Friday, 21 December 2007

3 steps forward & 2 steps back! (Update)

Well if you dont know by now or read earlier blog, I have a problem with my left hip & have done for over 18 months. This is on top of a disability I have had with left leg for well over 15 yrs.
I went to see Specialist after he tried over a month before an injection to relieve the problem which wore off 2hrs later. Even tho' injection wore off, it was a success. Well at least to the specialist, as it has now shown roughly what is wrong. Specialist told me its 1 of 2 things! 1st it's a lump on the ball part of the hip socket or 2nd, a tight muscle attached to the socket so it's in tension & overstretching when moving. This is great to me as they now know what to look for, now the bad bit! They wanted to do a 3D scan of the ball socket, then send me to another specialist who an expert on both problems.

Well they had done a 3D scan of the ball socket & sent me to another specialist who is an expert. This Specialist was then to decide on how to go about fixing the prob. But once I got there to see this Specialist, it all changed!
The Specialist has reviewed my scan & wanted me to have an X-ray there & then, so I did. When I saw him again, he decided that the problem isn't my hip but a Bone Cyst. Now this was dismissed 2 yrs back coz it was small. But now been told its grown & still growing & is across more than 1/2 of the cross section of the bone. Thus the pain & left untouched the bone will snap!
So I went into Hospital few weeks later for an injection to kill it & shrink it. The injection didnt work, so now its the operation!
They are going to cut out the Cyst, take bone off my Pelvic area as a bone graph which they mash up & inject back into where they removed the Cyst. And because of this, theres not much to hold me up in this cross section (25%). So they have to pin the bone together to stop it just snapping!
Completely threw me at the time, not what I was expecting! But now I had time to think, I just need to get on with it & let them do whats needed! I cant leave it be for it will get worse & break. But I am kinda reluctant to the idea of the op & bone graph!
Now as you can understand I'm not to happy with this news, coz until its sorted my leg is not only in pain but can snap with any force against it (No Jumping!) lol.

UPDATE

Well Xmas is coming up & I now have a date for Op'.
Its in January & I'm in a slight flap preparing for not only for Xmas but the op too! Apprehensive atm too, biggest op i've had too!
But if you look at the pic in the Picture Album named Cyst, I've circled the cyst & you can see why it needs to be done!

Tuesday, 4 December 2007

Well I’ve finally done it!!!

Well I've done it, I finally got my 1st Tattoo!!!
Now to answer those questions as to how it felt, yes it does hurt.
But not much, more like a slight discomfort that after an hour you be glad to finish! lol
If you want a look, its in my picture abum


If you were wondering where its from, Jules designed & paid for it for my Birthday & I love it!

Thursday, 5 July 2007

EU do have a sense of Humour!

If you cant see it, heres the link! This is an actual EU advert thats been discusssed if appropriate for the EU & has been agreed it is as theres not been any complaints! I wonder why? lol
http://youtube.com/watch?v=SpXVOE1n-MY

Monday, 2 July 2007

Waitrose shops for next generation of customers

OH Please! Supermarkets are now following the trend of Myspace & others like it! Read below! Cant they think up something new than copy other??

Retailer's web site revamp will include social networking tools

Supermarket chain Waitrose is planning to add social networking functions to its web site to allow shoppers to swap recipes and chat on message boards.

The retailer wants to encourage the one million people that visit its web site each month to debate topics such as organic food and to trade culinary tips.

Users will also be able to upload recipes and pictures with their homemade dishes as part of the £1m revamp of the web site.

The Food Forum will allow users to discuss important food topics such as maximising seasonal produce to turning an existing recipe into a signature dish, says a Waitrose spokeswoman.

'Those keen to access step-by-step video demonstrations on how to improve skills and techniques will also be able to do so at the click of a mouse,' she said.

A new generation of retailing is approaching, according to online retail analyst IMRG, with rich media content, interactive web sites and Web 2.0 initiatives to improve the online shopping experience.

Tesco.com has already announced its intention to introduce such features to its web site, starting with the addition of an interactive map to locate stores, and more community involvement.

Waitrose will announce the re-launch of its web site on Wednesday, which will include new simple navigation, more comprehensive nutritional information and online answers to common questions.

