January 30th, 2006
I’ve just been working out some stats for Am I Paddy Or Not? and the results are vaguely interesting. There have been 1238 votes and the percentages that think each particular person is Paddy are below.
| Paddy |
60.7% |
| Big Jim |
26.3% |
| Phil Collins |
24.7% |
| Stephen Hawking |
22.4% |
| Homer Simpson |
20.9% |
| Adam |
20.7% |
| Martin |
19.4% |
| Kieren |
19.2% |
| Ian |
18.1% |
| Chris |
18.0% |
| Monty Python |
13.8% |
| Anne |
13.6% |
| Louise |
13.5% |
| Bhagesh |
12.1% |
So 60% of people correctly identified Paddy as being Paddy, but over a quarter thought that Jim was Paddy. That’s probably because of their similar haircuts. A similar percentage also can’t tell the difference between Paddy and Phil Collins. I think we all thought that figure would be higher.
Bhagesh is the person who should be happiest. He’s least likely to be mistaken for Paddy. Surprisingly, Louise and Anne resemble Paddy more.
Posted in Funny | 4 Comments »
January 16th, 2006
It turns out the house we had an offer accepted on last month needs a bit more work than we expected (not least a new roof). But the good news (for us anyway – not so good for the owner of the other house) is that we’ve found somewhere else. We had an offer accepted today. This one isn’t so close to the station, but it has the advantage of having an extra bedroom and not needing any work doing whatsoever. So Louise will just have to emulate Sarah Beeny in some other way.
Posted in Uncategorised | 8 Comments »
January 4th, 2006
It’s seven years since I left science and five years since I last had my name on a scientific paper, but, despite my best efforts, it’s happened again. I’m sure you’re all avid readers of Nucleic Acids Research, but if not then have a look at the Ensembl 2006 paper.
Posted in Uncategorised | 2 Comments »
December 30th, 2005
So I’ve just been looking at meebo. It’s a Web-based application that consolidates the major instant messaging platforms (MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, etc…) into one user interface. It seems very good. I’ve just been trying it out with Paul, who uses MSN Messenger. Does anyone else use online chat regularly? If so, let me know which application you use, especially if it’s one that meebo supports.
Posted in Technical | No Comments »
December 30th, 2005
Last night I had a dream. I dreamt that I was at work and, as usual, was listening to music on headphones plugged into my laptop. Except that I hadn’t plugged the headphones in properly and everyone in my large open-plan office could hear what I was listening to, but nobody told me for three hours.
I think the interpretation of this dream is pretty clear. I’m a very, very boring person.
Who probably shouldn’t listen to Dire Straits at work anymore.
Posted in Uncategorised | 6 Comments »
December 12th, 2005
Louise and I had an offer on a house accepted today. It’s in Hitchin near the station. We won’t be moving in very soon though, because it needs a lot of work. It needs rewiring, central heating installing, maybe a couple of chimney breasts removing, dry sealing of the cellar, a new kitchen, a new bathroom, a door moving, one or two sheds dismantling, etc…
Anyone know a builder?!
Posted in Uncategorised | 23 Comments »
December 1st, 2005
So I was listening to Radio Five Live this morning in the shower and I heard Luke Harvey tip a horse called The Local in the 2:40 at Wincanton.
Now my friend Paul runs a Web site in Sweden called The Local, so I let him know. It didn’t take much to persuade him to put a tenner on.
But just before the race started, Paul revealed that there was a lot more than money and a tiny human riding on this horse. If The Local didn’t win then that was a bad omen for his namesake Web site.
Luckily, he romped home and won by three lengths. Paul made forty quid and I was pretty relieved.
He hasn’t offered me any of his winnings though.
Update: He bought me a very good bottle of wine just after Christmas!
Posted in Sport | No Comments »
November 30th, 2005
Apparently in Vietnam they’re not allowed to put up Christmas decorations this year.
They will, however, be hanging glitter.
(That was courtesy of Micky, by the way.)
Posted in Funny | No Comments »
November 25th, 2005
Sorry about the recent lack of posts. Louise and I have had a bit of a holiday. Taking advantage of the lovely weather at this time of year, we headed up north to Yorkshire and Lancashire to visit friends. We also managed to fit in a bit of touristy stuff and went to a couple of towns made famous by their links to important artistic works. We went to Haworth, where the Brontes lived, and to Holmfirth, where Last of the Summer Wine is filmed. Don’t bother going to Holmfirth.
Posted in Uncategorised | 1 Comment »
November 11th, 2005
Thanks to a problem with FastMail, it looks like I’m going to be without my email for the weekend. So apologies if you’ve emailed me and were expecting a swift reply. I’ll get back to you next week.
Pity nobody’s reading this, otherwise it would have been quite useful!
Posted in Technical | No Comments »