Still seems odd to me that we spend so much on 'labour saving' devices, then spend so much on gym membership to keep in shape.

I wouldn't like to arm wrestle with one of those poor sods who have been spending 6 hours a day doing the washing by hand.

Looks pretty good.

They ask "Why didn't a manually powered washer or dryer already exist? "

I know it is not exactly the same thing, but I have been using one for the last week or so.
We are still maintaining two houses at the moment and I refuse to buy a new washing machine which we won't need later, so I have been using one of these:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z6oE_6TwBuo

... clearly it is far smaller, and lacks a spin or dry facility - but it works surprisingly well.


If they started selling the GiraDora over here, I would buy one in a heartbeat.

I would see it as combining a keep fit regime with doing the washing. No need for a stepper or treadmill, just get more clothes dirty

My brother worked on a pig farm for a while - he swore they had a sense of humour.

Said you that if he turned his back on one particular pig when shovelling muck, it would 'jump him' and knock him face down in the crap then run off making what sounded like 'laughing' noises. I have no idea if this is true, but I would love to have seen it.

Of course, how you rate intelligence depends on the context and the definition of intelligence you are using.. however, in quite a few areas pigs outperform dogs.

Yes, I know, pigs <> wild hogs, but they are easier to test.

I don't fully understand what you mean - but I do a lot of column matching with the VLookup command - might be what you need.

Well that seals it then

If Auntie Bettie's website says it is Ok, it's got settle the pub bore argument once and for all.

TT - I warned you not to get me started on the flag/jack issue

You have taken on the mantle of the pub know-it-all so must bear the consequences - so.....

Bollocks!

To follow that line of reasoning is to :
* ignore that fact the English is a living language, and 'majority rule' ends up changing the meaning of words (if not, why are we not still using some of it's older names, eg. 'the British flag' or 'the flag of Britain'.
* to assume that everyone is happy for the 'name' of an object to change depending on where it is located - by no means a given.
* to assume that Uni mates who are RN are capable of independent non-partisan thoughts.
* and most importantly, to assume that the parliamentary approval of the 'union jack' as being an acceptable term for the national flag (1908) has in some way been rescinded.

Both are acceptable. Neither is wrong - super-technically or otherwise - and you can tell that to the Navy

I think we view or national flags a little differently.

Whether we should, or shouldn't is one of those debates that needs an evening over a few beers to really thrash out, but sadly, for quite a few years the union flag was 'adopted' by some of the extreme right wing (and fairly rascist) politcal movements.

This lead to many otherwise perfectly sane and sensibly patriotic people avoiding overt use of the union flag for fear of being associated with the racist nutters.

This is, of course, wrong on so many levels, but national identity within the British Isles is complex - e.g. a few members of the British football team didn't sing the national anthem 'cos they were Welsh.  'WTF?' you may well exclaim, but then one verse (not sung much these days) of the 'British' national anthem contains the words:

Quote
"Lord, grant that Marshal Wade
May by thy mighty aid
Victory bring.
May he sedition hush and like a torrent rush,
Rebellious Scots to crush.
God save the King."

.. that the Welsh footballers didn't sing it was mentioned in the media, but it wasn't much of a big deal.

As I said, it is complicated and confusing even for us Brits.

... of course, my country's flag is now:



... well kind of..... where is live now is Wales, but heavily populated by Mancs and Scousers (ie. English), so I think the threat of a horrible death in a whicker man is somewhat less likely than I feared.

[added]
We can't even agree on whether to call it the 'union flag' or the 'union jack' - both are defensible, but you will get plenty of pub know-it-alls telling you that is is only called the 'Union Jack' when flown on a ship.... don't get me started on that one....

There is so much stuff that Google 'could' measure that one could easily become scared into inaction on almost every SEO front.

The most important things to remember are:
* just because they can, doesn't mean that they are doing
* just because the spot SEO activity doesn't mean they will penalize you for it (it may need a combination of factors happening together before it incurs a penalty)
* even if they can't, or don't measure something, it doesn't mean they won't in the future. Think of all those headless chickens busy trying to remove directory entries and otherwise clean up their link profiles that they thought were safe.

There is no such thing as 'safe' SEO any more.

Overall it is a useful breakdown - with one embarrassing error right at the start (IMO, of course, but bear with me here).

The 'great example' he uses is:

Quote4G is a mobile broadband technology that will change the way your department communicates, collaborates, and operates.

No No No!!!!!

Quote4G is a mobile broadband technology that will IMPROVE the way your department communicates, collaborates, and operates.

'change' is irrelevant - 'improve' is a benefit.

It may sound like I am being Mr Picky here, but if this were a headline on a website sales letter, he would be losing some conversions with 'change' instead of 'improve'.

It's a brilliant idea - and think of the comedy implications as well

Free is always good value for money, and if it is anything like the usual conferences, most of the good stuff happens at the bar later.

If it was a bit nearer, I would go and loiter... but Brighton is a 5 hour drive - even free has it limits for me.

QuoteSOLD OUT in just over an hour.....

ermmm... it was free - not 'sure sold' out is the correct terminology.

I can't be bothered to travel to Brighton - bit of hike etc... but if I could, I would just go an hang around the bars/pubs where everyone is drinking and save myself the cost of zero.

I tried for a while, but it didn't work for my business model.

I was applying the same techniques as worked well for my ebay aff stuff - quick and dirty sites relying on long tail searches. Amazon didn't have enough variety in the inventory for this to work well, plus what little traffic I sent them paid far less than ebay did.

I know some guys through one of the ebay related aff forums who claim to have made it work, they said it needed a different business model with more presell and a better quality site. I have no way of knowing if they were telling the truth though. 

Quotebut its just cgi

I don't care - I'll still buy one - then all I have to do is move somewhere I can drive a cgi car.

If I remember correctly, it just needs me to take some kind of blue pill, yeah?