Bank Holiday Weekend

[Harrison]

Did you all have a nice Bank Holiday Weekend?

What did you all get up to? Was the weather nice where you were?

We ended up going over to the Isle of Wight early Sunday morning, staying in a B&B Sunday night, and then coming back Monday evening.

The weather on Sunday ended up being really nice, and I got a bit sun burnt on my face and neck as we were driving around the island in my Wife's convertible Beetle with the roof down.

Our friends were doing the organised cycle ride around the island on Sunday, so we met up with them on the day during their cycling. They did the half island ride, which was still 30 miles! Mad in my view! Much nicer driving around.

And there were hundreds of cyclists everywhere in the Sunday. You had trouble driving up the hills as you couldn't see to overtake any of them.

Monday wasn't so nice. Overcast, and it rained a bit in the afternoon. But we still managed to explore the island a bit more, and after visiting the Needles we had a nice cream team before driving back to the ferry.

So how was your weekend?

[Stephen Coates]

On Saturday, I made a cable with a 15 pin high density D type connector to connect into my 1438 monitor, to enable it to be used with the PC and Macintosh. Unfortunately though it will not go beyond 800x600 @ 60Hz.

On Sunday I made some improvements to the software of my parallel port interface.

On Monday I built a time delay circuit which interfaces to the PC's RS232 port. The aim of this is that the computer will trigger the delay circuit and pause the execution of the programme until the time delay has completed. It took me the best part of the day to get this built and working properly. During the night I started to write a technical report.

Throughout the day I made the sure radio and television stayed off most of the time to avoid having to listen to all the saddos from accross the region moan about having to work on bank holiday or feel sorry for those who are working or generally going on about how nice it is to have yet another bank holiday. Sometimes the content on the radio is very good, but at other times it is just constant travel news or in the case of bank holidays, constant discussion about 'yay its bank holiday!!!!!!!!!!!!' or 'sorry to all those that are working.' WHO CARES?

I do wonder what these nutters like so much about bank holidays. It is virtually impossible to do anything. A year or two ago, I decided that due to being bored on a bank holiday monday, I would go shopping. Of course, all the local shops were shut because they decided to give everyone the day off because it is bank holiday. There wasn't much option for public transport to get to other locations because the bus companies decided to give most of the bus drivers the day off because it is bank holiday. Going into the town centre revealed that there were little places open because all the employers had decided to give everyone the day off because it is bank holiday. The only place that was open was a large shopping centre and because everyone but the shopping centre staff had been given the day off due to bank holiday, just about everyone from the county had gone to said shopping centre, making rather difficult to get just a few feet through the door.

Since then I have failed to see the point in bank holidays for those who either don't work full time or are given the opportunity to work on them and have other (more 'normal') days off.

[Harrison]

You just stated what the point of a bank holiday is Steve. It's a public holiday, so you get a day off of work. You don't work so it doesn't make much difference to you at the moment. But once you have a full time job you will be very glad of the extra days off bank holidays give you in addition to the few weeks a year holiday.

And the UK still has less public holidays that nearly every other country in the world!

[Stephen Coates]

But what are you supposed to do on the day off?

Finding something to do on a Sunday is already a bit difficult.

[Harrison]

You leave the house and go somewhere. Like I went to the Isle of Wight with my wife, and met up with our friends over there. That made the bank holiday worth while.

[Stephen Coates]

I suppose that is fine if you like going to far away places and don't mind the excessive amounts of traffic.

[Tiago]

Yes weekend !!

Bank weekend, does that nean that it's a large weekend?
Here we call it "bridge"

Last weekend i got around 27 degrees, and there were a lot of people on the beach here in Estoril area near Lisbon, i went there with my girlfriend to catch some sun.
It was a relax weekend :-)

[Graham Humphrey]

On Sunday I went down to South London and watched my football team get relegated. Beat that!

[Harrison]

At least you have a football team. I don't support my local team, and don't really like football, but if I tell you that my local team is Southampton I think that says it all. Facing the prospect of third devision and possibly the closing of the team. Sad indeed to see a once great team fall so far.