The important thing is that the images have NO height or width settings, so they default to full size. On my monitor they come out side by side, even though the two images together are actually wider than the frame! This is what is called a side effect, and is something you want to avoid. It is the result of the “battle” between the rules that pertain to the IMG, TABLE, and TD statements and the rules that pertain to the width of the posting area [which is not actually a FRAME, but you can think of it as if it were]. funky!

Bottom line: The easiest way to make sure the images come out side by side is to size them down to under 300 pixels wide when you upload them. If you make that “thumbnail” a copy of the original image, you can then figure out how to make each image a hyperlink back to the original full size image if that is important. Tables are great, but they can be a real pain sometimes.

Posted by Drew458     on 02/26/2009 at 02:22 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff •  
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   Sunday - February 15, 2009

Sorry, America, I’m the bearer of bad news.  (A MUST read and please SHARE)

I predicted it all: the corruption, naivety, incompetence and wasting of tax dollars, says James Delingpole.

By James Delingpole
Last Updated: 6:05PM GMT 14 Feb 2009

Comment on this article

Towards the end of an American tour last week to promote my new book WELCOME TO OBAMALAND : I’ve Seen Your Future and It Doesn’t Work, I began to feel ever so slightly guilty. Partly it was all those people I met still wearing their “Vote Obama” badges like religious talismans, still quite obviously brimming with audacious hope for their country’s bright future under the new Obamessiah. Who was I to come from the other side of the pond and rain on their parade?

Mainly, though, it was because I’d never expected the Obama project to go pear-shaped quite so soon. Sure, it was nothing I hadn’t predicted in the book: the cronyism, the corruption, the naivety, the incompetence, the wasting of taxpayers’ money on pet, left-liberal causes. Even so, by the time I left Washington DC, I was feeling almost sorry for the guy. Couldn’t he at least have had a honeymoon before the divorce papers came through?

It’s still early days, of course, with plenty of “time for change”. But, after only three weeks, Obama’s presidency has begun more closely to resemble the shambles at the end of the John Major administration than the golden dawn we might have expected for this Tony Blair Mk II.

Tom Daschle, the trusted comrade who was going to mastermind the new Obama universal healthcare plan, was forced to resign over tax irregularities. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, the alleged financial whiz who was supposed to sort out the US economy, somehow managed to survive a similar scandal – only to preside over a “stimulus” package so vague, ill-thought-out and wasteful that Wall Street share prices have been plummeting even faster than Obama’s approval ratings.

“It will create millions of jobs,” declared House speaker Nancy Pelosi, optimistically, of the $789 billion (shaved down, after much opposition protest, from over $850 billion) “stimulus”. Conservatives have re-christened it “Porculus”, noting that about half of it has rather less to do with boosting the economy than it does with pork-barrelling favoured constituents on the liberal left and expanding the welfare state.

Obama’s new “heal the world” foreign policy is faring little better. All those liberal democracies who rejoiced at his plans to close Guantanamo have gone strangely quiet now that they’re being asked to give homes to some of the deadly terrorists once incarcerated there. (As P J O’Rourke once said: “Everyone wants to save the world; no one wants to help Mom do the dishes.") India is up in arms over his attempts to meddle in Kashmir. No one seriously believes that the Great Satanic hand of friendship he is offering to Iran will have any more effect on its ongoing “Nuke Israel” programme than did Dubya’s Great Satanic two fingers of contempt. And economies the world over are positively terrified by Obama’s moves towards protectionism. Have none of his economic gurus told him that protectionism was precisely what made the last Great Depression so deep and so prolonged?

Some Americans – the 48 per cent who didn’t vote for him – understand his shortcomings all too well. These were the ones I addressed during my lightning tour of about 30 talk-radio shows, covering everywhere from Florida, the Mid-West and California to the far-flung reaches of Hawaii and Guam. To a man – or woman in the case of the Annie Oakley of the Airwaves, Dr Laurie Roth (tagline: “She ain’t disabled, she ain’t gay, and she ain’t illegal, but she is ‘special’ “) – the presenters were properly aghast at my predictions of the horrors to come as the Land of the Free opens the floodgates to European-style socialism.

