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Having called the TEsco helpline and been told, it may be the sim card, it may be the phone. Take it into the store and have them check the sim card in another phone. So I head off to Inverness. Go to the TEsco Mobile section and the guy who sold me the phone ‘recognises’ me. I can see he’s thinking ‘oh no. he’s back with that iPhone’. Anyway, he took it outside. He said ‘we have a 3G signal at the back’ came back in after about 5 minutes and handed me the phone. ‘It’d been set for Orange. Needs to be set for O2′.

So I’m straight back to Nairn, to test the phone in the factory. And hey presto. It works a treat. can update all I want now.

OK. OK. OK. I’ve done it. Yes I’ve joined the rest of the world’s fascination with all things Apple and bought myself an iPhone.

Was in Tesco Invrness on Saturday and just by chance asked the guy in the mobile phone section if he knew anything about the arrival of iPhones. He said ‘well I’ve got 12 coming in today’. I asked what time, he said in the next couple ofhours with his next delivery. I left my number and he said he’d give me a call.

Missed two calls, but eventually went back in anyway and the phones had arrived. Now I thought the reason for no-one having iPhone4′s was the problem with calls being dropped. I thought ‘OK Apple will go quiet for a while, while fixing the problem, then do a second release ONCE they’ve got it fixed’. So I now of course hope I was wrong. I’d resigned myself to waiting until at least September to get one.

Anyway, here I am about to buy my first Iphone. So I reserve it. Head home ot collect my £60 Tesco Mobile voucher and head back to Inverness.

I had to get myself to Aberdeen that evening, so time wasn’t plentiful, but it took about half an hour or so. My fault entirely as I wanted to change the tarrif from the one I’d selected when I’d reserved the phone. Anyway, half an hour later, I’m on my way back to Nairn. But with an Iphone, you don’t just collect it from the shop and make your first call on the way home. Oh no… you have to ‘register’ the phone.

You have to register the phone with iTunes. But before you can install iTunes, you have to install the correct version of QuickTime.

But if like me you don’t keep software on your computer that annoys you, you may also have already downloaded iTunes or QuickTime, found it irritates you because it is constantly trying to do updates. Encourage you to buy things etc. So I’d deleted iTunes some months/years ago. QuickTime was there, but not being used.

Trouble is (as with all deletions) you CAN leave traces of programs on your computer after having deleted them.

So here I am – hoping/planning to go to Aberdeen (about 2 hours along the road) to sleep in a tent in the heavy rain (not really selling it here am I?) - trying to get QuickTime to install. No chance. I’ve got version 7.0XX and the latest one is 7.6XX or something of the sort. And I can delete one part of it, the other (the installation file) will not delete because it does not exist.

So I try to find the correct version at ‘oldversion.com’ – a website that has all sorts of old version of programs to download. Anyway, I find all sorts of old versions of QuickTime/iTunes up to around 6.8 or so. Eventually I find the right version, download it, install it, delete it, go into the registry delete every mention of ‘apple’, ‘itunes’,'quicktime’ and something else (as suggested by the Apple site). Anyway, 30 minutes of ‘find, tab, delete’ later and I’ve got iTunes consigned to the recycle bin. But what of my registry I hear you say. Who knows? But luckily I decided this time to ‘backup’ a copy of my registry before I started the marathon delete session. So I knew I could fall back, if necessary. As with all marathon deleting sessions, you become a bit blase with the process and when you get to the end of the ones you’re supposed to be deleting, you still continue deleting for a while until you realise. Later I discovered one of the three of four entries I’d deleted as litle ‘extras’ was my AV antivirus and a piece of my firewall.

So I restart the whole process – Aberdeen by now is looking a little more iffy – it’s seven thirty and I’m getting a bit tired now. Been up since before 7, and not much sleep the night before. So Aberdeen was sinking further away into the North Sea (in my mind anyway) than it usually is.

I retry to install iTunes – it seems to get past the nag screen that stopped it before (iTunes needs X version of QuickTime). And away it went. installed fine.

The rest of the process went relatively smoothly. Eventually I found how to sync contacts. I even managed to download/upload some tunes on my computer onto the iPhone (the next day). But the phone was now registered and I could make that first call!

But boy. That was tortuous.

The reason I’d decided to get an iPhone was to have internet access at my factory unit. Rather than having to have a phone line and paying line rental – getting a router – etc. I thought easiest to get a mobile device, then I can update my ‘jerky’ database at the unit. Saves me having to carry little pieces of paper around with me.

