2 days late after a weekend in london, followed by flying stuff.

Monday over to dad's for another xmas family get together. I finally managed to get the spikey thing out of the cage, and back in again. I bought this just before xmas from hawkins bazaar when shopping for presents. Interesting exercise in symmetry.

Tuesday we went into town for some (window) shopping therapy.

Wednesday up early for a slope soaring trip to the peak district with Lee and Simon. We went to the callow bank slope, near hathersage. Very close to the road at the top of the hill. Looks like it would work best in a W wind. We had a bit too much S and about 15-20mph. An unfortunate shadow hill in front not helping. A smoking chimney stack on the far hill makes a very good wind direction indicator. I flew the stiletto a bit, went too far back for the landing and crashed quite close to the cars, shearing both tail horns. The wing came away cleanly with the nylon screw, as it's supposed to and blew away - minimal damage really. Someone local turned up with a big glass ship, suggesting we move over to the ridge on the left. This we did. A very steep rocky outcrop, with stacks of lift right in front, but the air leaks around the sides, making it very hard to get back. I lost side of the zagi to the right, eventually finding it some distance away. No sign of the left fin, but I have a couple of spares. We had lunch after in hathersage at the pool cafe.

Thursday with carol visiting her parents, a quiet day at home for some tidying up. Closer inspection of the stiletto revealed a stripped left aileron servo. Hitec hs60 servos are obsolete now, but the wing cavity is carefully built for a snug fit.

Fiday we went into town for lunch. Found some hs60s at sussex-model-centre.co.uk, but they won't arrive before the next long mynd trip. Stripped the servo down and turned the penultimute gear through 180 degrees. Seems to be working OK now. Lots "new year" of fireworks between 22:00 and midnight.

Saturday, new year's day, we went to oxford to get the espess from the thornhill park and ride to london. Car park a bit cratered, but good value at £1.80 for 3 days. Return fare to park lane only £15. We spent most of the afternoon in the orgy of shopping that is oxford street. I was impressed by the size of selfriges. Started to rain quite heavily as we headed to where we were staying at the lse in rosebery avenue, finsbury. Fairly grotty 70s style student accommodation, but reasonably cheap (for london). We went out to eat, finding a strada italian very close by. Excellent tasty food with good service - they even knocked money off the bill for being a bit slow, which we hadn't noticed. They had a real wood fired pizza oven. Even had some real italian customers. Noisy night with people coming back at 03:00 in the morning.

Sunday morning nice and bright and sunny as we walked east past the barbican to see the spitalfields market. Then south over tower bridge, lunch at a pub, west past the golden hinde and the globe theatre to the tate modern. Didn't actually know where it was until we saw it on the map. Refreshingly free entry, except some rather expensive ticket only rooms. Not too impressed by the sound installation in the turbine hall, even after realising you need to walk down the middle. The video of a bowl of fruit decaying was a fairly obvious idea. Probably the best thing about it is the views of the city from the windows near the top. Dark when we came out. Over the (non wobbly) millennium bridge to the brilliantly lit st paul's. Then down fleet street and the strand, past the royal courts. There was an ice skating rink in the somerset house area. By now with blistered feet we were looking for a sit down eg. cinema. A dodgy bit of map reading took us into the middle of st james's park, before going back up pall mall. We saw some russian film in haymarket. Walked back up shaftesbury avenue to the lse. Another noisy night.

Monday we walked back down shaftesbury avenue for some more shopping before heading home. Bought the voice of the beehive dvd don't call me baby from virgin at piccadilly. Had a quick look in hamleys toy store in regent street. We had lunch and got straight onto an espress bus at park lane about 14:00 (they run every 15 mins). Home 2hrs 40mins later.

Tuesday off to the long mynd. 6 in the bus. Light rain as forecast, but lots of W wind straight onto pole cott. The rain came and went. The sun came out later and the wind got a bit smoother. Very much a day for aerobatics with extra ballast and zagi combat. A few minor breakages.

Back to normal red colour scheme for the new year.

Wednesday my hs60 servos arrived. Also my hp4150 pocket pc from simply - less than 2 days. Back to work. Attempting to install outlook 2002 went off the rails as often happens. I found I had broken the idisgo. Taking it flying in my bag with headphones plugged in put too much pressure on the 3.5mm socket, which has now broken away from the pcb. Attempts so far to reconnect it have failed - so many tiny tracks that aren't there any more.

Thursday I got outlook installed correctly and configured to do email how I like it, and installed active sync. Also fitted the lithium ion cell to the 4150. By default it fires up when you touch anything eg. before I had the battery cover back on. Anyway, it has a wonderfully clear, bright screen, and the menus are fairly intuitive. Had a lot of trouble lining up the connector on the cradle to charge it up. Interestingly there is a nimh backup battery in there too. It seems a lot of stuff is held in ram, so it must have power all the time. I guess the right way to look at it is as a volatile copy of master data on the main pc.

Friday I went to see the film alexander. 3 hours is a long time, but still large parts of the story missing eg. no gordian knot, no building of the many alexandrias. The general feel of the greeks and macedonians is reminiscent of some children's story book, but you get used to it after a while. Not helped by the irish accents, although I suppose without sub titles you can have whatever you like. All of the main characters are badly miscast and inconvincing, especially alexander himself. Like most true stories, the plot doesn't so much develop in a satisfying way, as degrade into despair. This probably why a key event ie. the death of his "father" is shown out of sequence, near the end. Angelina as his mum, olympias is rather good, although I don't understand why she has a russian accent. The battle scenes are shown in a ver jerky camera way, possibly for effect, or to hide some of the horror, but it just makes it impossible to see what's happening. Given the facts of the sexuality of the time, it is curious that the only real scene is with his persian wife. In the end, I suppose it does a reasonable job of telling the all too familiar story of barbarians from the north taking over the civilised world, then collapsing in paranoia and anarchy. It makes troy look really good.

Saturday morning I finished watching (10mins at a time over breakfast) the master and commander dvd. I had bought this at xmas for dad, but he already had it. Went into town for lunch before helping adrian with a new washing machine. Decided to give the indoor flight a miss, as I really need some tidy up time.

Sunday a trip down the tip with the old washing machine and our old microwave.

Sunday I managed to get the 4150 synced up and copy a few files across.

Monday over to dad's to sort out his isp connection and email account on his new pc.
Had some trouble syncing up again. It seems it is important to connect the usb cable after power up.

Wednesday I put new control horns and the zagi and stuck the tail back on the stiletto. Also, put extra fixing holes in the zagi fins, as they tend to get bashed off too often. Had a look at freeware for the pocket pc at pocketpcfreewares. Downloaded a space invaders game. Could do with a decent scientific calculator, curiously absent by default. Who do they thnk are buying these things ?

The long mynd soaring association site has been revamped.

Friday we went to see the film team america:world police. Very good it was too. The not so supermarionation obviously a nod to gerry anderson, deliberately clumsy at times, but the all important faces improved with moving jaw. Some nice surprises in the plot, but the traditional ending was a disappointment. Strangely, it steered well clear of US politics, targetting just about evryone else instead, although actors seemed a particular favourite. Stand out moment was the philosophical monologue on dicks, pussies and assholes. Go see.

Friday the huygens probe "successfully" negotiated the atmosphere of titan and soft landed. Actually 1 of the radio channels didn't work and half the photos were lost. Also, they were lucky to get anything at all after the comms to cassini were set to slightly incorrect frequency by mistake. Still, better than beagle. Results so far just as boring as you might expect ie. it's a very cold rock.

Saturday into town for lunch. Took the pda to a wifi "hotspot" (identified by www), but the staff seemed to know nothing about it. Bought the shaun of the dead dvd because it was reasonably cheap and it's supposed to be good.

Sunday nice and sunny. 2x round the village circuit and cleaned the car.

Updated the showcase and odeon links to point directly at the sites instead of cwn after finding it to be out of date.

Spent a few days watching the film the right stuff, on tv recently. A good look at the early days of chuck yeager and supersonic aircraft, and the 1st US people in space. Some interesting little nuggets of info, like the fact that the 1st man up was sitting in a very wet spacesuit. Probably lots more in the original tom wolfe book, sadly out of print, although a new hardback coming later this year. Some nice shots of the starfighter too. Tempted by the dvd.

Had a proper look at dad's toshiba laptop battery pack. I had to break into the case. Isolated the chain of 10x 4000mAh nimh cells from the control board (doesn't work very well with no supply). 2 devices in series with the chain. I guess 1 was a self resetting trip, and the other a higher rated fuse. Some cells seemed to have no volts at all. About 2.65V across the lot. 1st charge at 1A cut out after a few minutes. Discharge and 2nd charge went all the way, taking a little over 4000mAh ending up about 14V. I measured the current taken by the control board at 0.3mA, which is trivial compared to the self discharge of nicads and nimhs.

