50+ and proud of it.

I've been plagued recently by the infamous "Yahoo Search has hijacked my search bar in Firefox" problem. Like a thousand other people, Googling for that search generally yields nothing concrete. Most of the answers show that responders simply haven't understood the problem - "just set your home page" - no it's the damn URL search bar thingy, not my home page you idiot, etc. etc. Anyway, someone gave me an idea - "Search for the yahoo.xml file and delete it, it's in C:\Users\ \AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\ .default\searchplugins\yahoo.xml" And there it was, so I deleted it and guess what? Nope, it didn't make a blind bit of difference. So I carried on looking, and there, in C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\browser\searchplugins is the offending file. Shut Firefox and then delete the bugger. Job done. No, don't thank me, sponsor me... (Well, it worked for me. No hate-mail please ).  

Ar*e. On Friday evening I went to get up and my knee gave way. Not in the "oh, I'll just sway a bit" way, but, "F**k, that hurts like hell and I can't walk now" way. I somehow managed to hop upstairs to bed. It kept me up most of the night with the pain. I went to the hospital (minor injuries) the next morning. "Sorry, it's not swollen/broken/cut/bruised or generally anything we can fix. Here's a pair of crutches. Bye" I limped around like The Karate Kid doing that stork impression for most of the weekend. The doctor on Monday was more helpful. "You've pulled a tendon (or something), there's nothing we can do. Just rest it for three weeks." I then mentioned the magic words - "Private Health care". "Oooh, go and see a physiotherapist, but they probably won't be able to do anything..." I went to the company doctor (for referral to the PH scheme) who was even more helpful - he actually did ...

Ah, woke up this morning as normal and went to shave. I took one look in the mirror and nearly had a fit.   There, staring back at me was something out of a Hammer Horror. The white of my eye had turned a bright red. I think the rest of my face went white - which didn't help the situation as I now looked like a zombie or something This made the situation worse - I thought I'd been vampired in my sleep and now started to feel sick. I'm quite fond of my eyes and the thought of losing one of them was cause for some considerable concern. As always, Mrs Sensible came to the rescue - "Can you see OK out of both eyes?". "Yes". "Are you in pain?". "No". "Don't panic then". "That's easy for you to say" "Guess where you're going this morning." Time passes in the local out-patient's waiting room. "Next please" I walk in and before I even had chance to shut the door - "Ah,...

I found a bear a while back. This of course was not a real bear. It was a pink bear about 3" high languishing in the back of a draw of a desk at work. I found it whilst moving offices one day. No one claimed it, so it ended up in my drawer instead. I named it "Pooky" after the one in the Garfield cartoons. It used to stare blankly up at me every time I went for a rubber 1 . I occasionally would move its jointed legs around for fun and try and balance it on the desk divider, but mostly I would rummage it to once side to get to the eraser 2 . Today I had an idea 4 . In a sad attempt to drum up the sympathy vote, I came up with a fund-raising idea for my charity bike ride to Paris. I would kill the bear. It goes like this: Sponsor me or I would dangle the bear off the back of my bike on a piece of string at Christmas. In the cold. And the wet. I'm very good at knots. I ran the idea past my wife. I got the look that said 'even you've over-stepped t...

Hmm, if you think this is over the top text PTVC59 £1 to 70070, if not text PTVC59 £5 to 70070. The question is whether I can wear it around work as instead of my normal safety vest!

This is an unashamed plug at raising £2,000 for charity at:- http://www.justgiving.com/petethevan If everyone who visits my page above donates just £1 (or even, €1) then we can do this. Please visit Demelza House to see why it's worth it. You can even donate via PayPal - it's that easy! After many months of deliberation, I finally decided (=shamed into) to sign up for the Demelza House 101 Cycling Team . This is a 4 day, 270 mile, Sittingbourne-to-Paris bike ride in April 2014 to raise £100,000 for the children's hospice. Well, to be absolutely honest, I am the last one of my group of friends to do so. Several signed up straight away many months ago, the rest signed up over a period of weeks. My friend, Mark, and I took a more pragmatic approach. "Um, it's a long way, that's, like, 60 miles a day." "Yeees, do you think you can make it? "Not sure" "Oh good" "Let's think about it over beer." "Good ...