“As you are today, so we were in my country in May 1997, when we, too, elected a grinning ex-lawyer with chameleon charm and a snake-oil salesman’s patter that he could make us all better off and create social justice all in one go,” I warned. “But behold my ruined nation now!”

They got the message all right. Not that they didn’t have their suspicions anyway. Contrary to the image those right-wing talk show hosts have over here as frothing rednecks, they’re an astute bunch, the Limbaughs and the Dennis Millers, the G. Gordon Liddys and Jim Bohannons. In the US, unlike in much of Britain, people are still genuinely interested in political ideas, in the price of liberty and the ongoing struggle to defend freedom from the tyranny of the state.

At the same time, of course, there’s another half of the US that thinks the exact opposite. With unemployment (by some measures) approaching 20 per cent and consumer spending plummeting faster than at any time since records began in 1947, a lot of Americans are quite understandably scared for their jobs and for their future. Maybe, they believe, capitalism has failed and Big Brother Statism – the kind of Liberal Fascism that the US has already glimpsed in the First World War under Woodrow Wilson and again during the Depression under FDR – is the only answer.

America is as divided as it has been in perhaps any era since the Civil War. It’s going to get uglier yet.

http://www.welcometoobamaland.com

ARTICLE SOURCE TELEGRAPH

Posted by peiper     on 02/15/2009 at 05:22 AM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Democrats-Liberals-Moonbat Leftists • Government • Politics •  
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   Thursday - February 12, 2009

ok this really is my last for the day.  clever toon based on yestreday’s near miss photos.

Some of you might have seen yesterdays post with the video of the guy who almost got his ticket punched by a train.

You need to see that if you haven’t, to make sense of the cartoon.

Posted by peiper     on 02/12/2009 at 03:21 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Humor • UK •  
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A brilliant blog voice, Fred on Everything, calls it quits.

Some of you have read this fellow I know.
Some perhaps have at time even become somewhat frustrated when he writes in opposition to a strongly held conservative opinion.
He is a brilliant and experienced writer and doesn’t really fall into one political camp although it’s safe to say he is no lefty.

For those who haven’t seen Fred and read his blog or any of his books, here’s the LINK to his site.

Check out his achieves.  There’s some darn good reading there.

Gonna miss ya old man. 

Goodbye!

FOE Tits Up

February 10, 2009

All things must end, and Fred on Everything just has. This will be the last regular column, although the site will stay up and I’ll add things from time to time as the mood urges.

see the link above for the entire (short) posting.

Posted by peiper     on 02/12/2009 at 12:19 PM   
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   Thursday - February 05, 2009

Barack Obama needs to learn that apologising is for wimps.

It hardly matters to me (sometimes but not always) what this lady writes.  I just think she writes well and knows how to use the language. Very often she is quite funny.  I also like her looks. Which is not why I posted this article. But it is why I posted her photo.

Barack Obama needs to learn that apologising is for wimps
Politicians shouldn’t apologise, it just undermines our confidence in them, says Bryony Gordon.

By Bryony Gordon
Last Updated: 8:34AM GMT 05 Feb 2009

They say that sorry seems to be the hardest word. Certainly, Carol Thatcher has been having some trouble with it of late, especially regarding conversations about tennis players and the resemblance they may or may not bear to children’s toys. Gordon Brown also finds it a difficult one to get his mouth around, particularly in relation to the crumbling economy. Instead, he seems to have opted for the political equivalent of sticking your fingers in your ears and screaming: “SNOT MY FAULT, IT’S THEIRS.”

But the best non-apology ever must surely go to former defence secretary Des Browne. Of the sailors captured in Iran two years ago, and his decision to allow them to sell their stories, he said: “I have expressed a degree of regret that can be equated with an apology.”
Oh Des. A bunch of flowers would have sufficed.

