Last night I attended a meeting in Norwich, and went out afterwards for drinks with the others. Earlier in the evening outside Norwich library I seen an inventive usage Henry C Beck’s famous schematic diagram – see attached media at the end of this post.
Today began with a minor disappointment when Your Local Paper did not contain anything on the Floricultural Cabinets, in spite of the fact that they had been sufficiently interested for a colleague to phone my on my day off to get the images to them.
However, thereafter it was successful all through. On the database side I have definitely perfected my method of catalogue generation, and on Tuesday I should be able to produce a bid book that will bear some semblance to reality. I did a lot of imaging, although much of that will have to wait until Tuesday as although I took all the pictures I had very little time left for editing.
Enjoy the following…
I think Mr Beck would have appreciated this almost as much as I did.A great medal set.This image will form the centrepiece of a poster (I have created but not yet printed it)
I spent the whole of today doing database work, and should be able to move on from inputting to design and refinements early tomorrow morning.
I have decided that with no new images at my disposal I will provide a glimpse of the database (front end only for obvious reasons). Tomorrow I should have some new images and some stuff from King’s Lynn newspapers.
For the moment…
This is the “Front end of front ends” from which you can access……the client database (already fully operational)…the Stock Database (in progress)….and the Auction Database (in progress)
I can now confirm for a certainty that something regarding Joseph Harrison and the Floricultural Cabinets will be appearing in Your Local Paper, the new free publication for the King’s Lynn and West Norfolk area. Yesterday afternoon I emailed them the entire photo gallery for that item including a greatly enlarged version of the press release image (this in response to a phone call from a colleague).
Yesterday, having sought expert advice I cooked a lamb shank, which will also do Friday’s supper. I did not follow the advice given to the letter, but I believe that my interpretation was in keeping with the spirit of that advice, and it did work. Briefly, I put the shank in the centre of my stewing pot, distributing around it chopped leeks, potato and carrot, added some salt and in an unorthodox but undeniably successful hunch some dark soy sauce. To prevent the whole from drying out and burning in the course of a long cooking period I added a small cup of water (believing that the meat and the leeks had plenty of their own moisture and that no more was needed). I then placed the pot in my main oven, set at 125 degrees (cool enough for seriously long cooking, hot enough to be sure of finishing off any microbial nasties). I checked hourly, stirring and also regularly pouring liquid over the top of the meat, and six hours later at 7:30, the appointed time for my supper the moment of truth arrived. The result was delicious, although one more moment of truth awaits, when it comes to time to clean the stewing pot.
Included among my pictures accompanying this post is another of the book lots I imaged on Sunday, on which note…
This lot was so vast that I took two images and having edited them separately then used my skills to meld them into one.
After a productive morning working on the database I switched tack post lunch to other aspects of my job. Having loaded the book images from Sunday on to the computer, and got the OK to send off the now complete press release that I mentioned in my last post I imaged some more lots for the April sale.
The new lots were yet more books. The majority were obviously not going to be making big money but as you will see from the media attachments at the end of this post there were some gems sparkling amid the dung heap.
I expect to see something from my press release in the Lynn News because they went to the trouble of asking for a resized image that they could work with, which I duly supplied.
Next week I will be working on Wednesday to help prepare for the auction, and will be at the auction early on Thursday.
A couple of hours ago Fakenham was hit by an epic thunder/ hailstorm which had me very worried as I would have been a sitting duck had it still been raging when I finished work. However, in the sort of rapid transformation that English weather is uniquely capable of providing the sun was shining again by the time I left the office.
As usual, plenty of pictures….
This bound collection of magazines had points of interest.
This was undoubtedly the pick of today’s book lots, and I have included all three images that I took.
The binding is respectable if nothing else.The resized image sent to the Lynn News
I will definitely be participating in CLASS’s latest research program, and have of course taken the opportunity to volunteer myself for any other research they are carrying out.
All the book lots for April, which I imaged on Sunday are now checked, edited and ready to go up. I have also prepared a draft of a press release about one of the lots, which has some local interest attached to it (see the Media attachments at the end of this post).
Yesterday I made sure that the council had a copy of my February wage slip, which was the last document they needed to see about my housing benefit.
On Friday night I took part in “A quiz with a difference” at St Michaels school in South Lynn, helping to raise funds for Unicef. I was part of a team with my parents and my aunt, and we came joint second (and it should have been second outright but we were bilked of half a point in the first round). The quiz was very enjoyable (all the more so for the complete absence of questions on pop music, which are my Achilles heel, only more vulnerable), although I was a trifle disquieted to be very obviously the youngest person present.
Yesterday saw the climax of this years Six Nations. England had a very impressive win in Rome, though not by enough to force Ireland to do any more than win in Paris. The game in Paris that brought the curtain down was an absolute nail biter, with the Irish just hanging on to end the illustrious career of Brian O’Driscoll in the manner that he deserved.
