Fraud from Russia Concerning Amazon
I have had a lot of e-mails purporting to say that I have ordered something on Amazon. I know they are not genuine orders, as they come to an e-mail I never use for orders, but watch for e-mails.
They are baed on a fake AMazon web site, with a Russian domain name.
Be careful, as if you are a regular Amazon purchaser, your account has a valid credit card.
So login to the real Amazon, change your password and if you can, change your e-mail to something that you reserve for purchases over the web.
I Just Broke a Glass
I was drinking a glass of wine, when I wrote the last post. Because I make so many typing mistakes and have to correct them, I constantly shift from side-to-side on my chair, as I have to hit backspace all the time and then correct all of the mess created by inadvertant control keystrokes. The outcome was that the phone cable got tangled in my chair and as I pushed against it, the desk moved backwards and the glass which was in a safe place to my right toppled over. It may have been actually toppled by a fly-spray canister that was handy to zap the aerial irritants, inhabitating my office.
So no harm done really and it’s the first accident for about a week. I think, I’ll log them, as it would be progress to do a month without a problem. At least my little cordless Dyson mopped up all the broken glass, I couldn’t pick up with my right hand.
But it just goes to show, how frustrating computing is for a man with a gammy left hand! I believe that if I get the keyboard driver I want, it will improve my life in a very positive way.
Getting Emotional
Since the last stroke, I sometimes get a bit emotional. When people ask how I am and they say nice things, sometimes it can make me cry. But then I’ve been through a lot with the death of C and our youngest son and the strokes haven’t helped.
But then I’ve always been a bit like that. This piece is from the book I wrote about life with C.
There are quite a few people, places and events that have radically altered the way that I think and how I conduct my life. One event was the death of Jan Palach in Czechoslovakia. He committed suicide by setting himself on fire in Wenceslas Square on January the nineteenth, 1969, as a protest against the Soviet invasion.
I swore to C that one day, I would stand in Wenceslas Square in a totally free and liberated Czechoslovakia.
With the coming of Go, British Airways low-cost airline started by Barbara Cassani, Prague was suddenly a short flight away from Stansted. I should have gone earlier, as the Velvet Revolution that had ousted the Soviet-backed Communist regime had been ten years before.
But I hadn’t and I regret that.
We stayed at the Hoffmeister, which has all the charm and service expected of a Relais & Châteaux hotel. It was seriously good and from reading reports on the Internet, it still appears to be.
The weekend was our thirty-third wedding anniversary, but I have no recollection of where or what we ate on the seventh. All I do know is that the food and wine was excellent throughout the time we were in Prague.
But it was to stand in Wenceslas Square that was one of the main reasons that we had gone to Prague.
I cried!
And I cried buckets!
Will I ever be able to do the same in Harare, Rangoon and the many other places in this world, where people are oppressed and murdered by the state?
I wrote that in probably about January 2008 soon after C died. Do I feel the same now? Perhaps, I actually feel stronger about the last statement, as there are other places I could add to the list.
I sometimes wonder how C felt about Jan Palach! She booked that trip and she knew how I felt. But remember too, than he was only 15 days older than she was!
Perhaps I should return to Prague? I will only do that, when there are no more demons in my mind, dragons to slay and goals to fulfil.
In other words, I never will return!
Rough Aunties
This looks like a film to be worth seeing, according to the review in The Times.
I shall try and see it!
Nepotism – Tajik Style
This report says it all.
You may not be able to read it unless you have a subscription to The Times, but if you can’t just type “Zarrina Rakhmonova” into Google. There are several reports of her becoming a TV newsreader, in Tajikistan, where her father is president. Apparently, her brother, Rustam, is a professional footballer and a Member of Parliament. It would be interesting to see if he ever gets a red card. Incidentally, the national football team has a FIFA ranking of 135.
Annuity Rules to be Scrapped
You save all your life and create an adequate pension pot and then at 75, you have to turn it into an annuity, ehich in many cases would be like using twenty pound notes to keep warm in winter. But now the government has stated that it will abolish this rule according to the BBC.
The government has outlined its plans to scrap the long-standing compulsory deadline for people buying an annuity.
Present rules state that those with a personal or company money purchase pension must buy an annuity once they hit the age of 75.
In the Budget, the government changed this age from 75 to 77, and now it has outlined plans to abolish the deadline.
I’ll believe it when and if I get to 80. Remember that this change will mean all those commissions and charges that insurance companies and pension funds will lose. They’ll try all they can to stop the rule changes. After all government needs their services like the rest of us.
