Fighting The Flab

Am back, sorry about the absence, but a loss of computer and only running a blackberry (and there is no way on God's green Earth I am using that to update the blog) meant very limited blogging opportunities (which really means I could not be bothered to pick up one of the 4 laptops, or bring my tablet home from work, or use a friends... so actually that excuse is pointless).... Actually lets start this again...

Hello, I am back, sorry about the absence but life took over and I really could not be bothered to expend the energy needed to walk up the stairs to get the laptops :o) (that's better, and more truthful)

This post should have been finished and out Wednesday, however, it is now Thursday and I have still have not finished it... So pretend it is Wednesday and it will all make more sense!

Tuesday is weigh in day for the fab 4 (Kerry, Kellie, Dan and I) and it is with some interpretation that we approached it this week. Firstly, we all got off to a roaring start last week, secondly we have all been talking today about how rough we feel. Now lets get this right, I don't mean rough as in ill, I mean rough as in bloated, lethargic, generally not right.

Add that to my scepticism, about how you can eat so much food and lose weight, Kerry's abnormal insistence that her body will not lose weight or if it does its half a pound a week. The mood was generally down... also if we are honest none of the 4 of us actually like our counsellor, she is at best 'Walter Mitty' and at worse simply incompetent! However, the timing of the group is right for the 4 of us all to make it, so it is what we have. (We also happen to be the loudest, most opinionated and youngest members of the group I think!)

This week there was some faces we had not seen before, the 4 of them sat at the back next to us and promptly started eating! (I have to add that these 4 are also quite thin!). This set Dan off on an incandescent rage, which strangely enough he held back on when he blogged, but catch the post here... However, we duly lined up, paid our money, took our turns on the scales and then sat through an hour of psycho babble  and poorly explained nutritional advice. Now please dont get me wrong I dont think the diet is overly bad, and I dont think the organisation that runs it is particularly bad either, in fact, if you have to go to a fat club then it is one of the 3 I would suggest. Its just our counsellor...

Now.... the weigh in itself... this week I lost 9lbs (4.08 Kilos) giving me a total loss of 26.5lbs (1 Stone 12.5lbs, 12.02 Kilos) which is not too shabby and won me slimmer of the week. The others all lost as well with safe, healthy sustainable amounts. This week the fab 4 lost 17lbs together, bringing our running total to date up to..... weight for it.... (sorry could not resist)..... 52lbs!!!! (3 Stone 10lbs)

Well done to all 4 of us!!! Way to go team!!! Keep it up!!!


Todays thought....

Food Diary

That was it... I felt hungry at points but not starving... Dan saved my life at lunch time. with an amazingly tasty crispbread cheese triangle and slice of ham... with or without black pepper, it actually tasted OK, the only one thing I would say is that crispbreads are still crispbreads..

Had to stop at McDonald's for the passengers on way home last night (whilst being hungry) and I did not have anything, just a diet sprite, so I was quite proud of that!

How do I feel about the diet? well slightly empowered, very confused at the moment as I am working out what I can and cant eat, and trying to work out why pasta and potatoes are free foods? Really?

This morning I have woken up with a pounding headache.... 

I feel this is unfair... Dan's account of the evening is quite accurate, although I feel he stops short of telling the truth about the film 'We need totalk about Kevin', basically it is arty crap and to be fair if you have money to spend on going to watch it then you have too much money and second you should be helping the country out of recession by spending it elsewhere. Also, the two hours spent watching the film could be better spent by doing quite literally, anything else on the planet. I myself, found it a great time to catch up on 40 winks here and there...

So, OK, the film choice was mine... and yes I made a mistake, however, I have chosen many other films to watch that have been brilliant and inspired choices. My main defence for choosing this film is the tubes fault :o)

You see, I have been working in London and have been travelling on the tube every day and every evening, mainly in a dream like comatose state due to the times of my travel and the amount of time I spend at work, and a new born child and teething and and and etc... You get the picture, I am tired and half awake. Well, the tube is littered with literally several posters, all moody and red of this film "we need to talk about Kevin" with lots of stars and quotes from critics. I became mesmerised by the poster, I even saw it whilst asleep... it’s a good poster.

When our night got ruined by castaways (EXPLITIVE DELEATED) and the girls started talking about scary films, I was all up for paranormal activity 3, but apparently it’s too scary... so my mind wandered to this poster... I suggested the film and the girls went and researched it, (I did as well) and all the reviews were amazing! One even said it was the scariest film of the year. Now OK, to be fair this should have sent alarm bells ringing, especially the awards from film festivals, one review even mentioned the amount of red in the film and the way it was used... again alarm bells should be ringing... and normally they would... but this time nothing. Maybe it was because I was tired, maybe it was because I was angry and hurt because I couldn’t dress up as a witch and was bitterly disappointed for the girls who had put in a lot of work for the costumes... whichever it was I am not sure, but the alarms did not trigger.

