31 March 2026 (Tuesday) - Artificial Intelligence

I was up early as I always am when there’s an alarm set. I turned the telly on as I made toast. I always do that  because for some odd reason the SkyQ box takes an age to boot up in the mornings. As I fiddled in the kitchen so the thing eventually came on and was playing a teleshopping advert for a cordless pressure washer. I’ve got the exact same thing in the shed; the advert on telly was misleading (to say the least). I suppose I should really complain to the advertising standards people…

As I scoffed toast I watched an episode of “Derek” and then had my little look at the Internet. It was still there. American blood bankers were posting to the work-related Facebook pages asking social media questions that are common knowledge to anyone who has worked for maybe half an hour in a UK blood bank… I’m sure there must be some competent American blood bankers but they are clearly making a point of not sharing their wisdom with their trainees.

And another friend was posting a six-year anniversary of his leaving a toxic workplace. I worked in one of those… you don’t really realise just how bad a workplace is until you go somewhere else.

 

I Munzed, and got ready for work… in a summer shirt. Now the clocks have gone forward the winter shirts are back in the cupboard and the summer shirts have come out. I’m told that most people don’t have summer and winter shirts. Most people don’t go hunting for Tupperware under rocks, have Star Trek tattoos and more dogs than sense so I’m again in the minority.

 

As I joined the motorway I narrowly avoided being run off the road by a lorry of the Napolitrans company. As I've said before it is a bit daft to drive like an idiot when you've got your company's name emblazoned over what you are driving. I would complain to their head office, but I doubt they'd take any notice.

As I drove the pundits on the radio were talking about the Artemis mission to the Moon which is supposedly blasting off tomorrow. It was mentioned that this should be a big thing for schools as the astronauts who will be on the first manned mission to Mars will currently be in those schools.

Will they?

I'd like to think so, but... I can remember getting very excited when the very same thing was said during the Apollo missions of the early seventies when I was at school. That sadly came to nothing, didn't it.  I can remember a few years after the Apollos when I was at the secondary school's astronomy club. Someone asked the physics teacher when he thought the first landing on Mars would be. The fellow was spot on with his reply. He said it would be when the Americans got worried that the Russians or Chinese might get there first. This was in the late seventies, and the teacher said (and was probably right) that the technology to get to Mars existed back then, but the financing didn't.

 

I stopped off in Sainsburys for some supplies for the weekend and a sandwich. In a novel break with tradition they'd opened one of the tills operated by a member of their staff. I smiled at the nice lady on the till. She didn't smile back; her face might have cracked if she had done so. Oh, she was miserable.

 

I went on to work and did my bit, and came home again. Once home I asked Microsoft Copilot to do something. “Daddies’ Little Angel ^TM” says that the A.I. knows too much about me and I should be careful what I tell it. So I asked it to make a caricature of me based on everything it knows about me and it came up with the photo above on the left. When I asked it how and why it had come up this picture it told me “I based the caricature on everything I’ve learned about your creative preferences and interests. You’ve shown a clear love for cartoon and caricature art styles, bright, happy moods, and playful, whimsical depictions of everyday life—especially when they involve pets, nature, or humorous takes on technology.

So, I imagined you surrounded by the things that spark your curiosity and joy: fantasy books, gaming dice, pop culture icons, and a touch of tech humor. The scene blends fantasy and sci‑fi elements with a cozy, creative workspace vibe—reflecting your mix of imagination, humor, and intellect.”.

 

Well… I like sci-fi and fantasy… but I’m not massively impressed with the Discworld books. I honestly think “Lord of the Rings” is one of the most tedious books I’ve ever read, and I’d never heard of “The Wheel Of Time”.

I’ve no real interest in films; most play for too long.

Star Wars is (at best) over-rated.

I’ve not played any dice games for over twenty years.

I’m a dog person, not a cat person.

I’ve absolutely no interest in collecting Bobbleheads.

And the person in the picture looks nothing like me…

 

I suggested it might try again. It had a go but stopped and told me “It looks like the image request was blocked because the system interpreted it as potentially involving copyrighted material. That can happen sometimes even when the request is totally innocent — it’s more of a protective misfire than anything you did wrong.

Here’s the good news: we can absolutely try again, and I can help you phrase it in a way that avoids triggering that filter.

If you’d like, you can simply say something like:

“Create a whimsical cartoon caricature of me based on my preferences.” “

 

So I asked it to “Create a whimsical cartoon caricature of me based on my preferences”.

 

This time it came up with the one on the right. It still looks nothing like me, but there’s a dog in there. And I suppose fox poo features in my life…

When I asked it what prompted it to come up with that picture it replied “the caricature wasn’t meant to be a literal likeness of your face or body. I don’t actually know what you look like, so I built the image around your personality and preferences instead.

Here’s what guided it:

• You enjoy whimsical, cartoonish art, so the style leaned playful and exaggerated.
• You like forest and nature settings, so I placed the scene outdoors with woodland creatures.
• You have a fondness for humorous, pet‑centric imagery, so the dogs and fox joined in.
• You appreciate creative, geeky touches — hence the dice, laptop stickers, and “NERD HQ” sign.

It’s more of a visual caricature of your vibe than your appearance — a portrait of your interests and energy rather than your face.”

 

I don’t think A.I. is going to take over the world just yet…

30 March 2026 (Monday) - A Day Off

This “clocks going forward” nonsense means I sleep a little longer than I might usually. Last night was a rather good one – I stayed asleep until nearly eight o’clock.

I made toast and had a look at the Internet. There was a squabble about why society shouldn’t give anything at all to anyone who needed help… Some people can be very right-wing and very anti-commie-pinko social mindedness… right up to the point where they actually need some help themselves. I blame Margaret Thatcher who taught so many people that a house was a financial investment rather than something to live in.

And I found out tha the actor who played Young Mr Grace in “Are You Being Served” and Mr Blewitt in “Dad’s Army” came from my home town of Hastings. I never knew that.

I Munzed, and got ready for the off.

