Status-Q

Roger McGuinn, partly in an effort to save some old folk tunes from being lost, has released a number of recordings for free at FolkDen.com, under a Creative Commons licence.

Many of them are really quite good, if you like that kind of thing. I keep finding myself humming Blow the Man Down after listening to his recording, for example. Recommended.

Following on from my previous post about dull politicians, I’m glad to see that Boris Johnson got off to a good start.

He denounced as ridiculous the lights at Trafalgar Square. “”They are red for one minute 45 seconds and go green for only 12 seconds!”” He vowed to fix this as the audience shouted “”Yeah! Yeah!””.

It’s splendid stuff – more here. I only hope Sir Roderick Glossop doesn’t turn up and spoil the fun.

Mac users will appreciate these poster designs.

One of my favourite local cafes is more switched-on than I’d realised….

If you run any Ubuntu or Debian systems, or have users who do, you should read this if you don’t already know about the OpenSSL security bug. I fear it’s going to be important.

I’m one of those people who has no idea how many free texts I get on my phone, because I never get anywhere close to the limit.

It may be something to do with getting into the Blackberry thing early, so it’s always just been cheaper for me to send emails. Or it may be that I just never really like small keyboards, so while I read a great deal on my phone, I don’t write very much (despite my E61 having a nice QWERTY keyboard).

When I do want to send a text to someone, I often go to my laptop and right-click on their name in Address Book because it’s just so much easier to send it by Skype.

Anyway, what prompted me to post was the discovery that my mother is changing her phone plan because 100 texts a month aren’t enough for her. I probably don’t send that many in a year! So am I way uncool, or is it cooler not to be sending texts now that my Mum is being so prolific? How many texts do you send?

Hap has given us a wonderful book which includes some extracts from the “Travellers Manual for French Persons in Germany and German Persons in France”, written by Mme de Genlis at the end of the 18th century. It includes the following useful phrases, which you may want to look up in other languages in case you need them next time you get off your RyanAir flight:

Listen, postilion, if you drive at a good speed when the road is good, and slowly on corners and bridges or in towns and villages, then I shall give you a good tip. Otherwise, you shall have only the fare.

Postilion, a man has just climbed onto the back of the coach. Make him get down.

The descent is quite steep. I wish the brakes to be attached.

I believe that the wheels are on fire. Look and see.

The postilion has fainted. Administer the eau de Luce.

Gently remove the postilion from beneath the horse.