From Diamond Geezer. 

Hi Mum. Hi Dad.

Sorry, but for the first time in my life I'm not able to be with you this Christmas. At least it's not my fault, it's that damned bird flu. Even if I was allowed to leave London, which I'm not, I don't think I'd ever be able to get round the Felixstowe Exclusion Zone. I've heard they shoot people who try to cross the M25 now…

A really powerful read, more of it on his Blog.

It seems that the Sunday Independent has been a bit naughty.  According to one of my readers they published an edited down post of mine (‘Care Home’?) without either letting me know, or paying me for it…

This isn’t the first paper to use bloggers as unpaid column fillers.  Even the Guardian, who are pretty blog-savvy did it to me once.

So I’ve decided to send them a little email…

I have several brand new pillow cases.

Jeannie wants to wash these *clean* pillow cases before they get used.

I think she is mad, she believes herself sane.

Votes in the comments please.

Feel free to vindicate my assessment of her mental health.

It’s strange, but given the amount of times that I’m in the Docklands area (normally picking up twenty-something traders with cocaine induced cardiac problems), I’ve never come across this rather astounding sculpture.

I think it is made from bedstead wires.

I would also suggest that everybody reading this should take a day out to play tourist in your own hometown.

Did you know that it is an impossibility for an American tourist to cross the Tower of London bridge at night in under an hour.  I think Jeannie managed to fill up the majority of her 1GB camera memory card with pictures of the tower, or corners of buildings.

London is lovely by night, so we did my favourite walk, which is along the South bank.

Today we attack Camden market…

I expect to spend most of today standing around waiting for Jeannie to finish trying on rings, while holding her coat.

I often talk about ambulance Control, but although I’ve spent a shift up there, I don’t really know what it is like to work there full time.

But now I do.

Nee Naw is the blog of one of our Control staff.  If you like my blog (and you must if you are reading it), then you will also love this blog, as it shows exactly what it is like on the other side of the phone.

Go and read it now, then bookmark it/add it to your feed, and then you will truly know the idiots that we have to deal with…

Jeannie has landed safely and is, I suspect, planning to invade the UK, given the amount and weight of her luggage.

Why is it that men can travel in comfort with a shoulder bag, while women need two suitcases, a backpack and a huge carry bag?

A couple of days off work has meant that I’ve been a bit short on things to post about recently.  It comes to something when your own mother phones you up and tells you that you are slacking because of the lack of new posts.

However this has meant that I’ve had some time to ‘fiddle around’ with various behind the scenes settings, and has allowed me some time to think about the redesign of this site.

Also I’ve been working on the Podcast.

I’d also like to take this chance to say a big ‘Thank you’ to the people at Blogware, who sorted out my spam problem incredibly quickly.  Oh and also a big congratulations to Joey and The Redhead who just got married.

I flew out to Canada to celebrate Joey’s birthday – both the craziest, and most expanding thing I have ever done.

I promise, I haven’t been playing World of Warcraft (Not since some rotten sod introduced me to EVE-Online anyway, and I can level up in that while doing other things, which is great for me).

I’m back to work tomorrow, so with a bit of luck I’ll have something interesting to write about rather than ‘Went to another abdominal pain that turned out to be constipation’.

Otherwise I may have to make something up.

I have a feeling that I’ll be busy over the weekend, as there is a huge amount of overtime shifts that aren’t being covered…

In the past 10 minutes I’ve had over 650 comment spam messages to this blog.

Comment spam that I am going to have to delete by hand tomorrow/later today.

Were I feeling on top form, I’d be wanting to kill things in a painful and noisy fashion.

So I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to turn off anonymous posting. 

But console yourself that it is really easy to get an account, and that it works on all Blogware blogs.

I think I’ll be throwing things around the room after I’ve had some sleep though…

Blog Assessment of Personality System.

‘BAPS’ for short…

I was driving aimlessly around, trying to find an interesting job, but actually thinking about the redesign of the Guardian.

Many of the blogs that I read regularly have been commenting about the redesign of the Guardian newspaper, and I was pondering what this meant about the blogs that I read, and what it says about my personality.

The first time I was in college, I used to supplement my meagre income with Tarot card readings and palm reading (palm reading I would often do for free at parties, it allowed me to retire to a dark corner and stroke the hands of attractive young women).  All of which is utter rubbish, but it was amusing at the time.

So I now offer a new service – The BAPS.

Send me a list of 10 or 12 blogs or sites that you read regularly (Not Boing Boing, as everyone reads that), leave a tip in the Donation site and I’ll send back my analysis of your reading habits, and what it says about your personality.

It will not be the same as everyone else, nor will it be a simple ‘cut n paste’ job.

Honest.

And this post isn’t just a chance to snaffle some Google juice for the word BAPS, which for the non-Brits is a slang term for a female chest.