 

I took the dogs up to Kings Wood. As we drove the pundits on the radio were talking about the Great Strike of 1926. It was rather interesting… so much of history would seem to have been interesting. Looking back the history teacher we had at school would seem to have done his level best to have killed the subject stone dead. His style of teaching was to read out the text book, and we would write down what he said. He could have made it interesting, but sadly didn’t seem to want to do so.

We got to the woods and waked our usual route. With my hiking boots on (rather than wellies) we went faster than usual with Map My Walk saying I was doing each mile in less than twenty minutes rather than in about twenty-two (or so) minutes. Not that it was a race.

As we walked we met three other groups and said hello nicely. We didn’t roll in anything, didn’t wallow in any swamps, and didn’t see off any rabbits or squirrels. In many ways an ideal (if dull) walk.

As we came home I saw that the petrol station up the road had put up the price of petrol by two pence per litre whilst we’d been out.

 

We came home for a cuppa, I put a load of shirts and undercrackers into the washing machine then I went into the garden. I gathered a bumper crop of dog turds. How can three small dogs generate so much dung?  I strimmed the lawn’s edges and mowed the lawn. It’s a shame our lawn looks such a state, but my attempts to re-seed to with bird seed over the winter have worked to an extent. I might try that some more next winter; the trouble is that poking each seed in one by one takes an age. I ran out the hose (now that the hose pipe ban is over!) and topped up both ponds and watered the plants which are coming back. The pansies I planted a few weeks ago have come to nothing, but last year’s polyanthus are blooming. I might well get some more of those. Pansies and violas are pretty but they don’t seem to last.

And then I packed up and came in. I was worn out, and it was rather cold outside.

 

I Wordled from “about” via “overt” and “onset” (even though I knew the “o” wasn’t at the start!) to get it right with “comet”. I wrote up some CPD. I tumble-dried the undercrackers, then set about the ironing.

As I ironed I watched episodes of “Four In A Bed” in which everyone was matey and friends right up until the last episode when the fussiest one was shown to be running far and away the poorest B&B.

I do far more on a day off than I ever do at work.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up pizza then went bowling.  I sparked up Netflix and put on a film I’ve been meaning to watch for ages. Sadly “Borderlands” was a load of tripe, and I turned it off half-way through.

I’m going to work tomorrow – for a bit of a rest.

 

Oh – and today would have been my parents’ sixty-ninth wedding anniversary

29 March 2026 (Sunday) - Spring Forward

What with daylight saving it was nearly two o’clock before I went to bed last night. Again I popped to the loo while it was still dark, and again Morgan was on the floor wanting to get onto the bed but frightened of Treacle who was glaring at him. I lifted him up, and both dogs settled.

I got up shortly after nine o’clock which wasn’t really quite the lie-in it might have been. Yesterday that would have been eight o’clock.

 

I made toast and wondered what the Alexa was playing. We usually ask it to play Gold Radio which is quite entertaining. This morning it had decided to play EKR Gold which is some obscure European station.

As the radio played some rather grim tripe I rummaged round the Internet. It was much the same as ever. Had no one *really* been out and done anything yesterday? I’m nosey; I want to see what other people have been up to.

I sent out birthday wishes and had a look at my emails, Some new geocaches in Willesborough. They will make a walk for another day. And one in Hastings… Yesterday I whinged about the ones we found being far more tricky than the instructions would have had us believe. Another such went out in Hastings today. 

To find it you have to go to a given location and using a special torch look for a message written in paint that only becomes visible when you shine ultra-violet light on it. This message gives you another location to go to. You go there and use your phone to scan for a Bluetooth beacon. You then rummage in the technical data it gives you to get some information. You then do some sums with these numbers to get the final location that you are looking for. And this is rated difficulty two (out of five). There’s film pots stuck under rocks that have been rated more tricky.

I Munzed, and Wordled. “Rated” gave me nothing at all. “Clung” did a bit better, and “chuff” got me over half-way there, and I got it with “chump” on the fourth attempt.

 

I set the washing machine going and we took the dogs for a little walk. We’d looked at the map and seen two sets of geocaching Adventure Labs running along the canal near Hamstreet, so we walked along the canal and walked back again. We had one minor episode when some idiot took exception when Morgan growled at his dog. He got rather abusive and seemed to take offence that I’d been taking photos of my dogs… he even came back after the squabble to shout “dickhead” at me (albeit from a safe distance).

After that, Bailey’s rolling in fox poo and Treacle’s going in the canal were something of an anticlimax.

 

We came home where fox poo was washed off. I hung out the laundry on the clothes horse. I had hoped to stick it on the washing line, but the bright morning was becoming very overcast, and with rain forecast I didn’t want to bring laundry in wetter than it had gone out.

We had a cuppa with the last of yesterday’s coffee and walnut cake, then I had a little look at the geo-map. There’s a meet-up planned in early May near Wilmington. A drive out, a little geocaching in the village, a hike up the hill and a picnic with a view… Could be a plan.

 

And then I went into the garden. A few months ago I had a problem with algae in the fish tank. I popped six Ramshorn snails in last Christmas and the problem is gone… I started with six snails; I’ve now got twenty or more. Would they do a similar job in the small outdoor fish pond… I’ve tried every other algae cure. I took some of the weed from the fish tank with some snails on it and dropped it in the little pond. Will that work?

I then had a look at the big pond. The aerating pump was running very slowly so I took it apart, cleaned it all out, put it back together again and got the thing working perfectly. Sadly the screwdriver I used to fix it is now at the bottom of the pond… I need a magnet on a length of string to get it out.

Or a new screwdriver.

 

I came in and sat on the sofa. I read my Kindle app for a bit… then nodded off for an hour or so. I hate that. I lay wide awake in bed for hours on end, and when I am supposed to be awake I’m sparko.

Once awake I marked trainee work for an hour or so. It’s something I can do and it’s only fair on the trainees that they get feedback on their efforts. I can remember when I started trying to complete a specialist portfolio of my own some years ago, and gave up as it was taking about four months for me to get anything marked.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up bangers and mash which we scoffed whilst watching more “Throw Down”. It made me think - how do you do pottery as a hobby? The wheel and kiln and drying stuff is going to take up a *lot* of space.