Also had a go at fixing the idisgo. I actually got it working at 1 point, but after glueing the connector down, trying to solder some relatively enormous bypass wires to some of the teeniest smc components I've ever seen on almost invisble tracks and pads just did too much damage. Oh well.

Had a look at alan davey's bedouin site and downloaded the sampler track vision quest. Similar sound to hawkwind.

Friday decided to give the elektra film a go. A bit of a waste of time. It's just not very special. Reads very much like a sequel to daredevil, without the main character. Elektra still badly miscast as a raven haired greek played by a blond scandinavian US type.
Finished watching shaun of the dead. Not as good as it's supposed to be, or the tv spaced series. Spoiled a bit by all the well known faces. Still, entertaining enough.

Saturday bought the right stuff dvd.

Sunday frosty and sunny. Time for some tidying up. Found the v tail parts for the glider version of the simply the best. Might have to finish building it now.

Sunday I got the pda looking at the internet through the usb connection to the main pc and its dial up. Not particularly quick but quite good for a small screen (240x320). Seemed to make no attempt at java stuff. Ordered the bedouin cd and some more memory for the pda.

Wednesday cold and frosty, the car failed to start. Jumped it with the flight battery successfully. Bought a new 1 to fit at the weekend. As far as I know the old 1 is the original dating back 103000+ miles and 9+ years.

In updating the avg virus files, I found version 6 is obsolescent and needs replacing with v7. Still free though.

Thursday went to work up north and flew the swift at lunchtime with simon and his new nano floh electric - in the rain and the mud..

There's a new mpeg of goddess from skew siskin. There was supposed to be a dvd by now.

Saturday tried to fit the new battery on the car, but there are some special fittings on the terminals, which make disconnection really easy, but not a new battery. Looks like they were crimped on at manufacture. Put some more water in the old battery for now. Some of the cells were merely damp. Seems to be working ok in the warmer conditions.
Went down the pub in the evening. Actually seemed to be reasonably busy. Heard an owl on the way back.

I seem to have acquired the sore throat that is going round at work.

Sunday another damp grey day. Tidied up a bit and trimmed the trees at the back.

New links within the home page to get you to scroll down past the news.

February.

Monday got some extra battery connectors. Now I can see how they work, I think they would come off and go back on ok. Still easier with new bits.

Downloaded pocketmvp for the pda. It supports far more formats than the default windows media player. Still can't fit much on there without more memory.

Friday, sort of sunny and relatively warm, I took advantage of the daylight and put the new battery on the car. Now spins the motor very nicely. Also (jump) started the bike again.

Saturday we went to town with lots of garden cuttings in the back of the van. We might get a bit more sun this year.

In the evening I went to fly the hornet at the cadmac indoor flight session. About half helis these days. 4 examples of a new 1 - the trex. Slightly larger and very smooth. Mechanically very much like a scaled down raptor, with the forward mounted servos and complex linkages to the rotor swash plate. I put 3 charges (down to about 11V) through the hornet. Managed some rough rh circiuts from a nose in hover, over to the left and back to nose in hover, but no complete 8s yet. Getting occasional sudden tail swings, which I think are the tail drive shaft locking up inside the broken (and rather flexibly taped up) tail boom. Also, any dramatic moves end in a rather unstable gyration that takes quite a bit of settling down. I think this is just because it is a fixed pitch heli and any change in main rotor revs results in a tail swing, which the gyro can't really cope with. Really need a collective pitch heli, but they are so expensive, even now. I was watching chris flying using the finger and thumb technique. Must have a go at that.

Sunday afternoon some of the damp dried out and I took the bike for 2x round the village circuit. Also cleaned the inside of the car.

Ditched a few dead links.

5000+ hits.

Tuesday morning my secure digital 1Gb memory card and the bedouin cd arrived from amazon, but no time to play with them - too busy packing planes into the car and off to the mynd.
7 in the bus. A good run got us to church stretton quite early in sunshine, although still murky up the hill. Car park attendant doing the rounds, although of course we always pay the 30p. SSW wind as forecast put us on ashes hollow. Still a bit bad visibility at 1st, gradually clearing with even sunshine at times, which is not too helpful when you're facing south. A bit more W than ideal meant rough air from the other side of the valley at times, but plenty of lift. Lots of flying. Lee actually managed to completely discharge his zagi, but recharged at the van and back for more. Simon having a great time with the nano floh electric (with the prop off), doing lots of aerobatics. I got asked to trim a sports filip 400 aileron thing, which I did with just a few clicks of left trim and a bit of down. It was a bit lively in the lumpy air and I soon got the Tx passed back in time to recover it from too close to the slope. Handed it back, only for it to come back again. 2nd time I didn't catch it soon enough and it got crunched, with a full chord compression crease in the left wing - oops. I flew the zagi, filip 400 and stiletto. When I got home the remaining teeth had stripped from the lh wing servo - time to swap the whole gearbox. I seem to have lost my lh big glove somewhere - not those I use for flying, but for warming up in between.

Back home plugged the memory into the pda and turned on. It came up with no fuss as "storage card 970.63M". No formatting. Moved some mp3 and mpegs onto it. Seems you can't map it directly to the shared area on the main pc. Have to shuffle everything through the 64M ram instead. I suppose I could get a card reader, but I don't really want to keep taking it out. Access to flash is not as fast as ram.

The bedouin cd dates back to 2002. Not the latest - not available at amazon yet. Some high quality sounds in among the space rock, but lacking some of the singalong hooks of hawkwind.

Saturday up early(ish) to catch the new cgi captain scarlet, hidden somewhere inside 2hrs of kid's nonsense programming. Short as it was, they still had to cut it in 2, presumably because they think the audience has a minimal attention span. Anyway, it was very good. CGI not up to final fantasy standard, particularly the people and stuff like grass, but the vehicles were great - the 1st shot of the angel falcon aircraft with reflections off the canopy was really good. It felt a bit edited for pace, as the mars trip seemed a bit rushed. New incidental music and voices were not out of place. A female lieutenant green works well.

Bought some £5 headphones from tesco to go in the sandwich box with the pda.

Sunday had a look at the stiletto stripped servo. Soon as I turned it on, it started working ok - I think it just got pushed off the end of the remining teeth in the van. Mixed in a bit more negative flap for landing purposes, and recovered the rather battered nose. My glove turned up too.

Tuesday morning I finished wading through the war and peace film that was on recently. I knew napoleon had made a disastrous retreat through the russian winter, but not that he had actually taken moscow. I expect there's a lot more in the book. The film seemed to be mostly a vehicle for audrey hepburn. After work into town to buy the farscape dvd peacekeeper wars. Curiously absent from the shelves in tesco.

Friday 1 turned 46. We went to withybrook to eat. They've gone no smoking now.

Saturday sunny, bright and breezy with fluffy clouds, we went to oxford. For a change we went to the right off the park and ride bus, down towards the theatre. Had lunch at bella italia, which was quite good if a bit expensive. I realised that it was actually underneath where the stage club used to be - the (not very) highpoint of my musical adventures. We carried on through the bus station, taking some unusual streets and alleyways in loop round to the coffee and ice cream place opposite christchurch, which was so busy that we went underground.

The conclusion of the 1st episode of the new cgi captain scarlet was rather good. Captain black has become more of a main character, than the monosyllabic original.

Sunday similar weather. We spent all afternoon dismantling the polytunnel for the move to a new allotment. Managed to get most of it into the van just as it started to rain.

Started the massive task of ripping most of my cds onto the pc (again). A lot of them were done some time ago and the mp3 output won't play in win media player (silent) although they work fine with winamp. The pda has the same problem with pocketmvp. Up to g so far.

Snow on the way apparently. Frogs are stirring in the pond.

Monday bought the hero dvd. Looks very pretty, but whether the story stands up remains to be seen.

Saw the 1st peacekeeper wars dvd. Pretty much carries straight on from the tv series. Up to the usual standard. Clearly trying to drag together some of the many loose ends of the plot.

Tuesday hero did not disappoint. Started with the english, but quickly switched to the superior in original with sub titles. Some of the most beautiful imagery I have ever seen. The use of colour is a bit strong, but impressive. The fighting is as silly as usual, but well done. By the time of the 1st twist it started to get really interesting. See it.

The much anticipated snow turned out be rather pathetic and wet.

I see the millau bridge webcam is up now.

Saturday the 1st non introduction episode of captain scarlet was rather weak in the plot department. I see the anderson tradition of reusing sequences is in place eg. the scrambling of the angels.

