bob's ramblings

things

• ive been trying to use zoxide instead of cd this week
• we had a our leaky bath tap replaced on friday. we replaced it with a thermostatic tap. its great. no more running the risk of the bath being too cold because i turned the cold tap to far.
• my digestive system has not loved me this week. im swinging between constipation and diarrhea. hopefully it will calm down this week.
• while dealing with a banking thing I found out that the Faster Payments system doesnt like it when you have an apostrophe in your account name
• i could have done without dealing with the banking thing. its yet another sign of my dad's failing memory
• kake dyed yet another shirt for me.
• yesterday I made RGL read only for the general public so that we don't have to worry about the Online Safety Act hopefully. While doing this I worked out an issue I was having with basic auth for the edit instances of several of things based on openguides. As an aside chatgpt got the puppet for this wrong.
• i got annoyed with a password reset page

links

links i saved to my bookmarks that others may find interesting

• Here’s how I use LLMs to help me write code by Simon Willison.
• My Scammer Girlfriend: Baiting A Romance Fraudster. Interesting look into how romance scams work
• Super Nintendo Hardware Is Running Faster as It Ages

videos

videos i think you might find interesting (quite a lot this week and there were a couple i didnt include)

• 750-day Dry Aged Ribeye Primal
• Chinese Egg Salads
• A keyboard with ten hundred keys
• 20 years of Badgers Must have missed this last year.
• Podcast where Katee Sackhoff talks to Ron Moore lots of interesting things about Star Trek, Star Wars and Battlestar Galactica
• Rave with Trumpton
• How much progress have we made on climate change?
• An interesting video about a Quake Speed run

thoughts

( bullying )

things

• worked out how to make our scripts not output info messages if being piped or redirected. basically the test -t knows stuff.
• added card cam to my trivial pursuit videos using DroidCam
• watched the arnold strongman classic
• wrote up what books i finished in 2025-02
• trying to decide if i want to go and see a burlesque parody of star wars in London in June.

links

links i saved to my bookmarks that others may find interesting

• No one is born knowing how to chop an onion
• The least secure TOTP code possible and Towards a test-suite for TOTP codes
• ( content warning: bad things )

videos

videos i think you might find interesting

• Perfect Steak Frites At Home
• Andor | Season 2 Trailer
• A katsu curry fountain
• Easy Ways to Weather, Rust & Age Your Projects
• Two Regular Guys in Mos Eisley Cantina

things

• downloaded all our kindle books using BulkKindleUSBDownloader
• probably played OMG Words a bit to much
• my total number of uniques on untappd has dropped to 4999. A beer must have been merged. I still have my badge for 5000 though.
• dealt with far to many incidents which does bascially suck my will to live

links

links i saved to my bookmarks that others may find interesting

• Growing Up Murdoch
• Why Canada’s Oil Sands Aren’t Coming Back

videos

videos i think you might find interesting

• Bolero - The Breaking Winds Bassoon Quartet
• building an accurate mitre fence
• A STRONG WOMAN | The Truth Behind the World’s Strongest Women (Full Documentary)
• Airwolf theme tune
• Noodles in Nigeria
• Tripe!
• Will Anderson and Josk Sokol talk about a scrabble game they recently played

This weeks Friday Five

1) Do you like your birth-name? Why?

Mostly. It being a common first name means I don't go by it much. There were 5 Roberts in my class at first school so we went by our Last Names mostly. My family still call me Robert. My friends from School mostly call me Rob unless they remember I go by bob these days. At uni I introduced myself as bob and thats how you all probably know me. I get slightly annoyed at my middle name because its a variant spelling which means I keep on having to correct its spelling in legal documents. My middle name is Jeffery and people write Jeffrey a lot instead.

2) If you could change your name to anything else, what would it be?

I mean I've made that choice and its bob.

3) What names would you consider giving your children?

So, this is the main reason I decided to do this Friday Five. I'm not going to have children for many reasons but the answer I give is that until I stop thinking that giving any children a middle name of Sky and then one of Luke, Leia, Anakin, Jacean and Jaina as their first name is a good idea I probably shouldn't have kids. (My last name is Walker and I like Star Wars)

4) If you had a band, what would you name it, and why?

pass

5) Is there a name that you completely hate? Why?