I wonder if I could clear up the attic room and have a go?

28 March 2026 (Saturday) - A Rather Good Day

I slept through till six o’clock this morning, but woke aching. I ache more and more these days. I came downstairs to find Morgan in his basket. He said hello and ran upstairs, but by the time I’d had a shave he was back downstairs again. He looked at me and looked at the stairs so I went up with him. Treacle was standing on the edge of the bed glaring at him. He’s scared of Treacle; if she’s on the bed or on a sofa he doesn’t dare go up. He looked at me again and I lifted him up past Treacle. Once he’s up and on the same level as Treacle all is fine; it’s just the getting up that is an issue.

 

I went back downstairs, made toast and had my usual look at the Internet. For once it was remarkably quiet. I sent birthday wishes to my nephew’s three Facebook accounts and then Munzed. I opened a qrate and got a cubimal (as one does) then Wordled my way from “slept” through “grout” to “afoot” as no other word would fit.

I wasted twenty minutes trying to work out how to change my status in the works Whatsapp group to read “The fat bald one”, and then Steve came on the radio. This morning’s “Guess the Lyrics” was “Some people work for a living some people work for fun. Girl I just work for you”. No. I had no idea either. It was Wham – “Everything She Wants”.

 

We drove round to Repton and Dog Club where a good time was had by all. He played chase, we fetched balls, we had treats. All rather simple pleasures, but we all love it.

As we drove away Steve was doing the Mystery year competition on the radio. Quite a few songs that I’d not heard, and the question of when did the first run of Doctor Who end. I knew that was 1989, so why did I say 1990?

We drove up to Chartham for a little walk. As we’d driven home past Chartham last Sunday so two new geocaches had gone live. Over the week one friend had gone out and couldn’t find them. And still with no one having logged First to Find we thought we’d try our luck. The two of them (and another geocache) would mark out a walk of two miles.

We started badly… Looking for the first cache had us rummaging on a fence just outside someone’s back door. We gave up and went on with our walk. We went up through the village and across fields with a rather spectacular view down to a rusting barn in which there was supposedly a geocache hidden. Having the farmer standing there watching rather put us off searching.

 

We walked along the lane to where the next cache was supposedly hidden. Geocache hides are graded by the hider with a rating from one (rather obvious) to five (fiendishly difficult). This one had been rated as a two. I eventually found it; I think a rating of four might have been more appropriate. But a find is a find. And a First to Find is even better. The cache was named “FTF can name this cache” so I sent in a suggestion for a new name…

Our route took us back past the first cache that we’d failed to find earlier. But having seen the one we did find gave me an idea of what we might be looking for, and we soon found it. And another First to Find too.

And as an added bonus as we drove home we stopped near Wye where a bouncing Munzee garden had landed (as they do) and we Munzed like things possessed until the garden bounced off to somewhere else in the world.

 

We came home. According to the forecast the rain was supposed to have started by the early afternoon. It was rather sunny. As we’d walked we’d gone past a little shop where we’d got a coffee and walnut cake. We had some of that with a cuppa and I counted up the takings form Dog Club. We had twenty-one pounds eighty-six pence. At one pound fifty per dog, how did that work?

I then spent a little while building the Lego hibiscus that I’d got for Christmas. I’m quite pleased with it. As I Lego-ed so we had a hailstorm. The weather forecast wasn’t *that* far out.

 

I planned a little walk for tomorrow, and then Chris popped round. After the little hiccup with the internet connection between our Infinity Tables the other night he thought he’s sort out our router.

It resisted sorting.

But we got out our Table and played all sorts of versions of “Ticket To Ride”. I do like that game…

27 March 2026 (Friday) - Early Shift

With an alarm set I didn’t sleep as well as I might. I was up, scoffing toast and watching an episode of “Derek” by five o’clock, before having a little root around the internet. It was fairly quiet at half past five this morning, but there was a little argument. Someone had made the (patently obvious) statement that out of any twenty people, no matter how they are judged nine will be above average. Not only did most people disagree, most people were very happy to proudly show off their ignorance.

I Munzed. I set the dishwasher going (I forgot that last night), got dressed and set off to work.

 

As I drove to work I listened to the radio as I do.  There are calls for the government to apologize for the forced adoptions that happened after the war when babies were taken away from their mothers simply because the mothers weren't married. Whilst what happened was obviously wrong, as I've said before how can anyone apologize for things that happened before they were born? Are those who were responsible going to be held to account posthumously? Surely it would be better to look at current forced adoptions and stop the totally unnecessary ones before any apologies are needed and sack the people involved. Not that I'm in any way bitter.

And as the doctors prepare to go on strike asking for a twenty-six per cent pay rise their own union's staff are on strike themselves having been offered a below inflation rise of less than three per cent.

I suppose (if nothing else) it made a change from listening to the antics of the demonstrably senile President Trump.

 

I stopped off at Tesco to get myself a sandwich. The shelf fillers weren't swearing at each other. Instead some were leaning against the fridges talking about Lanzarote. Others were talking about how useless they were at using any form of technology; like so many people they took pride in being unable to do the simplest things. The staff supposedly overseeing the self-service checkouts weren't idly chattering though; they were just glowering at the public as though daring them to ask for help.

 

I did my bit… I came home through drizzle. Not bad enough that we couldn’t do “FEED THE FISH” but bad enough to put me off taking the dogs to the woods.

It’s supposed to be chirping up by the morning.

Today has been dull…

 

And after yesterday's debacle I've made a list of what I've used my phone for today.

 

• Alarm clock
• Checking transactions on bank account
• Making payments.
• Playing Munzee
• Playing Wordle
• Playing Panda Saga
• Whatsapping friends & family
• Checking emails
• Getting logon code for works email
• Checking Facebook
• Counting the calories in dinner
• Reading books (on the Kindle app)
• Checking the weather forecast
• Checking the traffic on the way home
• Logging a geocaching trackable

 

I knew I used the phone a lot but didn’t realise just how much… I’d be rather stuck without it. And today I didn’t use the calculator or camera or do any shopping with it or park my car…

26 March 2026 (Thursday) - A Day Off

 

I was sleeping like a log when the shouty dog woke me just after half past six. Someone locally walks a small dog round our roads from time to time. The dog barks constantly without ever stopping. I wish it wouldn’t. I dozed for a bit, finally getting up just before eight o’clock when I made toast and had a look at the internet. I do that every day.

