Over brekkie my phone
carried on updating itself from KitKat to Lollipop. I am told that
this is a good thing. I suppose it is but...
If I had to list my
faults (and to be honest there are one or two), top of the
list would be the fact that I don't like change. Anything new is
immediately viewed with suspicion and distrust. I am making a serious
effort to overcome this (which is why "Hannah" isn't in
the dustbin already) but what on Earth was the point of my phone
upgrading itself from KitKat to Lollipop? The process started off
with a gigabyte of download (which took ages) and then
involved a major cyber-fart-around which I left it doing overnight.
This morning I then had to update Google services; that takes some
doing when hitherto you are blissfully unaware of Google services.
After several hours I had
a phone which (apart from a few tacky graphics) seems exactly
the same as it was before except all the farting around had drained
the battery.
As I messed about with
Google services I was doing so one-handed."Furry Face TM"
had pushed on to my lap and had put his chin on my left hand and gone
to sleep. I was loathe to disturb him. Several friends have lost
their dogs and cats recently and I was feeling rather soppy about my
silly dog.
(Have I ever mentioned
that I never wanted a dog?)
I then popped up to the
corner shop where I exchanged stilted pleasantries with our
neighbour. I then picked up Steve and Sarah and we went on to
Shadoxhurst.
Every year the
Shadoxhurst scouts run a summer fete and a dog show, and every year
the astro club puts on a stall. You can't usually do much astronomy
at a summer fete, but with a clear sky we can turn the solar scope on
to the sun.
We arrived, set up our
stall and I soon found the W.I. cake stall. With Steve and Jason
having done a coffee and tea run we were soon having a tea break. And
that rather set the tone of the day. In previous such events our
stall has been heaving with interested punters all day long. For much
of today we had no interest at all; and at no time did we have more
than half a dozen people round our display. I suppose a permanently
overcast sky didn't help; a telescope trained on a distant tree is
somewhat dull.
I had a little mooch
around the fete. Not only was the attendance down on previous events
there were far fewer stalls than in previous years. But I still came
home with a bone and new cushion for my dog. There was no shortage of
dog-related stalls. In previous years the event has been a fete with
a dog show. This year the event was clearly the dog show; the fete
was very much a secondary attraction.
Leaving Jimbo in charge
of base camp Steve and I set off for lunch. I must admit I was not
impressed with the burger stall. Supposedly professional caterers; I
honestly think I could have done a better job (and have done so in
previous scouting-related events). They clearly had no idea how
to do mass catering. But the burger (when it finally arrived)
wasn't bad. Neither was the pint of ale that washed it down.
We prepared ourselves for
the afternoon rush; it never came. At about mid day the sky became
overcast and there were a few spots of rain. There was a noticeable
exodus of cars from the car park, and those who might have come for
the afternoon were clearly put off by the weather and stayed away. At
what should have been their busiest time the beer tent announced they
were slashing the price of the beer just to get rid of the stuff.
The event was supposed to
be open until 4pm; we were packing up shortly after 3pm. A shame
really; the organisers had clearly put in the effort, but what can
you do when the public don't show up?
I took a few
photos of the day; it actually was good fun; a shame that it
wasn't a little busier.
While I'd been out "er
indoors TM" had been giving my GPS unit a
once-over. One of the major problems with "Hannah"
is that when I've set her a target to find, the route on the map that
I want to walk is then highlighted with a thick pink line. I suppose
this is intended to be helpful, but it utterly obscures the very part
of the map I'm trying to see. Effectively making the device useless.
(Or more useless than it already is).
"er indoors TM"
has turned off that "feature". (Why is everything
that is usless about anything called a "feature"?) and
has fiddled about with it a little to make it more "user
friendly".
Having received a few
adjustments, the device has actually been improved from being "Not
Fit For Purpose" to being merely "Vastly Inferior To
My Phone In Nearly All Regards".
I've given that GPS unit
a fair trial over the last month. Despite being the biggest and best
there is, the screen is still too small. The thing weighs a ton. The
software sucks - it's got an alphabetical (as opposed to "qwerty")
keyboard. It's got no wi-fi capability; it has to be pre-programmed
at home before you go out so you can't just randomly geocache
anywhere. And (what really boils my piss) you then have to pay
for third party software to do the secret geo-after-rituals when you
get home because the thing simply can't do them.
I suppose in the
interests of fairness (and not appearing ungrateful for "er
indoors TM" efforts) I should give
it another go (if I can't get Ordnance Survey maps on my phone in
the meantime)...
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