New blog

WordPress for iPad has been updated. Trying to figure out how to use it.

Twitter: the process

There are 4 Stages of Twitter: Confusion, revelation, acceptance, addiction!

Geocaching Flash Mob Event: Market Harborough

Via Scoop.it – Geocaching
A Flash Mob is when a large number of people seem to appear, as if from nowhere, and do something unexpected.

A keen Geocacher arranged an event on June 4th in the centre of Market Harbough. Here are the instructions that potential attendees were given:

Summary

This event is part of the eighth World Wide Flash Mob. Thousands of geocachers will come together at dozens of events around the globe, all gathering at exactly the same time.

Description

At the previous WWFM in May 2010, nearly 6000 people attended 139 events in 19 countries. This event is only 15 minutes long! You MUST be present and sign a log sheet DURING this time to claim the event.

The theme for this Flash Mob is -
‘Mad Hatters and Mexican Waves!’
and it will take place at 18.00hrs on Saturday June 4th in the square in Market Harborough

Provisional timetable -
18.00 – Appear as if from nowhere wearing a silly hat (there will be a prize for the maddest hat!)
18.02 – Place a piece of paper with your caching name on in the Top Hat provided
18.05 – All line up to do a Mexican Wave (back and forth a couple of times with plenty of cheering!)
18.10 – Group photo shoot, then we will draw a name out of the hat for FTF prize
18.15 – Everyone disperse in different directions – leaving confused passers-by wondering what the heck just happened!!!

I have arranged to use the room above The Old Grammer School for an hour or so after the Flash Mob – as a place to meet/chat/swap trackables or just to have a look at the inside of this historic building! See additional waypoint for location

It has been confirmed that Groundspeak are issuing a ‘souvenir’ that goes on your profile, to all WWFM attendees – but you must have submitted your ‘Attended’ log within 2 weeks of the event.
If you don’t feel brave/silly enough to wear a mad hat and do a Mexican wave, don’t worry, come along anyway and laugh at the rest of us!
Additional Hidden Waypoints

OG2VGT3 – Old Grammer School
N 52° 28.705 W 000° 55.277
The Old Grammer School – Please come up the stairs for a drink and chat after the Flash Mob.
PK2VGT3 – GC2VGT3 Parking
N 52° 28.610 W 000° 55.335
This is the nearest large car park – cost 50p for 2 hours parking (free after 6pm) Alternatively there are a few free parking spaces around town if you are lucky enough to find one! (30mins max stay 8 – 6pm)

Passwords

The 10 Most Common iPhone Passcodes (graph) http://t.co/7QoNBDT

Do you use any of the most common?

(Passcodes = Passwords)

Ireland: Problems

As Ireland is in trouble and as an Apple fan, I have an idea.

Why doesn’t Apple just buy Ireland, and call it iLand?

Geocaching: First attempts

Geocaching: A New “Deal”

Many, Many years ago (40) a group of people met for the first time on an adventure holiday, an overland trip to Greece.

During the holiday we became friends and have a reunion from time to time. These are organised when one of our number John Bricher, who thoughtlessly emigrated to Australia visits the UK.

The latest reunion was held around Leicester and Nottinghamshire.

The ladies wanted to chat and the boys wanted to play, so I introduced them to the pleasures of Geocaching, although the first attempt was not to be a pleasure.

We were in Costock, Nottinghamshire at Dick and Sally Sutton’s house. The nearest cache was searched for and we set off. It transpired that the route followed the major A60 road, which had a great deal of traffic and it began to rain.

There were four of us, John Bricher, David Thompson, Dick Sutton and myself.

Due mainly to the rain and only one umbrella, there was significant disagreement as to whether we should press on or abandon. Eventually, we were shamefully rescued by my wife Chris in her car.

Not to be put off, we set out again later (initially by car) and eventually found the cache.

David Thompson showed a deal of interest and I demonstrated that there were caches in a great deal of the world, including some near to where he lives “Deal” in Kent.

One was described as being beside the seaside pier in Deal and gave a hint thus:

“In a red box – on a ridge below “enohpelet” at your right arms length”

David astutely noticed that the strange word in the middle of that sentence was “telephone’ spelled backwards. He said that there was a telephone box on an traffic island near the pier and that he would investigate when he returned there.

A few days later, I received a ‘phone call from David in which he said he was in the said telephone box, but couldn’t find the cache and could he have some additional clues from the data in the Geocaching website (www.geocaching.com). We duly did this and he FOUND the cache. It took about 10 minutes and in my mind’s eye there was a queue of people waiting outside the box, wanting to use it, whilst watching someone inside the box carrying out a telephone conversation on his mobile ‘phone. Also he was searching the interior of the box minutely, fingertip by fingertip, almost forensically.

That mission being accomplished, I mentioned that there was a cache on the international Space Station (really) and sent him on his way. It was at almost exactly this time that the Space Shuttle was launched for the last time, but David missed the flight!

Here are the actual notes that David sent to me:

“The cache was discovered this morning, but disaster, my mobile’s memory was full as a result of a surge of recent e-mails. Hence the photographic evidence is incomplete. I Will take another photo over the weekend.

Cache needed a second fingertip search to finally locate as I was not expecting such a small container.

The queue for the phone could not extend too far, primarily due to the heavy traffic circulating the roundabout.”

Till next time, this one was no big DEAL

Changing Money in Communist Czechoslovakia

It was before the Berlin Wall came down, Communism was the norm, Czechoslovakia was under Russian control and all that entailed. It was not expensive to stay in Czechoslovakia and this factor and the country’s highly regarded scientific expertise made it a convenient place to hold a conference.

