Fluffy Little Idiot

Thinking through goal setting and attaining

2012-01-25T01:27:00.000Z

At the beginning of this month, I took a copy of my 'Goals 2011/2' page and re-worked it. Some things got dumped totally (like learning French, as I really don't need it at the moment, and Italian was removed a while ago), and others cut down to reflect my needs and priorities better.

Some sections got increased! For instance, I included more needlework projects that I wanted to do, both as a 'training' for creating my own kits etc, hopefully later on this year, and also as a reminder of what needs finishing up and a motivating list to cross stuff off! I also reinstated the music learning section as, now we have downstairs neighbours and the worst sound-proofing I've come across anywhere I've ever been, I feel the need to make some 'blocking out' noise from time to time and I still do want to learn viola. I also added in one or two more things I wanted to read fiction-wise so that there was something 19th century on it and not all just 18th century and older, which can be pretty hard going at times.

So, how are things looking so far? Well, I seem to have met 24 of the current goals and a further 36 are in progress. OK, they aren't all in progress constantly as I do tend to stop and start on things, but they are at least part done. I'm thinking that all the needlework, music and at least almost all of the general reading sections will be completed. At least three of the five qualifications will happen (OK, one already has!) and I think I can look forward to about that sort of percentage on the self study projects as well, esp. as many of them are intermittent interests.

The really tricky bit is the last section, 'Writing Projects'. I've come to realise that two of those are not just massive projects, but also quite important and need a good deal more time devoting to them. OK, so if I finished one of these and break the back of the second, it may mean only one thing crossed off when I could have crossed several off other lists in the same time, but it comes down to what really matters to me.

The April 2010 'Awake!' magazine cover article series was on creating more time and it had an excellent 3 point plan in making time for what really matters and getting stuff done:
1) Clarify your values i.e. family, work, projects, health etc and put them in order of importance.
2) List the goals you want to achieve and that can realistically be completed, (which will be heavily influenced by your values.)
3) Plan and schedule activities that contribute to meeting those goals.
The result is that your life will have a unified direction and things that really matter will be achieved.

So, bearing this in mind I realised that I have to be cautious about working on certain things, esp. stuff like science and English language/linguistics studies that I'm interested in, but that don't contribute to larger, more important goals, just for the sake of 'working towards crossing something off the list' and finding stuff out! At the end of the day, those things are really interesting and I do want to know about them, but they are side dishes, not the main course. I need to schedule time for the central things and projects that are to lead to something such as getting on with my two Mandarin learning materials books. A good idea will be nothing more than just a good idea if I don't bring it to fruition....

Ditto with making kits etc. I may have lots of great ideas and have managed to attract squads of new stitchery blog subscribers by some of the tutorials and pieces I've done of late, but I need to get some saleable designs worked and instructions for those put together as well. The great reaction to my on-line tutorials has shown me I can teach technique OK with just photos and a few concise instructions, so I really need to move that forward and start with one or two design ideas that I'm already competent enough to produce - whilst learning more on the side, of course. Both this and the language projects require me to continue studying in order to make a decent job of them.

So, in short, goals are great things, but they need to be focused and moving somewhere definite as well as prioritised in order to really lead anywhere worthwhile. Whilst it's true that I hope to crack about 75% of what's on that list this year, if I can even mostly complete one of the writing projects, it will be worth two dozen of the other goals!

August Goals Report

2011-08-31T19:56:00.001+01:00

As expected, not much to report back on this month. I completed 2 more from the list and worked on about 13 altogether. I didn't even get much on the other list posted last month done as I've been labouring under one viral infection after another (often with about one day clear in between!), and so I haven't felt up to it. Tja! That's summer for you - air too warm to kill germs and so they just flock to see me!!

Let's hope for better things in September.=)

Your friendship account balance is overdrawn

2011-08-18T09:57:00.008+01:00

I wasn't going to do this, as I prefer to keep all personal stuff well and truly off blog, but to give relief to my spirits (which have got a bit ruffled over the last 24 hours by a rather lopsided 'friendship' and which I probably got too worked up over....):

Imagine this - One day you get a letter from a friend that reads in part 'I regret to inform you that your friendship account is overdrawn'. What would you make of it? I was thinking last night, that relationships are like bank accounts that we can make deposits into and withdrawals from. Deposits are things like the time spent on or with a person, the genuine interest actively shown in them regardless of whether we see them regularly or not and things like that. Withdrawals are what we get from it - their time, their concern and their willing help when we need it. It behoves us all to examine the balance of all our relationship accounts!

Don't get me wrong, I've never been the type who gives only to get something in return and I've sometimes suspected that being that way out has even led some to bracket me in the Fluffy Little Idiot category, or as a soft touch etc. Perhaps this is nearer to being true than I would like, but even so, one person who commented on my 'seemingly unending patience and mercy' found out that both did have a very definite end! They weren't the only one either. I've - hum - omitted to include certain people on new e-mail address notifications etc as the relationship was all about them and, in some cases, I've been treated really rather rudely by people who should know better. Certain individuals I no longer take any initiative to communicate with, but who I had put forth a lot of effort for in the past, as they fail to demonstrate any real interest in me and even to display simple good manners! One, who I bent over backwards to help (as did others who also got nothing in return) actually accused me of being selfish on the one and only occasion that I insisted on things being done to suit me instead of always her way. Given the multiple inconveniences she'd put me to, this pushed the balance irretrievably into the red. Credit limit reached!

Of course, I don't think anyone should keep a literal account, but it's good to ask ourselves from time to time, 'Am I getting much more from this relationship than I'm giving? Am I indeed giving anything at all? Do I contact this person only when I want help/advice/encouragement/congratulations etc? Or do I maintain a full, fair and balanced exchange with them? When I say I love this person, or sign my message 'with love', does that mean that I actively love them and that they could be left in no doubt of that fact, or is it only 'responsive' love? i.e. a feeling generated when they do something nice for me, but I really wouldn't trouble myself to break wind for their convenience! I'm really touched when they show a kindly interest in me, but would I do the same for them? DO I?' Or maybe we even need to ask 'How much do I get back from this person? Is it a real friendship? Could I honestly rely on them in a time of need?'

Sometimes I feel a bit like sending the following message: We regret to inform you that your friendship account is critically overdrawn. This account is now liable to immediate termination with no further warning unless immediate deposits are made.

July goals round up - addendum

2011-08-02T09:13:00.008+01:00

Basic stats for last month are:

5 goals completed making 14 altogether (I posted 4 earlier on, but it's 5 - I forgot one!)

21 things worked on including 2 newly in progress.

There are 34 in progress in total and 55 still left untouched, which will include a handful of new ones that I swapped in for things that weren't of interest/relevance anymore.

And that makes 102, so I seem to have miscounted again, perhaps on the original list, as I got that amount too many last time.... And when I just counted the lot, I got only 93! I'm clearly losing the plot somewhere!

________________________________________________

Later on:

OK, so I've re-worked it, there are now 100 items on the list as I've numbered them and there seem to have been 103 before. I deleted about 6 and added 3 new things in. So, now it should work and the previous miscount in setting the thing up will answer for why I could never get the monthly totals to tally properly.=)

She gets there in the end, but she IS a fluffy little idiot when all's said and done, so why expect better???!!!Ha-HA!

