trouble

I've had a few people say they are having problems with my blog.
So am I, some of the links - previous post and the comment form etc seem to be broken. However I think the comment form will work as long as you using the URL for the post and not the home page. As far as I can tell it is something to do with Blogger changing the URLs of blogs so they are geographically correct, I hope so. 
Because the other possibility is that I have finally managed to change my template so much that I have royally fucked it up. Anyway I'm going to wait a few days to see if it rights itself and if not then I guess I'll have to start again with the design.
Meanwhile if you do experience problems would you please let me know, either here or via Twitter or G+, there are links to my profiles on both in the sidebar.

In other more important news major panic descended on my house this morning.
On Thursday I posted an application form to be a host family for foreign language students, I have a spare room sat there sad and empty that could be occupied by a sexy young man earning me few quid, and a friend who already does this suggested the idea.
At the moment I'm in the middle of a few DIY projects, and that includes a few little jobs in said spare room.
Not least of all removing all the useful items crap I've stored in there.
But, I figured it'll take a while to get a student and I have a day off next Friday as I have to go somewhere in the morning, so I thought I could do it then as that's effectively a three day week-end. I also need a few things for the room - you have to provide bedding etc, but I'm watching some on ebay.

This morning I get an email "Hi Cowgirl, thanks very much for your application. At the moment we have students waiting for accommodation, so can we come and see the room Monday evening as we can provide you with a tenant straight away".

Fuck.
So much for the relaxing week-end I had planned.
I've spent the day doing that thing where you try and do ten jobs at once and just end up confused and knackered.
And tomorrow instead of sleeping until 3 a little lie in I have to go shopping for bedding, towels and a lamp. And I fucking hate shopping. They better send me a buff young man after all that.
And breathe.

Son has been getting in the way helping, well taking orders. But in the course of sorting the room out I was putting rubbish in a carrier bag, and we then decided to go downstairs for a coffee and fag break. When I went back up to the room I found this . . .

That is not what I call helping.

The students also have to have an evening meal provided.

Well you can just rent the room, but you don't get as much money, and I figured we have dinner every night anyway so I may as well. However the reality of this is just beginning to dawn on me.

I do like cooking, I love having people round for dinner and when I'm in the mood there are certain things I can manage to not incinerate do quite well.

When I first thought about doing this I suppose I imagined it would be like having a friend for dinner every night. Yeah. Right. The reality of that is I'd soon get fed up.

And while I say I can cook, I have six recipe books.

Five of which are about cooking with chocolate.

I hope the student likes pudding and cake.

And isn't on a diet.

Speaking of which I am very happy to report that I have now managed to lose 10lb.

And that is without going on a proper diet, I have just been walking to work from the train station a few times a week and not stuffing my face with chips and six chocolate bars every night trying to eat healthier. I don't plan to be turning this into a weight loss blog. Boring. But if I get to where I plan to, that is a couple of stone less, I might post a before and after picture. Just as an incentive for myself to stay that way, and maybe then I can post a non-photoshopped below the neck realistic picture on the dating site too.

I will leave you with a couple of pictures that were sent to me.

A friend of mine took the first one, she actually saw this in Tesco.

No amount of clubcard points could make me want to buy that.

And I really cannot believe that whoever wrote this outside a pub did not realise exactly how it could be interpreted.

I'm off, I have two tons of crap to put out with the rubbish before the cat gets his paws on them.

This really wasn't a post was it ? I just wanted to let you all know about the blog problems really, but I can never just get to the point.

But in case you came here hoping to read something interesting or funny I'm gonna do you a favour and suggest you go and read this. Funniest post I've seen in ages.

I hope your week end is more fun then mine is turning out to be.

ps Any HTML experts out there fancy designing me an all-singing all-dancing shiny new template ?

Update : Fed up with people saying they can't comment. I LOVE the comments so changed back to the old template and the links appear to work for me. I guess it was me caused the problem.
Who woulda thought ??
Note to self : Knowing how to read some code does not make you a programmer.  
Could a few of you please test them for me ? 

read me

My sister asked me to order my niece a Kindle as she hasn't got an amazon account.

I actually didn’t know what it was until then.
Now I keep seeing the adverts for them on the TV, clearly meant to demonstrate how convenient they are but the bit that concerns me is the woman on her bike with it in the basket on the front.

