Residents in a South Wales village say their peace has now been shattered by delivery lorries.

A Tesco One Stop shop opened a year ago on Sully’s South Road bringing, claim its neighbours:

An increase in shoppers seeking bargains …

Oh no! An army of David Dickinson wannabees! This is all that Sully needs after it’s cannabis factory was closed down.

I realised that I made a decision some time ago to change the name of the comment post script, wp-comments-post.php to something that the spam-bots could not get their hands on so easily and install a captcha.

When I removed this captcha system in favour of a hash based JS plugin I completely forgot that I had set all requests for wp-comments-post.php to redirect to Google, so, after deleting the file and re-uploading it a couple of times, checking out the database and the form I finally got a lightbulb above my head and remembered the redirect. Duh.

So, you can all go ahead and start commenting again. That means you, Dan.

ps. InsideCardiff.com is making a comeback.

Pin-up Abi may be eyeing up a Welsh property

FORMER pin-up Abi Titmuss has revealed she may buy property in South Wales.

Speaking at a book signing in Cardiff last night, the 32-year-old former girlfriend of ex-This Morning presenter John Leslie, told of her love for the Welsh capital.

Her only previous visit to the capital was a celebrity appearance at a nightclub.

The ex-glamour model said: “It’s really nice to see it in the daytime and I’m going to have a look round the Bay later.

“I’ve got family in Bristol so you never know, one day maybe I would like to have a place here. It’s beautiful.”

- Pin-up Abi may be eyeing up a Welsh property (WalesOnline)

So, not only are we supposed to be excited because it’s some woman who is only famous because she released a sex tape of her and a boring morning television presenter, but also to believe that, in her own words “you never know, one day maybe I would like to have a place here”, her move is a certainty.

Hell, you never know, one day maybe I would like to own a Ferrari. I wonder if I sent them that quote they would publish an article about me?

I particularly like the line “Speaking at a book signing … (she) told of her love for the Welsh capital”, quickly followed by “Her only previous visit to the capital was … at a nightclub” and “It’s really nice to see it in the daytime”.

Wow, what undying devotion she must have to our little town, on her second visit.

I never miss a post and get kind of excited when my Google Reader has a number other than (0) next to his feed.

I recommend the site to all of my friends and my habits in restaurants have morphed, undeniably because of him. Now whenever I eat out I tip 20% minimum. Some call me crazy, but after being let into the world of the service industry, it makes a lot of sense to look after your server, especially if you intend to be a repeat customer.

The blogger that I am talking about is of course The Waiter, of Waiter Rant fame.
His style of writing is unlike any other blog that I have ever read. Others have tried to imitate, but none have succeed in winning over the hearts and minds of the dining public quite like ‘The Waiter’.

It will be odd knowing him as ‘Steve Dublanica‘ and also having seen his picture, but as long as his writing style doesn’t change, I will continue to be an avid reader.

His unmasking comes now that his first book, ‘Waiter Rant. Thanks for the tip - Confessions of a cynical waiter‘ (or Waiter Rant - Behind the scene of eating out, as it is known here in the UK) is released in the US.

I got my copy today, a full 8 days before the official release date in Britain, the 7th of August.
I pre-ordered from Waterstones a few weeks ago and was surprised to receive an email this week telling me that it was available to pick up from the store. Obviously a boo-boo made somewhere, but, I am the proud owner of this paperback wonder.

[43 Folders] Hack your way out of writers block.

I am, however, reading a lot more than usual.
Plus, the shared links that you see on the right sidebar are updated mutiple times daily with favourite reads, keep an eye on those, there are some real gems quite often, I only share the best.

Wish me luck.

There have been calls from the usual backbench suspects - who clearly have very little to do outside of election year other than to stand up in the house and make absurd suggestions - to consider laws that could never possibly be implemented. Not without severe repercussions on freedom of speech and monstrous infringements of civil liberties.

