Andy Cunningham

Teaching the intangible – from “But she’s a girl”.

“I think that many traditional crafts require these kinds of skills that are difficult to teach quickly, which is probably why apprenticeships were traditionally so long. However, as someone who also teaches as part of my living, I can recognise similarities with some of the skills required to be a good scientist. For example, grammatical rules are fairly straightforward to teach, but trying to guide students in how to properly structure their writing, write clear, logical, flowing sentences and so forth is quite difficult to do. You can give tips, point out good and bad examples, and suggest ways in which they can improve, but in the end, they need to develop their own ‘feel’ for what makes a good piece of scientific writing.”

Tuesday 6th – 21:30 to 00:30 Towed around 7 cars and a truck up the Owlsmoor Road.  That included a woman in a complete panic trying to get back to her 8 month old baby, and two BA staff coming home from LHR.

Wednesday 7th.  Go to work to ensure office was opened.  Came home again.  Took in-laws to Gatwick for Thursday flight.  Assisted with clearing blocked Owlsmoore Road and attempted to tow an articulated lorry.

Thursday.  Worked from home.  Evening spent 4 hrs transporting care workers for Wokingham Borough Council

Friday.  Made it to work with a colleague.  Took another colleague to hospital after falling off his bike.  Got accosted by hospital’s ambulance service and took two patients home while waiting, plus arranged contacts with local 4×4 response and an additional driver.  Then spent 4 hrs in the cold and dark helping said driver fix a diesel leak.  Towed SWMBO’s car into our street.

Saturday 9th. Out before 7am to transport care workers again.  Home at 2pm, after stopping to pull a crashed car out of a ditch.  Driver escaped with no injuries and car seemed to be sound as well.  At 16:30 at Royal Berks Hospital to transport two patients home.  Towed neighbour’s car into the street, but demoted it to second slipperiest road in Berkshire after Alexandra Road in Reading.  23:00 pickup for Southern Counties Ambulance in Wokingham!  Home at midnight and a bit.

Sunday 10th – Assessment day for new members.  Left home at 7:30am. got home at 2:30pm.  Slept for 2 hrs, then 2 hrs doing accounts for the group.   Arranged to pick up a colleague en-route to work in the morning as well.

A couple in Kent who thought they were going to have to call off their wedding because of the snow may have the kind of white wedding they wanted after all.

Karen Rawlins is now hopeful of becoming Mrs Lee, thanks to offers of help from listeners to BBC Radio Kent. They have offered to take the wedding party and guests, by 4×4 vehicles, up a single lane track which is otherwise impassable.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8420602.stm

Version 1:

Dear Jon,
I want a man who knows what love is all about. You are generous, kind, thoughtful. People who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me for other men. I yearn for you. I have no feelings whatsoever when we’re apart. I can be forever happy – will you let me be yours?
Gloria
Version 2:
Dear Jon,
I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind, thoughtful people, who are not like you. Admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me. For other men, I yearn. For you, I have no feelings whatsoever. When we’re apart, I can be forever happy. Will you let me be?
Yours,
Gloria

After the electrics on the Dakar acting up again, major remediation is called for.

This means: if it carries current, isn’t part of the engine loom, and I didn’t put it there, it’s getting replaced!

Phase I – the stuff that’s broken

• Run new main power feeds from battery II and alternator to …
• Install new fuse box with relays controlled by…
• New Ignition Switch controlling main power via relays on new box.
• Re-wire hazards and indicator lights using existing wiring
• Wire new side/head light switch to existing wiring

In this phase I’ll pick up the existing wiring fore and aft for the lights.

Phase II – the rest of the existing wiring

• Wire Internal Light to Dash switch
• Feed Radio, dash sockets from new fuse board (ACC I)
• Replace wiring to front and rear lights
• Re-wire driving and rear work lights to Battery I.
• New Winch Control to front and repair front winch
• New Winch Control and power to rear and install rear winch
• Investigate and fix wiper stop problem.
• on a related note, install new washer jets and re-wire washer motor to new switch.
• Tear out anything not connected to the Engine ECU that isn’t my wiring and fix what’s broken.

Phase III – new stuff

• Install LED/strobe beacons
• Create new warning light panel to side of existing dash
• Re-wire Ignition, Oil Pressure, and Main beam switches back to new panel.
• Wire in a pair of Anderson Power Poles as ACC II to power amateur radio kit while out in the Dakar
• Install Circuit breaker in parallel with X-charge relay to allow starting from 2nd battery if isolated.
• Install warning light when second battery in circuit, and when second battery isolated when ignition on.

Yeah, lots of work.

So far I’ve got most of the bits, started to assemble the switch panel harness, fuse/relay box, and ignition switch harness.  Let’s see how this goes.

To give you an idea of the challenge, this is the space under the steering wheel right now:

And this is the space for the new switch panel:

Oo-er missus!

100′ Versatower on a trailer, shown fully upright and guyed here with the Disco to scale.   Three hours later it’s flat on the trailer and ready to take “home”.

Overheard at a US airport:

“Excuse me, sir,” said the TSA officer, pointing to the young female, “She does not need to have her ID out, she’s a minor.”

Dad: “How do you know she’s a minor if you don’t look at her ID?”

Meanwhile, Adam Laurie (of hotel safe cracking fame) has proven the new UK ID cards to be a waste of time and tax payers money…

I love working in security.  Being good is so easy when there’s this much crap around.

After being tired of pages of rubbish when trying to double check my IP address, I wrote this little site.

www.IPfor.me.uk

Just the answer you want, and a single line of ads.  I hope it’s useful for others.

The evidence is here