Politicians don’t really do apologies, which is why the world briefly teetered on its axis this week when Barack Obama issued one, and a heartfelt one at that. Just two weeks into his presidency, Obama went on television to talk about Tom Daschle, the man he had nominated as health and human services secretary, a man who was forced to withdraw after it transpired that he had forgotten to pay some of his taxes. While any self-respecting politician would have stood up and pinned all the blame on Daschle, Obama went on record to praise him, and then blame himself. “I screwed up,” he said. “I take responsibility for this mistake.”

I’m sorry? Come again?

Most people believe this to be a very good thing indeed. They think “good grief, the man even apologises! And by admitting his mistakes, he has just proved himself to be even more perfect.” But I am not so convinced. I don’t want the most powerful man in the world to admit that he has screwed up, and so early on. I didn’t much care about this Daschle fellow, but thanks to this mea culpa my confidence in the Leader of the Free World has been severely dented. I’m sorry, but apologising is for wimps.

I know this because I do it all the time. Someone treads on my foot. I say sorry. A person knocks me on the Tube. I say sorry. I throw a one pound coin into the hat of a busker only to miss. I say sorry. If a burglar was hurt crashing through my front window, I would probably say sorry. Sorry, sorry, sorry. I know quite a few people who apologise all the time, and what we have in common is that we are all pathetic, weedy excuses for human beings. Bosses, friends and family do not think we are decent people – they just think that we have self esteem issues and could do with some therapy.

I don’t think I can deal with another four years of Mr Obama saying sorry every time he screws up, which he inevitably will. Eventually it will seem tedious, needy and grasping rather than charming. Never apologise, never explain, Barack.

BRYONY

Posted by peiper     on 02/05/2009 at 08:30 AM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • UK •  
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   Wednesday - February 04, 2009

THE WHITE HOUSE PET ?

H/T Theo Spark. 

Interesting site here folks.  >> http://www.theospark.net/

Posted by peiper     on 02/04/2009 at 02:24 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Government •  
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IT’S A TOTAL WASTE OF TIME.  MAYBE. DEPENDS. TRY YOUR HAND AND EYE ON THIS.

OK, just so ya know.  This is NOT a lazy post. Go ahead. You try it but PLEASE don’t write saying you got this darn thing in the first go.  Or the second.
Not even the third try and beyond.
I’m not fast enough due to my age. That’s my excuse and I’m staying with it.

So young whippersnapper, what’s your excuse.  lol.
Ya I know it’s a time waster ...Got anything else serious at the moment?

http://www.addictinggames.com/theworldshardestgame.html

THIS MAY BE THE HARDEST GAME YOU HAVE EVER PLAYED.  maybe.

I got the above from Steve Bass newsletter.  Here. >> http://www.techbite.com.

Posted by peiper     on 02/04/2009 at 06:48 AM   
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   Tuesday - January 27, 2009

Tips on cannabis being handed out in schools. ("I get high with a little help from my friends")

I’ve been off line and ill the last few days. In fact, I should not even be here now. Really.
No need for tea and sympathy and please hold the flowers but, I really hurt. Have had a doctor come to the house as I couldn’t get in to the clinic and am just too sick to bus it in.  Chest infection and some strained chest muscles cause by a severe and constant cough.  Feel like what I imagine a limp rag might feel like if it could feel anything.

Who cares?

Nobody but the reason I’m sharing my puny medical ills is because when I came downstairs this morning and got the paper off the floor (it’s delivered through the mail slot in the front door), intending to read and try and relax with a hot cup of tea and honey, some headlines immediately caught my eye and naturally I just couldn’t go back to bed where I belong.

Some of these stories are so dumb, so looney tunes, so unbelievable there wasn’t any way I could ignore them or put off posting them until tomorrow, because I’m not certain I’ll be on line tomorrow.  No kidding friends and neighbors.  I feel pukey.

