Category Archives: NHS

English people want to destroy the NHS

Posted on 6 March 2013 | Leave a comment

Although everyone in England claims to want to protect the National Health Service, their behaviour at the ballot box suggests otherwise. Long gone are the days when people queued around the block to read government white papers on the subject, as they did for the Beveridge Report. We all know that private markets do not improve public services because they extract profits from money which would otherwise be spent on the common good. MRSA took hold in our hospitals after cleaning services were contracted out, because cleaners were being underpaid and overworked and consequently the job didn’t get done as well. That’s why private cleaning services have been banned in Scottish hospitals. That is but one example, albeit the starkest proof that privatisation of any part of the service is counterproductive, unless you’re one of the shareholders in a private medical company, as so many of the unelected parliamentarians who recently voted for the Health and Social Care Act 2012 are.

Although the thieving Tory bastards campaigned under an explicit promise to protect the NHS, no-one really believed that obvious lie. That’s why the Tories didn’t win the election. No-one could have believed that Labour would protect the NHS either because it had also systematically introduced free markets into its component parts, continuing the project started under the previous Tory government. Labour didn’t win the election either.

The Liberal Democrats had a record unblemished with political power until recently. They drew down support from a much bigger constituency than they previously enjoyed in the last general election. The rest is history, theirs specifically. Clearly, they have supported the Tories’ completion of the privatisation project.

In the most recent by-election, the voters of Eastleigh were clearly uninspired. Just over half of them bothered to turn out at the ballot box. The biggest number voted for the Liberal Democrats, despite their appalling record on the NHS. The second biggest number voted for the Kippers, despite them having nothing to say about the NHS. The third biggest number voted for the Tories, who have waged an ideological war against the NHS ever since its conception in 1945. Labour came fourth. The only candidate whose election campaign was explicitly devoted to saving the NHS collected just 392 votes.

Why am I picking on the English? Well, they decide every election in the UK. The Scots and the Welsh are irrelevant to the whole Westminster Bubble. Scotland has consistently rejected the philosophy of the Tories and consequently other parties in Scotland have not aped them. The Welsh are much the same.

Shame on you, people of England! You have consistently, over several decades, voted to destroy the NHS. You’ll miss it when it’s gone. The changes will come slowly and incrementally, because ever since Keith Joseph‘s theory on Ratchets To Socialism, the Right has understood that institutions delivering social justice have to be dismantled carefully, so that the dumbed down population do not notice the coming catastrophe. When the call came, you didn’t fight hard enough for it, as Nye Bevan urged you to, and that’s why it will now die.

Entertainment seems to be all you care about these days. You’ll blame the political elites for murdering the NHS but really the blame lies with you. Never mind eh? Keep calm and keep ordering the t-shirts. When you’re struggling to pay medical insurance bills, why not distract yourself with a good film?

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Posted in NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave

House of pain

Posted on 3 March 2013 | Leave a comment

I read the newspapers avidly. It is my one form of continuous fiction.

Nye Bevan, quoted in The Times, 29 March 1960

I’m living in a house of pain at the moment. That’s because my wife is recovering from major surgery. She’s in physical pain. I’m in emotional pain, watching her go through it. She’s healing well but it’s gonna be a long road. I’d like to thank all our well wishers, including her friend who turned up unexpectedly today with flowers, but also ask that they wait for us to invite them around. We’re not really geared up to receive people at the moment. The timing of today’s visitor was superb but it might not always be like that. We’re not expecting to be receiving any well wishers for the next week or so. Then the invite floodgates will open! Bring flowers for my wife and beer for me. *waves joke flag*

My wife has been very lucky to receive such excellent medical treatment on the NHS. These days are coming to an end. The service on offer will deteriorate as soon as the private sector gets its grubby hands on our pride and joy. How could it be otherwise? The private sector is not motivated by the pursuit of health care but by profit.