Anyway, I eventually manage to get into the settings on my router and ‘enable’ the iPhone to connect into my system. I have internet on the phone.

But the real reason for getting this device. On Sunday. I’m off to the unit to try out the phone at the BT openzone hotspot that is sited 20 yards from my front door. It’s Moray College’s outreach centre and so I open up Safari and expect to get connected via the hotspot. But all I get is ‘Sorry. This hotspot is not available to your network’. Turns out there are different ‘types’ of hotspots. And this one is not a premium hotspot. This one is a business hotspot.

I slightly despair, but still think. No problem. I can access via the 3G mobile mast that’s about 50 yards away on the top of the bakery almost next door. Just across the road. But that ain’t working either.

So now I’ve got a phone – very nice too – that doesn’t really do what I need it to do. I’ll persevere with the 3G signal. Must be something in the settings that’s not working correctly.

Oh yes. Does it make phone calls, or does it drop the line? Don’t really know yet. I do know htat in the house, if I hold it on the palm of my hand, it loses signal down to ‘nothing’. So we’ll see. If it loses signal sufficiently enough to ‘drop’ calls, I’ll have to put it back. The next seven days (Tesco money back guarantee) will be interesting and informative.

Brian

Well I’ve got World Cup withdrawal. So I thought I’d write about it to help.

So for the past X (I don’t know how many) number of years, almost all followers of football (no not soccer, it’s football because you play it with your feet) have been in favour of the introduction of technology. Now by luck, by chance, or by good management (well done Frank Lampard) Sepp Blatter, the German head of world football, has been embarassed into conceding that technology might be able to help referees to make better decisions.

Of course the rest of the world has already come to this conclusion several years ago. Tennis introduced hawkeye and it has even added to the spectacle. A player thinks an important call is wrong, so s/he asks for it to be checked by the technology. And the crowd gets involved. They all ‘woo’ when the ball is moving on the big screen towards the line and they either cheer, boo, or otherwise make their feelings know when the ball lands and it was either correctly, or incorrectly called by the line judge. But now everyone knows where the ball landed. A correct decision is made and that’s it, the game continues. So interuption to the game is not a valid argument against technology.

Blatter has said he is willing to have it discussed again. Whether the introduction of technology – only to the goalmouth mind – should be reconsidered. I think Frank Lampard’s goal and the Carlos Teves goal on the very same day in the game between Argentina and Mexico make the case that technology should be used to help any important decision making the referee or linesmen have to make. Teves was clearly a yard or so offside, and was clearly affecting play. So he was offside. No goal.

So to limit the technology to the goalmouth would make the footballing authorities look stupid. It has to be applied where it exists. Now that might be the test. Where it exists.

People have said that it’s not fair if someone in a lower league does not have the same rules and technology as the professional/international game. Why? Surely, if a world cup decider (now I’m not saying Lampard’s goal would have changed the result, nor am I saying that Teves not being given his goal would have saved Mexico) that swings on a referee’s decision, should take advantage of any assistance available. If technology can a ref make a correct decision, it should be allowed ANYWHERE on the pitch.

Three challenges

As in tennis, I agree the game would be boring if each team were continuously ‘challenging’ the referee’s decisions. It would not flow. By the way, if you think football is a ’fast’ game that needs to be free flowing – just sit down and watch a game of ice hockey, then directly afterwards watch the most exiting game you can think of football and it’ll appear really slow. your mind has speeded up to the speed of ice hockey. Happened to me anyway.

But I digress.

A few seconds, even a minute out of a game, especially where as in tennis the crowd gets involved, would enhance the game not take away from it. And would make it more fair, not less fair. And limit the challenges to say two or three. That would focus the coach’s mind. Maybe even two or three in a season would mean you’d have no challenges at the beginning of the season, then they’d start getting used up at the end. It’s all to be ironed out.

So serendipidy.

• Yes it was serendipidous that Sepp Blatter is German and is the main opponent to technology.

That he was present at a game between England and Germany is not serendipidous. He attends as many world cup games as he physically can. And a game betweeen England and Germany is going to top of his list.

• But that a goal incident took place very similar to the one that England WERE GIVEN during their 1966 (oh gawd not that again) game about which the controversy has raged ever since. Incidentally, leading to an academic institution spending time (and money) on cleaning up the recording of the goal incident and reducing it to frames such that they could decide definitively whether it was indeed a goal or not. (and I can’t even remember now what the final conclusion was). But I do remember the report on the news about it.
• That the person manning the big video (bet he’s been fired) in the stadium decided to ‘show’ the incident straight away in the stadium during the Mexico Argentina game meant the players had seen it, even the officials on the field of play probably saw Tevez was offside. But rules are rules. And the rules dictate that once a refereeing decision has been made – it is final! And normally, not even a referee can change it. Now I don’t that’s entirely true!! I’ve seen refs changing their minds during a game!

