William Goodall's Blog Occasional mutterings

December 13, 2013

Powerline 200

Filed under: IT,Television,Unboxing — William_T_Goodall @ 21:11

So I was down to three 85mbps Homeplugs again which meant the PVR wasn’t connected any more. Replacing a single 85mbps Homeplug was rather expensive as they are obsolete and it would be even worse the next time one blew. So I bit the bullet and got four new 200mbps Homeplugs. These cost me just about £30 for four including delivery from Amazon.

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Two twin-packs.

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Very compact. I worry about the lack of ventilation given that heat seems to have killed most of my previous 85mbps home plugs but maybe these ones run cooler.

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Instead of having to run a setup program you can just run around pressing the little black reset button in the correct fashion to assign a random encryption to the network. So far so good.

September 27, 2013

Electrical fault

Filed under: Insides,Uncategorized — William_T_Goodall @ 16:00

On the 25th we had a ten-minute power outage. This is very unusual – normally years go by without a power cut around here. A little later in the day several vans arrived and men dug a hole in the pavement in front of my front door. They found what they were looking for and cut the power (not my power – it’s still on). They need a bigger hole to replace a section of cable.

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The next day they put up lots of no parking bollards and put notes in windshields waiting for the parked cars to go away.

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Today they dug the rest of the hole, patched up the fault in the cable and went away.

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I expect somebody will come and fill the hole in again soon.

September 17, 2013

Pip on the bed

Filed under: Greyhounds — William_T_Goodall @ 16:15

He woke up while I was taking the picture.

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Sennheiser PSU

Filed under: Movies,Music,Television,Unboxing — William_T_Goodall @ 16:14

My Sennheiser wireless headphones had taken to cutting out (no lights on the base-station) after several hours of use. Unplug it and leave it and they’d be working next day. Since the cheapest part I can replace is the PSU, that’s what I got for £13.75 with next day First Class post delivery. The new wall wart is a switching unit whereas the old one was a heavy copper transformer. It’ll be a while before I know if I’ve cured it as it was an intermittent problem anyway.

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New Boots

Filed under: Unboxing — William_T_Goodall @ 16:06

I bought a £9.99 pair of steel toecap chukka boots off of Ebay. They are OK.

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August 14, 2013

Approved Food

Filed under: Food & Drink,Unboxing — William_T_Goodall @ 20:19

Another order from Approved Food arrived today. I had some PayPal funds and it was easier to spend them in places that take PayPal than to transfer them out into the bank account. So eBay got several orders as well, and I renewed my F&SF subscription for another two years.

A big box
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Containing four smaller boxes

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Each of which contains an assortment of weird foodstuffs I bought. Here are 12 soya desserts for £1, three energy drinks for £0.99, sixteen cans of stuffed green olives, half with almonds and half with lobster for 50p a can…

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The rest of the olives, 3 cans of tuna for £1.20, 6 cans of sardines in olive oil with hot peppers for 50p a can, a free gift jar of hoi sin sauce, and some loose cupcakes (48 for £1.99).

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8 kosher beef flavour vegetarian instant noodle soups for 50p each, 3 twin packs of vegetarian mango jelly for 50p a pack.

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The rest of the 10 packs of salted peanuts for 20p each and a box of 15 muffins for £1.49. There were 2 packs of roasted jumbo cashews at 75p each in there too. About 130 things if you count the individually wrapped cakes.

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May 31, 2013

Dishwasher Repair

Filed under: DIY,Insides,Unboxing — William_T_Goodall @ 14:33

This dishwasher rear rail cap cost £3.45 including delivery. It arrived this morning and I fitted it. Now the top shelf of the dishwasher doesn’t fall off its rails when you pull it out.

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May 1, 2013

RDFRS: When “Respectable” Supernatural Beliefs Come Home to Roost

Filed under: Superstition — William_T_Goodall @ 09:34

RDFRS: When "Respectable" Supernatural Beliefs Come Home to Roost.

April 2, 2013

Game of Thrones renewed for season 4

Filed under: Books,Game Of Thrones,Television — William_T_Goodall @ 21:28

It was announced today by HBO that GoT is renewed for a fourth season. So that’s nice. And I was right in my previous speculation about where some of the changes this season would be made. I’ll have to think about that some more.

March 29, 2013

Game of Thrones Season 3 Speculation (Spoilers)

Filed under: Books,Game Of Thrones,Television — William_T_Goodall @ 16:24

Don’t decode this unless you have read the third book or you are happy to be spoiled! It contains speculation on some essential changes that we will see in the third season of the TV show.


In the first season we see Barristan Selmy leave King’s Landing. He isn’t in the second season at all. In season three we can expect him to turn up in Essos and contact Daenerys Targaryen. In the books he uses a false name and we don’t know who he really is until a much later reveal. In the TV show of course we will recognise him immediately. Will the TV show follow the books and have him reveal his identity much later or, since it’s already spoiled, do it sooner?

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