Nik Nak’s Daily Teaser — 15th February 2025.

15th February 2025.

Right … 

I’ve been doing this — writing this blog — for some time.

And, as part of that … ?

I’ve been opening emails … and pressing various button, to publish posts.

Except this morning.

As … ?

As, it turns out, BT’s email service is down.

Why?

I don’t know.

But it’s tempting to blame the current US president!

At any rate … ?

I get the feeling that — once the service is back up — my email client’s going to be swamped … !

~≈📧≈~

Hmmm … 

I’ve just noticed this piece on the BBC’s Red button service, telling us how a prisoner in HMP Peterborough has been given time for assault.

Telling us the inmate attacked a guard with sugar dissolved in boiling hot water.

Don’t ask how I know … 

But they used to call that ‘jugging’ … 

~≈♨️≈~

A BT Spam Warning

OK, SLIGHTLY weird experience, here.

I’m actually using my SPARE machine: a late 1990s vintage G4 Mac, running Tiger.

JUST in case you’re interested … !

Not that that’s why I’m writing.

I actually thought it best to let you now I’ve had a spam email.

Yes, I know, happens all the time.

But this one in particular … ?

Claimed to be from my broadband, BT provider.

Thankfully … ?   Well, thankfully, I’d made sure I’d kept my last BT billing mail: I’ve had one of these emails, before, and kept my genuine bill, so I had something to compare any more fakes to.

I’m ALSO thankful Safari has a rather good phising filter: which warned me that the link in the mail was a dodgy one.

At ANY rate … ?

At any rate, I thought it best to put up a screen shot: just to let my fellow BT users know: “Keep Your Eyes Peeled … !”   And ALSO let you know, you can forward the spam to abuse@bt.com.

So you know.

Emails, and Appeals …

Pointless piece of trivia for you, here …

Did you know it’s — as I write — 13:25 in Los Angeles … ?

You didn’t … ?

Neither did I, ’til I had a look at one of me clocks …

««•»»

Which wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, when I started writing this …

I get mildly distracted, when I’m tired: you can tell, can’t you … ?

At any rate, bless ’er, I had Councillor Chilvers wonder into the shop, earlier: mostly yo have a mosey around and to say ‘Hi’.

I don’t think any of the stock caught her eye.

But she was certainly impressed enough to tweet about it!!

And leave me with a bit of a hot tip: seemingly, the planned development that had been refused in Fairfield Road — for more flats, so you know — is being appealed by the developers.

Sounds about right, given Brentwood Council’s history …

Hopefully, though … ?

It’s something I hope gets turned down: that boxing gym’s being eyed up by at three people I know.

«•»

Moving on … ?

Moving on, I’ve got to admit, I’ve been emailing the Gazette, again: mostly in annoyance at Eric Pickles’ column: about tuition fees, so you know.

Here’s what I told them …

Dear Sir,

I’ve got to admit, I’m writing after reading Eric Pickles column, in this weeks Gazette.

And admit, as I’ve written in my blog, I’m a disillusioned Lib-dem voter.

Now, I don’t have access to any of the government figures showing the university tuition fee — or the cap on the Educational Maintenance Allowance — as he does.

But my two younger sisters are both university graduates: ones still in debt as a result of things as they stand.

I think both they — and the law abiding students who’ve been peacefully protesting — wouldn’t call what he’s calling “the truth about fees”, a good thing.

And can only hope the current coalition government are voted out at the next election. After making a travesty of our childrens’ futures. And one too many blatantly broken promises.

Here’s hoping that gets published …

Elric and Emails: The Weird of the Local Newspaper

You know, you’re probably not going to be surprised if I tell you I’ve being doing something I’ve been getting notorious for, are you?

Are You … ?

I hope you not … !

At any rate, I think I can safely say that I’ve been happily emailing the Gazette, again!

Kaiju, Trevor, Kevin …?

Adrian … ?

Go on, tell me you’re surprised, go on, tell me!