The real tragedy is that the British people don’t care about the NHS. Whether that is because there are so few left alive who can properly recall life without it or some other reason, I do not pretend to know. However, the plain facts are that in recent elections the vast majority of the population has voted for parties who have steadily dismantled the NHS by privatisation over many years. In the recent Eastleigh by-election, the only party truly dedicated to defending the NHS collected only a few hundred votes. Much as though we might protest, the fact is that the NHS hasn’t been betrayed by the commanding heights of political capital, it has been abandoned by its patients.

Nye Bevan must be turning in his grave. In the meantime, the stealth attack on the jewel in the crown of our civil society will continue. By the time the many wake up to what they’ve allowed, it will be too late. We’ll all be living in houses of pain then. Most of us will blame someone else but, as with various other pressing crises at the moment, in fact it will be our fault for encouraging those determined to destroy one of our most treasured achievements.

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Posted in Life, NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave

Thanks to the people of Hastings

Posted on 1 March 2013 | Leave a comment

I’ve long dismissed Hastings, with its backward culture endlessly celebrating the big defeat in 1066 instead of looking forward, its fabled smuggling and cave culture ruined by the museum that time forgot and the debacle of how the inhabitants could not even organise for themselves a decent bonfire. Today, against all expectation, I’m praising the place. Why?

It simply can’t be as bad as all its symptons because it has attracted one of the best orthopaedic surgeons in the country to its local hospital, the “Conquest Hospital” (See what I mean? If I was naming a place of healing, I don’t think I’d go with that word association…). I’m talking about Mr Hugh Apthorp, whom my wife identified after some research as being as good as anyone gets. Consequently, he gave her a new hip a couple of days ago. I’ll spare you the gruesome details but I cannot let this crucial episode in our lives pass without properly praising both Mr Apthorpe and all the staff in the hospital who cared for my wife so wonderfully. Everyone. All were as helpful, as skilled and as organised as can be. Every last one of them. Together, throughout the day and night, they created a loving atmosphere of science, professionalism and humanity. I’ll be heaping up my gratitude much higher in the official feedback forms.

I’m guessing almost all of them live in Hastings, along with most of their colleagues in the hospital. Therefore, Hastings, I take it all back. Thank-you to all of you for what you’ve done, in our National Health Service. For all that you have done for us, I have far too little to return but nonetheless, I’ll be making amends from now on. Tomorrow, I’ll share the story of my visit yesterday to the legendary Hastings Chess Club. Hastings, I make peace with you. Do think you could quit obsessing about a battle that took place a few miles away, more than a few hundred years ago, though.

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Posted in Conquest Hospital, Hastings, NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave

Time for UK to fund research into promising cure for ME (Myalgic Encephalomyelitis)?

Posted on 26 June 2012 | 12 Comments

24 years ago I became friends with a fellow (let’s call him C – though that’s not his real name) who was studying Politics A-Level at Brighton Technical College, as I was. We both passed our exam and went off to University. These were the days before the internet had provided handy tools for socialising, before even email was being widely used. We kept in touch by handwritten correspondence. When we were both back in Brighton, we’d meet up, discuss old Woody Allen films and do all the sorts of things that young men do. Except for C, that’s all it was: a discussion. He couldn’t do all the things that young men do because he had been struck down with Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, more commonly known as ME.

As we both moved around a fair bit (me more than most, way more than most), we kept up the correspondence but eventually the inevitable happened: we lost touch. His Mum had moved too and I had no way of finding him again. I often wondered what happened to C. I freely admit that I – like many other people, including, sadly, much of the medical professional back then – had doubts about whether this wasn’t just some kind of psychosomatic condition. Depression by another name. It was such a strange illness, without much in the way of physical symptoms which I could actually see. From my ignorant perspective, it looked like clinical depression. After all, I only had C’s reportage to go on and he wasn’t saying much on the subject. Another friend’s Mum had it but she didn’t discuss it with me.

