I’m all for the return of Top of the Pops and TOTP2, and I don’t really think they should have disappeared in the first place. There are very few decent music programs on TV as it is, I’m pretty sure the Beeb could have adapted Top of the Pops to remain mainstream if they’d really wanted to. Of course, they didn’t, and then they announced it wouldn’t even be back for a Christmas special. As soon as Simon Cowell poked his head above the parapet and said he’d sort it out, they decided perhaps they would like to stage the show after all.

I don’t usually make resolutions, as I know I’ll either break them or have forgotten them by the end of January. However, I had already been talked into doing so over at Sidepodcast.com, so I thought I might as well share my three very simple resolutions for 2009. Try and stick to a Wii Fit schedule. I enjoy it when I do it but quite often forget and only remember when I’m tucked up in bed. Be a bit more house proud. I spend a lot of time in the one room - office - and often leave the rest of the flat to ruin. I want to pay more attention and try and keep things “nice”. Stick to one kind of to-do list. In my endless quest to find the ideal to-do list, I have spread my tasks all over the internet, the desktop, and my notepads. If I stick to one, then at least I’ve got a central place to adapt to my needs. Like all good resolutions, you should just start them when you think of them, rather than waiting for a specific day. I have already been mindful of these in the last two weeks, but I think January will be the real test.

The Mac doesn’t really have any cheap and cheerful image editing software. You’ve got the very limited features of iPhoto, and then you’ve got the expensive software of Fireworks and others. I don’t do that much image editing, as I let the other half invest in the software. However, as I intend to blog more, I at least want the ability to resize and crop as needed. I discovered Picnik.com recently, and it is amazing.

At some point, if you’re looking at Smarter Than Your Average, it should change from a Wordpress.com template, to a rather more customisable design. While the web is gradually making it’s way towards 3.0, STYA has taken that great leap into the world of web hosting and FTP for it’s very own version 2. I’m not going to make any rash promises about hundreds of posts and lots of fascinating features, but you should probably be able to tell that the blog is already getting a bit more love and attention than it used to. And we haven’t even got to New Year’s Resolutions yet.

The Boxing Day sales certainly were popular, especially at the Westfield Shopping Centre. The BBC have a short video of the mass hysteria as the doors to the centre opened. One woman even discusses the fact that she has travelled from afar, stayed overnight in a hotel, and was looking forward to her shopping trip more than Christmas Day itself. Needless to say, this freaks me out. Our cupboards are beginning to look a bit sparse and I need to hit the shops. Granted, I’m not going in search of food at Westfield, but I wonder how busy my local supermarket is going to be. Shopping before Christmas was a complete nightmare. I was elbowed in the aisles and shouted at in the car park. Now I must return to the scene of the crime and attempt to shop some more.

Whilst it is the norm to not even open presents until Christmas Day, nothing about me is normal. That would explain why I bought the present for myself, wrapped it, gave it to myself during a live stream of a party, and have now finished up with the present already. You know how it is. The gift I bought myself was the Mega Bloks Vodafone McLaren Mercedes Pit Stop - a lego alternative that comes complete with pit wall, F1 car and driver.

It never ceases to amaze me what a small world it is. My mother called me up and said a temp at her work had asked if she knew me (same name and all), and it turns out he’s a temp I had to train up at my last job when leaving for this one. When she said he worked with me for two days over there, I immediately said his name, and she confirmed it. If he remembers me and I remember his name, we must have made quite an impression on each other. I can barely remember my own name sometimes.

A colleague gave me one of those desk flip things, that should be a calendar, but actually is labelled as “30 Hilarious Desktop Signs.” I actually found it on Amazon, but I’m not recommending it. They’re really not all that hilarious but there are a couple I like, so I’ll share them with you. They are written as though they are motivational posters, all big fonts, with a little sub-message underneath.

I was listening to a recent episode of Get-It-Done Guy and he talked about how to keep your desk tidy. This is a real bone of contention at home, as my desk is always in complete chaos. It’s weird, really, because at work I have the tidiest desk of everyone. If only I could bring that mentality home with me as well. The Get-It-Done Guy, Stever Robbins, talks of folders and cardboard boxes, general organisation tips that might help. However, my favourite paragraph from the transcript is the motivational bit:

We went to Paris at very short notice a weekend or two ago, and one of our main aims was to snap a picture of the FIA headquarters. Yes, fine, people go to Place de la Concorde for the history and the beauty, but we went for the F1. Obviously. Anyway, it was a brilliant trip, but there were just a few tips I wanted to share with the class.

