Rick's b.log - entry 2025/08/10

A Whisper in the Dark

Today

The rubbish and recycling are bagged up, I'll deal with that later.

For now, I'm taking a break. And I decided to have a coffee. I very rarely drink coffee, but every once in a while it makes a difference to tea.
Of course, you probably wouldn't recognise it as coffee...

• I put a filter into a paper cup and empty the contents of one of my Starbucks Vanilla Cream capsules into it (so, Starbucks, I guess that's strike one).
• I use the coffee maker, that uses entirely different sorts of capsules, to drop a little bit (like maybe a shot glass amount) of hot water on to the coffee in the filter.
• I remove the filter (and coffee) and bin it.
• Then enough sugar is added to send a small child into a coma. Did I mention I don't much like coffee?
• The coffee maker, again, to add hot water until the cup is mostly full.
• Finally, some milk.

Once that had been drunk, back into the kitchen to rinse out the paper cup, pop a teabag in, fire up the kettle, and make a solid cuppa.

I don't know, I guess every now and then I get a little bit nervous that the best of all the years have gone by... wait, sorry, wrong connection. Let's try that again. I guess every now and then my body feels like it wants real caffeine? Heh, maybe I ought to give it a Red Bull, but I'm worried about how an ADHD brain might respond to something like that.

I ought to tidy up around my workspace, while I'm at it. Oh well, let's enjoy the tea first.

And then things tidied.

Tomorrow

Software written by morons

As I went through the checkout, I waved my card. The woman said "carte bancaire" and the next thing I know the cash box popped open and a look of horror crossed her face. She had tapped an icon on the screen that registered that I had paid by cash and the transaction was finished.
She, very apologetic, told me that she had to pass everything through the checkout again. Like, literally, a whole new transaction. Which of course I did, while she kept apologising and the woman behind getting more and more agitated (isn't it a good thing that I have an even temperament?).

I don't blame her. I blame the idiots that wrote the new software that they are using. How is such a thing possible? I am guessing that there is a shortcut icon that she can tap to say "exact amount supplied", supposedly to speed up the process rather than her having to enter the amount given.
There is a reason why we have these hoops to jump through. It means that paying, by whatever method, is a very deliberate action so it gives time for her to be "oops, wrong icon".
Additionally, the idea that there is no possibility of undo, no way to say that the icon was tapped by mistake. People screw up. It happens. If I had to do that a hundred of more times a day, I'm quite sure I'd screw up once in a while too. It happens.

But, you know, increasingly I see a disconnect between what software does and how it gets used in the real world, which makes me wonder if this stuff actually gets designed and tested with the input of employees, or if it's some sort of cheap-arse "solution" that the employees are just going to have to live with. Things could be simple and flexible and responsive, but that requires the developers to work with the employees to see how it is actually used and what parts cause problems. But that requires time and money and understanding the problem, and we all know that bean counters don't care for such fripperies.

Cosplay

No photo, sadly. For two reasons. Firstly she was sitting in the corner with her mother looking kind of shy, and secondly a middle aged bloke randomly asking to take a photo of a teenage girl...that's just weird and kind of creepy.

Tea!

One offer from Amazon.

PG Tips would have to do, I didn't come across any Tetley. It was the recommendation, 80 tea bags for €11,49. Being a Prime delivery product, it would arrive fairly quickly but most importantly, would come without all that import duty nonsense. Sorry, I'm just not buying stuff from the UK until the government gets their arse in gear and sorts out some sort of more favourable customs agreements, you know, like we used to have.
At €11,49 for 80 bags, it would be a little over 14 cents per cup. Getting close to French tea prices there!

As I procrastinate and take ages to decide, I scrolled and looked at other options, until I came across this. The one that probably should have been the recommendation.

A better offer from Amazon.

At €27,20 for 440 bags, that's a more pleasing 6 cents per cup. It's possible that the bottled water would cost more. ☺

It is supposed to be delivered tomorrow. I say that in italics because on the Amazon site it arrived at Rennes on Saturday afternoon, and three minutes later was marked (on Amazon) as "A delay has occurred". Accordingly Amazon is showing a potential delay. Meanwhile I received an email from La Poste saying that it is too big to fit into my letterbox so I should be home to receive it, between 10:15 and 14:15 tomorrow...which is the exact same thing the tracking on the La Poste website says (that doesn't mention any expected delay). Hmmm...

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C Ferris, 11th August 2025, 08:48

Talking about software - someone on RO site said the your music software didn't like Pinebook Pro very limited screen mode.  Pity there isn't a module that covers old modes like Amulator.

Rick, 11th August 2025, 12:05

It would be a surprise if it didn't support at least basic HD (1280x720). Well, it probably does...but not in RISC OS. ;)    That's one of lovely things about the Pi. The GPU is set to *always* output 1280x1024, and on the RISC OS side I can pick anything from 320x256 to 1920x1080 and the GPU just makes it work.

jgh, 11th August 2025, 23:50

If you want to be terrified by software, look up Therac-25.

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