The Waitrose.com site will remain separate from its online shopping site Ocado.

The company has an archive of 4,500 recipes on its web site and plans to add 20 new ones each month. Users will be able to create their own e-scrapbook of recipes, complete with notes.

Thursday, 24 May 2007

Apple fury at iPod sex toy (why??)

Apple must be a bunch of prudes! I would of thought any good adverts that mimic theirs would help sales as well as Ann Summers! lol

Have a read & a laugh!

Apple fury at iPod sex toy

Lawyers fight iGasm vibrator

iPod-maker Apple is threatening to sue a sex shop over a vibrator that hooks up to an iPod and has similar advertising to that used in posters for the digital music player.
Apple is demanding that stores remove all posters for the gadget, called an iGasm.
OPINION: APPLE ISN'T FUN ANY MORE
"We hope this request to remove it immediately will prevent us having to consider further action," said Apple lawyers.
The Ann Summers neon-pink ads feature a sexy woman with wires coming out of her iPod and into her knickers, teasing "Go at it hard and fast with a pounding drum 'n' bass track or chill with ambient classic."

iGasm ann summers
The iGasm advert
Apple lawyers claim the poster is a blatant rip-off of its famous iPod silhouette images.
The News of the World newspaper reports Ann Summers boss Jacqueline Gold saying: "Perhaps I can send them an iGasm to put a smile back on their faces!"

Wednesday, 9 May 2007

Oncoming Death of the Audio Cassette

Yup its true, been in the papers & on Computer magazine Web pages. Our well used & still needed Cassette is gradually getting the boot! I know we all use CD players, MP3's, but how many of ya still go a cassette deck at home & use it as well as one in the car? So have a read to the new I copied from a webpage!
Guess we are being herded to Disks like the shops did with the VHS!
"It was a product we all grew up with and loved but it seems that Curry's has finally bowed to digital pressure and called time on the audio cassette tape.
The electrical retailer has announced that it will be destroying the cassette legacy and many memories by outing the product to make more room for its digital cousins such as iPods and mp3 players.
The decision by the retailer follows the decline in cassette tape sales from 83 million in 1989 to just 100,000 last year.
The store will also phase out tape decks by Christmas, which are currently available in less than five per cent of audio equipment.
However, the cassette family it seems will die a slow death.
Currys will continue for now to sell existing stocks of cassette tapes, but these will not be replenished giving the products a shelf life of at least 18 months.
Peter Keenan, managing director of Currys, blamed the company's decision on the rise of "today's mp3 generation [which use] just a few clicks of the mouse to achieve what's arguably a better outcome".
Mike Floodgate, development executive for the Radio, Electrical, and Television Retailers Association (RETRA), agreed.
"There has to come a time where some technology isn't used enough to warrant selling it's components," he told Computeractive. "If it is no longer being used and not needed by people then it is the right decision for Curry's."
"Maybe five years down the line the same conversation about video will come up, the fact is that once people don't need things they have to be taken off the shelves," he said.
However, Floodgate had some good news for those who can't quite part with losing the nostalgia of lovingly making a compilation cassette tape to impress the opposite sex and memories that sounds of chewed tapes emitted - often like you had dunked the singers head under water.
He said: "Some of our members might continue to continue to sell this product as they are independent of the big retail stores and have their own client base."
Currys is not the first to stop selling the cassette and its components, last year both Woolworths and HMV pulled the plug on tapes after they saw public interest in the products was dwindling.
At its mid-1980s peak 900 million cassettes were sold a year. This was largely due to the way people could record off the radio without any risks of being tracked down and fined for digital rights. However, it seems that day and age has well and truly gone – look out CD's and videos your time might be limited too."

