Today was the first day back at work for a month, and it was the hottest day in Cardiff since I’ve lived here (32C). Not a great day, although brilliant to be interacting with real people rather than deciding if it’s going to be ‘Trisha’ or ‘Joy Of Painting’ (which is a joy BTW - Bob Ross, what a genius! I miss him already).

As I’m feeling so much better I’m gearing up for quite a hectic few months. No doubt I’ll be increasingly busy at the day job and the freelance work is also on the up - which is all good.

Some exciting news, well for me anyway, is a new 12" iBook (probably just as Apple release a new one in a month or so). I’ve got to say I’m very, very impressed with it so far, although it does get a tad warm. The battery life far exceeds my wife’s peecee laptop by a good hour or so. In fact she’s taken to using this instead (note to self - stop wife using iBook). And with the new computer addition I’ve finally sorted out my Aiport Express, and with the new external drive everything is nicely networked now. It’s like a well-oiled machine.

Next thing is my digital camera, which is bust. It’s a Pentax Optio 430, which had a nice chunky feel to it, but took an age to start up and then take a shot. So, the upshot is I need a new one. It’s got to be small, metal (non of this plastic rubbish), start up quickly and have minimal shutter-lag. I was thinking of the Canon Ixus 50, but what do you think I should spend my hard earned cash on?

Update: Decided to go with the Casio EX-z750 following several recommendations here and Mike’s great review. As always the UK is more expensive than the US, but I did manage to get it at a knock down price (cheapest I could find in stock in the UK at the moment) at camerabox.co.uk