What about August? Well, I expect to wipe a few more off the list as a matter of course such as getting at least more piece of needlework completed, finishing one or more novels and non-fiction books etc, but I think my main focus is going to be on getting a few things that are hanging around the house done. Here's an impromptu list:

* Mend my favourite winter skirt (will be tough as will need fabrics bonding etc owing to the type of seam that's gone, but I have ideas....)

* Alter that shirt of Sir's that's gone around one wrist to make a short-sleeved one. There's nothing wrong with the rest of it and I do NOT permit waste!

* Mend my ministry shoulder bag as one strap has come out in one place and needs re-sewing in.

* Finally finish a hem on a mad dress I began to alter well over 15 years ago! I'd like to wear it, to say nothing of emptying and clearing away the bag it's been hanging around in.

* Learn long document techniques with Word 2007 (such as Table of Contents, Indexes etc) so I can both use them in my writing projects and also get the book back to the library.

* Make a start on learning to use Access 2007 and get that book returned as well.

From the main list I should cross off the following:

* ITQ1

* 'The Eustace Diamonds', then start 'Phineas Redux'

* The blackberries design, including making it up into a manicure pouch

* Finish up the giraffe cushion

Might finish one or two non-fiction books too.

I've borrowed my mum's sewing machine so that I can really get on with some of the sewing things that have been waiting around and also try my hand at making little bags and purses with a view to trying to sell them.

June Goals Review

2011-06-30T16:25:00.003+01:00

Mmmm, not so much movement this month as I thought I might make. Some of it was down to focusing on a handful of things (such as the IT courses and all the exams involved etc) and some more was down to doing other things that aren't on the list, such as all the stitching I did of things not on the first two sections and so forth.

So far:
9 of the 100 are complete, which means only 2 have been finished off this month.
35 seem to be in progress (which adds up when I compare last month's figure of 37!!), of which I made headway on 14 during this last month. Nothing new was kicked off.

Some things have been re-coloured in blue as I'm not at all sure they're going to stay on the list and I may well boot them off and replace them with something more in line with current interests etc. Trouble is, my interests wax and wane incessantly, so changes are inevitable!!

I estimate that at least 4 things will be crossed off this coming month, very possibly more, depending on how much reading I do. Recently I've just been relaxing with the 2nd Palliser novel.=) As I said last time, goals are good things, but ignoring them sometimes and doing something for pure fun is good too!!!

Why I don't use social networking

2011-06-04T14:08:00.002+01:00

I'd been thinking about posting on this topic for a while and, having just read two excellent articles for young people on the subject (which raised a lot of the issues I had in mind) in the global magazine 'Awake!', I thought I'd share why I decided against having a Facebook or starting to Tweet.

First off, please note that I'm not condemning these services. I think they have some intrinsic value and, like most things, can be good if used wisely, but that there are also good reasons not to jump on the bandwagon if you so decide. I decided not to and these are my reasons. If you like them, I'm not criticising you - just telling you my own thoughts (if you want to read them - see the last comment on Twitter!!)

I think my first and major reason for not getting accounts is the time factor. Recently various applications for iphone and ipad were given 'awards' and the one deemed worthy of the one for wasting the most time was, no prizes for guessing: Facebook! Squads of people have commented on the sheer time wasting element of these things as one plays around looking at this page and that, at this group and that company, 'like'-ing this product and that posting. To my mind, this kind of stuff is just plain unimportant and therefore not a good use of my valuable time. One thing I can always assure any prospective employer is that, unlike many people in the workplace these days, s/he will not come in to my office and find me on Facebook!

Another reason is privacy. As has been so often said, nothing on-line should be considered anything other than permanent. There are specialised sites that enable you to, by just entering an old, ostensibly defunct URL, to re-visit that page. I actually have a photo that I got by trawling back via that site, so I know it can be done and that information can be found. Naturally, the same goes with blogs etc, but I do try to take care that I won't regret what I post. There have been some questions raised about official spying on certain social networks as well - that the company that runs it has connections in the US intelligence and that, when you sign up, on that 'User Agreement' page that 1 in a million people reads, you give permission for every piece of information you ever submit to be totally and permanently available to certain bodies. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing to hide (which is why I'm almost always to be found on-line under my own name), but I'm not happy with that!

The final thing is association with people I would not choose as friends. Whilst I know that many networks recommend that you only connect to people you know, frankly, there are some people I know that I would not choose to spend time I don't have to with. Whilst I was studying in Taiwan, a former classmate and one of the library workers asked me to link up on Facebook and, OK, they were pleasant to have around at school, but I wasn't thinking of keeping in touch and/or pursuing active friendships with them. One girl I'd met purely by her sitting next to me in the computer room asked me to connect on Facebook as about the 3rd sentence she said to me, (after asking my name and which country I was from). It was a great relief to be able to say that I didn't use Facebook and thus evade an otherwise uncomfortable issue totally.

I liked the suggestion in the article I've just read to review 'Friends' on networks each month and delete anyone whose profile makes you uncomfy or no longer meets your requirements for 'friending'. To me, the word 'friend' means a GREAT deal more than just someone I have a passing acquaintance with. I do use the professional networking site LinkedIn, and on that I have colleagues from a while ago, but this is for work and professional use and not for forging social connections.

When it comes to Twitter another issue comes to mind on top of the above and that is: Who cares for so and so's running commentary on certain events etc? I don't have the time to sit in front of my laptop following x and y's latest 'tweet' giving their opinions on world conditions etc and, frankly, I would expect any to do the same for any of mine! I write about what I want to here, (although I don't bother with most topics that occur to me for both time and other reasons, such as not wishing to start controversies etc), and very few bother to read it. That's fine. I do it mostly for myself anyway and with certain blogs, esp the travel one, I keep it to mostly photos.

To be honest, I think that if folk spent a lot less time living vicariously through others' Facebook and Twitter comments and more out and about forging real relationships and/or getting real knowledge of something that matters and/or is genuinely interesting, there'd be more happy and satisifed people around. If one wants to use these sites, go ahead of course, but I do strongly suggest using great caution as to what you post, what you read, who you connect to and how long you spend on doing it.

I'll get off my soapbox now!!!

Monthly Goal Update

2011-06-02T10:08:00.003+01:00

Time for the progress report up to the end of May:

So far 7 items have been crossed off as complete, of which 4 were finished during the month. Another 2 are part complete in that a major section of the work has been done - namely the stitchery on two cushion covers is complete, but they are not yet sewn up into finished items. I had planned to do these whilst staying at mum's recently for invigilation duties at Leeds Uni, but I was just too tired with several 11 hour work days etc!!

37 items are in progress, of which 22 have been worked on during the month and 8 of those have been started new.

That leaves a count of 59 unstarted. I realise that adds up to 102, when there are only 100 items on the list, but I'll fathom that out next time!! I expect the WIP number doesn't hold up against the previous month's list either, but some of that could be mis-counting and some more may be owing to the fact that I've actually deleted two unstarted items and replaced them with other projects that are already in progress and which I've now decided it would be better to finish than to start something else.=)

I plan to actively work on 30 items this month in the hope of crossing off as many as a further 10.

Goals are good things, I get a real buzz from updating this list and, especially, crossing stuff off it!!