Social media could be such a boon to humanity…

There were two rather spectacular arguments on Facebook this morning… The chap who I mentioned the other day when he felt he was being victimised on one of the geocaching Facebook groups has now set up his own group. But rather than posting sensible comments and questions to his group, he’s been just dashing out the first thing that comes into his head and pressing send (rather than re-reading and spell-checking) and not only is he posting incomprehensible gibberish, he’s also taking offence when no one understands what he’s going on about.

And there was a rather bitter squabble on one of the fish tank related groups when someone asked a genuine question. Admittedly a bit of a rather basic question, but why can’t people just either answer or ignore. Why do people have to make such supercilious comments?

I Munzed, and Wordled from “scale” through “merry” and “feted” before coming up with “befit”.

 

I got dressed and took the dogs out. We went up to the woods where we had a rather eventful time. Our walk started well, but Morgan will growl at the people he sees that he doesn’t know. He seriously resents anyone being in what he sees as his personal woods. We walked our usual route; at about the furthest point form the car I saw something move in the distance. It was a stag with (at least) four does with him. I stood for a good five minutes trying to get a decent photo. The camera on my phone does its best, but only has a maximum of times ten zoom.

The dogs didn’t see the deer at all.

I saw a few more bluebells then we had a little episode. I heard screaming. Bailey was chasing a small rabbit. Chasing it right at Treacle who caught it and shook it hard. In the time it took me to get to Treacle (about five seconds) she and Bailey were pulling the rabbit about like an old sock. I got it off of them and got them on their leads. I hoped the rabbit would hop off… it tried to crawl away. They’d broken its back.

I did the decent thing for the poor rabbit and dragged the dogs away. Or the two that needed dragging. Morgan had shown no interest in the whole debacle.

After about four hundred yards the girls stopped trying to pull back to the dead rabbit. I walked another hundred yards and let them off of their leads. Bailey went off to see what Morgan was sniffing at; Treacle was like a bullet from a gun. She totally ignored my calls and ran right back to where we’d left the dead rabbit. Once she’d got it she came back. Sort of. She carried the dead rabbit back but wouldn’t get within a yard of me. She simply wouldn’t let me take it from her. So I let her carry it. The thing was dead and carrying it wouldn’t hurt anyone.

And then I saw something that made me smile. As a youngster in the Boys Brigade we would load all of our tents and sleeping bags and kit into our backpacks and go for expeditions. We met a gaggle of young girls who (oh so politely) asked if I could show them where they were on their map. I had the same map on my phone (on my geo-app) so we were able to pinpoint where they were… about half a mile from the car park where they had started about an hour previously. But they didn’t seem disheartened at their lack of progress. They were happy to know where they were, and openly admitted they had no idea where they were supposed to be going anyway.

 

I posted some photos of our walk to the internet, and when we got back to the car I got the dogs onto their leads and told Treacle to drop the rabbit. She’s funny like that; if she’s carrying something she insists on carrying it, but knows to drop it at the end of the walk. We did “boot dogs” and I went to stop the “Map My Walk” app, but the screen on my phone wasn’t working. It’s all very well having a device that works by touching the screen all the time that the screen responds to being touched. Pressing the side button, and various combinations of buttons did nothing.

 

We came home where it was as well we didn’t need baths. With my phone still poggered I walked up to the town. I didn’t drive as with no working phone I had no RingGo app ro pay for parking.

Back in the day there used to be loads of little phone repair shops. Nowadays most of them have been replaced with nail bars. As I searched for a shop I’d all but decided that I would be coming home with a new phone which would cost a fortune and need no end of setting up. But what choice did I have? Without a phone I couldn’t pay for a car park. I use the phone as a camera and to play various silly games. Its Kindle app means I can read books without having to carry a library about. It tells me which birds are singing when I hear birdsong. I can’t pay bills without it, and if I couldn’t post bollox to Facebook I’d go stir-crazy.

And I use it to communicate with people too.

I eventually found that the phone shop I’d used before was one of only two that are still in business. The nice man asked if I’d tried restarting it. I said I’d tried everything… it turned out that I’d not tried pressing the side button and the volume down button together. That re-started the phone and all was well. Pulling the plug and plugging it back in always works – all the time you know where the plug is.

What a sense of relief… But as the nice man in the shop said, the phone is old. I got it in March 2021; is it time to get a new one? I suspect I shall ponder the idea for a day or so, and as soon as I stop getting adverts for new phones in my Facebook feed I will forget all about it until it packs up again.

I came home past the corner shop where I got us celebratory almond croissants for lunch.

 

I made myself a cuppa and had that croissant whilst cracking on with one or two little jobs that needed doing… whilst feeling rather relived that I wasn’t having to set up a new phone.

I told the admin people at work that I’ve just done two days overtime.

I struggled with the FTP uploader for mankybadger.co.uk – Apparently now I’ve upgraded I need to upload to a new IP address… I would if I could. In the end I messaged the nice lady to ask for help. Eventually we got it sorted.

I had a little fight with my NHS app. I’ve now installed a passkey (whatever that means)

I updated my ever-growing list of passwords – it is as well to have that somewhere safe *before* my phone dies again.

I wrote up some CPD.

And I cartoon-ised the photos I’d posted from the woods earlier. Personally I thought that people would be getting fed up with my obsession with Microsoft CoPilot, but yesterday at work several people said that they really liked the happy cartoon pictures I’ve been posting up recently.

 

After three hours of sitting on my arse I thought I’d better get up. I’d originally planned to do a tip run today, but what with Ashford’s tip still being closed that wasn’t an option. I announced that I was going to “FEED THE FISH”. I had hoped to make the dogs jump up with a start, but they knew that we feed the pond fish in the late afternoon every day, and they’d all been watching and waiting.

Whilst I was at it I harvested dog dung.