So then, because some stories raise my ire and do not make me feel warm and friendly, I’m trying to tie my BLM (blood pressure meter) to yours. Why should I suffer alone?  As an example, this EDITORIAL COMMENT by a Conservative. My gosh a conservative?  Yeah.  Some of you will say he is merely one in name only.  But honestly that isn’t true either.  But his swooning over RamaLama is just too much.  Try and read as many comments as you can.  I may not agree with all but they do make a point.  Of course, I don’t buy it and I kinda doubt you will.

Something tells me that I share a blood pressure meter with the Tiger.

There’s also a story about .. well guess. Our new fearless leader is quoted in a headline today saying that “THE US WILL LEAD THE WORLD IN GOING GREENER AND CLEANER.” He also took the time to take a swipe at President Bush and his policy on the green issue.  TheOne is going to fall in line with the Europeans
on Climate Change. 

Do I want to come home to the USA when the time arrives to do so?  Will I still have a country?  Jeesh!

Gary McKinnon believes in little green men – but it doesn’t make him a terrorist
Americans who want a harmless hacker extradited from Britain must be from a different planet, says Boris Johnson.

By Boris Johnson
Conservative Mayor of London

Way to go, Mr President. I think we can all agree that it has been a cracking first week. Apart from the swearing-in glitch – which was entirely the fault of that judge – I have supported just about everything that Barack Obama has done.

I liked the speech, and the promise that America is ready to lead again. It is good news that he is getting rid of Guantanamo and water-boarding and extraordinary rendition, all the dread apparatus of the Bush regime.

But before we all get too misty-eyed about the new era, and before Barack devotes himself entirely to the meltdown of the banks, there is one more thing in his diplomatic in-tray. There is one last piece of neocon lunacy that needs to be addressed, and Mr Obama could sort it out at the stroke of a pen.

In a legal nightmare that has lasted seven years, and cost untold millions to taxpayers both here and in America, the US Justice Department is persisting in its demented quest to extradite 43-year-old Londoner, Gary McKinnon.

To listen to the ravings of the US military, you would think that Mr McKinnon is a threat to national security on a par with Osama bin Laden. According to the Americans, this mild-mannered computer programmer has done more damage to their war-fighting capabilities than all the orange-pyjama-clad suspects of Guantanamo combined.

And how? He is a hacker. He hacked into the Pentagon, he hacked into the army, the navy, and the air force, and the Americans say he temporarily paralysed US Naval Weapons station Earle, by deleting some files.

In their continuing rage at this electronic lèse-majesté, the Americans want us to send him over there to face trial, and the possibility of a 70-year jail sentence. It is a comment on American bullying and British spinelessness that this farce is continuing, because Gary McKinnon is not and never has been any kind of threat to American security. He had only one reason for fossicking around in the databanks of Pentagon computers, and it had nothing to do with the war on terror or indeed the military capabilities of any country on earth.

Mr McKinnon believes in UFOs, and he is one of the large number of people who think that there is a gigantic conspiracy to conceal their existence from the rest of us, and that this conspiracy is organised by the US government.

Link editorial comment above for entire article.
Here is one of the comments made by readers in reply to Bad Boris.

Well, Boris, either you are a member of the MMGW orthodoxy and sitting in the GoreBore pocket or yoiu missed the Messiah’s latest commitment.

Out goes Bush’s eminently rational scepticism and in comes the whole Gore/IPCC, no holes barred, bring on the new Kyoto package.

Well, in doing so, he will ruin his country and its people, who for the moment worship him as if there is no tomorrow.

Michael
on January 27, 2009
at 02:11 PM

Barack Obama promises to lead world on climate change
President Barack Obama has promised that the US will lead the world on climate change and make cleaner energy a priority.

By Alex Spillius in Washington
Last Updated: 12:15AM GMT 27 Jan 2009
HOW GWEEN WUZ MY VALLEY

“We will make it clear to the world that America is ready to lead. To protect our climate and our collective security, we must call together a truly global coalition,” said Mr Obama, before signing three executive orders and memorandums on environmental issues.