When the opening credits rolled and I saw it was a BBC film, British film council, national lottery awarded funds, Cannes palm winner etc... I looked at Dan and even said out loud a nasty word... I knew... and I think Dan did too... we had come to watch the antichrist of films... the arty blurry focussed acclaimed gold polished turd of a film. To be fair, we were right...

The only thing I have to say about Dan's comments was this, he does not go far enough, he states;

"I'm not telling anyone to not go see it. I'm sure some of you will prolly like it, or even love it. But we unanimously did not like it nor love it."

I'm telling you he is wrong.... and again if you have the time and money to go see this film DONT. Find something else to do, anything.. Paint the house, write the blog you have been putting off, do the ironing, volunteer at a soup kitchen, give your brain over to medical science, do anything but see this film. I promise you, you will thank me afterwards.

As for not choosing any more films, I am still many many films up on the girls, who have a knack of picking poor films, however, if I choose another film as bad as this, then fair enough have me hung drawn and quartered. It won’t happen again..

Ok, so this was meant to go out yesterday, but somehow I managed to put the wrong date on it.... after thinking, why didn't that post publish, it finally dawned on me.

So as no doubt this will cause great humour among our fellow bloggers (one in particular springs to mind) I thought I would return the favour by dedicating this Music Monday to none other than 0ddness himself.

If you read his blog you will have no doubt read how he hysterically run around like a girl because of a slow worm heroically saved everyone from a massive snake invasion! Go Dan...

So, as tribute to the brave soul, today's tune is Cobra Starship singing Bring It (the tune from snakes on a plane)

I have stolen a blog post from 0ddness as I thought it worth sharing to a few more people!! It is about the privacy settings on Facebook and how to alter them... well worth the read people.


Privacy Woes

It's not been much of a secret that Facebook has been in the press a lot lately. And the more worrying thing about it is, it's been in the press a lot for the same reasons.

Privacy, Lack Thereof, and Your Information.

Now, if you've not seen any of it, it's probably a good idea to pay attention here, because your personal info could well be smeared across any number of websites you've visited, your data could be being used to target you with spam, and you could be getting signed up for random shit.

Right now.

A while back, Facebook changed it's privacy settings. You may have seen the big box that read something like "We've made it easier to adjust your privacy!" which was very nice. I bet most of you went "Ooooh *yawn* *close box*" Fact is, that those settings were changed to various default states that lets facebook do what it likes with your info. Even slightly more worrying was the fact that your FRIENDS could also use your data too.

Not good.

The geeks of the world pointed this out to the non-geeks of the world, and suddenly there was a rather large hoo-har over it all.

What people don't realise is that the guy that runs it has a pretty shady past according to the media. Even the idea and internal gubbins of Facebook were written by a friend. A former friend of his. After he nicked it. Hence him having to make a multi-million dollar out of court settlement...

Advertising is king on the Internet - it's how Google make their money and can afford to give all their stuff away for free. Microsoft is realising this, and that's why they've teamed up with Google to try get a slice of that rather nice advertising pie. So Facebook - who also makes it's money through adverts - has decided that YOUR personal info is now THEIR personal info. And when you're not on Facebook, you actually are, and the sites you visit that happen to have signed an agreement with them are quite happy to see who you are, where you're from, what you do, what other sites you visit...

The worst part - much like Yahoo doing something similar 8-10 years ago - is that you have to opt OUT. That's right, the default setting is "Why yes of course you can look at my personal info!" which means you have to go in an change it. The worst thing, is it's buried. If you're not sure of your way around settings and options, you've got a mission on your hands. Especially when you consider that the "new easy use" privacy settings have 170 options.

170.

So, what do you do? Well, you could go in, and fiddle with all the settings and piss around with what-not and hope for the best. You could get your Not-Dan-Computer-Geek to help sort it out for you. Or, you could try this tool over at ReclaimedPrivacy.org

THANKFULLY it's as easy as clicking, dragging, pressing some buttons, and job done. The instructions are all very clear and easy to use, and bare in mind that I thought I'd managed to set my Facebook page to nice and private. Turns out, I'd missed a couple of settings. Oops.

Honestly, follow the instructions, get yourself secured. It'll only be a matter of time before someone manages to get your info and do something with it... Except, me not being a nefarious hacker, I'm not sure what they would do, but I'm betting something. People are quitting Facebook in droves (I'm not saying it's dying mind you, but they ARE leaving) for various alternatives that are cropping up, and even various media outlets are suggesting "Maybe it's time to try something else"

Good luck out there ;)

Sources:

Facebooks new privacy changes:
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2009/12/facebooks-new-privacy-changes-good-bad-and-ugly

Facebook reduces control over personal information:
http://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2010/04/facebook-further-reduces-control-over-personal-information

Things to stop doing on Facebook:
http://finance.yahoo.com/family-home/article/109538/7-things-to-stop-doing-now-on-facebook

Facebook's gone rouge:
http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/05/facebook-rogue/

Essential privacy tips:
http://mashable.com/2010/05/18/facebook-privacy-tips/

What happens in Facebook stays in Facebook:
http://www.albumoftheday.com/facebook/