In theory this domain expires in a week or two, though I’ve only cancelled today and you know how companies like to be notified a decade in advance of cancellation so who knows, I may be hanging onto the domain name for another year. Either way I won’t be using it so to the two of you who may read this, change your bookmarks!

I haven’t really dieted before, my willpower extends to just a day or two normally, a week at a push. That is, until a month ago. For one month I have eaten no chocolate, biscuits, cakes or sweets. I think the difference this time has been motivation. Before the motivation has always been weight loss, but this time it was health reasons. About a month ago I had several bouts of extremely painful ‘digestive issues’. I’m talking the worst pain I’ve ever had. Super sensibly I didn’t see a doctor but I was pretty sure it was all down to what I was eating.

I’ve known for years that I have an intolerance to dairy (and a few other food types) but it has gotten worse lately. The symptoms were usually heartburn, bloating and upset stomach. So I decided I couldn’t take this any more and I’d cut it all out. All dairy and anything that gives me heartburn is out of my diet. This sadly includes chocolate, the most lovely of foods. For the first few days I got the shakes from not being able to snack on sweet things after meals, but after that I was astonished to find that I no longer craved the stuff. I was happy sticking to grapes and raspberries in their place. I thought for the first time that I could actually give it all up for good.

So here I am one month on and I have not had one moment of weakness. In that month I have not been ill and I’ve had no heartburn (used to get through a packet of Gaviscon a month easily before). I feel more full after my meals and I very rarely feel flakey when I’m hungry.

Today I bought a set of weighing scales. It’s a bit late now as I don’t know what I weighed before I started this diet but I figured I’d start keeping track now to see if there is any loss. 80Kg if you’re interested. I may even see about getting a bit of exercise here and there. I think if I managed to give up chocolate there’s nothing that I can’t do.

I’ve been playing with it non stop for about 4hrs now and I can safely say it’s”The Shit”. It is only  0.35Kg heavier than my iPad and so for a laptop of this power it is insanely light and thin. What has surprised me the most is that despite it’s thinness it is a solidly constructed device that isn’t flimsy at all. The display stays in place completely, more so than any other laptop I’ve had.

It runs almost silently when doing standard things like browsing the web and using office apps. When I ran World of Warcraft (which it does very well) of course it kicked the fan on and it was fairly noisy, but no more than most laptops running a 3D game.

Speed wise I have no complaints. I think the SSD is to thank for rapid bootup and app launching making it a very fast overall experience.

I last had a Mac in 2009 and I had Leopard so it’s been nice getting used to Lion. I really like the gestures and it hasn’t taken me long to get used to them. I’ve found I quite like running apps full screen and using the trackpad to swipe between apps or use Launchpad/Mission Control to switch quickly. In fact I have little use for the dock any more, I’d rather have the screen real-estate back.

The price is very off putting and they are limited (2 USB ports, no optical drive, small-ish hard drive space) and so it won’t suit everyone. But if you have ever pondered about getting a Mac, I’d say go for the MacBook air.

 right – ipad is doing a mammoth sync. What’s the best app for using office docs on it? any other apps you recommend?

First and foremost, the last time I checked opening and editing files from MS Office was not ideal on the iPad. I have not tried recently and I have not tried out the various Office apps for the iPad so try at your own risk.

If you just wish to read the files, I very highly recommend GoodReader. It opens all kinds of different files, allows annotations and lets you access files on Dropbox and other similar services. It is incredibly cheap for what it does!

Apple’s word processing, slide show and spreadsheet software (Pages, Keynote and Numbers, respectively) are very nice and easy to use but don’t expect brilliant compatibility with Microsoft Office files. Changing from one to another is not something I’d rely on.

It has been open to debate a lot since the iPad was released but I believe the device is much better suited to consumption rather than creation. You can create things with it especially if you’re willing to use workaraounds (eg emailing your documents to yourself on a PC and converting the files where possible). Very much is possible depending on how much effort you want to put into it and how much more convenient it would be to actually just use a normal computer. This is something that I think you can only judge by yourself.

Other apps that are essential or I highly recommend:

For You

Twitterrific for Twitter.

Friendly for Facebook (though I believe Facebook are releasing an official iPad app soon)

Informant HD is a very nice diary/organiser app and syncs with Google Calenders.

Instapaper – See a link that looks interesting? Don’t have the time to read an article? Many apps support a “Send to instapaper” feature. Open up Instapaper and it will download the articles for you, often strip out all the crap and present it like a clean crisp newspaper article for you to read offline.

Kindle – Sure I have a Kindle, you have a Kindle but as your Kindle books sync across devices it’s nice to have this when you don’t want to carry all your devices with you at once.

BBC News – The BBC website’s videos are almost always Flash based and so cannot be viewed on the iPad. Their news app will have the videos in a format that you can read.

Sky News – I hate to say it but their news app is much better. For following the riot news a fews weeks back I found this to be so much better.