Dead tired, but happy!

2011-05-15T11:15:00.005+01:00

They say every cloud has a silver lining and, whilst few people enjoy having to live with outside help (i.e. getting Housing and Council Tax Benefits), although I know some don't mind and don't want to work, there are some perks in that you can get stuff free.

I recently signed up for and started work on the ITQ2/ECDL Extra course, something which is increasingly being demanded in the admin and secretarial world. I paid £35 for the British Computer Society registration, but I'll get that back when I complete the course. The course itself and the tests have all been free for me - a saving of hundreds!

On Friday I went to another local low-cost training organisation to sign up for the OCR Level 3 Text Processing (Business Professional) suite. I already have the old Text Processing and Word Processing certificates from back in 2001, but I thought that updating and extending the qualification wouldn't hurt. I expected to be able to sign up for the Level 3 Certificate (=4/5 individual certs), but wondered about the Diploma (=7 or more certs). The lady there told me that, if I'm to be funded (i.e. to get it almost free, just £5 admin fee and 50% of exam fees), I have to do the full diploma! Challenge, yay! Actually, it's not that hard as I'd already looked at the programme in detail and seen that I can transfer in the Word Processing Software and Presentation Software from my ITQ2 and get those to count. Anyway, thanks to the benefits, I got all that lot for £48.69 - including a 10% discount for paying all in one go!

I just looked on the local college site to see that it would have actually cost me several hundred pounds to take the 5 exams I'd need to complete the Diploma with them (£150 each for 3 modules, plus £200+ for the final 2) and it would have been over £400 for the ITQ2. So, I've managed to get myself more than £1200 worth of training and certification for less than £50!

I don't have much time to complete the training, but that's OK as I know a lot of the material already and, esp. with the Text Processing Dip, I need the exam prep more than anything. By exam prep I only mean that I know OCR require things to be 100% their style or you begin to amass 'faults', so I just want to get my exam technique in line with their expectations. Both programmes are to be completed by late July, but then I will have 7 new certificates for my glory folder and, hopefully, a heavily subsidised leg up to the sort of job I want to get once I finally manage to strengthen up enough to lead a normal life again.=) Things are better, but it takes a while.

I've also been sussing out the best value NVQ programmes in the area and also just discovered that Chesterfield College, (which I can get to on the bus from v near home) offers the ITQ3 programme, which I'm coveting for later. Also have my eyes on the OU's Certificate in Business Studies.

Next fortnight we'll be up in Leeds helping out with exam invigilation, so we should be able to restock the bank balance a bit. Whew!=)

Too true. Oh, WAY too true!

2011-05-08T10:16:00.004+01:00

I confess to having shamelessly nicked this from the Times Higher Education's webpage (although it has the originator's details on still - phew!) It was just so true that I had to share it.

One month into the current 'Goals' list

2011-04-26T21:26:00.004+01:00

...and how am I doing with them?

Well, after a little bit of jiggling around with the list, I finally got it to number 100 items (although some 'items' are more than one thing in actual fact!!), which seemed like a decent number.

Progress thus far is:
3 tasks totally completed;
32 in progress; and
3 enquired about in the hope of getting going on soon.

By 26th May I hope to have completed at least 9 more, made progress on all those currently underway (some of which are rather long term efforts) and have started on around half a dozen new things.

Let's see.....

I like working like this. A list of stuff to do can take the aimlessness out of free time (of which I have rather a lot!)

Are GCSEs and A Levels getting easier?

2011-04-13T19:57:00.000+01:00

This is a question that's posed regularly each summer when the results of the UK national exams come out. For those who aren't familiar with the UK education system, basically, GCSEs are compulsory exams sat at the age of 16 and A Levels are taken by those who chose to stay at school or go to sixth form college at the age of 18 (although part of the exam is sat at 17). I got to thinking about it and came up with some ideas of my own.

It's doubtless true that a higher percentage of teenagers are getting better grades, especially for their A Levels. When I was at school, it was Hard to get an A or even a B grade at A Level, and about the top 10% got those coveted As. Now it seems to be more like a quarter of sixth formers who are getting top grades and university requirements have no doubt increased in line with the trend. However, does that mean that the exams are easier?

To be honest, I don't think so. I've looked at some A Level syllabuses and they contain the same sort of level and quantity of material as they did when I was in sixth form (1988-90). The main differences seems to me to be twofold:

1) The exams are now modular making top grades more accessible. A Levels used to be taken at the end of a two-year course and all papers were sat within one exam session. If you fluffed those, you could re-take at some point, but you would have to wait until the following summer and re-do the papers for the whole syllabus.

These days A Levels are split into two halves, the AS (Advanced Subsidiary), which is gained during the first year in one or two exam sessions (January and May/June or just the latter) and then the A2 year, which again may mean two lots of exams and leads to the full monty. If you do badly in any earlier examined paper, you can resit it at any time up to the last session in order to improve your overall grade. This means that whole sections of a course are examined and more or less closed within a few months rather than having to revise the whole course for the final exams. Of course, there are synoptic papers taken at the end of the course, but they're no longer all that way.

University courses went modular a short while before A Levels did and I know from my own experience that it makes better grades much more attainable. In the language classes, what you do one years builds upon last year's work, so you can't help but keep up there, but I know I would have struggled with area studies modules had I had to wait until the end of my fourth uni year before taking the exams! (Not because I couldn't do them, but because I've never learned to work consistently, the first 10 years of school being so easy to me, and so would have lost patience with all the revision material!!)

2) The amount of support and revision materials has grown almost exponentially. When I was doing my A Level courses, there were a few printed materials you could buy to revise from, but mostly you had your own notes and nothing else. There weren't really even any set textbooks. Not so anymore! Not only are there coursebooks, even ones based on the exact syllabus you're preparing for, but revision guides abound (again, even some exam board specific titles) and as for the computerised materials, well, to the making of many CD-Roms, DVDs and webpages there is no end! You can even download your syllabus, past papers and marks' schemes from the exam boards' websites! Exam prep right from the examiners!

So, as far as I can see, the exams and the subjects aren't getting easier, it's just that the format is more good grade friendly and printed and computer based support media is just so widely available that you really seem to have to try hard to fail! Even I might pass A Level chemistry these days.....

New Goals Page

2011-04-10T16:19:00.003+01:00

I missed my timed goals page, so I've re-done one. This one is stuff I aim to complete by the end of next year. A lot of it is reading and study, but there are also some qualifications I want to get on it and some other projects - including my needlework. I haven't counted how many there are in total, but I've got two completed already, (just reading things though). I hope to have another few done by the end of the month, including finishing one study book and one embroidery project. I've also dumped most of the former 'In progress' page and what's left of it has been renamed 'Ideas' as most of the other content has re-appeared on the 'Goals 2011/2' page etc. Let's see....

Sales calls, couldn't you just live without them??

2011-03-17T14:09:00.004Z

So, our phone and internet service provider just made yet another of their regular calls to make me the offer of my life. Oh, if only they would stop! As soon as I hear the Indian accent, I think, 'Oh help, it's TalkTalk - again!' They don't even ask if you have time, or if you're interested in knowing what they're calling about, they just start trying to get personal details from you and you have to interrupt to say, 'Look, I'll call you if I want to change things, thanks!'

