I guess I can’t complain really. My cure for the metadata did actually work but there are some artefacts elsewhere so it wasn’t worth continuing with. It did lead to a solution for another issue though, so that worked out okay in the end. Then spent ages optimising another load of stuff. It was very dull and very repetitive. Walked Sasha, popped in the vets and got worming tablets.

Went to Combat, my calve muscles are still aching, that was before I went. Did more work, ate salad. Think I’ll have an early night. Oh, I have a small wart on my finger, I’m not paying a fortune for wart freezer. I bought a can of pipe freezer, same stuff, tenth of the price.

This morning started off with breakfast for three (I had coffee, they had a tin of something). I then decided to split the day up into hours of studying air law and hours of something else. So cracked on with the book. Then took the dogs out, then another hour, did some server maintenance, then another hour etc. By the end of the day I’d done about four hours, walked the dogs, updated the server, did some gardening and went out for a run. I didn’t go anywhere else as the weather was a bit hit and miss. Actually I ended up studying “Effects of thunderstorms on aircraft”, while sat in a thunderstorm, which was quite ironic. Did the accounts. Then we went to the Italian. I did have a complaint about the Bolognese ravioli, there wasn’t enough of it. So he went and got me another plate of it. We also had some ridiculous offers, so even after have a vat of lager it was only forty-two quid. Came back and went to bed. Same again tomorrow, only without the Italian and more flying.

So after yesterdays epic fail on packing interpolators I decided to do it all manually, which is a real pain in the ass. Anyway, after a couple of hours I’d finished it. It produces an extra 300 shader instructions and ran 300 micro seconds slower. Time well spent. So my next ‘great idea’ was sharing h-tile meta data. So compute shader was written etc. Tested, actually worked, was quicker as well. Then I looked at alpha to coverage stuff, completely twitted. So another epic fail. Although later that evening I think I may have a work around for that one.

Went to the gym. First time this week, thanks to Combat being cancelled and putting a woman behind a curtain. New Pump. Difficult to set the weights up. Anyway, battled through it, then did a session with Laverne afterwards. My neck now hurts.

Picked the dogs up. Sasha was very excited, they were only there one day. Work was all about packing. Well taking two lots of float fours and compressing them to one float four. Now the compiler has a feature to do this automatically. It’s a shame though that this appears to not actually fucking work. Still a fun day all the same. Did eleven hours. Went for a run. Still haven’t studied air law. I have flying on Sunday.

So we started off at 6AM. Well the alarm did. I had cereal and coffee. We were supposed to leave at 6:30, after Jamie’s large amount of procrastination we finally left at 7AM. To be honest the next four and a half hours were fairly uneventful, apart from a lorry fire on the M25. We arrived at a chapel at 11:30. We stayed there until 11:50, the service started at midday. We had a look around. No one had arrived. We then realised that we were in the wrong place. It’s a good job there wasn’t a speed camera on Manston road as I think I managed to break the sound barrier. We arrived at the correct location, I dumped the car on a patch of grass and we ran. The undertakers were just closing the doors. The guest of honour was in position, Jamie’s dad had a space at the front, he went and joined him and I slid in next to Clinton. Talk about fucking close. The service was a funeral service. A reading of something vague about God, a hymn, “All things bright and beautiful.”, the music included the normal missing verse, the words in the booklet didn’t, this led to some confusion. Also behind me I seemed to have the Welsh National Opera, who were giving it all. There was a lovely poem by one of the grand kids. More prayers, the curtains were closed and 25 minutes on the dot a life was over. Twenty-five minutes for a lifetime is that all it’s worth? The vicar or celebrant or who ever he was, was just going through the motions. Yes, he probably had a meeting with grandad and went through a few things, but he had no connection, no feeling, nothing. It wasn’t a celebration of a life lived, it was a brief due process of disposal. Grandad did the eulogy (read by said vicar bloke), that was the only personal bit in it. He’s a truly strong guy (grandad, not the vicar, I really couldn’t give a flying fuck about him, even though he shook everyones hand on exit, yet more bloody due process). If I can get to his age and just be so not bitter, it will be an amazing thing. I’m pretty certain I’m not going to get that far though. Jim (grandad), seemed…how can I put it, ‘content’. He obviously felt sadness, but again I think he also felt a sense of relief. His dear wife had been ill for a number of years and had been in a home, yet he visited most days. I think inside he had already reached closure some time ago. I think it was summed up well in the words on his flowers, “Thank you for sixty years of your company”. You just can’t top that, hats off.