 

We had pie and chips for dinner, then sparked up the Infinity Table and played Chris across the internet… or so we thought. After a while it seemed to us that Chris had picked up the French version of “Ticket to Ride” really quickly and was very fast at doing his moves. However it seemed to Chris that we were taking forever to make a move. The connection had dropped and the Table was doing Chris’s moves for him. But the connection held up for other games.

Odd…

I’ve had a good day off… it’s back to work again tomorrow.

25 March 2026 (Wednesday) - Ker-Ching!!!

I slept far better last night than I did the night before, but was still wide awake at four o’clock. I gave up trying to sleep (as I so often do), made toast and watched an episode of “Derek” then had my usual peer into the Internet.

There was a lot of talk about proposals to move the tank in the Town Centre. Gifted to the people of Ashford over a hundred years ago there are suggestions that the tank should be moved to some museum in Dorset… Supposedly. Everyone was up in arms saying the tank should stay where it is. The council has said they won’t do anything without a full public consultation. No one would actually seem to have made a formal suggestion, but everyone was incensed about what looks to be baseless rumours.

And I saw a friend was celebrating a tenth wedding anniversary. Is it really ten years ago? Yes - it was.

I Munzed, and taking care not to disturb anyone I got ready for work.

 

As I drove I noticed that a local petrol station was knocking petrol out at six pence a litre cheaper than it had been a couple of days ago. I’d seen quite a few angry posts on local Facebook groups naming the petrol station and threatening never again to buy from those who were blatantly profiteering… I wonder if this price reduction was the result of a social media campaign or just market forces in action… after all if you are going to sell petrol at six pence per litre more than the other local garages, people are going to go elsewhere.

 

I headed west-wards to Pembury. This morning the pundits on the radio were talking about nothing but oil prices. President Trump is apparently still claiming that the peace negotiations are going well; so well that the Iranians have given him some big gift (but he was rather vague on the details)

Meanwhile the Iranians are still saying there's no negotiations going on. The sensible money seems to think that President Trump is wasting time until the US armed forces get to the Middle East when he will then use them to kick some arse.

With absolutely nothing else being reported on, presumably there's nothing going on in Gaza, and ex-Prince Andrew hasn't porked anyone recently?

 

I stopped off at Tesco to get a sandwich. Their meal deal is ten pence cheaper than the one in Sainsbury's, but I did have to contend with the young lads filling the shelves who were rather passive-aggressively swearing at each other. It also bothered me that rather than having staff operating the tills, it is all self-service with two or three members of staff standing watching the customers with obvious contempt.

 

I got to work early and carried on with the IT testing I’ve been doing recently. It was perhaps a tad frustrating at times, but it made a change to my usual routine.

I came home. We did “FEED THE FISH”. “er indoors ^TM” sorted us a cuppa, and I did a You-Gov survey about this and that. It gave me two hundred points to my account, and as that put me over five thousand points I got to redeem them. I chose to have fifty quid in cash which has already been transferred to my bank account.

You-Gov isn’t the biggest of earners, but each survey takes about five minutes, and I get fifty quid once a year or so, which has got to be better than a poke up the bum with a sharp stick. If any of my loyal readers fancy jumping on this gravy train let me know; I get points for recommending people (I think).

 

We had a rather good dinner of enchiladas which we washed down with a bottle of plonk whilst watching an episode of “Throw Down”.

I might regret the two glasses of amaretto I had for dessert…

24 March 2026 (Tuesday) - Bit Dull

Having been awake for most of the night I gave up trying to sleep and got up at half past four. I made toast, watched an episode of “Derek” on Netflix. It passed the time.

And with time on my hands I had a look at the monthly accounts. I wasted quite a bit of time talking to the bank querying some suspicious activity… Why do so many companies use such stupid names? My monthly direct debit to the dentist isn’t recorded on my bank account as “dentist” or anything remotely like that. It comes up as “Tabeo Plans”. Similarly the monthly bung I give to the goat sanctuary comes up as “DS16JAN”. Why?

I got the accounts done and accounted for all that I squander each month. As always my accounts are far better than they might be, but as always I wish I had far more money in there. So many people I know don’t go through their bank statements every month accounting for every penny. Am I really as skint as I think I might be, or am I just mean?

 

As I drove up the motorway so the pundits on the radio were talking about the ongoing war in the Middle East. President Trump said that the peace negotiations were going well; the Iranians said there weren't any peace negotiations going on. What was that all about?

And there was talk about a report coming out today on the bills charged by vet surgeries. Not that anyone felt they were overcharging (much!) but there was an interview with some woman whose dog had a lump. She claimed the UK-based vets had wanted one thousand six hundred pounds whilst a vet she saw in Italy vet charged her one hundred and forty quid for the job.

 

I took a minor diversion to the petrol station at Aylesford's Sainsburys. There petrol was far too expensive, but was five pence per litre cheaper than Ashford's.

As I was there I got a sandwich. The Aylesford Sainsburys petrol station don't stock up on sandwiches until mid-morning so I had to rough it with the leftovers from yesterday. I tried smoked salmon with cream cheese; I won't be trying it again.

 

I was in on an extra day (doing IT stuff) today so (within reason) I could do the hours that suited me. So I started early and finished early. I came home and took the dogs to the woods for a walk. A week ago the car park at Orlestone was heaving with people coming from far and wide to see the no-longer extinct butterfly. I think it’s fair to say that the novelty has worn off; we got to the car park which last week must have had fifty cars in it. This afternoon we were the third car.

We had a good walk, but as always in Orlestone the dogs were more adventurous and less inclined to come when called. It was a shame that Bailey had to reprise her fox poo episode of yesterday, and that Treacle had to wallow in the swamp when we were two minutes from the end of our walk.

We came home for a bath.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up a very good bit of dinner which we scoffed whilst watching some episodes of “The Other Bennett Sister”. It’s rather good, but I suspect that unless you are quite up on what happened in “Pride and Prejudice” a lot of the story might not make sense.

We’ve caught up with the show now, and we’ve got to wait for the next episode to come out. I’d far rather binge-watch the lot in a few days rather than spreading it out. 

 

I was up silly-early this morning and I’ve got another early start tomorrow. I really should have an early night.