I think I'd rather prefer the call if they didn't claim each time that they were going to be saving me money. Now come on, let's face it, the primary function of any and all businesses is to make money. No-one, but no-one is going to try and incite you to buy fewer of their products or services. If they'd just ask me if I was interested in the latest package/add-on/whatever, I'd respect that more, but no, they try to con me into thinking that I'd be saving money. Of course I would be spending more money, that's why they want me to take up the 'offer'! What's scary is that you know there'll be folk who'll fall for it....

Last time they wanted to 'save me money on our chargable calls'. Well, since Sir got a proper mobile phone contract and used that to make calls to other mobiles, our last two months' of extra calls have been £1.33 and 51p. I'm not really worried about that!!

Where's the 'no sales calls' box to check?? Actually, I've just found it on my account and it was already checked.....!

Life on a Budget - tips for all!

2011-01-24T09:40:00.001Z

Here are some of the things I've been doing to save money and that you can cash in on, quite literally, too. Many are also very green, so you can keep more money in your pockets and reduce your impact on the planet at the same time. Who could ask for more?=)

Home

*Look into changing your energy supplier, if you haven't already done so. Dual-fuel, on-line monthly payment schemes tend to be quite a lot cheaper than quarterly billing from two suppliers. Sites like USwitch and Money Supermarket can help find, not only cheaper home energy, but also insurances, mobile packages, internet deals and so on. You could save enough for a nice holiday with these!!

*Cut down on energy usage itself. It's amazing, but people still leave lights on in un-used rooms and have radiators belting out heat in guest bedrooms. Turn off what you don't need. Simple, but it can save a fair bit. Also, keep your heating thermostat at around 18C, not up in the 20s. Put on an extra wooly if you're cold, we don't need to heat our homes so much that we can walk around in T-shirts in December and need to open the windows!! Some do...

*Other ideas are to have the water heater set only for when you need it, not constantly topping up all day, using oil-filled radiator as auxilliary heaters rather than fan heaters, which use a lot more juice and cooking with the pan lids on - you can often turn the gas much lower that way. Turn off all appliances that aren't in use and don't leave device chargers plugged in. Little things that add up in time.

*Look into any free or subsidised insulation schemes that may be on offer in your area. Our local council does a scheme for private tenants and home-owners, not just council tenants, so there may be something near you too. If you rent your place, see if you can get your landlord to help out with, or even totally cover the costs of heat preserving improvements. Ours has had a quote for a more efficient boiler....

*Never use a dishwasher or a tumble dryer if you can at all avoid it. They guzzle electricity, esp. dryers, and you can wash up far faster (and probably better) than the machine can. Also, wash at low temperatures and use the shorter cycles where you can. Don't buy those new liquid capsule things, they're not good value. Tablets are cheaper. Powder I can't comment on. Another thing is make sure you're using the right amount of detergent etc for your machine and load, then try to shave a bit off the recommended amount.

*A clean and tidy home not only looks better and is less stressful for you, but can also mean that you feel less redecorating is needed. For instance, many things can be just well cleaned instead of re-painted. Good domestic hygiene also contributes to good health and with prescription charges ringing in at over £7 per item these days, that's another saving.

*Try natural alternatives to the many cleaning products you might otherwise buy. I hear that one part white vinegar to two parts water makes an effective, cheap and green window cleaner. You could mix it up and keep it in the spray bottle your last bought product came in. Do a websearch for other ideas. Also, just get one or two general products and use them sparingly. We really don't need the absolute arsenal of specific use cleaners. It's a waste of money buying them and a waste of space storing them. Use up what you have then simplify.

Personal Care and Clothing

*Learn to mend. Lots of people just throw things out that could easily be mended and put back into service. Ditto with stain removal. As our mothers and grandmothers did during the war(s): Make do and mend.

*In a similar spirit, learn to make simple alterations so as to make clothes go further and to take advantage of bargains that aren't quite right for you as bought. For instance, there are some lovely, low priced blouses around, but they are also low in terms of the top button! Check there's a spare button, then sew it on at the level you want it to be, sewing a press stud in place behind it. No-one will know you've altered it and you'll be decent - unlike many women these days. No, top buttons on or below bra level are not decent!

*Make use of secondhand and charity shops, both to give away your surplus possessions and to source the things you need. If you want good quality stuff, look for shops in relatively affluent areas. I got 3 Laura Ashley dresses from charity shops in better off areas of Leeds for a small fraction of their original cost.

*See what others have that you can use. Maybe even have a swap session with like-minded friends. My mum has been bought toiletries for Christmas for years on end and she rarely uses them. I noticed them piling up at her place so asked if there was anything she needed my help in using up. She gave me 4 items straight away and I've been glad to save the £10-15 I would have needed to buy them new.=) She was also able to give me some spare thermal undies (which she got free from a local charity group helping seniors with practical things), cosy socks and some pyjamas. Saved a packet on things I can really use.

*Buy Supermarket own brands. I've been amazed at how good quality some of them are. For example, I used to always get a certain hair conditioner for around £4 per bottle, but I neither know where to get it here, nor can really afford it at the mo, so I decided to trial one of Morrison's own and it's really good! Only £1 too and right now they're doing a 4 for £3 offer on shower gels etc. Same goes for domestic products. Even eco-friendly ranges are available in some supermarkets' own labels and can be about half the price of big names. The only thing I won't compromise on is Kleenex tissues and that's still a bargain as they're often cheaper than a box of own label 'balm' tissues and FAR better quality.=)

*Do you really NEED an item, or do you just want it? Sometimes we need to distinguish between the two and act on it. I find that, if I take a few minutes to wander around after being certain I'm going to buy something, the urge to buy it goes away and I'm happy to leave the shop without it. Can you try that?

*Have a good look at what you already have in stock and plan to use that up. During just over a year before we went to Taiwan, I used up over 100 personal care items, some of which had been hanging around for many years. I'm guessing that you have at least a few dozen yourself too. Don't forget that you can adapt the usage. For instance, bubble bath can be used as shower gel and if there's a product you were disappointed with, try to either find another use for it, pass it on or alternate using it with a better product. I used hair conditioners that weren't really rich enough up as pre-wash treatments and hand creams etc that I didn't like as body lotions - didn't matter so much on my legs!! I must have saved a couple of hundred pounds and cut down on stuff to store and move at the same time.

Crafts, Hobbies and Free Time

*Make heavy use of the public library. Many have on-line catalogues that you can access from home and you can even reserve items to be collected from your local branch. All this is free too! You can borrow books, CDs, DVDs and sometimes even toys!

*Use what you have. Many stitchers and paper crafters have the most ENORMOUS stashes. Honestly, there must be multi-thousands of pounds worth of art and craft materials just taking up room on people shelves whilst they go and buy yet more! If you aren't going to use it, try selling it, swapping it or giving it away to someone who will. If you can use it, then try to incorporate something you already own into your project instead of going out and buying that ideal item that you'll only use a tiny bit of and then leave to gather dust with the rest. You know it makes sense...(but it isn't as much fun as stash shopping, I know!)

*There are still some 'use up/complete x items before I buy more' challenges around. Find one that's suitable and join in. If you can't find one, then design one yourself, announce it on your blog and invite others to join you. Think it through well first though.

