Day 1574

Got on with the project. I've started taking a more rigorous approach - doing sessions of 1 hour without letting myself do anything else. Managed 3 such today, but in the evening ran into an impasse and considered re-designing the whole thing.

About noon rode up to Sainsbury's; with the wind behind me got up to 20.6 mph..

T rang up to ask why I hadn't e-mailed her; she hasn't had any of my messages since I saw her. Agreed to re-send them. Wonder what's going on?

I'll visit Effolk again tomorrow I think, see if different surroundings can inspire me at all project-wise.

Day 1573

Got back to work on my project with a vengeance today. Got some sort of display going, but I'm glad there's still two weeks left before my supervisor comes back.

I must put a stop to my habit of being so self-critical. It is this, I believe, that leads to the 'drabs' (and that's a thing that started way back in autumn 1987) - and the really sad thing is that it's all in terms of other people's value systems rather than my own.

Day 1572

Made a packed lunch, went off at 12.30 to Effolk. I forgot to bring all the necessary files for my project, so I had to go surfing instead. Actually it was good to have some time away from the bloody thing.

Spent the evening watching a long Bill, the one where that horrible northern woman comes back and gets killed.

I think it's 4 years since I got my hard disc (5 yrs and a week since I got the computer). Both still going strong! As is the not smoking, done 12 days 21 hours so far and beginning to forget that I am doing it. Mustn't get complacent, but it is an achievement, especially with getting down to 3½ bits of gum per day. As I said in my latest e-mail to T, the problem is not so much giving up now, as not starting again.

Day 1571

Up quite early for a Sunday, got straight to work on my project. The problem is not so much implementation as knowing what to implement.

C came round in the afternoon, I updated his web pages. He's off to America tomorrow night, so he left a series of updates for me to put on his page while he's away.

At 8.30 strolled up to the Crown: when M and E arrived we had a good, relaxed Sunday-night type conversation about jobs and so forth ('putting the nail in the weekend' as E put it).

When I got back, carried on reading nostalgically through those old Your Computers. It was a triffic mag in its heyday 1981-83.

Day 1570

Worked on my project. Went out in the late afternoon and walked all the way along the front at Raindon and back (2.2 miles) for a change of scene. A bath, fry-up and the 'Napoleon' episode of Dad's Army and it was back to the project.

To M's afterwards. Watched Genesis of the Daleks, swapped banter and computer opinions. E was dead keen on getting me to apply for jobs.

Dramatic drop in nicotine gum consumption. Probably because it's so vile, yet still better than smoking eh?

Day 1569

Enjoyed playing the emulator version of 3D Monster Maze which I got off the net on Tuesday. Making a map is the winning solution.

Watched a dark ep of The Bill - was tempted by my game experience to try making a map of Sun Hill.

Didn't I say I'd start looking for a job on this date? Well, I did look through Decline and Fall of the American Programmer.

Still smoke-free.

Day 1568

Up at 9.30, did a lot of work on my project. It's a bit of a grind at this stage but I've got some of the basics going. Experimented with some Z80 machine code, using the emulator.

C came round in the evening to watch that George Formby film he insisted I tape yesterday, followed by Men Behaving Badly. The latter's getting increasingly unrealistic - I think the writer needs a rest from it.

Day 1567

Didn't wake up till 10am - made good project progress, starting to understand the processor output file format now. Even though my supervisor never looked at VTPCM it was useful writing it - I've been able to give VT2 a much better structure.

Had fun with the 8-bit emulators - for some reason it's immensely satisfying to pretend to be able to use all those different machines.

Went out in the afternoon to Do It All in a heavy shower to get shelving materials. Put up the shelves, made a good job of it. There was sod-all on telly in the evening, so did some more project experiments.

Still not smoking. I've been surprised how easy it's been. I'm down to 8 or 9 bits of gum a day too - it needs to be 8 to save money over roll-ups (5p/week at 8 bits/day).

