January 2004
January 8
So Williams become the second of the big four teams to release their 2004 challenger, the FW26 …and with a nose like this, it’s hard to envisage a more radical contender being released.
I must admit my first impressions were, “What have they done to the nose? It’s ugly as hell!” but it has definitely grown on me. To an extent. It may well be quick (and from its initial pace at Jerez it seems to be)… it just doesn’t look it.
Just immagine — if it catches on, like the oh-so-ugly winglets of 1998 — what the grid would look like in a year’s time! It can be said quick cars are generally beautiful cars, but this one just isn’t. A grid of them would certainly make F1 look a lot slower.
January 6
What better way to start a new year than to start it with a totally new — and hopefully improved — layout! After the grey scale of the old layout, I thought I would inject some colour into this one!
As ever, compromises have been made to ensure it looks how it should in IE, but I made sure not to use any hacks (Instead of using the common box model hacks, I just added an extra div, named “wrapper”.). I was tempted to use a min-height hack on the photos page — as using the IE compromise (the ordinary height attribute), when the text is enlarged dramatically, the layout kind of breaks — but I figured it wasn’t worth the extra lines of CSS.
Like Zeldman, I have encountered an Opera bug on the site… every page has a 10 pixel high gap above the footer. Something else very curious about Opera's behaviour throughout the site is that, after all abbreviations (that are marked up with abbr), the following space ( ) will fail to materialise. Well, they do, but in a split second the browser refreshes, and they're all gone, making the typography look very shabby. Both bugs were experienced in Opera 7.11, but since upgrading to 7.23, only the abbr one persists.
However, I hope the new look is appreciated by all. If so/not, feedback is always welcome.
There is actually a better way to start the year: that is with a job! After working at the Royal Mail since November, the last work came on the Tuesday before Christmas. A real shame, as I was hoping for work between Christmas and New Year so at least I had a bit more money to come in, but they had already got enough numbers.
I gained a lot of experience while working there, but maybe not much that can be taken to another place of employment, but useful all the same. During November I was “segging”, which is sorting sacks into area codes. This is the most manual work (delivery is physical) and quite tiring after a day of lifting and throwing. Other work involved sorting Colchester and Chelmsford’s residue mail (using the second part of the postcode), and actually getting out on deliveries in Colchester town. Quite an experience.
I never realised just how much work a postman actually does — it really is a lot. From walk-sorting it (sorting the mail into road names and numbers) and bundling it up, to posting the letters through the door (or knocking for signatures) the whole process takes several hours, and given the UK’s weather, often a lot of commitment!
After going most of 2003 without a job, I’m determined not to spend long in '04 unemployed. That would just be too depressing. While working at the Royal Mail as a “casual” I applied for a full-time position as I heard they recruited in January. I was hoping for some kind of Data Entry position, but the Manager phoned me today to inform me the only positions they have available are deliveries… not quite what I had in mind!
I’m going to have to give it some serious thought, because turning this job down so early in the year, with no prospect of another offer isn’t something I really want to be doing. I wouldn’t mind delivering, sure it’s hard work, but it’s steady money, I just need to make sure I can get to and from alright as it wouldn’t be in my home village. Something else perhaps for me to consider is the fact that last year my postman informs me he amassed over £600 in Christmas tips!
Entries made in November 2003.