So I'm slightly concerned that I haven't heard anything since my tax return was submitted. In previous years it's been submitted online, but I can't do that any more because my taxes are now handled by Her Majesty's Customs and Revenue, Public Department One who, as I understand it, look after taxes for members of the armed forces (which I am not), people in the witness protection programme (which I am not) ... and me^*, because I'm worth it.

Anyway, my tax return this year was complicated because I wound up my company in the previous year, and my accountant had to do all sorts of weird stuff that I don't entirely understand to calculate my tax bill, and there's been a postal strike, and I'm fretting that they either haven't received it, or are convinced that due to it being the most complex tax return I've ever submitted, combined with my taxes now being handled by the same people who do James Bond's, that it's secretly flagged me as some evil terrorist money launderer and I'm about to end up in prison for tax evasion aggravated with nuclear proliferation or something (my mind works in odd ways sometimes).

So I look up Public Department One on Google, and they don't seem to have a website. Eventually I find what seems to be their number, so I call it and a nice lady answers. "Customs and Revenue. How can we help you?"

I resist the urge to answer, "In ways that don't involve latex gloves, hopefully", and explain that I just want to check that they've received my tax return because they haven't sent me a bill or anything. She asks for my name and National Insurance number, I supply them.

"OK, just let me receive your details"

*tappety tap*

*wait*

*intake of breath*

"Ah, er, I think you've, er, come through to the wrong extension. Please wait while I transfer you."

Somewhere in the recesses of my mind, a latex glove snaps back into place as it's released from the hand of a large hairy man called Igor.

Now a man with a lovely lyrical Welsh accent answers, "PD1, how can I help?"

I repeat that I just want to check if they've received my tax return, because there's been a postal strike and stuff, ha ha, please don't hurt me.

"No problem Miss Brown, let me just look."

He knows my name, and my National Insurance number already - these guys aren't like other public bodies; they have IT that works. Never mess with public bodies who have more power than deities and are competent.

"Yes, we received that in November, you should be hearing from us in a couple of weeks. Is there anything else I can help with?"

I say that there isn't, and thank him for his help. After all that fretting he was a very nice man who did not sound like he pressed any buttons marked, "dispatch ninjas to subject's house immediately, also, prepare the shark tank" while on the phone to me...

...which is nice.

^{* May also include anyone else with a Gender Recognition Certificate. Trans people may contain traces of nuts.}

Originally posted at http://auntysarah.dreamwidth.org/217176.html - you can comment here or there.

... which mostlyacat and I have now watched, on DVD.

1. It is very distressing in places.

2. It is rather problematic in several ways.

3. It is nevertheless exceedingly good.

4. PLEASE CAN I HAS JOHN CHO? KTHNXBYE.

Tags: films
Current Location: Eldamar
Current Mood: going down with a cold

( You are about to view content that may not be appropriate for minors. )

Tags: dw, fandom, film, films, flash forward, me, merlin, news, psa, random, spooks, the mummy, tv

You know that kneading thing that cats* do with their paws? When they paw you or another available surface with their front paws, often purring at the same time?

I grew up just calling it "kneading", but then mostlyacat introduced me to calling it "making pudding". Only, then I realised that mirrorshard calls it "happy feet". And inevitably each of them says the other is Wrong. ;-)

What do *you* call it?


Poll #1494598 Cats paw!
Open to: All, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 55

A cat is doing that kneading thing on you with their paws. What is it they are doing?

---

* And Nick. And occasionally me. And sometimes one or two of my friends.

Tags: cats, frivolity, nick, polls, sam, silly
Current Location: Eldamar
Current Mood: silly

My favourite theologian takes an attempt at a 3 minute answer at an extremely big question :-)


How can God be loving yet send people to hell? from A Passion for Life on Vimeo.

Direct download

There's so much that he could have said, and so much that just can't be packed in to three minutes. William Lane Craig (a Christian philosopher) debated "Can a loving God send people to hell?" in 1994 with Raymond Bradley (an atheist philosopher). I would have thought that debate would give a more detailed overview of the issues.

Tags: christianity, don carson, hell, interesting, morality, passion for life, raymond bradley, religion, theology, videos, william lane craig

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Tags: classics, news, pompeii, psa, random, rome

The other day I needed a lot of primes in a hurry, and I judged that it would be quicker just to sit down and write a simple Sieve of Eratosthenes program from memory than to faff about trying to google up one that somebody had already written and that wasn't in some unhelpful language.

So I wrote one; then I disposed of the obvious bugs by checking its output rigorously for numbers up to 10; then I ran it for numbers up to 100 and didn't see anything obviously wrong (though I didn't look that hard). Then I wondered whether there was any good way to be more confident of its correctness.

On a whim, I made it generate all the primes up to 2^32, and fed the output text file to md5sum (with Unix line endings). Then I pasted the resulting checksum into Google – and found a hit! Somebody else had generated the same set of primes, checksummed them in exactly the same way, and posted the MD5 on a web forum which was talking about prime-generating programs so that other people on the forum could use it as a test case. Just the confirmation I wanted.

The silly thing is that if I'd tried to google for things like ‘md5sum of primes up to 2^32’, it wouldn't have been remotely successful. But once you already know what you think the answer is (at least in cases where it's a mess of digits), googling for that will tell you whether anyone else agreed with you.

... that this morning I had a dream in which I was writing a poem (in English) and desperately trying to find a rhyme (in English) for the Welsh name "Pwyll".

I blame mirrorshard, pretty much entirely. ;-)

I can't even *say* "Pwyll" yet...

Tags: cymraeg, dreams, sam, silly
Current Mood: amused

Scroll down and check out the cartoons :)

They're not at all my usual style, but fun to do - I can't take credit for the jokes, sadly. I work there, by the way, although not as an artist ^^

Jeffrey L. Kasser's lecture course on the Philosophy of Science is currently on sale at a reduced price from the Teaching Company. It's $50 (£30) for the MP3 downloads, a quarter of its usual price. You get 36 lectures of 30 minutes each, so I reckon that's good value for money.

The reviews on the Teaching Company site are almost all positive, but almost all say the course is densely packed and makes you work. I'd agree with that. I'm not sure how previous knowledge of science or philosophy you need as prerequisites, but I reckon any reasonably educated listener could get something out of the course.

Personally, though the subject matter was dry in places, I really enjoyed the course: Kasser isn't a boring lecturer, and leavens the dry bits with some humour (the brocosaxodile and the 500 pound beagles stuck in my mind). I'd recommend the course if you're interested in discussions of what science is, how and whether it makes progress, whether science discovers the "truth", and so on; or indeed if you're just interested in trouncing religious apologists who persist in describing Richard Dawkins as a logical positivist (he's a naive scientific realist, FFS).

Tags: philosophy, science