Thinking about my supervisor's compliments yesterday I remembered my hopes last year that I might turn out to be really good at computing. But I also found myself regretting (again) that I didn't go on the course in 1992 when I first heard of it. Well, not much I can do about that now. And at least in the intervening 3 years I've learned just what I can put up with if I have to.

Day 1566

Hot thundery night, slept badly, woke up in a mood at eight. Felt better once I was on my way to campus, worked 10.15-4.15 on VTPCM. There were two impressive thunderstorms - the lab has a great view West across the valley and I could see them approach. K left, saying she was scared of thunderstorms.

Saw my supervisor: he did not ask to see VTPCM. But writing it was good practice. I must now start on VT2 - the actual displayer. He's off on holiday for 3 weeks and thinks it should be substantially complete by the time he gets back.

He paid me a big compliment - he said when looking for a job I should not set my sights too low and bear in mind that I was top M.Sc. student and had grasped the background for his work quicker than anyone else he'd worked with. 'Don't end up hacking some company's database about,' he said. Gosh. I always suspected I might have a talent for computing, but this is impressive.

Back at home, started VT2. Thanks to a shrewd bit of downloading on campus, got hold of a Dragon 32 ROM image for the emulator I got yesterday. I can now emulate the ZX81 and Spectrum on my 8086, and the Dragon-32, Oric, and CPC-464 on the 486, thus giving me the functionality of 5 mid-80s 8-bit machines that'd've cost something like £900 in 1982, for about 30p spent downloading the ZX emulators on Sunday.

Pretty hard-working day really. Done 164 hours so far. Not bad.

Day 1565

Really hot today, 80° in the afternoon. Worked on my project (VTPCM). Got certain elements working but it looks a bit poor visually and could work better. Also rewrote ZX-Asteroids on the ZX-81 emulator.

Jo Jones rang up in the evening, quite independently (I mean I hadn't spoken to her about it) and said she didn't fancy the plans for the hen weekend and how about just going for Friday and Saturday. I immediately agreed, as it gets me out of the sillier activities without offending M.

Not smoking has been a lot easier than I thought, thanks to the gum, but I wish I had something else to do while drinking, or after meals. How about sunflower seeds like Mulder?

Seeing my supervisor tomorrow. Hope he doesn't react too badly to VTPCM. I've done 141 hours on it so far (5d23h).

Wouldn't be surprised if a few thunderstorms drifted over from France tonight.

Day 1564

Woke up with a medium-to-nasty hangover at 9.30. Read the PCW I'd thoughtfully brought with me, humourously watched yesterday's Olympic highlights with D. Me and S were quarrelsome in the usual post-visit way. It wore off during the Waltons when D mentioned 'The Little House on the fucking Prairie' and S asked if that was a Quentin Tarantino re-make. Left at 1.10, still smoke-free. Agreed to show D round the net if he visited campus.

When I got home it was extremely hot, even more so than yesterday: stayed in the cool of the computer room, re-orientated myself with my project, tried out the PC ZX81 and Spectrum simulators I got off CServe yesterday. The ZX81 one is classic, very realistic, and even comes with good old Scramble (from Michael Orwin's Cassette Four). What a blast from the past!

It's seven years to the day since I last had sex.

Day 1563

Left at 11.40, got to T's at 1.15. Had a great, relaxed afternoon talking about everything and everyone and sipping splashes of red wine. And not smoking. It was nice to get her to myself for 4 solid hours till D came round. A bit later we went up to the pub for a drink or three, came back about 9.30 and watched the Files, Darkness Falls.

We talked till 4.30 am - I ended up drinking a lot, but not smoking was more important than that, on this occasion.

Day 1562

Went down town to the library, came back to fetch my building society book and went to the branch at Asda, for £40 for weekend and following expenses. Got the new PCW from the newsagent there.

Worked even harder on my project, getting to an advanced stage with my new graphic display, after writing a sub-project to do an expansible grid dependent on the screen size.