For a government to inhibit the circulation of the theory of practices that are not punishable by law, but rather frowned upon by society, would make the position of countless other publications, unrelated to suicide, untenable. This would of course be across all mediums; print, online, television, radio. In essence, to prevent access by force, as is being suggested, to websites that glorify or ‘normalise’ suicide, would open the flood gates to all those who feel the desire to complain about anything that aggrieves them in the media.

As an example, citation of this proposed act could have been used in the case of The Christian Faith vs. Jerry Springer The Opera. The BBC received 55,000 written complaints when it was due to be aired on the BBC2 channel in 2005. Would this have been enough public outcry to warrant invoking this act, leaving us instead doomed to ‘Allo ‘Allo repeats (which itself could be censored if enough French people claimed racism) on that Saturday night?

Legislation is no substitute for treatment or prevention. If there was enough attention focused on mental health treatment, which there is not, then perhaps there should be no need to consider absurd censorship such as this.

In my county, Cardiff, there is currently a six month waiting list to see a councelor courtesy of the National Health Service. This has been same since at least 2001. I can tell you this from personal experience. If a person seeks help from their GP citing issues of mental health, they are first and foremost offered anti-depressant drugs and then asked if they would like to be added to the waiting list to see a specialist for counseling. For some people half a year is too long, but have no other choice. Private counseling is an an option that is not always viable, for a multitude of reasons.

It takes a lot of courage for somebody experiencing mental turmoil to turn to somebody for help and for them to be dealt with in such a manner when they do, even more so with the state of mind that they are in at that time, can be horribly detrimental to their health.

In the wake of the Bridgend crisis the UK government should take this opportunity to improve the mental health services available to these vulnerable persons who feel the need to visit ‘pro-suicide’ websites, before it’s too late.

“Camilla?”

As part of an advertising campaign by ASDA earlier this year, statistics from the independent grocery shopping website mySupermarket.com were used to prove that ASDA were cheaper than Tesco on hundreds of items, despite an identical television campaign by Tesco claiming the same about them compared to ASDA just a few months prior. In fact, the Tesco price checker is still online and claiming to have 2274 items cheaper than ASDA, so, with two of the major players sending conflicting messages, who actually is the cheapest supermarket to shop from?

According to mySupermarket comparisons, when shopping like for like, ASDA is the cheapest of the 4 supermarkets (Tesco, ASDA, Sainsburys & Ocado (Waitrose)). This is probably the fairest comparison to use, as when taking into likening ’similar’ items (ie. own brands), there can be big differences, in size and weight or in quality which make the matches inequitable.

I had never considered using another supermarket, I was stuck well in there with Tesco, believing that they were the best value, plus of course their service wasn’t too bad, but then after some bad experiences (three failures to show, in fact), I made the decision to investigate alternatives, which is where mySupermarket came into the frame.

When shopping initially signing up with the website, you have the ability to import your favourite items (items you have bought before) from Tesco.com, you then choose from these and it will fill your trolley, all the while keeping a running comparison total from other supermarkets. If you are choosing own brand items, it will choose comparable own brand items. As you can see in the above graphic, my shop at ASDA will save me a cool £40 over my usual choice. This is a grocery shop for a single person for about three weeks, so the savings could potentially be much higher if you are shopping for a family.

Low prices aren’t the only thing to think about when making your grocery choices, because of course, if your driver regularly turns up with items missing, broken or just doesn’t turn up at all, wasted time, effort and eventually the need to go out and buy products elsewhere could completely negate the point of shopping around in the first place.

In summary, using this website could save you a small fortune, but do choose your supplier carefully, I have not used Sainsbury’s or Ocado, but I did switch to ASDA for my February shop and was quite pleased. With only a few missing items, which the difference was quickly refunded to my card, I shall be using them again this month. I don’t feel the need to rush back to Tesco.com any time soon. Being the biggest doesn’t necessarily make them the best.