Innit Though?

Back In The Real World Again...

2011-12-01T07:44:00.003+01:00

Sorry for the lengthy silence - a combination of generator troubles, fuel prices, internet access difficulties, dead computers and real life getting in the way of the virtual thing have all conspired to while away a huge chunk of time... Still, I can get online once or twice a week for an hour or so most weeks at the moment so I have nothing to complain about!One of the hazards of having joined so many online communities over the years is that, as though leaving one blog fallow for years at a time wasn't bad enough I seem to be neglecting several blogs littered around the information highway. That being the case, I will split my latest ramblings between said blogs, if I can get access to them, that is.

You can imagine what I've been going through ever since I managed to wreck my second beautiful Vasari marine computer upon which my freeware password-keeping application, Multipass v2.2 by Franck Priola of GBSoft (http://gbsoft.free.fr) disappeared with the rest of my data, over a year and a half ago, apart from a period with no computer, when I finally did acquire one I had to start the interminable process of asking every site of which I am a member for my password, a toil as yet unfinished, before I could do anything. Why? Because I didn't back up Multipass to some external place of safekeeping, that's why! As Richard Bach said in his lovely book Illusions, "You teach best what you most need to learn" and if anyone should have known better it was surely me after all these years!If you want to hear more of my drivel when you're done here you'll find some advice I recently gave an artiste/lyricist starting his career at my MySpace page...

Meanwhile, amongst other things, we now have a second cat aboard the good ship Leopard Normand III... six-month old Honey Bun looks remarkably like Sweetie Pie did at his age although you wouldn't think it imaginable if you saw the great hulking brute now! This newcomer joined the crew a couple of months ago and was in a dreadful state but is fast becoming a sleek and handsome young creature. It seemed only fair to saddle the new kitten with a name just as silly as the existing cat was obliged to tolerate but, it has to be said, they both live up to their names admirably and are firm friends already.

We are still anchored off Palmanova in Mallorca, enjoying the plentiful supply of secondhand books available from several outlets within walking distance amongst other things. Unfortunately, the only way I can get WiFi access to the Internet is by going above decks which is frequently difficult in the winter months, what with rain and chilly winds, even when there is enough power available to allow use of the laptop, so I haven't updated any of my sites in ages, let alone my book site. One of these days...

What I need is a sponsor or two - a portable solar panel manufacturer with something that would power the secondhand Packard Bell EasyNote Argo C that I picked up for a hundred euros a few months ago and someone who manufactures a WiFi booster that would let me pick up the signal from the saloon of this fabulous schooner, both of whom want enthusiastic publicity for the joys of using their product aboard a yacht at anchor...If anyone you know answers that description feel free to point them at me, on Twitter for example (@linnetwoods) where I have a reasonable number of followers who would be very interested to hear how these items perform! If necessary, I would even rejoin FaceBook to spread the word further, although I have enjoyed a long holiday from their auspices...

Speaking of performance, which I was a moment ago, I must try and acquire a new battery for this laptop... the current incumbent is definitely underperforming...In the absence of sponsors, I will have to limp along like this until I win the lottery or get to grips with purchasing goods online. Since I don't buy lottery tickets and have been refusing to own a credit card for the last few decades (ever since I chopped up the first one I was sent, in the days when banks were embarking on their quest to enslave every man and woman in the world by tempting them with goods they didn't need and would still be paying for long after they were defunct) either outcome is fraught with difficulty, without even mentioning the fact that I live 600 metres offshore and have to make complicated arrangements to collect anything!

Ooh! I wonder if the gift vouchers representing my accumulated commissions at Amazon come to enough to get those things from them? Must look into that immediately! Meanwhile, if you'd like to hear an outpouring of thanks for gifts gratefully received from friends and acquaintances, amongst other things, it's over at one of my other blogs.... I'll come back on that one...

Identity Crises

2009-07-14T00:50:00.004+02:00

It is beyond my comprehension why British politicians waste so much time talking about implementing an identity card scheme for the UK when, surely, it would make a great deal more sense to simply make it a legal requirement for all Britons to hold a passport.

The technology and infrastructure for the production of passports is already in place. Citizens could simply be compelled to acquire a passport upon reaching the age of 18 if they did not already have one; young offenders could be issued a passport as part of their processing and so on.

In order to spare people from having to carry the passport at all times, it could be agreed that a plasticated photocopy of the page containing the photograph and other personal details of the holder would be sufficient for the purposes of being identified in the street, provided that the individual were able to produce the passport itself on demand i.e. could go with police to their home to fetch it or produce it at a police station within a given period.

This is already done in several countries and seems to work perfectly well. Citizens would then have a passport ready if they wished or needed to travel at any time as well as being able to identify themselves. It seems obvious to me, but perhaps I'm missing something? What, I wonder, could that be?

Shame On Spendthrift Governments

2009-07-11T12:18:00.001+02:00

What a mind-boggling thought: Apparently, rich countries spend seven times more subsidizing their agriculture than they spend on aid to poorer countries which could supply the produce needed far more cheaply and support themselves by doing so.

This would be bad enough if the money being wasted in this way belonged to the governments that are wasting it but it doesn't.

That money belongs to the taxpayers of those countries who entrust it to their governments in the belief that they will do the best possible job of distributing and investing it.

The Cruel Irony Of It All!

2009-07-05T13:36:00.003+02:00

In my youth, I was advised by pretty well everyone with whom the topic ever came up, from my family to well-intentioned total strangers, to put as much of my income as possible into pension plans for my old age.

For various reasons, I ignored their admonitions and, apart from making the contributions required by law from self-employed persons in the UK whenever they weren't being dealt with by employers, I chose to enjoy my money while my youth and vigour was at it's peak.

When asked how I would manage in my old age, my response was that I would simply have to live within whatever means my state pension provided or, in the absence of that, starve to death - we all have to die somehow and at least I would know that I had enjoyed my life to the full on the way there.

The vast majority of those who shook their heads at my foolishness, whilst entrusting their funds to financial institutions in the belief that they would be available later, and with interest added, were sacrificing much of their pleasure in the present so that they could enjoy it at some future date.

Now, aged 55 and still enjoying the present, albeit temporarily on a constricted budget, it gives me no pleasure to see that most of those who have survived thus far are now in exactly the same position as me, in terms of the future, in the wake of the disastrous behaviour of so many of those financial institutions in which they had placed their trust.

Unfortunately, whilst I have at least enjoyed the past to the full, they don't even have those kinds of memories to enjoy. The irony is not lost on me but I dare not ask them what they think about my stubborn intransigence on the subject now.

People In Glass Houses

2009-06-25T14:45:00.001+02:00

One can, to a certain extent, sympathize with the view, held by more than a few people of our acquaintance, that Britain's government is being hypocritical in criticizing that of Iran over the quelling of protests in the matter of the recent elections there.

Whether the election was fairly run or rigged is one matter but whether the use of force in quelling potential riots was acceptable is entirely another. Under the existing British Labour government, peaceful protesters have regularly been treated with violence by police, including the appalling beatings meted out to the Countryside Alliance protesters against the ban on fox hunting, respectable and mainly middle-aged or older people who were doing absolutely nothing to deserve it.

The Countryside Alliance supporters had marched to Westminster without incident and some were standing still, unarmed and showing no indication of intent to cause trouble of any kind. One respectable and pleasant-looking lady of a certain age was smashed across the head with a baton before our very eyes - more shocking than most of the things I have witnessed in a life that has been spent witnessing shocking sights with alarming regularity.

Interestingly, although we happened to see that event live on television, it did not appear in the news the next day, or ever again and is not even on YouTube.

The current prime minister of Great Britain, Gordon Brown, is an unelected leader, irrespective of whether he is a good one or otherwise. A Britain promised a referendum over a matter of national importance discovered it had been lied to when the referendum never happened and the government of the day did exactly as it pleased.

What, exactly, gives the British government the right to pass comment on current events in Iran, I wonder?

The Elevator Trick

2009-06-01T13:58:00.002+02:00

Today is an exciting day for me and I feel like a teenager all over again (provided I avoid reflective surfaces that might remind me I'm not) with all the optimism and trepidation that accompanies launching something one has created out into the world.

My little e-book The Elevator Trick has been available for purchase for a few hours now and it is impossible to describe the glow that accompanied the discovery that people have already started buying it!

When Karen Redman aka @RedMummy, the only person to have received an advance copy, tweeted an unsolicited endorsement of my little e-book, The Elevator Trick, containing the secret of relaxing and getting off to sleep at will, a technique I have successfully taught quite a few people over the past 27 years, I was thrilled!

Someone asked me why I was charging a modest fee for a download of the book instead of giving it away for free. It's a fair question when there are so many free e-books available on endless topics but I have no problem in explaining why this e-book is not a 'freebie':

In my current financial situation I cannot afford to give away the product of almost three decades of experience anyway but, much more importantly, most people only value what they have had to pay for. How many free e-books contain anything truly valuable? How many people actually read most of the free e-books that are thrust at them from all sides?

Several people on Twitter advised me to charge far more than the price I had decided upon and maybe they are right but my 'gut' instinct was to stick with the price of a couple of cups of espresso coffee and that's what I've done.

If you are an insomniac, tense, stressed, nervous or just have the occasional difficulty in dropping off to sleep, my little e-book The Elevator Trick was written for you. Enjoy!

An Open Letter To Police Forces

2009-05-21T13:56:00.005+02:00

Before I say anything else, I would like to make it very clear that I do not consider myself to be any kind of social media expert or 'guru' - just someone who has been online and talking to people long enough to have learned a thing or two that might be helpful.

The only thing I want to say right now is that police forces and others hoping to gain assistance from the public and who open Twitter accounts need to realize that it is vital to follow back anyone and everyone who follows you on Twitter if you are hoping to get people to come forward with information. It is just plain common sense!

If you use TweetDeck or a similar application you can set it up to alert you with a sound when someone sends you a Direct Message and keep it running in the background while you get on with your other computer work.

Most people will not be willing to tweet publicly to say that they know something that could help you solve, prevent or catch someone in the act of committing a crime but they might well be willing to send you a Direct Message (DM).

If you tweet publicly every time you need people to give information, saying where and when the event in which you are interested occurred, in time people will learn to look and see if you have enquired about something of which they believe they have seen or heard something that might help you.

If you all work together, you can forward information to one another and harness the real time power of public communications to improve many aspects of your working day. You could also engage, in public tweets, with those who are still clinging to the hope that to serve and protect is the aim of the vast majority of policemen; to make friends with those who have nothing to fear from you and to let those who should be afraid know that the tide is turning in favour of law and order - because it will, if you will only embrace and utilize social networking properly.

