Minimal

I really don’t get on with cold weather. I don’t even get on with room temperatures. Today, in the office, I’m sat here shivering with cold hands despite it being 23°C. (Note: That’s not an exaggeration.) I really need to sort out my circulation.

In light of this, you might question the wisdom of going on a winter sports holiday. I’m certainly starting to question it. The latest weather forecast for Chamonix gives a maximum temp of -10°C and a minimum of -19°C. Frankly, I’m dreading it. Oh well, see you in two weeks, I guess.

File under “usability gripes”...

1. I have to press the Time button before I can press the numbers to specify the cooking time. Given that pressing the numbers before pressing time doesn’t have any other effect, why not default to treating number presses as cooking time?
2. The buttons themselves are those crappy touch-sensitive ones that don’t depress. I often find myself having to repeatedly press buttons because the first press wasn’t hard enough or central enough to be recognised. Why do people so undervalue tactile feedback?

There are other things I hate about it too, but I just had to get these off my chest. And yes, me having lunch does mean I now think the no-lunch thing was a dumb idea. :)

At work recently, we’ve adopted a system in which developers are kept free from extra-department interruptions from 10am till 4pm. The reasoning is that development is more importarequires extended periods of concentration more than most disciplines and that breaking its flow is costly. Fair enough. Despite the potential for political problems, most people seem to be accepting this.

Thing is, doesn’t lunch also break your flow? It certainly takes me a few minutes to get back into the swings of things after my soup. How is this any different to interruptions from colleagues? To me, it’s not, so I think I’m going to adopt a policy of not having lunch till 4pm. That way, I’ll get a full 6 hours of being in the zone. I just hope my rumbling stomach doesn’t distract me. ;)

My playing of GTA San Andreas is somewhat sporadic, but I’m now up to 55% complete with all 3 islands unlocked. The size of the game is continuing to stagger me. Every now and then I realise there are locations on the map that I’ve yet to visit and end up stumbling across yet another sub-game or other distraction.

Last week, it was a massive open cast mine that I’d missed and the San Andreas equivalent of Area 51. The week before, it was a hill-descent race on mountain bikes and photographing the sights in San Fierro. This week it was running freight train missions (admittedly, a bit boring) and base-jumping from a skyscraper.

Once I complete the main missions (assuming I manage that), I’m going to have to get the guide book to find out what else I’ve missed. :)

I could write my own, but I’m more than happy just reading Matt’s site. :)

Apple Mac mini gets warm welcome [BBC News]
The idea of a low-cost, basic Mac appeals to me somewhat. At £339, the new Mac mini sounds like it fits the bill. However, the second half of that BBC article raises some interesting points, not least of which is that the price doesn’t include a monitor. Or keyboard, or mouse. Even so, it still sounds pretty cheap, so I thought I’d look into what Apple charge for the rest of the package:

• £699 for their smallest monitor (20”) — ouch!
• £19 for a basic keyboard
• £19 for a basic mouse

That now makes a grand total of £1076, which is a bit disappointing. Surely the alternative of a Windows PC could beat that price (and possibly the spec too)? A quick search confirms my suspicions. Dell do a pretty decent PC for much less. It might have 3” less on the monitor, but at £459 all-in, it looks a far better deal.

BTW, I didn’t mean to write an Apple-bashing post when I set out on this. I genuinely had no idea of the different offerings’ prices. I’m actually staggered it’s that bad. Please let me know if I’ve missed something.

Update: here’s an idea! Buy the Mac mini (without peripherals) and that Dell PC and a KVM switch and you’ll have 2 machines giving the best of both worlds for much less than the price of the Apple-only package. God, I’m a genius. ;)

God, I’m being sorely tempted again. Sam Brown’s now taking pre-orders for a limited run hardcover book of explodingdog.com pictures. It would be a great thing to have on a coffee table. A coffee table that I don’t yet own, that is. Dammit, I still haven’t found a decent frame for that print I got yet. One thing at a time, Ross, one thing at a time.

Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, ...

...half an hour later...

...brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide, damn! Accelerate, brake, slide... WOOOHOOO! Get in there, you little bastard! YES! YES! YEEEESSSSSSS!!!!!!! Right, time for a cuppa.

Achieving the Gold award in The ‘90’ — just one of the many glorious moments so far from San Andreas.

Not long now till the Huygens probe reaches Titan. This is something I’ve been looking forward to for years, ever since I read the sci-fi novel Titan by Stephen Baxter. Fingers crossed Huygens fares better than my last big hope, Beagle 2. :-/

Actually, if you’re after something Titan-related in the coming week, that book’s not a bad idea. While it’s far from the greatest sci-fi I’ve ever read, some of the science is detailed and plausible enough to be fascinating. That’s where I get my kicks in sci-fi, at least — your mileage may vary.

...I’m not going to be home for tea,
I’m going to Chamonix,
Tell me ma, me ma!

Like the new duds? Thought I’d try to get myself a little more hyped for the boarding. I suppose I should declare the new stylesheet to be “totally sick, dude”. Forget French lessons — I need to learn some proper boarding lingo.

Photo courtesy of Gav, part of the Hope Collective with whom I’ll be practising face-plants. Cheers, Gav.

McRae crashes out of Dakar Rally [BBC Sport]
Even after switching the WRC for the Paris-Dakar rally, Colin McRae’s old weakness continues to haunt him. He’s just too damn fast and fearless (or is that reckless?) for his own good.

Bit of a bummer, really. I was rather looking forward to him winning the race this year, especially after last year’s disappointment. It was looking like a very real possibility, too. I just hope for his sake that the various teams in the Dakar don’t start to shy away from his reputation in future rallies (as they appeared to do in WRC).

A colleague of mine recently got his own domain and is taking his talents to the web. I’d heard he was into writing games, but I didn’t realise he wrote his own damned physics engines too. Neat. I’m just waiting for him to upload his push-a-man-down-some-stairs sample now... :)