Thursday, 24 February 2011

Keep it real

Nice item from South West News the other day, spoiled only by the needless insertion of the word huge: http://dlvr.it/GwP39

Apart from the fact that this sort of adjectivalising is irritating in a news story, the thing isn’t massive – it’s a pretty modest size for a fridge freezer.

Aspiring reporters please note. Also remember: for a cheap laugh, it’s often worth soliciting comments from the police because they can be so twattish.

PS: Fair play to this bloke, I say, for transporting his domestic appliances withut the use of fossil fuels. Let's see more of it.

My own efforts in this area are pathetic by comparison - limited to sticking a skateboard under the fridge/freezer/washing machine when it needs moving from room to room or garage to house. It does work really well though; you can steer it, apart from anything else.

Wednesday, 23 February 2011

Data runs wild

It seems the age of gathering information is at an end. It just doesn’t sound sufficiently 'business speak'-like, even for people you wouldn’t expect to be immersed in business bullshit.

This morning on the radio the British High Commissioner in New Zealand said officials were 'capturing data' about UK citizens who might have been caught up in the earthquake.

Regrettably for the English news media, no data about fatalities or serious injuries to British nationals seems so far to have been captured.

Sunday, 13 February 2011

Yes we can

Some expressions don’t stand the test of time because of changing technology.

“You can’t put toothpaste back in the tube”, for instance. That dates from the days when it came tin tubes (well, it was probably not tin but an alloy, I expect).

With plastic tubes, you can reintroduce a certain amount of toothpaste. It is only necessary to squeeze the tube in such a way as to create a potential vacuum, drawing the unrequired toothpaste back in.

I think it's important that people know this. Otherwise, having heard people say "You can't put toothpaste back in the tube", they might needlessly be discouraged from attempting so to do. There's too much negativity around.

Tuesday, 8 February 2011

Bookmark this just in case...

You can go looking for anything you need online these days, and sometimes you find really useful info just by accident.

Here are some top tips I gleaned on several topics (don’t give me a bad time about spelling, grammar etc – these excerpts are a straightforward cut and paste job):

Piles
One in every three households is looking for the best hemorrhoid home treatment to cure their condition. The symptoms are no laughing topic.
Make sure to drink lots of liquid, at least six glasses throughout the day. This is essential when increasing your fiber diet which has a tendency to puff up and absorb a lot of moisture. Include caffeine-free beverages as well as whole fruit and vegetable juices as part of your liquid intake. Softer solid wastes make it easier to eradicate your bowels.

Chicken coops
Folks possess a misconception which building hen coops is really a challenging job. For many people, creating a chicken coop is actually too difficult. It's an agreeable proven fact that chicken coop creation is not easy. Nevertheless, with the correct Plans for chicken coops as well as right resources, anyone may become an expert within chicken coop building.

Success with women
While going out on dates, be a gents, open the door for her and keep your attention on her. One rule to ALWAYS follow when on a date, never stare at other women when you are on dates. This will convince a girl that you are a player and she will eliminate you at the end.
I will leave you with one of my best secrets and techniques on how to convince a girl and keep her coming back to you. After a couple dates, shock your girl by taking her to get here feet and nails done.

All these from a website called SANE PR, a title which on this evidence seems to be a bit of a misnomer.

Sunday, 6 February 2011

Luxury I can't afford

It's no secret that I like a glass of wine, and that I have been known to cross the threshold of Majestic from time to time.

The Majestic connection is the only thing I can think of that might explain why the postman has delivered me a fat glossy brochure from a company called Spiral Cellars, who specialise in coming to your home, excavating a large hole in the floor and installing a lavish mini-cellar with spiral staircase, accessed by a large glass (or wood) hatch in the floor which will certainly impress your friends. It is designed to hold (by my standards, anyway) quite a large number of bottles.

I say large, but everything's relative, obviously. The smallest cellar in the range holds 650 bottles, which may not be a huge number but comfortably exceeds the largest total routinely to be found in our garage - maybe 20 or 25. I can appreciate the convenience, though. As one happy customer testimonialises:

"We used to keep our wine in a temperature-controlled warehouse. It became hard work always having to think ahead about what wine to have delivered to the house to drink in the short term, and in quantities of full cases. Now I have everything in one place, and a wine for every occasion to hand. What's more, the money I save on warehousing and deliveries means I have more to spend on wine."

The money saved might also, of course, help you to partially recoup the cost of the project, which appears to be upwards of £15,000 or so. How quickly the effect of the saving might be felt would obviously depend on your household's consumption of wine. Of course getting through the amount required to make a truly significant saving might leave you struggling to assess what the saving might be - or to get to a handle on anything else, for that matter.

I don't think I can afford to be taking this idea up. I mean, the suggestion is already offered in this household, from time to time, that I appear to be an alcoholic. What assessment of my character might result from a decision to go in for one of these?

If you can afford it: http://www.spiralcellars.com/