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28 November 2014 (Friday) - After the Night Shift



I can’t deny that working all night is tiring, and it is definitely early days. But so far I like night shifts. I get quite a varied workload at work, and I get to take my dog for a decent walk every day as well.
Last night’s shift could have been better; it could have been a lot worse. But once it was done I came home. Going to or from work still has the same pundits on the radio. Today they were commenting on “Black Friday”. In Britain we’ve always had the January Sales which is when traditionally all the bargains are to be had. But Americans do their bargains on the day after Thanksgiving. And rather than being a gentle polite affair, it’s usually something of a bloodbath. So in true lemming-like fashion Britain copies America and today shops across the country have had “Black Friday” sales in which the average customer would happily slit the throat of anyone and anyone in their bid to save a few pennies. Police were called on several occasions. I wish I’d gone to one… if only to watch the punch-up
Also in lemming-like fashion the Prime Minister is now spouting pure UKIP propaganda. To sum up the speech he made today, anyone who can’t prove a British pedigree is to be deported, and if the EU don’t like it they can get bent.
It worries me that he’s taking this line. Firstly he’s obviously trying to win back voters who have fallen for the UKIP lies by saying that shit is sugar. And secondly he’s following the tack of his coalition partners, the Dribbling Democraps, by abandoning principle in favour if vote grabbing. He might not be my favourite Prime Minister, but up till now I’ve had a grudging respect for him. Does he *really* need to try to out-nasty UKIP?
On reflection I suspect that to win the next election he does…

Once home I took “Furry Face TMround to the park for a walk. Apart from having lost all recollection of the whistle training I’ve spent years trying to instil into him our walk was rather uneventful.
I took myself off to bed shortly after 11am, and would have slept a lot longer had  “Furry Face TM “ not had a major woofing fit at 1.30pm. I got up, but wasn’t feeling as though I wanted to do much. So I settled down in front of the PC and did another module on my Coursera course. Today we covered the appearance of oxygen in the ancient atmosphere and the evidence for changes (up and down) in oxygen levels over time. I’m sure I would have paid more attention to the subject matter had I been less fascinated by the odd-looking chap presenting the lectures. His face looked about twenty years younger than the awful beard he wore. And he had either a very odd hair line or premature balding. Also his head was about twice as long as it really should have been. Poor chap. And then at some point between the second and third lecture he had a shave and haircut and ended up looking like a 1970s porn star (not that I’m an expert on the matter).
I can’t help but wonder how I did on the test for this module. For some reason it won’t give me a result just yet.

I see that the trailer for the new Star Wars film has been released. As a keen trekkie I’ve often been asked to explain the difference between Star Trek and Star Wars. For thirty years I’ve been saying that the key difference is that Star Wars is lame, and this trailer does little to make me want to change my opinion.

I then set off for some McTea. I should have left earlier; the traffic was terrible. But soon enough I was putting the world to rights with Stevey and Jimbo. And from there it was round to astro club. A reasonable turn-out really. We had the second evening of the new-look program; I’m still not sure if I like it; despite a really good talk, it does seem to go on rather late. Perhaps if my dog had let me sleep earlier I might have felt differently.

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