First, yesterdays issues have now been resolved, it all revolved around me being required to teach people something I’m not really interested in, in far reaches of the globe. They’ve now found someone far more suitable than me to do it, I would have thought practically anyone. Still at least I can get back to what I normally do now. May be twenty years ago, if I didn’t have a house and a young family. Anyway, got on with stuff, now finally on top of the last projects bug list so on to new stuff again. Got to a point where I can start on stuff again tomorrow. Walked the dogs, then decided to pop out and pick up some pizzas or tomorrow and a new gadget. Now I’ve been looking at these for a few days and Argos happen to have them at a good price. So I now have a ‘Fitbit Surge’, this is a watch with a built in heart rate monitor and GPS. The heart rate monitor is quite nice as it doesn’t require one of those chest straps, it works by pulsing a light into the veins and sensing the flow, clever stuff. So after work I went for a 14.5 mile run, only the second over half-marathon distance run this week. About 1600 calories in just over two hours. It seems fairly accurate and of course is linked into all the apps. You wear it 24 hours a day and it just maps your activity throughout it. It will be interesting to see what readings I get for a whole day. Did the shopping for tomorrow, I’ve actually got a curry on Sunday if I get all the required exercise in.

Well all the machines worked today. Source control failed several times. One machine failed to boot lots. The other one the backup failed on and all had to be rescheduled. At the end of the day I didn’t end up getting a whole lot of work done. Still, all set for tomorrow at least. Spent quite some time talking to admin about my contract and how to get out of it at short notice, I’m being forced into a situation I’m not particularly comfortable with and thinking I’m better off out of it. I’m old enough and ugly enough to choose who I’m patronised by.

Walked the dogs. Walked to the gym, did Pump and walked home. I won’t comment on my weight again for the moment, but it’s still heading in the right direction.

So started this morning finishing a few bits off and then yet another SSD drive arrived. Thankfully it worked fine and I soon had the last backup restored, just a shame that due to a cock up it was over a month old. Thankfully it was only the system drive, so apart from a few SDK updates nothing much had changed. All up and running again now anyway. I’m going to keep a very close eye on the SMART status incase it dies again, I’ve already set the backup scheme to daily. As Jamie was home he walked the dogs, I ended up working over nine hours. So changed and went out for a run, just a short one, over the distance of a half marathon, bloody slow time though. Still, I did have a doughnut earlier, so feel less guilty now.

So started on a Monday morning. Couldn’t really get into it for a long time. Got some good stuff done in the end, but a long time coming. Walked Sasha. Walked Dillon, then it rained. Went off to the hygienists, twenty minutes and fifty five quid later and I was done. Did a bit more work. Walked to the gym, did Combat where Laverne almost killed herself, walked home and did more work. Backup machine is now backing up, so new part arriving for new machine tomorrow, I hope that fixes it again.

So got up and had breakfast. Then did the wind calcs for the nav. Drove up to Staverton. We did look a bit strange in hi-viz jackets carry two dumbbells through the main terminal. The nav exercise was fine, pretty accurate. Droitwich looked very dull, but was big enough to find. Did the whole thing in 1.3 hours. Next is the two land aways. Once those are complete I have about five hours left. Drove home, had lunch. Then I drove Jamie down towards Cotham, parked up and then we walked down to the centre to find some sheep. Did a few and then headed to Ashton Court for the ballon fiesta, and managed to avoid all of it. Found both sheep, it was very miserable drizzly weather. We walked back across the suspension bridge and found a few more sheep. Came home, had my snack. Did the accounts. Had a bath and phoned mother, she’s still alive.

So woke up early and got breakfast. Read the paper. Then it was time to leave for Staverton. Helicopter had already been out that morning. Planned a short dual nav, we went out and flew that, did a few autorotations on the way back in. Parked up. Jayson then took his mate out in it. James had I had lunch and I planned out another nav. Just before you go out solo you always get a little pep talk. James invited me on to hist psychiatrists couch. Then jokingly said, ‘It’s all your mothers fault’. I think he may know me a bit better than he thinks. Got ready. Fuelled up. We put extra weights under the seats. I started up and James got out at the holding point. I then flew for 1.3 hours and carried out my first complete solo navigation exercise. It was a beautiful sunny day, with very little wind. It was perfect. It was a wonderfully uneventful flight. Flew back into the circuit and parked it by the fuel bay. Drove home. Ate my snack. New part for PC arrived, didn’t work. Very frustrating. Ran nine miles. Had a shower. Jamie bought me flowers and chocolate, he even changed the bed. He either wants money or sex, I’d rather go for the money option. So the plan is to do another nav tomorrow and then I’m ready to do the big solo land aways.

Just a quick one as pizza is almost ready. Got up and PC has failed for the third time. Pcie drive has died for the second time. New one on its way. Ended up not really being to do much. We took the dogs out for a couple of hours which was nice, managed to knacker them both out. Walked to the gym. Did Pump, walked home. Lots of flying this weekend.

I’m not going to comment on my weight. So got up ultra early and started work at 7:30AM. Worked until just gone ten and then drove to the dentists. Managed to park right outside, thanks to this residence parking thing, paid my two quid for a couple of hours. Dentist examined my teeth, moaned about me not seeing the hygienist. Took x-rays. Apparently I have very good teeth in good condition, and a jaw bone of a teenager, only if I had a body to match. Rather than replacing a couple more amalgams we opted for something rather more radical, so will sort that in a couple of weeks. Came back did more work, walked both dogs, more work. Ran ten miles. Got a very irritating forum post, sent a very snotty email. I’ve built up enough calories now to do torture porn night once again, although I’m not totally in the mood.

I’m not even going to comment on weight or body fat percentages. Cracked on with work, it was all about comparing between consoles and gamma outputs today. Trying to make things match, very unexciting. Cleaners arrived, did a shite job as normal. I walked the dogs while they were here. Walked to the gym, just missed the rain, did Pump, walked home. Did much more work. Ate salad, more work. Will now eat again. Tomorrow I have the dentist, which is usually a long and expensive experience.

Woke up this morning and lost weight, very strange. Work was very odd, going between two different consoles and comparing outputs using various tools. It was very interesting actually working out what was causing the differences. Had an odd notification this morning to say that Dillon has now been with us two years. He’s now asleep on the couch next to me, I think he’s settled in. Walked them both. Walked to the other end of town to do a home check for a kitten, walked back and then went for a run as I hadn’t built up enough calories for the day. It’s all in the numbers, that is really quite geeky. Spare wheel arrived for the car, bought of eBay. It looks very small, but it will probably be a hell of a lot more useful than that stupid bloody inflation kit it comes with.