New Moon

An interesting mono Monday challenge today. The usual sources tell me that a new moon has between 0% and 0.01% illumination (it is after all the opposite of a full moon), so even on the clearest of nights (and post Storm Debi, this isn’t one of those) there isn’t going to be much to see. I was stumped - and got on with the day.

Which began with an engineer arriving to connect us to the full fibre network recently arrived along our road. A manhole cover in our front garden conceals a chamber through which the fibre network passes, and it seems every time a house beyond is connected the cover ( and the plants growing above it) has to be lifted. I investigated how much it would cost to upgrade ourselves and was given a price which made it just not worth it.

That all changed with a conversation with a neighbour. He had found out what price our internet provider was offering new customers, and after hard bargaining had got the same price. So I demanded the same deal, and have got it - so full fibre at 3x the speed for almost half the price I’ve been paying up to now. I understand the commercial reasoning, but it does irritate me that modern business practices penalise and exploit loyalty to maximise profits.

All of which leads me to the blip image. I realised that the centre of our new router is a fair representation of the new moon. The logo is unfortunate (other internet providers are available), although with the likes of Elon Musk around brand advertising in space isn’t out of the question in the 21st century.