My concentration is coming in peaks and troughs, I am experiencing voices and visions. Fortunately I have a little bottle of promazine (25mg) which I can fall back on when things get out of hand.

I've sent off for two new books, discounted at the Register bookstore:-

"Linux Kernel Development 2e" by Robert Love, Candace Bos, Jeanne Schumm ISBN 0672327201 which describes the latest (2.6) version of the Linux Kernel

"C++ Template Metaprogramming Concepts, Tools, and Techniques from Boost and Beyond" by David Abrahams, Aleksey Gurtovoy ISBN 0321227255

I'll be studying the kernel stuff first and later on I'll try to improve my generic programming skills - last time I used the STL was in 2002.