There’s antimony, arsenic, aluminum, selenium…

Posted on August 2, 2011 by Nicola

About a month after my friend Andrew’s last birthday I had an idea for the perfect gift for him, only two weeks ago I actually got my arse into gear and started padding out the details. To date, I am two elements into creating him… a periodic table blanket!

Unfortunately, I don’t think it’s going to be ready in time… for Tuesday haha. But I am going to power on through the weekend to get as close to a finished product as I possibly can. In the mean time I thought I would give the lovely people of the internet an update and insight unto my (not very much) work so far.

The design phase

Most ‘software people’ or indeed any person managing any kind of project have seem how an idea of grand proportion is often broken down into its component parts, analysed, down sized, down sized again and tweaked until the end product is far from what was initially put down on paper. This project is no different. When I first envisaged my creation it came with it’s own divine rays of light and trumpet sounds, the reality was that the task I was to undertake was quite difficult and costly (Kill joy I know). Originally I’d wanted to have on each elemental square the symbol, the name and the atomic number. I designed a typical square and the printed out the fonts in the correct sizes. When I tried to cut out material in these shapes !!!FAIL!!!. The names, and atomic numbers has no chance and the symbols looked frankly terrible. So I went in search of other materials, I priced up transfers (YIKES!) I tried out fabric pens(a bit naff) and I landed on textile paint. Whether or not this is the best solution it remains to be seen, but if it works I might even be able to fit the atomic number on too. Wouldn’t that be grand?

Also here’s Nina teaching me how to use a sewing machine!

Wine + Sewing Machine = Fail.

 

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The Undertones – have so still got it!

Posted on April 15, 2011 by Nicola

Last night J and I went to see the undertones in the Liverpool o2 academy, as part of my valentines gift to him. When we arrived there was a 90′s brit pop act on, they where all tiny collared shirts and even tiny-er suit jackets.  The room was pretty empty, and there were lots of people wearing white jeans. My palms started to get a little sweaty =S. The dreaded realisation that my awesome punk fuelled evening plans were slipping away from me was all too real.

But I couldn’t have been more wrong!!

The undertones came out and they whaled! They had the energy of 18 years old with bad attitudes, but when the lead guitarist tuned his guitar between tracks he chatted with the audience with the confidence and style that only a mature rocker can master. It was inspired. There were guys fully over the age of fifty playing air guitar next to teenagers with Ramones T-shirts on. After rocking for a number of decades each track was so tight it could have been a recording yet they still had so much energy. It really was a great such evening, I left wanting to push bins over and swear at the police! =D

P.s. I was interviewed by a fan site outside the o2 and accidentally said post-pop instead of post-rock! WTF #pleaseworldswollowme

p.p.s I know this isn’t much of a review, but shut up. It’s my blog.

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My love / hate relationship with RunKeeper

Posted on April 6, 2011 by Nicola

In January I set out to become a runner. This isn’t the first time I’ve decided I was going to start running, but previous attempts had fallen by the way side. Having no clear plan and no quantitative way to measure my results, I quickly became bored and disheartened when I couldn’t see how my speed and distances were increasing.

However, armed with a place in the great Manchester 10k and my new smart phone I began a 12 week training course to become THE FLASH! A friend suggested RunKeeper to me and although I was inclined to roll my eyes at his iPhone lifestyle, I thought it might be worth a shot. You see, I had enviously watched him succeed at my endeavour the previous year, while I gingerly waited to see if it was possible …(if he could, then maybe I could too.)

Like many others, RunKeeper has been an excellent tool for me. There are pro’s and con’s sure, you can find yourself obsessing with times and and distances, and looking at the contraption far to often, but on the flip side when you get back after a run and you can inspect your trends and compare your results with previous attempts and with your ‘street team’ there is real sense of occasion and success.

The application is simple to use and pretty clear, even when you’re running. I can honestly say I’ve never had it crash which is pretty rare on my phone/android combo, and you can also easily resend information from phone to server should any problems arise.

There is also support for Polar heart rate monitoring, you can buy a heart rate monitor for around £45/$70. And the clever dudes at RunKeeper HQ have integrated the api so that not only are you getting you distance, speed and track information you can also get your heart rate and a more acurate calorie’s burned total. If you’re a numbers fanatic like myself that will seem very appealing.