CD ripping has progressed to l.

Sunday nice and sunny for 1x round the village circuit. Decided against the 2nd as the wind was very cold and the chain drive was rather noisy and kept dropping out of gear. Probably something to do with having half a poytunnel leaning against it.

Forecast -7 tonight.

Monday off to italia (work). M6 flowing reasonably well, and parked up in multi storey 2 (prebooked) in good time. Flight delayed by 30 mins. Stood waiting for F. By the time we made contact the flight had already closed. However, with no bags, they let me through. We flew alitalia from birmingham to malpensa outside milano. Only 3 seats across the fuselage labelled AJL ? The snow covered alps were very pretty, and we descended over snowy fields and varese. We drove down the autostrade through cold brilliant white sunshine acoss the plains to the hills and tunnels north of genova. Stayed at the grand hotel arenzano. Not too busy, so a sea view over the mediterranean, just the other side of the road - very nice. Too hot and dry in the room, even with the air conditioning off, but ok with window open a bit, with the sound of breaking waves on the beach.

Tuesday after work we went into the centre of genova to eat. Extremely cold in the windchill around the historic port and aquarium area. Nice to see the place again - Last there in 1999.

Wednesday we ate at the ristorante officina at the top of the hill above the hotel.at arenzano. TV reports (cnn) of -18 degrees in germany.

Didn't get much time to use it, but the pda did an excellent job as an mp3 player.

Thursday morning sounded like rain outside. During breakfast it turned to sleet and then snow. Heading for work through the increasingly heavy snow, we found the motorway almost stationary and the entrance closed. Gave up and went back to the hotel. Walked around arenzano a bit in the snow and had lunch. Trying again, we got onto the motorway and decided to make an attempt at getting to the airport for home. Actually it was quite clear and we arrived with 4 hrs to spare. During the wait, repeated warnings of delayed and cancelled flights to central europe. Even so, after a 30 min queue to check in, our flight was supposed to be only 15 mins late at 21:20. At the gate there was a wifi hotspot, but it wanted 6.5 euro minimum - hmm. I noticed the aircraft's name was enrico fermi. We sat on the aircraft for over an hour while they tried to close the main door properly. Lots of slamming, banging, tipping kettles of hot water on it etc. Eventually the de icer truck came out to us - not sure whether that was for the door, or to do the aircraft again. We finally took off about 22:45, just 20 mins short of claiming the new 250 euro compensation. Mainland europe quite dark, but saw london with the familiar snake of the thames. Also milton keynes with its 4 rows of shopping centre. Finally got home at 00:45.

Friday too tired to see otway.

Saturday too busy for indoor flight.

Sunday out to shilton for a family meal.

Still not seen the 2nd peacekeeper wars dvd.

1st part of the new paul whitehouse and chris langham tv thing help was rather good. He manages to be unrecognisable in some of the roles.

CD ripping not progressed much ie. m.

Monday bought the alien v predator dvd (2 disk). Not much of a story, but the photography/effects is worth a 2nd look.

Tuesday off to the mynd. 9 in the bus. NNW put us on the darnford slope. A reasonable amount of wind, but you never really get much lift from there. A bad launch of the siesta saw it zooming up to a stall, probably bad trim through sharing a Tx setting. Got the down in, but with very little airspeed it slid off to the side and cartwheeled in. Nylon wing screw sheared nicely and saved the wing, but the left v tail broke off again. Oh well, perhaps I can stick it back on at the right angle this time. Flew the other 3. Managed 12 consecutive loops with the filip, even brief inverted flight. Good visibility, but lots of cloud, and very little sun. Lots of flying - I think everyone had something in the air at 1 point.

Wednesday feeling a bit off, possibly from the cold on the hill, but more likely bugs going round at work, or in italia.

Friday much frog balling in the pond. Usual type with the silvery underside.

Started using a usb reader for the secure digital memory card. Makes drag and drop much easier, although it is not good having to keep removing/inserting it.

Saturday we saw a remarkable film on bbc4 cuckoo. A russian, a finn conscripted by the germans, and a lapp woman thrown together at the end of the 2nd war. All talking at each other in 3 different languages. bbc4 is excellent for this stuff - no need to visit the arts centre for it now.

Sunday at last saw the 2nd peacekeeper wars dvd. Ho hum. Lots of running around blasting, and an ending of sorts, but some left open..

CD ripping progressed to r.

Monday a minor cold, but coughing all week.

Spring has sprung. Either that or skipped it to go straight to summer, with temperatures of 18 degrees.

Tuesday morning there were a couple of ducks out front. Looked like the female was looking to nest in the lavender. Not a good idea. I think it moved on once the cars started moving.

Friday morning looking out to see the birds temporarily leave the food in the garden, saw a pheasant there. It took off too, but they take a lot of space to get into the air. In the evening we went over to withybrook to eat. Took rather a long time to get there with carol sweeping the road for toads on the way. Dad phoned to say that baz had died thursday. Strange to think he was flying with us last week.

Bought some piano wire and had a go at finishing the glider fuselage for the simply the best. Also bought a 3x cell 1050mAhr lithium pack from flightpower for the power version. That should save 80g (I weighed it), although it could also do with a bit less motor.

Got some photos from andy of last week's mynd trip. Here's a video of my inverted flight with the filip glider.

Saturday morning out early litter picking around the village. Forgot to record captain scarlet. Into town for lunch. Bought the da vinci code book, to see what all the fuss is about.

Sunday went over to leamington for the befa agm, or rather for the shopping, as I'm not a member - yet. Bought a cyclon elite mini brushless motor for the simply. Horribly expensive, but rather lovely in purple, and it should save a lot of weight, including the lead balance in the tail. Might have been telling me a story, but mine is supposed to be 1 of only 2 in the country (made in france), with the other going for magazine review soon. Not entirely sure it's going to fit.

Sunday afternoon helping carol put up the polytunnel frame on the new allotment. Only the 2 end sections this time, giving about half the area.

CD ripping not progressed.

Monday my bluetooth usb adapter arrived from amazon, but too busy with cadmac meeting and concours d'elegance to play with it. Entered the simply with both glider and electric fuselages, as it is 1 of the most elegant things I've ever seen, even though I had little to do with it. Couldn't expect it to do well, as these things are all about scratch built scale, despite the weightings allowed in the scoring. Came last, although being the only glider, it technically won that class.
Here's a pic of the bluetooth, and the secure digital thing too...

Tuesday had a go with bluetooth and the pda. Managed to get a secure paired connection working, but not activesync. After about 1hr of messing about, gave up. There are so many different apps, security settings etc. it is really confusing.

Wednesday after a bit of reading up, googling and a clear head, I had another go at bluetooth. Quickly managed to get file transfer up, then dial up (which is a bit eery), and eventually activesync, which seems to be mostly a matter of getiing everything to use the same pretend com port as the pda uses for incoming connections. Still have to initiate sync manually though, where it starts itself in the cradle.
Set up a gmail account, thanks to an invite from scott. Now I should be able to check email away from home.

Friday holiday. We did the saturday thing, and went to town, paying excessively for the car park. I started fitting the new cyclon motor to the simply. It does actually fit - just. Rather more surprising is that the previous kontronik unit fitted. The kontronik was 167g and the new cyclon is 84g (79g before I fitted the 3x 4mm bullet connectors). I can now also lose the 11g tail balance lead. So that should save 94g. The switch to lithiums saves another 80g. Total saving 174g.

Saturday 2x round the village circuit.
Got the bike out and down to B+Q to get a 12mm drill to put a clearance hole in the nose of the simply for the cyclon motor. Also uses 2.5mm screws on slightly closer spacing, so new fixing holes required. Filed a bit of the top of the fuselage away to make sure the spinning outrunner magnet cage doesn't touch. Fired it up with the lithiums and the current 9x7 blades. Didn't get past half throttle - that was scary enough, with masses of thrust. I need to keep the current down to about 12A to give a reasonable chance of 4x 1min motor runs (as well as not overloading the the cells). Changed the blades to 8x5. Still lots of power, but full throttle caused a cut out after a few secs. You just can't get lots of current out of a typical lithium pack.
Very nice bit of cgi air display by the angels/falcons in captain scarlet.

Sunday clocks change.
2x round the village circuit.
Tried the new motor on the 7x cell 1050mAhr nimh pack. 3x 1min runs and 20secs more, even with the smaller 8x5 prop. This is a seriously high revving motor, even with the 3.7x gearbox. It would probably go ok on 6x cells or a 2 cell lithium pack. It is also very noisy, compared to the kontronik unit.

CD ripping progressed to s.

Back to the stars logo for spring.

April.

