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| Wednesday, February 1st, 2012 | | 8:02 pm |
As seen at the journals of ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif?v=92.2) krabbe, mrs_warwick and bellinghman. Leave me a one-word comment about your day that starts with the third letter of your LJ username. Only one word please. Then repost so I can leave a word for you. Don’t just post a word and not copy – that’s not as much fun! | | Friday, April 29th, 2011 | | 11:34 am |
Cambridge has no Duke. Cambridge *needs* no Duke. | | Friday, March 11th, 2011 | | 9:54 am |
| | Friday, February 18th, 2011 | | 9:32 pm |
Explanations
A few days ago, I checked how many people here knew who Ted Codd was. Some at least did, though slightly fewer than I was expecting :-) For the benefit of the others, Ted Codd was the guy who invented the relational model of database design. That is, the underlying framework behind almost all large-scale computerised data storage. Financial records, medical records, personnel management, scientific databases: the lot. Why on Earth am I blithering on about this? Well you see, there was a time Ted Codd was supposed to be giving a major lecture on database design, and found himself unexpectedly unavailable at the last minute. My Dad was the person they called on to stand in for him. Second biggest expert in the world on database design, my Dad. His name was Chris Ellis, and he was a founder member and (until his retirement) chief techie for Oracle UK. He was widely acknowledged as one of their finest programmers - even their other top techies referred to him as "the mad professor". It's fair to say that without him, there would be no Oracle UK, or at least it would be very different. Larry Ellison (another name some of you may know!) sent his personal condolences at the funeral. Now, I'm sure that those of you who've worked with Oracle will mutter muffled imprecations at this point, and fair play to you, but it can't be denied that Dad achieved something with his life: he was somebody. That of course wasn't all he was. As with any parent, he was more than I could ever hope to describe, or bear to lose. Much of what I am, I owe to him; some things unwillingly, like the dodgy hearing, male pattern baldness, and a Tendency to Stoutness; many much more joyfully, the analytical mind, and a love of word games, puzzles and especially crosswords. Most personally of all, I owe him my voice - he was a fine amateur tenor himself. He was quietly, unfailingly and unobtrusively generous to those in need, and I shall be setting up a charitable fund in his memory to fund causes near to his heart. He was good father, and a great grandfather. On his last visit just a fortnight before his death, the last thing he did was to see James off to school. His last words to us on the phone were to reassure us he hadn't forgotten the kids' birthdays. Among his last thoughts in life, the presents on the table waiting to be wrapped. To quote the younger generation: "Grandad Chris was epic". He proved that family ties are more than just blood: from the very first time they met he made it clear that Julie was "one of us" - one of clan Ellis - and that her children, my stepchildren, were family too. That meant, and continues to mean, so very very much. He would have been 69 today. Too soon. The one scant consolation is that the postmortem report made it very clear than there's no way he felt anything. A second or so of flight, perhaps, as his foot caught on the stair, and then no more. *********** The Moving Finger writes; and, having writ,
Moves on: nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it
-- Omar Khayyam | | Sunday, February 6th, 2011 | | 12:19 am |
OK, my friends list is pretty geeky. Who here knows who Ted Codd is? | | Friday, December 17th, 2010 | | 8:43 am |
James: "Do I stay home from school today? I have a lot of coughs." Julie: "Aww, do you want to stay home?" James: "I'm asking YOU, silly! Was I talking to myself? NO!" And he harrumphed. An honest to God harrumph. | | Wednesday, November 17th, 2010 | | 11:49 pm |
Post-mortem shows Dad died of a head injury from the fall. No stroke, no heart attack, no *reason*... just shitty luck. Now the three of us (me, brother + sister) can head to Gloucester tomorrow to start sorting things out. Formal identification of the body will be on Friday. That doesn't scare me too much - I've seen bodies in med school. What's giving me the sleepless nights is knowing it'll be up to us to clean the blood off the stair carpet. | | Friday, November 12th, 2010 | | 5:48 pm |
...
Dad's dead. He was found at the bottom of his stairs yesterday morning. He may have had a heart attack, a stroke, or just plain slipped. Hopefully it was quick and not painful. Given all the health problem Mum's had recently, this was not the bad news I was expecting. I don't want him to be dead. I wasn't ready. | | Tuesday, June 29th, 2010 | | 11:09 am |
My day is awesome because...
... I'm still on a high after singing the Roasted Swan in our production of Carmina Burana. Nailed it too, if I do say so myself :-) | | Monday, May 24th, 2010 | | 12:51 pm |
Lurgified...
External temperature of 28 degrees C and internal temperature of 39.5 degrees C is not a good combination. <ache> | | Friday, May 21st, 2010 | | 11:41 pm |
| | Friday, January 1st, 2010 | | 2:08 pm |
Well, that was an... entertaining... year.