In the evening to beer festival. On the way E seemed to be trying to put me off going on this 'hen weekend'.

Afterwards they accompanied me back as far as the Red Lion, from whence I got home in whatever the difference between 11:24.23 and 11:39.42 is for one mile. It really is bizarre the difference that not smoking for 3 days has made to everything. I feel completely different. The best thing is, now I know the gum works, there's no real excuse for not giving up ever again. If this is not smoking, give me more not smoking. 'A strong passion' etc...

Day 1561

Beautiful weather again too, no hangover again. Either a large part of the ill-effects of my hangovers came from smoking, or I've been so preoccupied with not smoking that I simply haven't noticed the symptoms.

Got some useful project work done. Was a bit tempted to break my resolves at about 10.45, but conquered it at the cost of raising gum consumption to 12 pieces a day, making it £5 a week more expensive than smoking. Cheap at the price if it succeeds. But I don't think I can afford not to risk a bit of cash for a purpose like this. I will investigate nicotine patches though.

Found out there is a newsgroup, alt.support.stop.smoking; good quote, 'cigarettes temporarily relieve the symptoms caused by cigarettes'. Rather chimes with yesterday's thought that any lapse would leave me in exactly the same position after five minutes.

Watched Men Behaving Badly. No smoking in it, thankfully.

Day 1560

Well, it's working so far. Beautiful weather. Got a lot of work done on my project while chewing that damn gum every 90 minutes. It does work, but I keep catching myself wanting to slip off for a smoke. But basically all I have to do is keep chewing the gum. It's vile stuff, it tastes like the silver paper you get inside fag packets.

Noticed an improvement in breathing and senses of smell/taste already. My last attempt but one broke down on day 4, which I'll bear in mind (the lemon juice attempt). The visit to T's is a potential flashpoint but she can be trusted not to tempt me, especially since she's thinking of giving up again too.

The crucial points are 3 days, 4 days, a week, 10 days, 2 weeks, 3 months, a month, 2 months and 3 months.

Going out will be difficult but hey, if during the Great Abstinence in 1993 I could go to pubs and not drink, I'm sure I can go there and not smoke.

There was a good feature-length Lovejoy in the evening. I really like Phyllis Logan as Lady Jane, she's not conventionally pretty but does great expressions and walks interestingly.

Went out for a walk later to relieve the tension. Am pleased with the project progress. Indulging in a bit of light George Orwell now.

Day 1559

Saved a pound by getting a ticket to Dulchester West and getting the bus from there, but regretted it as the bus ground, bounced and pounded across town.

Did some experiments in the software engineering lab. Looked up Andrew Mainwaring on the Lowlands uni database and e-mailed him about the exam results. Hope he's pleased. Met my current supervisor at 2pm. Had quite a good discussion - he's good at setting weekly targets so I don't lose track.

In the evening Amanda, M's bridesmaid, rang up to say what she had in mind for the hen weekend. I was a bit unnerved but was pleased it would be next month, as it only leaves me 4 weeks to worry about it. If I don't go, I'll worry about it for 4 years, so it's the lesser of two evils. I can always assert myself if things get out of hand.

That's interesting actually, I very rarely actively assert myself with friends - the attitude of a woman who is never sure how popular she is. It ought to change really. I sort of passively assert myself, ie people respect my minimum standards of behaviour, but up to now I've always been too afraid of rejection to assert myself any more strongly.

Nothing that can't be changed by time eh. Like abandoning smoking tomorrow. Let's hope it works.

Day 1558

It turns out that Imogen Hassall was only in Carry On Loving. The woman in Jungle, Girls etc is someone called Valerie Leon. They don't half look similar though.

Made progress with the text-mode test program for my project. in the evening watched The X-Files - quite a good one about Indians and lycanthropy in Montana. Very atmospheric rain and mist.