With the G1 only available on T-Mobile, I had to cancel my Vodafone contract. Firstly, it was almost impossible to find out how to do it, with the information tucked away in the smallest corner of the Help section of the site. I can understand a company’s desire not to lose customers, but if you’re going to have a help section, it’d be good if it was actually helpful. I sent off my email with the required information and got a reply saying something along the lines of: Sorry you’re going, we’ll cancel your contract, but will call you with the final details.

I’m not entirely sure why, presumably just as an exercise in corporate relations, but Peugeot Sport took their Le Mans team to the Michelin factory in France. They had a look round they tyre manufacturing plant, but also learnt some of the basics of production and had a go at making a tyre themselves. Wurz, Gene, Sarrazin, Minassian and Lamy were all very impressed with what they saw, but here’s what Franck had to say on the subject:

I use the alarm on my phone to wake up of a morning, so was happy to see how easy to use the G1 alarm clock was. I even got to choose a sound! The first time I set it, at midnight, I thought it would be hilariously brilliant to choose the rooster alarm noise to wake up. It wasn’t so funny in the morning. Also, my boss has the rooster as his normal phone’s ring tone and it just brings back bad memories now. Oops.

I got myself the Google Phone last week, and have been playing around with it for a while. I’m not going to do an extensive review of it, because there are gadgety types who can do that much better than I can. All I will say for now is that I love it, and as I find things I really like, I’ll be sure to tell you all about them.

I was listening to Buzz out Loud, and they pointed out a phishing email scam test. I’m never one to pass up the opportunity to rate myself, so I looked into it. The idea is to see if you can tell the difference between a legitimate email and one that is phishing for your details. There are ten questions, and each one shows you an image of an email, and you have to make the decision. I scored 80%, meaning I got two wrong. Unfortunately, I did it the wrong way and decided that two were legitimate when actually they were phishing. It would be better to have got it the other way and overcompensated.

I was just checking out the official Franck site for any news and updates on our favourite Frenchman and the latest article is about his test with AGR. However, at the end of the post, there is a snippet of information. Since then, Franck returned to Europe on our good old continent. On the agenda this week, a Training Camp in good and due form! Franck joined his coach and osteopath for a week of intensive training mega!

After a relatively good showing with AGR’s American Le Mans team, Montagny was given a road course test with the IndyCar team a couple of weeks ago. Franck already had a go in the Indy car back in September, testing at the Kentucky Speedway, but this time he got to have a go at Sebring - which should be a more preferable circuit style to him. He tested with Tony Kanaan, one of AGR’s current drivers, and Franck said the pair had fun and shared a friendly rivalry. He felt the day went well, although both he and the car needed some time to adapt to each other:

This is a story a friend of mine told me: She was walking back to work after lunch, through the underpass, and a mother pushing a buggy with two screaming kids was coming the other way. Now, when I say screaming, I mean enough to make you want to rip your own ears off. The mother was trying to quieten them but not having much luck. A policeman also entered the subway, and spotting the commotion, beckoned the children towards him. They immediately hushed, and walked over to him.

Even though I consider myself to be somewhat “down with the kids”, I’ve got to say that txt speak and internet slang are starting to confuse me. I’m not above using the odd lol, omg or wtf, but it’s becoming a bit baffling. Firstly, I want to point out a very useful site for fuddy-duddies like me: Internet Slang Dictionary. There’s a translator in there, if you come across some abbreviation/acronym you don’t understand, or you can simply look something up in the dictionary, if you so desire. There’s even a quiz, if that takes your fancy.

One of the things I regret from my lack of time these days is not attempting to play the piano anymore. I can’t honestly say that it’s all down to being busy, as I did hike a keyboard around with me through a couple of flats and it didn’t get much use. I don’t know where the motivation went but I do miss it. Playing music is great fun, and there’s nothing like jamming with anyone you can find who can also lay their hands on an instrument.

I’ve just finished the second of two exams this week. I’m pretty sure I failed both of them, but that’s okay. In fact, I’m really happy about it because I now know at least one path I don’t want my career to take. The reason for this post, however, is because of the severe cramp I have in my right hand. My exams have always tended to be a lot about numbers, and today I sat a paper that was more about theory. This afternoon, I wrote at least ten pages of A4 sized paper… with a pen.

