There's light at the end of the tunnel

moreover the boom gates are down, the siren is blaring and the bells are ringing. Heino will understand :-)

In short, we got it working! Our robot now does the things I've been here in Dallas for the past three weeks to get it doing. It's a thing of beauty to see untested chips in the left hand tray make it to the burn in board; then to the oven and thence back to be sorted into categories depending on how they passed or failed.

All being well I will get to spend more than 3 or so days back in Phoenix.

However, we were doing this here in Dallas because it's easier here. We have to get it going in the Philippines and I suspect that after I get my passport stamp on Friday I'm going to find myself over there.

Sometime in 1999 Heino and I found ourselves, with Gary, at Robins house. Cutting a long and boring story short Gary needed to wash his hands. We were outside the house at the time and Gary spied a tap. So he turned it on but no water flowed. Heino and I both remember very clearly what happened next. Gary gazed along the pipe and saw a stopcock. Ah, he thought, the stopcock's stopped. So he reached for the stopcock and turned it. The stop cock had maybe 45 degrees turn betwen full off and full on. And, naturally, Gary had not turned the tap off. So as he turned the stopcock.... well you can guess. Heino and I both watched in amazement as Gary turned the water from full off to full on without closing the tap.

The truly evil thing is that both Heino and I knew what would happen; we chose to not say anything; sometimes you just have to let a mate make a dick of himself :-)