Day 1557

Blimey, I enjoyed myself last night, but I had a rotten hangover today. Went out for a walk in the morning to try and speed the metabolic processes up - head stopped aching at 12.45 but I didn't feel normal till 5pm.

Despite the hangover got some work done on writing a QBasic prog to parse the input file for my project. It's important to keep the work ticking over.

Day 1556

Up rather early for a Saturday at 9.30. Went round to C's and on to the libe, got a surname dictionary and bought the two issues of PCW I couldn't carry home on Monday.

Had dinner early at twelve, worked on my project, testing container classes for the lists I'll need. Went on the WWW to get Old English stuff.

Re-stuffed my big cushion, sewed up the rent while listening to play on R4 about Louis Armstrong. It wasn't a pretty job but it worked.

After tea phoned M and agreed to meet her and her brother and E at the Crown. Set the video for The X-Files - Miracle Man, one I particularly wanted to see. Had a brilliant evening talking about the wedding, relatives, T etc. I pointed out that this should be the last time they'd see me smoking. M's brother was driving so I got him to drop me off here afterwards.

Day 1555

Up early again for a massive C++ stint. By the end of the day I'd got a Windows versh of the guess-the-hidden-point game going. Think it's starting to come together.

Went round to the chemist to investigate anti-smoking stuff; the pharmacist warned me that people tended to get addicted to the gum (though, he said, it was good for business) but I thought something that satisfied an oral need would be good.

Good film of Nelson Mandela in Brixton and at South Africa House today.

To M and E's in the evening. Made a sort of tentative arrangement to join up with their meal at the Crown tomorrow evening.

Day 1554

Borrowed mum's car and went to Dulchester, worked on some C++. It was graduation day and the pay-and-display machines were covered up, so stayed unusually long for a car day, till about 2.15.

Came back and did more C++. Practised handwriting again.

Watched a rather dark and serious ep of Men Behaving Badly. Read some more O. Henry.

Day 1553

Did some C++, then worked exceedingly hard at solving the CompuServe problem. With an idea from Technical Support I finally managed to get through on an ASCII teletype, and found an answer to my forum message. It seems the combination of a modem on COM4 and an S3 graphics card can cause trouble. Turned off hardware graphics acceleration as suggested; WinCIM worked!

C came round in the evening: printed him some change-of-address cards and updated his web page. Read some more O. Henry.

Good cartoon in the paper of Heath (he's 80) outlasting Th**r and Major.

Day 1552

Slept exactly 8 hours, give or take 10 seconds. To campus. Did a JavaScript Julian Date calculator, saw my supervisor who suggested a lot of things I should do for my project. He OK'd me to do it in Visual C++ which will make things a lot better CV-wise.

Back after a weary walk due to the new boots not being broken in yet. Read the O. Henry book on the train. Nice soothing reading for travelling.

Cooked my tea, dug out that C++ book I was using last autumn and set to work learning how to use ClassWizard etc. It's not as easy as Visual Basic but gives you more power.

Btw, found out you can print, draw etc onto forms in VB. Thought it wasn't allowed. Does look a bit messy I suppose.

Practiced my Chancery Cursive for those wedding place cards E wants me to do, gave my project some general thought.

Day 1551

Took back the XView book (don't need it now I've got the manuals on disc), renewed the Xlib one, got 6 old PCW's for 20p each out of historical interest. Also got a massive collection of O. Henry short stories from the cheap bookshop for 99p. They're a bit moral but have got great period feel - about 20 years pre-Runyon.

Got my project platforms assessment printed out. Also a screen shot of my project prototype.

Had a reply to one of my forum messages about Win 95/WinCIM: a bloke with the same problem asking me to pass on the solution if I found it.

Watched The X-Files (EBE) not bad, particularly 'Sure I find it remotely plausible someone might think you're hot.'

Day 1550

Busy day for a Sunday. Went round to M's to borrow a magazine to help with the Winsock problem, then to Staples to see if the Plus Pack would be any use - it wasn't. I got a typing chair for my computer - the existing chair is not suitable for typing, it gives me rotten backache.

