Tuesday 14 April 2009

Tuesday 14 April - PC's Maths, Bicycles and a Sleep Over

This Day In History

I Am Buying An Apple Mac... I Am Buying An Apple Mac... I Am Buying An Apple Mac...I Am Buying An Apple Mac...I Am Buying An Apple Mac!!!!!!!!!!

Or A Mac-Book

because once again the PC is buggered, and this time it’s buggered BIG TIME!!!!!

The Main hard drive appears to have vanished. I came down this am and found it off. When I tried to start it up I noticed I got the CPU over temperature warning, which usually means the fans are clogged with dust and the case needs removing so that I can use and air blower on the inside. Dully did so. Tried to fire the system up again but still no sign of Windows XP or Ubuntu 08.04. Loaded the Knoppix rescue disk and load it in repair bios format. Knoppix loaded OK but when I shut down and restarted still no Windows or Ubuntu. Loaded the Ubuntu disk I’d made and this was OK of course it didn’t show the files I saved on the copy I’d installed alongside windows but it did show that the hard drives weren’t showing. I’ve tried all I know through out the week, with the exception of going the windows rescue route, as I want to save the files if possible, but no luck. I’ve got a working system only if I load Ubuntu from disk and of course nothing is saved unless I save it on line – thank god for Google Docs. I may put the old PC back on line, with Ubuntu loaded on the system, whilst I think about what to do. As at Sat 18/4 the situation remains as described above.

Maths

Nat’s been given quite a bit of work by Deb, and the lady who takes his extra lessons class, to do over the break in anticipation of his SATs tests. Today he was having trouble with percentages, not the concept so much; he’s got that when he thinks about it, but more the mechanics of working them out and converting back and forth between decimal, fraction and percentage. They haven’t enough time at school to cover these areas for long enough so it’s hardly surprising that so many kids give up on maths at secondary school. You can’t build on weak foundations in this subject. If you haven’t understood what went before you ain’t got as chance of understanding what you’re doing now. I spent some time with him trying to help and give him some tips; the trouble is that this level of maths comes so naturally to me that I find it difficult to understand where he might be having a problem – my fault not his. Personal experience of badly taught secondary school maths illustrates my point. When I arrived, at secondary school, I was really pretty good at maths and I though by the time we had done O level that I had understood everything we had done to date and that I was well set up to start studying for A level maths at Bedwellty Grammar (the 6th form school we transferred to if we stayed on to do A levels). It was only when I got there and had been to the first lesson that I discovered that my low O level mark, wasn't due to the fact that I’d had a bad day but was, rather, due to the fact that we hadn’t covered half the syllabus because we’d had an incompetent teacher. Suffice to say, that like all good rats I quickly abandoned the sinking ships of maths and physics and sailed off on the good ships history and economics. Those who had transferred from the same school as I and who stayed aboard drown to a man when they took their exams. From day one they were lost and as each day passed they drifted further and further off course.

It’s Bicycle Repairman

I had arranged with Deb to meet her at the bike shop, after she finished work, so that she could pay for the repairs to the bike and I could ride it home. Approx 02:45pm I left the kids at home and set off to walk there. I thought I’d give myself extra time because it is still pain full to walk and how painful varies from day to day. As I was making my way under the underpass I was approached by a couple in their 20’s who were clearly lost and who a wanted to get to Kingsway North, we’re Kingsway South. I wasn’t sure of the best way to suggest that they go so I pulled out my trusty Nokia N95 fired up the GPS and opened up Google maps.

I got the address they were looking for entered it as the destination for our current location and a few seconds later I had the best route for them door to door, GPS in a phone, its gobsmakingly amazing when you think about it!

Once more, I set off on my quest to reach the bicycle shop before Deb got there. As I emerged from the underpass who should I bump into but John, Donna’s dad. John is a smashing Geordie

fellow, he’s lived in Leicester for years but not lost his accent, and I like him immensely. The only problem is, that he’s quite deaf and it’s difficult to have a conversation sometimes because, he mishears what you say. Despite this we happily chatted as we walked, together, down Narbro Rd. By now I was expecting Deb to be there, waiting for me, but surprisingly, despite the distractions, I still arrived first... Deb arrived, eventually, and we paid for and picked up my bike. Amazing, I now had brakes that worked and a new basket with a handle on it! I cycled home whilst Deb went to ASDA for provisions for tonight’s sleep over!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Jacob’s Coming!!

Nat’s been desperate for his friend Jacob to come for a sleep over at our house, he’s already been to his, so tonight was to be the night. After his extra lesson he and Deb would pick up Jacob and bring him back for the night. When Deb returned from ASDA y6ou’d have thought she’d been shopping to feed the 5,000!

How much food, even with the help of an 8 yr old girl, can 2 11 yr old boys eat. Pop, crisps, chips, dips, coke, sausages, sausage rolls, biscuits etc etc…

Jacob arrived and after Monty spat him back up, he went upstairs with Nat (Han was in close pursuit). The plan, games and films upstairs, them downstairs to watch films and TV (especially Family Guy which they love)


No Sleep Ever WE R Staying Up.

They came down about 10:00 and I stayed down with them until around 12:00, saw a couple of episodes of FG (Is this programme really suitable for 11yr olds?) with them before I went up to Nat’s room to use his computer. Deb told me next morning that she had popped down around 3 AM and found them both fast asleep with Quantum of Solace playing in the background. Because Han had climbed into bed with Deb and fallen asleep I left her there and eventually bedded down in Nat’s room.

VERYBODY UP - JACOB’S MUM IS PICKING HIM UP AT 10AM

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