Michael Crichton died yesterday, and I don’t think I’d be lying if I said he was my favourite author of all time. I didn’t even know he was ill, which is so unusual in this day and age that it makes me like him even more. Obviously the usual applies, with thoughts and feelings going out to his family, but on a purely selfish level, I’m sad that there will be no more books. Every novel I picked up I thought was going to be a nightmare to read, with so many scientific, technological, and futuristic plots. But Crichton has a way of making the complex understandable and from that it becomes enjoyable.

The new look. Yes, okay, you can still view via the ‘old Facebook’ but presumably this will not always be the case, and I’m not a fan. It takes ages to upload photos. I tried to put up 5 pictures and it literally took half an hour. I timed it and everything. Messages from groups. I join groups to visit occasionally, have a look around, see what’s in the discussion boards. I don’t want messages sent to my inbox every day. Surefire way for me to unsubscribe. When searching for a person, the profile pictures are too small. How can I tell if that’s the right person by looking at a tiny square of photo. It posts EVERYTHING to yours news feed. You can’t just go there, browse around the games and see what they’re like. If you even look at something, people will know.

It’s been a while, but I return with good tidings. Franck won his first ALMS race this weekend, taking the top stop of the podium with team mate James Rossiter. The win came after some good strategic calls from the team, some good decision making in the pit stops, and some good driving from Mr FKM. The team waited until the minimum amount of time a driver has to be in the car (45 minutes) before calling Rossiter in and switching him up with Montagny, but because this was under yellow flags, they didn’t lose too much time.

Via the iPlayer, I watched a four-part series about Mark Beaumont. He’s a cyclist from Scotland who set himself the challenge of crossing the world - 18,000 miles - in under 200 days to set a new Guinness World Record. If you missed the programme, there’s plenty of information about it on the BBC website, including when and where it will be on (if it’s repeated). The guy was absolutely amazing. He travelled through Europe, Asia, all the way across Australia, all the way across America and through Europe again, starting and finishing in Paris. Only a couple of flights to avoid the ocean, and a bike, were his means of travelling, and he had to record his mileage every step of the way.

Just wanted to point out that I’m currently in the midst of loving identi.ca. If you’re fed up of Twitter’s flakiness, and want something a little bit prettier, then identi.ca could be for you. I’m busy posting there at the moment, amazed at how many 140 character sentences I have come up with already, having only been registered for a week. If you’re interested in following me, head to identi.ca/christineb. I highly recommend it.

I know I’m very late to the game about this, but I just wanted to say that Google Docs is actually rather cool. I’ve just set up my very first co-ordination project for Librivox (as in, encouraging chapter submissions, rather than recording them) and I used Google Docs to host the text for each chapter. Being able to publish the document at the click of a mouse is amazing. I haven’t used it much more than that, and I know you’re all way ahead of me, but I just wanted to add my two cents.

Apparently I am suddenly interested in lots of different sports. I vaguely remember watching bits of the last Olympics, just because it was on, and I was bored, and I liked TV. This year, I actually seem to care how well we do. This is a weird development for someone who hates sport, and I don’t like it. The BBC page is brilliant, of course, with live video and an automatically updating commentary. However, the medals table doesn’t automatically update. This is an oversight, I think, but then again, it’s not like we win enough medals to make it worth the coding time. Apparently there is a maximum size on the women’s volleyball outfits. And there’s me thinking volleyball was just about pretty ladies running around in next to nothing on a beach. Interesting that we were all blown away by the opening ceremony, and panicking that we would never be able to match it in 2012 (we won’t), but it was all fake. The footage of fireworks was shot on a previous night, and the iconic cute little girl singing was actually voiced by another girl behind the scenes. The best bit of action I’ve seen so far, as described by the BBC Live commentary team: 1537: One of those things on TV that you shouldn’t laugh at but can’t help yourself, a Russian weightlifter failing to make a lift and staggering off the stage with her head in her hands before walking into a wall. As Mel Brooks once said: “Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you walk into an open sewer and die.”

Did anyone else realise that along with the new redesign of Delicious, they’re pushing delicious.com instead of the del.icio.us crazy url? Apparently they’ve always had the .com domain but redirected it. Now they’re a bit more popular, the crazy url is a bit too complicated, so it’s delicious.com from here on in. I’ve stopped embedding my delicious links in this blog, in the hopes that it will make me write more. There’s more guilt if no new content goes up, than if you can say: “Well, at least there’s a link or two…”

Since the dawn of time, but also quite recently, I have been looking for a decent to-do list manager. This is how it used to work: While I’m out all day, I keep a list of things that I need to do, remember, or think about on a scrap of paper. When I get home, I action all the ones I can and cross them off the list, then transfer the rest to a master list in a giant notebook.

