Commercialised Declaration of Love Day

So you're either an abstainer or a partaker, but do we really need to be told when, where and how to declare our love for someone?  On February the 14th, we all rush around like crazed animals trying to searching for that overpriced token gesture that tells our other halves we care when actually, we could do this at any other time of the year for free (or considerably cheaper).  And whilst all the couples are panick buying bunches of roses, chocolates and V-day card, those without someone to share Valentine's day have it rubbed in their face every which way.  You can't escape, it's everywhere - even on the GOOGLE logo <sigh>!

Relationships in a mobile age

As I sat in bed the other night with my ipad in one hand and my phone in the other, having just dropped the ipad on my head and reprimanded L for laughing uncontrollably, it suddenly occurred to me that we'd hardly spoken a word to each other all day.

We often have extended conversations via Twitter, Facebook or text, yet put us in a coffee shop together with the intention of having a face to face conversation, and we both instinctively reach for our phones to tweet to the world that we are sitting in a coffee shop and the day is rainy or sunny or windy or snowy and the barista has just made a pretty picture in the coffee froth!


I'm ever so slightly concerned that the panic I feel when I've left my phone at home is an indicator of an addiction.  After a short while, I get twitchy and start tapping on any shiny surface that resembles a touch screen.  No doubt if I was left without my phone for long enough, I'd resort to conversations that were limited to a maximum of 100 characters or end up speaking in the third person:  "Bighair hasn't seen you for a while and wants to know if you've had a good week?"  "Bighair is suggesting that you and she go to the pub for a swift pint sometime soon", "Bighair is going offline"!

How did we ever get by without mobile technology and will my ability to hold a real conversation simply fade away? Will human kind evolve to talk only with their thumbs?  Who knows - I must now go and tweet this cartoon.

Baltic!

Yes, it is really, really cold.   -4C to be precise!  Ok, so everything is relative, I mean the conditions aren't on a par with North Pole (yet) but the latest Big Freeze is quite enough to give me an insight, and frankly, unless I had my own supply of seal furs, walrus blubber and an Eskimo, I'm quite happy to continue whinging about -4C.

Last night I had the misfortune to travel for two hours on a train with no heating!  Everyone on board was wrapped up, grown men were shivering and tourists were pulling spare jumpers from their suitcases for extra warmth.   It feels like a real winter - we just need some snow.