Tell me, tell me, tell me … !

AHEM!!

Sorry!

But, at any rate, I’ve mailed them, again, after seeing a feature — in this week’s — about the cost of Essex County Council’s website.

Seems they give quite a bit of taxpayers dosh to Deloitte to handle that: and from what I’ve seen of the ECC site … ?

Not a lot’s on the metaphorical screen …

At any rate, here’s what I said, this time.

Dear Sir,

I’m writing after reading your about the cost of Essex County Council’s website.

And I’ve got to confess, I’m thinking that the IT needs of both our town — and county, by the sounds of things — are being badly served by both our Borough council and our county council.

As many reader’s may know, I’ve long encouraged other people to explore the possibilities open source software, and proprietary alternatives to Windows —things like Ubuntu and Mac OS X— can do for them.

Including the possibilities inherent of things like Flash, as mentioned by Mr Edwards.

Or, indeed, of applications like OpenOffice, possibly the best alternative to MS Office available: again, free of charge, much like other open source alternatives.

Now, on the basis of my enquiries of Essex County Council about the computers used by Essex Libraries, I’m guessing that the ECC have little or no experience of alternative software available to both professional or home users.

And on top of that … ?

Going by your interview with Mr Edwards, it also sounds — to me, at any rate — as if they’ve also wasted quite a lot of tax-payers money on a service that they’ve really not made use of.

Yours,

Here’s hoping that’s published. It only took a couple of weeks to print the one about the town centre … !

‹‹‹~›››

Phew!

And boy, I’m glad THAT bit’s over!

If nothing else … ?

It means that — either after finishing this post, or tomorrow at some point — I’m going to be writing an email to a certain Mr Pickles.

In regards to the wheel clamping.

Tell you in the morning … !

‹‹‹~›››

Now, I’m imagining that you’re wondering about the rest of the pictures I’ve put up, aren’t you … ?

I’ll be honest, it’s because I’ve finally done something I feel I should have done years ago.

At least, something I meant to do, many years ago, when I’d work out a little something.

That something … ?

Was the correct order to read the various shades of short story by Michæl Moorcock that make up the life, times and doom …

Of the chap in the last picture.

The last of the Bright Emperors. The albino sorcerer-king. The White Wolf, himself.

The by now iconic character that is …

Elric of Melniboné …

And, barring a few other works, I know of fantasy characters, I know of little else like Elric.

Hmmm …

Let me rephrase that: I know of few other’s before Elric quite like what Moorcock wrote of him.

Now don’t go getting me wrong.

I’ve read enough of Michæl Moorcock’s work in my time — mostly within the Oswald Bastable and Corum sequences — to know I’d like what I’d read.

But the keynote Elric stuff … ?

Most of Moorcock’s Elric novel’s I’d kept well away from.

Mostly because there seemed to be quite a lot of it: and none of it in any particular chronological order.

But I recently managed to dig up the book of the same name: Elric, by Michæl Moorcock. Basically, the nine or so core short stories that make up the basic structure o Elric’s life, and published in the UK by Gollancz, back in 2001, as part of their Fantasy Masterworks series.

I’m glad they did that.

I really am.

Because it gave me, at least, the chance to catch up.

‹‹‹~›››

Now, these stories have been summed up a lot better than I could ever achieve.

But the tragic anti-hero, hating and loving the sword he uses to kill and which provides him with the strength he needs to stay alive has influenced — however subtly — a good deal of what was to follow.

I’m half convinced that Peter Jackson, in his film version of Lord of the Rings must have read Elric and passed that on to Elijah Wood. Allowing Wood to present Frodo as hopelessly addicted to the Ring.

And I’m certain that Games Workshop, in their Warhammer universe owe Moorcock quite a bit!

If not royalties, then certainly a VERY polite thank you.

‹‹‹~›››

Which really boils down, ultimately, to one thing.

I’ve taken Elric back to Brentwood Library.

Go get … !

