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Sometimes a person, a name, personifies a whole time of your life

Sometimes, you don’t even realize until you hear their name years and years later and it is a TARDIS moment, you suddenly see people you’d forgotten, hear voices as though they were still speaking, you are scooped back in time and it is magical

It also destroys you a little.

This is not an interactive blog, but if you have had a similar experience, and if you are moved to share it here - sawubona. I see you.
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What - in words of one syllable - the heck is cryptocurrency?

I've spent most of my working life in finance and yet I can't get my head around bitcoin / digital currencies / cryptocurrency. It's, like, electronic, you can't actually see it, touch it or spend it, but it gets more valuable all the time - wha?

Am I being super thick? Can anyone explain it without posting in links to sites I've already given up trying to understand?

I didn't even know whether to classify this blog as gaming or technology frustrated
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Anyone else awake?

Lying in bed with the van door open drinking coffee and roaming the smartphone for anyone else awake. Nearly 9 am in Spain. I seem to have the world to myself. Noone on the campsite is stirring yet. The mountain to the east blocks the dawn but I can see the sunshine on the opposite slope and it is sliding closer as the shadow shortens

Coffee?
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For the writers on CS - Evie nails it

If you don't care to follow links, the text is below but the pics and gifs on her original blog are hilarious



When you write books, people are gonna want to ask you stuff. It is very important that you LIE when answering these questions. Lie through your teeth and don’t ever let them find out the truth. As a helpful resource, Evie Gaughan put together a mock interview, a mockterview if you will, to guide you through it.

Do you have a writing routine?
Yes. I like to see how long I can spend not writing before the guilt kicks in. Then I simply distract myself with the kind of housework I wouldn’t normally do if my life depended on it… like cleaning the oven, descaling the kettle, washing my make-up brushes or, worst of all, clearing out THE DRAWER OF NO RETURN.

Where do you get your ideas from?
Right at the back of THE DRAWER OF NO RETURN.

So can you tell us what your new book is about? (best pic of all - Biff rolling on the floor laughing)
Oh. Holy. Jesus.

What’s your favourite part about writing?
The ‘not writing’ part.

What do you tend to wear when writing?
Um, Chanel No.5? And the elasticated pants I’ve been threatening to throw out for two years.

Who are your favourite authors?
Woah, hey, I’m not here to promote other peoples’ work!

How do you handle bad reviews?
Very well actually. I’m a big believer in karma. But just in case karma is busy, I simply fashion a home-made punching bag with the offender’s avatar taped on the front and take care of business myself.

What can readers expect from you in the future?
Bitter disappointment? Long periods of idleness? It’s hard to say.

Did you always want to be a writer?
Yes, but then I’d never written anything, so I didn’t know any better. Reading books and thinking you want to be a writer is like watching the winter olympics and thinking you want to be an ice-skater… Then you realise how unbelievably slippy ice is! (It’s like, really slippy).

Any advice for budding authors?
Yes. RUN!
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Looking for help with Outlook.com

My Outlook mailbox recently gave itself an upgrade and seems to have lost my email address in the process. Now when I try to sign in it comes up with my skype name, and I can't find how to change that default. It asks me to enter or create an email address and when I enter my outlook address, tells me that name is already in use. Well, duh.

Anyone had this problem, more importantly, anyone know how to solve it?

Tried the following so far -
When I click on support I get the options of user community or support.
If I choose support I am looped back to the first screen roll eyes
If I choose user community, I can't find the topic of changing the default, and if I try to ask the question, I am told to log in first very mad

So if any of the rather brilliant people lurking on this site know how to solve this small problem, I would be very pleased to know

For the rest of you, have a great Sunday.

Today a year ago the movers picked up all my furniture in Scotland and took it into storage while I packed my camper ready to hit the road. It has been an interesting year.
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The quartermaster's store

The bloggers included all commented on my last blog which seemed as good a way as any of selecting victims dunno

Add a verse, make it worse laugh
There have to be two lines before the chorus
Comment without a verse and you will get done too
Pick anyone you fancy even if they’ve already been ‘done’ my rhymes are awful

And for those completely bewildered - this is an old camping song and here it is


*disclaimer*
No bloggers were intentionally harmed in the making of this song


Starting here, starting now -

There was Side Side looking far and wide in the store, in the store
There was Lindsy, Lindsy, wearing something flimsy in the store, in the store
My eyes are dim I cannot see I have not brought my specs with me
I have not brought
my specs
with
me
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Spoilers don't actually spoil anything - look into the future -

I still believe I would have enjoyed Terminator 2 more if I hadn’t - hang on -

SPOILER ALERT

look away now if you are one of the handful of people on the planet who saw T1 and not T2
uh oh

been told Arnie was the good guy this time round. That bit where wossname is crawling backwards on her bum, squeaking with fear, and then the ‘come wiv me if you vant to live’ moment? WASTED.