Help Me To Help Patricia Zglinski. Please!

2009-05-16T15:26:00.001+02:00

A lot has changed since I last posted to this blog. I have built a Twitterhood website and been adding neighbours and neighbors to it gradually. People seem to like it and I am very glad of that!

Amongst the population of the Twitterhood, now about 9,500 people strong, so it's a virtual sizeable village or small town, is Patricia Zglinski, a disabled writer who cares for her mother, an Alzheimer's patient, and whose father, Ralph D'Esposito, has just been sent home from hospital with terminal lung cancer.

To try and help raise the funds for the impending funeral costs, Robbie and I have committed to contributing 20% of income from paid links and donations on the Twitterhood site and Patricia has set up a ChipIn widget to which contributions can be made directly by those who wish to donate direct. It would be a personal favour to me if you would, please, contribute something, no matter how little you can afford. Thank you.

Signed, Sealed and Delivered In Error

2009-05-09T01:27:00.001+02:00

It fascinates me that many European politicians have just involved themselves in getting the killing of seals banned almost completely without, apparently, thinking about the fact that they have just voted to ensure that the competition for the world's dwindling fish stocks heats back up again.

These people want to be able to have childern and grandchildren, all of whom will need to eat and, at the same time stop other creatures that are competing directly for the same foodstuffs from being culled.

Please don't misunderstand me - I would like to insist that no creature's life be sacrificed so that mankind might thrive - especially now that so much of mankind has become so utterly vile. Since I have no living children and never will have any, I am plagued by no conflict of interests in this matter. I can afford to want all living creatures to have equal rights with me.

If I were a parent, matters would be very different. I would be obliged to weigh up the importance of protecting other living creatures against the importance of seeing to it that my offspring flourished and it doesn't take a genius to know which I would choose.

A compromise would have been sensible. The Inuits should have been offered a means of killing seals painlessly - lethal injection perhaps - not told to let all seals live and accept the fact that their own starvation would probably result before too long.

Letting all those seals live will soon result in seas devoid of fish and the seals will respond by starving slowly, just as the Inuits are expected to do in order to save the seals for a slower demise later.

Just as the fox hunting ban was imposed by people who had no idea what the whole thing was about and how much worse things would become for everyone in the countryside, including the average fox, as a result of their meddling, so now the seal-hunting ban will bring misery upon man and beast alike.

To Filter Or Not To Filter on Twitter

2009-05-02T12:00:00.002+02:00

What follows started out as a comment on the blog to which the title of this post is linked but I decided to remove it and post it here instead as i I wanted to share it with you:

Perhaps I'm just weird but I refuse to filter anyone or any type of tweet out - if I don't like the things someone chooses to talk about enough of the time, I will stop following them. If I'm not interested in a particular topic being discussed by people I like, I just ignore the conversation.

What happens if you are filtering out someone's tweets is that you may be unaware that they are saying things you do not wish to be associated with or appear to endorse by following the person. Your reputation is at stake here.

Several people I have followed have suddenly revealed themselves to be racist or in some other way abhorrent to me after having seemed perfectly acceptable people for a while and, because I was allowing all their tweets to flow down my All Friends stream, I have found out almost immediately it happened.

Having spotted a 'bad' tweet, I have been able to disassociate myself from the person straight away, either by un-following if it was simply not to my liking or blocking if that person ought not be allowed to express such views publicly (incitement to violence, for example) in my opinion.

By all means use filters but, at least, be aware of the risks you take by doing so...

Advice To Those Under Attack On Twitter

2009-04-30T10:43:00.003+02:00

Last night, something of a fight broke out between two people whose views were at odds. Unfortunately, it escalated to the point where the more reasonable of the two lost his temper and was drawn into acting almost as obnoxiously as the provoker. Although I was not following either of them, a third party asked me to advise on the best way to limit the damage done to the reputation of the provoked party. With a little luck, it would seem that, like most storms, it appears to have passed into history rapidly.

While the incident is fresh in my mind, I thought I'd post the advice I gave to the nice chap whose temper had been temporarily lost, to share it with anyone else who might benefit from it...

In general, I would think of Twitter as a local pub with various bars in it – if some obnoxious creep, like @racistfascist or @rantingbigot, is throwing his/her weight about in the first bar you walk into, turn on your heel, shutting the door behind you (un-follow him/her) and try another bar.

If the creep tries to follow you into the next bar, lock the door (block him/her) and if he/she shouts through the window at you (uses your @name so his/her messages still get through even though you’ve blocked him/her) complain to @twitter publicly and go to Twitter Help to fill in a support request.

Unless you came to Twitter looking for a fight, don’t let people draw you into one – by all means argue for your opinion in a measured way but don’t let people talk you into getting hot under the collar. Life’s too short for going on missions to change people by arguing with them. Set a good example and let them see how much happier your way makes you than their way makes them...

Plenty More Fish In The Sea? I Think Not

2009-04-26T14:26:00.002+02:00

Once again, a depressing program about the declining fish stocks of the world, and how fishermen are chasing down the few that are left in a desperate attempt to feed their families, has just been broadcast on BBC Radio 4.

Subsidies that enable the fishermen to keep going in spite of poor catches should be being spent on sending them out to feed fish or release new stocks into the seas with strict instructions not to engage in any fishing operations whatsoever until the stocks have had time to recover. It beggars belief that governments do not appear to see that.

This is a subject close to my heart, as a sea-dweller who has watched the fish stocks of the world decline before my eyes over the past few decades, as anyone who has read my blog before will know.

Another problem that has long besieged the world is that of finding ecologically sound ways of disposing of used car tyres. Experiments with building reefs out of used car tyres have turned out disastrous as chemicals leaking from the materials used in their manufacture kill all in their vicinity. Now, off Florida for example, operations are underway to remove the tyres as fast as possible and send them to be burned. It beggars belief that these projects were undertaken without the possibility of this outcome having been considered beforehand.

Meanwhile, many are the times we have come across lines of garbage and used bunker oil, jettisoned at sea by large ships, presumably to save money on the removal of those items at their ports of call. We have sailed through such vile pollution several times when crossing the Atlantic in both directions and, more recently, in the Mediterranean. Fishermen could be paid to patrol the seas and report on these activities, resulting in ship owners being fined for their desecration of the seas. It would not be that difficult to work out where lines such as those I have described came from - by measuring their set and drift one could narrow down to very few the ships that could have been responsible for them.

We have visited beaches in remote places that were entirely covered by several feet of plastic containers, mainly drinking water bottles and plastic bags, in various stages of the process of breaking down. Years later, those same beaches have an increased depth of plastic on them - the original layers are still there, underneath later additions. Fishing boats could be deployed to collect floating plastic before it gets far enough out to sea to kill turtles and wind up on the other side of the world.

The question is whether anyone in a position to do something would really care enough to give these ideas any thought if I were able to reach them in the first place. Sadly, I doubt it.

The Cattle Herders

2009-04-18T16:19:00.000+02:00

It would appear that a great many so-called Internet 'gurus' and 'experts', who have latched onto social networking as a means of spreading their nets wider, are unaware of the meaning of the word 'social'.

One of the obvious indications is a huge discrepancy between the number of people following them and the people whom they are following. Designed to give the impression that a large number of people are interested in their 'expertise' whilst the 'gurus' themselves are far too important to grace their devotees with a follow, these numbers are achieved by following people in large numbers and then unfollowing them, repeating the exercise until a large enough 'following' has been achieved.

Another sign that the meaning of 'social' is lost on these individuals is the fact that they tend to indulge in monologues, preferring to do all the talking rather than engage in conversation. They retweet what others have said about them but rarely what others have said to them. They include links to their slick sales pages as often as they dare.

Some of these people have brought their techniques of building enormous lists of people to whom they can pitch their wares onto Twitter, for example, on the basis that a handful of the unwary amongst a large enough group of people is a profitable enough quantity and it doesn't matter if their activities make the Twitter experience less enjoyable for others along the way.

A raft of artificial follower-gathering schemes has cropped up, most started by people who ensure that they themselves only follow a small handful, to create the illusion of being some kind of elite. Some of these schemes involve following a set number of people whose names appear on a list, regardless of whether they are interesting in any way, and adding ones own name to a similar list. It is forbidden to leave anyone out and so people involved in those schemes tend to be surrounded by people with no personal interest in other people at all.

Some of these people, I have followed since they first joined Twitter and, in spite of seeing that they are involved in such schemes, have continued to follow, just to see what they will do. In 90% of cases, they are being followed by a couple of thousand people after three months of trying but are sending out messages to the effect that joining the schemes to which they belong will bring one a following of 30,000 in three months... Cattle-herders I call them. Well, they would be if most of us were willing to be the cattle but, fortunately, many are getting wise to the idea and choosing people to follow on the basis of interests shared rather than agreeing to take on all and sundry in exchange for an artifically swollen follower group consisting of thousands who are not in the slightest bit interested in them or interesting to them.

Freedom of Speech

2009-04-09T19:19:00.002+02:00

Recently, an extremely unpleasant element has surfaced in various places on the Internet, including, I am sorry to say, Twitter.

When people complain at the vileness of what these people say, the response is always a claim to 'freedom of speech'.

Whilst I believe in freedom of speech to a great extent, in that I think one should be at liberty to express religious, political and philosophical beliefs which do not imply that harming anyone is a good idea, I don't consider unlimited freedom to place cruel, hurtful or dangerous material in the public arena a good idea at all.

Apart from the danger that children will read things that forever alter their world view for the worse, those who feel compelled to write such material might do well to consider whether their writings might inspire people with mental disorders to act in a manner which could bring pain to other living beings, seeing those writings as justification of their urges.

Writers of cruel and nasty material might also ask themselves what terrible flaw is within them to bring about such an unpleasant character trait and seek help with finding a path to a life with more light and love in it and less darkness and hatred.

At the very least, people who want to publish vile material for others who also wish to wallow in foulness should be aware that they may be causing more terrible things to happen than they would do themselves - there is no question that people who hear a thing often enough tend to end up believing it to be true - and might consider using private channels to share their thoughts, rather than those where the vast majority who see them would rather not have done and a tiny minority might take them as permission to commit abominations.

Power Struggles

2009-03-03T12:56:00.002+01:00

It never rains but it pours, as the old saying goes, and we seem to be having at least our fair share of problems lately! Yesterday, whilst checking to see whether anyone had responded to a comment I left on someone else's blog, I discovered that a very unpleasant individual, whose abuse on Twitter is mentioned in my last post, had started stalking me around the Internet.

