I think that if I received this as a present, I would probably destroy it the very first morning.
Getting up in the morning is hard but getting up to play hide and seek with a stupid alarm clock is not something I'm prepared to do. 
This website is actually quite special.
Does anyone know why?
I'm not telling yet.
As much as we complain about the NHS, it could be a lot worse:
...most Americans are unaware that the United States is the only country in the developed world that doesn't already have a fundamentally public--that is, tax-supported--health care system.
That means that the United States has been the unwitting control subject in a 30-year, worldwide experiment comparing the merits of private versus public health care funding. For the people living in the United States, the results of this experiment with privately funded health care have been grim. The United States now has the most expensive health care system on earth and, despite remarkable technology, the general health of the U.S. population is lower than in most industrialized countries. Worse, Americans' mortality rates--both general and infant--are shockingly high.
I know that the Canadian public health care system has problems which are very similar to those experienced by the NHS, but at least is there.
An island so remote that there are only four pictures of it in Flickr.com. More pictures can be found here.
It's a small place but has learnt a long time ago that it needed to control its population to guarantee its survival.
Tikopians practice an intensive permaculture system similar in principle to forest gardening, and the gardens of the New Guinea highlands. Their agricultural practices are strongly and consciously tied to the population density. For example, around 1600, the people agreed to slaughter all pigs on the island, and substitute fishing, because the pigs were taking too much food that could be eaten by people.
Somebody travelled to Tikopia.
I always wonder about this type of news.
The lives of elderly hospital patients are being put at risk because nurses do not always have the time to feed them, according to a survey by Age Concern. Nine out of 10 nurses - out of 500 questioned - said they were sometimes too busy to help older people eat and drink.
Age Concern said 60% of these patients were at risk of malnourishment or deteriorating health. Those aged over 80 had a five times higher risk of malnutrition than those aged 50. Malnourished patients stay in hospital longer, are more likely to develop complications after surgery and have higher mortality.
from the Guardian
Today everyone talks about this but come on we can't pretend to be surprised. Anyone who has been to a hospital or has had a relative in hospital (I guess some hospitals are better than others, what I've seen and heard in London is pretty grim) would have known this already.
And now there are even less nurses around.
I would like to add another issue here. Elderly people that have to stay in hospital longer than necessary because their local authority fails to provide day care and cannot be discharged until something is provided for them. This is definitely a problem in my area for people that are too ill or disabled to look after themselves.
If they can look after themselves a bit, the opposite happens, they are discharged far too quickly to free up beds. Quite often NHS and the local authorities spend more energy and resources into trying to establish that it is not their duty (or not part of their targets in their current speech) to provide care for someone instead of doing something constructive. And for those put into care only 44% of homes meet standards.
I find that something is wrong when a society seems to focus only on people that can consume and produce. Maybe I'm just old-fashioned.
As it's a Bank Holiday Monday it feels like a Sunday evening. Sunday evenings are boring.
Have a virtual dog.
Have a look at these very hyperactive cats.
Check to see which celebrity looks like you.
Weird.
I'm not sure about this. For £12.99 you can buy a laptop cover that looks like a takeaway pizza box. So people with bad intentions think it's a pizza and won't mug you. First problem is to make it look real you have to carry it like you'd carry a pizza and that's quite uncomfortable. Secondly when we see someone carrying a pizza box called Power Pizza we know it has a laptop inside. Thirdly are we so sure that there are no people prepared to mug someone for a pizza?
I've found this video on YouTube which I thought was interesting enough to share. It's Little Red Rooster with Eric Clapton. I'm generally not a fan of Eric Clapton but I have to admit this is quite outstanding.
As we are on the subject, tonight at 8 o'clock Radio 2 will broadcast the Stones concert of three days ago in Scotland (where apparently Keith Richards smoked on stage). I love live music, nearly any music as long as it's live, so I will give it a try.
Today another search engine appeared, it's called Wink. It gets the results from Google but users can tag and save results directly, so it combines Google with Deli.cio.us. It seems that search results will be affected by how many users bookmark the links.
I would have found it a lot more useful had I not used Deli.cio.us for so long and therefore have a large link collection, there is a way to import bookmarks though.
Yahoo has also startes something very similar.
I know there are services like this available where you can store all your bookmarks and favourites from several sources but I'm getting more and more confused, there is too much around and I'm not a very organised person to start with so I'm struggling to find a way that works but at the same time I'm so curious to try every new service that comes out.