But this ref was not for changing. The goal stood.

During the England Germany game. As the ref had not seen any replay (although it was available and had been shown over and over again on the television coverage), he could not change his mind. But had video footage on the big screen, or someone (like in Rugby) sitting in front of a tv monitor trusted to make the ‘call’, been available, he could have made the right decision. Then it would have been England 2 Germany 2 at half time. Different team talk. Different perspective on the game – different team coming out in the second half. Maybe. Maybe. Maybe.

Now I’m not an England supporter. You might be confused by this commentary therefore. No, I’m a proud Scot and we weren’t at the World Cup. Haven’t attended for too long now. I just hate to see injustice and maladministration, where it is clearly so unnecessary. And where it appears to me to be simply for ‘thrawn’ reasons. That’s ‘stubborn with bells on’. And it’s what Highland Scots have in abundance.

 So while I can say honestly that Germany deserved to win the game. England were done.

I wonder though over the last few years whether other incidents would have changed history were technology to have been used.

What about the Henri handball just before he scored to put Ireland out of hte World Cup? France might not even have been there.

What about the incident where a player at the corner flag fell down and started gripping his head, when after replay it was clear the bal had hit him on the leg.

What about the numerous penalties that are given/are not given which after replay, it is obvious players have dived, or have been taken down. And they’re all cast as liars, cheats, OR as great players for the team, when really they are liars and cheat.

So finally I hope serendipidy has helped sense to prevail. But I’m not holding my breath. Sepp Blatter could not deny the evidence afer the England/Germany, nor the Argentina/Mexico games. But I suspect when the item comes up at the FIFA meeting in two months, his mind will have changed again. And there will be many reasons for NOT introducing technology to football.

Been a while since I blogged, so time to try again. How do people find the time and discipline to write something every day, or even every week?

How do they find something to say that is ‘interesting’ for others to read?

Survey

Have decided it’s time to plot the future out a little and decide which way to go, so thought it would be a good idea by to try to find out what customers think. I’ve put a survey linked from the website to ask some general questions about our jerky – how people found us – what they think of our products and packaging in general – what we need to do to improve.
If you’d like to contribute (the more the merrier) go to here to take survey and tell us what you think.

Hard Drive

Spent much of yesterday trying to recover photos from a dead (well in the final stages of dying) hard drive. It makes the dreaded ‘click’ sound. Amazing what you can find on the web. I found that did seminars in how to recover a hard drive SuperFlyFlippingA is his handle on You tube. If you ever need to dismantle a hard drive there’s tons of it on the web.

Apparently he’s been getting flack from the data recovery industry for telling all the secrets. but he’s right – I’m not going to spend £500-£1000 to get my photos back. I’m going to blodge it and see if I can get them back myself. Well I never did manage to get these photos back. And trashed two hard drives in the process – probably by opening them and prodding around in them. Doesn’t really matter as they’re old and all the data has been taken off.

The guy mentioned a couple of useful pieces of software – DD rescue seems promising – well it would be if I had Linux installed on my pc. So that’s got to be the next thing. Install Linux on my old pc and see if I can recover the photos that way.

The man who cycled the Americas

Watched Mark Beaumont the other night on the telly. The man who cycled The Americas. He had previously done a cycle around the world. Having been mugged and generally in danger in some of the former Eastern Block countries, this seemed very tame. He just spent several months on his bike, cycling from Alaska through Canada’s wild country, where nothing really happens. He met up with a few ‘old boys’ who were having a music festival – looks like maybe 30 people came. They just had to ‘know’ the festival was happening! No advertising. No signs. It was just happening. Can’t imagine that happening here. Here we have to advertise, promote, package. I suppose they had packaged, as they were offering ‘free camping’.

In the whole program however, there was not a mention of jerky. You’ve have thought going through the ‘land of jerky’ he’d have come across it once or twice.

He’s having to take in 6000 calories per day. Sounds like that would be great, but is probably not as great as it sounds. If you want to catch up, it’s on the BBC iPlayer.

