I confess, we have a cat

I confess, not only do we have a pug, but a CAT! This is Portia, who gets along very well with Jonty. Portia is probably 17, but we aren't really sure. She more or less came with the house.

She and Jonty cooperate at dinnertime, lobbying for their eats. They think dinnertime is 3 pm. I think it is no earlier than 4 pm, but they do wear me down. Portia is extremely vocal, and as she winds up, so does Jonty. By 4 pm the combined effect is irresistible. Dinner is served. It takes a lot less time to eat it than it does to convince me to give it to them. Working from home makes me an available target for their wiles.

I've spent all day thinking about interoperable metadata schema for an 8 am conference call in the morning. I've also done my business activity statement. Phew! That's something I've been putting off, but it isn't too bad once you get going.

In another furious bout of time-wasting I have gotten together all the equipment I need to record my vinyl record collection to hard disk/CD. Many happy/unhappy hours have been spent trying to get the adjustments right, but I am still getting distortion on my files. The records themselves play just fine through the computer speakers, but not the recordings. Either another sound card is required, or I am doing something wrong.

More happy time-wasting has been spent on getting Skype installed. This involved buying a microphone for the PC, which naturally led (don't ask how or why...) to the purchase of a new flat screen monitor. Happy scrabbling around under the desk with a zillion cables later, and Skype works. Happy birthday to my sister in the US! Skype allowed a very pleasant phone call.

Isn't technology fun? Don't you just LOVE new toys??? Don't you adore crawling around under the desk to see what is plugged in where, untangling masses of cords and wires? I think I'll go back to my knitting...