Nuisance Calls
My last post took a long time to get posted as I was interrupted by an American lady on the phone, saying C had won a cruise. I dropped the phone and this hit some dodgy keystroke, which meant that the post I was editing got deleted.
If I have time, I usually greet these callers with suitable arrangement of Foxtrot Oscar, especially when they ask for C. These low-life are a very good place to vent my anger and frustration with life.
My phones are all listed on the Telephone Preference Service, so they should not be cold calls. But then American companies do not feel that they should abide by UK and EU law. It’s America first and the rest don’t count.
Until they do, I will not buy any products from US companies, unless they adhere to the ethics that all sensible people adhere to!
A Gluten-Free Nut-Free Strategy for Business
These days businesses like to show that they are friendly, equal-opportunity employers, who are not-racist, sexist or homophobic and of course carbon neutral.
But do they extend this caring attitude to such things as food allergies, when they do business personally or perhaps entertain clients.
Let’s put a couple of facts in here. according to Peanut Allergy UK, it is estimated that 1.8% of children have a peanut allergy at school entry. Also, 4% of the UK ppulation is a coeliac, many of whom are undiagnosed.
So just as you wouldn’t serve meat to a vegetarian, is it not a wise idea to not serve gluten to a coeliac or nuts to someone with that allergy. In fact there is a big difference between veggies and some allergies, in that some allergies are very dangerous and others make you ill.
So why not startt by ensuring that your tea/coffee and biscuits are both gluten and nut free. Also remember that chocolate isn’t banned, so you can indulge your clients if that is your wish.
I’ve actually heard of a couple of companies in London, who do this and now only give away GF and nut-free biscuits with their coffee, as they find it avoids any problems and shows them to be a caring company! One was a financial services company dealing with a faddy actress. They got the business.
At least now corporate events at places like hotels, racecourses and football grounds have got a lot better in recent years. I know that Newmarket racecourse, Ipswich Town and Tottenham Hotspur can all cater, as can most decent hotels with a trained chef. But do at least check about allergies when you book. If they can’t cater, it might just be your luck, that your best client is a coeliac.
In these tough times, profits will be harder to grow or even make. But by applying lots of little details like this to your corporate strategy, you might help your business in the tight direction.
Hotel Chocolat
It has just been announced on the local news, that Hotel Chocolat is expanding and creating 250 new jobs in Huntingdon and at its chocolate factory in St. Lucia. I checked their web site to see if they do gluten-free, as I am partial to the occassional bit of chocolate. Now that Cadbury’s have been taken over by Kraft, I worry that their products will end up contaminated by wheat maltodextrin to save money. I just can’t take the chance and so I was pleased to see that Hotel Chocolat have a gluten-free page on their web site.
I have sent a comment to Hotel Chocolat to query the level of gluten, as they say the odd contamination might happen.
I am a coeliac and also I monitor a Yahoo group for others. I haven’t tried your gluten-free products, but some coeliacs won’t as they are very sensitive to gluten. I myself am not, but I do react to wheat maltodextrin. What’s wrong with Demerara sugar? I think you may find that there is a lot of demand for a simple guaranteed gluten-free product, especially since G&B are now part of Kraft and US companies seem to have a fetish for wheat maltodextrin.
I shall await their reply.
what is interesting, is how they have raised the money for the expansion. They have raised it from their tasting club and will pay the interest in chocolate, as described here in The Telegraph.That sounds a model, that might work with a lot of food and drink products, especially where you are dealing with a specific group of people like coeliacs.
Between Life and Death
This program on BBC1 last night, was not the sort of television I usually watch, as I jokily say I’m allergic to hospitals. I suppose, that as I’ve seen the inside of them so much in recent years, what with the death of C and our youngest son, and now my strokes, it is quite understandable.
But for some reason, I didn’t turn the program off last night. Partly because it was Addenbrookes, I suppose and I do have a respect for the place after what they have done for my family. I’ve also played tennis with several of the doctors and know the cutting-edge ethos of the hospital, which is pushing the boundaries of what is possible.
In the end I found it very uplifting and almost supportive of my recovery, albeit from a very minor problem to those shown in the program. I could relate to all the people in the program on various levels, as a scientist, a father and a patient.
If there is one lesson we should all learn from last night’s program, it is that we shouldn’t stop funding units, such as this at Addenbrookes, in these times of austerity. You can’t put a price on human life and with this units, there must be much they are learning that can be applied across the NHS and the wider world. There are also other lessons to be learned by us all and let’s hope that someone, who watched the program last night, is moved to improve his behaviour or driving skills, so that he avoids the need for going to hospital. That would be a positive benfit for everyone and everything.
We might all learn that human life is precious!