Well yesterday, 27 June 2009, we completed the Gaick (GA-EECHK) pass which runs from just below Dalwhinnie through the Tromie strath and on to Kingussie. It is mainly following a path, which I don’t like and ends up on a tar road, which I hate with a passion – check my feet for confirmation!

The weather was great. Started off and it had just rained. So I’d wet legs(bad), which however soon dried (good). Then the weather varied from warm with very little wind (bad for midgies) to quite humid (OK for walking) to a section with a horrendous windtunnel effect (but on our backs – so not too bad) to the final looooooooongest five miles of my life on a tarmac road. I’m sure the tarmac road made it easy for the organisers to get people, not able to complete the course, out (who says you’re not supposed to split infinitives in English). But it made the final steps – all several thousand of them – very hard on my poor – not used to walking – feet.

Why did I do it? I hear you say

Well. It seemed like a good idea at the time. I’d done the Larig Gru about 4 years ago, and coped with it fine. Don’t get me wrong, I probably coped alright yesterday. But boy that last stretch was boring.

Yesterday was also our border collie (Meg’s) first long walk. Normally, she goes walkies during the week and runs probably five times the distance I do. Yesterday, we were making sure she run only a little more. We succeeded in the main although she kept stopping to ask someone to throw her ball or pick up a stick for her to chase.

After about 13 miles or so, she’d had enough and was starting to ask when we were going to get back to the car and when she was getting her tea. Well, about 7 or 8 miles later was the answer I was not prepared to give her at that stage. A little later, she decided (and I thought she’d cope) to try crossing a cattle grid. She got to about the 3/4 stage hopping deftly I thought, then suddently feel down between the rungs. She got straight up and got to the other side of the grid however. I think my shout (of despair) probably sounded like she was being told off! So when I got to the other side she was very submissive until she realised she wasn’t getting a row, but could probably use this one to her advantage. The next six or so cattle grids she was carried over by yours truly. So at least we got something out of it. She probably now won’t cross a cattle grid again. She’ll most likely stop and ask to be lifted over!

By the time (about 5.30pm) we got to the end somebody wanted to take pictures of us - 500m from the bus. I do understand the organisers want to have such images (people enjoying themselves!!!) to add to their publicity material for next year. But I have to say, by that stage I just wanted to do the final 500 metres and be finished…

Anyway, we got to the bus. And then to Kingussie and logged ourselves as completed. Got our certificate,   our soup and sandwiches (well cider and cider) and relaxed in the sun (got my head and neck burned) but overall a good day.

Back to Nairn where we all went to bed at 1030. Earliest I’ve been ready for sleeping for several years. Heard Andy Murray win his 3rd round Wimbledon match on the way home (isn’t technology great?)

Sunday

Everyone a bit stiff in the joints – dog still a bit tired, but not too stiff. Although she slept better than usual, she’s raring to go again now.

So life gets back to normal and the sunny weather is already away and the clouds back again.

May 11, 2009

Posted in Uncategorized

Saturday, April 4th, 2009

Welcome to our new blog. We will put any comments, updates etc on this site. We’d also like your comments, so please do join in.

Today we rushed over to Grantown on Spey to get in to the start of the Beale & Pyper(furniture retailers) (www.bealeandpyper.co.uk ) SALE.  Well, you’d expect to see a load of people bursting down the door, or at the very least, a shop that is a bit mobbed with people. There were three groups of people in the place. They have good furniture though. So we’re getting a couple of new book cabinets and I’ll get the old ones to help improve the orgnaisation of my office. So all’s well.

Next week we’re going to try to make some changes to the website. This is one of them. An SEO expert on LinkedIn gave some free advice stating I needed a blog. Well, that’s alright if you’ve got a lot to say for yourself. I don’t. Especially not in writing. I did try writing a blog already, but it was for my collie dog Meg. You can read her musings at http://megwilsonsblog.blogspot.com

Finally got a bit caught up on orders this week and started fulfilling some of the things I’d promised I’d do. Like making a batch for Walter – who found the peppery taste of the venison original too strong for his delicate stomach, especially while up the hill. So we made some with no pepper so he could try it and let us know how it goes. My concern is that without the pepper, it will be a bit too bland tasting. So far, he said he’s tried it at home and found it was not as bland as I’d feared. So we’ll wait and see how it goes on the hill, which is where he said he’d try it out next. Hopefully more to come. Maybe even pics which I’ll put either on the website or here. Walter has suggested this may be a new range – the ‘jerky for sensitive stomachs’ range. We’ll see once he’s tried it on the hill.

Cheers for now

Brian