h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Thursday morning is usually the worst of the week for traffic and commuting in Austin. I don't know why. There are more cars on the road, longer queues at the lights, more people on the bus, people getting on or off at stops where there's no-one the rest of the week, and there are more... problem bus passengers. I usually get to work a few minutes late on Thursdays because the second bus of my journey is inevitably at least ten minutes late, and gets later as we progress.

Not yesterday. It was on time. And it stayed on time for the rest of the journey. And there were very people on it, or getting on it. I got to work early

After getting changed in the break room and walking into the brewery, which was open, and there was some music playing, and machines were running, there was no-one there Place was like the bleedin' Marie Celeste. After a while people started wandering in but I never got around to finding out where they'd all been.

I spent around an hour yesterday up to my elbows in hops. Not something you might expect to find in a place that makes cider, but we make a hopped cider now, and it's quite

Someone who's been with us for only a short while but already had a promotion to team leader announced, quite out of the blue that he's leaving and moving to Asheville (can't remember if that's North or South Carolina).

My journey home was as easy as the journey to work, in fact even more so. The bus that's the bane of my commuting life - the 300 - which is almost always late, often by several factors of its scheduled frequency, was not only on time, it was actually early! *Faints* ::THUD:: ©® At first, I thought this must be the previously scheduled bus running almost 15 minutes late, but no - the driver announced that we were ahead of schedule and had to wait for two minutes. What's more, this particular bus usually involves a driver changeover - a somewhat lengthy affair and not what you want when the bus is late and you've got a connection to make.

Rather than going straight home last night I had to call in at a shop to buy a replacement airbed. I bought one about six months ago but a few nights ago I found myself sinking Since it's not the kind of thing you can put in a bowl of water to find the leak, like a bicycle tyre, I figured I'd just go and buy another one. After all, it was only $45. I spend more than that on a bottle of Scotch at least once a month, and I decided that if this one only last six months too, I'll make the effort to buy a proper bed. But when I got to the shop the shelf tag said $88 Oh well, I need a bed so I'll get it anyway. But when I got to the checkout and the woman scanned it... $45

The interwebs was being a bit weird last night. I posted something on Twitter about an old mill in Bradford being destroyed by fire. I hit the post button and it showed up, but then I refreshed the page to bring up the "View summary" link, because it had a link to a BBC news story, and it vanished About ten minutes later it reappeared, but this morning... gone completely.

In fact, the interwebs is being even weirder this morning than last night.

But the most weird thing about yesterday?

I had no booze *Faints* ::THUD:: ©®

Naturally, I expect today's bus journeys to be a complete 'mare

Yep, normal service has pretty much been resumed. Morning 300 ten minutes late, barely got to work in time.

Oh, how I laugh when urbanites complain about their public transport...

Compared to London, Austin is rural