Phlegmatic

Health update

2010-03-10T15:34:45Z

Everyone else does it, so for the first time ever, here is a post about my health! I had a medical for work on Monday, and they sent through the report yesterday.

I am 37 years old, 5'6" and 12 stones 10 pounds. I have been treated for epilepsy since I was 25.

I have a "fairly healthy lifestyle".

My diet is an area "where improvements could be made". "...high in animal fat with a lot of cheese". Yup.

Cholesterol / HDL ratio is in "the 2 times average risk range" mostly because I have a low level of HDL cholesterol.

BMI 28.7 (much the same as two years ago).
Body fat % 15.1 (down from 20.4 two years ago - so I'm doing something right!)
Waist-to-hip ratio 0.9 (improved slightly from 2008)
Nuffield Body Composition Index -1 (that's better than the recommended score - gotta be happy with that!)

Hydration level 68% (up significantly from 2008 - more junior staff in the office to bring me drinks all day...)

Blood pressure 122/84 (normal)

Cardiovascular risk score (Framingham method) 4% risk of cardiovascular event in next ten years. (Normal)

Lung function:
FVC 118% of predicted score (up from 110 two years ago)
FEV1 107% of predicted score
PEF 135% of predicted score
(which I think means I have healthier than average lungs).

Far vision without correction
Left eye B1
Right eye B1 (both down from A1 in 2008)

Near vision without correction
Left eye A1
Right eye A1

Haematology
HGB, WBC, RBC, HCT, MCV, MCH, MCHC, RDW, PLT (no idea what any of these mean, but they were all "within the reference range").

Clinical chemistry
UREA, CREA, ALB, PROT, BILI, ALK, AST, GGT, ALT, CA, CACO, GLU, HDL, TRIG all within reference range (HDL only just)
UA, CHOL, LDL, TCHR all higher than recopmmended norm.

Urine normal.

Posture score 3 - functional (improved from 2 in 2008).
Upright posture 3
Postural flexion 2
Postural skill 3

Resilience index (a measurement of heart rate variability)
1.5 sympathetic
0.0 parasympathetic

Current level of physical fitness 7.3 (at the top end of the normal zone, close to the 'athletic zone' - quite chuffed by that.)

Antioxidants
Just like two years ago, the clever antioxidant scanning machine couldn't get a reading off me. This "almost never happens", and usually only happens with builders etc with very calloused hands (certainly not like mine). Best explanation: I have "exceptionally luminescent skin".

More lit snobbishness...

2010-03-02T12:44:09Z

"They don't appeal in the slightest I'm afraid, although I admit I don't know very much about them. I'm not a follower."

"That fantasy world isn't really my kind of thing."

- Melly Still and Mark Ravenhill who directed and adapted for the stage at the National Theatre Terry Pratchett's 'Nation', quoted in the Daily Telegraph and in Dave Langford's 'Ansible' newsletter.

Premier League footballer wins Countdown episode

2010-02-25T09:31:40Z

True story:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/lancashire/8534578.stm

The Book of the First Law (yet again)

2010-02-24T23:10:56Z

Yes, I know I keep going on about this - The Book of the First Law trilogy by Joe Abercrombie - but nobody seems to listen.

For those of you who can't be bothered to read them, but might go for an audiobook, you'll be pleased to know that Joe has just posted on facebook that they are being made into audiobooks - narrated by STEVEN PACEY!

Sachin Tendulkar. Wow.

2010-02-24T16:28:12Z

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/shared/fds/hi/statistics/cricket/scorecards/2010/2/85701/html/scorecard.stm

Death Awareness update

2010-02-23T23:19:41Z

We passed 100 members yesterday. Yay!

Mass Effect

2010-02-23T21:56:31Z

Anyone played Mass Effect? What did you think?

I'm thinking of playing it now that I've finished Dragon Age. Mass Effect 2 is supposed to be better, but I'd rather start at the beginning.

Windows 7

2010-02-23T21:47:47Z

I upgraded my main PC to Windows 7 64 bit from Windows Vista 32 bit on Saturday afternoon.

