My R/C four wheel steering controller needed some fixes to work on both PIC12F635 and PIC12F683 chips, and there were some other minor stupid mistakes I had to fix.

Here's the latest version: source code and updated manual.

Here's a very nice radio feature (complete text and mp3) that ran recently on ABC (local gov't-backed broadcaster).

It discusses the mess and mindset that contemporary MBAs represent. Food for thought (bwuahaha - thinking, what an outdated notion, we've got leadership instead!) for my employer's vPHBs, oh yes indeed.

...unless yours is made from porcelain, weighs 15+ kgs empty and has no tank.
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My daughter has a hard time accepting why I won't visit her: as she lives in the USA, I would have to deposit my fingerprints with that regime of crooks - which I refuse to.

So I've got the choice between convenient and wrong, or inconvenient and right (according to my personal universe of values).

Simply caving in and being suitably cowed to let Them do whatever They want would, of course, make my daughter and hence me happier - but only for about 2 seconds:

I am neither a criminal nor a shipping container!

and I refuse to be treated and tracked that way. Nobody and nothing has the right to do that to me, neither my 'own' country nor anybody else.

I cannot accept this kind of demands, and so I don't visit the US or the UK anymore (apart from lots of other Garden Spots I never wanted to see anyway).

So, will I personally make a difference? bwuahaha Not bloody likely.
Does that deter me? No.
Does my insigificance suggest conformance as an acceptable solution? Hell no!
Am I a fool? Likely, but no bunch of governmental thugs deserves my blind obedience and I'm very much in agreement with H.D. Thoreau in this matter.

But of course trying to be steadfast and true to my personal values feels to Conny not much different from me not wanting her or finding her unimportant. Neither of which is the case.

But what is more important, my universe of values or her happiness? Damned if I do, damned if I don't.

I choose my values. Sorry, Conny: you can be happy without me visiting you in your place, but I can't be content with serving as a silent, conformist gear wheel.

So far we've managed to soften the sting of this conviction of mine by my sponsoring her to visit me instead. So far this has worked out ok. But will she ever understand me making my stand in this?

Nevertheless I see less and less travel ahead of me, and/or extensive sanding paper sessions when I have to renew my current passport.

Governments and human nature suck. If only humanity was evolved enough for anarchy to work...

This is not a Beatles song.

Horricle + Sun = the horror, the horror.

Apart from two minor bits of work I consider the bathroom done. Here's an update of the most recent work and a few pictures.
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Grouting tiles seems to me the most perverse building-related type of work: first you do your best to goop up your Nice New Tiles, (wait 30m), then you do your best to wipe and wash off most of the bloody gunk again.

Combined with my "love" for cleaning this is not a happy exercise.

Still and all it was to be done, and so I spent this arvo first prepping and then grouting all the bathroom walls. No photos right now, because during the work I was way too busy for snapping pix, and afterwards I had the joy of cleaning up the mess, and now I'm too tired.

I'm quite paranoid and absolutely want my privacy. Hence I use encryption pretty much everywhere: disks, backups, email etc. On the other hand I'm a sysadmin and as such lazy: I want things efficient and elegant. This post is a quick rundown on how (& how far) I personally manage to combine those somewhat incompatible goals on a technical level.
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Just a quick update on the disaster zone progress: no new troubles anywhere, and I'm happily working off the remaining todo-list.
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After work on Monday Rob dropped by and gave me a quick jump-start on the tiling. Unfortunately he didn't have a lot of time so the actual doing was up to me, myself and I.
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