I day late due to freewire not working properly. Very strange fault. I could dial up and access any site but my own (and freewire itself), no email, no ftp. Yet other dial ups could see them ok. Back up on monday - oh well.

Sunday we stayed up to watch the 1st part of the wagner ring cycle. As usual with opera, most of the music is terribly tedious (especially the singing), but the story was interesting, with many of the norse gods appearing, including thor as donner (thunder), and wotan (of wednesday ie. wodin's day). It is remarkable just how much of lotr is stolen straight from this story, although it is probably also heavily based on earlier tradition.

.Monday holiday. 2x round the village circuit. Weather a bit better, with some sunshine. We went to ikea. They seem to have done away with the no trolley in the car park rule.

Tuesday back to work, but Lee and I escaped at lunch time to attend baz's funeral in a very full church.

Wednesday got the car brakes looked at. Replaced leaking cylinders at the rear.

Friday morning pheasant in the garden again. Managed to get some pictures this time. It didn't seem so bothered, eventually running off round the corner rather than flying away.

Saturday a wonderful warm sunny spring day. Went for a walk down a footpath near pailton and saw some horse riders.

Sunday 1x round the village circuit. Went round to dad with the new lithium pack. He spotted that 1 of the cells had bubbled up a bit. Maybe it was overstressed driving the new motor.
Finished reading the da vinci code. Great fun, and a nice ending, despite the endless conspiracy theories and weakly coded puzzles. Difficult to separate the fact from fiction. It is really a rather contrived action thriller plot allowing a quick tour around the various theories on its subject.

Started looking seriously at big moulded gliders..Prompted by recent coverage in the magazines of the new british falcon. Not many detail photos on the www, but still looks like the best option so far. Stuck the tail back on the siesta with epoxy.

CD ripping progressed to z. Still some mp3 conversion and renaming to do.

Monday the car rolled through 105000 miles. cadmac meet was the 1st of the season with electric flight, but rather miserable weather meant few takers. By the time I got there, just chris flying his trex mini heli - most of the time all we could see was the gyro led.

Tuesday off to the long mynd, despite the forecast rain. Actually, the wind looked good at WSW 15mph for pole cott. 6 in the bus - me lee, graham, brian, simon, andy and graham by car. Already spots of rain in the coop car park. A bit cold and blustery - not the smooth lift we expect from the slope. I flew the zagi and risked the stiletto, losing the V tail in a hard nose in landing on the mud where the undergrowth was a bit thin. Front of the wing popped out too, although the nylon screw held. Andy had a new zagi, including lots of carbon spars and slimmer elevons, which flew well, until a duff Tx pack got too low. Might have to get 1 of those. Graham lost a scale mustang in a fast sweep across the slope. Other Graham flew his large moulded scale glider in great swooping aerobatics - very nice. Simon flew lots of stuff including a (different) big scale glider successfully. Lee flying lots of stuff, but not the trusty zagi due to duff Rx pack. Brian flying the recovered zagi, but wisely (given the conditions) not the repaired filip. Rain came and went, with very little sun, eventually getting heavy about 14:30, and we headed home. 1st trip since Baz died.

Friday morning snowing. Not proper snow, but falling too slowly for rain. Coming home through flurries of snowflakes in the air, although too warm for it to settle.

Saturday cold and windy, we went into town. Found a new slits cd live at the gibus club. 1978 in paris, back in the days of wonderful musical naivety and creativity, before they moved over to the reggae styles of the 1st studio recording. This is much more like the peel sessions. Remarkably good sound for a live recording, with a lot of atmosphere from the chat in between songs.

Sunday morning nice and sunny, if still a bit windy. Cut the grass. Afternoon 2x round the village circuit. Bit of tidying up, and got round to sorting out the swift.
The 1050mAhr flightpower lithium pack together with the nose weight (including my £2 coin) is within 1g of the new 1500mAhr kokam lithium pack. Also similar depth and width, just slightly longer. So I've extended the hole in the foam back almost to the Rx. The reinforcing tape on trailing edge has become so unsticky that it just flaps up and acts as an airbrake. Decided to solve that problem by wrapping the whole thing in yellow solarfilm. This will add a bit of weight, but hopefully it will be made up for by the cleaner lines. Also hoping for a little more power out of the higher capacity pack ie. less internal resistance. The plastic motor bracket was still well epoxied to the foam, taking some force to separate. New version will be bolted through the foam with 2.5mm screws.

CD mp3 conversion complete. Still some renaming to do.
New gmail account starting to get some use.
New mylene farmer cd should be on its way.

Back to snow logo, as it's been snowing.

Monday morning saw the pheasant in the garden again from the bedroom. When it saw me, it made an impressive 45degree take off over the roof.
Finished off the swift. Final weight 368g. That's up 31g due mainly to the solarfilm covering, but also the 3x 2.5mm screws and nyloc nuts holding the motor plate on.

Tuesday morning the mylene farmer cd avant que l'ombre est arrivé.

Took the swift to wolston after work. The field looked much better than last time I was there, and dry too ie. not muddy. Vertical performance slightly compromised by the extra weight, but otherwise flys same as before. Rolls fast and more axial - I think the c of g may have moved back a few mm. The propeak charger was whinging about my flight Pb battery being down about 11.5V, so I had to use the car to charge it.

The mylene cd is pleasant enough, but no stand out tracks so far. The cd is completely black(both sides), apart from a small label in the centre, and the packaging is the usual extremely complicated fold out affair with booklet. The video for the single "fuck them all" is included on dvd. Nice to see flame haired mylene riding a horse through the romanian snow covered countryside in feb 2005 (according to "the making of").

Wednesday I forgot until carol reminded me to go the the free public einstein lecture at the university of warwick. There's some sort of 4 day gathering for physicists going on, and this was the 1 bit open to the public. Of course it's 100 years since einstein had his most productive year. Nothing really new in the lecture by John Strachel of boston university, but an interesting sideways look at some aspects of science history. His delivery was a bit fast, accented, and annoyingly different from and out of sync with the slides being put up, but it was free. The main theme was what 1 thing he will be remembered for, say in another 100 years ? The proposed answer was the dismissal of space (or spacetime if you like) as a background in which things happen ie. the recognition that there is nothing but things and the way they interact. I didn't explain that very well, did I ? There is no such thing as empty space in between things ie. that gap is influenced by the things themselves eg. that spacetime is "bent" by (all) the things "in" it. Not a new idea, but it is still counter intuitive. Implications for string theory are strong, in as much as they need to account for spacetime as well as fundamental particles ie. it (spacetime) needs to be made of stringy things too. Again, not a new idea, but maybe its time is coming.

Saturday morning epoxied the V tail back on the stiletto.
Into town after the recycling drop.
Noticed that the revamped O2 shop was open again. I had pretty much already decided to go for a sony ericsson k700i next and decided to check how much an upgrade would be. Rather surprised to find it was only £10 for a phone that would be £150 - £250 bought separately. Err... so I got 1. A really wonderful modern little box of tricks, including gsm 3 band phone, colour screen (176x220), camera (vga 640x480 with video), fm radio, bluetooth, internet, java, media player, 41M memory etc. Not had much time to play with the new toy yet, but it is up and running after a quick charge. Charger incomptible with the nokia, and there was no car charger in the kit.

Sunday morning was actually frosty, but not for long. Bright and sunny until late afternoon. 2x round the village circuit. Over to the allotment to help shift some paving slabs to make a root cage for the new fig trees, and lift the polytunnel door frames into position.
Fitted a new control snake inner to the stiletto, repaired the front wing joint dowel hole, and patched up the covering. Had a go at charging the flight Pb battery using the propeak charger itself (and the mains pc psu unit). The highest it will go is 50Ahr and the battery is actually 75Ahr, but the max charge rate is good at 5A. It seemed to back off quite quickly to about 1.5A though. I suppose it knows best.

Still some mp3 renaming to do.

Keeping the snow logo, as it's still frosty.

Monday managed to get bluetooth ftp comms working on the phone and fetch the photos off, and put some music on.
Went to the cadmac meet. A few more people flying. More talk about the electric fence and financing the purchase of part if not all of the wolston field. 1st slg glider competition coming up.

Tuesday carol upgraded to a k700i too - for free. It managed to trash most of her numbers from the sim in the transfer. Same thing happened at last upgrade. Mine worked ok though.

Wednesday up north for work. Too wet for lunchtime flying.

Thursday after work helping carol lower the slabs into the fig tree root cage hole.