Well, I can only apologise for not updating more often. There are no excuses, except I don’t really understand the Le Mans series very well, and therefore don’t find myself going looking for news every day. It looks like Montagny is showing well in the series, but having some small bouts of bad luck. At the moment he’s partnered with James Rossiter, I believe, and they raced this weekend at Road America. Doing pretty well, I gather, but knocked out with only ten minutes to go due to contact with another car.

Another Firefox extension I have just found has made my day, and I must spread the word. It’s quite simple: Copy Link Text. Basically, once enabled you can right click on a link, and get the additional option of copy link text, alongside copy link location. This should be filed under: Things You Didn’t Realise You Needed Until You Found Them.

I have recently upgraded to Firefox 3 and am writing a post about my experiences so far. The main problem I have had is that none of my old extensions work on the new version. This is slightly annoying, but at the same time, they really were due a clear-out. I had a weather thing in the top nav bar that I never even looked at. Sometimes I would accidentally click on it and wonder what the hell was going on.

Whilst the new Amazon design is very fancy and navigation is supposedly easier, there seems to be an elemental problem. Being from the UK, I signed up ages and ages ago, via the .co.uk side of Amazon. Today, I accidentally logged in via the .com domain. For a moment, I thought the stupid site had lost my wish list. But the truth is, it doesn’t seem to be able to access it across stores.

Sometimes, as holiday cover at work, I am in charge of changing the backup tapes for the system. You’ll find me huddled in the dark corner of a server room, standing in front of a rack of hardware, eyeing up the blinking lights and wires, and tapping away on the keyboard. It’s like being in Mission Impossible. It’s wonderful.

Out of the Blue has been axed. Well, that’s out of the blue. Ha. Sorry, couldn’t resist. If the numbers in that story are to be believed, chances are you won’t have even heard of this programme, and now you probably never will. But I want to take a closer look at what happened, because it makes for an interesting story. The problem Here is how to systematically undermine a programme’s chances, à la the BBC.

It’s hula-hooping, right? Who knew that hula-hooping was actually hard work? Okay, so you’ve probably guessed it: I am now the proud owner of a Wii Fit. And it’s brilliant. At the moment, I’m still suffering the effects of a cold and wintry three-day stay in a tent, and can’t put the maximum effort into a routine. However, from what I know already, it’s brilliant. I’m not entirely sure how it does it, but the Wii Board knows everything about me! It knows that I have poor balance, and even made a joke about falling over when I walk. This put other members of the household into hysterics, so already the Wii Fit has brought joy to our lives.

It started out well for Franck, as he finished the first practice session on top, although only by a tenth of a second. He then went on to hold a provisional pole during the qualifying sessions, but ultimately finished seventh. Afterwards, however, two Audi drivers were given penalties and pushed back to ninth on the grid - which helped our boy somewhat! Overall, Montagny finished 6th, and three laps down, which isn’t too bad on your first race.

Having performed so well in the Le Mans 24 Hour race, Montagny has been snapped up for the American Le Mans series for the remainder of the season. Now, I’m a bit late with news, and the race this weekend at Lime Rock sees Montagny teaming up with Marco Andretti but it looks like he will have various team mates throughout the season. The new lineup is somewhat unexpected, as AGR had only just got settled with a team of Christian Fittipaldi and Bryan Herta. But the boss wanted a big change, and thankfully Franck got the benefit of that.

Disneyland is the host of a new “Home of the Future” - an interactive tour through a house chock full of technology you can only dream about. The Gizmodo story has tons of pictures, and CNET have a fab video. It is quite possibly the coolest thing ever. The best part, in my eyes, is the wardrobe mirror thing. Even though I am not your typical girl, and most days I get dressed in the dark, the idea of trying on an outfit without having to make the effort appeals to me no end.

Wimbledon is always on at the same time every year, and yet this year, it completely slipped my mind. At one stage in my life, it was the sport I followed. Much easier than F1, as it only spanned two weeks of the year. I even created a massive wall chart to follow the progress of players throughout one of the championships. It was gaudy, but I liked it. This year I have very little time to consume anything tennis related, especially as it’s the same time as Silverstone testing and the British GP. I am incredibly jealous of the person I know who has taken the week off to revel in seven days of tennis-y goodness.