*Want to learn a new skill but can't afford a class? Try advertising a skills exchange. I'm going to try this with getting viola lessons started again - I'll put up a poster in the Music Dept at the local university for a viola student to teach me in exchange for Mandarin Chinese lessons. What skills do you have that you could offer? A French friend and I are about to start a language exchange this afternoon. She'll help me re-learn French and I'll help her develop her Mandarin. Free personal tuition for us both.

*Who says you have to put on an expensive spread when you entertain? Have a 'bring a bowl' party, or just have a few guests 'round for afternoon tea. If you do this for about 4pm on a Sunday, you can pick up bargain fresh cakes at your local supermarket just before your guests arrive too.=)

*Cost free fun includes going for walks, playing in the park, board games, crafts, putting on little plays, musical evenings where guests show their skills and SO many more ideas. They're so much more fun than things that cost money and prevent you from communicating and relationship building with your friends and family too.

Food

This one deserves a post all of its own, so look out for one....sometime!

Better is the seeing by the eyes...

2011-01-23T17:55:00.002Z

"Better is the seeing by the eyes than the walking about of the soul. This too is vanity and a striving after the wind." Ecclesiastes 6:9

So what does that mean? No, it's not talking about disembodied spirits, (and that's not what the original Bible word for 'soul' meant anyway - it meant the whole person/animal, or the life they enjoyed, quite different from what most people think of, no?). What this scripture is saying is to enjoy and make the most of what you have, rather than wasting your time dreaming about and desiring what you can't have. I thought this was a good theme for many of us to have at the moment, given the financial stresses millions are under these days.

This photo shows how I'm trying to apply it. Only one of these books is new (the German grammar workbook in the middle and that was a £2 bargain), the others I've had for anything up to 14 years already! These are the books/courses I'm studying at the moment in my little 'home school'=). I'm doing English Language/Linguistics, Chinese, French, German, inter-disciplinary science and maths. I want to get back to my viola soon too.

I noticed both from my own experience and from reading others' blogs that we're all very good at buying books with great expectations of using them, then they get left on the shelf and we don't come back to the subject until we have a totally new text on it!! Being un/under-employed at the mo, I can't afford to buy new texts (and I intend to work through that German grammar PDQ so as to be able to sell it on to someone wanting to tone up for their GCSE/AS Level exams in June!), so I've been forced to get familiar with what's on my shelves and make the most of those.

I've also been forced to think very carefully about budgetting and that will be the topic of posts over the next day or so.=)

Four months? REALLY?

2010-12-15T17:04:00.003Z

Gosh, does time fly, or what?

Well, here we are back home and have been for 3 months already. We're settled into our new home and I finally got the last 2 packing boxes emptied on Monday. OK, so there are a couple in Sir's study, but they're things we're not likely to need here, at least not yet, so they're waiting to be relocated in the attic which, being a top floor flat, we have access to.=)

Our new place is bigger than our old and that means Sir has a much larger office and I have a tiny room of my own. I actually do get far more study etc done in there than I ever did in the living room of our old place! You can see photos of my little den here on the relevant post on Sew in Love. Funnily enough, just last week, the bookshelf photos from our old lounge (pre-Aug 2009) were featured on Kyusi Reader!!

Disadvantages to our new place are really only that we don't have a lot of storage space (but that can also be seen in a positive light - keeps stuff to a minimum and I don't have a lot of time for ununsed 'things'), and that the long living-dining room has 3 outer walls and so it's very cold in there and hard to get it warm at all. However, the local Council are offering free cavity wall insulation etc, so we're keen to take that up and hope it'll help. I think the sheer cold in there is one thing that makes me less interested in my needlework these days, the other being that I'm preferring to study instead!!

I've got rid of the old '2010 Goals' page and replaced it with an 'In progress..' page which details all the things I'm working on at the mo, from craft and writing projects to things I'm studying, or planning to get going on within the week. I'll keep that updated every week or so. As for goals per sé, I don't think I'm going to set any/many in the near future.

So, all we need now is some money coming in.....

Clever, but not clever enough...

2010-08-17T01:32:00.005+01:00

What was? Well, in response to my last post, I got a Personal Message (PM) on the Barbara Sher 'Refuse to Choose' forums (from the book you can see in the header photo), which I occasionally have a look at. This chap was sympathising about my perceived problem on the job front and was wanting to offer me an opportunity. He said nothing about it at that point, so I PM-ed back to ask what it was he had in mind. You never know, it could be something genuine and helpful.

The reply basically didn't answer the question. It was all about my 'drive' and how I went about creative projects and then promised to tell me more in the next message. It also mentioned my interest in Asian languages (much of which comes from the travels we're in the middle of having just been to Japan and heading to Korea on 28th) and seemed to be saying I could use them. There was just about enough info about the actual substance of the job for me to see that someone was trying to get me into a sales scheme. I wrote back and said that it seemed I was wanted to sell some product or other to Chinese, Japanese and Korean speakers and was that right? If so, I wasn't interested.

Back came another lengthy epistle on meeting goals, creativity and so on without directly answering my question or telling me what the product was. The writer did mention the overall company though, NSA International, so I looked them up (long live Wikipedia!) and found that they sell various health related products, some with very dubious write up, and operated by 'multi-level marketing' methods. Put plainly, this guy was trying to get me in on a neo-pyramid scheme selling supplements! He would have got a percentage of any sales I made having introduced me to the company and possbly even a bonus for trapping another fly on the web. These marketing programmes have been condemned for their similarity to the now thankfully illegal pyramid schemes. It was all based on greed and trying to make money through me under the veneer of helping me make money and realise my potential.

I was NOT impressed! Not only had I had to find out what he was up to by doing my own research from the brief snippets he did let slip, but he was trying to get me in on something which meant I would have to use methods I don't approve of to sell a product I wouldn't recommend! He proudly mentioned it was a 'peer reviewed' genuine food product, but neglected to mention that it was actually classified as a supplement (I believe some of the ingredients are dried veg juices or something of that type, thus the misleading claim that it was actual food), and that of the 15 peer reviews available, 14 were arranged for and some even carried out by people directly related to the product! Hardly reliable and trustworthy. (It's called 'Juice Plus' if anyone wants to find out more about it.) When I mentioned this and told him, for about the 3rd time, that I was not interested, another long message came back, which I suppose was justifying the whole thing, but I confess to having lost patience by this point and deleted it mostly unread. I mean, what part of the word 'no' didn't this chap understand??

Stunning really that, on a forum that was designed for intelligent people with multiple interests, there should be someone trying to entice members into pyramid sales schemes. Surely most intelligent and informed people would be aware that these things exist and be able to spot a poor deal a mile off when the person doesn't just get to the point straight away, but sends pages asking you to analyse your working methods and your drive for success. Highly suspicious!

So, for future reference, should anyone ever consider trying to get me in on a sales scheme, do us both a favour and forget it! Save your time and mine and don't contact me about it. I am quite certain to be absolutely uninterested! I actually added 'Please don't contact me about sales schemes' on my sig line for that forum as well!

