HD Failure

Posted on December 3, 2006 by Ponder

About time I got around to writing about this.

Dateline: Wednesday 22nd of November I get home from skittles to find error messages all over the place on my Linux machine and the secondary HD remounted as read only. This is normally solved by a reboot but not this time. Nothing I could do could access it and no recovery program I tried had any success. That’s everything in the /home directory so no “mission critical” stuff, thankfully, with the exception of the IRC server, but a lot of personal stuff. Most of the really important stuff is backed up so it’s more time loss than anything else.

Anyway, I discovered something about superblocks and with the aid of Caz discovered the locations of backups on the HD. With this information I was actually able to error check/fix the HD! Trouble being there was so much corruption that what I did get back was quite limited, but useful all the same. With this data copied off the HD using my Windows machine I thought I’d return the HD to its rightful place. Bad idea. Lots and lots of errors so it’s basically knackered.

All back to full running strength now but with half the storage. It’s still enough (this is Linux not Windows after all 😉 ) but I’d like more so I’m going to be on the lookout for an 80GBish drive soon.

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Trauma Clinic – Take 2

Posted on November 16, 2006 by Ponder

Appointment time was 10.50, arrived at 10.30, called at 12.40, seen at 13.00. The consultant examined me and instructed me on some light, low physiotherapy I have to do three times a day (pendulum like actions) and that was it. One fresh sling and another appointment in three weeks and we were out at 13.10.
I’ll see my G.P. tomorrow for some more painkillers and another sick note. I wonder if I’ll be back at work before Christmas :-/

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Trauma Clinic

Posted on October 26, 2006 by Ponder

I had an appointment today at the trauma clinic. Appointment was for 10.50, I was eventually seen at 12.40. From then it was pretty (or not) quick.

A nurse pull up my x-ray then a doctor assessed me, prescribed some more strong co-codamol and took down the other injuries that have become apparent then told me to make another appointment for three weeks time. While he was writing the prescription I took this photo:

X-ray

I’m so glad my phone has an “Airplane Mode” so I can use its non-communication functions in places that don’t allow mobile phones 😉

Afterwards a nurse changed my sling and added some padding to reduce the chafing so I’m a little more comfortable now. Just got to see what happens in three weeks. Maybe some light physiotherapy, but a 10% chance I’ll need surgery. Fingers crossed it doesn’t come to that!

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Accident – Update #2

Posted on October 25, 2006 by Ponder

Day 4 after the accident and it hurts just to move. Ibuprofen are crippling my stomach so I have to stop taking them, leaving my with co-codamol which is making me constantly lethargic.

Pain in my foot had come out as a bruise now as you can see below:

Foot bruise

Also, the bruise in my shoulder is far more pronounced:

Shoulder bruise

I’ll give another update after tomorrow’s trauma clinic appointment. I don’t feel like adding any more today 🙁

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Accident – Update #1

Posted on October 22, 2006 by Ponder

Some photographs:

Bike

Damage done to the bike.

Pedal

Damage done to the pedal. I think I must have lifted my legs or I surely wouldn’t be walking now!

Front side

Side view of the damage to the front wheel.

Front front

Front view of the damage to the front wheel.

Bruise

Visible damage to me!

I’m not going to give out too many details of the accident itself on here until after all legal proceedings have taken place but I’ll keep up to date on my personal progress in this matter.

The pedal will not shift from the axle and the seat is also buggered (my specially purchased gel seat too!) 🙁

Can’t check the rest of its integrity and it might be cheaper to get a new bike than get the damage on this one fixed 🙁

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Accident

Posted on October 21, 2006 by Ponder

Just a quick on-the-move post to let you all know I’ve broken my shoulder after being knocked off my bike by an idiot in a silver Citroen pulling out of a side street 🙁

I’m ok in myself, just a bit sore. More details when I get a chance because I have a feeling I’m going to be fussed over when I get home and not get a chance to get at the computer for a while 😉

Update

Definitely a broken clavicle. Sent home from hospital in a sling and with painkillers. Trauma clinic Thursday. Feeling much under the weather. Bike condition unknown, apart from a definitely knackered front wheel, sould be able to arrange that to be returned tomorrow.

Very bad timing, I had a guaranteed easy overtime day tomorrow too, now I’m off for who knows how long 🙁

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Bye bye fishy

Posted on October 9, 2006 by Ponder

One of the two fish died yesterday 🙁

Almost 8 years old they are too!

Let’s hope the other isn’t going to follow close behind.

Posted in Pets | 2 Comments

City of Lights – Reprise

Posted on October 7, 2006 by Ponder

The two new sets of lights in the City Centre are now active, and guess what? Yes, I was caught by one of them on my way to work this morning (in which time no traffic emerged from the “green” direction, until the one car that approached triggered the change to green for my direction). In fact, out of 22 sets I was caught by 11 of the bloody things!
My journey to and from work can basically be split into two roughly 3 mile sections. The “home” side being mostly easy hills (down to work) and traffic light free and the “work” side being mainly flat and saturated with traffic lights, 10 of them in the last mile. They can add up to 10 minutes to my journey because they’re so badly organised. I sometimes wonder why I bother stopping at them but the reasons are twofold: (1) also being a driver I like to follow the Highway Code and (2) I like to stay alive!
Also, while I’m thinking about it: “CYCLISTS DISMOUNT”. What the hell is that supposed to be in aid of? It’s a sign I’ve seen on many of the aforementioned “psycho paths” where it’s just too narrow for both cyclists and pedestrians to co-inhabit and just highlights the sheer pointlessness of them. I mean, would you expect to get out of a car to push it across a narrow bridge? Well why do they insist cyclists do so? I’ll just stick to the safer roads thank you very much.

Posted in Cycling, Observations | 1 Comment

Anniversary

Posted on October 4, 2006 by Ponder

No, not wedding or anything as exciting as that but it’s a year ago today my cycle computer was fitted to my old, second-hand racer. This was transferred over to my mountan bike at Christmas and between them I’ve run up a grand total of 2326.7 miles. I’m happy with that 🙂

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November the 5th

Posted on October 3, 2006 by Ponder

Is it just me or does this date start earlier and last longer every bleeding year? There have been bangs and crackles going off all evening!
I reckon it’s time to ban the sale of these bloody fireworks to the public until the start of November, and totally if the buyer is wearing a hoodie. They’re bloody dangerous with them!

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