Car decision

I took the car in for repair this morning, and walked back most of the way, having shopped at Lidl's on Tyndall Street en passant. I took the bus from Westgate Street to Canton Cross, to bank a cheque in my local branch, then popped in to Constaninou's next door for a haircut before heading home for lunch, well shorn and exercised.

I went to the CBS office in the afternoon, and met with Ashley to enquire of BT about SIM unlocking. It's not necessary on phones we issue, he was told. They come unlocked, presumably so that any of the network SIM card providors BT has take over in recent years are not a cause of un-necessary problem to users. Everything now comes under the umbrella of EE, which should include Orange, O2, T-mobile and Vodaphone. So, Clare's SIM card was inserted into the Galaxy III and worked first time, showing her caller i/d, once Ashley had, found the configuration menu to reveal rather than withhold details.

Earlier in the day I saw a notification on my Blackberry which told me that Ian has co-incidentally set up an Instagram account for the Business Crime Reduction Partnership. It'll be interesting to see how he will develop this in action. Slowly CBS and the BCRP moves towards having a decent web presence, it's long overdue as it's something I've not had opportunity to work on properly.

Then, I had a phone call from Phil at N G Motors to discuss work needing to be done on the car. The coolant leak is the least of the worries. There are brake discs, a shock absorber and a wheel bearing to be replaced, all cost more than the car is worth. But then the new tyres and exhaust last autumn also cost more than the car is worth. Despite wear and tear, it still runs well and has little structural rust, so will survive another MOT. It's reliable and it's still nice to drive. With these repairs I can put off the buying a new car for a lot longer, perhaps another year. Our car has long stopped depreciating in value. Why pour money into something newer that will start to depreciate as soon as it's been purchased?

     

All Saints' weekend

Although yesterday was All Saints' day, the chaplaincy annual memorial Service for the Departed took place at six in the evening, attended by eighteen people. After the service, I drove to Malaga airport to pick up Fr Hywel, whose plane left 20 mins late but arrived on time. There was lots for us to talk about so he could feel adequately briefed to get started on Monday. In the morning I prepared a chorizo and vegetable stew for supper so that we could eat straight away and make the most of the rest of the evening. We got to bed around midnight. 

With Hywel from Cardiff came my replacement Blackberry Q10. I got it started OK, but it still wouldn't lock on to any network automatically. Mindful of trouble I had last time, I put it away and reported this back to Ashley, who promised to chase up BT mobile and make sure the SIM card had been registered to work with the new phone. Nothing will happen before Monday, that's for sure.

We were up and out of the house by 8.30 and on our way to Benalmadena for the first Eucharist of the day, giving Hywel an early opportunity to meet and greet people, and for me to take my leave of them. After the later Eucharist at Los Boliches, there was a delightful bring and share lunch attended by a couple of dozen people, a time for me to say my goodbyes. After the service, LInda presented me with a beautiful carved olive wood pestle and mortar, a work of art in its own right, but a proper size for use in the kitchen for making alioli, or hummous. A real practical treasure to remind me of here.

Then I took Hywel out by car to show him the way to Calahonda and the route to the two inland centres of worship. When we got to Alhaurin there was a service of prayer for the dead being held in the chapel, inevitably on this Todos Santos weekend, today being the Dia de Muerte. Unfortunately there was also a Requiem service scheduled here this morning at eleven, despite the fact that our Anglican service is regularly in the diary for ten thirty. No consultation, no checking by those responsible at the ajuntamiento, for the diary is controlled by the civil administration, and as with local government all over the world, the left hand doesn't know what the right hand is doing. It happens occasionally when there are Sunday funerals too.

After our outing, we walked the length of Los Boliches as the sun was setting, and called at the parish church of Our Lady and St Faith which was crowded for an evening Requiem mass. We stopped at Granier for coffee and chocolate cake before returning for supper, and the rigours of getting everything packed and ready to go early tomorrow. Handover done, mission accomplished!