I get upset if people call me Robbie.

books i finished

• Throwing the Book by Wayne Barnes Enjoyed this one.
• Permissionless by JA Westenberg A good read especially in conjunction with Platformland. It does get a bit libertarian and there are points where it is noticeable that the author didn't ask the permission of an editor(It gets a touch repetitive with the examples).
• All 5 books in the Bobiverse so far These were all good and hard to put down. They led to several 'oh shit i should have gone to bed 2 hours ago' moments.
• How Infrastructure Works: Inside the Systems That Shape Our World by Deb Chachra Finally finished this after having stopped a while back. Its a good book and you should read it.
• Le Coq: A Journey to the Heart of French Rugby by Peter Bills I really enjoyed this look into french rugby.
• Trap and Trace by Megan Carney Pretty good thriller and I've bought the others in the series. Was good that the main character wasn't a man.
• The Space Between Worlds by Micaiah Johnson Got through this quite quickly. Certainly going to try the sequeul

books i'm currently reading

• From Hackerville with Love by Megan Carney
• Platformland: An Anatomy of Next-Generation Public Services by Richard Pope Taking my time with this one since its a work related book. Its a good read though if you are into Digital Government stuff which I am. (Yes I do know Richard since we were at GDS at the same time)

Since the GBBF is once again not running and I'm still not ready for indoor spaces which are not our house its time for another addition of bob's good beer festival.

This year I intend to take it at a better pace so that I don't have the repercussions I did last year (turn up and you can ask about them). Therefore I intend to do only 8 hours a day with plenty of time for food and stuff.

The timetable is currently (all times in BST):

• 2021-08-10 - 13:00-17:00 and then 19:00-23:00
• 2021-08-11 - 13:00-17:00 and then 19:00-23:00
• 2021-08-12 - 13:00-17:00 and then 19:00-23:00

I may spend the lunchtime sessions on alcohol free beer or I may not.

If you would like to drink some of the beer I will be drinking I bought the following cases.

The 24 beer pack of alcohol free dark beers: https://wisebartender.co.uk/dark-beers-12-or-24-beer-wise-pack-save-5-2185-p.asp

A box of 15 boring beers: https://www.bestofbritishbeer.co.uk/mixed-cases/case-of-15-traditional-bitters.html

If you would like to drop into the zoom call which will be running for all the sessions contact me via email/twitter/comment here and I will let you know what the zoom call details are.

Where did you travel on your last vacation or other big trip?

Japan for the rugby world cup, it was awesome

What was the best trip you ever took? Where did you go, and with whom, and what made it so good?

Probably Japan, with my dad. Japan is awesome

Where do you dream of traveling on your next vacation when it's safe to travel again?

I'm contemplating several places in South America. (After that I only have Antarctica to tick off continent wise)

Where are you likely to actually travel to on your next vacation when it's safe?

Australia/Spain

Do you prefer to vacation to new places each time or to familiar places -- or maybe you prefer to stay home?

All of the above. they all have their merits and it depends on what I want from that holiday.

things i did

• ate pizza for my leaving lunch
• left GDS after 5 years and 24 days
• gave my own leaving presentation
• looked very purple
• drank a lot of beer
• slept on the sofa for 2 hours
• had pie and mash
• had the tips of my hair dyed again
• had bad anglicised cantonese
• got very cold walking from London Bridge to dxw
• joined dxw
• had a disappointing lunch on my first day
• increased the number of stickers on my door
• only had 5 hours sleep two nights in row
• had free pizza at work
• had things disrupted by the snow
• been surprised at actually having already got my P45 from shared services
• worried about being too opinionated in meetings
• been anxious about if I've made the right choice
• increased the length of todo list by quite a lot.

next week

• be opinionated in meetings
• reassure myself I've made the right choice
• have lunch with my dad at Hawksmoor for his birthday
• explore more of the food around hoxton square
• drink beer at someone else's leaving drinks

• Today and Tomorrow at the GBBF.
  
• Thursday to Monday at Loncon 3.
  
• Tuesday at the Oval.