The Wednesday Round-Up

Oooh …

Had a brief worrying moment, there …

When the little save button at the bottom of the ‘New Post’ page had a ‘Could Not Contact Blogger …’ moment … !

Which didn’t seem to last, thankfully …

‹‹‹•›››

But, at any rate, do you remember me telling you — last week — that I’d emailed the Gazette … ?

You don’t … ?

You should, it’s getting to be a habit …

Well …

Yes, I think definitely ‘a habit’ is the phrase.

Rather than, say, an ‘addiction’.

Says I, whilst waiting for the “I’ve Just Got a Touch of ’Flu, Today” gags to die down …

At any rate …

What I was going to tell you about was the simple fact that my letter last week, got published.

And that — just to kind of hammer home the point about Windoze security — the BBC news channel’s 5 o’clock bulletin had a rather serious piece.

According to their breaking report*, there’s a Trojan doing the ’rounds: one aimed at users of an as-yet-unnamed high street bank. Along with the clear implication that the Trojan — apparently, a Zeus v3 which includes a key logger set to go off under very specific circumstances — in question was aimed at Windoze users.

One that only activates when it detects a user logs into the banks online pages.

‘Records’ the login-details.

And — here’s the nasty bit — only shifts money out of the account if it detects more than £800 in it.

Now, I know I’m not directly affected: from what the report said, along with it’s interview with a spokes-body from computer security film, Sophos, this is a Windoze-only bug, aimed at people whose monthly income is a lot greater than mine. It’s many folks minimum income, at a guess.

But I’d be being irresponsible not to mention it, wouldn’t I … ?

And definitely not myself if I didn’t smirk, like the smug git I can be, sometimes … !

Mind you, I should be.

After all, as many of my Windoze using friends of mine will remind me, Apple’s mobile devices haven’t exactly not had their share of (thankfully corrected) problems …

‹‹‹•›››

Let’s move on, shall we … ?

What I meant to tell you was …

Well …

That security threat was one of them.

But one of the others … ?

Was the simple fact that I’d sent off another email … !!

Sparked, this time, by a couple of articles: one about proposals for renovating the area around the ruined chapel at the centre of Brentwood High Street and another about the various cuts that Brentwood Council are planning.

Here’s what I wrote …

Dear Editor,

I’ve got to confess, I’m really rather confused … !

No, really …

On the one hand we seemingly have a council who’re planning cuts at a rate of knots.

On the other … ?

We have a joint venture between St Thomas’ and English Heritage to improve the area around the Chapel ruins outside the Bay-Tree Centre.

Now, granted Brentwood Council’s trying to save money.

Granted, they’ve asked us to suggest where to save money: and there’s TONS I could be saying about open-source software, there.

But couldn’t they have spent a few extra bob of taxpayers money in doing the proposed changes, themselves … ? As they were spending money on the revamp of the High Street, anyway … ?

Either way, I can’t help but think it’s a pointless effort.

Or pointless, in view of the increasing unlikelihood of any kind of replacement for the Ritz and Odeon cinemas.

After all, do we really need to re-focus attention on the centre of town …

When the proposed development possibly isn’t going to be moving attention away from it … … ?

Yours

Whether that’ll get published is a whole other issue: after all, the William Hunter Way development and the High Street’s make-over has generated some column inches … !

‹‹‹•›››

Oh …

Just one more thing …

(To coin a phrase … !)

I’ve noticed a bit of good news for those of us who were glued to Sherlock for the past three Sundays.

It’ll be back … !!

* As of this writing, the BBC have only reported it on the BBC News channel, rather than also on the website. As and when it does, I’ll add it to this page.

Checking out L-Space …

Do you remember, a little while back, I wrote about the email I’d fired off to Susan Carragher, about the computers in Brentwood and Shenfield libraries?

You don’t?

Now come on, it wasn’t that long ago … !!

At any rate, I do know I seem to have cause a stir — however small — with the relevant people at Essex county Council.