Blackberry Blues

Today's flight back to Malaga was punctual and uneventful apart from a brief bout of turbulence over the Pyrenees which caught everyone by surprise inclding the air stewards. After we landed, I found that my Blackberry Z10, newly converted to run on a BT EE network sim card could find the local network but wouldn't attach to any of the four carriers available with strong signal. I tried different settings, and re-started the phone to no avail. In the end, it booted up to 100% but wouldn't even display what Blackberry call the 'Escreen' = the 'desktop' on an ordinary computer, so I couldn't even use it to retrieve emails via wi-fi. My own personal PAYG phone, on the same EE network switched over to Orange ES, without a hitch.

Nothing much can be done about this over the weekend, and I certainly can't do anything from Spain, it will have to be done by Ashley in Cardiff, as he is the account holder for all our business phones. My guess is that BT, despite having a contract to supply us with acccess to roaming services while I'm in Spain have foisted a new SIM card upon us without checking if roaming abroad was required. If so, it's a serious indictent of the quality of service to business customers in an world where crossing European borders, if not continents is an everyday matter. Once again EE's 'Everything Everywhere' service turns out to be more like 'Nothing Nowhere' despite all their expensive media advertisements. It's not so much the technology that doesn't work properly, as the people who manage it.

 

Incompatibilities

Quite apart from checking and organising financial affairs when I come home, there are always office jobs to be done. I spent time today making a MS Publisher version of a training manual for retail workers, devised by CBS colleague Sarah, entitled 'How to Make an Arrest'. This involved going into town and taking photos of the City Centre retail zone to supply up to day graphics, but it will be up to Sarah to complete the enhancements. Needless to say, we discovered that our versions of MS Publisher are incompatible. Now that's what I call a crime against computer users. Backwards file compatibility is one of the essential attributes of any working system. Unfair.

This afternoon the switch over of the BT SIM card of my work Blackberry Z10 from Vodaphone to EE was completed. Needless to say, because EE reception in our area is so poor, compared to Vodaphone, that I cannot get a signal on the ground floor, once I cross the threshold. So, I have to go up to the attic our out in the street to call someone. The good thing about the Blackberry is that it is quick to pick up a signal automatically, whereas the Samsung Galaxy Ace II automatic facility has never worked, and any time the signal drops, it has to be re-set manually. Inconvenient and such a waste of time. Instant connectivity wherever you are, is an illusion created by marketing people, and an unfulfilled ambition on the part of the technologists. Why create and promote an expectation when you cannot be sure to deliver?

    

Homecoming

Up at quarter to five after an early night with more rain, then a quick breakfast, ready to be collected by Peter to drive to Malaga Airport for the 7.15am flight to Cardiff. From the time he dropped me off it took less than twenty minutes to check in and pass through security. The flight left on time, and dawn broke above the cloud cover somewhere over northern Spain, but there was cloud all the way into Cardiff. My first glimpse of home was Sully Island at high tide, on the last leg of the flight path along the coast into Rhoose. 

When we landed the pilot said: "Welcome to Cardiff Airport, where the temperature is eight degrees. Sorry." Back from the land where it's more sunny than it's not, to the land where it rains more often than not. A land of grey and green, not much red and orange in the landscape. It's still unusually green, however. There are but a few tinges of yellow in most trees, as the mild Summer weather extended longer than usual.

I was home by half past ten, catching up with Clare, ignoring the pile of unread mail. glad to be back despite the rain, apart. While Clare went to the hairdressers, I went to the CBS office and did some catching up there as well. A 61 bus was at the traffic lights on Romilly road as I approached the junction, so I decided to run to the next stop, some seventy yards away. The bus caught up with me and reached the bus stop when I was still twenty yards away, but it stopped anyway. I thanked the driver profusely. "I only stop if I see someone putting in the effort." He quipped. It's pleasing to know that I can still sprint that far if I need to. All the long walks in Spain are doing me good.