Started as it meant to go on, with unexpected medical drama, i.e. throwing up blood, taking a ride to casualty in an ambulance, and spending the rest of the month in a haze of anaemia. Warming to its theme, the year then led on through an ear operation that left me permanently deafer than before, Mum having a bad fall and breaking a leg and an arm, and not one but two bouts of norovirus which thoughtfully demonstrated the basic principles of rocketry. The house, too, was far from immune to the perils of everyday life, with failing drains at the front, and failing pipework in the kitchen that screwed things up to the extent that we had to gut it, re-do the damp proof course, replaster the wall, and refit the kitchen. It now appears that 2009 has been consistent to the last - Mum's suffered a bad hemorrhage in her remaining good eye, and currently has little useful sight. We're remodelling the kids' playroom to make it suitable for an extended stay, and she'll be coming to stay with us once loose ends are tied off back in Somerset. Future plans will depend on whether (slim chance) her sight improves, or whether that's it. Is it can be refund tiem now plox? | | Saturday, September 5th, 2009 | | 10:54 pm |
Advice from Cambridge types needed
Righto, well the kids are finally of an age where it may be safe to start having a social life again - either heading out together as a brood, or leaving M in charge of the others while isihac and I go out for a while of an evening. Since we're both a little out of the loop socially, clearly the solution is to consult the Intertubes for ideas as to where to go. Really, we're looking for suggestions in two areas: 1) Family-friendly pubs we can go to as a group in the early evenings, and 2) Pub quiz nights in the Cambridge area that isihac and I can head along to We thought quiz nights in particular because if you go out without some sort of agenda, you just end up sitting there having the same conversations you'd have at home, only with more expensive drinks and a vague sense of unease that you ought to be having more fun :-) Music nights are another option, but it's likely to be difficult to find something that suits both of our tastes - moreover it's difficult to talk to new people and make friends when you can't actually hear anything! Failing the quiz night angle, any pub with a sufficiently welcoming / non-cliquey set of regulars would be a good proposition. Do forward this on to Cambridge types that aren't on my f'list - we're more than happy to meet new people and make more friends, in fact that's kind of the whole point! | | Sunday, August 23rd, 2009 | | 4:28 pm |
Time to move on
We're selling off a bunch of early and/or rare Pratchett editions. Always been readers rather than collectors, can't really justify having them sitting around unread and un-looked-at on the shelves. We'd prefer them to go to genuine collectors rather than re-sellers, so we don't want to eBay them if we can avoid it. Contact me via email (pjie2@cam.ac.uk) for photos, or if you have any questions. We're happy to sell them singly or as a group. I've put guideline prices here based on what I've seen on abebooks.com or eBay, but all reasonable offers will be considered. There are a couple of Cunning Artificer works as well, however we'll be contacting Isobel about those first and foremost, since I believe she keeps a waiting list. All guideline prices below are exclusive of postage and packing. The books are in very good condition, no damage to dustjackets, no fading, etc. They've not been read, that's what the trade paperback copies are for, and we're hanging on to those! :-) Books for sale are: * Colour of Magic First US edition, first printing. SIGNED. Guide price : £350 * The Light Fantastic First US book club edition. Not signed. Guide price : £20 * Mort - two copies available Both are first UK edition, second impression. Not signed. Guide price : £80 each * Sourcery First UK edition, second impression. SIGNED. Guide price : £175 * Wyrd Sisters First UK edition, third impression. Not signed. Guide price : £80 * Pyramids First UK edition, first impression. Not signed. Guide price : £60 * Small Gods First UK edition, first impression. Not signed. Guide price : £35 each * The Last Hero (deluxe edition) - two copies available This is the one that came out simultaneously with the first edition, dark blue cloth bound. Guide price : £35 * Carpe Jugulum (uncorrected softback proof) Provenance: I won this in a raffle at the second Discworld Convention, Adelphi Hotel, 1998. It's been read once (well I wasn't gonna wait for the publication date, was I!) and stored carefully since. SIGNED. Guide price : £300 * Unseen Library, first six books. This is the half leather deluxe edition with Paul Kidby illustrations on the cover. There were no dust jackets in this edition. So far 18 of the series have come out in this edition, however the first six were only made in limited numbers, never sold in shops and seem to be pretty collectable. Guide prices: CoM / TLF / ER £200 each, M / S / WS £125 each. | | Thursday, July 9th, 2009 | | 9:50 am |
OK, that makes 5 people on my f'list going down with flu or flu-like stuff in the last week or so. Any more of you out there? | | Saturday, April 11th, 2009 | | 10:24 pm |
A clerihew for the season
Friday's hot cross bun-day Chocolate eggs on Sunday But nothing on Holy Saturday Because it's neither the former nor the latter day. | | Saturday, March 14th, 2009 | | 5:04 pm |
| | Friday, March 13th, 2009 | | 11:00 am |
| | Wednesday, March 11th, 2009 | | 5:35 pm |
*ache*
OK, this is getting beyond silly. I have now been unwell since ~mid-November. In order: mid-Late Nov: Ear problems in both ears leading to pretty severe deafness First half of Dec: 'Flu for two weeks. Yes, real 'flu, not man-flu Second half of Dec: Tonsillitis subsequent to the 'flu First half of January: Vomited blood as a reaction to taking aspirin, followed by weeks of anaemia Lateish January: Norovirus - rocketing temperature and explosion in all directions ** Mid Feb: Ear operation followed by a couple of weeks of recovery Start of March: Back to the damn 'flu again. Currently sitting around 39 degrees Celsius. Yum. Still, can't complain too much - I did get almost a whole fortnight of relatively normal life between the norovirus and the operation. Still can't help feeling that in four months I'm owed a bit more health than that. Worst of all is that Julie and the kids got most of the infectious diseases too, so we literally have not had a single healthy day as a family for a third of a frigging year. Where do I sign for a refund? | | Wednesday, January 14th, 2009 | | 1:09 pm |
Geography lessons
Places that ExistHome Cool Docker (Not well? Go docker, make you better.) Osmical (Daddy go osmical, get edi-sin.) SHOP! Rooms that ExistKit-sin Payroon Bedroon Uffaroon BAFF! So there you have it. There are exactly 10 locations in the world. If you're not in one of them, you're nobody. |
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