I loved Rachel's response to my last post about setting up an agency for 'the brilliant, but easily bored'. I don't think I could get that into it, but I did get from that the idea of going freelance (thanks also to another Rachel's comment!), which I may well look into early next year when I've got some temping under my belt and have explored the freelance market a bit more. Thankfully, Sir usually earns the lion's share of the money and doesn't mind if I don't work much, so I'm not under financial pressure at the moment, but it's nice to earn a bit oneself - especially as I want to be able to take art courses soon and don't like to put extra burden on the family budget. I like to cover my own optional extras, so to speak.=)

Jobs are hard things to find....

2010-07-18T07:12:00.003+01:00

OK, so I'm not actively job hunting at the mo - would make no sense given that I don't get home for another 8 weeks, but I do keep my eyes on the Sheffield job market to see what kinds of roles and wages are on offer there. There seem to be plenty of them around, but you wonder sometimes if you'd ever fit into their idea of what the ideal candidate should be.

From an advert I've just read, the right person is someone with extensive experience of doing the same thing and 'a stable work history'. Others say things like 'sustained recent experience'. So, what they seem to want is someone who's been doing essentially the same job for the past 5-10 years, preferably longer, and has no career changes or breaks to mar their record. That would seem to exclude anyone who had a long-term illness (they may get it again, or another one), went on career break travels (lack of commitment), had a baby (might leave to have another baby and then decide family comes before work - dreadful!), decided to change industries or even whole career directions (unreliable and unsettled), got made redundant (must have been a poor employee - who'd let a good person go?) and couldn't find a suitable permanent position (see? Clearly not good enough for anyone to consider) for quite some time or other everyday scenarios like these.

The above also nicely excludes anyone who has the potential to pick up the job extremely quickly and be as good as anyone else at it within a fortnight! This is something that really gets to me. Often, when I've sent my CV to employment agencies, I've got the reply, 'Sorry, we currently have no vacancies that match your experience.' Actually, I have considerable office work experience, all the required skills, the potential to do the job very well and the aptitude to learn new things very quickly and an eye for high quality work (which some of these high flying secretaries don't have if the quality even of plain letter typing I've seen is anything to go by!). However, all they see is my having spent most of the last decade in teaching and they consider me unsuitable. In the absence of recent experience, skills and especially potential and aptitude count for NOTHING!

Seems in order to be seriously considered for anything other than temping (and even that can be hard to get into at times, esp when the job market is tough and competition is fierce), you have to have already done the job you're interested in and, preferably, be now prepared to accept less pay for it. A couple of years ago I saw a PA position advertised offering minimum wage! They wanted all the skills and experience required to get into £20000+ top positions, but they were only prepared to give £5.73 an hour for it, which is around £11K. Double it to start with, pal! I wonder if they ever got anyone at that rate? Still, that was at the worst of the recession, so it could well be that they managed to fill the post at that rate. At least someone could work there for a year or so and then apply for a good job with previous PA experience from that miserly company.

When I look at the best agencies who offer the kind of posts I'd be interested in, I know they wouldn't consider even registering me for temp work owing to my not having been in admin and secretarial since 2001. When you know you have the potential to wipe the floor with even some of the most experienced people, this is a bit galling, I can tell you! On the brighter side, I did do 4 weeks temping in autumn 2008, so there's something recent at least, but that was with Reed and their lack of professionalism really put me off registering with them again unless in the most desperate of circumstances.

Anyway, when we get back I'll be concentrating on about 3 agencies who seem to be a bit better and at least one of which deals with language related posts. Whilst I don't have fluent European languages (and no-one thinks of hiring a Brit when they need Chinese language skills, they get a Chinese person with a UK university MA or MBA instead!), they may need temps for some of these companies later on and who knows if someone like me with at least some knowledge might not be in with a better chance than most? I plan to improve my German (which seems to be in surprising demand in the area), brush up my rusty French and get back to Italian over the next few years. I'm really interested in Spanish as well, and so is hubby, but I think for me it's falling behind the other 3. Language related jobs in Sheffield have been asking for French, German and Italian though, so it's not too bad a choice.

Then, of course, you have the question of 'what consitutes fluent French/German/etc?' Some say that means speaking the second language as well as you do your first, but I know that's not true. That's fully bilingual and probably means you grew up with the two languages, like an Italian girl in my class last term who was sent to German language schools in Rome as a child as her parents wanted her to know more than Italian from as early an age as possible. Her German is now as good as her Italian. Another definition of fluent is to be able to speak without constant breaks or straining to find words etc and that what you say is correct enough to be easy to listen to - not that you know every word going and never make a mistake! I described it recently to a former student of mine as 'not knowing everything in the language, but using what you do know so well that no-one can tell the difference'!! I guess that'll have to be my aim with Euro-languages!! Anyway, for shorter term roles, companies are less likely to be overly concerned about that than keeping up to the necessary everyday running of their business whilst their regular person is on their happy hols.=)

Anyway, I just wanted to gripe a bit!!!=)

Six weeks (or so) into the goals, so how am I doing?

2010-07-10T13:19:00.006+01:00

Seems from my last post that I put the '2010 Goals' page up on around 29 May, about 6 weeks ago. How am I getting along with them?

Well, to be honest, I've had to modify some of them as they proved to be a bit unrealistic, but that's OK. It's better to lower one's sights and enjoy a feeling of accomplishing something reasonable than to fail to meet a series of overly high goals. It looks unlikely I'll get much Japanese done before we go, but last week one of my Japanese classmates asked to do a language exchange with me, so I'll have some motivation anyway. I plan to ask my Korean classmate to do the same soon too.

I had to delete a couple of things on the list including taking the intermediate TOP (test of proficiency in Mandarin) exam as there isn't a test available to me before we leave, sadly. Still, I can take it in the UK some time later on if I'm still interested then. I'll meet my first target fine as my assessments have gone really smoothly this term so far and I must remember to get my marks for June on Monday and put that on the list.

As far as the reading goals go, I've finished 3 of the books I was part way through and have made significant forward movement on another 2, plus got my Bible reading back on schedule and read and returned my two library books before the due date. That's going very well and is easy and pleasant to do.

Needlework goals I'm also moving forward with. Since setting that list up, I finished a cross stitch that had been hanging around for a bit and have today started making it up into a cushion cover, although I'm not sure how well that's going to work out after all. I also finally got a needlecase made up out of a piece of hardanger stitchery I'd completed some months ago. I often drag my heels with finishing things into the final items, then seem to have a big push to get a load of them done. I remember the early days of my Sew in Love blog featured a number of those 'hanging around' projects being finished up.=) Anyway, things are moving forward and I've also made a good start on another gift for a local friend.

I've also made a start on some of the things for after we get home - mostly the making of enquiries and looking things up on-line, but it means that the way ahead is clearer. It seems increasingly unlikely that there'll be any teaching work for me as Sheffield seems well supplied with Chinese tuition, but I don't really mind that. I've been in touch with a decent looking office work agency instead - one that does positions with languages too. I don't want a permanent full-time job, but it's likely that the positions they fill involving languages will come back to them for temps at some point and I might fit the bill for them.=)

So, goals for the next fortnight are to get the cushion cover finished, finish Xie Jiemei's hardanger mat, finish at least one more book and get on well with the Japanese learning. As my hubby is away for most of the next two weeks, I'll have a bit more freedom to set my own schedule and am hoping to get a bit of progress with my Chinese grammar book and other things done in his absence.

Anyway, we'll see how it goes.