This is a very long American article. It starts with how Sparta famous for having mastered the art of war had a few rules. Countries like the USSR, US and Israel have failed to learn from history.
I'm not a historian or particularly erudite but I could see before the Iraq invasion how things were going to go. I still don't know whether they are just that dumb or they have some ulterior motives that I'm too stupid to see. It cannot be just for oil, there could have been less expensive and bloody ways to guarantee an oil supply.
They have certainly managed to break all three of Sparta's war principles and that, as history teaches us, is very dangerous.
The madness started a long time ago. Perhaps, as Israel's invasion empowers the very organizations it was supposed to destroy, and as America's invasion of Iraq draws us closer to a systemic breakdown, and as our repeated attacks teach the world's military small fry how to drive mighty armies to despair, perhaps now a growing universal disgust will bring an end to the sickness of the quick, convenient military solution. We would have done well to adopt the Spartan injunctions, or some version of them: 1) don't let your enemies become too familiar with you, 2) beware invading a people who considers itself freer without you than with you, and above all, be cautious in wishing for war as you might get what you wish for.
How ironic and tragic that even one of the most successful and highly militaristic states in history actually can teach us today about humility and the judicious use of force, when it is we who should be looking back at them and shaking our heads at their single-minded barbarism. And yet it is we who are making the Spartans look good.
It's The Magic Roundabout.
Le Manège Enchanté (known in English as The Magic Roundabout) was a children's television programme created in France in 1963 by Serge Danot. Around 500 5-minute-long episodes were made and were originally broadcast from 1964 until 1971 on ORTF.
However, it was in the United Kingdom, where it became best known. The English version was narrated by Eric Thompson, from 18 October 1965 to January 1977. This version of the show attained cult status and was watched as much by adults for its dry humour, as by the children for which it was intended.
The British (BBC) version was especially distinct from the French version in that the narration was entirely new, created by Eric Thompson from just the visuals and not based on the script by Serge Danot that accompanied the original animations.
The first BBC broadcasts were stripped across the week (shown at 5.40pm, just before the early evening news each day), which was the first time an entertainment programme had been transmitted in this way in the UK. Since BBC1 did not start broadcasting in colour until November 1969, the series was seen only in black and white in the UK until then.
52 additional episodes, not previously translated, were shown in the UK during 1992 by Channel 4. Since by that time Thompson was no longer alive the job of narrating them in a pastiche of Thompson's style went to Nigel Planer.
It's sound advice but then someone can take it too literally:
Feline tobacco use was spotted by a viewer in two Tom and Jerry episodes shown regularly on Boomerang, a children’s cartoon channel owned by Ted Turner’s CNN organisation.
A list of touristy places that should be avoided because they are tourist traps.
They are mainly in the US with only 4 European places making the list. Unsurprisingly two are in London, the Changing of the Guard and Madame Tussaud's which I think are places that appeal to American tourists anyway. The third is in Dublin, the Guinness Storehouse and the last one is the Leaning Tower of Pisa in Italy.
Any others not in this list?
Another survey: this is not serious and somehow I've only found it reported in South African and Australian online papers.
Basically it confirms that British women fancy firemen and British men like nurses.
But what really intrigued by was that 1.7% of women fancied politicians. John Prescott again? Politicians score better than milkmen while men are not really keen on traffic wardens.
From the BBC website
Cows have regional accents like humans, language specialists have suggested.
They decided to examine the issue after dairy farmers noticed their cows had slightly different moos, depending on which herd they came from.John Wells, Professor of Phonetics at the University of London, said regional twangs had been seen before in birds.
The usual Guardian/ICM poll published yesterday shows once again how unpopular this government has become.
What it's actually worse is that the majority of people do not believe what the government says. Not a huge surprise as I have not met a single person who does for a very very long time.
Tony Blair keeps saying that there is no connection between Iraq and Afghanistan but:
72%, including 65% of Labour voters, think government policy has made Britain more of a target for terrorists. Only 1% of voters believe the government's foreign policy has made Britain safer, a devastating finding given that action in Iraq and Afghanistan has been justified in part to defeat Islamist terrorism.
The findings will shock many at Westminster who had expected Labour to gain ground following John Reid's high-profile handling of the alleged plot against transatlantic airlines. Carried out over the past weekend, following the series of terror arrests, the poll shows voters do not believe the government is giving an honest account of the threat facing Britain. Only 20% of all voters, and 26% of Labour voters, say they think the government is telling the truth about the threat, while 21% of voters think the government has actively exaggerated the danger.