Pleased by how simple the upgrade process was (clean install, naturally). 7 doesn’t seem to be radically different from Vista (which I actually quite liked and preferred to XP, even though I know you’re not supposed to), although some of the little things are nicer. The new version of Explorer has got rid of pretty much all of the old ones annoying little niggles. I was particularly impressed that the newly installed operating system was able to set up network access automatically with no input required.

There’s a very nice little blog posting application called Live Writer which I’m using now to write this available as an optional download. It may well work for Vista too.

…and this is why I can’t afford to suddenly spend lots of money updating my collection

2010-02-23T21:02:16Z

I was feeling well off after getting lucky and getting pretty much the car I wanted for quite a lot less than I’d budgeted for.

I’ve now spent or am about to spend slightly more than the difference on a) upgrading the in-car entertainment system in the car and b) bookshelves.

The current ICE in the car is a simple head unit, six disc changer and four pretty ropey speakers. The new system will have a Pioneer double DIN (i.e. double height) head unit which can control my iPod and has satnav, two Alpine speakers in the front dash, large Jehnert speakers in custom door surrounds designed specifically for the 996 coupe, a Pioneer active subwoofer and an Alpine digital amp. Supply and installation by Plymouth Car Sound.

The bookshelves are for the games room. For those of you who have seen our ‘games room’* the bookshelves will cover all of the eastern wall (the one with the little side window in it) and the whole of the southern wall (the one with the dartboard) from floor to ceiling. This will allow me to move the RPG collection upstairs from the library and therefore free the library for other books. The shelving is to be provided and installed by B J Shelving. It’s the shelving that has gone over budget because I was only originally going to do the eastern wall and only up to the window at that. We’ll never need to buy shelving again, and when I can afford all those new Traveller products, I will have somewhere to put them.

In the more medium term (i.e. before September), we’ll be buying a sofa bed for the games room, but that’ll have to wait.

* In practice, the room where the dogs sleep.

A dilemma for the Traveller collector

2010-02-23T20:39:00Z

Assuming you are prepared to stay within certain tight constraints, it is now possible to legitimately publish your own commercial Traveller products.

On the one hand, that’s fantastic. I must admit, I am sorely tempted to do just that. Self-publishing in downloadable pdf format is easy, and self-publishing using services such as lulu ( http://www.lulu.com/ ) isn’t much harder. I’m not naive enough to think that this would be profitable. But it would allow me to contribute an official Traveller product.

On the other hand, other people (not many, but some) are already doing it. And that means that the completist Traveller collector in me feels the need to buy them.

Do science fiction films need to have realistic science?

2010-02-23T20:17:16Z

“An American physicist is calling for Hollywood producers to tone down the fanciful science in movies - and restrict themselves to just one scientific flaw per film.”

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/8530405.stm

So – how real should the science in science fiction be?

Discuss.

Personally, as long as the fictional setting is internally consistent, I’m not overly bothered by fanciful ‘science’ in science fiction. I think science fiction should be more about the fiction than the science.

Test title

2010-02-21T14:07:34Z

Before cut

After cut

Test title

2010-02-21T14:04:42Z

Test text. Please ignore.

DVD meme

2010-02-18T23:25:17Z

My intense instinct to catalogue things has overcome my inherent laziness. So here is the list of television DVDs I own (plus some that are bunn's but she won't mind). Meme by way of pellegrina by the way.

Dallas, series 1 to 8
Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy
Smiley's People
Sharpe's Eagle, Sharpe's Enemy
ANZACs
Life on Mars, series 1
I, Claudius
Stargate: SG-1, series 4
Noggin the Nog
Ivor the Engine
Bagpuss
Pingwings
Mister Benn
Fingerbobs
The Day Today
The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin (complete)
Peep Show, series 1 - 3
Porterhouse Blue
Ripping Yarns
Planet Earth
Bush Tucker Man, Bush Tucker Man: Stories of Survival
The Nightmare Man
Adam Adamant Lives!
Doctor Who: The Tomb of the Cybermen, Genesis of the Daleks, The Brain of Morbius, Horror of Fang Rock, The Robots of Death, City of Death, Earthshock, The Five Doctors, Resurrection of the Daleks, The Caves of Androzani, Revelation of the Daleks, The Curse of Fenric, new series - series 1 and 2
Blake's 7
Firefly
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, series 1 to 6

(Brief) random jottings

2010-02-18T00:06:46Z

Radio 4 listeners are apparently complaining that 'Desert Island Discs' has been dumbed down. How do you dumb down a show whose fundamental premise is asking celebrities what songs they would want on a desert island? It's hardly 'Civilisation' is it?