AppAdvice – Great app that lists news about new apps, discounted apps and has guides for new users.

Zinio – Many magazines are starting to release iPad versions that you can sometimes buy cheaper than the print copies.

iPlayer/4oD Catch Up/ITV Player/ – Self explanitory.

VEVO HD – Music Videos

Guardian Eyewitness – One new photo a day, stunning ones mostly.

IMDB – Great app of the website. Want to know what that actor from that thing was in? This is what you need.

TV Guide – Self explanitory.

Windowshop – Amazon’s app. Great way to browse and buy goods from Amazon.

Games

Words with Friends HD

Infinity Blade (Just to show off to people how good the graphics can be on iPad, try Epic Citadel for a free version that lets you just walk around a castle)

Plants vs Zombies HD

Cut the Rope

World of Goo

Osmos HD

Fruit Ninja HD

Kids Apps

Interactive Alphabet (by Piikea)

I Hear Ewe and I See Ewe (latter is animal, shape, object and colour matching game)

Magic Piano

Peppa’s Party

The first step in the right direction was perhaps a year ago when I decided to set up a second account that was for food and household purchases only. That way I could put a lump sum into that account every month and know exactly how much I was spending on food without having to keep track of receipts and such. The new Lloyds TSB Money Manager is actually pretty good but still to have it coming from just the one account makes things much easier.

I have just created a third account for personal spending. With comics, apps and other miscellaneous small purchases I’m letting them add up without really thinking about it. Turns out a couple of comics a week at £2-£3 each adds up!

I love to plan budgets even if I don’t love to follow them. I’ve a little planner on Google Docs and to make me more aware of when my money comes out I’ve put all the major bills on Google Calender too. So in theory I can spend £100 on myself and have an £80 ‘buffer’ still to use for unexpected costs like vets bills, presents for birthdays or the bi-yearly internet domain fees I always forget about.

In theory I can then split the remaining money at the end of the month between my savings accounts.

Or, you know, piss it away on more comics

The web filtering is done in a central place by the county council and applies to all local authority services but I do wonder when (if ever) they will take a more informed approach to internet filtering. Personally I think it should be left up to each service to control their access. I think employees should be treated as adults and told what is and is not acceptable use. Most monitoring software is capable of seeing how much time you spend on websites, so anything out of the ordinary should be dealt with accordingly.  I also think social networking should not be singled out. What is the difference between posting a funny picture on your Facebook wall and emailing it to your friends or posting it to your blog? Is time spent on Facebook any more wasteful than time spent reading the news or doing some online banking? What about coffee or smoking breaks? I take neither so how about letting me spend 5 minutes to catch up on Twitter?

Social networking is not a fad. It is already incorporated into a huge number of businesses and there are thousands of jobs dedicated to it. We should be embracing this technology not treating it as a disease. Kids should be studying it, schools should be using it as a tool to raise attainment and strengthen interactions with students and parents.

Urgh. I know I’ve moaned about this sort of thing before but I felt the need for another moan. If I didn’t have my private internet connection via 3G I would moan a lot more often!

I have played tens of hours of Oblivion before but never got on with the main plotline. No change here either. That first moment you leave the sewer you really feel like you’re in a living, breathing world where you can do anything you want. I can’t think of any other game that has made me feel like this before.

I’ve gone for the Assasination class this time. Again I’m favoring the bow, it’s just so satisfying getting those critical hits from stealth. My character will be motivated primarily by money and adventure. Like the guy Indiana Jones gets his fedora from. I entered a cave that is right near the sewer exit that I have somehow never been to before. It had several layers to it with artifacts to collect. A little later in the game an artifact dealer requests an audience with me. After seeing I’d sold the main artifact he tells me I undersold it and there are more of them he will buy from me if I can locate them. I loved this, what felt at the time as finding a random tomb to raid has led to a quest to collect them all. Bugger the main plot I’m out for treasure!

I’ll try and post a few pics of it as despite the game being 4 years old it is still one of the most beautiful games I’ve ever played. It is also hyping me up ready to play Skyrim (hopefully) later this year.

Well that worked until today! In her defense she was woken up accidentally by her Mummy but still, it took her a long time to settle! Twice she was at the top of the stairs, waving her nappy at us telling us it smelled (she had done a wee).  It’s the kind of situation where you can’t help but laugh at her.

Anyway one one of the many trips made to try and settle her, I thought I’d take a video and so here it is:

(Obviously she’s saying “Cheese” because she thinks I’m waiting to take a still picture.)

So using this simple guide and then visiting this lovely blog of Kindle wallpapers, I give you my jailbroken Kindle:

I assumed wrongly.

On learning that there are crocodiles down the plug hole, Hannah proceeded to shout down it “I’m going to eat you, crocodiles!” and chomp away at them.

Then after a while she started shouting at the plug hole “Go away snakes, you can’t get my sweets!” and then blew raspberries at them.

I love my crocodile eating, snake scaring little lady.