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Blue and yellow

Ria — Mon, 25 Jan 2010 23:49:56 +0000

Back to work on Monday after an exhausting IKEA weekend: long trip to the mainland on Saturday, then six hours shuffling round the blue and yellow megabox, sustained only by Swedish meatballs and a family-size bag of Daims; Sunday busy with the allen keys, baffled by pictogram instructions simplified for our 23-language community.

What

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Future proofing

Ria — Sun, 03 Jan 2010 23:07:33 +0000

I’m trying to get my head around joining up various online activities. It’s a challenge, which may be ultimately pointless, but the potentialities of crossover are too inviting.

Current linkups include Squeezebox to and from Flickr, LastFM and Facebook; Stet (this blog) to and from Flickr, LastFM and Twitter, with a pending bug query

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Resolutions

Ria — Sat, 02 Jan 2010 22:46:11 +0000

Pre-dawn awakening to the sounds of baby Sam, our attic bedroom muted grey from the snow-covered skylights. From the panoramic kitchen windows downstairs, we enjoyed the views of virginal roads and footpaths. It was another hour before another soul stirred outside and spoiled the pristine effect. Another hour before the sun rose.

Went sledding with

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The truckers were the real heroes

Ria — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 23:44:07 +0000

Our plan last night was to put up shelves in our wardrobe and further reduce the chaos of our living conditions, which seems to involve shifting boxes from one room to another, until it becomes unmanageable, then redistributing the boxes to other rooms. Every few days we generate enough garbage to fill the bus and

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Squeeze me baby, till I lose control

Ria — Fri, 10 Jul 2009 22:42:20 +0000

It’s odd coming back to this place that was once so familiar and now seems so … neglected and … quite frankly, dowdy. I reckon this blog could do with a makeover, a little nipping and tucking in the layout, minor facelift-like.

Since I stopped blogging regularly, I have maintained my presence in the

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To the barricades, James, and don’t spare the Porsches!

Ria — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 00:35:19 +0000

A few days after my previous post, residents of Dakar suburbs, Castors, Derklé and Liberté 06, took to the streets to protest against the prolonged and repeated electricity cuts. Actually, what pushed them over the edge was the distribution of double invoices from the electricity company, SENELEC. Yes, we give you no power and charge

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30 hours: a new record

Ria — Fri, 03 Oct 2008 23:20:52 +0000

30 hours without electricity. A new record. Not happy. No. Not sleep much in the heat and darkness, wondering if the kids are OK …

I’ve walked down to the Shell station twice in the last 24 hours, going down to fill my jerry cans with petrol for my thirsty little generator. I only fill

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Bara the Wifebeater

Ria — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 14:02:42 +0000

It’s not the name he would choose, and no one dares use it to his face, but with his empire in our street reduced to his wife’s chop shop, Bara has little left to show for himself except his frustration and his fists. Yet at the peak of empire, the ruler of Rue 103 was

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Addicted to Alice

Ria — Sun, 13 Jul 2008 21:54:26 +0000

I got a chunky translation job last month, 61 pages of sobering and inspiring information about childhood in Senegal: sobering to read that children’s charity X allows a maximum grant of US$5 per month; inspiring when I think of the hundreds of people freely offering their time and experience to help others less fortunate

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Blistering bandwidth!

Ria — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 10:11:17 +0000

I signed up with Sonatel last week and got a phone line installed. The broadband services are predictably very expensive, and I chose the cheapest one, which gives us just 512k downspeed … or that’s what I thought. In fact I had already warned the salesperson that, annual tied contract notwithstanding, if I didn’t get

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