This person had been posting unpleasant responses to whatever I said and using any opportunity to malign me and several others of my acquaintance. Whilst I was engaged in contacting blog owners to request that they take a look and decide whether they wished to continue hosting such nasty comments, our main generator decided to break down.

Having ascertained that it would not be a simple matter to get it going again, Robbie started the small standby generator, hoping that the larger one had brought our service batteries up to a level at which the rather potent 'smart' batter charger would be able to continue filling them without demanding too much power.

Unfortunately, this turned out to be impossible and finding out involved the smaller generator, usually able to supply enough power for the fridge, small appliances and/or the saloon heater, breaking down as well! By this time, darkness had fallen and we decided to wait for daylight before seeing what could be done.

It is now mid-day, pouring with rain and the sea is throwing us about as though we were a toy duck in a bathtub occupied by two energetic children, making even standing up a chore. We have to smile at the discrepancy between how some people imagine 'living the dream' to be and what is happening right now!

A mini-inverter is supplying power to this little notebook computer from the 12 volt battery bank at the moment. The larger generator appears to have suffered the same fate as its predecessors and will have to go back to the store which has already replaced it three times. Robbie is fairly sure he can get the smaller generator running again and that will supply the 12 volt battery system, allowing me to continue using this mini-notebook computer but it doesn´t have enough 'pop' to run the main computer which I have been using to build a website for a client and update my own websites.

Unfortunately, until the sea calms down a little, fixing even the small generator is likely to be very difficult and, given that there is no emergency - we're at anchor - it is pointless attempting it under these conditions. A cold wind is howling here so the heater would have been nice, but Robbie filled a small stone bottle we keep for the purposes with boiling water and I have it on my lap with a blanket keeping the heat around me, so things could be far worse.

Once the weather improves a little we will have to take the larger generator ashore and make the trip across the island again. For now, we have enough 12 volt power to keep this little notebook going provided I don't overdo it.

Now the question is whether to attempt to do the Twitterhood Quiz today. With this notebook I could host the quiz and announce the winner but probably wouldn't be able to update the results straight away although I will be working on that possibility too once I have tweeted a link to this post so that the curiosity of anyone on Twitter who wants to know why I have gone so quiet may be satisfied...

Things could be far worse - oh that these were our only problems! Still, to go out the way I came in, riding on a cliché: it is said that what doesn't kill one makes one stronger!

Tornado in the Twitterhood

2009-02-28T15:39:00.001+01:00

Friday 27th February 2009 will not be remembered by me with a great deal of pleasure for two reasons. It was the day that I found myself caught up in a storm of abuse from fans of two British football clubs who called me a Nazi and a liar in public on Twitter.

That day was also the occasion on which we celebrated the life of Tom Brubaker, a dear friend who passed away a few days earlier and who will be remembered fondly by many, not least for his wonderful Yiddisher humour.

The storm on Twitter started the night before, when a lady tweeted an urgent prayer request for 22 missionaries whose execution by Taliban was imminent. Naturally, I retweeted this message, as I do all such requests by calling upon prayer warriors of all denominations to include these missionaries and their captors in their prayers.

It would appear that a British football fanatic who was following me saw my retweet, looked for information on his usual news sources and, finding none, accused the lady of deliberately lying and racism.

When I returned to Twitter on Friday morning, it was to discover that this person had not only heaped abuse upon the lady directly but had then started working his way down the list of people who followed her, maligning her in tweets to them. Naturally, the lady was distraught at this and I sent four Direct Messages (private tweets) to the abuser, asking him to desist and apologise.

There was no response but the abuser then turned his attentions on me and I found myself similarly under attack. My suggestion that he read the DMs sent earlier was met with refusal on the grounds that it is "snide to hide" obliging me to address the issue in public, which I did.

To the abuser's insistence that the lady had invented the whole story, I responded that he might wish to put '22 missionaries Taliban' into a search engine and see a blog article dated 25/2/2009 which, whether correct or not, would have given most people the impression that the story was true. Parallels were drawn, within the blog post with an earlier incident, involving a similar number of missionaries.

My point was that the lady had acted in good faith on the basis of what might well turn out to be a rumour but there was no way she could have known that. Failure to report such an event in the news might have been the result of a decision to avoid allowing the press to be used as publicity tool thus rewarding such actions.

There ensued the most horrible series of abusive postings, both on Twitter and twitpic, the abuser deliberately ignoring the article to which I had referred, insisting that there had been no recent mention of any such action and calling a series of people, including me, liars and Nazis along with a great deal of profanity. Looking at his profile I noted that the website he had included a link to was that of the official Arsenal Football Club.

My efforts to reason with this, presumably mentally unwell, person were to no avail and I was obliged to block his account, a thing I never do lightly since it is a serious statement about someone and it is usually enough simply to 'unfollow' someone who has become unpleasant so that one no longer sees what he, or she, has to say.

Unfortunately, due to an oversight in Twitter, in spite of having blocked someone, it is still impossible to avoid reading anything they tweet that starts with one's user name! Various people, including me, urgently requested that this person's account be suspended and it was done fairly swiftly, though not before he had had time to abuse a few more good people.

Having been ashore to meet Tom's brother Herb, who had flown in from Washington DC, his daughter and various other friends of Tom Brubaker to give his life a send-off that he would consider fitting - sharing wonderful memories of time spent with him and affirming his place in all our hearts - I returned to Twitter in the evening and prepared to host the daily Twitterhood Quiz at 22:00 UST.

It was mentioned that the abuser's account had been suspended as a result of pressure from so many complainants and that, I thought, was the end of that. How wrong I was about that became evident halfway through the first question when tweets from a female follower accused me of being a liar and a Nazi and having victimised the abuser by getting his account suspended.

Being somewhat busy at the time, I decided to retweet these abusive messages and then ignore them while I got on with gathering up responses to the quiz. It seemed to me that this would both let others know that I was having to pick the answers out from amongst a new source of abuse and, perhaps, indicate to her that her statements were not being taken personally nor given any credence by me.

Before long another source of abuse joined in and, from the style they contained it was immediately obvious that this was the morning's abuser using another account. This time, the link included in the profile was to West Ham United Football Club's official site. That account is still functioning as I write but, for whatever reason, the abuser has fallen silent, at least for the time being.

To cut a long story short, I was on the verge of abandoning Twitter, in favour of returning to my pleasant and peaceful solitude, after one or two people had tweeted me quite rudely about the situation, when a great many others offered their support and words of great kindness, causing me to remember that it would be a shame to throw the baby out with the bathwater, so to speak.

A mechanism needs to be added to Twitter which prevents tweets of any kind from people whose accounts have been blocked by a user appearing in their tweet stream. It must be possible to write a string of code which links the act of blocking an account to a refusal to allow even @replies from that account to appear.

Failure to do something about this will be to allow blocked abusers to carry on unabated and people like me will not stay around long to put up with that sort of thing. Most of the women in my group understood instantly why I felt it necessary to stand up to the bullies and defend others in the group from their attentions.

Quite a few men, on the other hand seemed to be in favour of putting up with it, which I found fascinating. No wonder so many women are losing respect for men when so many of them have become lily-livered and cowardly when faced with unpleasant situations. Nobody is suggesting they become aggressive but standing up for oneself politely is not aggression, it is having healthy self-esteem.

Standing up for others perhaps less accustomed to dealing with difficult people is not 'trying to be the police' but looking out for others in one's social circle as one might hope they would do if the situation were reversed. When people follow me they honour me with their presence and they deserve better than to be left to cope unsupported when attacked simply for having chosen to associate with me.

What I do find surprising is that those football clubs allow themselves to be associated with people who can do their images nothing but harm. This is the first time I have realised that there is a very good reason for monitoring just who is suggesting that there is a relationship between themselves and oneself and taking steps to prevent any misunderstandings by, at the very least, publishing a statement to that effect somewhere with high visibility.

An Idea To Die For

2009-02-16T17:24:00.002+01:00

There was an item on BBC radio online today about the idea of using papier-maché coffins to save trees. This is one of the most brilliant and exciting ideas I have heard of in quite some time, for several reasons of which I will expound on a couple here.

Obviously, saving trees is very important to me - perhaps if less trees are needed for coffins, more broad-leafed varieties could be planted to help oxygenate the planet and restore some of the beauty we have so carelessly axed.

Setting aside the ecological benefits, though, my imagination immediately leaps to the wonderful decorative possibilities for papier-maché coffins. Elegant Vetruvian scrolls or Greek key pattern for the classically-minded, the company logo for the business tycoon, perhaps, or photographs of the deceased from birth to the last.

Sailors could have nautical charts pasted over their mortal remains and farmers might have a corn sheaf motif. A romantic might ask for his or her coffin to have a collection of love letters arranged over it whilst a more pragmatic person might choose a plainer effect.

The possibilities are almost limitless, allowing every individual a last opportunity to express personal taste and giving the loved ones of a dear departed person another way to express their admiration and love.

Since I hope to be buried in the sea that is my home I am unlikely to benefit from this idea myself but I still find the whole idea of papier-maché coffins very exciting. Just thought I'd share that thought with you!

So Tell Me I'm Wrong!

2009-02-10T10:32:00.005+01:00

Once again, the small fishing boats that have been systematically removing every last fish from the bay around us are out today, some laying nets to be taken back up later, others trawling. At one point we were feeding a couple of hundred small fish daily but we haven't seen any whatsoever in weeks now.

The nets being used appear finer than is permitted but nobody is checking anyway. If only the authorities of the world would devote less resources to harassing people for minor infractions that do nobody any harm and send more officials out to prevent the decimation of fish stocks to the point where they may never recover!

The last time I worked on a fishing boat was off the southern Spanish coast in 1991 and, back then, a catch of mackerel was considered a very unlucky find as local housewives would not buy such fish, considering them vermin and the fare of paupers. When the net came up with mackerel in it, the men would groan and start throwing all the fish back into the sea! The only person who filled up buckets to take ashore was me and I did a roaring trade around the British bars in the area, to the great amusement of my colleagues. This was proof that the English foreigners were mad, as far as they were concerned!

Returning to Spain in 2002, it was fascinating to see great heaps of mackerel on the fish counters, apparently enjoying a brisk market now that the choices of fish had been limited by overfishing of other species. It was sad, though, to see how quickly the mackerel stocks were being decimated, even then.

In the early 1990s, a shoal of mackerel would churn the surface of the water up over such a wide area that it was frequently impossible to see the further reaches with the naked eye. In the same area, a decade later, a typical shoal hardly occupied the surface area that could have been covered by a cot blanket.