23 March 2026 (Monday) - A Day Off

 

I woke with a start to the sound of a loud crash at ten to one this morning. Morgan had got tangled in the hose of my CPAP machine, got into a panic and bolted, taking the CPAP machine and bedside clock with him. He was terrified… it was as well he is sent out for a late night tiddle before bed time.

 

With him eventually settled I slept through till eight o’clock, got up and made toast. Facebook was the same as ever. There’s one chap who plagues the geocaching pages on Facebook who was bemoaning about how nasty everyone else can be, and why doesn’t anyone set up a Facebook page which is monitored and moderated. Needless to say it was all “why doesn’t someone else” and comments about “why don’t you do it yourself” were seen as a personal attack.

And there was a post on one of the work-related Facebook groups from someone in America asking about how to get compatible blood for transfusion. Reading the posts from American blood bankers is always interesting. Some of them are state-of-the-art and up to date on the cutting edge of progress and others (like the one posting today) ask the most basic and simplistic questions. This morning’s question really was along the lines of a motorist saying that their car has stopped going and that they’d heard that good results have been achieved from putting petrol in the petrol tank, and does anyone have any experience of this.

 

I went down the road to the dentist. Having messaged me twice, emailed me four times and phoned me I thought I’d better not miss the appointments. The dentist had a go, took some X-rays and said I was good for another six months. And then I went in to the hygienist where I nearly drowned in the chair. But I came out with a cleaned gob, which must be a result.

 

With dentist done I took the dogs up to the woods. We did our usual circuit, and as we walked my birdsong app detected a red-tailed hawk. That was clever of it as they aren’t a bird which is native to the UK. Perhaps it had escaped from somewhere. Like America?

Treacle detected some horse poo and ate it, and Bailey detected some fox poo and had a very good roll in it. Foul creature!

We came home for a bath. I made us both a cuppa, then I spent a few minutes going through my payslip. We operate a system where any overtime or extra we work is paid the next month, so it is quite easy to lose track of where you are and what you’ve been paid. Most people don’t bother, but I’m incredibly mean and account for every hour and every penny. Sometimes I spot a mistake in my favour…

 

I went into the garden,  harvested dog dung, then wound out the big waste hose. I stuck one end at the base of the monkey puzzle tree, attached the other end to the pond’s pressure filter, and gave the filter a cleaning. Quite a bit of grungy muck came out. But what is grungy muck to me is rather good to a monkey puzzle tree.

I topped up the bird feeder, then had a little sit by the pond. It’s definitely coming back to life. I would have sat there for longer, but after half an hour I got rather cold so I came back inside and made us both a cuppa.

 

I wrote up some CPD… I realised I hadn’t Munzed, so I Munzed. Our Clan reached the last of our monthly targets today and got all of our in-game rewards.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up pizza and went bowling. I watched the last of the Netflix dinosaur documentary. What to watch next…

22 March 2026 (Sunday) - Geo-Meet

I did my usual trick of sleeping like a log and then waking full of energy and raring to go… at five past three. I nodded off but only dozed fitfully after that.

I gave up trying to sleep and scoffed toast as I watched another episode of the Netflix documentary about dinosaurs in which two of them did the dirty deed. I suppose dinosaurs must have done the dirty deed, but did we need it on Netflix?

And then I had my usual rummage round the Internet. Two friends were having a birthday today. I sent them the video. There wasn’t much else happening at half past six on a Sunday morning though. As I rummaged through a dull internet I could hear not-so-nice-next-door shouting “Hey! Hey! Hey!” She does some sort of exercises in the morning which involves this shouting. All the time she’s not bothering the dogs she’s not bothering me.

And talking of not bothering the dogs, I dressed quietly and set off to work.

 

As I drove to work I listened to the pundits on the radio who were talking about religious stuff as they do on a Sunday morning. There was quite a bit of talk about the investiture of the new Archbishop of Canterbury. It was repeated several times that the service starts with her turning up and banging on the door of Canterbury Cathedral, and there was loads of talk about how this is symbolic of how (many years ago) the new Archbishops would walk down the Pilgrim's Way making a pilgrimage. It strikes me that she certainly ain't going to be hiking the hundred and twenty miles from Winchester, so why mess about pretending that she has?

And there was talk about the Pope. My initial thought was that this current Pope ain't much good; what's he actually done? And then it turned out he's done quite a bit... according to Catholic sources. There's a lesson for all of us there... Well - two lessons. Firstly it would seem that the news I listen to has chosen not to report on him very much. And secondly if I do my own research, pretty much everything I am going to find out is written by someone with a vested interest in writing what they are writing.

 

It was very foggy as I drove. And the roads were a worry. There were birds, squirrels and rabbits charging all over the place, and several dead badgers on the roadside. I'm quite confident I didn't splat anything, but I did swerve a few times.

 

Pausing only briefly a mile or so from the hospital for geo-reasons I soon got to work and got stuck in. Originally I was down to be doing the late shift, but I'd rather not do a late shift if I can avoid it. With no alarm set I certainly sleep better, but I still spend the time before I have to go to work sulking that I've got to go to work. And a late shift makes for a rather late finish. My colleague doing the morning shift was up for a swap, and so was I. And as I’d driven in this morning I remembered that this afternoon there was a geo-meet. Originally being on the late shift meant I wouldn’t have been able to get along. But not being on the late shift meat that we could.

I drove home, collected “er indoors ^TM” and the dogs and we drove down to the meet. With a little time on our hands we drove on to Walmer where we found some people trying not to look suspicious as they had found the geocache we were looking for. From there we drove on past another geocache… the lid was missing and the thing was awash, I popped a new logsheet inside  it; the logsheet having its own container. That will keep it going for a while longer.

 

We went onto the meet-up. It is always good to catch up with friends. One had brought her dogs along. Treacle and Bailey were fine with them. Morgan was better than he has been in the past, so I’m taking that as a result.

We had coffee and cake and the chance to get the co-ordinates of an NFC cache. NFC caches are rather obscure things. They beam the final location of the geocache to whatever device you use via Near Field Communication. My Garmin GPS device does NFC easily. My phone has an app… If you like endless adverts I can’t recommend that app highly enough. But we got the information we needed, and got the cache too.

