Grumpy & Farting: Sudoku

Showing posts with label Sudoku. Show all posts

Saturday, 1 September 2007

Sudoku 2

If bloggers have problems finding things to write about so do newspapers.

The main purpose of the newspaper isn’t to report news but to sell advertising space! To do that they need to publish a paper with a given number of pages. One easy way of filling the gaps between the adverts is to have a puzzle page: Sudoku, crossword, chess puzzle, etc.

Yesterday I suggest Friday should be made a fun day.

Why stop there?

Why not join in the fun and post a caption on YesBut’s Images, or give your brain cells a workout with a Sudoku puzzle.

Better still, do both, first post a caption, then return to do the Sudoku puzzle.

Leave a comment and let me know how long it takes you to finish the puzzle.

Have a fun day.

Thursday, 28 June 2007

YesBut how can I speed up my computer?

One of my pastimes is to visit message boards especially those devoted to technical forums. I admit at the onset, I’m very much a dummy rather than a geek. But I like reading about Firebox extensions and Plugins, don’t understand a word of what I’m reading, but I admire people’s ingenuity and technical skills.

One of the main questions asked on message boards is “how can I speed up my computer?”

I have had YesBut’s computer boffins to address the problem, with the additional requirement it must be easily applied even by the most inept and computer illiterate person (i.e. me).

Edward de Bono, the pioneer of “lateral thinking” tackled a similar problem some years ago. The problem he had to address was:

For the fifteen minutes before the start of the workday at a large office block, and again at the end of the working day, large queues formed for the lifts (elevators). There was no room to install additional lifts, nor any method of speeding up the existing lifts. How could the congestion be relieved?

Phasing the starting times was one option, but it would have unacceptable disruptive effects on interdepartmental activities. The solution was simple and inexpensive. Mirrors were installed in all the lift lobbies. People were so busy looking at themselves in the mirror; they no longer noticed the time taken waiting for a lift.

So back to the speeding up a computer problem.

It takes about a minute from the time I switch on the computer to the time the Windows XP bing bong sounds and I can click to open my account. It then takes another three minutes to (I think the jargon is) boot-up, and I can surf the internet. So applying the mirror solution. I start up the computer, go into the kitchen fill the electric kettle and switch it on. Go back to the computer, click to open my account. Return to the kitchen and make my breakfast. Return to the computer which by then is up and running and ready to go.

That solution is OK at the start of the day, but what about during the day? There you are up and running wanting to post your blog, and your computer has sneaked off to its private dreamland. No problem, have a book of Sudoku puzzles at hand. Direct your attention to finding the missing numbers and forget about the computer. Or get yourself one of those executive desk toys - click your Newton’s Balls. Simple

Another thing you can do is click here see today’s YesBut’s Images, then when your computer has its little siesta, think about a caption.

Tuesday, 22 May 2007

Free newspapers

Free newspapers serve three purposes:

To increase the risk of global warming, resulting from the number of trees that have to be cut down to provide the paper.
To incease litter in the streets and public transport when copies are discarded.
To mask the inefficiency of the National Health Service appointments system.

They serve no other purpose.

You have an appointment to see a doctor at 11:20, (not 11:15 or 11:30 but precisely 11:20). Don’t kid yourself all appointments are created by a random number generator and are pure fiction. Turn up by 11:20 and if you are lucky you’ll see the doctor at 12:30. When he’s in a rush to get rid of you so that he can go for lunch. But that’s where the free newspapers comes into play. Left around the waiting room, you pick it up and turn to the Sudoku - caught again, concentrating on the puzzle you don’t notice time passing.

Yesterday I finished the Sudoku. All the magazines in the waiting room were pre World War 2, so I had no alternative but to read the paper - I use the word ‘read’ loosely. Turned the page, and my blood pressure shot through the roof. There in the paper was a photo of the face that was on TV screen every day during the months leading up to the Iraq war.

Supercilious, arrogant, lying, those are only the flattering epithets for Geoff “would you buy a second hand car from me” Hoon, the Minister of Defence at the time Britain went to war in Afghanistan and Iraq. He was giving a “60 Second Interview”.

The first question was . . .Sorry I can’t even think about this heap of steaming dog excrement’s opinions. Only to say, in his opinion the Iraq insertion was a success. Asked why, if it was a success there are still British troops in Iraq? He replied, “The aftermath has been more difficult than expected”.

Its just like a surgeon saying, “Mrs Blogs, I have good news for you and not so good news. The good news is we successfully removed your husbands ingrown toe nail. The not so good news, he bled to death".

Now I can’t make up my mind, is this pathetic excuse of a politician so dim-witted that he thinks Iraq was a success, or does he think that we are so stupid we will believe him? The only glimmer of hope is at least we will soon be free of Blair.

I must finish with a classic quote from the interview.

What’s Donald Rumsfeld like?

Hoon: “He’s very straightforward. He said what he thought. He was always very clear.”

Rumsfeld the man that sounds like a maladroit randomly farting Babel Fish