Because, in response to my last email, I had ANOTHER reply.

Only this time, from a chap called Graham Herbing, the Library Customer Services Supervisor, in Basildon.

Who I’m assuming is the chap at the more junior level who deal’s with this sort of thing.

And I’ve got to confess, his reply was …

Interesting …

Or, at least, something I felt to be an interesting piece of publicity bumf, explaining what Essex County Councils broad plans were, with regards to the People’s Network: the name given to the Library services public computer services.

Hmmmm …

Just as a reminder, here’s the text of the email I sent to Susan Carragher: which I believe she forwarded onto Graham Herbing.

Right …

All absorbed … ?

Here’s the reply he sent to me, yesterday morning …

Dear Mr Downie,

Thank you very much for taking the trouble to email us with your concerns.

Firstly, I would like to apologise for the delay in responding to your complaint. Unfortunately the council’s email server was out of action for a few days, so I was unable to get to your message.

Having looked at the details of your complaint, I can only agree with you that the current limitations of our library PC’s do mean that we cannot offer as flexible a service as we would like.

The People’s Network was originally intended to allow high speed access to the web to everyone. Over the years peoples expectations, the content on the web, and the way we use computers have all changed dramatically.

In Essex, we have a number of things happening over the coming months which will help address the gap between people’s expectations and the service we deliver.

• The network is being upgraded to cope with a higher volume of traffic, and deliver higher speed connections
• A new software build is being developed which will reduce logging on times, allow more file types to be used properly, and deal with the USB flash drive issues.
• Wireless access points will be available at all 72 libraries in Essex.

These improvements should deal with all the issues you raised, and deliver a much improved service all round.

I am sorry that we are not able to meet your expectations at the moment, but I hope you will be pleased that these improvements are on the way.

Yours sincerely,

Graham Herbing

Acting Group Manager,

Brentwood Library,

New Road,

Brentwood.

And here’s the reply I sent back, yesterday afternoon …

Dear Mr Herbing,

Thanks for getting back to me on this subject: I’m glad to get a reply from you.

And can I also say ‘Thank You’ for outlining the basic plan’s that you have for the library computer services.

They’re nice to know.

But … !

Oh, dear me, but … !

But I think I have one or two additional questions I’d like to put to you: questions I’ve also raised with Ms Susan Carragher, the Director of Adult Learning and Libraries.

I’ll attach a copy of the email dialogue I had with Ms Carragher, but to summarise …

One of my concerns was exactly one you raised: the ‘new software build’ you describe in your email.

I’d like to know what you have in mind, there, if you don’t mind my asking.

One of the points I raised with her was whether the Council would — as part of the much needed overhaul — would be investing in Apple Macintosh computers.

These are — as you know — near enough impervious to the various forms of malicious software circulating the ’Net: 99% of which are aimed at the various Windows platforms many people use.

And, while I realise that Apple charges a premium for their machines, I’m also aware that I — as a Mac user — have had to use little other than basic common sense — rather than expensive anti-virus software — to make sure I and my kit is safe, on-line. I also pointed out to Ms Carragher that Apple include a hefty discount for educational establishments, and that the Council’s purchasers should be able to take advantage of this.

I also pointed out to Ms Gallagher that the far cheaper alternative would be to use what’s called F/OSS: Free and open source software, in other words: again, dealt with in my last email, to her. But the Ubuntu Linux OS — to use the example I gave her — is free to use, for both government, enterprise and home user.

I’d like to know if that’s something Essex County Council will be using in the proposed new build: after all, Linux distributions like Ubuntu are free, many within your IT department will be using a server version on their internal machines, AND the soon to be released version of it will happily run on the current library machines.

At no extra cost to the Council, or to Essex taxpayers.

•••••

Which (sort of) brings me to my next point …

Sort of …

I couldn’t help but notice you mentioning that one of the various improvements to the library computer service would be ‘Wireless access points will be available at all 72 libraries in Essex.’