Crossing the Atlantic, as recently as 1998, one could quite easily catch enough fish in a single morning to fill the deep-freeze and put the fishing tackle away for the rest of the voyage. Returning in 2001, we only managed to catch a single, rather small, yellowfin tuna in the entire 35-day voyage, including a five day period in which we had no wind whatsoever and all day, every day, in which to try!

People have taken to eating species that take more than 50 years to reach maturity. It must be obvious that they will extinguish those species in record time. Fishermen, fully aware that they are doing untold and permanent damage to the sea bed and pushing fish stocks towards the point of no return, persist blindly, wilfully ignoring the ruin of the future in order to grab the last drop of profit in the present.

On a trip aboard a trawler in 1994 to photograph a typical day in the life of a
trawler crew in Spanish waters, I was asked by the captain to let him know if I saw a Guardia Civil vessel appear on the horizon as they were fishing in a prohibited area, designated thus to protect breeding grounds!

We have frequently watched fishing boats slow down on the way back to port, to allow time for all the illegally small fish to be thrown overboard to the waiting seagulls, just in case there is an inspector on the quay awaiting their return, although there hardly ever is.

We are not intellectual 'greenies' plucking theories out of thin air. We live full-time at sea. The skipper has lived aboard continuously since 1989 and I since 1996. It is our habitat and we speak from personal experience, not that we suppose anyone would be interested in anything we have to say in the absence of any 'relevant qualifications'!

Tell Me Who You Go With And I'll Tell You Who You Are

2009-01-08T11:40:00.007+01:00

It is my habit to take my main annual vacation in winter and spend the time keeping cosy in the saloon of Leopard Normand III, although some years it has been necessary to work, especially when we have been running restaurants/bars. This year I took my holidays on Twitter, or to be more precise, in the Twitterhood as I call the group that comprises those whom I 'follow' and those who 'follow' me at Twitter.com ...

It was a wonderful vacation and I met so many great people over the period that my world has been transformed but, as one might expect in any society, I also met one or two people with whom it would have given me no pleasure to associate.

Unlike some people, I don't mind that some of the characters of my acquaintance are somewhat pushy individuals, trying to sell something and inept at human relations. It is my opinion that they will be better helped by being accepted and then gently shown the error of their approach than by rejection.

As I am in the habit of introducing the existing members of the Twitterhood to new people as they 'move in', I have the opportunity of letting certain individuals know that I don't feel willing to introduce them just yet. In some cases it is because they haven't provided any information about themselves in their Bio, in others it is because they have not communicated in any 'tweets' yet, so there is no obvious reason for anyone to want to follow them. Once in a while it is because it is obvious that advertising is all they have in mind.

Occasionally, the reason I am unwilling to 'shout-out' an introduction is because I would not associate with a person outside the Twitterhood and am loathe to be associated with them inside it.

Yesterday, for example, I explained to a young man, as kindly as possible and in a direct message (i.e. privately) that I didn't want to introduce the Twitterhood to his unpleasant style of tweeting - liberal use of words to which the parents of the younger members of the Twitterhood would not thank me for exposing them, unpleasant attitudes to women and 'jokes' that could only appear amusing to someone with a very damaged psyche.

As a result, after a couple of private messages had passed between us in which he was increasingly insulting, he publicly tweeted a message that was unpleasant in the extreme and demonstrated, more clearly than anything I could possibly have said, why he would not be a person to have around decent human beings. He later appears to have deleted that message, perhaps realising that it said a great deal more about him than about me.

It was my intention to ask what you would have done in the same situation - accepted all comers, introduced them without making any kind of judgement of their suitability for the existing group and let the neighbourhood fill up with the scum of the Earth or exercised the capacity for discernment - but then I realised that it doesn't really matter whether you would do one thing or the other! The joy of Twitter is that each of us is free to act exactly as we wish in both directions, what we put out and what we take in. The results of exercising that freedom must always speak more loudly than any speculation over it!

Tides of the Twitterhood

2008-12-01T01:53:00.007+01:00

Oh what a fascinating social whirl Twitter is turning out to be! There are representatives of almost every race and creed, culture and kind in the world. The famous and, no doubt, the infamous, the modest and the boastful, rub shoulders with the branded and the anonymous, the brazen and the self-effacing, for periods that can be of but a moment´s duration or quietly assume an obvious permanence.

Kind words abound, seasoned with scorn, sarcasm and outright ugly malice. Some join for purely commercial reasons and commence a torrent of the equivalent of 'spam' which, because of the maximum length permitted for each 'tweet', as posts are called, can easily be ignored by a member who is following a sizeable group whilst entirely obliterating all other tweets in a smaller group, to the intense annoyance of the follower.

Some join Twitter in search of a soulmate, some seek kindred spirits or horizon-broadening new acquaintances. Some may be on the prowl for the unwary, others legitimately seeking potential business or employment opportunities, sponsors, donors or advisors. Let's face it, some are bored and spiteful, others lonely and grateful, no single element appears to be missing from the mix if one but looks around a little.

Much has been made of the recent involvement of 'Tweeters', as those who are members of Twitter are known, in the unfolding of the tragedy in Mumbai over the last days of November 2008. On a global scale, Tweeters passed information into and out of the area and around the world in real time, as Tweeters on the spot reported what they could see and hear, questioned others around them and kept up a flow of rapid bite-sized chunks of 'news'. At quite an early stage, requests for help started to flow in both directions too.

Families desperate to know how a loved one had fared and individuals, hysterical with fear at the possible answers, trying to ascertain the fate of their families, turned to Twitter´s enormous network and were, in the vast majority of cases, able to find out at least who had not been caught up in the maelstrom and, in some heart-wrenching cases, to confirm the loss of dear ones without the added distress of interminable hours spent waiting by the telephone and agonising between hope and despair.

Hospitals needing a large and immediate increase in supplies of blood for life-saving transfusions had only to say so once and the request was tweeted and 'retweeted'- as in repeated - around the world and back again, repeated again at intervals until there must have been few citizens of Mumbai and the surrounding area that had not been canvassed for a blood donation within hours of the attack commencing.

Some Tweeters chose to retweet, indiscriminately, every snippet of news, information, misinformation and pure speculation that came their way. Figures were, apparently altered along the way, whether deliberately or through poor typing skills I know not. It reminded me of the World War I joke about a message passed down the trenches that arrived as "Send three and fourpence, we're going to a dance" but had started out as "Send reinforcements, we´re going to advance."

A few people chose to pretend the situation wasn´t really happening and others, the group into which I fell, passed on only those messages that requested concrete help, such as blood donations, or introductions to other local tweeters who might be able to offer more assistance by helping to form a cohesive team.

A tiny minority of tweeters displayed a stultifying level of self-absorption, thinking nothing of making casual remarks to the effect that vacations in Mumbai were probably out of the question for a while and that they would probably have to select an alternative for next year's trip. A small but vocal minority started calling for retribution before anyone even knew against whom it might be levelled. Racial tensions flared up, as thoughtless bigots began blaming an entire race for the behaviour of a handful of deranged fanatics.

Whilst keeping an eye on the tweets of any number of the 2000 people on my 'following' list, that is to say people whose tweets I was receiving, rolling past in rapid succession, keeping an eye open for emergency requests that would need immediate retweeting, I was also engaged in conversations of all kinds with people on unrelated topics - life goes on. As time passed, my list of 'followers', those who had chosen to receive my tweets, gradually appeared to be increasing at the rate of about one an hour.

There are various websites that exist purely to service the needs of tweeters in one way or another, some of which offer statistics on one's followers and unfollowers, including stating the tweet at which they either started or stopped following one. Normally, I would not be particularly concerned with analysing these matters but I noticed that several people had joined and others left at one particulat tweet.

Although I did not disseminate any of the news messages about the events unfolding in Mumbai, I did retweet, on request, any and all pleas for blood donors, able to get to given hospitals in Mumbai, to do so urgently. Several people unfollowed me at one of these retweets and a couple of people joined my followers at the same ones!

As I pondered the reason for people choosing to unfollow at the messages asking for help in Mumbai, a fellow-tweeter suggested that people who were following few others might grow bored with seeing the same messages repeated often by comparison to other tweets.

It occurred to me that some people might have unfollowed because their religion did not permit blood transfusions and they did not wish to be associated with someone who did not share their beliefs on the subject. Another possibility is that some assumed those tweets were yet more 'news' items about Mumbai and, tired of being bombarded with such messages from all sides, they may have unfollowed without even pausing to read the retweets.

Another tweet that both brought new followers and took away others was my mention of having dreamed of bacon sandwiches whilst crossing the Atlantic in 2000. Again, perhaps some were offended on religious grounds and others put off by the vulgarity of my tastes: had it been caviar I hankered after, perhaps they might have been able to understand my cravings! What attracted those who decided to join at that tweet I really cannot say.

Various other messages elicited only positive or only negative resposnses and, in retrospect, I could see how easily a tweet could be misinterpreted by anyone who had not seen the tweet to which it was a response. This time I was reminded of the World War II line: "If Hitler is the answer, what on Earth was the question?!" Although it had seemed to me, whenever I thought aboutb it at all, that my list of followers was creeping slowly up, what was really happening was multiple substitutions so that, in all, 21 people left and 35 joined during the same period!

The ebb and flow of a Twitter group started by one with as diverse a set of interests as mine was bound to be tidal but it would be fascinating to hear what a sociologist would make of the relationships between tweets and virtual rip-tides.

Christmas Is Coming... Santa's Working Hard...

2008-11-23T06:19:00.002+01:00

Oh I do love the season of goodwill - the tree, the lights, the nativity scene and you name it - you can hardly get to the galley past the Christmas tree every year - it occupies half the saloon and the cat has to be persuaded not to climb up it or tear down the baubles and bat them into the bilges,,, Here's a great way to get the family rascal to behave, at least between now and Christmas day! You never know - a whole month of practising and he, or she, might even get into the habit of being good... I know, it would be wiser not to hold one's breath whilst waiting to see...

Anyway, take a look and see whether this might be a way to get some co-operation from junior as the Holiday season progresses - the people who organize it seem very nice and Santa seems to be quite involved with them - they help him with his mail and his packages and they know that the wonder of Christmas will always be in the hearts of children everywhere, even slightly creased and faded ones like me...

My Claim To Fame For Today

2008-11-21T23:03:00.005+01:00

		Ooh! Lovely! It's always nice to get a little recognition, even if you've had it before! My latest article submitted, the first in a good couple of years or so is to be featured on the home page of eZineArticles later today, apparently.
Most of my writing is done to order, so it isn't submitted in my name. And they called me an expert author... again... That's nice!