Aren’t you supposed to be watching where you’re going ?
Who in their right mind is gonna be reading a fucking book whilst riding a bike.
That’s just asking for trouble, if I get run over by a demented bookworm on a bike I’m gonna sue Amazon.

And yes, in case anyone thinks I’m stupid I do realise that the point of that is to show how portable the thing is…..Wow ! How original.
Yeah ‘cos nobody ever realised you could take a book anywhere did they.
Thing is I know what I’m like when I get my nose stuck in a good book, I don’t want to put it down. However the fact that I need my hands to ride a bike and/or hold a book means that I can’t do both at the same time.
Now if only someone would invent a hands free book…..oh wait….yup, bad idea.

What are they gonna invent next - a device to install Kindle on your Sat Nav ?
Oh sorry Officer, I didn’t see the little old lady crossing the road because Harry Potter was just about to kiss Hermione.

Personally I don’t think a Kindle can ever replace a real paper book.
I love to read a good story but there is also something about the smell of a new book, or even an old one.
And no matter how old fashioned it becomes I will never tire of thumbing through pages.

I still have some of the books I read with Son when he was little, had they been on a hard drive no doubt by now the files would’ve been deleted and replaced or lost on a crashed device.

I plan to read those books with my granchildren one day.

I really don’t see how a small grey electronic screen could ever replace a brightly illustrated children’s book.
Kids learn the stories through the pictures and that is the first step to reading, associating words with pictures and then beginning to mentally connect sounds with letters.


You’re never going to do that unless you can capture and hold their attention and I don’t think a Kindle will do that for a three year old.
It doesn’t do it for me and I’m way past the age when I need pictures in a book to follow the story.

Well unless it’s porn.


As much as I appreciate the technology available now I do think that we are in danger of losing out. It’s nice to get emails but for me there is still something special about a hand written letter that can never be replaced.
I had a friend that died in the tsunami in Thailand and I have a letter that she wrote to me whilst travelling. I treasure that letter, had she sent me an email I might still have it saved but I would not see her writing or be able to hold something she had touched and keep it in my box of memories.

I’m sure that servicemen and women appreciate a handwritten letter far more then an email too. I know you can recieve an email the minute it's sent, as long as you have access to your email account of course. But you can’t carry it with you or keep it under your pillow and read by torchlight if you’re feeling homesick, lonely or just because you want to. And if you have childen who are too young to use a computer they can't send you a scribble or a drawing by email.

The other thing that concerns me is whether having access to so much technology is actually going to have an adverse effect on the education of our children. Who needs to learn to spell correctly when spellcheck can do it for you, or when you and your mates converse lyk dis.
There was no text speak until teenagers all got mobile phones.

When there is so much information readily available online at any time will we get to a point where people think there is no need to actually learn anything, other then how to turn a computer on in order to ask google. I suppose that isn’t always a bad thing, I have to be honest here and say that nowadays if there is something I want to find out it’s usually the first place I look. However there is also a lot of misinformation on the internet, any idiot can have a website and put whatever garbage they want on it.

Fuck sake even I have one now, and look at the amount of crap I put on it.

But I do worry that we are too reliant on the new gadgets and in danger of forgetting basic skills.
Many years ago I worked in a nightclub and we had to total up the cost of drinks in our heads, and give out the right change. And the rule was if your till was out by more than a pound you were sacked. Our tills were usually spot on to the penny when cashed up at the end of the night.
Nowadays you wouldn’t even need to enter an amount - just press the button for the drinks ordered and the till does it for you, any idiot could do it.

Last week I was in the Supermarket and there were two young lads in front of me, as they were getting served they asked the shop idiot assistant if they would be able to use their cards to pay half each.

When their bill was totalled it came to £104.50. She said
“that’s ….ummm…..errrr…….” after two very painful minutes one of the lads said,
“£52.25”… to which she replied,
“are you sure ?” and got a pen and then spent another two minutes trying to check.

Fucking hell, how thick ?
Even I worked that sum out the minute she said it and I am SHIT at maths.
I was trying not to laugh, as was one of the lads but when I caught his eye he had to turn his back.

Clearly you don’t need any level of even the most basic education to work in Tescos, which is good news for the dumbasses of the world I suppose. But where is the incentive to learn to add up in the first place if you always have a calculator to do it for you.

