Amanda Knox - what about the boyfriend?

I've been reading and watching all the coverage in the media about the release of Amanda Knox following her appeal. It's been front page news in all the papers and lead item on the news.  What I find so fascinating is that there is almost no mention of her former boyfriend other than to state that he was also released along with her.  Even during the trial she was dubbed "Foxy Knoxy" and almost all of the coverage was about her. I strongly suspect that if you took a poll of the general public, 99% of people wouldn't even be able to name the boyfriend - Rafffaele Sollecito ( I admit I had to look it up) but most of them would know her name.  It's not just the press but I've noticed that in phone ins on TV and radio and also in comments on various forums and websites the comments are all about her and the general view is that "she got away with it".  Now I don't know if she is truly innocent or not because I, along with everyone else apart from the police investigating the case, don't know- I only know what the media have told us about this case and we all know that their main interest in any story is whether it will help them sell more papers/get more viewers and so of course they sensationalise anything they pick up on - a lot of which is probably not true and gathered from various"sources" who may or may not be reliable or unbiased.   Rafffaele Sollecito seems to have slipped quietly off home (although I suppose the Italian media may focus on him more) whilst Amanda Knox has the worlds media hot on her heels.  Supposing that she is innocent she undoubtedly now finds herself in a no win situation - the press simply won't let her just go back to her life and will continue to hound her until she gives up her story and then of course everyone will say that she is profiting from murder. Some people say that she is the focus of all the attention because she is an attractive woman which is a rather depressing indicment of our society - or is it just sexism?

 I do feel desperately sad for the family of Meredith Kercher who, having thought that their daughters killers had been brought to justice, had probably started to put their lives back together (as much as they ever will be able to) and now find themselves thrust back into the full glare of this media circus. They at least seem to have conducted themselves with extraordinary fortitude.

Suddenly I'm attractive!

Unfortunately only to some wasps!  I haven't been stung by a bee or a wasp or anything else since I was about 6 or 7 years old and yet suddenly they seem to be attacking me like there's no tommorrow.  Last Sunday morning I was out walking Izzy and Ella at around 6.30 am and as I was strolling along the side of a field when a wasp like insect flew straight into my face in quite a frenzied manner and stung me just below the left eye - it took me quite a while to get it off me.  I'm not sure what type of wasp it was - not the usual stripey sort - smaller than a standard wasp and a pale gold colour.  Within minutes I could feel my face swelling and by the time I got back to the car about 40 minutes later and looked in the mirror it had swollen and taken on a bruised appearance making me look like someone had punched me in the eye - in fact my husband was worried that people would think he'd done it!!  On Tuesday morning I was walking through the woods when another one attacked me but this time I managed to fight it off before it could sting me. Finally this morning I was walking in another place and noticed something yellow on Izzy which I went to brush off and it was another one which stung me on the hand!!  I suppose I should count myself lucky that I'm not allergic to them but I have to say I'm beginning to feel a bit paranoid!  Anyone got a bee keepers helmet I can borrow?!

Wind Turbines - what's the problem?

I just don't understand all the fuss about wind turbines - now I'm certainly not claiming that they are the most attractive things in the world but people seem to get in a right state about the prospect of one being put up in or near their area.  One of the farmers near to our house was going to have a few installed - they would have been up on the hill but behind a line of very tall trees - so they'd have been hardly visible unless you actually went onto his land to get a close look and they would certainly have looked no worse than the massive line of electricity pylons and accompanying trails of wiring which already stretch across the skyline and which in my humble opinion are a lot uglier.  The farmer received all sorts of hate mail including death threats and in the end decided not to go ahead because it wasn't worth all the hassle.  I reckon there are lots of things which we have grown to accept as part of everyday life which are pretty unattractive - TV aerials and masts, satellite dishes etc - and people don't complain about these.  I wonder if anyone made so much fuss when these things were first introduced - I certainly don't remember it .  I'm also pretty sure that if they became more popular someone would soon come up with something a little more attractive to look at and which wasn't bright white so that it would blend into the background a bit more.

All creatures great and small

Last night we had a positive infestation of Daddy Longlegs in the house - they were everywhere.  Dive bombing me in the kitchen when I was trying to get supper ready and one even tried to get in the bath with me! When I got into bed there were about 12 of them in the room but seeing as they are pretty harmless I decided to leave them be since they were mostly just dangling from the ceiling and we didn't have the energy to try and get them out.  Ella and Izzy (our dogs) decided to help by catching and eating any that swooped in low!   Once the lights were off all I could hear was a buzzy fluttery sound coming from around the room - not overly condusive to a good nights sleep!  I did eventually nod off only to be woken with a start just before 4.00am by a very weird screeching noise which went on for about ten minutes and caused both Izzy and Ella to jump up to the window to investigate (yes I'm afraid they do sleep in the bedroom!).  I suspect it may have been a fox possibly having a go at next doors cat "Bosley" because when I got up to have a look myself the PIR outside light next door had come on indicating that he had made a run for it back home and in through the catflap.  Poor old Bosley doesn't have much luck - there's a massive wild ginger tom cat who calls round on many an evening during the summer to pick a fight with him - we're often awoken by the growling and snarling which signals the start of these fights and then will find huge chunks of cat fur in the garden the next morning - his owners tell me he even had to go to the vets the other week to have a claw removed from his head.  Given that the ginger tom is so much bigger than Bosley I can't help worrying about him, particulary since he's getting on a bit now, and usually get up and shout out of the window to try to scare them off but it doesn't often work.  Once all the fuss had died down I finally managed to drop off again only to be awoken at just after 6.00am by a lorry going down to the farm - it wouldn't wake me if they drove straight past but they sit outside the window with the engine running whilst they struggle with the combination lock on the gate (necessitated by the fact that 3 tractors were stolen from the farm in the dead of night last year).  At this point I gave up and got up to take the girls for their morning walk. And they say life is quiet in the country - I think I'll have to keep the windows shut tonight!