Track Your Social Marketing

2008-11-16T17:56:00.005+01:00

Unless you have been reading my posts elsewhere, you may not be aware that I have recently been initiated into the world of the mentored, at long last, under the auspices of the excellent team of experts, consultants and Internet heros at ASC and am having a wonderful time disovering where I have been going wrong (and, in parts right, luckily) as well as getting top quality advice on how to proceed, along with some unbelievably useful software. You might think that, by now, I'd have seen all the software I could possibly rate but this stuff is cutting edge and, what's more, it's included along with a range of other superb material, the Authority Black Book, for example, made available to all members and some, like the aforementioned even to non-members!

Anyway, one of the great resources made available to anyone who so desires is Jack Humphrey's Friday Traffic Report blog. A goldmine of useful information, it recently included this excellent article on tracking your social marketing which I wouldn't want anyone who is serious about making a living online to miss.

Speaking of Jack, he sent me a link to a piece of software he had created especially for members, the other day. Although it is primarily intended to be used for the purposes of getting ahead in business, it has also been incredibly useful to me in another new role that I have just been assigned, that of the Recreation: Boating: Sailing: News & Media Editor for DMOZ and I am in no doubt that it will also be useful in endless other aspects of my life online.

All in all, it's been a fantastic fortnight and now I really must attend to the important business of enjoying our Sunday evening movies - a tradition aboard Leopard Normand that is rarely cancelled - this week I think we're going to watch a couple of our Sci-Fi collection... I don't know yet; I like to get Robbie to choose because he has an uncanny knack for picking the right movie every time. Last week we were in a George of the Jungle and Peter Pan mood - you'd be amazed what two old fogies will watch when they think nobody is looking. Now don't go telling everyone, will you?!

If You Only Buy One Book This Winter...

2008-10-31T01:01:00.006+01:00

Make this the one for several good reasons:

This is an excellent read - funny, poignant and thought-provoking.
Robin Sheppard, the author, is donating his share of the proceeds to a very worthwhile cause.
Someone you know may be eternally grateful for the gift of a copy of this book.

You can take my word for it or click on the book title and learn more about it. I haven't read the description at Amazon but Robbie and I have both read the book twice and reckon we will again before long.

The Amazon.com link is below for those who are in the USA.

The French have a saying that translates as 'One must suffer to be beautiful'. If that is true, then Robin Sheppard must be one of the world's most beautiful people...

Meanwhile, the wind is still blowing quite hard, though nothing like as hard as yesterday. A friend called today to see whether we were still afloat and told us he had heard that there were nearer 50 boats beached at Andratx than 20 yesterday. No fun for all those boat-owners whose pride and joy will take a great deal of restoring if it can be saved at all. Suffering can take many forms... Such is life. Now, if you haven't done so already, get Robin Sheppard's book or miss out on one of life's great experiences...

World Cruising and Sailing Wiki

2008-10-29T23:48:00.003+01:00

This morning we had 68 knots of wind in the bay of Palma (Mallorca, Balearic Islands). We were fine, aboard the schooner Leopard Normand III, thanks to a 97 kilo CQR on 100 metres of chain and a 33 kilo Bruce on a handsome warp taking the heat off the chain. Others were not so fortunate (or, perhaps, so well-prepared) and we watched one unfortunate skipper trying to battle his sloop forwards into the teeth of the gale (no sails up, obviously) but his motor wasn't up to it - I doubt if anybody's yacht motor is capable of bashing a hull through wind and seas like those...

We called some friends who have a small wooden boat to check on their welfare and were delighted to hear that they had moved into a marina when they heard the forecast - just as well because the bay they had been in, Illetas, where we spent a couple of seasons anchored while we ran the restaurant and bar at the Anchorage Club, was a seriously dangerous place to be today. We were so grateful that we are anchored outside Palma Nova, on the other side of the western area of the bay of Palma.

Anyway, we mentioned to our friends that we had seen a couple of boats beached, outside Puerto Portals, through the binoculars, but that Illetas had been obscured from view by the white-out caused by the wind whipping sea water into the air. They called us back later on and told us that they had driven round to Andratx on the southwestern side of the island to sort out a tree that had been blown down in a client's garden and seen that a pontoon had broken up and deposited twenty yachts onto the beach there. Wicked winds.

Anyway, all this set me to thinking about sailors in general and I remembered that I had joined the World Cruising and Sailing Forum in summer but hadn't got around to actually posting there yet, so I thought I'd go and do that in the delightful lull that is taking place before the expected return of foul weather tomorrow. Having introduced myself, I went to see what was happening in the forum and found the post about the World Cruising and Sailing Wiki. Good idea and I thought I should post the link here (in the title of this blog) in case you'd like to visit...

Well, not a lot else is new, or at least not a lot you'd be interested in...

Venturing into the 21st century, one step at a time

2008-10-16T00:33:00.003+02:00

You know, even after ten years online and having tried all kinds of weird and wonderful software as a beta tester, visited websites in which one might easily forget which planet one inhabited and marvelled at the avalanche of information that can be unleashed from a little piece of plastic with a USB plug stuck on one end of it, I never cease to be amazed at virtual reality.

Actually, that is the whole point of this post - so much of what is online is not virtual reality at all, it's total unreality - ranging from weird fantasy animation game sites to weird fantasy get-rich-quick-with-this-turnkey-website sites, of which there are all too many and the number is rising exponentially as wave after wave of greedy suckers are able to suspend rational thought for just long enough to part with their credit card details...

Virtual reality is what I had in mind when I created the LWA shopping malls and, since one of the things that happens all over linnetwoods.com and no less in the US Mall is that we review sites we visit, mainly in the course of normal life and occasionally with the specific intention of writing a review, it seemed a great idea to review sites that are there to replace a physical experience with a virtual one...

You may be an ardent fan of grocery shopping but I have to tell you that I am not and I have always considered having to throw myself into the fray, with an uncontrollable shopping cart as my sole companion, a particularly poor way to spend my time, so the idea of having a go at experiencing the virtual alternative was far from my mind.

When I was putting together the new Food Halls at LWA US Shopping Mall, a couple of months back, a friend suggested that I make sure an online grocery store was included amongst the other merchants there or, as she actually put it: "It's all very well offering caviar and cookies but people like to eat real food as well, you know!"

When I asked her who on earth would be offering 'real food' online in the USA she said "Don't you know anything?!" which I thought was a little harsh, even if justified!

Well, long story short, a grocery store has been part of LWA Food Halls for a few weeks now and I was finally persuaded to join my friend on a foray into virtual grocery shopping this afternoon. What a revelation! Believe me, you should try it - in fact, if you live in North America why not grocery shop today at Peapod and get $10 in FREE groceries ?!

Still not convinced you'd enjoy it? Live vicariously then - try clicking the link in the title of this blog and read about a shopping trip online for a great dinner, not to mention all the usual groceries - it was a blast and anyone one who hasn't tried it is definitely missing out!
Well, I suppose I had better go and get on with ploughing through the 997 e-mails in my inbox... aaargh!

Ladies Fashion at LWA US Mall

2008-10-06T21:19:00.002+02:00

Well, it comes to something when a visitor has to e-mail you to tell you something about your website that you didn't know yourself (apart from broken links and that sort of technical stuff) and are very pleased to discover!

The things is, that in the bad old days, every single time a merchant produced something new, it was necessary to take away the old store banner and put in the new one. With 1400+ stores in a single mall, that made for a great deal of work. A lot of merchants still use this antiquated method but the ones with their fingers on the pulse have finally realized that it is a great deal easier to swap the new image for the old at their end of the deal. As long as the name of the new image file is identical to the name of the old one, there is a seamless transition from one to the other, with the new one appearing as soon as the server is refreshed.

Of course it can be difficult to persuade merchants to remember that some of us need their images and links to stay consistent with the theme to which they were first applied. You can imagine how irritating it is when a banner that used to display shoes in the shoe department suddenly starts showing nappies or a sweet little cot in the baby department becomes a garden hose...

It is almost as annoying when merchants lump several categories together on one banner instead of making separate ones (I wouldn't mind if they did both! :-) so that one either has to repeat the same banner in several departments or decide against including the merchant anywhere except in one of the stairwells, or 'Main Halls' as they are described...

Anyway, I digress... in the e-mail I was informed, in a very complimentary manner although none of the credit is mine, that she liked the new 'look' of the Ladies Department and some of the new season's clothing was very nice... Since I hadn't changed anything I rushed to see what on Earth could have happened and, sure enough, there were things there that I hadn't seen before either!

I must get around more! :-)

Drowning Street

2008-09-27T22:03:00.002+02:00

YOU SAW IT HERE FIRST!

JJ Boat In The Sun

2008-09-19T19:00:00.003+02:00

Hope this helps those who are trying to get to John Perkins' web get there more easily - apparently trying to find JJ Boat via Google brings one here instead of to his website and I know just how frustrating that can be! Just click on the title of this post to go directly there.

Not much else to report - our splendid little generator stopped working yesterday so we went out with our friend Sketch today, in his splendid mobile home, and bought a slightly more powerful one to see us through while the baby one is being fixed... This means I am two days behind with everything so I had better go and try to catch up... watch this space... more soon! Cheers!

Catching up...

2008-07-28T23:05:00.003+02:00

It's funny how there are times when you neither hear from nor see anyone for days or even weeks at a time (living out at anchor rather reduces the number of people who can simply drop in) and others when, suddenly, everyone you know seems to get in touch at once!

We have just spent a lovely afternoon with Alex and Faye, a couple who were clients when we had the bar at the Anchorage Club and who have become friends. We all had such a lovely time at Wellies bar, in Puerto Portals, (we met at 12:00 noon and didn't part till some time after 18:00!) that we've agreed to have a picnic on a tiny beach not far away, next Monday.

Meanwhile the inbox was stuffed unusually full of messages this evening - perhaps it is the holiday mood that makes people want to say hello. Maybe they are so busy trying to stay ahead of the credit sharks these days that most people only have time to write personal e-mails during the holidays! Whatever the reason, it's great to hear everyone's news and be reminded of so many lovely people. Now I've got to get down to answering as many as I can... I'd better go and get on with it!

An eventful week...

2008-07-20T18:15:00.005+02:00

Well, we have been having an interesting time lately! Robbie is having to languish while he waits for his foot to mend... He is not a man who likes to sit around but he is trying very hard not to gripe about the enforced idleness.

