Residual Current Blues (by alaric)

Bah. Yesterday the RCD tripped, shutting off the electricity supply to the house, while I was standing in the kitchen.

This means that, somewhere, something's leaking electricity. An RCD measures the current that goes out to appliances on the Live wire, and measures the current that comes back via the Neutral wire, and if they differ by more than about 100mA (in the case of our unit), then it knows that coulombs of charge are going awry somewhere - which is usually a dangerous situation, since it means either a short to ground of some kind (which can start fires due to electricity flowing through things it shouldn't and making them hot) or a short to ground via a human being, which is usually rather unhealthy.

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Life changes (by alaric)

My life has been changing a bit recently...

Firstly, I've resigned from the last company I don't own that I was an employee of. I used to be a full time employee, but nearly a year after the company decided to "downsize" drastically to save expense and stay afloat (ditching all of the staff apart from myself, the MD, an admin person, and the production guy and abandoning the office in favour of us all working from our homes, and cutting our pay by 10%), I went part time to start pursuing a freelancing career. Well, I've now resigned entirely, although I may take on freelancing contracts from them.

The difference will be that such contracts will have a beginning and an end; the reason I've resigned is that the work had become a constant stream of quite menial work, most of which came in with very little notice and tight deadlines, meaning it was an endless distraction. Also, if I spent all of my time on it I'd earn enough to feed the family at the end of the month, while freelance contracts would take months to pay back, which combined with the depleted state of my savings after the move, birth of Jean, and Sarah's illness meant I had to spend most of my time working as an employee to pay the bills. The proper lucrative interesting work had to be squeezed into the evenings.

So I'm hopeful about this change. The finances will be a bit tight for the next couple of months, but my pipeline is filling already.

The other change is that I've become a cub scout leader. This is because our village is restarting a scout group, with all three ages - beavers, cubs, and scouts. Sarah got involved, but the person who was going to be doing cubs backed out. Now, I'd always planned to do something voluntary for the community; either rejoin St John Ambulance or see if the Air Cadets take civilian volunteers (I was in the Combined Cadet Force at school, in the RAF section). Being a scout leader hadn't occurred to me, but the village needed one, so I decided to give it a go.

I was very nervous up until our first meeting with the children; but now I've met them and know a bit about them, I can start to actually have some idea of what they'll enjoy, so the fear of the unknown is ebbing fast. We have to go through a lot of training before we can run the group alone; we're being heavily supported by other groups in the area and central district resources, and while I'm sure the training will be useful, what I'm planning on doing is asking if there's a nearby cub pack that meets on a Tuesday and could do with me as a helper for a couple of weeks, so I can learn from others directly. I learn fast that way.

All of this means that I'm moving rather fast along my Life Plan.

• Married - check
• Father - check
• Self employed - check
• Doing some volunteer community activity - check
• Have employees - WORKING ON IT
• Become a magistrate - SCHEDULED FOR 2009
• Implement ARGON - WORKING ON IT
• Rule the world from an orbital battlestation - STALLED DUE TO POOR AVAILABILITY OF ANTIMATTER

English Music Festival (by sarah)

Me and Al unfortunatly cant go to this but it looks fun 🙂

http://www.englishmusicfestival.org.uk/

The Jean Alarm Clock (by sarah)

This morning I was awoken by Jean being lowered onto me being told to hug mummy!

She then proceeded to pick up my glasses from the side of the bed and try to poke my eyes out with them - obviously she knows where the glasses go!

Her baby sign is really coming on now - she says poo but unfortunatly she does this sign when breaking wind also. Shes developed some of her own signs as well like more done with both hands when she really wants something and is going to cry if you dont get it. She points to things with a huge degree of accuracy now aswel!

She has said Lion but only once - mind due it was the day she got a board book about a lion and we opened a birthday presant that was a singing lion!

To day she went and got a plum from the fruit bowl by herself and eat it - well she eat half of it and then shared it with me - she really likes feeding me and sharing her food - I wounder if this is becuase me and Al tend to share what ever we are eating with her?

I think I may have been over cleaning the cupboards and stuff in the kitchen as when I gave Jean a basin with a little bit of water in it to play with she started cleaning the cupboards with it!

She also does the cuttest little wiggle dance when music comes one or you start dancing - we have some cute picks and little video clips that we must upload for all you baby fans out there!

Chuggers! >:( (by sarah)

Chuggers - mmmmm..... most of the time its fine but yesturday I was pounced by a chugger (charity mugger - you know the bods who stand on the street with the clip boards). I gave my standard reply 'You going to make me feel guility'. 'No I'm not he says' I was trying to be polite about the fact I wasnt going to sign up - but what I do want is charity connections - we have a scout group! I dont mind making them do fund raising stuff!

Anyway he asked if I knew about Age Concern and what was I doing about this problem of elderly people being left to suffer. I pointed out that I'd recently done a concert for Havering Age Concern (it might actually have been Help the Aged or something but I'm not good at remembering exactly but it was one of the old people charities). He was 'oh wow you sing blah blah blah' in a really sort of false I'M TRYING TO KEEP YOU TALKING voice. Then one to the heating thing - ie did I know x - amount of old people die of cold each yr as they cant afford the heating bills - I said I was awear of the problems facing old people as we live with my Husbands 73 yr old Aunt - the fact that she has more income than us isnt really the point - I was just annoyed he assuming people dont do anything for the elderly.

I understand that he was trying to make me feel guilty so I'd donate but it just annoys me - most of time when chuggers ask me what I've done for the children or Aids or what ever they then shake my hand when I tell them and are very nice about the whole not donating in the way they are selling. I get giving contact detials n stuff of the charity - this was what I was expecting when I said to the guy - 'Look before I waste anymore of your time me and my husband dont have the money for this at the moment but we have a scout group and are happy to do fun raisers' he just lost interest in me shock my hand coldly and walked away - no contacts for the Charity or anything and I was offering to do fund raising!

I was annoyed about this - I have become even more annoyed when Al said that he is probably commissioned based - FOR A CHARITY!!!!! Grrrr! Now I think that perhapse it is worth the charitys time and money employing students etc... but commission based? They are just cars sales people then - I think I must have always got the genuin 'do gooders' before rather than just an 'employee'.

It makes me sad that he reacted as if I'd burned him when I said I didnt have money to give at the moment 🙁 I only stopped as I thought I'd get contact detials of the charity - sigh.