I will be participating in some research in Autistic Spectrum Conditions in the near future, having just received a letter from CLASS (Cambridge Lifespan Asperger Syndrome Service), not be confused with KLASS (King’s Lynn Asperger Support Society), inviting me to do so.
I have some photos for you as usual, this time in two sets. Firstly there are four pictures that relate to buildings in and around King’s Lynn, which will be accompanied by clues as to where they are, and then a collection of other pictures with no extras.
The building that provided this shot is one of the best known in town.This stonework can be seen high up on a building at the Minster end of St James’ StreetThis statue which sits atop its building was snapped across the width of Kings Staithe Square.This wall mounted coat of arms adorns a building in the Hardwick Industrial Estate.
First a coda to my last post: England did post a consolation victory in the final T20 at Bridgetown. The player of the match was the Barbados born Chris Jordan, 27 off nine balls and then two early wickets to set the Windies right back.
Having spent all of yesterday on the database, today was my first day on my new regime of database pre-lunch and other stuff post-lunch. The stock database now has up to lot 300 for the March sale, so a couple more mornings should do the trick in terms of getting the stock records in there. I will then have to fill in vendor details as fully as possible in both the stock and auction sections (hopefully I will find a way to automate this process), before then processing buyer details as appropriate.
After lunch I worked on imaging for the April main sale, doing all the lots that required camera work and starting on the scanning (I always try to ensure that anything I leave undone will be scanning work because this is quicker and easier than camera work). The individual highlight of the day imaging wise was a handsome clock with a roman numeral face. As you will see below there were a couple of other decent images…
this lot features the March saleThis postcard appealed.These prints are by John James Audobon
This clock is a fine specimen.Decent quality stamps image well.
For the first time in a long time I have had a day at James and Sons that did not involve any imaging, but owing to the nature of what I was doing I still have some images for use in this post – good images that I had not previously used in this context.
For most of today I have been updating the stock element of my database with stuff for the March sale, with a view to testing out this and the auction element, to see if my system can produce the desired results and a hope/ expectation of going live in all its glory for the April sale, which will make it more or less exactly one year from me starting at James and Sons to my system taking full control.
One of the fields I have in the section of the database is a photo gallery field (links to the images we have for for a particular item), and this is how I came across images today even though I was doing no imaging as such. My progress was slightly held up by having to do some emergency editing of images that had been transferred from a previous auction and revealed this fact rather too obviously, but I had still got to lot 181 by the end of the day, and will make much more rapid progress tomorrow.
I have a few other refinements to make to get the whole system ready, but the work I had already done was sufficient to amply impress the colleague with whom I discussed these developments.
Can England cap a positive day for me by at least salvaging some pride by winning the the third T20 against the West Indies, to bring about a series score of 2-1 against rather than 3-0? This remains the be seen. The World T20 gets under way shortly, with a playoff series to reduce eight associates to two to go into the main draw. One of these eight teams playing for the right to take on the big guns is … Afghanistan!
Here are today’s pictures…
Inside the boxOutside the box…… and finally a close up of the label
It was obvious right from the start that today was going to be a good one weather wise, but not even I was initially optimistic to imagine that it would be a day for sitting out in the sun.
However, the heat became obvious even while I was performing a couple of minor tasks. I needed to get some new washing up liquid and also to establish whether my mobile phone was finally beyond all assistance (it was, so I bought another cheap PAYG handset, and retained my existing number by putting the old SIM card into the new phone), and these tasks achieved I decided it was time for a walk and set out along the bank of the Great Ouse.
I continued on beyond the point at which I normally leave the river bank and beyond the A47 and Palm Paper, finally turning away from the water at Tail Sluice, walking through Saddlebow, and hitting the Nar Valley Way to head back into the centre of town. Having shed my jumper part way through the walk, I had lunch outside and spent the afternoon enjoying the sun (the jumper has just gone back on, as the sun is no longer a factor, and I am back inside).
I have some photographs from the walk, which are below…
Another successful day at James and Sons. For the first part of the day until just after lunch I was finishing a job started on Friday of transferring pre-existing descriptions, estimates and images for old stamp lots into the April T-Bid auction folder. All of the images needed editing, and one or two needed doing again from scratch, hence why it took me a total of close to six hours (including Friday’s work) to deal with 84 lots (about one tenth of the whole auction – hence why work on it starts this early).
Then I created a press release focussing on medals because we have some very special specimens going under the hammer at our next auction. I also created a message for bulk emailing to the entire mailing list and sent it to the person responsible for putting out such emails. I finished off by attending to some stuff that was going into the April main sale.
aspiblog 