The plaster cast is giving him all the usual itching problems and the heat in there could cook a chicken, apparently...

To try and keep him occupied, I have been buying three different UK newspapers whenever he climbs gingerly into the dinghy and takes me ashore to do the shopping while he waits in the dinghy.

For a few days, up until yesterday, a huge and strange mega-yacht was anchored not too far from us and we joined the rest of Mallorca in speculating about whose it might be...

Today, I bought the Sunday Telegraph, the Mail on Sunday and the Sunday Times and, in the latter, on page 5, we found the answer...

Nonetheless, I thought I'd show them to you anyway... This is the 'A' (yes, that's all the name she got...) A for Aleksandra, although it might just as easily be A for Andrey as this 390' steel megalith was built for Mr. and Mrs. Melnichenko, founder of the MDM bank.

She has enormous doors that open up at the back and either side of the aft end of the yacht, three swimming pools etc. etc. and cost a mere UK£200,000...
Can't wait to see what the 613' yacht that Abramovich is having built, in order not to be outdone, at UK£240,000, will look like. He has chosen the name already, so we read. 'Eclipse'. Oh dear. One-upmanship is clearly not dead after all. It has moved to Russia...

Anyway, returning to Melnichenko's new toy, what Maurice Chittenden says about the way 'A' looks, in his article, is absolutely true.
Robbie's reaction on seeing her at anchor was to ask if it was a new generation of submarine, until he used the binoculars. How peculiar, he said, that it was so like a Dreadnought but clearly pretty new.

Apparently, he was far from alone in thinking these thoughts. I wish I could say it was an attractive sight. Impressive, maybe, but not attractive. At night, all lit up, seen from the back, it looks like the ghost of a jellyfish more than anything else. Unfortunately, my camera won't record anything properly after dark, so I can't show you. Seen passing it is another ultra-modern, but smaller, luxury yacht. Like every other moving vessel in the bay, they couldn't resist getting a closer look!

Well, that's it from me for now... hope you're having a lovely summer!

So much for plans...

2008-07-14T01:25:00.002+02:00

Ah, how happily we were working our way down the checklist of things that must be done before we could set sail for Croatia to meet Robbie's daughter and her family for a lovely holiday, already imagining ourselves playing with the grandchildren, looking around the little holiday home they bought last year (no, not the grandkids, their parents, silly!) and generally enjoying a change of scenery.

Rather in the manner that some people go to a supermarket with a shopping list but come home with half the items on the list unpurchased and with bags full of items that were not mentioned on that list, Robbie has done something that not only was not listed but has made the list somewhat redundant... he has managed to break a bone in his foot, which is now encased in plaster and will see him out of action for several weeks, by which time it will be too late to go.

Disappointed!

Next year we will have to leave in May, to make sure we get there in time and if we are early we can explore some of the coastline. I have wonderful memories of Croatia, having been in 1956 and again in 1966 and I long to see the country again. Oh well. The great things in life are worth waiting for...

I've just published another new site...

2008-06-24T14:10:00.003+02:00

Because of a worrying trend around Europe, I have found myself impelled to create a new website and see if we can't get something done before it is too late... Local coastal authorities have begun to squeeze live-aboard cruisers out of safe havens by laying down moorings and charging hefty fees whether you pick up a buoy or just anchor.

In addition they limit the stay of visiting yachts to around five days maximum in many cases. This is an infringement of the rights of sea people and someone has to do something. I figured it might just as well be me... Free Sea Pass is going to have a go at lobbying MEPs so, if you feel you have a vested interest or could help in any way, do pop along to freeseapass.co.uk or freeseapass.com and have a wander about!

I've just remembered that I still have to put the link to the joining form on there, so I'd better dash and try to get there before you do! :-)

Dolphins in Distress

2008-06-15T21:40:00.002+02:00

So, nobody can decide how the dolphins that died near Falmouth in Cornwall, UK, last week came to be in their predicament but there 'may' be a possibility that the Navy on exercises with sonar had some part in their demise. Wish I had blogged the day the news broke. When Robbie read the article on the incident out, with all the 'experts' pontificating on the reasons they thought it might have happened, I said "Crap! Bet you the Navy were somewere nearby using sonar and it drove the dolphins to their deaths." Now, it transpires the Navy were testing sonar with a submarine in the area but it 'may have been a factor'. Yeah right! More than twenty years ago a marine biologist mentioned the effect that sonar has on sea creatures and the potential for mass deaths like these. It wasn't 'a' factor it was the factor.

The Navy should not be testing this sort of thing so near to the land. They are supposed to be a navy so why don't they put out to sea and get away from the land altogether, consulting oceanographers as to where to go in order not to disturb marine widlife? Not that want these people on our territory but we realise we can't stop them getting onto the water any more than we can stop nanny governments trying to dictate how things should be at sea when they can't even manage the affairs of the land. Grrr!

My very own button!

2008-06-15T01:16:00.005+02:00

Technorati gave me a button you can use to add this blog to your favourites... Whaddya mean "Technorati?" It's like Glitterati, or Litter Arty, innit? Technorati is to blogging what bling is to shopping... Alternatively, Technorati is to blogging as lips are to snogging... That's enough of that. Let's not go there. Anyway, I'm the proud possessor of a new button. How exciting is that? It's totally exciting, innit? There's more" Today I took my oDesk Readiness Test and came out in 1st place ever! How about that? I'm so pleased with myself that I am going to try and upload a little screenshot I made - I've never tried putting an image in my blog efore. There's a first time for everything, so they say...

A quick update

2008-05-18T17:41:00.004+02:00

Sorry it has been a grillion years since I last published any news, I will answer as many worried emails as I can and hope the rest are responded to by this – the inbox is stuffed and I haven’t that long in which to sort it out. This will have to be quick as we very rarely get access to the internet and it very rarely lasts long...

Our new sails were finally delivered and we left the bay outside Torrevieja (where we were forced to go in order to avoid further violence from the harbourmaster's helpers) in a storm which nearly dashed us up onto the rocks at the harbour entrance and obliged us to leave a perfectly good chain and anchor on the bottom of the sea around there somewhere. Arriving in the bay of Palma, Mallorca, we found ourselves unable to stay or stop, the winds being around 50 knots with gusts of around 70, and ended up making an impromptu visit to the port of Algiers.

We stayed 3 weeks under armed guard (apparently we were in danger of beng targeted by terrorists) and met some wonderful local policemen plus the crew of a ship delivering 11,000 tons of steel - 17 Syrians and 3 Egyptians, all fabulous and generous people (eventually there will be a piece about them in MarineZine)
and spent a fortune getting our brand new sails re-worked because they were absolutely useless... that's another story...and finally left again with our water tanks and galley cupboardsfull to bursting.

We managed to anchor in Mallorca on our next attempt (it was a surprisingly quick journey back from Algiers) and spent the next couple of years running the bar and restaurant at the Anchorage Club in Illetas which was great fun but exhausting. Our contract expired in September 2007 and was not renewed (again, eventually there will be something about it on one of our websites maybe I will even make one especially for the purpose as it was a really beautiful place (I say 'was' because the current
committee seem hell-bent on making it as drab, characterless and clinical as possible in the belief that that constitutes 'going upmarket', bless them) and we looked around for another premises but either we liked a locale and it was too
expensive or we could afford the locale and it wasn't in the slightest bit desireable...

We are still at anchor just in front of the Anchorage Club at the moment - relaxing, giving the boat some TLC after a couple of years of neglect and deciding what to do next at our leisure. Leopard Normand will be hosting a summer-long party (well we've
got to use up all that booze somehow!) and this entry to our blog is being uploaded via a borrowed GPRS 3G mobile connection, some 300metres offshore. Think we might get one of these for ourselves and invest in some extra fuel for the generator…

Apologies again for any concern caused by long silences but just remember - if we're not here then we must be somewhere else and, wherever we are, we're fine! Robbie says "Hello!" I say: Enjoy yourself and watch this space... we may be back sooner than you think..

Still alive and kicking

2007-11-11T03:02:00.000+01:00

Just a very quick entry in case anyone is wondering... we are in Palma, Mallorca in the Balearic Islands and will soon tell all about our adventures since the last time you heard from us. Never a dull moment...

Escape from Torrevieja harbour...

2006-02-24T00:53:00.003+01:00

On Thursday 16th February, one of the yachts anchored out near us dragged a little and, instead of picking up his hook and moving to a sensible spot, the skipper decided to stay anchored too near the salt sock, causing a minor problem that evening. I told Robbie that, for sure, that guy was going to draw the wrong kind of attention to us all and, sure enough, on Friday 17th February, at about 10am, the Guardia Civil patrol boat showed up again and one of the officers on board said that he should leave immediately and then came over and told us we should also go immediately because now it really was against the law to anchor out.

When asked which law exactly he was referring to, the officer flapped about a bit and then said it was a new law, passed on January 12th 2006. I said I was surprised that the local authorities had accused us in December of breaking a law that wasn't even going to exist until weeks later and explained, once again, that without engines it is not always possible to leave just because one would wish to. We have all our new sails now but wind to fill them was not included in the deal...
The next boat they visited, they told the skipper he couldn't paint his cockpit at anchor but they didn't tell him to leave or mention any law. They zoomed off and, about half an hour later, I called the harbour master to ask where we stood. He said it was out of his hands to affect the behaviour of the Guardia Civil, which I found very interesting because the officers had told us they were acting on his instructions, but I didn't mention that.

The HM also said that it was true that there was now a new law but agreed that we had the right to anchor out in the bay outside the harbour so we could still get our parts from local tradesmen, in spite of the fact that it would make it much harder for those tradesmen to deliver, or for us to collect, our goods.

Within five minutes of my thanking the HM politely for taking the time to speak to me, the Guardia Civil were back. They shouted at us through a loud hailer and said we had exactly one hour to get out or they would cut our anchor cables, tow us out to sea and dump us. One of the officers was filming us with a video camera while this went on and I said I hoped that if any of their mothers ever took up sailing that she could expect rather better treatment than that. One of the officers sneered and I said I hoped that any of them who visited my country would find the attitude of the officers there a little less inhospitable, especially if they spent as much money with local tradesmen as we had just done. The patrol boat took off as the officer with the loudhailer shouted again "One hour"

Robbie was, as you can imagine, completely stressed out, and so was I, but at least a breeze had come up, so the two of us set about trying to get the anchors up. We had picked up a whole bunch of fisherman's cast off tackle and rubbish on one of the anchors, we discovered, and it took an angle grinder and four hours of intensive labour to get the chain and tandem hooks aboard, leaving a single Bruce anchor on a warp keeping us there. By the time we had finished, the wind had picked up quite a lot and was blowing straight in through the harbour entrance, so there was no way we could sail out.

