If this post works it will be something of a miracle, given the colossally amateurish mishmash that is my hacked-together blog code, but then I am rapidly beginning to expect miracles from Microsoft's highly surprising gem of an operating system, Windows 7. I have only had it running on my PC for 48 hours but already it is punching a large hole in my long-running (and, based upon extensive prior experience, thoroughly well-justified) assumption that everything with a Microsoft logo upon it is a bloated, bug-festooned software turd which will eat your hard drive, burn through your desk and surreptitiously sell your personal data to a Syrian mafioso named Faisal.

For one like myself who is used to daily byte-wrangling with recalcitrant machines over such simple tasks as "please, computer, print this small document" and "for the love of Uncle Charlie's red lacy suspenders, please, computer, fail for once to randomly delete irreplaceable photographs of my children", Windows 7 is simply a pleasure to work with. For example, it not only picked up the existence of my printer within seconds of it being turned on, but identified it correctly, downloaded the requisite drivers and management software, and changed the printer icon to look like the actual printer. In about 30 seconds. Without me having to click anything. For me, whose daily IT experience regularly includes the joy of such informative errors as "Win32 unspecified error", and "Microsoft Office has encountered a problem and needs to explode chunks of screen into your face", a system which not only correctly identifies problems but suggests options for fixing them and then goes off and fixes them for you is frankly flabbergasting. To take another example, I've provided one of its components with nothing but the name of this blog and the credentials for my blog host, and it's letting me write this on a perfect facsimile of the actual blog, complete with backdrops, images, the works. Sharing documents is a breeze. Streaming media to my telly is a breeze. The whole experience so far is practically seamless.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not so naive as to credit Microsoft with having thought of everything. There are bound to be niggles (I dislike the "ribbon" style of folder navigation, for example) and there is no doubt some enormous security black hole lurking in the bowels of the OS which will leap up and bite us all in the collective arse at some point, but for once I find myself in the disconcerting and unfamiliar position of quietly congratulating the Redmond boys on a job which, at least for now, appears to have been jolly well done.

I'm still using Firefox for web browsing, though. There is hope for me yet.

Unseasonal "good" weather is upon us (one might think that good weather in July is far from unseasonal, but one would be wrong because this is England) and the fabled Yellow Eye of Hotness is casting its piercing rays over our sweltering foreheads like a malevolent disco ball at a rave party in Hades. Wildflowers wilt visibly in the fields, sparrows fall exhausted in mid-flight, and even the normally stoic British cows moo plaintively and gulp from evaporating troughs. The site managers of our office building have so far managed to stave off the worst effects by directing their hunched goblin-like minions to whack the air-conditioning up to 11, but the general Stygian atmosphere of the place has just taken a distinct turn for the worse, as I have returned from lunch to the smell of burning plastic (or possibly brimstone, as my nostrils are currently hiding behind my ears and wincing audibly). Clouds of thick, oily, black smoke belch merrily from the machine room, corroding my specs on their way to the freedom of the air vents. Armed with gas mask and wet towel, I investigate further and discover some swarthy, bearded, shifty-looking blokes wearing white robes, huddled in a corner and holding a blowtorch. Fortunately they do not appear to be members of the Warwickshire branch of Al-Qaida on a fiendish mission to sabotage our servers, but are instead trying to fix the air-conditioning unit. I use the word "fix" in its loosest possible sense, because the bloody thing had been working perfectly this morning and it now looks like a burnt-out Mini. It has damn great metal bits hanging off which were clearly not designed to hang off. On a more positive note, the fumes are unbelievably smelly but have cleared my sinuses quite nicely.

Is it just me, or has this Obama bloke actually got some? I know I don't normally "do politics" but this seems more interesting than usual... or am I just falling for the Obama hype? I dunno. The chap looks promising, insofar as one can attach that adjective to a politician without sniggering. The prospect of Gordon Brown having the cojones to apply such an unceremonious boot to the head of a large corporation (and, probably, party funding contributor) in similar circumstances is, to put it mildly, somewhat unlikely.

Am suffering from unexpected and rather Scroogesque dislike of the Arctic weather conditions currently prevailing here in Blighty. Normally I would be bouncing up and down like a rubber wallaby at the appearance of so much snow, and indeed I spent much of last week introducing my kids to the joys of snowball wars (like snowball fights, only with strategy and barricades) and building very small igloos. However, while attempting to get to work on Friday I managed to introduce my car to the Lighthorne Heath roundabout (they got on smashingly well) on account of icy road surfacings, so the resulting minor whiplash and large dent in the front of my beloved Pastamobile have rendered my feelings somewhat antipathetic towards all things wintery.

Lest the words "humbug" and "bah" should find themselves wandering towards this post, not necessarily in that order, I shall stop here and go and apply something warm and soothing to the back of my neck.

After a truly whopping number of years plugging away at miscellaneous unruly servers for the same client, I am legging it away off to a brand spanking new job. I am hoisting the mainsail, singing yo-ho-ho to several bottles of rum, stowing the anchor and sheeting the yardspoon.

Okay, maybe not the last one; it's been a while since I sailed anything larger than a bath sponge.

Given the volume of job-related crap which has been dumped upon my long-suffering noggin in recent months, I'm quite pleased about the prospect, as my will to live was seriously considering faking its own death and buggering off to Panama. But, no longer; I'm now positively brimming with vim, vigour, verve, vivacity and other fizzy-sounding words beginning with "V" which are surely just dying to leap out of a nearby thesaurus and attack this sentence.

I have sent out my "so long and thanks for all the fish" email. I have arranged the traditional farewell steak-pie-and-half-a-shandy lunch at the local pub for this Friday. All of my electronic offspring have been handed over to their new guardians. My desk is clean and my drawers are as empty as a hermit's social calendar. All that remains is for me to try and get as much as possible of the contents of the giant economy size tub of Marmite sitting on my desk onto the eight slices of toast which are sitting next to it. I suppose I could always take the jar with me, but where's the fun in that?

Exciting times, citizen!

Am suffering stomach-grumblings on account of eating too many sunflower seeds. It's not my fault, they taste really good and they're incredibly more-ish. Also, they are very good for you, what with being low in salt and packed chock-full of magnesium, which probably means that if you were to light a taper and apply it to my tongue I would burst into fizzy white flame. Cool.

Suspect I may be turning into a budgerigar.

Can one reasonably dub something "Thai beef noodle soup" by virtue of having, basically, boiled up a few cans of Campbell's minestrone, dropped what looks like a pack of Tesco's Value minced beef into it, and shoved in some lemongrass stalks and a tablespoonful of chilli powder? I highly doubt that any of the ingredients of what I'm now consuming have come within an elephant's fart of Thailand, unless of course Campbell's have moved their worldwide soup manufacturing facilities there without telling me first. Also, given that most Thai food (in my not even slightly humble opinion) tastes wonderful, and given further that the soup in question tastes like it has been boiled in a troll's vest for a month, albeit a troll given to liberal use of the new Lynx "Lemongrass and Chilli" deodorant range, I am equally sceptical as to the provenance of the recipe.

Our office canteen gives "false advertisement" a bad name.