Wednesday, 21 February 2007

Twelve-steps to curing e-mail addiction! ( Oh pls!!! LOL )

PHILADELPHIA, Pennsylvania -- Alcoholics have one, and so do drug abusers. Now people addicted to e-mail also have a 12-step program designed to tackle their obsession.
An executive coach in Pennsylvania has devised a plan to teach people how to manage the electronic tool, which some users say can be as much an intrusive waste of time as it is fast-paced and efficient.
Developed for cases such as a golfer who checked his BlackBerry after every shot, and lost a potential client who wanted nothing to do with his obsession, Marsha Egan's plan taps into deepening concern that e-mail misuse can cost businesses millions of dollars in lost productivity.
"There is a crisis in corporate America, but a lot of CEOs don't know it," Egan said. "They haven't figured out how expensive it is."
One of Egan's clients cannot walk by a computer -- her own or anyone else's -- without checking for messages. Other people will not vacation anywhere they cannot connect to their e-mail systems. Some wait for e-mail and send themselves a message if one hasn't shown up in several minutes, Egan said.
The first of Egan's 12 steps is "admit that e-mail is managing you. Let go of your need to check e-mail every 10 minutes."
Other steps include "commit to keeping your inbox empty," "establish regular times to review your e-mail" and "deal immediately with any e-mail that can be handled in two minutes or less but create a file for mails that will take longer."
Egan says she hosts no 12-step meetings but is planning a monthly teleconference for "e-mailers anonymous."
Michelle Grace, an insurance agent in Lehighton, Pennsylvania, said she receives up to 60 messages a day and uses Egan's program to make it less time-consuming and less stressful.
"E-mail had me by the throat," she said. "When you can't find what you need, then it becomes a problem."
Now that her e-mail is transferred -- some manually and some automatically -- into files, Grace said she spends less time hunting for them.
On average, workers who receive an e-mail take four minutes to read it and recover from the interruption before they can resume working productively, Egan said.
She also recommends checking e-mail not more than three or four times a day.
Some employees resist the lure of e-mail during the regular workday, only to find themselves putting in extra hours at home to clear the backlog, she said. One of Egan's clients said he had 3,600 messages in his inbox.
Part of the problem is senders who copy messages too widely and are too vague in their subject lines, so recipients don't know what they need to open right away, Egan said.
For Grace, relief from her e-mail addiction means she is not checking her computer every five minutes.
She said she has let her colleagues know that if they need to reach her immediately, e-mail is not the way to do it.
"I told them, 'If you need me urgently, pick up the phone,'" she said.
---------------------------------------------------------------
Following are the 12 steps of a plan devised by executive coach Marsha Egan in Pennsylvania to teach people how to manage their e-mail:
  1. Admit that e-mail is managing you. Let go of your need to check e-mail every ten minutes.
  2. Commit to keeping your inbox empty.
  3. Create files where you can put inbox material that needs to be acted on.
  4. Make broad headings for your filing system so that you have to spend less time looking for filed material.
  5. Deal immediately with any e-mail that can be handled in two minutes or less but create a file for mails that will take longer.
  6. Set a target date to empty your in box. Don't spend more than an hour at a time doing it.
  7. Turn off automatic send/receive.
  8. Establish regular times to review your e-mail.
  9. Involve others in conquering your addiction.
  10. Reduce the amount of e-mail you receive.
  11. Save time by using only one subject per e-mail; delete extra comments from forwarded e-mail, and make the subject line detailed.
  12. Celebrate taking a new approach to e-mail.

Tuesday, 20 February 2007

Senders of indecent electronic mail to land a place on sex register (You gotta read this crap!)

Amendment to sexual offences act now includes harassment via electronic communication

Members of the public sending emails or texts with sexual connotations could earn themselves a place on the sex offenders register under changes to existing laws.

The new amendments which came into effect this week will focus on schedule five of the Sexual Offences Act 2003, which prosecutes offences which are not primarily sexual in nature.
Under the new amendments any phone calls, text or voice messages that are seen as sexual harassment could result in a sexual offences prevention order (SOPO).
Anyone with a SOPO will also be automatically placed on the sex register which has been designed to monitor and control the behaviour and risk posed by said sex offenders.
However although this new change will bring electronic communication firmly into the Sexual Offences Act of 2003 it is not the first time people will be prosecuted for an electronic communication crime.
Under the Communications Act 2003 the improper use of a public email network is already forbidden and anyone sending a message that is "grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character" will be prosecuted according to the law.
So does that mean we all going to be on the register for sending sexual referenced communications to those who know us??
I'm one for protecting the ones at risk, but come on! How many of us have done it, sending sexual referenced messages like comments on Myspace?