Last year I bumped into C in Brighton Library. It was great to see him again! Not so great was the realisation that he still had ME. He’s had it for 20 years. 20 years. That’s a very severe case indeed. We caught up on all our news but mainly it was me doing the talking. Not because of what I’m like but because I had 20 years of news to report. He had 20 years of debilitating illness instead. I’d often spoken to others about C in the years we had lost contact, describing him as one of my best friends ever. I’d spent a fair bit of time trying to track him down, without even a hint of success (although, to be fair, if I’d joined Facebook before starting this blog, I’d have found him). I’d often wondered what happened to him. Now I know the answer. He’d suffered. Suffered and struggled without the energy to do so in a world indifferent to his plight.

ME is a fairly common illness in the UK. There’s a quarter of a million people with it. Sometimes known as Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, it complex, severe, long term, neurological illness – or group of illnesses. 1 in 4 are housebound or bedbound, sometimes for years or decades. Many are too ill to go to work, and school, or going out with friends, or even do any normal day to day activities, like cooking lunch, or having a shower. Some are too ill to talk, or to swallow, and have to be fed with tubes, and communicate with sign language. It’s often described as like having the most severe flu and trying to run a marathon all at the same time, all of the time. Really, I’m doing it an injustice though. There are dozens of other symptoms. Even the smallest amount of exercise can wipe the sufferer out.

C tried to explain this to me but I didn’t understand. I wasn’t him and I only had his words to go on. He used the same words as all sorts of people complaining about all sorts of conditions, ranging from clinical depression to just sheer bloody fecklessness. I was so pleased that we’d hooked up again that I taught him how to ride a bicycle. Soon after I suggested a country ride and ever so slightly underestimated the distance involved. At the time, C had good reason to think that he was recovering. He had a girlfriend, a work placement and a brighter future than he’d had for many years. 25 miles of riding later, we were both worn out. It took me a couple of days to get over it. It took him a couple of weeks. Only then did I properly grasp what he’d been telling me. Since then, I’ve been very careful around him. Very careful not to wear him out.

Earlier this year, C suffered a full-scale relapse. After having tasted the beginnings of a normal life again, it hit him hard. I lost contact with him again. He wasn’t even answering Facebook messages. Later I discovered that he’d attempted suicide.

Now I’ve learnt that there appears to have been a massive breakthrough in the treatment of this mysterious disease. A drug designed to treat cancer has produced dramatic results, with two-thirds of the patients in one small study experiencing a complete cure. The study was in Norway. Here’s a short video from Norwegian television talking about it. You’ll probably need to watch this on a desktop machine, because you’ll need to click on the CC button at the bottom of the YouTube screen to see the subtitles (Unless, you are Norwegian!).

Here’s a more detailed scientific explanation and an interview with one of the Norwegian doctors featured in the film above, from the European Society for ME. Not much point me pretending to know about that stuff.

I am aware that this is a highly contentious subject matter and that non-expert writers like myself should be very careful before they dash off blog posts on the subject, without properly understanding the issues involved. A doctor has urged me to realise that there are definitely some people who present with ME who have psychological symptoms. Apparently there have been death threats against doctors who point that out! On the other hand, C tells me that there is a distinct lack of UK funding avenues for research of the type shown in the video above. He’s not the sort of fellow who would make a death threat. He described the situation as “very frustrating”. If there’s a real potential to finding a cure for this terrible illness, shouldn’t our excellent clinicians be funded to research that properly? A quarter of million people, their friends and families would probably agree.

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Posted in Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, ME, Myalgic Encephalomyelitis, NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave, Rituximab

Normal service is suspended: this chess player’s strategy today is to bring down the government.

