Tractor man's 12mph police chase: 'Prosecutor Simon Jarvis told the court that on 26 November Legge had been drinking when he took the tractor and trailer without the owner's consent from the farm where he worked.'
Coastalblog on the execution of Stanley Williams (scroll down a bit).
10 stoner ways to bring peace to Iraq
Hotel creates giant Xmas tree from beer bottles; I want one!
Thud! by Terry Pratchett
Good bits: It's Pratchett! It's a watch book!
Interesting to see how Vimes works with a son.
Some very funny bits in there, and as usual the social commentary dominates the storyline.
Bad bits: Come on, Terry! That Captain Carrot storyline can't wait for ever. I'm almost close to saying that's enough books about Vimes. What about the other watchmen? They seem to have fallen to the sidelines of late.
Generally: It's Pratchett! Okay, this isn't his best book -- not even his best Watch book -- but it's still brilliant. It still beats the pants off any of the pretenders.
Buy it! Buy it now!
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See also:
I went to pick up the Silver (and Red) Machine on Saturday, following the repair work [entry]. Total bill was £107, which was a lot less than I was anticipating.
I was due to meet up with one of my old university coursemates in Exeter, but ditched her because I wasn't (at this point) convinced that my motor was 100%[7] and didn't want to risk driving into the city centre during Christmas shopping season. Neverwell, I'm going to try and organise another coursemate meet in the new year, so I'm sure that I'll catch up with her then.
So, I went straight on to the cottage, and watched one pretty good fight and one pretty mediocre fight with my Dad, whilst my step-mother set up a bonsai tree in the corner and covered it with shiny things[8].
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[7] Where before (in fact since I've owned it) the gearstick has moved so much that it's been like driving an artic, it now hardly moves at all. Took some getting into, but I only tried to pull away in third a couple of times.
[8] Having got used to big, real trees the last couple of years, the small tree that we always used to have now seems quite pathetic. I'm trying to convince myself that the tree will make the presents beneath look bigger, but as arguments go it's not a winner.
I read this recently on Andy's recommendation, because I've run out of things to read at home (just waiting for Christmas now and the books that brings).
Plot: Lewis works as a builder and plays rugby, but he is beginning to question the routine that he finds he has fallen into and the future he has in his small town.
Review: Whilst it's well written, and a remarkably accurate portrayal of the whole small town/rugby thing, a couple of things about this book disappointed me somewhat. And it's a shame because I wanted to like it.
The first is the ending; it doesn't really work, and what happens isn't given enough justification in the preceding story. It feels almost like Davies gets to Sunday, and just can't decide what to do with it.
The second is the unexpected, and completely unnecessary slip into first person narrative in the aforementioned bad ending. If there's one thing that throws me out of a story, it's a change in PoV like this.
Worth a read, though, and entertaining for the most part.
So, I will be grading in October 2006 instead. 20 months seems like a much more reasonable number, as I'm told the average time to black belt is two years.
Something that surprises me is that the other brown belt was not offered May; instead, during his own meeting, they only discussed the October grading. I had assumed that we would both be offered this, but apparently not.
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Last night I broke black and orange boards together for the first time. According to a supplier of the same boards that we use in class, that's equivalent to a 2.25" wooden board and a 7" wooden strip. That's pretty cool.
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[6] Which seems very likely in the new year.
The story so far:
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Chapter 5: Linkage
So Saturday, when I went to pick Shithead up from the airport [entry], I started having engine trouble again. As leaving the airport, the Silver (and Red) Machine struggled to pull away. I attributed to the additional weight that Shithead and his rich French diet had inflicted on my car. It happened once more near Exeter, but then everything seemed okay and I pushed it away from the front of my mind. For the rest of the weekend it was okay, but driving to the pub for Sunday lunch, it happened again. This time the gear-stick became completely loose.
I had it towed to a nearby garage, and I called my dad to pick me up and bring me back to Salcombe. I had to take Yesterday off work, because I wanted to stay in the area until I had heard from the garage. They called me this morning to tell me that the gear linkage had snapped.
A lot less serious than originally feared, but still inconvenient (esp. 3 weeks before Christmas).
So, I've given them the go ahead to repair the damage (luckily the estimate was also a lot less than originally feared). Unfortunately, because of the need for new parts, I'm without a car for a week. Until then, I'm using buses.
I tell you, I'm jinxed as far as cars go. In darkened car lots across the country, old cars tell ghost stories about me.
As it's December now, we are officially allowed to start celebrating Christmas. To begin, we (myself, Andy and Jen, AS, OS, and others) went down to Marlborough last night for the switching on of the Christmas lights. Apparently it happened, but because of the torrential rain we didn't actually witness it, nor any of the organised events and japery.
Instead we spent the first part of the evening in a friend's hobbit hole of a flat, drinking Glühwein courtesy of our host's Austrian bf. The second part of the evening was spent in the nearest pub, sampling the ales and, more importantly, not getting wet.
A festive start to the month and, thankfully, no sore head (although I did have a slight mulled-wine aftertaste this morning when arose).
From a cast of 22 . . .
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