We took a circuitous route home via three more geocaches. One in a picnic site, one near a farm, and one on a cycle path. And with the last one we completed the latest set of geo-Treasures.

That’s that done for another month…

 

We came home where the dogs were soon snoring; they’d had quite the adventure today. And once I’d washed a very good dinner down with a bottle of plonk and some amaretto I was soon snoring too…

21 March 2026 (Saturday) - Dog Club, Cat Figurines, Infinity Table

I woke at three o’clock last night when Morgan was having a nightmare and was kicking me. I then dozed on and off, finally getting up shortly after six o’clock.

I stood on the scales. I did that last night just before going to bed. Despite having had a tiddle (and consequently shifting some weight that way) I’d put on three pounds overnight. How was that possible?

I made toast and watched more of the Netflix documentary on dinosaurs. It was interesting, but again a *lot* of what can only be speculation as passed off as fact.

 

I then had a little look at the internet. For once there wasn’t much kicking off. On one of the local groups people were talking about the tattoo shop up the road which was once an ironmongers. I made the observation “That ironmongers was once the office of UKIP (or whatever the party was called then)” partly because it was, and partly to see what squabbles would be made from an innocent and factually correct statement. No one rose to the bait.

Two of the people on my Facebook friends list had birthdays today. One was an old friend from my days in the Boys Brigade who I’ve seen once in the last forty years, and the other died five years ago.

A local (ish) pub - the Blacksmith’s Arms – is closing. Being near where I used to work, a group of us used to go there on a Friday evening after work. Looking back that was thirty years ago.

And I was presented with several posts exhorting the dangers of ChatGPT… apparently my recent use of AI to generate caricatures will not only make money for some non-specified mysterious cabal, but also allow the machines to take over the world.

 

I Munzed and Wordled and listened to Steve on the radio. The “Guess the Lyrics” competition had me stumped. “Back in 68 in a sweaty club before Jimmys machine and a rock steady rub”. No – It was “Geno” by Dexy’s Midnight Runners. Some twelve years ago I found a geocache which was hidden where the video to one of their other songs had been filmed.

 

We got the dogs (and ourselves) organised and set off to Repton and the busiest Dog Club of the year (so far). I *think* I counted nineteen dogs and then four more came into the field. But despite so many dogs we had a good time. There was no squabbling or fighting or humping.

 

As we drove down the motorway so Steve was doing the Mystery Year competition on the radio, When was construction completed in the Channel Tunnel? 1993.

We drove to Newington where there was a series of geocaches along the bottom of the Downs. They would give us a good little walk, and finding each one would qualify us for the latest series of geocaching Treasures. The track was surprisingly mud-free. We didn’t find one of the geocaches, but we had a good walk. I had no idea that track was there – we walked for a mile at the end of which we had a rather good view of the White Horse that is carved into the hills above Folkestone.

And then we walked back to the car. A two mile walk, and home by one o’clock…

 

We came home for cheese on toast. I’d taken some photos at Dog Club and on our walk so I showed them to the world, and then I had a look in the garden.

I strimmed the lawn edges and mowed the lawn.  I pulled weeds out of the shingle round the pond and bionically burned other weeds. I de-bunged the aerator pump in the pond, and pulled loads of stringy algae out of the small pond, then gave the small pond another dose of the algae treatment.

I had a look at the area under that back window where Bailey seems to spend a lot of time hunting. I couldn’t see any rats or mice, or any evidence of them. But I couldn’t move the boxes out of the way as they looked as though they are about to collapse. I shall have to have a measure-up and build a replacement. Bearing in mind I made the old boxes out of scrap wood over ten years ago, they’ve not done badly.

I gave myself a haircut then had a little sit-down… and woke up half an hour later when “er indoors ^TM” asked me to help fetch the shopping in.

 

We got the Infinity Table out, and I spent the evening having my arse handed to me on a plate as we played several different versions of “Ticket To Ride”. France, Switzerland, Germany, UK, Asia… I lost the lot.

20 March 2026 (Friday) - A Day Off (?)

I slept through till half past four last night which was something of a result. And once I’d tiddled I went back to kip and slept through till after eight o’clock which was even better.

I got up and made toast. Whenever I make toast when it isn’t silly-early the dogs listen for the sound of the toast popping up then come charging down needing to immediately go outside. It’s not so bad now that it is getting warmer outside; I can leave the back door open. But over the winter I have to fart around with them and I get cold toast. “er indoors ^TM” says that they don’t do it deliberately (they are only dogs!) but they really do wait for the toast to pop up every single time.

 

I had my usual look at the Internet. The local pages were all incensed at the county council where all of the opposition councillors walked out of some debate or other when they weren’t getting their own way. Looking at the details of the mater, they were probably right to do so… but this is how our (so-called) democracy works, isn’t it. If there is a majority which agrees, then the minority’s viewpoint doesn’t get a look in. This obviously raises the questions of who elected the majority, and was that electorate competent to do so… but no one is asking those questions.

And there was a post on the Dog Club’s Facebook page asking if we only meet on Saturdays. Maybe someone could tell me where I’m going wrong with that Facebook page. When you call it up there is a pinned post saying where we meet, when we meet and how much it costs. But (apart from me posting photos of the weekly meets) ninety-nine per cent of the posts on that page are from people (who have never been to Dog Club and will never go) asking where we meet, when we meet and how much it costs.

 

I took the dogs up to the woods. Quite often Morgan isn’t keen to go; he’s not a “morning dog” but he was up for it today. We started our walk and my heart sank when we met some of the normal people. Some old woman (probably about five years younger than me!) was having near-hysterics because her dog had found a dead squirrel and wouldn’t put it down. I suggested that she just let her dog carry the squirrel. I told her that Treacle often picks up dead squirrels and carries them for miles, and when we get back to the car she drops it. The old woman didn’t actually call me a liar, but it was quite plain that she didn’t believe that anyone would let their dog carry a dead squirrel about.

Am I wrong to let Treacle carry one when she finds one. She clearly enjoys it.