Friday lee, simon and I went to bradgate park after work for some slope soaring. Tony came to watch. £1.50 each for 2hrs in the car park is a bit steep. Shame the hill isn't as steep. Very little wind in the shade of the hill/monument, but actually very windy on the exposed slope. Lee broke the tail off the champion just carrying it. An E wind is probably the best direction there, with the late afternoon sun behind us, but still tree hazards to the left and rocky outcrops to the right, and no flat area to land. It doesn't suffer from any facing hills disturbing the air though, so what lift there is, is quite clean. Flew the zagi 1st quite successfully. Then the newly repaired stiletto. It was zipping up and down the slope like a proper pylon racer. Nearly trashed it on the landing, barely missing the rocks. Into anstey after for food before heading home.

The k700i photos are not brilliant, but better than nothing - apart from the low resolution (640 x 480), the colours don't look right. Also the videos are in 3gp format. Downloaded quicktime alternative to view those. Here's a photo of 3 generations of mobile.

Saturday into town. Bought a car charger for the k700i from orange.

Sunday morning 1st cadmac glider competition. Just the top 3 from last year (neil, me, ray) plus a newcomer keith. A bit windy, but not enough and not in the right direction to stay up with slope lift alone. While we got organised, I managed to catch a bit of broadcasting house on radio 4 using the k700i. The new motor was disappointing. Despite being lighter, the climb out was about the same, if not worse. I kept the motor run to just 50secs, but on the 3rd flight it cut out before 50secs anyway. Of course this season we have to go 4x. The last run cut after about 15secs, but I managed a bit more by resetting it and keeping to low throttle. Still only enough height to do 4mins 11. My best flight (2nd) of the day was only 7mins 23. Others were mostly maxing out. I managed to get within the tape (30) on the last go only - new system now, with a 10m tape graduated into 2m segments, stretched to your spinner, giving 10, 20, 30, 40, 50 points. So that leaves me last out of 4. Still, no breakages. Must look into the power system again. I think the problem is mostly gear ratio ie. a very small high revving prop is desperately inefficient. I think it wastes a lot of energy being noisy too. Also, the folding prop wasn't (if you see what I mean), as the sides were binding on the crossbar - so acting as a bit of an air brake. Keith did very well - he is an experienced power flyer. 3x simply the best aircraftr apart from neil's highlight hybrid thing. Nearly forgot to mention the sheep sh1t, which is all over the patch. We have a new electric fence, strategically placed to keep the horses out and let the sheep in ?
2x round the village circuit.

Still some mp3 renaming to do.

Back to the stars logo, now it's warmed up a bit, at last.

May.

Monday, after much research on the o2 site, I eventually managed to set up the k700i with a dial up internet profile and access the internet. Seems to default to a compact view of google. It didn't seem to like my home page, but I managed to see a bit of the bbc site - no pictures. I think it may be doing text only in a wap sort of way - quite sensible, given the small screen available.

Wednesday I managed to get the pda bluetooth connected to the phone and dial up internet. Shows my home page well, including photos, but without java.

Thursday much doom and gloom at work after BT excluded marconi as a supplier for its 21CN project - share price fell about 40%.

Friday went to see the hhgttg film. Not a complete disaster, as some bits stick to the original(s) quite closely, but a lot of the new stuff is unnecessary, especially the "nice" ending. Terrible to miss out the role of the babelfish as proof of the (non) existence of god. Distracting to see a non blond trillian. Zaphod's 2 heads is done rather cleverly. The new marvin is ok, but jarring to see the original as a cameo in the queue on vogsphere.

Saturday hot and sunny. Cut the grass.

Sunday 02:45 thunderstorms and heavy downpour.
2x round the village circuit.
Tried a few different props on the simply the best electric glider, thinking that more pull for a shorter (than 60secs) run might be a good idea. Works well for the 1st run, but 4 is really not feasible - it just cuts out after a few secs, as the voltage drops below the bec limit. Might have to go back to the old motor, add more Ah or yet another motor.

mp3 renaming progressed to h.

Monday holiday. 2x village circuit.
At the cadmac meeting I got most of the details of ray's glider power system ie. hacker brushless bl20 with 4.x:1 gearbox, gp1100 8x cell. These gp1100 cells are quoted as max current 20A, compared to the kan 1050 at 14A - hmm. Long mynd trip rained off.

Wednesday after work helping carol fit the mid rails, add protection tape, and drag the polythene over the polytunnel until 19:30.

Thursday bought the house of flying daggers dvd, which I somehow missed in the cinema.

After voting in the election, we went down the pub. I stayed up to see the 1st 3 results, which looked pretty much as predicted.
Ordered some gp1100s from overlander.

Friday we have the expected result.
Marconi making the (bad) news again, closing sites including the factory where I work. Despite what the news says, this may not be directly linked the the loss of the BT order, although it may have precipitated it. Whatever - it looks like it will gradually disappear over many months. Anyway, they told us we could go home for the rest of the day, which eventually most of us did. Lovely sunny day outside, if a bit windy.
I went to see the kingdom of heaven film. Possibly the most accurate depiction of the time since python. Suitably long. It deals with many complex issues, but ultimately the characters used to tell the story are not convincing. Worth a look though.
Cut the grass again. 2x round the village circuit.

Saturday 2x circuit. The gp1100 7x and 8x cell packs arrived - less than 2 days, speedy service from overlander.

We went into town for lunch and coffee, before heading over to the university of warwick open day. Nice sunny day for it. Music and a juggler outside the students' union. Had a wander round carol's old psychology department - not much to see there, then the language labs, which are in the same building. There's a lovely atrium with plants and a pond with ducks. Tried to have a look at engineering, but not much was open. Saw some physics displays including 1 of those rising plasma arc things. Not been in that building since we went over on a visit from school - I think we saw or did a hall effect experiment.
Back home 1x village circuit - a bit too cold and windy. Put some 2mm bullet connectors on the new gp1100 packs. Tried the 7x cell pack and 4x 30secs runs and about 15secs more before cut out - better.

Sunday 2x circuit.

mp3 renaming progressed to m.

Sunday evening we went for a quiet walk around the village circuit.

Monday back to doom and gloom at work, but lots to do as usual.
Popped in to see the polytunnel progress, now with mesh around the bottom, guttering, and 1 door.
Tried the 8x cell pack in the simply, only to find it cut out after about 20secs, despite being fully charged. Tried the 7x cell pack - the same. Strange. Decided to refit the kontronik unit. The ends of the 2.5mm fixing screws looked very flat and shiny. Maybe they have been interfering with some part of the rotary casing - eek. Tried it with a couple of washers as spacers. Now got 4+ 30secs runs with the 8x cell, with excellent thrust. Very nearly 5 with the 7x cell.

Tuesday after work we went straight to wolston for a flying session, me lee, simon, andy (and his brother), francesco. Sunny and dry, but cold in the wind. Several others there, but no helis. I flew the swift, which is just great, even though it won't quite climb vertically. Tried the simply with the 7x cell, only to find it cutting out after about 5secs. Don't know what's up with it now. Could be bad connections, but I doubt that with gold plated 2mm bullet type. Again tempted to go back to the kontronik. Lee did some training for andy and francesco with the twinstar and dual Tx lead. Simon gave a quick demo of small diesel control line aerobatics - very noisy. Got a brinklow takeaway home. Here's a video of the swift flying...

Updated my cv a bit. Not sure what's really happening at work.

Saturday power was a bit unstable - went off for a second or so, blank screening the pc, then about 5 mins later it went up and down quickly a few times, before going off for about 30mins. PC came back up complaining about something in the bios, but was ok after another reboot.
The last episode of captain scarlet was darker and intriguing, with a mysteron defector. It seems there will be some more. Now, where's that dvd.

Sunday 2x circuit. Lovely sunny day with a light breeze. Read some more of the time book in the garden.

mp3 renaming progressed to r.

1 week+ late due to holiday in france.

Sunday evening we went for another walk through the village.

Monday cadmac scale evening was rained off.

Thursday late finish at work before home and packing for france. Cut the grass. Late night.

Friday off to france. We flew flybe from bhx to toulouse blagnac. Shown as delayed by 1h20, we actually set off only a few mins later than the scheduled 11:10 when they used a replacement aircraft. Saw the car in the long stay 1 as we climbed out. An expensive, indifferent, but adequate cheese and pickle sandwich and coffee.
Arrived to warm sunshine. Very curious baggage reclaim, having to exit customs 1st and then go back in again to collect. We had a europcar edmr (economy 4dr manual air con). Not impressed by the opportunity to spend yet more money to avoid the large excess on damge cover. Bit of trouble finding it, as they are off to the side rather than out front. Turns out to be a typically dark blue renault modus. Works ok, but a bit big, rather ugly, and the air con not up to much. Bit of a nightmare getting out of toulouse in rush hour traffic. Actually it was complicated by the fact that we were actually headed for the opposite E side of the city, and trying to miss the centre to the north.
We repeated the success of last year's idea, taking a friday b+b near the airport, this time the cathar room at manoir saint clair in balma. Lovely red brick room with a glass wall and a "secret" door to the en suite bathroom, accessed by rotating 1 of the coat hangers on the wall. The window in there looking out to the garden through a narrow slit in the wall, with a swing in brick faced panel to make it disappear from the outside. From a wide selection of eateries, we chose the espagnol option at el chupito, which turned out to be very french. A nest of lbj chicks just inside the roof getting rather excited each time 1 of the parents returned with something while we ate.