We then drove to France, well almost. If I went any further south I would have got wet feet. So we were within pissing distance of Dover at some merchant seaman club or something. I get a drink in. The first person who comes up to me is ‘Nial’, now he’s a bit of a wanker to be honest. He’s a thirteen-year-old boy trapped in the body of a decaying fifty-year-old. His first words were, “Hello, notice I haven’t mentioned a certain North American pop star”. Now this is his dodgy reference to Paul Simon. My reply was quite simple, “Its a good job too or otherwise I’d punch your fucking lights out”. He then made light of that would make a great YouTube video. I got my phone ready. He fucked off. It’s a shame, I’m sure it’s a tradition to have a punch up at a funeral. The odd thing is, he turned up again half hour later, and we had a fully coherent and sensible conversation. He’s still a wanker though. We stayed about an hour and a half. To be honest the only people at the wake were family. All the usual cousins, oddly only Jamie and Megan managed to send flowers. Uncle Pete was propping up the bar. It’s a strange family, but aren’t they all? Oh and another thing, the funeral directions stated, no black suits and shit. All the men had black suits and black ties, I was there in a purple shirt and green trousers. Jamie, Megan and I looked like we should have been at a fucking circus. Anyway, all over and done with now. The journey back was even more uneventful, I did it in one stint of about four hours. Every time Jamie dropped off I turned the heated seat on.

Got home. I went for a run. It’s quiet without the dogs. Glad they are back tomorrow.

Oh, now if you are an owner of multiple multiple cats and were thinking of Christmas presents, then I’ll just say that ‘Monty Python Mostly Live’, is released in November and if you preorder now from Amazon it’s just over a tenner#1

#1 I can’t guarantee that I won’t have divorced the porky big shit by then.

Started off this morning testing early depth test, didn’t really get anywhere. Then spent the rest of the morning sorting out buffer formats. Then did some interesting tests with alpha test and alpha blend, and providing you don’t want to write depth then alpha blend is actually faster. Anyway, took the dogs to the kennels. Nasty road diversion. Came back and did more fun stuff.

Met up with a fellow Geocacher in Alveston and we went and found a couple of caches I’ve been unable to find. It’s a shame as all the brambles have been cleared so they were now fairly easy to find. Came back and finished off a bit more work.

Driving to Kent for a funeral tomorrow.

Today’s work was all about using less bandwidth. Basically reducing 64 bits of colour data down to 32. This, after many support requests was quite successful. There is one bit still outstanding, which will require more support requests. Also looked at the joys of ‘re_z’ which is a whole fun area to explore. I need to do a lot of performance testing in this area tomorrow.

Walked Sasha. Dillon hid under the bed. Liz was ill, contacted Laverne, but no Combat tonight. Was going to go geocaching but wanted to do something a bit more athletic. So I did an eight mile run, without stopping and cross country. I haven’t managed to achieve that in a long time, all the walking and everything has paid off. My calf muscles hurt now though.

Off meeting ‘GentryAlveston’ tomorrow afterwork. Need to drop the dogs off at the kennels.

So this morning I woke up and Jamie failed to provide me with coffee, apparently a light was on and he didn’t know how to deal with it. I had tea, I was disappointed. Eventually got up and we ventured to Ikea. I bought Jamie a couple of picture frames for some signed Sonic poster and his World Record certificate (yes, he is a world record holder and it’s not for being a fat cunt). Then I parked up in Cotham and forced him to walk into town. I needed some trousers for a funeral. The requirements being ‘bright and not black’, so I settled on a pair or turn-up lime green skinny jeans, they will go great with my purple shirt. Came back and had eggs. Then fixed the washing line and picked up all the dog crap. Then went for a run. Fixed up the new pictures then did the accounts. I only have seven years nine months to go on my mortgage, then I have to find eighty-five grand from somewhere, maybe look down the back of the couch. Had a bath and watched the Grand Prix.

I did get an email from mother, thanking me for taking her to Weymouth. No matter how sincere it may seem, you just know it’s fully loaded. One of the comments yesterday was apparently from the guys who trimmed her bush, “Don’t your kids help you with stuff?”. No we don’t. I’m too busy flying helicopters and Sarah has her own set of stresses. she did say, “I’m pleased you managed to do what you wanted to do.”. In relation to dumping her for an hour while I sorted out a couple of geocahces. If she mentioned it to me and the time I would have just said, “Well that’s nothing compared to dumping a five year old in an auction house for three hours on a weekly basis with the strict instructions to not make a sound.”. I’m still bitter. But at least I don’t do a massive fart when I go up steps, unless I want to.