To set the persona involved Kevin Feltham accompanied me. Without being too conceited I believe that both of us are adept at arithmetic. Indeed Kevin has a PhD which involved a good deal of computer programme writing, involving fairly complex calculations. Remember this was in the 1970′s, pre-Microsoft.

In those days, exchanging currency in countries of Soviet States was difficult to say the least. Foreign currency transactions were severely restricted and confined to official channels at fixed and favorable exchange rates. (Within a few years, the exchange rate had lost its historical basis and no longer bore any direct relationship to purchasing power in other currencies).

There were limits of cash that could be exchanged and pertinently exchanges had to be made at the “Official” rate and at a Bank..

We weren’t exactly out of cash when we strolled over the famous Charles Bridge, a highlight of the Prague scene. A man sidled up to us and said in English “Would you like some money?” Who could resist answering “Yes” which one of us did.

Kevin produced a £10 and a £5 note. The man’s eyes lit up and he quoted a rate of 90 Koruns to the pound which was nearly five times the “Official” rate. We must have agreed, don’t forget our Czech language skills were limited. He then proceeded to place wads of notes in Kevin’s pockets, not one pocket but several. This was done in a very underhand and surreptitious manner.

We felt rich at this point and decided to find a bar in which to celebrate. By our calculation we should have had 1,350 Koruns. I began to count the contents of one of Kevin’s pocket and that one pocket alone contained over 1000. There more more pockets to emptied and their contents counted. There was a total of 10,000 Koruns, so we had £500 at the “Official” rate for a £15! The man had made a mistake and given us seven times the unofficial Black Market rate.

Shocked and confused we ordered another beer each. We quickly calculated that a beer which cost 50p at the Official rate was costing us about 0.5p!

We did really look for the tout, really, mainly because we thought that he would be looking for us! We didn’t find him but we did pass a shop which sold hats. Kevin thought that a hat might disguise us somewhat so we went inside and bought two hats, for about 2p each.

You’d think that we would be in a wonderful predicament, lots of money to spend, but… There was nothing to spend it on. The hat shop for example sold only one style of hat. We went into a Department store and could only find a great mound of hard rubber discs, about 10,000 at a guess. They were Ice-Hockey pucks, we really should have bought one as a souvenir. I fact we probably could have bought all of them.

Beer was almost free to us, and there is only so much one can drink, though we did try.

The other problem was that we couldn’t change it back into Pounds Sterling, as this was against the law. We did exchange some with two of our close colleagues at the conference, Barry & Claire. Th exchange rate we agreed with them was 30 Kroums to the pound & they thought they had a good deal. So we had our original sterling back.

We did eat out at the best restaurants we could find. We didn’t understand the menu items but didn’t really need to, we merely ordered the most expensive things.

There was some cash remaining when we had to return to the UK, what did we do with it?

This happened about 40 years ago and I’ve forgotten many details and I’m hoping someone reading this (esp Messers Professor Sneath, Sackin) will remember exactly when and which conference it was that we attended and any other memories.

My colleague Dr Kevin Feltham has read the above and has added the following:

It was the first trip to Prague, and I seem to recall spending most of the remainder, after drinking and eating as much as we could, on some souvenirs – e.g. I bought a painting at the shop near the castle which would normally have cost £50 or so, but I ended up buying at our exaggerated exchange rate for around £7

Help: What are the benefits of the Blog?

I’ve been asked to give a presentation to a group of senior citizens about “ Benefits of New Technology”. The person who asked me to do this said that this blog was an example of such a benefit.

I have my own ideas but what do you think I should include? Any suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Seniors Computing

Unusual: What’s not there?

This is an unusual paragraph. I’m curious as to just how quickly
you can find out what is so unusual about it. It looks so ordinary and
plain that you would think nothing was wrong with it. In fact, nothing
is wrong with it! It is highly unusual though. Study it and think
about it, but you still may not find anything odd. But if you work at
it a bit, you might find out. Try to do so without any coaching!

Scottish Accents and Language

Several years ago a lady friend of ours spent 6 months in Zimbabwe. She returned with a Southern African accent, which stayed with her for a year or so, gradually diminishing.

Last week I stayed in a ski chalet with 5 other men. All the men were from Scotland, and frankly I had difficulty understanding them and I was concerned that I may return to the UK speaking with a Scottish accent.

I don’t really know the difference between an accent and a dialect. I thought that if different words were used for exactly the same meaning, it was a dialect. If so, in this case it was a dialect. For example, for the word “No” the guys said “Nay”.

It may not have been a dialect even, it may have been another language. I do speak some French and if they had been speaking that language I would possibly have understood more.

I probably didn’t understand one word in three and at first had to keep asking them to repeat themselves. This they did, a repetition of the phrase exactly, so I still didn’t understand. They must have thought I was dense or deaf. Maybe I am?

We had 2 chalet girls looking after us and lo and behold, Sophie quickly admitted that she was born and spent her early years in Scotland. There was an English Chalet girl, Jess, so I wasn’t totally alone. I asked Sophie if the Scots could understand me and she affirmed that they could. I can’t really follow that logic, can anyone explain?

The five guys did not live in the same areas of Scotland and it was pointed out to me that I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t understand, at times, they could’t understand each other, ie the Glaswegians could not understand the Aberdonians.

To complicate matters of the 6 men, 3 were called Michael,….. I think ….