Posted on 15 October 2011 | Leave a comment

I’m supposed to be posting on chess today but there’s more important matters to attend to. I’m on my way to London to help occupy the stock exchange. I’m sick of our pretend democracy when the reality is that all power is held by corporations who avoid/evade taxation. Now that parliament has voted to privatise the NHS, it has become personal. I’m going to help set the camp up. It’s difficult for me to stay more than a couple of nights due to some unavoidable personal issues. Please note, these do not include the audition ITV invited me to but I’ll probably make that anyway. I’ll be donating a tent to the cano and returning a couple of days later with more donations.

Some people have commented how nice it must be to not have a job and be able to carry on like this. These people are, of course, trolls. They troll twitter for amusement. How very sad. I feel sorry for them.

Time for the inevitable chess analogy. Damn! Just remembered that I’ve forgotten to bring my board. Very often in our culture you hear the expression, “we’re just pawns in a game of chess” whereas anyone who knows how to play properly understands that the pawns, collectively, are the most important piece. If a game is not lost through a silly blunder, pawn structure is very often the deciding factor. On a chess board the pawns only constitute 50% of the population. In life, we are the #99%.

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Posted in "all necessary measures", Brighton, Chess, Chess In The Cave, NHS, Protests

The Day A Death Warrant Was Served On The NHS – Now It’s Personal!

Posted on 12 October 2011 | Leave a comment

The thieving Tory bastards have made this personal attack on us all. We are the 99%. They are the 1%. The Liberal Democrats know they are facing, as a good friend of mine described it, “political armageddon”. There’s now no distinction between these two forces of darkness. They have cynically manipulated the democratic process with bare-faced pre-election lies about protecting the National Health Service. Now they’ve signed its death warrant.

This treason will never be forgotten. This heinous crime against the most precious achievement of our civil society is far, far worse than a mere breach of the social contact between state and people. It is a direct attack by the rich against the poor, an ambush against our community spirit and a low point in British political history.

From here on in the ordinary rules of political combat have changed. The MPs who voted for the bill must be challenged every waking moment of their day. Everywhere they go, wherever they live, whatever they do. Politics is no longer polite or respectful, they have made that true. The gloves are coming off.

If you feel even half as angry about this as I do, this is the time to work out what you can do to assist the campaign of mass civil disobedience now beginning. If you can’t be involved personally as much as those of us who intend to occupy the London Stock Exchange on Saturday 15th October (see info below), please consider what else you can do. Remember, this revolution is not being televised.

Be creative, be peaceful, be persistent. Jam their phone lines, decline to cooperate wherever possible, donate cash and goods to the occupation camps.

I had been really looking forward to celebrating David Ingledew’s 60th birthday on Saturday and am gutted to miss it. My wife will go. She does plenty for the NHS already – she’s one of their doctors. One of our doctors! I’ll be heading to London with a sleeping bag, a tent, some solar power, some video cameras and an internet connection. I’ll be staying until necessary and if that means choking up the prison system, so be it. As Nye Bevan famously said, the NHS will only survive for as long as people are prepared to fight for it.

If you can’t be spared for this level of involvement, please do whatever you can to help those who can. There’s also plenty you can do on the home front. Follow the activists online to find out where this movement is going and what you can do to help. Doing something every day, even if it is just a telephone call in protest.

If you want to join us in London on Saturday, here’s how:

Occupy the London Stock Exchange
15th October
12pm
St Paul’s Cathedral

The words ‘corporate greed’ ring through the speeches and banners of protests across the globe. After huge bail-outs and in the face of unemployment, privatisation and austerity we still see profits for the rich on the increase. But we are the 99%, and on October 15th our voice unites across gender and race, across borders and continents as we call for equality and justice for all.

In London we will occupy the stock exchange. Reclaiming space in the face of the financial system and using it to voice ideas for how we can work towards a better future. A future free from austerity, growing inequality, unemployment, tax injustice and a political elite who ignores its citizens, and work towards concrete demands to be met.

Assemble in front of St Pauls Cathedral at Midday – please try to be on time and not early or late. When you are there be ready and attentive. Make sure to follow @OccupyLSX on twitter for updates on the day.