In a dig at Mr Bush, who was accused of subverting science for ideological reasons, he added: “My administration will not deny facts - we will be guided by them.”

Hillary Clinton, the new Secretary of State, meanwhile picked Todd Stern, a veteran of the Kyoto Protocol talks, as her envoy for climate change, in a clear signal of intent to world leaders aiming to reach a successor to Kyoto this year.

The protocol was drafted late on in the Clinton administration only for Mr Bush to reject its environmental standards as bad for American businesses.

Mr Obama set out a bold vision of an energy-independent US, a goal he described as critical for “our security, our economy and our planet”.

Well now, apparently there are only ONE set of “facts” to be given credence.  The “facts” that he approves over anything else put before him. You either agree or are in denial and deserving of ridicule.  How typical of the left.  Oh boy.  How many more years?

Now then ... for sheer over the top MoonBat looney tunes insanity .... I offer you this below the fold.  I’m not sure I follow the logic here. Is there any? 

Posted by peiper     on 01/27/2009 at 10:01 AM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Education • UK •  
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   Saturday - January 24, 2009

A Special Find

I went down a trail of hyperlinks and wound up at a very unusual blog. It’s very professional, and it’s very insightful. The author, DetroitBlogger John, does several interesting pieces a month on life in Detroit. He also is one of the editors of the Detroit Metro Times, which I guess is a newspaper, dead tree or online. Skilled and professional, his blog is a treat. “John” considers himself an Urban Explorer and he loves the city and the stories he shares on his blog. It’s made up of those colorful fill-in articles you sometimes find in the Sunday paper, that take a look at the people who are keeping this city alive. Barely. From the old man who fixes pianos in his unadvertised windowless shop, to the empty house set up as a monument to the people that died in it, to the little mom & pop bakery still in business after 60 years to the old men who bought a shack and started their own social club because it got too cold to be sitting around on the front stoop, DB John tells each small tale in a truthful but upbeat way, and usually includes a couple of pictures to help the story along.

The archives go back several years. In case you have a rainy Saturday to contend with, or there’s nothing on but reruns. detroitblog.org

• Did you know that many areas of Detroit have gone downhill so far that they’re coming back up the other side? No, I don’t mean Urban Renewal. I mean Earthly Renewal. Vast sections of this most dilapidated city are turning back into prairie and forest. It’s not just a bottom-up thing either; sometimes it’s top-down.


• The answer to that perplexing trivia question “How many boats have their own zip code?” is ONE. That’s because it’s also the post office.


• Got a hankerin’ for some roast raccoon? How about with a side order of Delta Blues? Glemie Dell Beasley can set you up right.


• Literacy in Detroit is less than 50%. Yet libraries still hang on, even though they sometimes just serve as shelters for the homeless. But at least some folks are trying to keep the dream alive.


• Think you have a tough job? How would you like to run the only gun shop in Detroit? They buy and sell guns and ammo, do repiars, teach CCW classes, rent guns (for use on their range) and have a somewhat safe shooting range in the basement. General Laney, the man that owns the business, has strong views on gun control, and he’s taken them all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court. And won.

  His core belief is that gun laws target blacks. “Gun control in Detroit is racist to begin with. You heard of Dr. Sweet?” he asks, referring to the case of Ossian Sweet, a black physician who, with his family, was tried and eventually acquitted for shooting into a mob that attacked their home when they moved into an all-white neighborhood in 1925.

  Soon after, the state passed stringent gun-control laws, known as Public Act 372 of 1927. Laney sees those laws aimed squarely at blacks, a reaction to the verdict. “After the Sweet case, the Michigan Legislature said we couldn’t allow black people to have guns, and that’s how Michigan gun laws come about.”

  “Gun control is race control,” he adds. “It has been that way to keep blacks in servitude.”

Posted by Drew458     on 01/24/2009 at 03:59 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Editorials •  
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   Thursday - January 22, 2009

Great Grand-dad has to prove he’s over 18 to buy a sling shot.  They are called catapults here.