Meanwhile, the ship's parrot (or, rather, macaw), Bella, always very sensitive to my husband's moods, must have picked up on the fact that, instead of calming her down, as I had always done on the rare occasions he became stressed before, I was just as stressed myself. She dropped dead at the age of 13 (they can live to over 100) of heart failure. Four solid hours of panic must have been more than she could withstand.

We couldn't go anywhere because of the wind; we were both grief-stricken over Bella's death, and so we remained where we were and I did some research on the Internet and found out that no new law has been passed. The harbour master had, seemingly without reference to anyone else, passed a 'resolution'on the 12th of January 2006 and, on the basis of that, instructed the local authorities that anchoring must be stopped and even gone so far as to instruct the Spanish National Hydrographic Institute to remove the anchor symbols from the charts of the harbour.

I sent an e-mail to the Institute, asking for clarification of the harbour master's right to single-handedly change a status quo several centuries old and asking whether they intended to do as he had demanded without giving the public any right to object under Spanish constitutional law but I have received no reply thus far.

We spent the whole week worrying about the Guardia Civil returning and carrying out their threat. They haven't been near the harbour since saying we had one hour to leave...
This morning, a friend came out with a friend of his and towed us outside the harbour. We are now at anchor and, although the boat is rolling rather a lot, I can still pick up the signal from the WiFi hotspot, for access to which I have paid in advance up until 7th March, some of the time, so I thought I'd better post this while I can.

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2006-02-10T01:42:00.000+01:00

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Web Content Awareness Day

2006-02-09T12:15:00.000+01:00

It's a special holiday - the first of its kind - and I'd like to congratulate Dina of WordFeeder.com, the founder of WCAD (Web Content Awareness Day), on not only coming up with the idea but also following it through to a successful outcome.
Well, I can't hang about here - I have lots of site-seeing to do today...

Diapers - is this the 2006 equivalent of a chink in the armour?

2006-01-31T15:36:00.000+01:00

It isn't all that long since a gentleman of my acquaintance described a boat trip with 20+ Chinese nationals who were making their way up the Caribbean chain aboard a sailing yacht, more than a decade ago. When he told me that they answered the calls of nature without leaving their seats, I thought he was exaggerating the lengths to which some people will go to avoid losing their place in a crowded transport. Apparently, similar behaviour avoids loss of place, if not of face, on modern trains, too.

Another gentleman, who shall also remain nameless, suggested that the sign of a truly dedicated geek would be a commode in front of the monitor, alleviating the necessity of leaving the screen, even for a few moments, every now and then.

Perhaps adult diapers will catch on, from Silicone Valley to Tin Pan Alley and bathrooms won't be needed for their original purpose any more... On the other hand, perhaps it would be more practical to move the computers into the bathrooms and avoid the mind-boggling logistics involved in the disposal of the potential mega-tonnage of used disposable nappies that results from pursuing this line of thought.

Do excuse me - nature calls...

Donkey Dancing

2006-01-27T06:28:00.000+01:00

Isn't it odd how it takes a day or so for muscles that have been put under sudden strain to complain fully. The day after our near-fatal swim, we both felt very tired but neither of us was too sore although my biceps felt like rocks to the touch. But the morning after that was a completely different story. We both felt as though we had been danced upon by donkeys!

My pectoral muscles are still aching, my legs ache and so do my arms, and my abdomen feels as though a donkey had kicked it particularly hard. Robbie has similar aches.

I am still shuddering every time I remember the sight of Robbie suddenly going limp in the water and seeing nothing but the middle of his back for too long to draw any other conclusion than that he was unconscious and must be rescued immediately. Luckily that image is reappearing in my mind less and less often as the hours and days pass. Time is, indeed, a great healer.

Simon flew back to the UK a couple of days ago but has been calling us regularly to check that we are OK. Tonight he told me that he had walked back up the quay three times, thinking he had heard a faint cry from somewhere and then deciding he was mistaken - with all the clanking of halyards in the marina and the wind blowing in the wrong direction it's a miracle he heard anything at all at that distance - but, the third time, he was certain and he figured it had to be me shouting.

He told me that he had run all the way to where the marineros keep their boat and got them mobilized instantly - I hadn't recognised either of them in the dark or their boat but then I wasn't very aware of anything at the time, except how incredibly cold I felt and how cold Robbie was too.

All three declined the invitation to supper - they must have known we'd both be feeling the effects by the following evening and we certainly were! We have stayed aboard except for a quick trip ashore that Robbie made this morning, to get some provisions and we have watched quite a few old movies together. I work on the Internet and listen, mainly, and Robbie watches properly.

The little portable DVD player that Ivan and Svetlana aboard Cristina VII gave Robbie for his 60th birthday (on the 200th anniversary of the battle of Trafalgar) is so handy to put wherever you want and the reproduction is excellent. The screen is quite big enough for two people not sitting too far apart to see a film on.

It has been lovely to spend the time cosily in the port cabin letting our battered bodies recover and drinking lots of tea, the British answer to all ills...

We survived, thanks to Simon Clark of the Drewanda!

2006-01-23T23:05:00.000+01:00

So much can happen in a single day...My post earlier on today was very nearly my last ever!

To cut a long story short, I will just copy and paste the contents of a Skype chat message I sent out at 22.55 (UTC+1) this evening to our friend and business colleague who lives aboard his boat about half a mile away from us....

Si, I can't tell you how grateful we are for what you did for us tonight. Without you, we woud both have died of hypothermia. When you heard me shouting, I was in the water, holding onto a bit of rope that wasn't actually tied onto anything aboard properly, hoping to God it wouldn't come away in my hand and force me to have to tread water any more than I was already doing.

Robbie had fallen from the dinghy as he was trying to get aboard with those stupid Chelsea boots of his on (a present from his daughter, so he puts up with the impracticality) and the dinghy slipped out of his reach. He seemed to be trying to get it and then he suddenly went floppy and all that was left showing above the surface was the middle of his back.

It didn't take long to realize that he must be unconscious so I jumped in (hell this water is cold at this time of year!) and swam to him, as best I could with all my thick clothing on (but nothing at all on my feet) and managed to yank his head out of the water, stick my arms around him and jerk my hands together as though he were choking and I was doing that technique that begins with H and I can never recall the name of.

He started to splutter and I tried to get him to kick his feet and help me get him to the boat, and the other dinghy, tied on the back, but he was almost a dead weight, except when he was trying to drag me in the wrong direction for a few seconds when he suddenly realized that I was seriously scared and started flailing around but couldn't control his limbs because of the cold.

We got as far as the side of the boat and held onto the rope but it wouldn't have taken my weight if I had been in any condition to climb it and I held it with one hand and kept Robbie's mouth above the water with the other and we rested for a few minutes. Then he set off towards the dinghy on the back but he couldn't get into it so I started shouting, against the wind: Robbie... grab... the...painter... and... try... to... haul.. yourself... over... the... bow... Follwed by HELP!!! at the top of my lungs. Eventually, he managed to get into the dinghy and then started calling me to join him and it took me ages to get there against the wind and with my limbs all heavy and unwilling to co-operate.

Somehow, we managed between us to get me into the dinghy and I lay on the floor for a couple of minutes, face down and unable to organize my movements, until Robbie helped me to get into his arms and cuddle up close. Having shouted for help at full volume 50 times, I didn't think I could manage any more shouting and hoped that someone might see the dinghy and wonder where Robbie was, although I didn't think it very likely in the dark...

Another half hour like that and we would both have died of hypothermia so you and your friends literally saved our lives. Robbie wants you to come and have supper with us tommorrow night and so do I. Please say you'll come and your friends are invited too. They were so kind.

Thank you so much for caring enough about somebody (you didn't know it was a friend of yours) shouting for help from far away to turn back and take action. So many people would have just thought "Oh, somebody will deal with it, I'm busy" and you didn't. There's a special place reserved for you in heaven and I hope you will find that heaven on this Earth and not have to wait until you die to claim your reward for being such a wonderful guy. No wonder Sarah is so much in love with you. She has the sense to see what really matters in a man and that you have all those qualities. Anyway, sleep well and I'll talk to you in the morning. Good night our new hero!

Topsy's Head

2006-01-23T04:59:00.000+01:00

Would you believe I just added the 80th department to the LWA US Shopping Mall?! Like the little girl in the story, whose head just grew and grew, so the department store seems to be expanding in all directions!

Meanwhile, back in the physical world (oh, I do go there occasionally - when there's a power cut and I can't get online, for example :-) politicians in Britain are talking about banning the oldest profession and I wonder if they have lost their minds altogether. Banning alcohol during the Prohibition, with a capital P, in the United States simply spawned an increased quantity of drinkers (humans have a tendency to rebel) and a nightmare underworld full of madmen with machine guns and illegal hooch brewers in the hills around every city.

Some radio presenter implied that it was incumbent upon all good Christians to stamp it out. I wonder what Jesus Christ would have had to say about that. Doesn't it say in the Bible that two of his closest lady friends were in that very same profession?

Don't get me wrong - I am not saying that these things should not be regulated, for the sake of the ladies involved, their clients and the society around them, but trying to stop the profession from existing altogether can only bring about worse problems than exist already. Apart from the fact that the profession exists because the consenting adult people on both sides of the deal want it to, I would love to know what makes some of the women that decry it so vehemently think that it is so different from marrying a man and expecting him to support one, even when there are no children who need one to stay at home? Is having an exclusive deal with a single man, to whom one would never admit that one wanted his money, so much more morally righteous than having lots of clients with whom one is completely honest about what is expected?

What would I know? Less than most people, I suspect. My life has been blessed by endless opportunities to earn a living with other assets than my own body but I have been to plenty of places where many women had nothing else whatsoever with which to earn enough money to feed the children whose father had simply vanished when he became bored with his responsibilities.

Why are politicians always so much more interested in stopping things from happening than they seem to be in making better things happen and accepting that the bad things will fade away if enough good things are being created to keep people occupied?

Speaking of keeping oneself occupied: I made some banners so other sites can link to us if they want to and I notice that the most popular one, so far, is the one I like best too. It says: "Just Windows Shopping, Honey".
I put a few free classified ads online too and I would have taken a couple of the paid deals on offer, except that I wasn't offered a payment method that I could use! Pity, because one deal was less than $4 for three months and another was $11.99 for a whole year! That's about the level of investment I can afford at the moment! Don't laugh!