Have you heard about the “Awesome Highlighter”? As Web 2.0 gets bigger and better, it seems as though people are always trying to find ways to do online things that they have previously manually done on paper. I know that seems obvious, but you would think it was impossible to replicate the act of marking something with a highlighter for future use. Apparently not. Check out awesomehighlighter.com (link retired). Like I said, it does have the word awesome in the title, which is a point against it. But the problem is, it is kinda awesome.

You know it was Friday 13th last week? (And yes, I had a bad day.) Did you know that the subject warrants its own page on Wikipedia? Firstly, Friday the 13th is observed by many, many countries. But in a few, Greece and Romania, for example, it is Tuesday 13th. In Italy, it is Friday 17th. This totally blows the superstition out of the water, because it’s roots are in the fact that Friday is scary and the number 13 is scary. Given that differing countries believe in the 17th or a Tuesday, this is ruined.

Oops. Turns out that when I said this year was his best result, I was wrong. And my only excuse is that clearly I cannot read. To make amends for my error, here is the full run-down of Franck’s achievements at Le Mans. Year Team Result 1998 Courage 5th 1999 DAMS DNF 2000 DAMS 9th 2001 Oreca DNF 2002 Oreca 6th 2005 Oreca 4th 2006 Pescarolo 2nd 2008 Peugeot 3rd For the last few years, there’s been a nice trend of the results going up, for Franck, but it appears this year was not to be. Never mind. There’s always next year.

Franck did an amazing job. He started second, and at one point was driving so fast he could catch the leaders at four seconds a lap. He overtook the front runners to lead the race at one point, and then made the big mistake of handing the car over to Klien. A couple of laps in, Klien through the car in the gravel. Still, we have to be impressed that our guys managed to recover enough to finish third. Franck started and finished the race, and it was nice to see him on the podium.

Top five reasons the Mac is winning me over Installing things is too easy. Flickr Uploader is a thousand times better than on a PC. The Mac has approved software lists. I’m starting to get used to (and like) the fact that things are open without having an actual window open. It took a long time, but now I’m adjusted, it’s a plus. I can make enhanced podcasts. Top five reasons it isn’t Office 2008 isn’t all it’s cracked up to be on the Mac. The @ key is in a different place. I don’t care who is right or wrong, but some standards wouldn’t go amiss. Switching from Mac to PC is a real pain. There’s no hash key (why the hell not?) I have to reformat my iPod. I can’t find any decent personal finance software. I’m sticking with what I’ve got on the PC.

Peugeot continued their fine form from the first round of qualifying, and took the first three spots on the grid. Franck’s car is second, behind Stephane Sarrazin, and ahead of Marc Gene. The finishing times were over three seconds quicker than Audi. The full qualifying results can be viewed here. Unfortunately, Montagny’s team mate Ricardo Zonta was having a go in the car when he was involved in an incident. The Peugeot was hit by another car and smashed into the barriers. Zonta is unharmed, but this has put them on the back foot slightly, with only a short amount of time to rebuild the car.

First qualifying for Le Mans 24 Hours took place last night (thanks to Andrea in the comments for the heads up). Our Peugeot boys were on top form, taking the top three spots, with main rival Audi taking the next three: Pos Class Drivers Team Car Time Gap 1 LMP1 Lamy, Sarrazin, Wurz Team Peugeot Total Peugeot 908 3:18.513 – 2 LMP1 Montagny, Zonta, Klien Peugeot Sport Total Peugeot 908 3:18.682 +0.169 3 LMP1 Gene, Minassian, Villeneuve Team Peugeot Total Peugeot 908 3:20.451 +1.938 Stephane Sarrazin set a serious benchmark, posting the fastest time that anybody has been around the Le Mans track since 1989!

I’m trying to quit Coke Zero and it’s killing me. Two weeks now, with a couple of lapses. Apparently Diet Coke is the beverage of choice for geeks, but it can’t be good to consume as much as I used to. How long before I stop thinking about it, though?

Leo Laporte is turning his life into an internet show. But this isn’t like Justin TV, this is podcasting at its finest. He joined in the group of people who were live streaming themselves recording a show, which meant you could interact with people via the chatroom and it was all real time. Then he took that idea and brought it to a whole new level. Now he broadcasts live from his office A LOT. I still don’t have the schedule clear in my head, it’s every day except Mondays and Fridays, I think, and obviously there’s a time difference between here and the US.