Samedi a proper french breakfast with croissants and bowls of café. With all day to reach our destination, we decided to swing a bit SE through castres. Nice modern auchan on the approach, but we didn't buy anything, with the rest of the day to go. Stopped in the centre of castres for lunch at place jean-jaurès, which was being relaid. Quite a pretty place, reminiscent of narbonne (not far away). A goya museum - closed for lunch. N through albi, again ignoring the supermarkets, then the rather spectacular hill town of cordes sur ciel, which we decided to come back to later, on to st antonin noble val, which the info recommended for provisions, only to find a tiny, expensive petit casino. Oh well. Weather had clouded over a bit. Back up the same road and N to our destination, le puech de barrayre, near villevayre, not so near najac.

A very nice house, the west wing with a downstairs living area and kitchen, 2 bedrooms (4 poster bed) and shower room upstairs. Wash room shared with the main house and the other gite. Outside west facing covered dining area looking out over the wild flower meadow down to the valley below. South facing breakfast area facing the pool. Good soft drinkable water. English owned, but managed by a couple of live in artists. Most importantly though, complete with free cat - dots - getting on a bit (14), but still in charge.
Sky satellite system giving all the free uk standard regional channels, but no music - it seems they want you to pay for mtv, so the freeview hits and tmf are not available. Too much like home, so we stuck mostly to the french terrestrial stuff.
Reading the log book we looked forward to the blue faced green lizard and grass snake. A loose leaf ring binder containing only glowing reviews and gaps. Too tired to stay up for the eurovision song contest. Despite the threatened wildlife, we left the bedroom window open. 1 or 2 bats in the darkness. Electric thunderstorm in the night and steady rain.

Dimanche we went to varen for the recommended boulangerieand pain de campagne - sold out though. On the road down it was eerily quiet. We saw/startled a couple of strange birds with golden brown heads and stripey black and white tails. Carol saw the crest too - hoopoes apparently. Then we carried on to st antonin for the weekly market (in the rain). Nice little town. Lots of art shops. Much evidence of the english including beans, salad cream, ketchup etc.. There is even an english book shop. No sign of US though. had a nice saucisse frites lunch in a cafe. We went N through caylus to villefranche de rouergue to find the supermarkets, although they were closed of course. Coming back carol missed the turn and we decided to have a look at villevayre. More or less just a church and 2 houses with lots of debris about, including an old bathtub that carol managed to reverse into, putting a small scratch/dent in the tailgate - argh!

Lundi found I had broken the cafetière in the dishwasher - oops. The sun came out and pretty well stayed that way for the rest of the week, with temperatures about 30degrees. Went over to have a look at najac. Fortifications on the top of a curious bump in the valley. Pretty little place. Had lunch at the restaurant salamandre - saucisse de toulouse/frites and saumon. Went to the hyper u at villefranche to do some proper shopping. Back home for a good look at the meadow wildlife. Saw the other cat, but it wouldn't come close with dots defending.

Mardi a quiet day. Cat in through the bedroom window early in the morning. In the afternoon we went to les pieds dans l'eau at st antonin to paddle a canoe up and down the aveyron for an hour. On the way back we stopped in the middle of nowhere to change the camera memory and get a picture of some poppies (that were just everywhere). Found we were actually very close to a clear stream running by the side of the road. A couple of strange looking frogs and a few tadpoles. 1 with a sparkly green back and stripey brown legs.

Mercredi decided on the big drive over to see the millau viaduc. Bit of a late start and lots of traffic around rodez. Had lunch at laissac on the way. The last island before the a75 autoroute being guarded by a couple of heavily armed police. They stopped us, probably because of the hire car, but waved us on straight away. I was surprised that there was no péage until the actual bridge itself - about 5 euros. Heading S for the tarn valley you get an early view over to the right before it disappears until you are nearly on it. Actually driving over was a bit of a non event, as the view is obscured to each side, and all there is to look at is the road and the towers and cables. We got off at the 1st exit after and headed for millau. Rather barren/scrubby land around there. Stopped at a panorama point, looking down at millau and the viaduc, although it was rather a long way away. Saw a couple on a french registered triumph bike there. A bit too tired for a look around the centre. We stopped at a géant and mr bricolage on the edge of town. Saw several paragliders working the ridge above the town. Headed back along a different road past the micropolis insect centre. Stopped at a super u and bought an ultimate x-men #6. A long drive back through the late evening sunshine lighting up the beautiful countryside, doing some tiny roads and villages including lunac.
With some new guests arriving, they changed the water in the pool.

Jeudi I was feeling a bit ill. I noticed the water had gone a bit brown - maybe the pool had lowered the levels a bit? Anyway back to volvic and very little to eat.
We saw a bit less of the cat - probably getting sorted at the other gite.
Carol had a horse riding session booked for the afternoon at ferme equestre de daoudou. I dropped her off and went back for a sleep. Returned in plenty of time and got the pda out for a bit of kt tunstall and heather nova. A good 2 hrs (15:00 to 17:00) riding mostly through shaded tracks in the woods in the afternoon heat. A bit of horse looking after required too. Lots of other animals there including goats for the cheese and loads of cats and dogs.
We sat outside with a bottle of gaillac wine, books and bat detector, and watched the spectacular sunset.
Tried to get a picture of the bat, but being black, against a dark sky, and with a bit of latency in the camera I didn't catch anything.

Vendredi a leisurely breakfast in the hot sunshine with the cat and the insects buzzing around the flowers, including some bee like flies and hummingbird hawk moths. We had seen a hornet earlier too.

Drove south through laguepie, cordes, through vineyards to gaillac, where we caught the end of another market and had lunch at a brasserie. Rather short of shops, we headed over to albi. Very pretty centre with a mix of modern and medieval, with car parks hidden underground. Stunning red brick cathedral, mostly quite plain, but with an ornate entrance. Found a replacement cafetière at 54 euros (ouch).
Back home carol found the green/blue lizard, dead, just outside the car port. Bite marks around the neck, we assume the cat had it. Apparently it was not a 1 off though. Impressive beast, about 25cm nose to tail and quite chunky.

Samedi another sunny breakfast with the cat, before we got packed and left about 10:00.
Didn't get far before the flapping noise revealed a left rear flat tyre. While changing it at the junction a dog came to see us from viilevayre.
Back on the road we headed for montauban, where we popped into an auchan, before stopping in the centre for yet another market. Stopped for lunch at grissolles, just eating what was left in the fridge really. Some sort of fête des jeux going on in the central covered market area. Had a coffee at a bar des sports. Stopped at grenade, which is quite a pretty little place, with rather narrow streets and a 1 way system.
The drive back to toulouse blagnac was a lot easier than leaving.
We had a noisy turboprop thing coming back at 18:30. No sandwich deals left apparently. Anyway a nice sunny flight with views of the coast and isle of wight.
The 106 spluttered into life ok, but felt like really old technology with no power steering. Stopped at the allotment on the way home. Seems there was a lot of rain.

There was a lot of debate on tv about the french vote on the EU constitution while we were there, and several party broadcasts for both oui and non. Managed to follow some of it. Of course we returned the day before the actual vote.
Saw a couple of "science" programs c'est pas sorcier - lasers and motorbikes (especially engines). Aimed at school level, but an impressive style and lots of technical detail well explained, even getting down to atom excitation and coherence etc.
Bought several cds and a couple of dvds. The scanning sample play stations take a lot of the guessing out of it. Even saw 1 scanning sample player for dvds in an auchan.
Managed to read lots of the time book, but not quite finished.

Sunday 2x circuit. Into town for lunch. Bought the team america dvd.

We went to see the star wars 3 film. Ho hum, not actually very interesting. Fairly motors along at the beginning. Long as it was, it had the feeling that a lot had been missed out - who were the other jedi? The basic plot is not very credible, and the characters don't seem to have much motivation. The join between a 2005 and a 1970s film is not a smooth 1. CGI is excellent, but gratuitous.

En france on a dit non a la constitution 55/45. Qu'est-ce qui se passera maintenant?

