But this is a great archive with lectures aplenty, and books that you’d struggle to find anywhere.

A great site.

I loved the first 107 books.

Collecting Destroyer novels provided endless excitement. Trawling through cardboard boxes of old paperbacks looking for those elusive missing numbers - and the excitement of finding a missing book. ebay has put an end to all of that now.

The publisher managed to ruin it for my by changing the writer although some of the later writers seemed OK, but my enthusiasm for the series had waned.

But I have finally finished all the Destroyers that I own and I don’t think I’ll buy any more.

The new Destroyer series never really took off for me - despite having Jim Mullaney as writer (Jim, Murphy, Sapir and Murray wrote the best destroyers).

So bye bye Remo and Chiun - I’ll miss you.

… until of course I learn to read French and then start collecting l’implacable.

Much though I love pulp fiction I could find nothing to endear me towards Hawk.

For some reason the author would never consistently refer to him by one name. One sentence we call him Hawk, the next we say Mike, then we say Hawk, then we say Mike. Bah humbug. That alone ruined the books for me. Sometimes we even say Michael, or Michael Hawk.

I used to read the Tarzan comics as a kid - fab.

I think I read one Tarzan book as a kid - illiterate slob.

But now I have built up my Tarzan book collection and have decided to work through them in sequence. Boy have I enjoyed this ride so far.

Boy did Hollywood mess Tarzan up.

Film Tarzan bears no resemblance to book Tarzan.

“I want to make a film about Tarzan.”

“Have you read the book?”

“I read the first 50 pages”

“Good enough”

No, Not good enough. And then the next person to make a Tarzan movie - just watched the first movie. And so on, and so on.

So a message to Hollywood - start again. Make a new Tarzan film - but start with the second book, then go on from there.

I don’t think I can really begin to express how excited I feel to read these books. You get a cliff hanger every few pages and the action roars forward.

Thus far each book has ended on a cliff hanger - pulling you into the next book.

And unlike ERB’s turgid Mars series (which I really hated). Tarzan bleeds excitement.

Check it out if you like pulp and haven’t read them yet - but start at the beginning - well worth it.

Sadly it didn’t seem as fast and funky as I remembered, but it does work well on my EEE - which I want to run it on.

And then I stumbled upon Q10.

Q10 has a really small executable that runs really quickly and feels nice and simple (F1 brings up all the shortcut keys you will ever need).

Things I really like about Q10:

• If I write with headphones on, then I can switch on the typewriter sounds. Strange but it feels really satisfying to crank out a few pages of pulp action with typewriter sounds.
• Notes - if I start a sentence or paragraph with “..” then I can get a list of all my notes and flesh out my stories quickly in any order - great.
• SpellChecker - obviously
• Fast word and page counts
• Full screen so no distractions.

I currently really enjoy writing on my EEE with Q10 - try it out for yourself.

Fiddle, fiddle, fiddle, fiddle. (no work)

So I installed XP - aaaah. Out of the box working.

So many of the apps I use are portable ones anyway that it was easy for me to get most of the apps I need installed on an SD card really quickly.

I’ve actually been productive on this thing for the first time in months.

I guess I’m not ready for Linux yet.

So now gmail goes off to my pop3 accounts. And I access gmail through imap in Thunderbird.

Any email worth keeping goes off to the local thunderbird folders. Anything deleted gets deleted. And I can use gmail tagging for temporary conversations that I’m having.

I can’t imagine getting anywhere close to the 7gig of storage gmail gives me, since I can’t imagine being able to track that much stuff.

If you haven’t got a gmail account - check it out.

And I wondered what would make it glow
Because there’s nothing up there to make it so.

It has stones and rocks and rubble,
It has dust as well, but nothing shineable

But maybe that’s just what scientists say
maybe the truth is some other way

Maybe the moon is full of glittery stuff
diamonds and pearls would shine enough

but how would they travel all that way?
Ill have a think, "hmmmmmm…" I say.

Maybe if I drop my watch and leave it,
Something would see it, steal it, move it

And it would end up way up there
Up on the moon, and would I care?

Because all night long it would glow,
And I would, at long last know

How the moon is so very bright
each and every single night

"What’s that?"

"What?"

"That?"

"This?"

"Yes!"

"That’s my key."

"Key? What’s it the key to?"

"None of your business."

"Yes it is."

"No it isn’t"

"Is too."

"Nope."

"It is so! You’re just scared it’s rubbish and I’ll laugh"

"Am not."

"Are too."

"Not."

"Prove it! What’s it the key to?"

"Llama mountain"

"What’s that, is that a new toy?"

"Nope, it’s a place."

"You can’t have a key to a place, you’re too young."

"I am not. I have the key see."

"Yeah but you’re still too young, I don’t have a key to my house and you don’t have a key to you’re house, so how come you have a key to llama mountain?"