Saturday, 17 February 2007

Tips for Handling Telemarketers

Tips for Handling Telemarketers, something I love doing to them! lol
(1) Three little words: "Hold On please..."
Saying this, while putting down your phone and walking off (instead of hanging-up immediately) would make each telemarketing call so much more time-consuming that boiler room sales would grind to a halt. Then when you eventually hear the phone company's "beep-beep-beep" tone, you know it's time to go back and hang up your handset, which has efficiently completed its task. These three little words will help eliminate telephone soliciting.
(2) Silent Calls...
Do you ever get those annoying phone calls with no one on the other end? This is a telemarketing technique where a machine makes phone calls and records the time of day when a person answers the phone. This technique is used to determine the best time of day for a "real" sales person to call back and get someone at home. What you can do after answering, if you notice there is no one there, is to immediately start hitting your # button on the phone, 6 or 7 times, as quickly as possible. This confuses the machine that dialled the call and it kicks your number out of their system. Gosh, what a shame not to have your name in their system any longer !!!
(3) Junk Mail Help:
When you get "ads" enclosed with your phone or utility bill, return these "ads" with your payment. Let the sending companies throw their own junk mail away. When you get those "pre-approved" letters in the mail for everything from credit cards to 2nd mortgages and similar type junk, do not throw away the return envelope. Most of these come with postage-paid return envelopes, right? It costs them more than the regular 24p postage
"IF" and when they receive them back. It costs them nothing if you throw them away! The postage was around 29p before the last increase and it is according to the weight. In that case, why not get rid of some of your other junk mail and put it in their postage-paid return envelopes. For example; send an ad for your local chimney cleaner to American Express. Send a pizza coupon to Citibank. If you didn't get anything else that day, then just send them their blank application back! If you want to remain anonymous, just make sure your name isn't on anything you send them. You can even send the envelope back empty if you want to just to keep them guessing! It still costs them 24p.
The banks and credit card companies are currently getting a lot of their own junk back in the mail, but folks, we need to OVERWHELM them. Let's let them know what it's like to get lots of junk mail, and best of all they're paying for it...Twice!
Another thing the Royal Mail are doing now, is to stuff local adverts through your letterbox. I collect them and put them in their own Post Boxes. Good fun! Let's help keep our postal service busy since they are saying that e-mail is cutting into their business profits, and that's why they need to increase postage costs again. You get the idea?
If enough people follow these tips, it will work!

Another example of American Justice

Got this in an email & thought you would like to read it!
This is the ideal definition of true justice.
A Charlotte, NC, lawyer purchased a box of very rare and expensive cigars, then insured them against fire amongst other things.
Within a month of having smoked his entire stockpile of these great cigars and without yet having made even his first premium payment on the policy, the lawyer filed a claim against the insurance company.
In his claim, the lawyer stated the cigars were lost "in a series of small fires"
The insurance company refused to pay, citing the obvious reason, that the man had consumed the cigars in the normal fashion. Ther lawyer sued.....and won!
In delivering the ruling, the judge agreed with the insurance company that the claim was frivolous. The judge stated, nevertheless, that the lawyer held a policy from the company in which it had warranted that the cigars were insurable and also guaranteed that it would insure them against fire, without defining what is considered to be unacceptable fire, and was obligated to pay the claim. Rather than indure lenghthy and xostly appeal process, the insurance company accepted the ruling and paid $15.000 to the lawyer for the loss of the rare cigars lost in the "fires"
NOW FOR THE BEST PART
After the lawyer cashed the cheque, the insurance company had him arrested on 24 counts of ARSON' With his own insurance claim and testimony from the previous case being used against him, the lawyer was convicted of intentionally burning his insured property and was sentenced to 24 months jail and a $24.000 fine.
This is a true story and was the 1st place winner in the recent Criminal Lawyers Award Contest.
ONLY IN AMERICA! NO WONDER THE WORLD THINKS THEY NUTS!!!!

Saturday, 10 February 2007

We are all Doomed!!!!