But it turns out psychologists reckons spoilers actually heighten our enjoyment. Thrillers where we peek at the end, matches where someone insisted on telling us the score, we enjoy more for knowing. dunno


&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

So - if you ever got a chance to take a look into your own future, would you? My blog, my rules.

***You can't interact with your future self.
***You can chose 5 years, 10 years, or 15 years
***You can only watch for 2 minutes

I think I'd go for 5 years, and hope the app found a me to look at, 5 years from now ... uh oh

At the very least I'd want to zoom in on someone talking about how I died. One thing if I had died of bliss because my new millionaire lifestyle had killed me - hey, we all have to go sometime - but if it were nasty perhaps I could sidestep Destiny. help

BTW, this is just for fun because at this point we don't actually have that technology grin
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Waiting

I've got approx an hour to wait and nothing to read. An hour is too short for some things and too long for others.

Ways of filling time?

(Other than blogging of course)(which can make the minutes pass even slower sometimes)
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Theory: Women should be clear, men should not

Scenario - They are watching TV at his house. Woman rubs her shoulders, mmm, I’m cold. Man nods, yup, it is quite cold, and carries on watching TV. Eventually she gets up in a huff, finds a blanket, then sulks because he doesn’t care about her. He is completely bewildered.

Theory - women should be clear. If she wants a blanket, she should say mmm, I’m cold, could you get me a blanket? He will. Men are nice, but not automatically caring.

Scenario - he comes back home after a really bad day and collapses in a chair. Honey, would you get me a coffee? She says (or maybe just thinks) huh, what did your last slave die of? You think your day was so bad? Etc.

Theory - men should not be clear. If he wants cossetting and sympathy, he should say only ‘I’ve had a terrible day’ and then stare into space looking stressed. Her natural nurturing will kick in, she will bring him a coffee, even give him a shoulder rub (or any other little service which might cheer him up) because her protective caring instincts have been aroused. Women are nice, when not belligerent.

Just a theory, and not mine, but I thought it had legs.
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Got my dozen

and in the order that I got them -

good morning
goie more
sawubona
tumela
bonjour
guten morgen
g'day
bore da
madainn mhath
buenos dias
bon dia

and now

dobre rano.

wave

I noticed one change, before, I learned them by going there, now I am learning them from guests coming to me. Are my travelling days over? A year ago today the pets got their rabies shots ready to make the trip to Spain with me (I don't keep track of these things, but FB does). One month short of being in Spain a year. I may have melted into a puddle before then, it ain't 'alf 'ot.

help
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Another penny in the jar (a research question)

The theory - if you put a penny in a jar every time you make love in the first year of your marriage, and after the first year you take a penny out every time, you will never empty the jar.

I looked it up to see if I could find out more of the history, one comment, ‘took four years but we finally got the 6th penny out of the jarrolling on the floor laughing most people were smug about how quickly their jars had emptied.

So, research question / opinion please. My characters started a blazing affair 2 years ago. They don’t live together, are neighbours, spend most nights together, and things are good between them. He hadn’t previously been in a relationship, had spent years hooking up once or twice a week - a pretty active libido. She’d had a long-term placid marriage. They got together in book 5 and this is book 10 (last in series) and the regular older beta readers, who have enjoyed this middle-aged romance, want an indication of how good things are between them, how often they are blushing taking pennies out the jar?

I usually stick to writing what I know but my recent relationships have been LDRs and when you don’t see each other often, time spent together is marked by the urgent clinking of pennies dunno

The question - how often is often in a good relationship after two years? Opinion or experience grin I may also do a forum question with anonymous boxes to tick.

I never get many responses on my research questions but always get something useful, hopefully this time too cheers
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Microphone no longer working after skype update

Blast it skype insisted on doing another of its interminable updates recently and I've just found that I am no longer audible. Checked both my skype and pc settings and can't fix it.

Can anyone give helpful advice?

I skype on my desktop computer and up to now, never a problem. The webcam is a plug-in and doesn't do audio, just video

(This luckily doesn't affect teaching, which I do on another computer, but damnit I enjoy my occasional skype calls)
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