We met a young mother jogging along with her baby in a push chair. She said she’d not been to the woods before. I explained that if she stayed on the track she was on it goes in a big circle and after four miles she’d be back where she’d started from. She seemed keen; I explained the importance of staying on the track… I hope she didn’t wander off of it.

And at the furthest point of our walk from the car park we saw the first bluebells of the year.

 

After four and a bit miles we were back at the car. We came home where we didn’t really need a bath (result!) I made us a cuppa and I played with Microsoft Copilot. For nearly twenty years every blog entry I’ve made had had a picture with it. Photos I’ve taken are easy enough to get, but it isn’t always so simple if I want something vaguely related to whatever I’m ranting about. Like today. ChatGPT was good, but will only allow me five images a day. Microsoft Copilot seems to have less limitation, but… I suppose I just need to specify what I want of it. This morning as I walked round the woods I took some photos, and when I got home I asked Microsoft Copilot to work its magic. You can see the results here. It looks OK, but that post had one or two issues behind the scenes:

• I needed to start from scratch whenever I wanted it to do a second photo as if I didn’t, it would just do another version of the first.
• It would randomly add toys and butterflies to pictures.
• It would randomly add cartoon people to pictures.
• It would randomly add extra dogs to pictures.

But it got there in the end. Mostly. Like with ChatGPT’s images, if you look closely you’ll find inaccuracies and errors. But I’m quite pleased with what I got. Not bad for a first attempt.

 

I then remembered I hadn’t Munzed or Wordled. Munzing was easy enough; I opened a gold qrate and got another. And then I Wordled. Bearing in mind what I’d just been doing I started with “image” and worked through “paint” and “radio” to “oasis”.

And I remembered that I had trainees’ work to mark as well. That took a while. I put some shirts in to scrub and whilst that scrubbed I took Treacle and Bailey to the Doggy Dentist

 

Doggy dentist went well… or as well as it could. Treacle’s got a chipped back tooth, and Bailey’s teeth needed serious attention. It’s quite clear that she’s gone off of the chicken’s feet she gets offered (and turns down) every night.

I shall have to pin them down every evening and get busy with the toothbrush. I keep saying that.

 

We came home and I got on with the ironing. Dull, but it needed doing. As I ironed I watched drivel on the UK Gold channel… or U and Gold as it is now called. I wrote up some CPD, and programmed Hannah (my GPS unit) for tomorrow.

 

“er indoors ^TM” boiled up fish and chips which we scoffed whilst watching the latest episode of “Danny Dyer’s Caravan Park”. I’m still in two minds as to whether I want to get a chalet in Leysdown. And then, starting as we mean to continue, we brushed the dogs’ teeth.

 

I’ve had four days at work this week and for all that it was perhaps a bit much (!) today was hardly restful.

And in closing today I’ll just whinge that my shoulder still hurts. It went crunch when I took my coat out of my locker at work yesterday, and it’s been really painful ever since.

19 March 2026 (Thursday) - Microsoft Copilot

I woke feeling full of energy and ready for the day… at twenty to two. I then dozed on and off for the rest of the night. Unlike last night the dogs were settled, but I wasn’t.

I got up at five o’clock and watched more of the Netflix dinosaur documentary. It is very entertaining but a lot of what it presents as fact can only be speculation at best… how would anyone know details of the courtship rituals of animals that went extinct two hundred million years ago? And on a purely personal note, I might try listening to it before bed rather than after it; Morgan Freeman’s narration is rather soporific, isn’t it?

 

I had a little look at the Internet as I do. There was all sorts of bickering about all sorts of subjects. One argument particularly caught my eye… a day or so I accepted an invitation to a pubs-related group. It would seem that the chap who invited me has invited loads of other people in the hope of getting elected onto the ruling committee of the Campaign for Real Ale. I was a CAMRA member many years ago. Back then the local branch was very clearly a little clique of mates with no interest of having anyone joining in with their little gang. I packed up CAMRA as at the time it was quite plain that they had no interest in the opinions of their membership. “Pubs ot the Year” would be voted for by a committee who would announce the decision after it was made… the committees would announce their own elections after it had happened. It would seem this sort of thing is still going on. I got involved years ago, but now… not my circus, not my monkeys.

 

As I drove to work I listened to the pundits on the radio who were talking about yesterday's Prime Minister's question time in the House of Commons. Quite a bit of footage from it was played on the radio; it sounded as though it had been an utter debacle. Some MP or other would ask the Prime Minister a question about something or other. Members of his own party would ask him about his recent triumphs, and the Prime Minister would thank that person for their question, and there would be mutual congratulations all round. And then members of opposition parties would try to embarrass the Prime Minister by asking about recent balls-ups, and rather than replying about the balls-up in question, the Prime Minister would then embark on either a personal attack on the questioner or a more general attack on the questioner's political party, and drag up all sorts of their historical balls-ups.

At no point was anything on any matter ever seen as a good or bad idea; everything discussed had become a party political matter. This is entirely what is wrong with politics, isn't it? One party will say "we like cheese and onion crisps", and no other political party will ever again eat a crisp of any flavour, let alone cheese and onion.

 

Work was work; again I was doing extra helping out with the new computer system. I had a productive morning, but reached a sensible stopping point so slipped out a tad earlier than I might have done.

I came home, bundled up the dogs and took them to Orlestone which was again heaving with butterfly hunters. I *think* I might have seen one or two of the large tortoiseshell butterflies. I say *think*; I’m not sure, but there were very large things fluttering about at the bottom of the woods. They were the wrong shape and size for birds, and were changing direction far too rapidly to be a bird. Had it been at dusk I would have said they were bats, but it was three o’clock in the afternoon.

 

We came home and did “FEED THE FISH”. I fiddled about on-line looking at the price of paying for CharGPT… Would I use it enough to warrant seven quid a month? Only getting five free piccies a day with ChatGPT is a tad restrictive… but then I realised that Microsoft Copilot does pictures and I pay for that already… Having spent a few weeks learning ChatGPT I’ve now got to learn something new, but I’ll (hopefully) be able to do more with it…