Marcus D. Hanwell's Blog

Been playing with the Linux beta of the Google Earth for the last few days. I had played with the Windows version once or twice and was impressed but as I do not run Windows full time anywhere (just very occasionally in VMWare) I hadn't played with it much. The Linux beta seems to be really good, it has crashed twice on me so far, but for a beta it has taken a lot of hammer and remained stable and it looks very slick.

I am really pleased to see Google developing for Linux too, and I think this is a very positive move on their part. They have been doing so much for the open source world it was starting to worry me that they like many large companies were neglecting Linux with their software offerings. I still haven't had chance to try Picasa which is a more disappointing port in my eyes, although a definite beginning. It didn't work on my amd64 system last time I tried it though...

In other news I seem to be so busy right now! I can't make it to the Gentoo UK 2006 Conference down in London this year. I hope you guys have a great time, wish I could have made it myself. I would have even rustled up a talk for you guys

I went diving yesterday at the famed UK dive site - Stoney Cove, with an old school friend Matt for the day. He also works at the local dive shop, SDS and sold me half of my new kit. So if it wasn't all top notch I had the guy to complain to out there with me We got there at about 10:30 and were allowed into the bottom car park - now I know why everyone obsesses over this as I saw how far we could have been walking in full kit. It cost £15 each which I thought was pretty steep to just let us dive in their old quarry but I am new to all this.

I just know everyone wants to see me covered head to toe in neoprene so you are in for a treat - Matt took a photo of me just before I jumped into the water but didn't quite manage to get my head in the shot. As Matt hadn't been diving this year he wanted to take it easy so we avoided the deep bit in the middle and stuck to a floor of about 22 m maximum depth.

We took in a few of the sites on our two dives including a big boat (must check its name), a transit van, a Wessex helicopter and a submarine with one of those geocache signs on it. We even saw some fish here including a couple of monster pike! You can see all my other pictures here - I got quite a few. All my new equipment worked really well and there were no leaks in my camera stuff. I did a test deployment of my DSMB and we did our safety stop off it on our second dive.

I was quite amused though as I had told Matt about the diving I had done out in Malta and how they had asked me if I breathed (I do by the way). They wouldn't let me have a 15 L cylinder, even on our 35 m dives as they said I would never need it. In their defence they were right and I usually came up with 60-120 bar I think at the end of every dive. Matt got me a 15 L and a 12 L, and himself a 12 L and 10 L. Needless to say we were coming up for him on the first dive and I finished with 110 bar, and the second I think he had 30 bar and I came up with 100 bar... I think he believes me now. It is all these 10 km runs I think

We had a really good day, finished it off with a beer in the resident pub. I now have Stoney Cove in my log book too, although I did scratch the face of my dive watch a little on the second dive These were my coldest dives to date at 11 C, but my Oceanic semi-dry suit kept me nice and toasty warm. Matt did fine in his drysuit too. I still haven't spotted the appeal of dry suits, but it may become apparent up in the Farne Islands next week!

I finshed my 10 km run in Graves Park today!!! I was really pleased with myself as I did the whole thing in just under 59 minutes, I didn't get any shin splints and I managed to raise £56.50 for the British Heart Foundation. It was certainly very tough and there were some big hills on the course. It was mostly on grass too which seemed to take more out of me as I was running it.

I was aiming to do it in under an hour though and I did that. I don't think I am super fit yet, and I haven't lost as much weight as I would like but it certainly made me feel good that I could make it round the course and come out with quite a good time. There were a few there that did it in 35-40 minutes I believe - I might get there one day! I would quite like to find a half marathon to run somewhere next!

I am going to relax for the rest of the day working in front of my computer...

Well I signed up for the 10 km race in Graves Park, Sheffield this Sunday. I nearly wimped out and took the 5 km option as I know I can run that but I thought I should try to push myself. Louise did really well in her 5 km run she did the other week and that inspired me to push myself. So I signed up and paid my entry fee.

On Saturday we went to Rother Valley and ran around both lakes - that is about half the distance at ~5 km. Then on Sunday I ran 6 km on the treadmill at the gym, and yesterday I managed to run 7.5 km on the treadmill. I kept it on a 1% gradient the whole time to put some gradient on it. I am planning on running 9 or 10 km at the gym tomorrow, and then running about 10 km at Rother Valley on Friday. If I make it I may actually have a chance.

I am fitter now than I have been in years and I hope I manage to make it round, it would be great if I can do it in under one hour. I have raised £40 for the British Heart Foundation already, and hope to raise a little more before the race. If you fancy giving a little money to a good cause, and sponsoring a fellow Linux geek in his bid to get fit they have an online sponsorship page for me here.

Running has been a great way to keep the weight coming off, even when I am not as disciplined as I should be Wish me luck on my first ever long distance run (used to run 400 m at school) and my first race since I was at school! Hopefully all will go well on the day.

Did my first dive in the UK on Friday of last week! I went to the Blue Lagoon inland lake. I hired some kit from TigerDive and went with a few of the people who frequent their online forum. We got there and we started kitting up and the day nearly ended there in disaster. The high pressure hose to the SPG blew on my hired regulator! Never seen that happen before and it really did scare me.

Fortunately I was able to borrow a set of regulators from one of the dive masters there, and I had only lost 20 bar of pressure despite all the noise it made. It really was true what I read about the pin hole in the high pressure hose reducing air flow It was a beautiful sunny day and in the end we got into the water. It wasn't as deep as their site claimed (or we couldn't find the deep bit) - we managed a maximum depth of 6 m and didn't see any fish. I did see some newts, tadpoles and lots of tiny larvae.

The first dive was just under an hour and I came up with half a tank left. The water was lovely and warm but I discovered 6 kg was too much lead. We had a nice cup of coffee and a great bacon sandwich, after which we went in for another short dive. We looked around the boat wrecks and the tank. There was also an artillery gun that was on its side and a few platforms to sit on. I practiced inflating an SMB too - good for when we go diving in the Farne Islands at the end of the month.

It was a good laugh although I do prefer diving in the sea I think... The equipment issues pushed me into getting my own gear sooner rather than later too. I got myself an Apeks XTX50 regulator set up with the nice DIN300 fittings, and a ScubaPro Knighthawk BCD which is pretty nice with the tech wing style inflation at the back and integrated weights. It was a gentle introduction to UK diving with a bit of a scare at the start of the day - thankfully everything went smoothly after that