The British team at the Winter Olympics has 52 members. The BBC team at the Winter Olympics has 74. From what I've seen of the coverage, they spend most of their time talking to each other and precious little showing actual, you know, sport.

I didn't watch the Brits (preferring instead to enjoy Manchester United beating A.C. Milan), but it sounds like host Peter Kay was on form. He described Lady Gaga as "New York's answer to Su Polllard", former Spice Girl Mel B as "Yorkshire's answer to Beyonce", described Kasabian as "Leicester's answer to Aswad" and called Robbie Williams "Stoke on Trent's answer to Shakin' Stevens".

Trivia from the Brits: La Roux is the daughter of Trudie Goodwin, who played Sergeant June Ackland in The Bill, while Bat for Lashes is the niece of squash legend Jahangir Khan.

It's good to see that it is once again legal to say that someone who died in sordid circumstances has died in sordid circumstances.

On the radio today was an interview with Ken Taylor, the Conservative leader of Coventry City Council. The council is going to save £700,000 a year by fitting dimmers (controlled by someone in a control room) to all of its street lights at a cost of £125 million. "But it won't cost us anything, because central government is funding it", he said. Head, desk, repeat.

At a motorway services I stopped at today, sales reps were giving out free sweets (bunny-shaped Malteser things). When I was little, accepting sweets off strangers was just about the naughtiest thing a child could do. Those of a certain age will remember "Charlie says...". This made me wonder - at what stage of my life did it become safe for me to accept sweets off strangers?

How on earth has Reader's Digest survived into 2010? It is without doubt the dullest magazine I have ever flicked through. And don't forget I get sent 'Accountancy' and 'Oxford Today'.

Death Awareness is up to 96 members now, almost all of whom I've never met, and most of of whom are not from this country.

Sky News newsreader Kay Burley has got into trouble for failing to realise that what looked like a bruise on the forehead of the American vice-president (yes, they have one, but he keeps out of the way - which is probably for the best as he's the guy that thought that a Neil Kinnock speech was worth plagiarising...) was actually some sort of ash to commemorate a christian festival called 'Ash Wednesday'. The American VP is apparently a devout catholic (just what America needs - yet more devout christians in positions of power...). She then apologised but apparently compounded the error by saying "I’ve said three Hail Marys, everything is going to be fine." Jeez, you can't take the piss out of anyone any more. If you can't take the piss out of christians who walk around with ash on their forehead, who can you take the piss out of?

I must admit that I've never heard of 'Ash Wednesday'. A couple of people I used to work with and who shared a house in Ivybridge once convinced warrior_princess that in their house, every Wednesday was 'Naked Wednesday', but I'm guessing that was a rather less catholic festival.

On a related note, random and I are trying to persuade everyone in the office to wear some item of knitwear on Mondays when they are in the office. Knitwear Mondays. Each week we plan to name a Knitwear Wearer of the Week. Monday's inaugural award went to fox_hunter for the bright pink V-necked jumper she wore without even realising it was Knitwear Monday.

Researchers from Oregon State University estimated that someone in the US who does all the headline 'green' things like buying a Prius, using public transport whenever possible, using energy-saving light bulbs, fitting double-glazing etc, will reduce the amount of CO2 he is responsible for emitting into the atmosphere by just under 500 tonnes. But if that man chooses to have one fewer child than he otherwise would have done, he will reduce it by almost 9,500 tonnes. I'm not planning on having any children, so I reckon that's 19,000 tonnes I have in hand over the average. Now, where did I put my Porsche...

A celebrity chef on the Italian version of 'Ready, Steady, Cook!' has been suspended for recommending cat casserole. It is apparently a local dish in Tuscany...

The 40 yard dash

2010-02-15T20:15:54Z

In American football, for most positions, speed is very important, and the most common measure of speed for players is 'the 40', i.e. how fast a player can run 40 yards from a standing start. This is shorter than sprinters in athletics will run because it would be very rare for a football player to have to sprint for more than 40 yards.

