So, my GP referred me for an allergy test, to find out what it is that keeps making me sneeze and generally feel like the living dead. The reminder letter I got (I've been putting it off because they insist on my using the phone and I hate doing that) tells me I can use the "NHS Choose and Book" service online to remind me of their phone numbers. So I do that. It wants me to log in with the number and password they gave me, so I do that, and keep the phone numbers onscreen, since I need my laptop and Google Calendar with me by the phone.

And the nice guy at the end tells me that he can't make my appointment, because they have to use the same system and he can't log in while I'm logged in. Presumably it gives extra functionality to them, since all it does for me is show me this. (It gives me an option at Homerton Hospital as well, but they're unrated and the only advantage they have is a 21-day wait time.)

General Allergy (LCH) - Allergy - Barts and The London NHS Trust - RNJ

* Distance: 3 miles from postcode E11 ***
* Approximate Wait Time: 41 days
* Location: THE LONDON CHEST HOSPITAL, BONNER ROAD, LONDON, GREATER LONDON, E2 9JX
* Booking Instructions: 0800 043 0143 Mon-Thurs 0800-1800; Fri 0800-1700; Sat 0900-1200

And then he tells me that it will take 20 minutes to release the lock on the system after I'm logged out, so I'll have to call back. WTFF? Even by the normal standards of government IT systems this is fairly epic comedy fail.

Tags: allergies, fail, hating software

I'm looking for an IM client for Windows - specifically for use with MSN. I don't use other services as it stands.

The reason I'd like a new one is because I often find the new-message notifications on the official MSN client really stressful and intrusive.

So if any of you know of a client that will notify me visually but without any flashing or flickering, and preferably in a nice nonstressful colour, I'd be very interested to hear about it.

Tags: geek, hating software, lazyweb

This is partly just as a note to myself so I remember what I did.

The problem is that I keep forgetting what day and/or date it is, so I wanted a program that would provide a better clock display than the built-in one, ie. one that showed the correct day and date without my having to go look for it. Ideally, of course, I want it to be a proper updating clock, but a cron job that pops up a window saying 'Today is Saturday the 5th of February' for me to see when I got up in the morning would do just fine too, and require less immediate programming.

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Tags: computers, hating software, perl

I tried out Opera, but I've finally given up and switched back to Firefox. Opera looks good, and seems to be a little bit faster, but I kept finding things that were unreasonably hard for me to do out of the box, and other things that it just didn't do, for one reason or another. (I should specify that I'm using a new, quite good PC, with Windows XP sp2.)

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Tags: hating software