No Holiday for us - times are hard!

Just been speaking to my sister who is off to Turkey on her holidays today and I'll admit to feeling somewhat envious - particularly since Autumn seems to have arrived in the Cotwolds already and it's a particularly grey day here!  A week in the sun would be just the job.  Unfortunately money is tight in our household and we can't afford a holiday this year along with the accompanying cost of getting someone to look after the dogs - which frankly costs almost as much as the holiday itself.  I couldn't bear to put them in kennels so we usually get a pet sitter to come and stay in the house with them but this doesn't come cheap.

I've come to the conclusion that we must be old fashioned because we could of course pay for a holiday on a credit card as so many people seem to but w'ere not comfortable doing that.  I'd be worrying about how I was going to pay it back  - I think I'm lucky in that I didn't grow up in a time where people were happy to get into and live with huge debts as so many people seem to be now.  If  I can't afford it I don't have it!

For a lot of people it all starts with going to uni or college and then leaving with huge debts which will take them years to pay off - it's seen as the norm now.  The more debt you have the more emails and letters you seem to get from banks and other financial institutions offering you even more credit that you won't be able to pay off in your lifetime. We seem to have created a new breed of people who not only spend, spend ,spend but borrow, borrow, borrow to do it!  I have a friend who has huge debts and even though she has a good job she'll never pay them off - and yet every time I see her she has some new shoes or item of clothing that she doesn't really need! Madness.

Looking for a Job - it's a full time occupation

I've been job hunting on the internet and what a nightmare.  I chose to use the internet because it is free and I had hoped would be more efficient saving me money on phone calls and petrol - how wrong was I!  I'm after either a part-time job, or something that I can do from home as I have 2 young dogs and can't leave them shut in the house for too long - I reckon about 4 hours a day - maybe a bit longer if I could split the hours I worked into 2 separate periods and pop home to walk the dogs in between.  I therefore need to find a job locally because the time that I'm out of the house will need to include any travel time to and from work and also I have to think of the cost of petrol when getting to a job - I live in the countryside and there is no public transport at all so I'd have to drive and may also need to consider the cost of parking. I've spent the last 20 or so years working full time as an HR Manager/Consultant  but have been looking for general admin roles as it's much more likely that I will find something local and part-time in that area.  However, whilst there a few things I definitely don't want to do - like selling and cold calling - I'm pretty open to trying something new or different too - if it fits in with my criteria. 

So to start searching - first I thought I'd see what opportunities there are for people to work from home - what a minfield - mostly all you get is people trying to sell you some mystery package which they promise will make you a fortune for just a couple of hours work a week - I firmly believe that if these things sound too good to be true they probably are so have given these a wide berth!

Next I thought I'd look for a part-time local job - this has been incredibly frustrating - firstly searching takes you to hundreds of online recruitment agency websites whose sole aim seems to be to get you to provide them with all your details before you can even look at the jobs.  When you do get to look at the list of vacancies you gererally just get the vaguest of details about the job and there are no details such as who the company is,where the job is based (beyond the county) and what the hours are and how much flexibility there is over when you can work them.  Apparently all this is a secret!  Many of the jobs clearly don't exist but are just used as a "carrot" to get you to sign up with an agency. This means you can waste hours of your time applying for a job that may not exist in the first place, is in a location which is impractical for you and with hours that were never going to work for you!  Why waste my time and theirs?  I've come to the conclusion that many of these home-working and recruitment websites are there just to get all your details so they can sell them on. 

So then I decided to go the more direct route and search for jobs on the individual websites of local companies - it takes a little time to find out what companies there are locally (and I'm surprised how many of them don't have websites or don't have any info on them about jobs)  but at least I know that they're in a suitable location.  However, when you do go to the websites even these are unclear on the hours - most just say "part-time" - with no details of whether this is flexible or not - so you can waste more time and money ringing them to ask what flexibility there might be and often they tell you to just apply and discuss the hours if successful.  Surely it is in their own interests to be clear about these things from the outset if they want to find the right person for their vacancy?
So here I am still no sign of a job with a phone bill the size of the National Debt!

Brain past it's use by date?

In the papers, on the radio and TV they've all been banging on about all the confusion over sell-by dates and use buy dates on food and now the government want to introduce a new system to reduce food waste. I dread to think how much money the various goverment departments involved have wasted to come up with this theory.  I just don't get it - firstly can people not use their sense of smell and their eyes to tell when food is off?  I often buy stuff from the reduced section in supermarkets but only if it looks a healthy colour (some of the meat is starting to turn a green colour and I'd never buy that).  You often see food that's well within it's date but which looks decidedly iffy and I certainly don't buy that either. The dates aren't  reliable anyway- I often find  things like pre-packed salad and vegetables and cole slaw go off well before their supposed use by date and other things are fine long past the date.  Surely it's just a matter of using your common sense.  Secondly I just don't believe that food waste is down to sell by dates - it's simply because people buy too much food in the first place and fail to plan meals properly - you only have to go into a supermarket in the run up to Christmas/Easter or any other bank holiday to see people loading up their trolleys with incredible amounts of food as if the shops are never going to open again!  Far too many people are tempted into buying things that are on offer or are "buy one get one free" - even when they probably know that they are unlikely to use it and can't freeze it.  It's simple really just buy what you need and can use!