More MOONBAT stuff.  Hardly have to look to find it anymore. It’s everywhere. 
Thought it was a gag at first but, no.  Take a look at the old guy.

btw ... not being a fisherman ever I wouldn’t know but.  Couldn’t you do the same thing with a home made sling shot using a hanger?  We did that as kids. Making the slings that is.

This is pretty silly and so that’s why it’s posted. 

Last post for me for the day ... playing nurse to wife who has a cold but worse .... she’s really ticked off at govt. in general but particularly with the locals.
We think that very soon the powers that be are going to allow the paving over of a portion of the valuable GREEN BELT here. They wanna build like 2,000 houses plus the support things like stores and whatever else might be needed.  If our weather clears up enough in my lifetime and the wife gets better, I’ll try and get pix.  Really awful darn news if they go ahead.  But hands are tied council says, by London.  So along with sneezes, cough and sniffles, I’m getting an earful (but no bad language) and the way she’s muttering you would think I was on the darn council myself.
Non of which has a thing to do with this post however.  Just thought I’d add it in closing.

Cheers

Shopkeeper refuses to serve great-grandfather, 73, a toy catapult ‘ unless he could prove he was over 18’

Last updated at 1:53 PM on 22nd January 2009

A 73-year-old angler was reeling after a tackle shop refused to sell him a toy catapult - unless he produced ID proving he was over 18.

Great-grandfather John Payne, who suffers arthritis and walks with a limp, was told the £1.50 toy could only be sold to adults with valid identification.

Staff said the plastic catapult - used to fling fish bait into rivers - could be used as a weapon if it fell into the hands of a teenager.

Humiliated: John Payne was forced to show identification proving he was over 18 before he could buy this catapult

It meant John, who was taking one of his 10 grandchildren fishing, was forced to hand over his driving licence before the ‘jobsworth’ shopkeeper allowed the sale.

Frail John said he was left ‘utterly humiliated’ following the incident at the Original Factory Shop in Melksham, Wiltshire.

The retired foreman said: ‘At first I thought that she was just trying to be humorous.

‘But when I cheekily replied ‘Do I look 18?’ she asked if I could prove it, and then asked me to verify this with some form of identification.

‘At this point I realised that she was in fact being serious.

‘I am 73 years old and have grandchildren who are probably older than the woman serving me. I have a 50-year-old daughter, for goodness sake.

‘I have bought other equipment in the past with no trouble. Surely it is obvious that I am going to use the catapult for its intended purpose.

‘I understand that the girl had a job to do, but she should be able to show some discretion.

‘What sort of a world are we living in now when a 73-year-old cannot go into a shop and buy fishing tackle?

‘It seems some people are jobsworths who are completely devoid of common sense.’

Balding John, who suffers from crippling arthritis, has been a keen fisherman for the past 50 years.

The grandfather of nine and great-grandfather of 10 visits his local rivers most weekends, often with his young family.

But he was stunned when his local tackle shop refused to sell him the catapult - a standard piece of kit for most fishermen across the world.

The shop assistant told him that she had to screen everyone before handing over the ‘dangerous’ implement.

But John, who lives with wife Dorothy, 76, slammed his ‘nanny state’ treatment.

He said: ‘The implication is that I was not a responsible enough adult to purchase a catapult, which is designed for the purpose of firing maggots into the river to attract fish.

‘As much as I am not impartial to a little humorous flattery, on this occasion I felt extremely humiliated by the assistant’s obvious lack of judgement.’

A spokesman for the store said its shopkeeper was being ‘vigilant’ - while having ‘a bit of fun’.

He said: ‘I am sure the assistant was having a bit of fun with the customer and did not seriously expect him to show identification.

‘But this does prove that our staff are very vigilant about asking for identification.’

GRANDAD

Posted by peiper     on 01/22/2009 at 12:31 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Miscellaneous • UK •  
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   Thursday - January 08, 2009

Thinking Vs Linking - Blogging Vs Microblogging

When I was helping out The Skipper with this blog, I was always the “Linker” while he was the “Thinker”.  I could pump out many quick articles linking to what others had written, while he would write long essays on many different topics.  We complimented each other well.