Monday holiday. 2x circuit. We went over to tesco and had a look at the new borders book shop there.
Spent most of the day writing up the holiday.

mp3 renaming still at r.

June.

Tuesday back to work. Went down the pub in the evening.

Wednesday put the kontronik motor back in the simply together with the 8x gp1100 cells. Rather heavy, but at least it runs reliably.

Thursday 2x circuit. Started doing late shift at work.

Friday the invoice for the hire car came - no sign of charge for the scratch and flat tyre.

Saturday into town for lunch. Had another long look at the new borders bookshop next to the new tesco.
Loaded some bat noises into carol's phone as a ringtone.
Fitted an 11x6 prop to the simply. Managed almost 5x 30secs runs, pulling quite nicely. Should go with a 35secs run for the competition tomorrow.

Sunday morning up early for the 2nd cadmac glider competition of the year. While we were getting organised, I put the swift up for a quick tear around the sky. A bit windy, but it was coping ok when the motor cut quite suddenly. I still had control and landed ok, but no sign of life from the motor - later confirmed to be the problem, rather than the controller. Oh well, it has had rather a lot of volts up it, and they don't cost much (standard speed 300).
A turn out of 5 for the competition including from last time ray, neil, keith, me and bruce plus a few helpers. I was drawn in the 2nd slot slot against neil. Ray, having trouble with a servo, swapped with neil. After the 1st slot, ray's aircraft was still no go, so I had to fly on my own, recording a time to be measured against those of the 1st slot, on the basis that the conditions were still similar ie. moderate wind and cloudy.
The new prop/motor produced a very respectable climb rate with plenty of height after the 35secs run. I managed to fly out most of the slot (9mins 23) and landed very close to the centre of the tape for max bonus (50), putting me in 1st place 1000 points.
With ray out, we flew the remaining slots 4 together. In the 2nd, most of us found some lift and ended up with an embarrassment of height, leading to me overflying by a few secs. Also cartwheeled it, including a bump on the tail, resulting in just a minor crease in the left ruddervator. 9mins 59 recorded, with -30 for over time.
3rd slot I forgot to pump in some down trim for the ascent and managed to "fall off" on the way up, ending up with only about 70% of the normal height. 5mins 47 and landed short compared to neil and keith flying out almost the full 10mins.
4th slot I ran the whole 1min motor run. Not sure if it actually managed it - kept resetting just to make sure. Anyway, plenty of height. 6mins 56 and landed short again, but not bad compared to neil's 7mins 33 +10. Probably a lot of sink going through.

Sunday evening we went for a walk around the village.

mp3 renaming complete to z.

Monday insured the car online through the post office - much cheaper.

Tuesday didn't go on the long mynd trip as the wind in the S means ashes hollow which is banned during the nesting season.

Wednesday 2x round the village circuit. Lovely sunny weather this week - nice to be about in the morning. Popped over a bit early to see lee flying his new swift at lunchtime. Motor thrust was not as strong as reported earlier, and burnt out completely after a couple of minutes. Apparently the day before it had been massively powerful. It may be that his 7A speed controller is letting a bit more through than my old 5A version. Maybe we need to go brushless - they are quite cheap in that size now. Nearly took the big heli, but the Rx pack was very low, and the gyro mode switch is broken off on the Tx.

Thursday replaced the broken switches in the Tx. A more fiddly job is just about feasible - eventually I had to take out the whole left stick assembly. Hovered the eco8 heli briefly in the garden - a bit windy, but seems ok.

Friday it seems work will last until xmas at least.

Saturday my 2 speed 300 motors arrived. Under the graupner sticky label they are marked as mabuchi r2,slightly different to the original mabuchi 40 - not sure what this means. Ran the 1st for a few secs underwater. This is supposed to bed in the brushes, while keeping it cool and disposing of the debris.
Maplin have moved out of town to a retail park - bought some more toggle switches.

Sunday fitted the new speed 300 to the swift. A bit more work on the cv.

Broadband is coming - started having a look at adslguide.org.uk to understand what's involved.

I see lara is to return this winter.

Back to normal hours tomorrow.

Monday back to work early. Took the swift in for a quick fly at lunchtime. Seems to go as well as ever ie. zipping about the sky very nicely. Simon had a bungee launch glider too. Have to be a bit quick with just 30mins. Gave the spare speed 300 to lee.

Tuesday flew the swift again at lunchtime. Lee's going well too - he's swapped the original 8x6 prop for an 8x4 in the interest of being kinder to the motor. Climbs well, but top speed compromised by the reduced pitch.

Wednesday the car failed its mot, but only for a gaiter. Left it to get fixed. Got the bike out, pumped up the tyres and jumped it for a quick run ready for tomorrow.

Thursday needed to jump the bike again - battery really not very good. Took the jump leads with me. After work it started OK, but I needed to get some money, so stopped at a fuel station cashpoint. Then it wouldn't go, maybe because it was warm. You would think that someone would help, but no - everone too busy, in a hurry, got to be somewhere etc. With carol not answering the phone it was a long wait. Those bat noises tend to disappear in general noise. Spotted roy going in to pay. He retired a few years ago, and helpfully sorted me out. After paying for the car, it still wouldn't start, but at least now I could use the car battery.

Friday popped in to mps for a new battery at £18. Put it on charge for a few hours.

Saturday was the leamington peace festival, but lee talked us into going to the weston park model show. Extremely hot and sunny. A bit like a scaled down woodvale, with most of the usual traders, fairground etc., even microlights. but in the grounds of a stately home. A crowded flight line, crosswind, down an avenue between the trees, with the view straight into the sun. The falcons parachute jump was unwatchable until the last bit, as they were also in line with the sun. Lots of large aircraft, including some impressive jets. I saw 1 shower of confetti after the thump of an aircraft hitting a tree. Apparently there had been several other crashes earlier. All the flying seemed to be safely away from the crowd though. We had a pleasant walk around the gardens of the house and a coffee in the stables. Got rather too much sun.

Sunday up reasonably early for the 3rd cadmac glider competition. Hot again, especially with yesterday's sun burn, but bearable in the morning. 5 flying including me, ray, neil, keith from last time and graham. Bruce discovered he had rewired his brushless backwards - unfixable without an iron. With just 3 landing circle tapes, and just enough helpers, we decided to fly all 5 together.
In the 1st slot keith had some radio problem resulting in a heavy crunch into the ground just after takeoff, putting cracks in the fuselage. The rest of us got away ok, up into very active air. With the wind still coming straight out of the sun, I stayed over to the right. Climbing very well, I cut the motor after about 20 secs. I managed 5mins 50, but landed short, more than a minute less than neil, but slightly better than ray who got the ascent all wrong. Graham not doing well with his traditional big balsa aircraft.
2nd slot I swapped my sunglasses for distance, and used a 35secs motor run. Again good height, and stayed over to the right. Managed 6mins 31 and landed short again, slightly short of ray, but neil went on to 8mins 28 and max 50 bonus.
3rd slot I ran about 40secs motor burn and strayed over to the left a little, where there should be a bit of slope lift. Neil had radio trouble early on, resulting in some spectacular inverted circuits before landing in the next field. I managed 7mins 7 and 40 bonus - at last judging the wind right. A little better than ray - 1000 points. Turns out neil's Tx had somehow swapped over to a different aircraft program, reversing rudder and elevator controls. The aircraft survived a reasonably soft landing in the crops, but he didn't want to risk it again.
4th slot with just 3 left, I ran the full 1min motor. I think it cut out at 50secs so I reset it. A bit hard to tell exectly what's happening in the lively air up there. Managed 7mins 18 and circled it in for maximum 50 bonus. Ray had an exhausted power pack and managed only 4mins 42 - 1000 points.
I think that puts me ahead on the day, and gives me a chance in the season. The simply is still a bit heavy, sink rate is a bit high compared with the others, but it climbs well and is competitive.

Popped in to pcworld to look at adsl modem and wireless routers on the way back. In the afternoon it just got hotter. No sign of the promised thunderstorms. Consensus seems to be to go with plusnet as broadband ISP. They certainly get a good customer rating at adslguide.org.uk.

Last weekend's isle of wight festival got minimal coverage - mostly limited to the most popular song from each band, even less from some. Still better than nothing I suppose. Similar with this weekend's download (donington) festival - a very different set of music. Next weekend's glastonbury looks like having wall to wall coverage over 3x bbc channels. I expect there will be lots of repeats though - like last year.

3 days late due to a weekend away at glastonbury.

Not many hits this week (and a bit).

