to the place at once, I think. Absolutely. These are important factors.
Well, I think as, as I say, you're, you're finding it, I don't know, I'm finding it a struggle to,
to pull shows together. I, I must admit, I've got one, I'm, I'm, I'm completely out of
shows because I usually have some shows, um, to, to send in if, if the, the queue gets a bit low,
sort of thing, but I've, I've, I've no spare shows at all. I, although I, I'm working on one,
but which I hope to get pulled together this weekend, but we'll see. So, so, so, yeah, we'll,
we'll see anyway, but yeah, that, that sounds ideal. Yeah. I, I, I, I'm having similar problems
with shows, I should say. I used to be able to produce, you know, about one a month or something
because I, I just still do have a long list of things I'd quite like to do and ideas for series
and that sort of stuff. I cannot bring myself to, to get on with, I'm, I'm working on a final show
on the, said, said, uh, stream editor thingy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. All that would be good. So, a show
six. And, um, I said that when I finished the, when I thought I was finishing the five shows,
that I would try and bring the notes together and make a wee booklet out of it. And I'm,
I'm sort of about 90% of them the way through that. So, I'm hoping to produce an ePub or a PDF
or something or both. That's, that's just what I was going to ask. I said, why don't we form
like you'll, you'll do it. And yeah, that, that, that would be X and actually, yeah.
Well, it would be nice if there was an index. And it would be nice if you could, you could easily,
find stuff. That's one other. I forget a lot of this stuff. You know, I go looking back at my notes
and it's, it's a bit of a struggle to find stuff. So, putting it into a form where you can find
things more easily, I think would be quite a valuable thing. So, I've not, I've not got any,
shears and any of these sort of things, but the book series that I, oh, sorry, sorry, my, my mouse
fell off the push-to-talk button. Oops. I forgot that if my mouse falls, there's a kind of square
and it says push-to-talk, if your mouse slides off it, it unkeys. So, yeah. So, I was just going to say
that I've got pocketbooks and whatnot and I was so impressed with the first one that I bought more.
I don't have any shares or any, you know, linked any of these, but my very first one was a Linux
pocketbook by O'Reilly, you know, on that app. That's great for, I mean, it's just, it gives you,
you know, all the sort of common text process and type, well, and Linux commands and whatnot,
and it's really small and concise. And then after I got that, I thought, well, that's quite handy.
So, I've got other ones. I've got one for great, I've got one for bash, I've got one for Python,
I've got one for said in oak, and said in oak when it's tiny, it's, how many pages is that now?
Oh, it's, I don't know, 35, 40 pages, something like that. So, they're really good and great,
great references. I highly recommend those, you know? So, yeah. Yeah, it's a good thing to have.
I've got a lot of post-its around the place, which reminds me of strange things I have to type
in VIM, because it's my favorite editor. If I want to do things like enclosed the current
paragraph in such and such as, and in many cases, the hacks I've made myself, but I can never
remember how, how to use them, you know? So, yeah, really good. Some means of easy access to
a crib sheet for this type of stuff would be very desirable. Yeah, yeah, I look forward to,
to seeing that when it, when it gets pulled together, that'll be, I'll be excellent. I do
really enjoy it. I mean, the thing is, it's funny things, but it's probably good to be able to
tie it along with it. I never very, really get the chance to do that, but even, even just listening,
it's surprising, I can remember things I've read in the books and say, oh, yeah, I remember that,
I don't know that. So, I still get valuable information and find it really interesting to listen
to, harm the indices or whatever, you know? Good, good. Yes. So, we will get back to doing shows
at some point, but it's been a bit of a struggle, but thank goodness. A lot of people are,
coming stepping up to the plate and sending stuff in. Very much. Of course, yeah, just,
I've got to do what we can, I suppose, and just, you know, it's just, and these,
and these, for the cotton, and these, what was it, what was it for you to freeze again at,
and these times? That's troubling times. That's a, yeah. Very good, very good. All right, then,
let's, let's call a hold at this point. That's been really good. Thank you very much for joining in,
and then having the chat and all that sort of stuff. Yeah, like, like, why is, and I hope,
it's fun. Yeah, it's a good fun. Obviously, I went for, later on, I said, with some points.
So, yeah. All the best for now, then. All right, then. See you later. Bye-bye. Bye-bye, then. Bye.
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