The nuisance of the week was when I tried to transfer part of the money it had already taken three weeks to get from my bank into MoneyBookers across to PayPal and was told that 'for '
security reasons' it is not possible to transfer money from MoneyBookers to PayPal or PayPal to MoneyBookers! As MoneyBookers is British and I am advertising an American Mall on American classifieds sites, it doesn't come up as an option which is a shame, because it is just as quick for someone in the USA to get their money as for anyone in a large numer of countries and it is a heck of a lot faster too.

Well, visitors are starting to find their way into the Mall and discovering that everyone gets the red carpet treatment wheher they are buying or just looking and, for fun, I tried putting LWA US Mall into Google.com although I thought it might be a little early yet, to get a mention, Imagine my surprise when it came up at the #1 slot! On the other hand, I then went on to put my home site address in, including the www. and it didn't show up at all although it had always come up at #1 before! Hmmm...

Now I am busy putting little treasure chests in different departments.... Closed ones are full of special offers and hot bargains and the open one will reward the first person to find it each day with a small prize from one of the 1000+ merchants whose stores are represented in LWA US Mall so far.

I know it shouldn't really make a difference whether a merchant is a small business or a household name but I can't help getting a little more excited and feeling proud when another big name approves me as an affiliate. Partly because it says I am doing something they like the look of and partly because it means my visitors really will be able to find everyone who is anyone, conveniently gathered together.

Yesterday I launched my trademark 'minimallist' page which has little logo banners from as many of the merchants as I could convenietly obtain one from, ten across and sixty down, so anyone in too much of a hurry to stroll round the 2D departments can go to the list and quickly find the store they want, unless it is one of the ones I haven't managed to add yet, of course. That was a lot of fun to do as well. In fact, whether the Mall is the success I hope it will be or not, I will have had so much fun creating it that I won't mind half as much as I do about the project I spent half of last year on, for a client who ended up not being able to pay for my time.

I have ended up owning a website I don't really want and a domain name that has been soured by the fact that he owed a lot of people money by the time he disappeared! The only thing I salvaged that is worth having is the host server package that does not expire until 2008 and I will use that to put MarineZine on, or maybe the malls, depending which needs a new package first. Still, that's only less than $200-worth - hardly worth months of my time and effort!

Never mind! That is behind me and I have a good feeling about 2006 already...

Happy New Year!

2006-01-03T14:01:00.000+01:00

Well, it's still new, even if it is already three days old... I came to wish you all the best for 2006 as soon as I could - I have been busy putting the finishing touches to the US Mall - it now has 54 departments! In a few days I will have to remove all the holiday stuff so I'm enjoying a quick breather and having a go at the other malls, plus adding stragglers to the US mall - merchants that have been a little slow to approve my affiliation with them.

It's understandable - you have to be so careful not to associate yourself with the wrong people/image/etc in business. Just as they have to 'vet' my site carefully before choosing to accept me as a partner, I have to 'vet' theirs too, to ensure I am not risking sending my visitors anywhere I would not want a three-year-old to go. This may disappoint anyone who was hoping for a highway to trash but should please the majority of my visitors. Decent people who don't want the uglier side of life thrust in their faces.

I like to think people will find my shopping malls the most convenient place to go whenever they need absolutely anything and will continue to add more stores as I find them. If this doesn't please you, I give up! I have put 100% of my energy, dedication and time into this project over a considerable period of time, working up to 20 hours a day most days (I have never needed a lot of sleep, luckily!) and I have completely ignored commission rates (I only get paid on results) in favour of choosing stores I think you will want to visit.

Even if I only make twenty cents here and a dollar there, I am hoping that the cumulative total will make the effort worthwhile and will suppost the costs of providing all the free information on my dozen non-commercial sites - something will have to! Take a look at my LWA US Shopping Mall if you live in the USA - or the UK Mall if you live in Great Britain. I'd love your comments...

Wow!

2005-12-28T16:09:00.000+01:00

Well! You could have knocked me down with a feather this afternoon. My host server in the US runs a brilliant forum for the customer community and quite a few of us make full use of it to get technical help, site critiques, swap jokes, find out what's new and so on.

Today, after an absence brought about by the fact that my US virtual shopping mall had taken my life over and expanded into different departments in all directions, keeping me slaving over a hot keyboard late into every night of the so-called holiday season (holiday? What holiday?!) I finally got around to popping in and what did I find? The package that was 5GB of space and a ton of other goodies for US$7.77 per month has suddenly become 12GB of space and a ton of other goodies! Plus new customers can pay for 1 year and get 6 months free! The new price? US$7.77 per month! Wow!

As I said in the forum thread about this generous holiday gift to us all: now I can build virtual car parks for my virtual malls! I'm having so much fun putting them together! The idea started as just six one-hall floors of a virtual building like the one my site is spread about in. Now there are several departments on each floor of the US mall and I'm looking forward to expanding the UK mall just as soon as I have finished, plus building the Australian and European ones is underway, slowly but surely - I do a bit of work on them as a change (always said to be as good as a rest) and they are coming along nicely...)

I really hope my visitors are going to like whatI have created - I had to put a little notice up saying that some departments might load a little slowly the first time they visit them - the average ADSL browser probably won't have much trouble loading fast but some of my visitors are on somewhat slow landline connections so I hope they will bear with it until they have a chance to see all the goodies laid out for their perusal. The January Sales are on at the moment, in quite a few of the stores - always fun - and this way they can enjoy window shopping and even snapping up bargains without being trampled!

It's funny, only the other day I wondered if I was in danger of getting a notice from my host server to say that I had exceeded a space or file limit and today, not only did I discover that they had raised the space by more than double but I also found out that they abolished the file limit months ago and I must have missed the notice! Whoopee! There's no holding me now!

Open Always & Everywhere

2005-12-13T07:22:00.000+01:00

Oh how smug, albeit exhausted, I am feeling, tra la la... I have finally completed the third shopping mall (I've never seen anyone else's, so I don't know how smug I'll be feeling a few days from now but I was determined not to be influenced by anything anyone else had done, as usual) and created an 'ad' for it, to put on the other sites.

Just as I was finishing the graphic for it, a slogan flashed into my mind: 'Open Always & Everywhere' and you heard it here first... of course that had to go on the 'ad' as well, so it's a bit longer than I had planned but, what the heck - it's not like they sell web space by the centimetre, do they? I wouldn't be surprised.

The other day, when I was being slightly cloak and dagger, it was about some gunshot sounds that have been occurring in my computer headphones, like a rifle in a canyon being fired several times in quick succession and I was worried that it was a virus or something. I still don't know what it is but it hasn't been happening so much lately - it was suggested to me that it might have somthing to do with a particular piece of software but I don't think so, somehow... unless someone installed it remotely... Eventually I will get to the bottom of it, I'm sure!

Meanwhile, I've got used to it and it doesn't bother me any more. Ooh, that was odd. My Anti-Virus just said it detected Eicar Test File and wanted to delete it, so I said OK and it said that it couldn't access this 'object'. Oh no! I hate it when that happens... Better go and see what can be done...

If this is how the Sober worms behave...

2005-12-08T02:03:00.000+01:00

God help us when the drunken ones get going...
The harbourmaster hasn't had a visit, or even a phone call from me yet... I'm brooding over whether to ask the sailmaker to intercede on behalf of himself. It might sway the old fellow where some foreign woman he has hardly even met is not likely to meet with much friendly assistance in that quarter, methinks... Yes, I think I'll put a call in to the sailmaker in the morning...

Now, where was I? Oh yes, Nasty Nazi Sober worms posing as old school chums...From what I can remember of some of my school contemporaries, they wouldn't be easy to distinguish from the wretched worms at all. Their one redeeming feature is that none of them are any more likely to send me a photograph of themselves than to expect one from me and the ones I liked probably wouldn't go chucking photos of themselves at someone they hadn't seen in a grillion years anyway, so I'm not about to get into a state of hysteria...

I don't know anything about worms but I've been having a strange computorial experience since yesterday, or rather I was having one but it appears to have subsided somewhat - perhaps due to the lateness of the hour. I will be back in the next blog to bring a link to a post I made about it elsewhere... I'm just going to see if anyone answered...

Midnight Swoop by the Guardia Civil

2005-12-06T21:24:00.000+01:00

So, there we were, at midnight last night, minding our own business and enjoying a chat with a visiting neighbour, when the Guardia Civil (coastal and rural police) turned up in their battered old motor launch and served a writ on me for 'illegal anchoring', although we have been here since September and nobody has ever intimated to us that it was illegal to anchor here. In fact, there is an anchor on the chart!

Anyway, today is a public holiday so I will go and see the harbourmaster (whose bidding the Guardia said they were doing) tomorrow and find out what the hell this is all about...

If you are interested in the proceedings, you can follow them here: When Is An Anchorage Not An Anchorage as I will be keeping the forum posted now that I have darkened their door...

The Death 'Penalty'

2005-11-30T04:27:00.000+01:00

Title of this entry is linked to a forum discussion ealier today...

It amazes me how often I have entered into conversation on the topic of 'capital punishment' (as though death were something that could teach one a lesson that would be of any use in this life) and how inflamed people can become on the subject.

One of my favourite places to go, currently, is the forums at www.knockheads.com and the topic came under discussion again today, so rather than go over my point of view again, I will let you take a wander over to KnockHeads, if you feel like it.

Best by name, Best by nature...

2005-11-27T06:40:00.000+01:00

George Best has gone. Another person who went into the hands of the medical profession a little sick and soon became a great deal sicker, to the point of losing his life altogether. He was a footballer and I am no football fan, so one might wonder why I mention him here. I cried when I heard he was dying, and I cried when I heard he was dead, because the world is a poorer place without him.

If the football 'stars' of today had as much character in their entire bodies as that man had in one little finger, they might be worthy of the vast salaries they receive and squander so spectacularly. Actually, if they could play football half as well as he did, it would be a start...

It's all geek to me...

2005-11-27T05:16:00.000+01:00

Well, let's face it - we're all going to have to become bloggers, sooner or later - to blog or not to blog is no longer the question, is it? So, my debut might as well be now and it might as well be here. Logical, innit?

Inspired by Michael Markowitz and Lisa Arch, amongst others, this is likely to be a hit and miss journal but, as I will be talking predominantly to myself, it doesn't matter does it?

Next thing you know I'll be dabbling in the deadly podcast... No! I hear you cry! (It's alright, Me, myself and I talk amongst ourselves a lot this way, it doesn't mean we don't get on...) but don't hold your breath...