In the meantime, life remains busy. I could only post 4 days in a row (or thereabouts) at the beginning of June as it was the school's holiday week and I had time to do lots of blog organisation and posting. I set up 2 new blogs that week and got them at least looking how I wanted to. The art one is still rather devoid of regular content, but I don't really expect to be able to make any serious progress on art work until next year. I need to temp for the first few months of being home to make sure there's enough money coming in as Sir can have to wait up to 3 months for his money to come in. After that, and when we know what the future of the government funding bodies is with all the big cuts that are being made at the moment, I can start thinking about things like signing up for Open College of Arts drawing and painting courses and taking formal viola lessons as well.

I've been having a good look at what's available in Sheffield where we're moving and, although Sheffield College only does A Levels as part of a full-time programme and that mostly for 16-19 year olds, they do have one evening programme in - joy of joys - chemistry! Why does that make me happy? Simply because I underachieved BIG style during my A Level time and totally failed chemistry. Part of the reason was that I simply lost interest and got frustrated with it, but a bigger part was that, up to just before then, everything had been so easy that I'd never had to work hard and so had never learned how to work. I'd got a B grade for my GCSE simply by showing up and doing the exam - I don't think I revised a word! At most I may have flicked through my own notebook, but nothing else. I suppose I thought A Level would be the same.

The other reason was that we were the first lot of students to take the GCSE exams and, whilst those results were generally fine (I could have done better on some, but didn't for the reason above - I didn't have the discipline to work when I needed to), the real crunch came two years later when we did our A Levels. Many of the results were terrible. Having said that, I deserved to fail A Level Chemistry and have always felt I needed to make up for having fluffed that. If all goes according to plan, I want to get at least a C at AS Level soon, preferably a B. However, the new government wants to scrap AS Levels and the course next year is on the one evening per week I can't attend, but who knows what might work out? I'm thinking positively and will be revising the GCSE material over the next year or so. I remember my old headteacher comforting me on failing one of my chemistry tests by saying he once only get 10% for one of his and he later went on to get a PhD in chemistry!!! I don't plan to follow in his footsteps, but a good AS pass would boost my ego, I feel.=)

Oh, and I still struggle to make myself work consistently. It still tends to go in fits and starts, but at least things are moving in the right direction and I'm being a lot more systematic and 'loyal' about my language classes now than I was on my year abroad here 12 years ago. I'm going to be ordering a book on overcoming procrastination for potential high achievers to be sent to my Mother-in-Law's in Germany to read whilst we're there in early September.

I've also found a great looking organic and wholefood wholesalers who do cash and carry to the public in Sheffield. So, buying in bulk will be us! I've had so many ideas on dishes to make and what I'm going to cook ahead and freeze that I'm having to write them down in order to not risk forgetting them! I'm SO much looking forward to having a 'proper' kitchen again, with a grill, an oven and enough room to work properly without running out of counter space and banging my head on things! We seem to have only about 5 different meals here over and over again too, so I'm even getting sick of pasta and tomato sauce dishes. I tantalised myself yesterday by looking at the Tesco on-line shopping site!!

<-Yes, this really is all the kitchen work space I have at the mo! You can just see the start of the fridge on the far left and the wall with a cooking implement hanging rack thingy on the right. I'm over half way up the whole extractor fan height-wise too!! "It's not foreigner sized", as one local visitor rightly said!!

OK, enough of my wittering on for now. 'Til next time....

Motivation and Goal Setting

2010-06-01T12:43:00.003+01:00

Recently, Rachel and I were discussing motivation and productivity following my post on Sew in love regarding having a focus for my needlework, i.e., if there wasn't a tangible, and preferably pressing, reason for doing it, I probably don't do it! She has a list of things she wants to achieve by her 30th birthday. She has a couple of years to fit those goals in and it's a good milestone to look towards, isn't it?

I'm too close to 40 to make that too realistic a deadline for many of the things I'm interested in accomplishing. 17-ish months is an OK timescale for many of them, but I guess I don't measure my life in decades enough to make that motivating enough for me, so what I've done is to create two lists - one of general goals, which will change as my interest in various things waxes and wanes in the months and years ahead, and a list of stuff to do during this year. You can see the list by clicking on the relevant name link just under my header photo.

I've only had those lists up there for a couple of days (although most of the general one was on Sew in Love for a while), but I'm really finding that 2010 list helpful. I've been rather drained over the past few days, but having the list there to spur me on has helped me to, not just read a library novel (I read 'Rebecca' for the first time), but also work towards some of my reading goals. I'm a few chapters further down the path with other books than I might otherwise have been! Rachel told me her 'Before 30' list helped her to get on with things as she couldn't leave them all 'til the last minute, and I can quite see why this has made a difference to her. Having a set of goals decided and published, so to speak, really helps to provide the focus needed to get back into action.

I update my lists very regularly by adding new things to the general one and removing stuff I'm no longer bothered about (which happens a fair bit!!), and by putting in progress 'report's on the 2010 one. I find having something to update there good fun and quite motivating in itself. I always loved the 'colour off a block when you've done this far' type of progress chart. I suppose this is my version of that.

So, if you're finding that you're getting stuck in a rut and getting nowhere fast, try a similar list. Not only can it help when you're feeling paralysed with too much to get done (writing it all down into a list of tasks that can be accomplished within a reasonable time frame helps to relieve panic enormously), but it also can help you find a focus when you've little more than yourself to answer to. I always find a deadline to be a terrific motivator and exams are great for making me study. Having my own deadlines to work to will be harder to keep up to, but you never know, it could work....!

Teeth, the Raw Diet and a new 'Five A Day'

2010-05-30T05:34:00.008+01:00

Living in Taiwan, I can honestly say that my worst fear has been going to the dentist. It's never a relaxing affair, as I'm sure everyone will agree, but it's even more scary when you have to deal with it in a language you're supposedly fluent in, but actually lack a lot of everyday terminology. (Chinese language based degrees seem to omit the basic of dealing with ordinary life, but you do learn to debate on a lot of current affairs etc!!) An American friend who lives near our language school told me he had to have a root canal treatment here and that, not only was the injection next to useless, but that they covered his face with a mask with an opening only for the mouth. He's sure it's so that the dentist and nurse can't see the patient's agony.... 'Barbaric' is a word that springs to mind in connection with Taiwanese dentistry.

Anyway, it got me thinking of some of the good dental tips I was given by a good friend back home and also my old dentist. In addition to the veganism I'm interested in, I've also always been interested in health in general and the raw food diet. One of the problems many raw foodists seem to encounter a lot is an increase in dental decay, so I though that this might be of use and interest to anyone who wants to eat all or mostly raw, but, sensibly enough, also wants to protect their teeth.

Some say that it's a lack of dental hygiene that causes decay and, whilst there's no doubt that this can be a major contributing factor for some, there are others who brush and floss religiously, but still end up spending stressful times in their dentist's chair. Why? There are two reasons that suggest themselves to me:

1) Acid erosion of teeth. My old dentist told me that, after consuming something acidic, say orange juice with breakfast, the acid remains on the teeth and, when the person then brushes their teeth more or less straight afterwards, this acid helps the process along a little too vigorously for most folk's purposes. The simple solution? Swill your mouth out with plain water before brushing. I remember reading a raw fooder saying that he swilled his mouth out after each thing he ate, which could also be helpful, especially if there's a lot of acid fruit in the equation.