Our business telephone service provider BT is switching from Vodaphone to EE. We've been issued with new SIM cards to activate for office mobiles. Swapping SIMs is a fiddly procedure. You have to schedule a swap time with BT via the internet, use your phone until it can't receive calls, then swap SIM cards, losing all your SIM card data unless you copied it to phone memory, which means one more thing to learn how to do! The question is, when the swap has been effected, will I be able to receive calls on my Blackberry at home. At the moment the indoors EE signal reception on the ground floor is non-existent with my Samsung and sometimes outside as well. New improved fast data service only works if you have a signal to start with.

Following the office visit, I had an appointment with our GP practice nurse for a 'flu jab, fitted in at the end of her day, thanks to a phone call from Clare in the morning. Then, I met Owain from the Bristol train on his return from work, and the three of us went to Stefanos for supper. It was good to see him, as he's under pressure to get lots done before he flies to Berlin for a long weekend with one of his music making partners. He said the trip was being paid for by virtue of royalties received from the Performing Rights Society for techno music he's composed. He certainly deserves it. And I'm impressed.

Troubleshooting by Twitter

Pope Francis is inspiring others and being inspired by his visit to Assisi today, home and last resting place of his inspirational namesake. The whole world is a better place for the light and joy he brings to sharing the Gospel. I spent the morning in Pontcanna's Coffee #1 learning about how one of my St Mike's students from last year packed his summer with really interesting things to do. I found that inspirational too.

This morning I woke up to find that my internet router/modem was dead, and tweeted about it to service providor TalkTalk Care. Within an hour, I received an email to tell me that a new router/modem was being dispatched to me. Great, you may think, but the story started yesterday afternoon. The internet connection was very intermittent, as it has been intermittently several times of late. It was annoying as I had some office work to get done before the weekend. I tweeted a moan about poor connectivity, and my growing curiosity about changing service providor. Within an hour I had a response from TalkTalk Care asking me to explain the problem. This was the first of nine exchanges via Twitter during the rest of the day.

First I was asked to log into my TalkTalk account page and request a line test, which I was only able to do because I had an internet enable Blackberry, of course. But at least I was spared the telephone queue, the multi-option menus and technical support people with accents difficult to comprehend. The TalkTalkCare tweeter(s) were under the impression this would restore service, having not taken in the fact that the device under test was not lighting up, even with the power on. 

I rummaged about among my spare pieces of kit for a redundant modem of bygone years to use, and came to the conclusion it was somewhere in the office. TalkTalkCare suggested I register a support request with the help desk via their internet page. The page link sent to me with the best intentions was unreadable, as it was not intended for a device as small as a Blackberry. After supper, I went off to my Tai Chi class, discussing this by tweets when an opportunity to stop arose.  On my way back from class I went into the office, rummaged around there for the spare modem without success, logged into the TalkTalk website on a desktop PC and registered my request.

When I got home late, I dug out an old multi-voltage transformer to test with the modem, just in case it was only the transformer that was dead. Sure enough the transformer powered up the modem after fiddling with the on-off switch. This got me back on-line and I was able to tweet a message from my laptop describing the outcome to the TalkTalk Care team. I left the device running and went to bed. When I got up, I found the old transformer was dead, so evidently it wasn't up to meeting regular demand, or the modem had a fault that was taking more than it could possibly give. I tweeted this to the TalkTalk Care team and very soon after had a message to say that a modem had been ordered for despatch to me. It should arrive in three working days - I make that Tuesday. Meanwhile my work Blackberry and BT mobile dongle are proving invaluable, and my jobs are getting done.

At tea-time I collected our friend Andrea from the train. She's come from Scarborough for the weekend to go to a Sunday afternoon opera with us. This weekend I have no locum duties, so it'll be good to share extra free time with her. Just as we were saying goodnight, the phone rang. It was Father Graham Francis in need of a little tech support as a consequence of a suspicious email that had set of alarm bells as it carried a file attachment which refused to open. All sorts of straightforward reasons for this, but better safe than sorry, so I talked him through starting a full security check on both his machines, just in case. I bet his namesake Pope Francis doesn't get calls like that just before bedtime.