Mirrored from ThreeCuckoos. Comment here or there.

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Speed Camera Firm Boss caught going 100mph

Mirrored from ThreeCuckoos. Comment here or there.

Last week was quite an important week for me.

My first iPhone application was released on the iTunes App Store.  Unfortunately this doesn’t mean I’m gonna be leaving my full time Job anytime soon as I wrote it in company time and using company machines, so I will see very little if any of the profits.  However it does mean that I’ve been paid for learning how to do it as well as getting the experience of releasing and iPhone App and getting it Apple approved.

So far 11 copies have sold, since Friday (2nd May ‘09) evening (1 to me and 1 to a co-worker), but that is with no advertising.  At £1.79 a copy that totals £19.69 of which £13.78 comes to my company, or will do once $250 of sales have happened.  If that rate keeps up the £50 developer licence will be paid for by the end of next week.  Not exactly Job quitting numbers, but it’s the experience that I value more than anything.  I can now start churning out iPhone apps whenever an idea springs to mind, and can write iPhone applications to support ThreeCuckoos ideas, like the one we are currently working on.

The current ThreeCuckoos project, I think we’ll call it project Q, will eventually make use of Facebook, an iPhone App and a normal website.  Other projects we have in the cookpot also include a re-branding of this site as it’s not really branded at the moment, and none of us like the lightning image.  Along with finishing off the Facebook game we started last year, and more work on the iPhone game we started this year.  I think I may add some kind of .plan page to this site as well so people can keep up with the status of our projects…

Cya’s

Crazy times...
On Thursday I got some bad news. My gran (Maternal grandmother) has recently had to have an eye removed due to cancer in the eye. After the op she was given an all clear after various scans. On Thursday however she received some really bad news - she has a secondary cancer of the liver and it is essentially untreatable - she might possibly have 6 months but that would probably be a maximum. Obviously this upset me and I have been in a sad/bad mood since. I visited her today on the way back from Tom's 30th birthday party in London and the topic of Em and my future wedding arose. The long and short of this is that Emily and me are hopefully getting married this year at the beginning of April. We are only doing a very small wedding (40 guests max) with the vast majority being family, with the intention of having a renewal / hand-fasting a year afterward in our original location with bigger numbers.

We're sorry but you probably won't be invited to the small one - but you probably will be getting invited to the big one in a year and a bit.

As for Stag do's and Hen do's we will be having some kind of celebration before the wedding, probably a joint venture, but doing the proper (separate) do's before the big one the year afterward.

This is all very sudden, shocking and panicky so if we're somewhat short, and all very busy, please forgive me and em, we will try to resume normality soon...

...An Apology that is. Came home on Saturday, from a nice couple of days in London for Eddie Izzard and Em's birthday, to the welcoming sight of a letter from Southern Electric. This letter was a full apology, promise to investigate how this situation occured and a freefone number incase we have any more questions or issues.
Woot!

For background to this story, read here

So... Come home on Monday to the welcoming visual treat that is a bill, ney legal threat letter, from Southern Electric for the sum of £318 for... That's right, you guessed it, 23A elgin road - yet another flat that we have not lived.

I swear British Gas and Southern electric are colluding with one another to make it impossible to have a month free of the stress of being on hold waiting to hear the dulcit tones of some lame ass, barely apologising whilst they take our names off an address I never lived at, yet again.

This time after being told it wouldn't happen again, I demanded a letter of apology. I was told by said lame ass that he couldn't write me a letter of apology, so I requested to speak to a supervisor. He told me that no supervisors we currently in and wouldn't be for the rest of the day, after I demanded that my number be given to a supervisor so that they could phone me tomorow when they were in, I ended the phonecall, immediately phoned up again, explained that I was phoning up to complain and got put through to a supervisor (Amazing considering there were none in). I've been promised a letter of apology, and for the guy who lied to me to be investigated.

Arrrggggghhhhhhhh!

Who remembers when we used to live in Flat C, 23 elgin road?
That was back in July 2005 to July 2006. We had our Gas and electricity with Southern Electric. Paid all our bills (even on time and stuff) and all was nice and fine.

3 years later we are living around the corner in our house and we come home one sunny summers afternoon to a hideous bill for Flat B, 23 elgin road, from Southern Electric for the period July 2006 - July 2008. We phone up saying - "OI we never lived there and we didn't even live in Flat C at that period" - they say "ok", bill us again, we complain again they say "ooops - really is fixed now" and that's the last we hear about it.