Hmmmm …

OK, now granted I know many people — many of my friends, included — have wireless capabilities built into their machines.

Which is my first point to raise: I’m assuming that the library service have made provision — however basic — for each library to have at least one member of staff capable of talking members of the public through how to connect their laptops to the library’s wireless hotspot.

Whether that laptop is running Windows NT, Me, 2000, XP, Vista, & 7, OR Mac OS X 10•3•9 (Panther) and above, OR whatever form of Linux they happen to prefer: just so you know, those are — from what I’ve learnt — the dozen or so extant operating systems — counting everything — most commonly seen, today.

To not do so, I think, would be seriously limiting the help you wish to give, and that I as a customer would wish to receive.

SECONDLY … !!

Secondly, there’s also the point that I’m aware that some of my friends and neighbours have laptops that aren’t wireless capable: at least, not with the software provided.

Will that ‘wireless’ access also include one or two spare wired access points, for those who’ve not had the chance to upgrade their laptops?º

After all, in today’s technology age, ‘Customer Service’ means trying to think ahead of the game!

Yours,

Paul Downie.

And here’s what he sent back, today …

Dear Mr Downie,

Thank you for your further questions.

As you are communicating with Susan Carragher I will pass this to her so the library service can provide a coordinated response to your enquiries.

Some of your questions will require further information from our corporate IT team. Susan has asked for their input and will respond to you more fully when she has that.

Yours sincerely,

Graham Herbing

Which I think I’ve caused a bit of a stink …

•••••

Right, let’s move on, shall we?

Because I think I want to mention a couple of other thing’s, if I may … ?

Right, we ALL know there’s an election on in the UK, don’t we?

I mean, we couldn’t miss it, here in the UK, could we?

I think the only show that hasn’t mentioned it, so far, is the episode of The Sky At Night I’ve currently got on in the background.

And frankly, if it’s not measured in stellar masses, light years or parsecs, I think Sir Patrick isn’t going to be bothered … !

At ANY rate!

I know I’ve seen a couple of worthy causes, doing the rounds.

First off, I know I’ve — on and off — suffered with depression, so when a couple of friends mentioned Rethink — the mental health charity — and it’s campaign to raise awareness the subject amongst MP’s. The link for their petition is here, so you know!

And — secondly — there’s also something Movie Night Adrian sent me, as well.

Ever here of Robin Hood?

Robbing from the rich, and giving to the poor*?

Which is the name — or nickname, I should say — given to the proposed 0•5% tax on financial transactions between banks, and specifically earmarked for various worthy causes.

Actually, I’ve got to admit, I like this one!

Let’s face, banker’s haven’t exactly made themselves popular, in the past few months: it’s just a shame it’s been overshadowed by the row about potential increases in National Insurance payments … !!

Either way, I’m going to suggest you maybe pass those links on …

•••••

And FINALLY … !!

I’m famous!

I think!

Well … !!

As you’ve probably noticed, I’ve had that advert for Dr Paul’s quiz questions in the side bar for some time, now.

After all, I’d originally started the Ol’ Peculiar blog as a way of advertising my own pub quizzes, so it seemed fair enough to post a few resources up!

Now Paul had been asking dozen’s of quiz master’s what they’re favourite quiz questions were, with a view to putting them together and passing them ’round.

And I’m pleased to admit that I’m rather pleased …

Because, in amongst the absolutely fantastic mix of questions — including one about the lyrics of Squeeze hit, Up the Junction — is a contribution from little ol’ me!!

I think I’m gonna close there.

With a nicely contented sigh … !!

º Actually, that reminds me … ! I should’ve asked about keyboards and monitors. For those of us with seriously portable desktops …

* Which is bloody obvious, really: the rich are the ones with stuff you’ll want to steal, the poor are the ones you’re going to have to give money to, to help avoid getting caught by the sheriff! Mythology’s all very well and good, but let’s get practical, shall we?