The draft newsletter I have in front of me lists the unofficial 40 yard dash times for all of this year's leading draft-eligible players. The fastest time listed is 4.38 seconds (Clemson running back CJ Spiller) and the second fastest time is 4.45 seconds by several players.

The reason I mention this is that today it has been reported that former Washington Redskins cornerback Darrell Green today ran a 4.43 40 yard dash.

Now what is quite amazing is that a retired player with no real reason to keep himself in peak fitness should be able to run faster than 21 and 22 year olds whose draft status depends very much on how fast they run in the various draft workouts in the next few weeks.

What is really amazing though is that today was Darrell Green's fiftieth birthday.

Dragon Age: Origins

2010-02-15T16:24:18Z

Finished Dragon Age: Origins last night.

Conclusion: Very good game, cliched setting but generally well-realised. Ridiculous shoulder-pad armour. I'd probably write a longer review, but it would have to include spoilers, and I know at least one person on my friends list was also playnig it and might not have finished it. Combat not individually as satisfying as 'The Witcher', tactical spellcasting not as clever as the Baldur's Gate games, but all in all, very good game. Recommended.

Have decided to give PC a bit of a spring clean with a new operating system, so will install Windows 7 this weekend. The computer is two years old and that's a decent interval before a nice fresh o/s install anyway, ao I might as well put 7 on there.

Collage of what I've been posting about - 100% LESS PORN THAN WELLINGHALL'S!

2010-02-08T12:25:01Z

What I've been journaling about!

Create your own! By ga_woo using Web Services by Yahoo!

Henning

2010-02-07T19:31:42Z

More photos of Henning, to illustrate size.

Our six cats

2010-02-07T19:11:20Z

Photos behind the cut.

Perl:

Footnote:

Henning:

Kjetil:

Sumatra:

Yamamayaa:

As there has been particular interest in His Magnificence on miss_next's LJ, I'll post some more photos of Henning shortly.

Ten months of thinking, researching, spreadsheets and graphs later...

2010-02-05T21:41:44Z

Remember this post?
http://philmophlegm.livejournal.com/91384.html

And this chart?
http://pics.livejournal.com/philmophlegm/pic/0001gc8d/

Well, today I bought a new car.

Picture and details behind the cut.

It's a Porsche 911 996 Carrera 2 in deep purple with grey leather interior and GT3-style aerokit. Test drove it today. It's slightly higher mileage than I was looking for, but a long way below my budget. Pick it up on Wednesday.

Forget Thrud the Barbarian...

2010-02-05T21:17:28Z

...the best cartoon strip in White Dwarf was 'The Travellers'.

And now it's been digitally remastered* for the web

http://www.2000ad.org/markus/travellers/

* It's in colour.

Death Awareness update

2010-02-05T00:22:19Z

We've gone past 50 members! We're now at 52 and counting. I know many of you have signed up, so thank you for that.

http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=wall&ref=mf&gid=275818863325

Oxford NFL player

2010-01-28T18:47:35Z

One of the more interesting NFL draft prospects this year is safety Myron Rolle. Scouts are suggesting that he's likely to go in the second or third round. What makes him stand out is that he's a Rhodes Scholar. He could have entered the draft last year, but chose instead to do a Masters in Medical Anthropology at Oxford.

I'm curious to know which college he is at. Does anyone who is closer to the university than I am have an idea? Google came up blank.

Flash, I love you, but we only have fourteen hours to save the Earth!

2010-01-28T17:00:50Z

This is actually a post about the Apple iPad, but I thought that if I put that in the title, then people who are understandably hype-fatigued by the device might be put off.

Half the internet is full of Apple fanboys and fangirls gushing over the device.

The other half seems to be full of people pointing out the device's shortcomings. "It's nothing new", "It's just a big iPhone without a phone", "It can't multitask", "The battery life is too short", "It's too fragile" and "It can't cope with Flash-based websites".

"None of this matters" say the fanpersons, "It doesn't need to do any of those things. And anyway, Flash is an obsolete technology that nobody uses any more."

The BBC website has a huge advert, sorry "news story" about the iPad, with a gushing video review by celebrity fanboy Stephen Fry.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/maggieshiels/2010/01/the_morning_after_the_tablet.html

The video is in Flash.

Class.