A couple of months ago we received, in a similar vein to above, a letter from British Gas saying that we owe them for Flat B, 23 elgin road, from July 2006 - Present. Seeing a pattern emerge here we phone up British Gas and say "OI - also this has just happened to us with SE and we don't want a repeat of SE with their 'It's fixed when it's not' statements"
They say "OK all fixed now" a few days later we get an abusive letter telling us our "Gas will be disconnected less you pay £600" - call up get told "Sorry, cross over, all sorted now, promise".
Another month goes by and we recieve yet another bill from British Gas still up to the present period.

There's a couple of things that are suspicious about this scenario:
1. Why are we being billed at our actual address for gas used at a different address for the present period?
2. Why have we been got by 2 completely different, and independent from each other, utility companies for an address we never lived at?

Anyway I raise these points in a threatening email to BG stating "Give me a resolution or I call the Energy Ombudsman and set him on your ass" - No response from them for over a week, then Monday we recieve a statement from BG telling us our final balance on the address for the period July 2005 - July 2005 was £-360 ? Think OK - is this the end have you just got it wrong and this is a final statement for Gas we never used (Presuming that someone who lived there over payed during that period and got their money back 3 years ago and this is just a statement telling us this?)
Then today Em goes home at lunch time and finds a cheque from BG for £360.

Arggghhhhhhhhhhh!
We never lived there and we aren't owed and don't owe anything.
What are we supposed to do with this cheque? If we cash it can they demand it back? If we tell them we never lived there will they ever listen?

Just in case any of you don't read BadScience and related blogs - It seems that Chiropractors in both New Zealand Chiropractic Association and the British Chiropractic Association have both started suing people who show evidence against their Quackery...
The two linked articles have appeared within a month of each other (I wonder if they are starting to get together to make their bullying away of evidence, more effective) I can only hope both legal systems will give the Chiropractors in question a big kick in the face...

Right: Last night I woke up at about 2am after a crazy nightmare which, for some reason, stopped me going back to sleep. This hasn't happened to me for quite some time and I now see how riddiculous it is and find it realy quite odd that as a fairly rational (Ignoring my crazy Waterwheel phobia) person how I can be scarred of something that I absolutely know is not even slightly real.

Why do we have nightmares and why hasn't someone cured people of them yet?
(I've now finished my 3rd cup of tea since 9am and am about to go make number 4)

Today - Emily and me have been together for 5 years.

I think that's all... :)

I regularly read Ben Goldacre's www.badscience.net and I even have an RSS feed from his miniblog which is basically a list of other articles he likes. Few days ago one of the mini blog links was about how the scottish police had arrested a number of Annonymous (that's the group) protesters for having placards with the word cult whilst protesting outside the Church of Scientology. This angered me but I thought it an isolated incident and didn't really think any more about it. Then today I have read the miniblog again and it linked to a youtube video of channel four footage showing how this was not isolated and indeed appears to be worse than I first though.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmFSuxYAj5w

For those who can't see this youtube video, it basically shows a series of protests (All peacefull) in which the police swarm upon the protesters claiming that they will be arrested under section 5 of the public order act. This basically states that if you are being threatening or causing distress you can be arrested. The video shows how one guy was arrested for this because he had the word cult on his sign, but the case was dropped byt he CPS. It is completely outrageous how people in this country can't protest against things peacfully without the threat of being arrested.

It has made be really angry and now I want to go on protests with these people, but I can't find a website which will tell me how I go about this. They all wear V (as is V for Vendetta) masks so that Scientologists don't backlash and persecute them.

I want to go out drinking. How do people feel about Clowns Friday Resurrection tomorrow?

( Flying )
Basically it was bloody brilliant, and I'd love to do it again (regularly if it wasn't so damn expensive).
The hardest thing about flying is keeping an eye out for other planes - they are quite difficult to see untill they are quite close, by that point it's quite dangerous to be close to them...

Thanks Em, it was a great birthday present :)

Left for hospital at 7:00 this morning after stopping eating / drinking at midnight.  I ended up waiting around in various waiting rooms till 1:30pm when I was finally given a bed.  Consultant came and drew some arrows on my neck (And apologised for how long it had taken since the original consult).  Meanwhile i was ridiculously hungry. at 3:00pm I was taken over to the operating area (Where again ther were comments and surprise at how long I have had to wait since the consult) where I was injected with a pian killer (Then apparently an anaesthetic)  The pain killer was was sooo strong that I apparently fell asleep before the anaesthetic was even injected.  I remeber feeling extremely light headed and stoned, then saying something like "You should sell this stuff" then I remeber waking up an hour and 20 minutes later a littl groggy and extremely hungry.  Em arrived on the ward about half an hour later and kindly bought me a burger king.  About 30 minutes later the hospital fed me, then we got chinese on the way home...

