Week 136, Leg o' Lamb

I've no idea why this leg of lamb, wrapped up and all the way form New Zealand, ended up resting on the grass behind the office.  Apparently these things cost a lot of money, I have no idea, I haven't eaten lamb since before The Darling Buds of May* was on TV and don't recall ever having bought any.

It is no surprise that a meat thing should be so pricey, this one was the size of a small car.  And while it lay in the blazing sun it was picking up a few passengers keen to make use of a mass of free protein.

When I returned to dispose of it later it was gone.

Taken by a fox? - Surely too large for that.

Taken by one of the late night garden revellers who leave their detritus? - If they like their meat 'ripe' then perhaps, but surely not.

Taken by the carnivorous grass? - This is obviously what happened, the earth absorbed it and next week the bone will be regurgitated and wrapped in the shredded plastic like a land-based owl pellet.

* This is purely here as a navigational aid to indicate the year as roughly 1990/91.

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Week 135, The bees are all mine

Or they would be if they were a type of miner bee.

I'll go out on six tiny limbs and say that these are probably Bombus terrestris, a variety of bumble bee.

They certainly look like bumble bees rather than mining bees - mining bees are a much different beast.

The bees aren't mine, other than by default due to living in a cavity underground next to a wall in my garden.

They are welcome, and more power to their minuscule elbows.

Each time one comes out of the ground I cry - up the workers!

ISO 6400 shutter speed 1/1250th and the wings are still blurred, super fast bee.

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Week 134, Encryption begins, IT illiteracy continues, bluebell ends

The IT systems failures at the end of last week has handed the Tories a stick to beat the NHS with.  Journalists who should have access to expert analysis found themselves either unable to locate experts, or unable to understand the experts they had located.

It appears that the Tories don't understand the cause of the problems, or if they do they are taking advantage of widespread ignorance to pass the buck.  It is obvious that the journalists don't understand the cause of the problems and are failing to hold the Tories to account.


Summary of events:

• The Tories cut the NHS budget.
• Replacement for NHS software systems that only run on Windows XP cannot be funded.
• Windows XP goes out of general support.
• The Tories cut funding of Microsoft extended support for NHS Windows XP systems.
• NHS systems inevitably and predictably get infected with malware due to a security vulnerability of Windows XP.
• The Tories (specifically Amber Rudd) say the NHS "must learn" from this and upgrade its IT systems.

It was Theresa May who was responsible for cancelling the extended support for Windows XP from Microsoft when she was Home Secretary, a post with responsibility for cyber security.  Support which would have meant patches would have been available for many out of date systems run by the NHS.

Why weren't NHS systems updated to newer versions?  Reasons why that might be are: lack of availability of software; lack of technical staff with the right skills; contracted-out services with no interest in improving systems; complexity of the process.  All of the reasons are directly attributable to the lack of available funding to pay for the process.

I didn't hear a single journalist ask what the reasons were.  I heard one expert mention software applications being unavailable for newer versions of Windows, but the journalist failed to recognise the point being made.


Why hadn't the various NHS trusts upgraded from Windows XP where they could, surely the NHS has an Enterprise Licensing agreement with Microsoft?

In 2010 David Cameron's Tory government cancelled the Enterprise Licensing agreement that the NHS had with Microsoft after deciding that there was no business case or budget to renew it.  The decision to scrap the licensing agreement pushed the burden of software licensing onto individual NHS trusts, these Trusts would have been ill placed to manage such agreements.  

Cancelling an Enterprise Agreement required every single license covered by that agreement to be recalculated - every computer desktop, every application, every desktop which connects to a server, all of this involves interpreting individual license types of Byzantine complexity for each use case type.  The cost of recalculating the licensing will have cost the NHS a fortune, and mistakes would have been made, and during this process Microsoft also targeted NHS Trusts with audits.  Individual license agreements made by the NHS Trusts with Microsoft would have been in totality more expensive than the original Enterprise Agreement covering the entire NHS, before the additional cost of managing the agreements.


When Amber Rudd says that the NHS "must learn" from this and upgrade IT systems she is demonstrating her ignorance and being disingenuous.  And to suggest that the NHS hasn't learned from this is outrageous when they have raised the issue of risk repeatedly.  It is clear to see from this however that the Tories have successfully managed to pass the buck for a massive cock up which should lie squarely at their door and instead have blamed the victims.

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Week 133, Home to roast

As the storm blows in, so does the roast.  Fresh from the North African fjords, carrying herbs and spices under their contour feathers for warmth, the Fustiers Ink duck comes ready seasoned.*

Easy to spot with their bright yellow plumage, they glide in on the lightest breeze.

Some say these ducks were part of a collection owned by Jimi Hendrix, others that they were released after no longer being needed for the big budget Hollywood epic The Beak and I.**  All we really know now is that they are very easy to catch and that they are reported to be very chewy whichever way they are cooked.

Not currently available, due to the unseasonably pleasant weather, meat eaters will have to satisfy themselves with something else for gourmet night this weekend.  Duck's off.***

* Floatees
** Kingston parakeets
*** FawltyTowers

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