Try to come with a friend or group of friends. If you are thinking of staying for a while bring plenty of food and water, wrap up warm and you may want to bring tents and a sleeping bag.

Bring your energy and excitement, and be ready to create a better world!

If you have any questions or comments, please get in touch
Email: general@occupylsx.org
Twitter: @OccupyLSX
Website: occupylsx.org

This is not a party political affair…

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Posted in "all necessary measures", 2011, Abuse, Anonymous, Camping, Corporations, Facing Fear, Liberal Traitors, NHS, Occupy London Stock Exchange, Police, Politics, Politics in the Cave, Protests, Scams, Thieving Tory Bastards

This is what the thieving Tory bastards want to do to our NHS

Posted on 7 September 2011 | Leave a comment

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Posted in Liberal Traitors, NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave, Thieving Tory Bastards

Childhood Vaccinations – the risks explained

Posted on 18 June 2011 | Leave a comment

This post is especially earmarked for Jason Kitcat, Green Party councillor for Regency ward in Brighton and Hove (and cabinet member) who has not replied to my tweet about how wrong he was to blow the trumpet for a medical study which he hadn’t read or understood. You don’t have to reply to me Mr Kitcat but you do need to decide which side of the debate you are on: the evidence based side or the side of the scaremongerers. Here’s another way of looking at the issue:

 

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Posted in Green Party, Jason Kitkat, Medication, NHS

Science or mystical fear: a choice the Green Party must make

Posted on 8 June 2011 | 7 Comments

Last night I noticed a tweet from Jason Kitcat, a Green Party councillor for Regency ward on Brighton & Hove City Council. He is also the Cabinet Member for Finance & Central in the City. He’s a man of influence and clearly going places. I like him. He’s hard working and very capable. He’s a techie with a sense of humour. Unfortunately, on June 6th he tweeted a link to an abstract of a paper hidden behind a paywall (as most medical literature is), which claimed new evidence of a link between childhood vaccinations and autism. He said this was “Serious stuff.”

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I looked up the abstract. I decided that it wasn’t worth me paying the £25 for the paper it abstracted from, since I have no scientific training and am unlikely to be able to assess it properly. Consequently, I checked it out with a child and adolescent psychiatrist, who had never heard of it. She takes her NHS job very seriously and keeps up to date with all developments in her field, of which this would definitely be one.

She informed me that there had been much research which showed that there was nowhere near enough evidence to justify such a link being made has now disproved the theory that there was a link between the measles, mumps & rubella vaccine and autistic spectrum disorders. She confirmed that no new link has been established between childhood vaccinations and autism. [Note: corrected upon a further conversation with her, on the day of the original posting.]

Sadly, Jason Kitcat did not trouble himself with reading the original paper either. He admitted in a conversation on twitter that he was not “expert” enough either:

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Which begs the question, why did he tweet a link to an abstract from it? What was the point? Spreading the word about something useful is one thing but if the data is misleading it could be dangerous. In the case of Mr Kitcat’s tweet it could well be dangerous, since there is an industry profiteering on the back of fear for children’s health. This industry is very quick to promote misinformation and quackery in exchange for cold cash. Why have you done your bit to help this pernicious industry, Mr Kitcat?

The tabloid press and its brethen in the new media make much hay out of this scare story. By hay, I mean profits. Profits inform everything they print, which is why they have recently been attacking our rule of law over the super-injunctions. In some cases, we the public may benefit from this but in most we do not. In most cases, we are scared into making bad choices because we are not expert enough to understand the real issues. Choices not grounded in evidence based research but on fear. The more frightened we are, the more profits for Rupert Murdoch.