"’cause I do."

"’cause it isn’t a real place! I bet you just found the key."

"I did not, it was given to me."

"Yeah, like that big key I found on the mud heap."

"No, this was given to me, it is a special key, it opens up the door to llama mountain."

"Where’s that?"

"Llama mountain?"

"Yeah, where is it."

"I don’t know."

"Well how are you going to open up the door to llama mountain then."

"I don’t need to know where llama mountain is to use the key. I just need to know where the door is. Sheesh you’re stupid!"

"So where’s the door?"

"Wherever I use the key."

"That’s rubbish. A key only opens one door, and doors don’t move. My house door doesn’t move, and only the key my mum has and my dad has opens the door. s’not me who’s stupid, your door doesn’t move. "

"Neither does the llama mountain door, it doesn’t move to the key, the key moves to it. Your mum has to move the key to the front door doesn’t she?"

"Uh huh."

"And your dad."

"Uh huh."

"well then, its the same with this one."

"Go and use it then. Move the key to the door to llama mountain."

"No."

"You can’t can you."

"I don’t know, I haven’t tried."

"Then how do you know?"

"’cause Mr Buttoon said so."

"Who’s he?"

"I don’t know."

"Is he a stranger? You’re not meant to speak to strangers! They give you sweeties and push you on the swings and stuff."

"I know but he’s not a stranger, he’s Mr Buttoon. I know Mr Buttoon. He hides at the bottom of the garden."

"he does not."

"He does!"

"I’ve never seen him."

"That’s ’cause he hides."

"But there isn’t enough room for you to hide at the bottom of the garden."

"Yeah but i’m bigger than Mr Buttoon! Huh, you think you know everything."

"Yeah, but if you’re bigger than him then he can’t be a mister, ’cause misters are grown up and they are bigger than us."

"Well Mr buttoon is a smaller-than-us grown-up."

"There’s no such thing!"

"There is! There’s Mr Buttoon."

"Why did he give you the key?"

"So I could visit llama mountain."

"So why don’t you?"

"’cause its very far away."

"How do you know?"

"Mr Buttoon said so."

"Oh, but the door isn’t you said the door was here."

"Not here, just wherever I use the key."

"but that could be here if you used it here."

"Uh-huh"

"so that means the door is nearly here. And that means it isn’t far away at all."

"no, that just means the door isn’t far away, llama mountain is still far away."

"Well let’s go, it will be an adventure."

"I can’t, mum won’t let me go far away, I’m not allowed out the street, and I’m waiting for my tea, it must be almost time for tea and if I go now then mum will shout for me and I won’t be here and I’ll get into trouble and I’ll have to tell her why and then I’ll have to tell here about Mr Buttoon and then I’ll get in trouble for talking to strangers."

"Oooh i thought he wasn’t a stranger, you said he wasn’t, you’re not meant to talk to strangers, they might take you to see their puppies or something. you shouldn’t talk to him again."

"But he isn’t a stranger, he’s Mr Buttoon and he lives at the bottom of the garden and he’s always lived at the bottom of the garden."

"Oh. So why would your mum be annoyed?"

"’cause I’d miss tea."

"oh yeah!"

"But we could just take a look, just a peek, just to see what it is like, just a quick shifty."

"No."

"Pah, you’re rubbish. Why did Mr buttoon give you the key if you’re not going to use it. I think you should give it to me. I’d have used it already. I’d have been to llama mountain and back a trillion times and still not miss my tea. Give me the key."

"No, you don’t know how to use it."

"So show me."

"no."

"Why not?"

"’cause… its nearly tea time."

"We’ve still got time for a quick look though, just to open the door."

"Well, I don’t know."

"Well, I do, and I’m older than you."

"Not much!"

"Just enough!"

"Pah!"

"I told you how to climb the bendy tree, you couldn’t have climbed that without me!"

"I’d have figured it out."

"Yeah in a few years. and, and who told you how to catch sticklebacks in your hand?"

"My Grandad."

"Did not."

"Did so."

"But i told you first!"

"But that doesn’t count ’cause someone else showed me too."

"Does too count."

"does not."

"Does."

"not"

"Does."

"n’t"

"’too."

"No."

"You’re just scared."

"Am not!"

"Prove it!"

"how?"

"Open the door."

"how else?"

"The door, open the door."

• blog 1 - 130 comments (all spam), ok that didn’t take long
• blog 2 - 90 comments (all spam), easy peasy
• blog 3 - 40 comments (all spam), ho ho
• blog 4 - 10,545 comments - ! gulp!

I thought Akismet was supposed to catch this…oh, it wasn’t active.

<sigh>

Mental note - perform this comment spam trimming much more regularly.

And switch on Akismet.

<Kick myself>

<Kick myself>