Monday still no sign of thunderstorms, or even rain, although there are reports of floods up north.
Went to see the new batman film. Not perfect, but a very good effort, and easily the best go at it yet. Rather too many similar looking actors is rather confusing. Michael caine as alfred is well cast, but too well known. The main theme of fear is nicely woven into the plot. However bats really aren't scary, and the things they do in the film are not credible. The car is seriously cool. Somehow it is hard to care about the development towards the climax, probably because we all know more or less how it ends.

Tuesday and the summer solstice. Went over to wolston in the afternoon/evening - me, lee, andy, francesco and colin. Comfortably warm and sunny, but a bit breezy. I flew the simply a couple of times, managing about 6mins 30, with the wind from the sun and anti slope lift. A bit windy for f's little electric cessna, we set up my swift with lee's Tx and training lead for him to have a go. About 3 mins of rather exciting dual control before the new motor burned out. I normally limit the full throttle to a few bursts, and keep it movinhg, but this was flat out all the time, with lots of turns in the hot afternoon. Anyway lee had bought me a replacement at weston, so it will fly again - maybe I should swap to an 8x4. Lee's and andy's new swifts going well. Took the big heli too, but too windy for that. Francesco decided to go for it with his aircraft, insisting on being at the controls from the hand launch. Managed a creditable few circuits before the power went off, ending in a nice 3 wheel landing on the circle.

Wednesday the 106 is 10 years old. Actually it's probably a lot older than that - who knows how long it stood in a field, and then the showroom. 107000 miles. A bit of late packing for glastonbury.

Back in april sunday morning I sat online with the radio controlled clock by the pc, and hit the galstonbury ticket site 6 secs after the hour. With a desperately slow update on a dial up I picked 1 of the links and followed that, only to find eventually that it was the home page, not the correct site. Took 30mins of refresh to get to the fill in your details page and submit, followed by another 45mins of clicking to get the confirmation, but there it was - you have tickets.

Thursday afternoon off for an early start to glastonbury. Lots of last minute decisions about what to take left us setting off just before 17:00. A clear drive down through the afternnon sun. Turning off the motorway I tuned to radio avalon 87.7, but nothing until we got a lot closer to the site. Going down the A39 was vaguely familiar from our last visit in 1992. Advice from various sources said that thursday evening was absolutely the worst time to turn up, yet we didn't hit any queues at all. After street and glastonbury itself, we approached the NW red route area. Put off by the "drop off" point signs, we carried on to the blue route, as advised in the guide. After decanting a couple of bottles of red wine into volvic bottles, we were parked in E10. Actually the furthest car park from the site, although we didn't know that at the time - oh well. Just as the sun was setting we loaded up and headed for the site. had to stop for several readjustments of the load, eventually arriving at pedestrian gate C. Asking for quiet camping they advised heading for the family camping up the NE corner. When we arrived they said it was very full, but there were a few spaces under the pylons. When we got there, at the top of the hill, a particularly unhelpful camping crew threatened us with security if we camped there - nice. Anyway, extremely tired, we stood about for 20mins having a rest. Apparently there was still some space in the NW corner "woods" field, behind the cinema. Didn't like the sound of that much - late night screenings, but with no other options we had to carry on. Got stuck up several dead ends along the way in the dark. Got separated going through the woods, meaning getting the phones out. Unfortunately, mine was still set to vibrate and trashed quite a bit of charge before I got it out of my pack. Past the cinema, we found the field, but no obvious space - people even crammed in along the side of the road. This is still the night before the official festival starts. Didn't fancy getting run over, or moved in the middle of the night, so got the torch out and explored the field. Found a bit of space between some tents and went for it. Bringing the spare tent, just to claim an extra bit of space, now seemed like a really bad idea. I was carrying a 6x pack of 1.5 litre volvic, which seems to have damaged my 3rd finger - went a bit numb. Finally got to bed at 02:00 in the morning. Still people talking, but no problem falling asleep.

Friday morning the thunder, lightning and steady rain started, and kept going for hours, finally easing off about 11:00. Yes it was forecast, but still a disappointment. Tent proving to be not entirely waterproof. The outer cover was not well streched, given the confined space available, but the volume of water was the main problem, with it ocasionally spattering straight through the top. We eventually had a small puddle collecting at the low end, soaked ground mats, and sleeping bags with wet edges. We were lucky. Carol's food bag proved very useful for breakfast. Got the fm radio going in the phone. Reports of people being washed away, and advice about going up to the top for blankets and support. I assumed they were exaggerating, but no. Not really wanting to go out in it, an empty volvic bottle proved very handy. 1 of the main reasons for arriving thursday was to see the subways on the pyramid stage friday morning 10:45. Still raining heavily, so we missed that. Anyway there was eventually a break in the rain and we got there in time for the undertones at 12:15, after retracing steps to higher ground as the W end route to the stage was flooded. Started to rain again. Good to hear the old undertones stuff again, without the original annoying vocal style. Carol decided we really needed to go back to the car for the wellies, left behind for weight reasons. We headed for gate C, only to be told it was flooded/closed, so we had to out of gate B at the N of the site. Saw some partly submerged tents in the family field, even at the top of the hill. Horrified at the length of coming back in queue, but we pushed on anyway. Impressive security, requiring a wrist band, original ticket, and a pass out to get back in. Having walked right across the site, back across half of it again, then around about 30% of the perimeter we arrived back at the car. Had a rest and put the phone on charge for a while. Coming back we got in through gate C, although curiously, they were still stopping people going out that way ? Had a quick look round the left field tent, before stopping for a late lunch. Past lots of flooded stalls, back to the main stage, where we saw the end of the zutons set - quite musical. Round the edge of the back stage area, via espresso doppio to the other stage for babyshambles, who were very short, yet tedious, although they seemed popular. Back again to the pyramid stage in time to see some of the doves - pleasant enough, but a bit boring after a while. Back to the tent for some warmer clothes. Had something to eat at lulu's cafe. Put the wet sleeping bag and ground mats on top of the tent, to dry in what was left of the overcast daylight. Then back for the killers. Very much a highlight of the festival, with so many great songs from just the 1 cd, played accurately. Shared a decanted bottle of wine. Stood behind a seated group, watching someone rolling a 3 paper, including sprinkling something mysterious into it. Didn't seem in any hurry to light up. Stayed for the white stripes. They were very good. Amazing how much you can get out of a well played guitar and distinctive voice. Drums sounding like a rather hastily programmed drum machine, but did the job ok. A very slow glastonbury shuffle back to the tent. Didn't fancy the film much. With just 1 reasonably dry sleeping bag, it was a case of sleeping under coats, but so tired, slept well.

Saturday still a bit damp and cloudy, but not actually raining. Headed down to the main stage in time to catch the last couple of songs from the hayseed dixies ("AC/DC"). Heard ace of spades and highway to hell on the way down. Technically brilliant, but plinky plonk banjo and mandolin really don't make a great sound out of heavy metal tracks. Walked through the circus field, past some big "recycled" art creations. Site vehicles out making an effort to pump the worst of the water away, and dump straw into what was left. Back to the main stage for goldie lookin' chain - don't like rap style much, but it was rather fun and we stayed to the end before dashing (as fast as you can through sucky mud) round for kt tunstall on the other stage. Only managed the last couple of songs, but they were good. Back to the main stage for that bob geldof moment, before ash. A couple of good songs, but mostly boring. Back at the tent, there was actually a bit of sun trying to break through and the bedding was drying nicely on the tent. Dashed over to the john peel (new bands) tent, past more mud and abandoned tents, to see the subways. Apparently their 1st show had been cancelled due to the weather. Extremely popular, and a lively set - cd out soon. We walked down part of the old railway line, through an avenue of rippling flags, round the back of the other stage, past the jazz world stage, to the cabaret tent, where we saw men in coats, followed my marcus brigstocke. the mic act is familiar from the tv, but still entertaining. Marcus was a bit off, we thought, doing the standard stand up fall back of slagging off almost everyone, although it got a bit better towards the end. Shared a very tasty organic spud on the way over. A different atmosphere up that corner of the site, with lots of dressed up people wandering about. Back to the other stage to see the start of the kasabian set. Very tight and excellent sound, but I wanted to see new order. Only saw the last few songs, including the terrible s*cc*r anthem. Even apart from that, the material was a bit boring and badly played. Looking back from lulu's cafe in the dark, the glastonbury bowl is a beautiful sight with the bluey/purple pyramid, capped with a white lit up peak, surrounded by twinkling starry lights - probably unique. Very tired, we couldn't be bothered to stay for glastonbury standards coldplay, but it sounded good from the tent, including a surprisingly appropriate version of kylie's can't get you out of my head. Even more too tired to get up for the hhgttg film at 00:00, we fell asleep under a relatively dry sleeping bag.

Sunday and hot sunshine at last. Time for clean clothes. After the horrendous arrival experience,