Being no expert on the subject either, I researched what I could on the story. The best narrative I have yet found on the scare story comes from the Guardian’s science columnist Dr Ben Goldacre. Please click that link and read it. Contrary to popular opinion, doctors want to help people. Being scientists they do not act in conspiracy to suppress information. On the contrary, they publish and ask to be proved wrong. The NHS doctors are not driven by greed. They do not advertise. The adverts appearing alongside this blog post will not come from NHS doctors. I have tried to avoid repeating certain words too often to prevent me from having to hunt down and ban the scaremongerers who would otherwise pay Google and me for advertising on this blog. (Previously, due to too many adverts from Tesco for chicken, I hunted down and banned all of Tesco’s affiliates from appearing here. This took a long time.) The tabloid media, as detailed in Dr Goldacre’s article certainly do operate a conspiracy of silence when some new information will kill the profits to be made out of a story.

At the end of the day, Mr Kitcat is just one of thousands of parents who are no doubt deeply concerned about the wellbeing of their offspring. He’s no different from any other parent in that regard. He’s certainly not the only tweeter or blogger or forum user who is prepared to promote bunkum that he little understands. I guess it is fear that drives him to say it “pays to be cautious on all medications”.

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Come off it! Why does Mr Kitcat make this assertion? Where is the ‘payment’ if I contract a serious illness and then delay treatment for a few crucial days? In the case of the childhood vaccinations, the fear whipped up by the profit driven media created the caution first and the diseases came later. There was a mumps epidemic. Measles is returning. These diseases could not previously take hold in the population because the children were being given preventative cures. Blanket statements like this are rarely useful.

It is difficult to think of a bigger issue than one concerning childhood health. However, in my book there is: whether we found our society on evidence based research, science, replicated knowledge or on the fear, scaremongering and panic promoted by those who would seek to destroy our socialist values.

Not A Socialist

Rupert Murdoch represents all that is the worst about the free press in this country. He hates the freedom the internet has given to the rest of us. He hates the concept of social justice, formerly known as socialism. His media empire makes profit out of scaremongering. Thanks to the enormous power and influence this man and people like him wield, it has been an uphill struggle to achieve any progressive change.

However, we, the activists have been successful. We have fought hard for the values we believe in. We have consistently buried whatever difficulties came between us and will do so again for the bigger principles at stake: the better vision we hold dear. Call it what you will, I call it socialism. Ah, that dirty word again. I’m cleaning it off. Socialists fight for a society governed in the best interests of its people, not just the pockets of the few. Clearly no socialist can ignore the pressing threat of climate change, for its impact on human society will be, if unchecked, catastrophic.

2011: Brighton & Hove elected a minority Green council. It would have been a Green-Labour coalition but Labour, for some reason, didn't want any power this time.

The Brighton & Hove Green Party shines a light for the rest of the country. Our local party pulled off a major historical upset in the normal scheme of things with the election of Caroline Lucas to the House of Commons. The election of a (albeit minority) administration to govern Brighton & Hove City Council was a more impressive milestone, which pits our beliefs against the practicalities of wielding power. If the local councillors get this exercise right, a new dawn may rise in British politics. Other people around the country may well follow our example and elect Green councillors.

The annual naked bike ride in Brighton

Brighton & Hove is an unusual place. It has the highest graduate retention rate in the country, with approximately one-third of its residents having attended one of the two local universities. This highly educated population has chosen to stay in Brighton for several reasons but chief among them is the very lovely civil society that exists in Brighton. Of course Brighton’s fame and raison d’être is partying, posing and promenading. All of that holds good but we have also consistently led the way in counter-culture, in creativity and holding onto the things we hold dear. We have not built on the downland, preferring instead to become the most densely populated city in Europe. Even our local football team’s supporters refused to give in the hard-faced men who sold their stadium from underneath them and despite years of homelessness, are now experiencing a well earnt rebirth. Our population votes for what they believe in, rather than because of what they fear.

