Excel... "the clipboard cannot be emptied" - a solution

I say "a solution" advisedly: Excel warns that another application may be using the clipboard - thereby preventing it being cleared (because e.g. the other application has "locked" the clipbaord.) But even if it were true, how does one identify the offending app? The hard way... quitting them one by one and seeing when the fault goes away. As a result of which I found an offender: the Skype add-on for Firefox - and whilst other applications have also been noted as being at fault, the only one I had previously noted was rther more obscure than Skype.

I had tried all sorts of cleverness (such as adding DWORD AcbPreventPreemptiveCollect = 1 to HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\14.0\Common\General; checking that rdpclip wasn't running; worrying about the VM integration features of Windows 7's XP Mode, etc.), none of which worked, and then for some reason just thought I'd be methodical with the only other major app that was running - FireFox.

I restarted it in safe mode and the Excel error (which actually only affected Drag and Drop, rather than cut and paste per se) disappeared. I then went through the Add-ons disabling all and re-enabling one by one until the culprit was found. To be honest, I had expected the Adobe Reader plug in to be at fault, but it wasn't.

Hope that helps lots of people with various clipboard problems in various versions of Excel and various Microsoft operating systems.

Creativity Strikes (at last) in Ladakh

A chorten (the Tibetan form of stupa) is

a mound-like structure containing Buddhist relics, typically the remains of a Buddha or saint, used by Buddhists as a place of worship

There are rather a lot of them in Ladakh...

This photo is of just a few on the slope below Shanti Stupa in Leh, Ladakh









The Chortens of Ladakh
   
Chortens crowd the valley floors,
    Chortens mount the steeps.
Chortens climb the ridges;
    There are chortens at the peaks.

Chortens loft the sun and moon,
    Chortens shelter bone.
Chortens case the scriptures;
    Every chorten is a tome.

Chortens shine a bright, lime-white;
    Chortens light the air.
Chortens chant in silence;
    Every chorten is a prayer.

Chortens meditate by day;
    Chortens dream of sleep.
Chortens know their purpose
    Is the promise that they keep.

Chortens are the testaments
    Of chorten-builders’ faith;
Every chorten is a last bequest –
    And all of them decay.

Chortens are impermanence –
    Chortens show the way;
Chorten brick, like human flesh,
    Is merely will-full clay.

When the wind has flayed the flesh,
    When sun has bleached the bones,
When ice has pierced the marrow,
    There is no strength of stones.

Chortens rise and chortens fall,
    Lime-white pales to grey;
Chortens are impermanent –
    And scripture too decays.

Chortens moulder on the hillsides,
    Chortens crumble on the plains,
Chortens tumble from the ridges;
    The lotus flower fades.

Chortens teach what chortens know –
    Each teacher makes it plain –
Chortens must be raised anew...
    Lest wisdom too decay.

June 6th 2010; Oriental Guest House, Leh, Ladakh