Connor Gurney

Blog

  • Sudan II: a sketch by Simon Eldritch

    I came across this comedy sketch from Simon Eldritch in my once-local newspaper many years ago, and it still makes me giggle every time:

    Customer: Worcester sauce crisps please.

    Shopkeeper: Sorry, can’t, it’s off the shelves, cancer scare.

    Customer: Oh right, Chinese chicken wings?

    Shopkeeper: Ah that’s the same. Cancer scare.

    Customer: Hamburger relish?

    Shopkeeper: Cancer scare.

    Customer: Sausage and Mash?

    Shopkeeper: Cancer scare.

    Customer: Cottage pie?

    Shopkeeper: Yes. No wait, cancer scare.

    Customer: So they’re all off the shelves because of a cancer scare?

    Shopkeeper: Yes.

    Customer: (sigh) Just give me a packet of fags then.

    Shopkeeper: Certainly. That’ll be £4.50 please.

  • Tonight, the streets are mine

    Tonight, the streets are mine

    I don’t think that I’ll ever get fed up of this city, man. 🐝

  • The Cell Site of Theseus

    Whilst undertaking training on the mobile products and services that my employer offers this week, I found myself deep in thought with ChatGPT*, and it brought me an amusing philosophical question:

    If every antenna, every radio, every cable, every cabinet and every computer has been replaced over the years, is it still the same mobile site?

    From an operator’s perspective, yes. It has the same site ID, the same lease, the same grid reference and often the same role in the network.

    From an engineering perspective, almost none of the original technology remains.

    As my trainer said when I showed him this post, it’s like the modern-day equivalent of Trigger’s broom from Only Fools and Horses!

    * Other large language models are, of course, available.

  • It’s not often that I’m shocked…

    Trump has now posted an AI-generated video of himself winning a fight with a tiger following the incident at Yorkshire Wildlife Park this weekend just gone.

    Where does one even begin to address the cruelty of one of the most powerful people in the world mocking the brutal death of an ordinary man with mental health issues?

  • In memory of Margaret Hamilton

    Like anyone with even the remotest fondness of either the science of computers or the universe that wraps around us, I was gutted to hear this morning of the death of Margaret Hamilton.

    Whilst her obituary in The Times describes her vast contribution to our understanding of who we are better than I ever could, I’ll say one thing loudly and clearly: we know more now than we ever have before, and she played a key role in getting us there.

    Quite the loss.

  • There’s still some good in the world

    It’s hard to remember, sometimes, given the amount of negative things that are happening, but there’s so much good too.

    bbc.co.uk/makeadifference/awards

  • September 11, 25 years later

    September 11, 25 years later

    Every time that the anniversary of a well-known terrorist atrocity rolls around once again, I think of the words of a woman whose son was killed in one such attack on UK soil and how she “broke the cycle” of hatred by forgiving the men who murdered her son.

    Today, as we mark 25 years since a day in which time seemed to stand still, I shall be a little kinder than is necessary to the people around me and follow in her footsteps in breaking the cycle of hatred that it’s far too easy to get caught up in. I invite you to join me.

  • Seek to understand before seeking to be understood

    A few months ago, I came across the advice that forms the title of this note in one of the many books sat on my reading list for an extended period—The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen Covey—and it’s stayed on my mind a lot ever since.

  • Nyah’s ripples

    Nyah’s ripples

    A few days ago in a land far, far away, I had the fortune to visit a bench. Of course, I can now hear you asking “So what?”. “A bench?”, you might ask.

    It’s a bench dedicated to Nyah Taryn James, a 14-year-old girl from Swansea, who died on 6 February 2017.

    This is getting weirder by the minute, I know, but stay with me.

    Nyah was a close friend of my other half—the sort who, in her words, was “loud, bubbly, and optimistic”—in her formative years. She directly shaped the person I love more than anyone in this world.

    Of course, I will never meet this young girl who helped to make my partner who she’s become, so watching the world pass us by from a bench left in her memory is the next best thing that the world has to offer.

    In us doing so, the ripples that Nyah left on this world continue on their way. To paraphrase Terry Pratchett, she won’t finally be dead until those ripples stop for the final time. We won’t let that happen.

  • Imogens, are you out there?

    Just randomly dawned on me that I haven’t met anyone called Imogen in many years.

    Are any of you out there?

    Do you still exist?