The Negative :

The main problem with RunKeeper is are the little hick-ups at the start, one ‘feature’ is that it seems to include the the last position the GPS tracked before you started your activity, so that could be back across the street, or if you turned on the GPS as soon as you started your run on the Manchester canal and the last time you turned on your GPS was while you where trying to find the nearest Tesco in Liverpool, it could mean your run distance is our by between 0.01 of a mile or 27 miles out. Some people wouldn’t be to worried about this, after all you can go home and edit the values online and you still have a reasonably accurate assessment of your run. Not me though, I find it can completely throw my session and I will only run 2/3 or even 1/2 of what I would usually achieve.

But all that said and done, I just LOVE RunKeeper, my favorite thing to do is share my session with my friends and family and what better way to do that than hitting a button and having all the info right there on your chosen social networking site. Plus, everyone loves a graph right?

 

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Thailand and all the ways it’s trying to kill me

Posted on April 3, 2011 by Nicola

I’m going to Thailand in June! Yey for me! But before I go there are a number of inoculations I need to get to ensure that my time there is spend in the most fun way possible… and not with my head down a toilet or foaming at the mouth. I’ve spent a lot of time reading about the different inoculations that I should require, the benefits, the costs and the side effects. And finally after consulting a nurse and my travel partners here’s the skinny:

Hep A / Hep B / Typhoid / Diphtheria / Tetanus / Rabies / Japanese Encephalitis / Malaria

Are all potential risks in Thailand.

Diphtheria – caught by contact or breathing in infected air (should have been administered three times in your life)

Tetanus – contracted through open wounds and found in soil (should have been administered three times in your life)

http://www.patient.co.uk/health/Tetanus-Immunisation.htm <– lists the times when you should have had these inoculations

Typhoid - caught by ingesting food or water contaminated with the faeces of an infected person. Yum.

Hep A – contaminated food or water or through direct contact with an infectious person.

These jabs are all currently free on the NHS 03/04/2011 so you’d be crazy not to. (but this may be set to change under the new government regime)

Hep B – exchange of bodily fluids. Nice little factoid about Hep B, it is 100 times more infectious than HIV

Luckily at my local GP Hep B is also free, but this is set to change very soon.

Now for the trickier ones!

Rabies – transmitted from animals, most commonly from bites. This is my own particular nightmare! And one I personally will be going for.

Japanese Encephalitis – main carriers are pigs and birds and transmitted through mosquito bites. My nurse suggested a risk assessment strategy for this, if I’m not planning on visiting the north (which I’m not) or going to rural areas (which I’m not) then the risk is significantly less. the JapE seasons are from May to October in Thailand so the chances increase, but it is generally only suggested for stays over 4 weeks.

Malaria – contracted through mosquito bites and only a major risk if you are travelling near the boarders of Laos, Cambodia and Burma. No jab available, only preventative tablets to be taken before, during and after visit.

So that’s the basic information down, now lets get to the important stuff. Where to get the jabs and how much will they cost. As I said The only two jabs I have to pay for at my clinic would be Rabies and JapE and I’d also have to pay for the Malaria tablets. As it stands, Malaria and JapE are low risks for me and So I wont be purchasing them. I visited my local GP Ellergreen Medical Centre in Liverpool and was given a prescription for the Rabies Vaccine and was encouraged to shop around for the best price. So far, Rowland’s have been the most expensive at around122 quid and Boots was around 36 quid per vial (3 vials)  but the cheapest by far has been Superdrug at 86 quid for the course. However I’ll be calling the nurse I saw and asking where she recommends as she thought it would be closer to 50 quid. I suspect the JapE is a little more pricey from a pharmacy too, but I don’t know for sure.

The best advice I can give you from what I have gleaned is that Sandringham Medical Centre can provide a really good deal. I believe travel inoculations is something they specialise in and they off everything I have listed including the malaria tablets for the princely sum of around 110 pounds, British. An extremely fair price if you ask me for peace of mind and a safe trip.

This blog is not exhaustive and is merely information I have gathered after a lot of reading and discussion on the topic. At the very least it has helped me collect my thoughts and at the most it may save some eager traveller a bit of time and stress. When I know more, you’ll know more!

-Nicola, out.

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None-Sense is born!

Posted on April 3, 2011 by Nicola

Having failed to make a real ‘go’ of the last blog, I decided to start a fresh. With lots of interesting projects in the pipeline it seemed proper to have a place to catalogue my experiences and mishaps and spark the imaginations of like minded denizens.

Nicola

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