Hooptedoodle #477 - Årstid and the Acer - a week for time travel

 No garden progress this week, since it has been raining steadily (which is, of course, perfect for new plants). I've been doing Other Things, an underrated pastime in my opinion; as ever, Nature likes to chip in with the odd minor accident or inconvenient coincidence, but it's all part of the Great Plan.

Årstid

I really don't wish to know how this is pronounced. One small event which could have been a big nuisance is that the bedside lamp in the attic room has packed up. Broken switch. Needs to be replaced, and the first obvious issue here is that it must be 25 years old. I realise these little domestic mishaps are sent to test our faith, so I don't take it personally.

I had a look online to see what is available, and felt a familiar sinking of the heart as I was confronted by the riches of endless, bewildering choice. I find much of this choice is not what I'm looking for, since, stupidly, I have no interest in a lamp which is rechargeable, or has a USB socket for charging my devices, or is dimmable, or is touch sensitive, or can be spoken to, or switched on while I'm still on the train, via my phone, or is light sensitive. What I do want is something very like the old one, which takes big, screw-in bulbs, is tall enough and has a big enough shade to light up the room yet not be scorched by the big LED bulbs I use. I want it to have a simple pull-switch, which I can operate without upsetting everything when I wake up - in the dark, for goodness sake. Cheap and simple would be good characteristics.

My wife, who is extremely good at this stuff, found that what we currently have is an old IKEA design called Årstid. She also found - wonder of wonders - that IKEA still sell it, and it is very cheap. Here it is:

With a bit of luck I should have a new one up and working by tonight. My ability to read in bed is depending on this, so it is not a trifling matter. One great thing about this big old-fashioned model is that modern LED bulbs will create an astonishing amount of illumination without offending the current or heat limits of the old 40w-rated design. 

The Acer

Tonight I am hosting a Zoom wargame to test a modified version of my Corporal John rules. This version is deliberately designed to facilitate remote gaming, and also to cope with games involving more than two players. I mention this (briefly) to remind myself that this is supposed to be a wargaming blog, but will say no more for the moment, other than to take this opportunity to thank Jon Freitag and the Jolly Broom Man for their generosity, patience and wisdom in helping me with a couple of the proposed changes in the rules. Gentlemen, I am in your debt.

Part of the changes requires some thorough testing of dice systems for combat, and, as often happens nowadays, I found myself lamenting that I no longer have access to my old QBASIC facility on the PC, which made it very simple to run extended series of simulations, varying the conditions and the numbers of dice. Stochastic testing for idiots, which I used to find enjoyable and useful. Same thread as the broken lamp story; the world has moved on. It is probably possible to install a virtual environment to simulate DOS on my iMac or my current Windows laptop, but - while such a project would have been very stimulating some years ago - I find the very idea of attempting it now brings a great weariness. To be honest, I would rather have a cup of something and get on with my book.

The laptop screams at me, every time I switch it on, that I had better upgrade to Windows 11 or I shall be excommunicated. A few key programs (that's "apps", sorry) will not run if the machine is not connected to the Internet, since the software has to check online that my licences are up to date. Sapristi. 

I find that in some ways I miss laptops which I had in the past, which were less user-friendly but actually let you use the machine in useful ways by getting behind the Eternal User Interface (EUI) without going on a nightschool course first.

And then, out of nowhere, I remembered that, somewhere in the bottom of the Junk Trunk in the attic, there is a little Acer Aspire One which I bought in about 2009 - specifically so that I could keep in touch while on holiday. It has a 10inch screen, runs Windows XP, and will allow me to duck behind all that front end and run in old-fashioned DOS. The QBASIC editor should be there, along with my old testing suites, not to mention various bits of the old Elan game I wrote to manage solo Napoleonic miniatures games (last time I played Elan was with Clive Smithers, about 15 years ago, and he was impressed enough to take a copy of the software, though he never installed it. Life is a bit like that). 

I still have my QBASIC textbook - if this works, I could get a little useful fun and keep a few neurons firing.  

Because the Acer will not be able to connect to the Internet (since we have changed our modem/router/hub at least 3 times since it was last switched on), I can't think of any reason why DOS and Windows XP shouldn't still work. If they are not supported into the future, well I couldn't care less. I have found the machine - it looks OK, and is charging up now. I suspect the wireless mouse may have died, but I have a few suitable museum-piece mice with wires which will do the job. 

That should keep me entertained for an hour or two tomorrow.

In the meantime, today's priority task is to set up the table and the cameras for the Zoom test game.

Busy, busy.