A majority, 51%, say the government is not giving the full truth and may be telling less than it knows. That finding comes despite a newly introduced system of public information warnings that saw the home secretary downgrade the threat level from critical to severe.
I've decided to explore more my avatar and I've found quite a few interesting things.
Meerkats actually go to school.
LONDON: Humans aren't the only smart species to educate their young. Meerkats in South Africa's Kuruman Reserve were found 'teaching' their young how to obtain food. The methods employed by these animals were quite in line with the basic principles of teaching, a team of researchers observed.
But these cute animals also have a very dark side.
You are free to adopt one if you like.
Meerkats have their own soap opera called Meerkat Manor. I'm not sure they actually watch it. Above is a video extract.
They also take part in commercials.
Lots of meerkats pictures.
This is a whole documentary about social co-operation in animals and includes meerkats.
And finally we have Michael Portillo that seems to have become an expert in ethology in a radio program about:
Michael Portillo goes in search of natural despots and finds them in some surprising places. Meerkats have the reputation of being cute, timid animals. Their social structure, however, is much more sinister. Over millions of years evolution has honed these animals to find a group solution to surviving the rigours of desert life in South Africa.
This is a hybrid between Google Maps and BBC news feeds.
Basically you see the latest news where they happen in the UK.
I've not thought of any practical use yet.
Metropolis
Nosferatu
Freaks
M
Battleship Potemkin
The Kid
Modern Times
L'age d'or
A virtual tour of Macchu Picchu with a local tour guide. You need to navigate the map on the right to find spots of interest.
It might not be the same as being there but I don't feel I'm making things worse:
The ancient Inca city of Machu Picchu is in danger of becoming a victim of its own popularity. Built around 1460 and discovered by American historian Hiram Bingham in 1911, the breathtaking and well-preserved mountain ruins have become Peru’s most popular tourist attraction, drawing half a million visitors every year. The site’s 200 buildings, located in a geological fault zone, are in a precarious position to begin with. Constant foot traffic has made matters worse, wearing down and destabilizing the ancient stone foundations. Development near the site is exacerbating the problem of landslides, which threaten to dislodge Machu Picchu from its alpine perch. To stem the tide, Peru recently limited the number of visitors to 500 per day and closes the site for one month every year to repair damaged trails. But that may be too little too late.
Full article about other endangered tourist destinations.
I've found this online gallery (in Finnish) that has some unusual and surreal art.
1. Have a painting that illustrates your mood
Unfortunately the masterpieces cannot be saved but I used Irfanview to take a screenshoot and save it.
2. Create polls for your blog.
4. Create a magazine cover with your picture on it.
5. Create a logo for your blog.
6. Create a slogan for your blog.
7. Create a new title for your blog.
8. Create a graffiti for your blog.
9. Create your animated 3D avatar.
10. Become a pope.
11. Create a surreal quotation.
I've still have to come to terms to that woman on the radio that makes a living organising parties for dogs. Now it's getting worse we have holidays for Teddy Bears.
I don't own one but even if I did I doubt I would send it on holidays. This is worrying.
These two websites should give anyone a serious cuteness overdose.
Nice piece of animation called Monalisa descending a staircase.
If you look it up on Wikipedia, Algeria's official language is Arabic. But apparently other Arabic speakers need an interpreter to understand everyday speech.
Almost five decades after independence from France in 1962 and following a decade-long Islamist insurgency, Algerians employ an everyday speaking style as mixed as their identity and history.
The linguistic jigsaw puzzle reflects the many civilisations that have occupied the North African country - Phoenicians, Romans, Byzantines, Arabs, Turks and French.
In a recent speech, President Abdel Aziz Bouteflika, said "when other Arabs listen to someone mixing Arabic, Berber and French, they say he's Algerian. It's become our trademark!"
Bouteflika, in sympathy with traditionalists, says he would like Algerians to speak better Arabic.
Understanding Algerian speech is not easy.
In a single sentence, the subject might be in Arabic, the verb in French, the predicate in Berber or Turkish.
I never cease to be amazed by the amount of stuff you can find on the web. I keep saying I feel overwhelmed because I do. I admit that I've found many things extremely useful and my life would now be severely affected without my internet connection. I've not been in a bank for donkey years and I rely on it to find information that I need to make decisions in life.
But one of the most endearing aspect of the web is the opportunity it gives me to waste time on websites that contain information which am very unlikey to ever use in all my life.
This is one example how to count up to ten in over 5000 languages. I did not even know there were over 5000 languages.
