A new (faster) Linux

Crunchbang Linux

New operating system. The Linux community calls them 'distros' as in distributions. This one is lighter and faster than Ubuntu. Greater speed and efficiency inevitably means fewer bells and whistles (and that in turn, to some, means less user-friendliness) to the front end. However this seems fine. A much faster initial install, an automatic update after install, and best of all a very simple screen and right-click, straight in interface. Much, much faster than Ubuntu 12.04 on older machines (like mine), which, in turn, is much, much faster than anything the evil empire put out. Plenty as standard, and plenty more available. I've used it for all of a couple of hours, but so far it seems a great alternative to what are becoming slightly too bloated versions.

Beach House

I liked Teen Dream. A lot. First listen, and I like Bloom, too. I'm going to listen more over the weekend.

amores perros

MM made sure I went to see Biutiful, and that was me hooked on Inarritu films. He then got me amores perros, 21 Grams, and Babel last Christmas. I watched Babel, and now I've finally got around to amores perros (love's a bitch). It's a brilliant film. Unfortunately the second hand and creaking external DVD read / writer is having a bad attack of the creaks and I've had to restart it twice. Luckily these coincided with putting the kettle on and a (ahem) comfort break.

Poet's day

Got a glass of water. Glanced out of the kitchen window. Car park: empty. Quarter past five, Friday afternoon at the start of long double bank holiday weekend, and I was the only one stupid enough to still be at the office. The building was deserted. With all the diligence and motivation I could muster, I shut down the computer and tidied away and was out of the door at 5:29.

Then I sat for hours (1) at some special three-way temporary traffic lights in place for the bank holiday traffic; (2) while some wonderful village-idiot parking brought everything to a standstill; and (3) behind a Honda Jazz that was barely moving, driven by Montgomery Burns' grandmother.

The three-way roadworks presumably replace the recently completed roadworks at the junction of the site where MM works, and represent a new and even more inconvenient home for the cones, traffic lights, and blokes leaning on tools, rolling fags, carrying clipboards, and talking on mobile phones while lots of expensive-looking plant and equipment stands idle.

An idea for Mr Osborne

Inheritance tax. After making all those post budget u-turns on pasty-tax and charity-tax and so on, the treasury must be feeling the pinch. So to avoid having to go without moat cleaning and mars bars, here's an idea. If you want to extort inheritance tax on an ordinary three bedroom terraced house in Earlsfield, that is, no-one's who should be is exempt any more, why not remove the loophole for the royals? There's some prime real estate being inherited there, along with the throne. A good part of Cornwall and Wales, and Belgravia. Let them off Windsor, that's too near Staines. Location, location, location and all that.