00:37 - Something quite a long way away exploded. My wife and I were having a drink, chatting. We looked at each other and she asked "
what was that". We often hear unidentified loud bangs. But this one was definitely a bomb. I'm not sure why. (I've heard a few, working in Central London.)
We finished our cans and conversation and she went to put on the radio. A bomb had exploded outside the BBC Television Centre. I guessed it was Shepherds Bush, which is a few miles away from us. They were interviewing a BBC cameraman. He sounded shaken. I got the feeling it was the violation of his workplace that was upsetting him more than the proximity of the explosion - but he didn't say.
08:30 - The cameraman's pictures are on the news. He described the taxi as being "utterly destroyed". The pictures confirmed this. What you don't get any idea from the television is the intensity of the "bang", though.
Trivial thoughts... I wonder if the Tube will be working on Monday...
10:00 - Oh dear. The car won't start. I think the battery is flat. And we have no battery charger. We were planning to go to a DIY shed to buy timber and hardware. Instead, we walk to the local car spares place and buy a battery charger.
Hmm, the nuts need proper spanners rather than adjustable ones due to the limited clearance. Sigh. Hmm, the imperial set don't seem to fit. The nut isn't 3/8" or 7/16". Just a fraction over the 3/8" one. I guess I need a metric set. I walk to the local car spares place any buy a 10mm spanner. In reply to the proprietor's cheery "See you again soon", I say "Not too soon, I hope!"
11:45 - Okay, I now have the right tool and the battery came out easily. I read the charger's manual. Hmm, "open the cell caps"... I can't see no cell caps... Uh, unless that's these sealed looking things. A phone call to the AA resulted in a "Uh, not sure - we'll send someone around". I started vacuuming the living room.
12:35 - AA Patrolman arrived and looked, hummed and hawed and said "you need a large screwdriver". "Rubbish", we both thought. The caps had eight point star-shaped indents. No screwdriver was going to open this. But at least he was sure they were meant to open. He went to his van. I got a 2p, opened the caps and sent the patrolman on his way.
The battery is on charge. "Up to 10 hours". Well, we're not going shopping today, then. (10am to 4pm opening on a Sunday.) Back to the vacuuming!
15:00 - Uh, had lunch and finished the vacuuming and cleared some rubbish out of the "new kitchen" (one day it will be a kitchen). Finally finished my Document write up for Document Object Model. The next one, Node, looks even longer. I'm quite pleased with Document, though. "Node what you don't know" is definitely a good thing to try. I learned about XML namespaces and generally exercised what I'd learned so far about XML. (One day it might help me in my career. I can live in hope.)
17:15 - Hey, where'd the last couple of hours go..?
More on the bomb: They reckon the bomb was planted by Irish dissidents. Coded messages were received by a charitable organisation and a hospital about an hour before the explosion. The security services were attempting a controlled explosion when the taxi blew up. The area had been cleared and there was only one injury (a London Transport worker).
See http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1201000/1201616.stm and other BBC News pages for more.