In summary: I'm alive - and sleepy.  I've also had 3 meals since I woke up at 4:20pm so I'm full...

I get the result of the biopsy a week tomorrow (8th) :S

So on wednesday at 00:00 I have to stop eating and drinking and then at 7:30am I have to arrive at the hospital for admission. I shall then be anaesthetised and sliced open, have a lymph node removed, sewed back up and wake up feeling like crap.
The node will then be transported somewhere, where it will be dyed purple, set in wax, and be cut into slices. Each slice will then be looked at by trained monkeys, or lab people if they haven't trained the monkeys yet, and checked for traces of Reed-Sternberg cells (Or robotic spiders if you believe Al and Em).  Meanwhile I shall be waiting for the results.

( Running and health )
That is all :)

The Joiners is still listing a gig on Monday 26th May for Frank Turner, his site and his myspace do not agree, but they do list Southsea a few days later so it's possible... Who wants to go (If it's on)

Sorry to those on my friends list, to whom some of this is a repeat. This is my first public post about this and so for those who aren't on my friends list / those who read this on facebook and not livejournal, here's some recent history.
About a month and a half ago I found lumps on my neck. One big one on the right and two smaller ones on the left. The doctor diagnosed these as enlarged cervical chain lymph nodes. The differential for such a symptom is a very numerous list and so began the weeding process. I was blood tested for various things, including some hint that it was an infection causing the lumps and all came back either negative or inconclusive. Today I went to a special Neck Lump Clinic at RSH ENT (Royal South Hants Ear Nose and Throat) department referred using a special "Emergency Cancer Referral" thingy, with the intention of hopefully ruling out the scariest in the list of differential diagnosises, Lymphoma.
End of History.
Today:

I went along to be sat in a room full of lumpy necked peoples who were gradually weeded out through several processes. First was a general poke and prod (It's probably got a technical name but I don't know it). Some people were got rid of at this stage, but my lumps were obviously impressive enough to warrant an endoscopy. The consultant, Mr Randall, numbed my nose and throat with horrible tasting spray and shoved a camera up my nose and down my throat. Again some were weeded but I passed on to the next test... The Ultrasound. About 10 of us were sent upstairs to the radiology dept where a crack team of radiologists / oncologists were lined up ready to scan, poke and prod some more. Yet again I passed this test and went on to a minor biopsy. This involved a needle being repeatedly stabbed into my lump on the right side, pulled out a bit, twisted wriggled and shoved back in. This was repeated about 40-50 times to attempt to get some "lump cells" out and under a microscope. Unfortunately all this told them was that I needed further tests. The status now is that I'm awaiting a call at some point in the next 2 weeks to tell me to go in, get generally anesthetised, have the lump on the right sliced out, and sliced up to be looked at for a week or so under a microscope.

Basically At some point in the next 3 weeks or so I shall know for sure If I have cancer or not. For those wishing to know more, feel free to ask me at livejournal http://wsmithrill.livejournal.com or message me on facebook. The most likely condition, if I have lymphoma, is Hodgkins Lymphoma which is one of the most treatable cancers and about which, is a plethora of information on the internet.

So now to wait...

I want to get tickets booked for Frank Turner Apparently they are selling fast...
Who's up for:
a) Southampton Joiners on 29th March (Sat)
and
b) Winchester Railway Inn 24th April (Thurs)

Copied from frank-turner.com:

29th March @ The Joiners, Southampton (solo show, album tour warmup)

Who's interested in joining me and Em for this gig (Providing there are still tickets left)?

On Sunday, Bob, Em and me all went to the Gym, I managed to run 4K in 27:34 (mm:ss) which is under my first milestone target by a good couple of minutes :D
On Monday I phoned up the solicitors as, after having heard about Jon's mega compensation, I wanted to hear what my claim was up to...
The solicitor told me that the other party's insurance company had lost my medical information, which was re-submitted on thursday so that is why there is a delay. However he also told me that Jon's ammount was almost certainly a mistake and that he was not hopeful about me getting the same amount. It was much, much more likely that I would be getting about 1/2 what Jon got :(
So if that's the case I probably won't be getting me a macbook air, but just putting the whole lot into a deposit for the wedding venue.