The local Green Party has been born of this population. As the issues which concern us have become more urgent, we have professionalised our operation. Gone are the many party speakers and in is the one leader. Our media presentation is slicker and we have grown mechanisms to take control of the story, so that the Rupert Murdoch’s of this world cannot completely control it. This has been the result of hard, consistent grafting. People who like to waive religious totems around are still most welcome in our party (Hey, everyone’s welcome!) but they no longer dominate the agenda.

Our local councillors must represent all that is best about the Green Party. Their conduct over the next four years will be scrutinised like no other elected politicians before them. Attention to detail has to be a hallmark of their civic pride. Throwaway remarks in public are no longer acceptable. Anything tweeted is public. We say that our policy is no longer informed by mysticism but by science, that our human values are concerned with social justice rather than the inequality promoted by Murdoch’s crew and we demand that our political decisions are based on properly conducted research instead of being informed by undue panic.

This is a plea to all our local councillors, including Mr Kitcat: please be sure when you speak out in public that you truly know of what you talk. Either you truly know about something or you do not. In the first case, fine, let’s have your expert opinion. In the latter case, shut the fuck up because if you don’t, you’ll cause us more harm than good. Stating that something you haven’t read and can’t understand is “serious” is, at best, disingenuous and, at worst, misleading and dangerous. Neither approach is attractive by a leading politician. By “us” I mean, those of us who you seek to rule, not your new friends in the old media. It’s fine to say that something is not your area of expertise and pass someone over to someone who is. Mr Kitcat, you are in position of considerable influence. Your standing with the local party could not be higher. Please use your public energies to supporting the NHS and its hard working doctors. If you want to tweet away about public health, please use your time to promote public health, not scaremongering. It is unacceptable to repeat gubbins you barely understand, absolutely unacceptable. Loose words, especially now, will cost us all very dear.

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Posted in Brighton, Hove, Jason Kitkat, Kason Kitcat, Medication, NHS, Politics, Politics in the Cave

Blimey, Diazepam does the trick!

Posted on 12 March 2011 | Leave a comment

It certainly has cured my leg flu, warded off my appetite and left me a jolly calm sort of fellow. Can see why it might be highly addictive. Even had a nice little nap this afternoon, mid-conversation. Hope the leg flu doesn’t return as soon as my supply runs out. Weirdly, someone found my blog via google having searched for the terms “leg” and “flu”, so I guess I am not the only sufferer. Also, have been an efficient coder today, making 115 PayPal buttons for a website I’ve nearly completely overhauled, transforming it from a humble html site into a fully fledged php showboat. Watch this space to see it relaunched soon.

Sooner or later someone will point out that there is an alliterative theme in my pursuits: chess, cycling, cooking and coding. I have other interests and, yes, they mainly begin with the same letter!

The other main excitement of the day was not really convincing myself that I had bricked my Samsung Galaxy S. In fact, I just stupidly returned the damn thing to the stock rom in a fuzzy bid (that’ll be the diazepam again methinks) to cure a shared calendar glitch. Only later on did I discover that Titanium Backup – a great app for rooted android phones – would have cleared the calendar data for me, allowing me to reset it and win back my copy of my wife’s calendar on my phone. From the stock rom I then decided to try another rom and with the increased fuzziness things went downhill. However, since I can still boot into recovery, I will be able to achieve this. Just need a clear head. This is the sort of fun and games iphone users never have. Most of them think that they’re better off with loads more apps when in fact they need extra apps because Apple denies them flash and consequently many websites don’t work for them, with the result that they need specialist apps just to get the advantages of the internet. Anyway, I was running a beautifully modified rom from Tayutama. Get the latest Tayutama if you want to vastly improve on what Samsung offer as firmware for the Galaxy S. They make great hardware but hackers make even better software, surprise surprise. The reason for this is that there are always more hackers than proprietary employees. Really, I’m just waiting for the legendary Cyanogen to release a stable rom for the Galaxy S.

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Posted in Android, Coding/Development, Cyanogen, Diazepam, Flash, Hackers, html, Iphone, Medication, NHS, phones, php, Tayutama