CANCER UPDATE FROM JOHN HOPKINS HOSPITAL , U S - PLEASE READ

Please circulate to all you know, Cancer update -- John Hopkins --
Cancer News from John Hopkins:
1. No plastic containers in micro.
2. No water bottles in freezer.
3. No plastic wrap in microwave.
Johns Hopkins has recently sent this out in its newsletters. This information is being circulated at Walter Reed Army Medical Center as well.
Dioxin chemicals causes cancer, especially breast cancer.
Dioxins are highly poisonous to the cells of our bodies. Don't freeze your plastic bottles with water in them as this releases dioxins from the plastic.
Recently, Dr. Edward Fujimoto, Wellness Program Manager at Castle Hospital , was on a TV program to explain this health hazard. He talked about dioxins and how bad they are for us.
He said that we should not be heating our food in the microwave using plastic containers.
This especially applies to foods that contain fat.
He said that the combination of fat, high heat, and plastics releases dioxin into the food and ultimately into the cells of the body.
Instead, he recommends using glass, such as Corning Ware, Pyrex or ceramic containers for heating food. You get the same results, only without the dioxin. So such things as TV dinners, instant ramen and soups, etc., should be removed from the container and heated in something else.
Paper isn't bad but you don't know what is in the paper. It's just safer to use tempered glass, Corning Ware, etc.
He reminded us that a while ago some of the fast food restaurants moved away from the foam containers to paper. The dioxin problem is one of the reasons.
Also, he pointed out that plastic wrap, such as Saran, is just as dangerous when placed over foods to be cooked in the microwave. As the food is nuked, the high heat causes poisonous toxins to actually melt out of the plastic wrap and drip into the food.
Cover food with a paper towel instead.
Oh well, guess we all should ban Microwave foods, as if!!!!

Saturday, 20 January 2007

Just when you think you are over your ex!

I was having a good day today, cold finally gone, aches receding a bit now the cold has gone. etc, etc, etc..........
Then someone I know emails me a section of a Blog. Supposedly from my ex-wife Blog page. So I read it, didn't like what I read so went to her website & yup there it is! No I'm fuming! So here is the bit I'm fuming about!
"It is hard to explain, even to myself I guess, why it is different this time - why I can say this love feels stronger then others that have gone before. I do not deny I loved the others - but if I am honest, I think I was in love with the idea of being in love with them, more then I was in love with the person involved - maybe THAT is the difference this time, I have given myself time to get to know him a little first. There is still much for us both to learn, but there is plenty of time for that, all I know is there is a connection there, something that was lacking before has been satated, the hunger in my heart. There is more to this story, but for now, that is all you get - be patient, as I have to, the rest will come in time."
Now if you don't know why, well simply put it's this bit "but if I am honest, I think I was in love with the idea of being in love with them, more then I was in love with the person involved", I can't believe she said that!! We got married, I gave her everything & I'm still paying off the f'ing debts from it all! Now if that's how she felt, why the f**k did she marry me in the first frigging place? Now it mean all my heartache & loss of her leaving me for another was all for nothing!!! We never rushed things; we were together for near on 3 yrs before the Wedding! She had plenty of time to stop things moving on if she felt that way!
Well now I know how she feels, the gloves are off now. God help her if she tries to contact me because I feel nothing for her anymore! And she will get all the anger I had held back over the yrs. So if anyone who reads this knows the both of us, just tell to stay out of my life!!! She has broken too many promises & told too many lies for me to care anymore, for now I will not honour the promises I made to her all those yrs ago for the way she has been to me!
I am so tempted to phone her & call her every name under the sun, but I wont sink to her level! I could do alot of damage to her but wont, I just want shot of her & enjoy my life with what I have now!
So now I am watching DVD's & drinking Mulled Wine, half of which is now gone! Trying to calm down! She is no more a part of my life! I am happily looking to a better future & now my past is my past! No more ghosts to haunt me!
It is the New Year for me & so much has changed already before it, now I'm spring cleaning my life so it's ready for what's ahead! She has hurt me for the last time! Now it's time for me to work out where my life is now! For the way things are, it sure isn't here in Farnham!
So here's to the new future! New Life! New near on everything I guess! I'll wake up in the morning regretting my actions tonight with the Mulled wine, but not anything else!
So here's to 2007, a new beginning!
P.S. Sorry if this seems a long winded, just needed it out of my system!!!