In the afternoon finished off the XView document conversions with some clever QBASIC programming while listening to the Wimbledon final.

M rang up to say I should expect a phone call from her uny pal about the hen night, or hen weekend as she worryingly referred to it. Warned her if there were any stripagrams I wasn't interested.

Day 1549

Five years to the very day and day of the week since I left Lowlands. Continued wrestling with the Windows 95/CServe conflict. Thought I'd hit on the solution in the afternoon when I compared WINSOCK.DLL dates, but it was a false lead. Rang up M and she said she knew someone at work who'd had the same prob. Rang up Technical Support again and must've worn them out because the woman said the Windows 95 expert would get onto it and ring me back next week.

Rode round to M's in the evening after a particularly exhausting bout of XView manual postscript-to-text conversion. E suggested I could develop parallel C++/XView versions of my project (as I'd thought earlier) and pointed out that even the VB prototype would be CV-able. M pointed out that even XView has to be written in C. Will present their comments to my supervisor on Tuesday.

Rode home, like swimming through cool dark water, I thought.

Well. The last five years have been very instructive. Let's hope there's not too much repetition in the next five, eh?

Day 1548

Had to go into town, so decided to measure the distance on my bike between here and C's new place. 1.7 miles, slightly further than M's but all uphill.

In Wilton Books I found a book with the Java compiler on CD. It needs Windows 95. I went to the computer shop, Office World and the new Staples on the site of Homebase to compare prices. Eventually got it on credit card from Staples for £77. Got home and plunged into a saga of phone calls to Compuserve Technical Support - WinCIM would not work with Windows 95. Packed it in about 7pm and reinstalled it.

Strangely, no-one has reported a similar problem. Lucky they've got an 0800 number.

Took a break in the afternoon, brought my radio outside and listened to the test match.

Massive thunderstorm 6.45-8pm, very exciting.

Day 1547

Five years since graduation. Borrowed mum's car and drove up to Effolk. Got them to reset my password, but apparently it won't take effect till tomorrow morning. So I was limited to a bit of JavaScript and some web surfing.

E came round - as predicted, she has selected her uny pal as bridesmaid. She said it would've been me had I not already effectively declined. I did so because I'm not really the type you have to be to be bridesmaid. Nice to be in the running though.

Watched Men Behaving Badly. I think he's going for comedy-in-depth this time, the scenes are longer and the gags subtler.

Day 1546

After some false starts got down to producing a project prototype with XView. I was impressed how easy it is if you take the trouble to plan. A canvas is just a picture box, nothing more complicated or frightening than that.

Yes, I was pleasantly surprised enough to start compiling my own XView manual from that library book. Btw, discovered why it's such a hard book to follow - the chapters are in alphabetical order. Wish I'd noticed that before.

T rang up in the morning to tell me about some teaching assistant's job at the University of Wales she'd seen on the WWW and thought I should apply for.

Day 1545

To Effolk in the morning - busy sky with promise of activity later. Had fun outpacing the clouds in the train.

Saw my adviser. He congratulated me and we made various project plans. He said in his project report he was pleased how quickly I'd picked the stuff up, functional languages weren't part of the course etc.

After that went to get my results. The secretary called me the 'star student'. I got 94 for the studies! Actually, that's less of a surprise, it was just regurgitation, but 94! That's my all-time exam record, beating 90 in 2nd-year Chemistry in 1983. My composite mark was 83.4. I can't believe these results. Still, I must've done it. And I'm top stude too. My project'd better live up to it.

Translated into D&D ability scores the results are 15, 17, 17, 13 for the group proj, 17 and 19.

After tea went round to see C's new place. Not bad, bit of a musty smell but surely that's dispersable. Came back, checked my e-mail.

Day 1544

Decided to go to Lakeside. Came back, made project notes, worked on the XView application.