My cat can tell the time!

I have scientific proof that my cat, Charlie, can tell the time. He knows that it is his feeding time at about 6pm and every day at about that time he seeks attention, by doing charming things like tripping me up.

What's remarkable about that? Nothing really, except when the clocks change. On Sunday they went back an hour. Summer time and the living is easy, as the song says. Well maybe!

Anyway, to get back to the plot: you'd imagine that Charlie would wait until 7pm before starting the kamikaze cat routine. After all, the Government didn't bother to notify cats about the time change. But nothing doing: Charlie is up to his usual range of tricks bang on time.

How does he know? Ironically, he adapts to the new time quicker than I do (I find it tough to get up at a reasonable time in the morning on the first week of summer time, as opposed to summertime, because, of course, British Summer Time starts in spring. Genuine summertime is a long way off. I hope you are getting this, I may ask questions!).

Since he adapts quicker than I do, he can't be taking his cues from me. And as a house cat (he has cat aids, so he's not supposed to go out), he only meets me.

Proof, I believe that he reads the clock! Now if only I could teach him how to use a keyboard....

Another night in Leyton

Last night on the way to the pub was passed by an ambulance. It sped by a parked police car just as the officer dangerously jumped out and rushed across the road, fishing a much larger man than himself out of a take away and pinning him against a wall. In the pub one bloke said: "that's the man who hit your father."A little later the pub was disturbed by a blood spattered woman who burst in, fell over, muttering incoherently. Another night in Leyton.

Marketing by passwords

A friend of mine is going through a crisis. Her computer won't let her get access because it's suddenly decided she has to enter a password and she doesn't know what the password is. It all happened because someone installed a USB card (it's a very old computer).

She will probably need to get a new (or at least a newer) computer. What an effective method of marketing the password is. So far as data protection is concerned, it is more or less useless. It probably won't stop your computer being hacked via the internet. And your data is unlikely to be at risk from physical attack unless your home (or office) is burgled. 

No doubt some keep secret stuff on computers but how valuable is this material? Is someone really going to spend hours (probably days) trawling through a stolen computer to find secret information. Perhaps, but very unlikely. In any case if the computer has been removed, you've lost the data (password or not).

Since it is extremely hard to back up a computer (I find about half of my back up DVDs fail, especially any aged about two years or more), the whole philosophy that you can keep data safely on computers is thrown into doubt by passwords.

But companies who sell software and hardware, have a lot to gain from them. A lot of people make the final decision to buy something new because they are locked out of their old system.

A new genre

It is difficult to create a new genre: but a feminist film about bullfighting probably qualifies. She Is The Bullfighter (Gemma Cubero del Barrio, Director, Producer, Executive Producer, Talcual Films) is a strange, rough and ready sort of film. The type of film where you feel they deliberately put dirt on the lens to give that all action feel. But there are a few highly memorable images, notably highly grainy film of a naked woman bullfighting.

It's an odd film because it asks an interesting question (why can't women be top level Matadors in Spain?) and then answers the question quite convincingly (because many of the audience like to see dishy blokes risking their lives and flaunting their masculinity). It's a bit like asking why can't men be strippers at some of the more fashionable gentlemen's clubs. OK they can do hen nights, but they never really make the big time, do they? Someone will probably make a film about that now!

Strangely there was an interesting film to be made. In Latin America, apparently, women Matadors are accepted. Why? What's the difference?

But for myself I'd be quite pleased if no woman ever made it as a matador. In fact I'd be quite pleased if Bullfighting, a barbaric practice, came to an end. Call me a male chauvinist, if you like!