Fine I suppose until your batteries run out.

Or there’s a power cut.
Then you’re screwed.

I'll just get a candle and read a book.

shrinking planet

I’m still amazed by the internet.

This fact has occurred to me again since the addition of the globe visitors map I put on my page. Each of those little dots represents someone who has stopped by to read some, if not all, of what is written here. I find that pretty incredible, without the internet that would never happen, how could it ?
But thanks to the world wide web there are people in what to me are far flung corners of the globe who know something about me and are aware of my existence.
I don’t know why I like that thought quite so much, but I do, and I appreciate the time they have spent here. The world certainly is getting smaller every day.

The thing I really love about the internet is the idea that you’re never truly alone. As I’m writing this it’s 5pm on a Sunday, I’m sat on my bed with a coffee and my laptop and in between writing I’m conversing with a few friends on facebook, my msn is on and there’s a couple of people popping in and out of chat there. Apart from one person I don't see any of them very often - yet cyberspace enables me to regularly keep in touch. I’m also an insomniac and I really appreciate the fact that if I can’t sleep there is always someone to talk to.

I have friends that I have made online from all over the world, I know some people might say that someone you’ve never met and are not likely to is not a real friend but I’m inclined to disagree with them, there have been times when I’ve told these relative strangers things that I might not share so easily with real world friends.

If you’re that extra bit removed from someone’s life it can make it easier to be non-judgemental, and sometimes a different persons outlook and perspective on problems is all you need to see things differently yourself. And it’s fascinating just to hear how different peoples lives are elsewhere on the planet from them rather then watching it on tv.

In some ways I think the internet is a great equalizer. It doesn’t just remove geographical barriers, the differences between our social standing, economic status, age, race and sexuality that separate us in our communities and daily lives become irrelevant. I am the sort of person who will talk to anyone, but without the web my circumstances and surroundings limit that.

And as for internet shopping......I’m beyond impressed that I can go to Asda.com at 4am, pick what I want and the next day it’s delivered.
I actually did all my Christmas shopping online last year too, I may be the exception where females are concerned but I HATE shopping at the best of times, never mind when there is all the extra hassle and short tempered customers in December, but thanks to my Vaio I avoided it all.
Actually I do think it’s quite true that you can get anything you want online, all you need do is enter the right keyword and google will find it for you, and that's preferable to negotiating shops and crowds to me.

There have been times when I’ve been pondering some bizarre question or other, or been involved in a discussion and wanted facts to back up what I’m saying, and it’s all there just for the looking.
Of course whilst you can filter out adult content and spam, and scan for Trojans and spyware, I’ve yet to see a bullshit filter so it does pay to exercise caution over some of what you might find.

I suppose it’s my age showing really, younger people who have grown up with the technology are so used to it always being there they take it for granted. But I can remember when a long distance phone call, to my cousin who lived in the North of England, was an expensive novelty that I was only allowed a couple of times a year.
As a child we didn’t even have a telephone in our house, in fact we only got one after my parents split because my mum then thought it might be wise to have ‘in case of emergencies’ as she was the only adult in the house.

I remember, I think I was 17 at the time, a friend telling me that her parents were going to get a video, which meant that you could watch cinema films on your tv, and us both being totally amazed that this was even possible.
When this wonderful machine arrived it was the size of slab of concrete and weighed about the same, but we were mesmerised by it, and spent hours being more impressed by the fact that we were watching movies at home then the content of them.
That is until the day Ellie found the one featured in the above illustration in her parents room, we were highly amused by that.

As a child I loved Star Trek, still do really (apart from Voyager...just sayin'), and my favourite thing was the ‘communicators’, at the time it seemed so far fetched yet nowadays everyone’s got a mobile phone, which is the same principle to my mind - no matter where you are you can be spoken to, well unless there’s a poor signal.
But even Spock and Kirk would occasionally have difficulties communicating because of some inter-stellar interference. I hope it’s just a matter of time before I can transport myself off to some tropical beach in a few seconds and I’m planning to clear out the spare bedroom ready to install a holodeck.

I once watched an episode of the twilight zone where a man from the past time travelled to the present and was scared to see aeroplanes in the sky. 
I can only imagine where technology will take us 100 years from now - space travel I guess, and I’m only sad that I’m not going to be around to see it.


Beam me up Scotty.