We went to a local Stately Home last Sunday to view the rhododendrons, which allegedly were "just right" according to my wife. It was raining slightly, but got told to "Shut up and get on with it" and, "Here's your cagoule". The entrance is not very far from the car park and we walked to the little hut (aka garden shed with a door) where the man behind the desk was busily engaged in conversation about the house and the grounds with a (possibly) retired lady . After about five minutes of us standing there in the rain with no sign of the conversation ending - which had now moved onto the price of fish during the war - I thought I'd chivvy things on a bit with a jovial "Come on mate, stop talking and do yer job!". Fortunately both the lady and the concierge took this in the spirit it was meant and she thanked him and left. He turned to us and launched off imparting the same information he'd just given to the lady and probably a tho...

*ring* *ring* (Thick Asian accent) "Hello, it ees World Wide Web Services here, your computer 'as been infected by some malware." "Oh right(!)" "We need to fix the problem. Are you OK with that?" "Yes of course(!), Will it cost me anything?" "No, no this is a perfectly free service. Are you sitting at your computer?" "Yes, of course I am." (I really was). "You liar!"  *click* Jeez, didn't expect that. 1 minute later. *ring* *ring* (same bloke I think, same accent anyway) "Are you sitting by your computer?", "Yes, I am.", "Are you sure?", "Yes, I have a mobile phone", "Right, please left click the start button, this will not cost you anything", "Where's that?", "At the bottom left, have you done that?", "Yes", "What do you see?", "Properties", "What?", "It just says Properties...

I finally got around to installing Windows 7 today which I bought a while back. I thought I'd better wait until I found I had a day free - the last time I had to reinstall XP it took me about 2 days to even remotely get a system up and running that I could use, so I didn't see why 7 should be any different. I read around the subject first and came across the Windows 7 Easy File & Settings Transfer thingy and the corresponding "Upgrade Adviser". "...yes, of course you can upgrade to W7 in one easy mouse click..." I took today off as I had an annoying cough and it was raining - perfect conditions for the upgrade. I ran the adviser. "You might want to upgrade a few device drivers, but otherwise everything's fine!". I thought it wise to take a ghost (copy) of the hard drive before starting, you never know do you? I started the transfer wizard. "Please come back in a few hours..." I went downstairs for yet another cup of tea,...

I am completely paranoid about getting cancer. Sorry, but that's the way I am. My Dad had skin cancer (a small patch which was cured with a small, single laser treatment) and regrettably, I have lost a few friends and neighbours to the disease. So when a mole on my head did something funny I freaked and went to the doctors. "This mole has done something funny!" "Um, you mean like singing and dancing?" "WTF?" "Sorry. That seborrheic keratosis is completely benign and there's nothing to worry about." "Can I have a second opinion?" "Yes, it's the same as my first one." I got sighed at, but the doctor referred me to a specialist who took on a more serious stance. I went today. "There's really nothing to worry about." "But it did something funny a while back!" "Like singing or dancing?" "Stop it." He took a long hard look using a hand microscope thingy. ...

I went to London for a meeting this week. This is not unremarkable, except that I had completely forgotten about it and went into the office instead. It was only when I started reading my emails and read one from my boss that said "...we will discuss with the client at Monday's 10:00am meeting with Jim from Glasgow..." that I knew the next few hours would be interesting to say the least, mostly because I was wearing all my safety gear (PPE) required at my place of work and a fluorescent jacket - I certainly didn't have time to go home and change into my suit. I got a lift to the station and missed the Cannon Street train by seconds. The next one in was the High Speed one to St Pancras. I got a return ticket, got on the train and wondered how to explain the fact that I was going to be unfashionably late and still wearing PPE. I was exactly and hour late, however the client never batted and eyelid - "Don't worry, welcome to London, the trains are always awf...

Nothing much is happening so I thought I'd share this email I received today. It was all about someone hinting that they might turn off a legacy system that we still use because it inadvertently caused a major issue and I suggested we moved the documents to a more modern system. Here is the email trail between me, Jim, Dave and our Boss (all CC'd together). Mr Turner is a resource we can call upon : Subject: RE: Account lockout issue - post issue report.   I’m in agreement with your thinking here PTV. Hey Boss, as we employ Mr Turner on an ad-hoc basis – I wonder if it is worth using him as a librarian to set up share point or the likes and get the docs moved across. If we lose that database, the IT department will struggle. Just a thought. Kind Regards Jim Subject: RE: Account lockout issue - post issue report.   Jim, I think the loss of the doc’s would be the least of the business’s worries. As PTV points out, the Plant would lose system f...

Following on from the yo ungest s on's MOT wonder last month, my daughter text'd me the other day - "I think my car insurance is due.". I checked wit h the insurer, and, sure enough , it was. Tongue-in-cheek I text'd back - "Yes it is, better sort it out then!". About an hour later I go t a reply - "All done!" Wow.