2) Eating too often, also called 'grazing'. Most of us fall foul of this, but my friend (a senior dental nurse) tells me that teeth can cope with up to five attacks per day. Beyond that, they get 'overwhelmed' and will succumb to decay. So, not only is this good news for those who found they could never make their sweet treats last the whole afternoon (one binge is far better for the teeth than a constant barrage of smaller portions), but it also gives pause for thought. How often do we eat per day? Five times means three regular meals and two snacks. Sweets and cakes are best eaten straight after a meal (just one attack that way) and some may need to also take into account how often they have sweet drinks during the day. Having a cuppa seven times during the day may mean seven lots of milk and sugar for the teeth to deal with. Water or herb teas may be better beyond your 'five attacks a day'! And teeth have been known to dissolve in Coke (so I heard many years ago, but will probably need verifying).

When it comes to raw food diets, it's not uncommon for folk to be picking at fruit, nuts etc throughout the day or even sipping at juices much of the time. This is a sure way to the dentist's drill! So, even if you're someone who feels that one should eat only when hungry and that larger meals are too conventional, you may want to consider a more planned approach for the sake of your teeth.

And for those mums, grans, aunties and so on amongst us: Never tell the kids to 'make their sweets last'!=)

Why do I always use the same, plain blog template?

2010-05-29T02:25:00.003+01:00

Anyone whose been to all my blogs will notice that I always go for much the same blog template, the Minima Stretch, usually the 'Lefty' version, i.e. with the sidebar on the left hand side, only my travel blog has the right hand version so far. So why is this? There are a number of reasons.

I like the stretch part of it as it enables more of the screen to be used. With many of the more graphical templates, you lose huge wide margins to the image part of the blog template or wallpaper and I prefer to use my whole screen. I think text going all the way across the screen with no sidebar to break it up is over the top (plus navigation gets difficult), but constantly having to scroll down through narrow paragraphs can get a bit of a nuisance.

Another reason is that, years ago, when I did a basic web design and HTML course, we were advised to keep the fancy stuff to a minimum and focus on content. If you have good content, you will have plenty of visitors. Too many novelties and graphics create a cluttered, confusing appearance that will put readers off. When blogs rely on a lot of photos etc, simple outlines are always best. There are some really pretty wallpapers and graphics out there, no doubt about it, but when you have a busy photograph, or series of photographs as a header, graphical things in your sidebar (i.e. features that involve a lot of images, such as Feedjit, visitor maps, photo mosaics etc) and also photos in your main text, then having a background image as well can make the overall impression too cluttered. I've seen some craft blogs that are really off-putting as they have just too much to look at. The whole impression is so busy that it's hard to focus. So, my suggestion is, unless you have only very plain text posts and next to no graphical widgets, go for a very simple template or wallpaper.

Other things that can really clutter up a blog are far too may sidebar attractions, those little programmes that display the cursor as graphics following it all over the screen etc and sounds. There's nothing that ensures my not re-visiting your blog more than music starting up when I log on, a little tinkling sound every few seconds, or my cursor turning into hearts, butterflies, fish, birds or whatever! Some have so much in their sidebars (frequently a list of favourite blogs) that the sidebar is more than twice the length of the posts section! So, if your sidebar is longer than your posts, consider cutting down your sidebar content and/or increasing the number of posts visible on your front page at any given time. Balance is important. If one is to be shorter, make it the sidebar. (Admittedly, my sidebar is ever so slightly longer than the main postings at the moment, but only because it's a new blog with just two postings to date.)

Also, make sure that all the colours work harmoniously together within your layout. I've seen blogs with so much conflicting colour that the result is almost painful to read. Post texts are best keep to neutral or muted shades. I love bright colours, especially purple, but I don't enjoy reading purple text, or bright blue, or red etc. In my early blogging days, I used to use more colour in the posting text, esp before I realised there was a header/title box I could use and so I'd put the header in a more vibrant shade and the main text in a more readable, softer colour that matched, but now I prefer to keep the whole thing standard.

One more thing that helps to contribute to a good appearance is double checking your post before leaving it for the public to enjoy. Spelling is one obvious thing as, embarrassingly enough, when posting the link to this new blog yesterday I input the URL wrongly, which led to numerous potential visitors not making it here!! Another thing is that blogging programmes often tend to mess with your post layout when you add in photos. I know Blogger can be a real pain with that, adding in multiple line breaks whenever you put an image in. It's worth double checking, first with the 'preview' function and then on the blog itself, that you don't have large gaps around your photos and between your paragraphs. Some bloggers just leave them in and it doesn't look as good as it could with just a minute or two more spent on final presentation.

So, in summary, I choose this layout as it's simple, uncluttered and easy to work with. I can change any of the colours at any time to provide variety, but I keep graphical elements to a minimum so as to not confuse the senses and to make the whole reading experience easy and pleasant. What do you say?

Welcome to the Fluff!

2010-05-28T09:09:00.004+01:00

Hi! Welcome to my new blog, which I plan to use to cover my learning, reading, research and a number of other things over the months and years to come. I have many interests and love to develop myself in any way I reasonably can, including reading plentifully and learning new skills in as many areas as I can without depriving myself of too much sleep!!

I seem to have amassed a number of blogs now all of which are devoted to different interests. Of course, I could merge them all into one, but I know that some readers of my needlecrafts blog are not interested in language related matters, what I've been reading and so on, so I thought it as well to keep them separate. I've moved the general pages, such as my CV and Goals sections from Sew in Love to here and also my reading list from Google Sites. I've added to the general Goals page and created a new one for what I want to achieve the rest of this calendar year. I'll be updating that on a regular basis.

Why 'Fluffy Little Idiot'? Well, I pinched this name from one of my favourite children's books where Joey Bettany, the Head Girl of the Chalet School (oh, if only that place existed and I could be a pupil!) dismisses the young, new matron as a 'fluffy little idiot'. This woman deserved the name, as anyone whose read 'The New House at the Chalet School' can testify, but I thought it was pretty similar to what I see in the eyes of some people who like to think I've nothing going on upstairs as I'm often smiling and joking, I'm friendly to people without ulterior motive, I feel things very deeply and can't help being emotional, I can't stick to just one area in life to specialise in and, normally, I tend to have a very lively nature and a rather baby-ish face and look anything up to 15 years younger than I am (the latter is something I am NOT complaining about!) depending on the light and the other person's estimation!!! Yes, I can see them thinking, 'nice, but a bit naive', 'not really going anywhere', 'totally out of touch with reality, a bit empty-headed', 'emotionally instable - possibly even manic depressive', 'immature and flighty' - you know the sort of thing. Yes, it can hurt, but I've learned to laugh at them now as it's them that's making the mistake in underestimating me and, even if someone decides I could be a borderline manic depressive just because they really don't know me at all, that isn't going to even start to make it true. The egg is not on my face!

There will be pages to come above on my interest in defining adult giftedness, vegan issues (no, not roaring animal rights stuff, don't worry), and perhaps some other things as time goes on. As I only have 10 pages to play with though, I may have to keep things to a bare minimum. We'll see.

Anyway, sign up to follow in the usual way and please leave comments and so on freely!