When I started looking for someone to take over this blog, I was glad Drew threw his name in the hat because he is a “thinker”.  You’ll notice that when I post a story, it is typically a quick note and a link to another blog or news site.  That style works best for me.

For about a month, I’ve been playing with Twitter, the “social networking” site that has become so popular.  As I wrote before, I never really got the whole idea, but then I started to look at it from another angle.  If bloggers and nes agencies are “tweeting” links to their stories, or if I come across something interesting, maybe this would be a fit to my style of blogging.

Microblogging is in.

I saw the term “microblogging” used somewhere to describe what Twitter has become for many users.  You link up, or “follow” other users with similar interests and all of the sudden you have a news network better than any RSS feed you could imagine.  Plus, when posting a “Tweet”, you are limited to 140 characters.  That keeps everything small and managable.  If something looks interesting, you click on a link and get the whole story.  If you think your followers would like it too, you can “re-tweet” the message and it goes out to your community.

If you want to see what its about, go over to twitter.com and sign up, then follow me by clicking on the link to the right.

Now, I wonder if there is a way for my “Tweets” to show up here as posts?

Posted by Drew458     on 01/08/2009 at 11:22 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff •  
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   Monday - January 05, 2009

Post of a more personal nature with thanks to PIXIE.

Last week I posted a story about the treatment of a man aged 101, by the hospital he was in.

BMEWS readers all posted comments of outrage or disgust or bewilderment that anything like that was even possible.

Well, our BMEWS Pixie had one heck of a comment to make and she wasn’t pulling any punches.
Her background as a nurse had her all the more angered as it wasn’t the kind of treatment she and her class would ever have put up with.
But what she had to say reminded me of a personal experience I witnessed in a hospital in Riverside, Ca. some years ago.
Here is part of what Pixie had to say.

I am appalled by this story.........I have been a nurse (now retired) for over 40 years.  Never have I witnessed this type of treatment of a patient.  I have worked OR, as a med-surg staff nurse, a supervisor and for the last 20 years of my career in an Emergency Department.

I have never witnessed this type of negligence.

Posted by Pixie under comments

Pixie,
Good for you and I wish there were more with that attitude. 

The story got to me and reminded me a tiny bit (not quite the same but bad enough) of an experience I personally witnessed at a hosp. in Riverside,Ca. some years ago.

I was recovering from back surgery and in pretty awful shape.  Don’t have to tell you about back surgery I know. Every move agony in the hosp. bed.  So .....

I had a two bed room and they wheeled in an elderly man from surgery for prostate cancer and some other thing I can’t recall.  He was in deplorable condition and drugged out of his skull as you will know.  And lots of moaning poor man.

He came to a few times and asked for water (?) but couldn’t reach the or wasn’t aware of the call button, so I used mine.  It was awhile before a nurse came, they are short handed I know, and she took care of his request, but it almost seemed grudgingly. Now I confess that may not be the case, it was just her look.

I had to get out of bed and oh boy was that an effort, (having to hold onto the wall and anything else handy for support) to use the loo as the Brits call it.
As I passed his bed to get there I noticed a US Navy tattoo on his arm, similar to the one my favorite uncle (more like father) had.  It was the USS Chicago, and of course WW2, so this old guy was a Navy vet and from a well known ship as well.  Wow.  When he came to again (he was in and out) I was calling him “sir.”

I’m too damn long winded so here’s what happened.

This guy was wired up with needles and tubes the like of which I never want to see again. He had them in his nose and in his (ah, you know) and and in his hands and heaven only knows where else. He was tossing and turning and I could see the tubes coming out and the straps that had him secured were beginning to come apart.  He was in some pain but he wasn’t totally conscious, and the moaning was pretty much non-stop for long periods. Like ALL night for the first couple of nights. Finally, at some point I was worried that he’d get hurt or something bad would happen with those loose tubes and things, and I also thought the straps would give and he’d fall out of bed.

