Choosing a mixing bowl…

This is a tip mainly for bread-makers  like me, who have to contend with ME/CFS, as well as the vagaries of beating bread dough into submission (or anyone, really, who is physically weak/sick or otherwise impaired, and bakes).

For more years that I care to remember, I’ve used a Mason Cash earthenware bowl for mixing pastry, or bread dough. However, a few months ago I switched to a 5 litre stainless steel bowl (I may have mentioned this elsewhere).

Bigger than the Mason Cash bowl, it has the room to work the dough until it’s all incorporated – then it can be tipped out onto the work surface in a neat lump, for kneading.

Today, though, I’d carelessly put something else in my steel bowl, so I had to… Read more at my bread-making blog

A close shave…

I’ve mentioned before that we seem to be producing a nation of pussies – and it’s getting worse.

There’s a current TV ad featuring a young guy who hasn’t shaved for the entire weekend, so he has stubble (and let’s ignore the fact that the weekend is when most young people socialise, and the lazy bugger  should have shaved!).

The ad points out that shaving 3 days worth of stubble, before

New HSBC scam…

The email below speaks for itself – and is probably a phishing scam.

I don’t have an HSBC account, and I don’t know

Radio 2 or Radio Caroline? No contest…

Well, not on a bank holiday afternoon, it isn’t.

This afternoon, BBC Radio 2 is recycling Tony Blackburn and Cilla Black, to front a sixties music show. I know bank holidays are often poor in terms of radio, and TV, content, but

Bloated stomach with COPD…

I was just shutting down for the night, when I found this search string “my father has COPD and he says his stomach is very tight”.

That’s a very common problem with respiratory illness, and one I’ve suffered from all my life. It’s a condition called “aerophagy” – literally, air-eating, which causes a painfully bloated stomach.

When it’s difficult to breathe, it’s a reflex action to

My doctor won’t tell me if I have COPD…

Again with the search-engine slush-pile “my doctor won’t tell me if I have COPD.”

If you have COPD you are entitled to know. Period. And if, whoever you are, you’ve read my posts on the subject, you’ll probably know why.

On the other hand, the best reason for your doctor not telling you you have COPD is

Is ME/CFS worse in winter?

An item from my search-engine slush-pile “Is ME/CFS worse in winter?”

In my experience, no. My level of sustained physical mediocrity is pretty much the same summer or winter, and any time in between.

Other people may have different experiences, of course – one of the biggest problems with getting ME/CFS taken seriously is

Amsterdam-Detroit flight security sucks?

Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian nutjob prevented from blowing up an airliner has, apparently, been a known risk for two years, and is on a “terrorist identities” list of 550,000 names maintained by US authorities. He’s also believed to have links with

Pomegranates and MRSA – just hold on a minute…

Pomegranate ‘can combat MRSA and other superbugs’ claims the headline in the Observer.

Well, maybe – and maybe not. The word “can” implies a degree of certainty, the word they should be using, at this stage of the game, is “might”.

Anyone remember the “Anti-cancer curry” cobblers of a couple of years ago, when laboratory tests showed that turmeric had a detrimental effect on cancer cells? Or any of the other, equally unlikely cancer “cures” that seem to pop up every few months, often in the Daily Mail, probably when there’s a slow news day? And which rarely, if

Attract visitors to your blog – first step, write one…

A seemingly perpetual question in the WordPress forums is “How do I attract visitors to my blog?” Often posed by people who have written bugger all beyond “Hey, look, this is my new blog!” Big deal…

To get people to visit your blog you have to write. A lot. More importantly, you have to write well and interestingly and – a personal bugbear this – you have to know where the spell-check button is and use it obsessively! And don’t overuse