Category: General

2023 has been a pretty rough year – I’ve had several health problems (still making my way through the NHS system), lost a major client (a natural end as there was no longer enough work to justify reserving my time each month), and have lost touch with some people. For most of the year I’ve […]

As mentioned in Life under lockdown, I am currently trying to re-learn Latin, partly for self-fulfillment purposes and also because I’d like to be able to understand texts used when I attend classics and ancient history lectures, or when I deliver them and need to translate sections for notes. I’m also trying to re-learn French […]

Like most people in the UK, I have spent the last three weeks in lockdown, and experienced significant curtailment in social activities in the two weeks before that. At first I was somewhat blasé about it – after all, I normally work from home, I live by myself, and I walk to the local shops […]

Over the last few years I’ve built up a collection of notes in various places on the wide range of topics I’m interested in. So that I can keep them all in one place for reference and editing, I’ve setup the Rixort Wiki. Read access is public, but only I can edit. Yes, this goes […]

This year has been a poor one for achieving the goals I set in January: Improve photography skills: Failed, although thanks to Lesley I have some resources to help me now. KAM Tools (software startup): Failed due to a lack of available time. Company is now being wound up. Training courses: Partial success, in that […]

Posted here mainly so that I have a reference: Improve photography skills to the point where I can take half-decent photos of trains. Start selling licences for KAM Tools (software startup with a colleague from a previous job). Finish and deliver training courses on Configuration Management with Ansible and Version Control with Git. Read The […]

Over the years I’ve accumulated lots of books, maps and DVDs which I’ve rarely used. I don’t have enough space to store them all so I’m looking to sell them on at a significant discount. All items are in very good or excellent condition and most have only been read/watched a couple of times at […]

New goals for this year: Buy house—assuming I’m still gainfully employed and the banks start to lend to people without £30k+ deposits. Continue to sign up new clients to web/email hosting package, with the goal of having 5-10 clients by the end of the year. Goals carried over from last year: Redesign and rewrite my […]

Highlights from today: The slightly worrying suggestion that when Chris sees The Prince (Niccolò Machiavelli), he thinks of me. A black metal teapot with built-in infuser and a tin full of loose leaf darjeeling. A desk diary which contains a different paper plane design for each day of 2011. Confirmation of my earlier suspicion that […]

One of my hosting clients is looking to launch a new website for their company, which provides ecology consulting and training services newt and bat surveys, reports for planning permission committees etc.) to other businesses. They’re looking for a unique custom theme to use with their existing WordPress install, which needs to look professional but […]