This was happening around 2am, the ward was quiet and so I used the call button. Nothing.
Waited and it probably seemed longer then it was but truthfully it was a long wait.  Still no response.  What to do? Surprisingly, I didn’t see any side rails on the bed.  Or maybe they didn’t use them as he was strapped down.

With much pain myself as I hadn’t been out of surgery that long myself, I got out of bed and managed to make my way to the door, and peeked out onto the hallway.  I saw nobody at first. Not a soul.  So I’m hanging on to the door frame when I spotted a nurse coming down the hall and I called to her.  She was quite young and when I told her the situation, she informed me that this wasn’t her floor but she’d see what she could do.  I told her I was worried that he’d somehow get the straps holding him down undone and he might fall out of bed.  This was her word for word reply to that.  I have never forgotten it. 

“WE ALL HAVE TO BE RESPONSIBLE FOR OUR OWN ACTIONS.”

This old sailor hadn’t been out of surgery for 24 hours yet. This was the first night of the day he came out of surgery.  OK so, she more or less retied the straps while he’s tossing to and fro and not being at all still, so it wasn’t easy for her I realize. But she could have called for help and didn’t.
Think I’m through?  Nope. Because later that morning once again the straps and the wires and the tubes seemed to be falling out and the straps for certain were now undone, but he was slowly coming to but still in pain.

Hitting the call button yet again brought two nurses (this would be around 8 or 9 in the morning by now) and they started to put things back together.  And this really got to me for sheer ...????
I can’t find the word?  Stupidity is one but that doesn’t work for me as I need something stronger.
Here’s what happened next.

You know those horrid hospital gowns patients have to wear, right. They always seem too short and they usually are.
During all his tossing and moving previously, his hospital gown rode up exposing himself a little.
I watched as he tried to lower the damn thing and cover himself which he finally managed to do.
One of the nurses, an older hag says to him ....  “Thank You Very Much.” And I promise you it was said with a great deal of scorn and sarcasm. As though he were some kind of flasher and he exposed himself on purpose.  Why couldn’t she have pulled his gown down a bit?
What the heck kind of attitude was that?  She’s a nurse for gosh sake.  She’s never seen a nude patient before?

I felt very sorry for this guy and who wouldn’t?

I felt even worse when he finally came around a little more and asked me to get his carry bag in the wall closet. Locker?  Whatever. He said he had a 38 cal. in there and didn’t see the point of things anymore. 
That was scary and heartbreaking. 
That could by ill chance also be any one of us. We just never know for sure what the future holds or just what state our body and minds will be in. 

Until then, we should be thankful and grateful for any nurses out there that might be like Pixie.
Our bad luck that there aren’t more, and that ones as described here are still working in the field.

-end-

Posted by peiper     on 01/05/2009 at 01:09 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • Health-Medicine •  
• Comments (5) • Trackbacks(0)  Permalink •  

   Wednesday - December 31, 2008

THIS IS MY FINAL POST FOR THE OLD YEAR …. HOPE TO SEE YOU ALL BACK NEXT YEAR

SINCERELY WISH EVERYONE A MOST HAPPY AND HEALTHY NEW YEAR.

It’s been fun and rewarding and maddening but always insightful and thought provoking.

Many thanks to all those who’ve remained throughout this past year, and welcome to any new folks on the scene. 

STAY TUNED.

Posted by peiper     on 12/31/2008 at 04:01 PM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff •  
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   Tuesday - December 30, 2008

CAPTIONS, ANYONE?  They just HAD to sign the road this way. Not that anyone pays any attention.

Hey, what’s the speed limit here?

WHY THE HECK CAN’T THE POWERS THAT BE PUT UP ROAD SIGNS THAT PEOPLE CAN SEE?

Posted by peiper     on 12/30/2008 at 04:24 AM   
Filed Under: • Blog Stuff • UK •  
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