![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Celebrity CEO
Oct. 31st, 2007 10:03 amSo Stan O'Neal departs from Merrill Lynch, adding a $160m pay-off to the $8bn or so that the company has already set fire to. I hear that Merrill Lynch has come up with a novel way to recoup some of this lost income. In conjunction with Celador, it is launching "Survivor CEO". Applicants for the post are left on a desert island with little more than their Blackberries, laptops and two personal assistants each. A series of tasks are broadcast each week as Merrill Lynch attempts to whittle down the applicants to a single winner.
Oh, what I would give to see Alan Sugar and Mr Pickle both competing.
++++++++++++
So, I got home last night, saw that there were some updates available from Microsoft, and clicked to install them.
"Operation failed", I was quietly informed. Clearly, Vista tells you that "updates are available" whether or not you are actually online (a requirement, I would have thought, for the word "available" to be accurate). Because online I most definitely was not. Router was dead as a doornail. No lights, no nothing.
A fool here would telephone BT (Mumbai). However, it only took a few seconds to realise that the transformer had overheated. There's no 'off' switch on my Belkin router, and recently I've tended to leave the router on all of the time, rather than disconnect it at night. Clearly the Belkkin router can cope with this, but the transformer supplied with it cannot.
Diagnosis, however, does not necessarily predicate cure. I might well have 20 or 30 transformers in the house, but was there one that was an exact match? Was there fuck. Transformers and their connections to devices are about as compatible as camera bodies and lenses. I wandered round to Dixon's and got it confirmed that the transformer was dead, but, no, they didn't do replacements. So much for reducing carbon footprint. For the want of a 50p transformer, would I buy an £80 router?
Well, hell, no. Damnit, I could prove that I wasn't addicted to the Internet. I had a nice night in. I cleaned the bathroom (needed doing). I watched A History Of Violence (very good, by the way). I practised a little longer on the piano, and I went for a walk. All good stuff, the like of which I should do more often.
Oh, and I brought the router into work and tested it on a "universal" transformer that I have in the office, which I previously used to run the Rio (and charge it up), A quick hunt for the right plug-in, an alteration of the voltage and, voila -- working router. I might pop into Maplin's to see if they have a bespoke replacement, but they almost certainly won't. So I'll use the catch-all transformer at home.
Eat your heart out Butler.
++++++++
I bit the bullet and went short on GBP/$ this morning, ahead of the Fed announcement on interest rates this afternoon UK time. I was half-tempted to take quite a big punt, but I couldn't be bothered to transfer over the necessary back-up funds. If you could transfer the money back with equal simplicity, I might have gone ahead, but to move money in the opposite direction you have to phone them up. I usually take the opportunity of such calls to tell them what I think of Michael Spencer, their ultimate boss.
Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing him on Survivor CEO either -- except that he'd probably win it.
Oh, what I would give to see Alan Sugar and Mr Pickle both competing.
++++++++++++
So, I got home last night, saw that there were some updates available from Microsoft, and clicked to install them.
"Operation failed", I was quietly informed. Clearly, Vista tells you that "updates are available" whether or not you are actually online (a requirement, I would have thought, for the word "available" to be accurate). Because online I most definitely was not. Router was dead as a doornail. No lights, no nothing.
A fool here would telephone BT (Mumbai). However, it only took a few seconds to realise that the transformer had overheated. There's no 'off' switch on my Belkin router, and recently I've tended to leave the router on all of the time, rather than disconnect it at night. Clearly the Belkkin router can cope with this, but the transformer supplied with it cannot.
Diagnosis, however, does not necessarily predicate cure. I might well have 20 or 30 transformers in the house, but was there one that was an exact match? Was there fuck. Transformers and their connections to devices are about as compatible as camera bodies and lenses. I wandered round to Dixon's and got it confirmed that the transformer was dead, but, no, they didn't do replacements. So much for reducing carbon footprint. For the want of a 50p transformer, would I buy an £80 router?
Well, hell, no. Damnit, I could prove that I wasn't addicted to the Internet. I had a nice night in. I cleaned the bathroom (needed doing). I watched A History Of Violence (very good, by the way). I practised a little longer on the piano, and I went for a walk. All good stuff, the like of which I should do more often.
Oh, and I brought the router into work and tested it on a "universal" transformer that I have in the office, which I previously used to run the Rio (and charge it up), A quick hunt for the right plug-in, an alteration of the voltage and, voila -- working router. I might pop into Maplin's to see if they have a bespoke replacement, but they almost certainly won't. So I'll use the catch-all transformer at home.
Eat your heart out Butler.
++++++++
I bit the bullet and went short on GBP/$ this morning, ahead of the Fed announcement on interest rates this afternoon UK time. I was half-tempted to take quite a big punt, but I couldn't be bothered to transfer over the necessary back-up funds. If you could transfer the money back with equal simplicity, I might have gone ahead, but to move money in the opposite direction you have to phone them up. I usually take the opportunity of such calls to tell them what I think of Michael Spencer, their ultimate boss.
Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing him on Survivor CEO either -- except that he'd probably win it.
