Category archive: uncategorized

I've just received the vest from the charity I'm running the Great
South Run for. Blimey it's pink. I love it.

More info, and the possibility to donate and sponsor me if you wish,
at http://www.justgiving.com/lucabelletti

Watching the x factor live show with friends. They have pinned this on
the front door. I think it is meant to be ironic.

1. In 1994 the Estonian Royalist Party offered Prince Edward the (non-existent) position of King of Estonia.
2. Actor Stephen Moyer (vampire Bill Compton in True Blood) is British. Essex boy, actually (not that you'd guess it from his Southern US drawl in the series). Oh, and he turns forty tomorrow.
3. Caffeine is a bug killer.
4. David Bowie's Loving the Alien is a 'vivid depiction of Bowie's famous dislike for organized religion'. Pretty obvious from the lyrics I guess, but I think the last time I listened to it I did not speak English.
5. You cannot create a Gmail label named 'todo' – possibly because it's a reserved internal name.
6. Jonas Altberg (Basshunter) has been diagnosed with Tourette's syndrome. Hear him talk about it at BBC Chartblog.
7. More than half of all Argentines are descended from Italian immigrants.

Image via Wikipedia

I woke up in the middle of the night because I was laying on something hard – my mouth guard, which I had manage to remove while sleeping (no small feat). But let's go back a bit.

A couple of years ago my dentist referred me to a periodontologist i.e. a gum (and other tooth-supporting structures) specialist. When I found out his address (just off very expensive Harley Street) I shivered, then after enquiring how much my treatment would cost, I nearly fainted.

I failed to find cheaper alternatives, so I submitted myself to (look away now if sensitive to yuckiness) regular scraping of the deep pockets inside my gums (a result of two decades of heavy smoking and fizzy drinks), and learned how to maintain them clean at home.

I was also given a custom-made protective guard to wear around my upper teeth at night, to keep them in place and prevent damage caused by grinding.

When I went for a checkup a few months after finishing my treatment, I was told that there had been visible progress. Well, you'd think he'd say that after what I paid him, but I must say I am indeed pleased. Nobody noticed, but this improvement means that I will hopefully be able to bite into an apple with my own teeth for another few years.

So now all I need is to pay alternate visits to my regular hygienist and the periodontologist's hygienist every three months to keep everything in order.

Although… There is something he mentioned, and I have been thinking about it for several months now: because of gum disease, my front teeth have grown apart, and it could be possible to rectify this with orthodontic care. Which basically means I might be wearing braces at the tender age of 42.

So you lot, stop smoking now, kick the diet coke habit, see a dentist regularly and brush your teeth. I was not so careful and I am (literally) paying now.

To avoid staring out of the window at the grey and wet October day.

Sent from my iPhone

http://juliasegal.tumblr.com/post/202090219

Via juliasegal.tumblr.com (via zee.posterous.com)

1. There are two Madonna songs entitled 'Forbidden Love' – one in Confessions on a Dancefloor (2005), another in Bedtime Stories (1994). Found in my own iTunes library.
2. Popping corn is not dried sweetcorn, but a particular variety (Zea mays var. everta) that pops when heated (not all do).
3. Actor Ralph Fiennes' first name is pronounced 'rafe'. Heard on a Film24 promo voiced by my mate Mike.
4. The word Vigorish ('The Vig' – the amount charged by a bookmaker) is Yiddish slang originating from the Russian word for winnings, vyigrysh.
5. More than half the babies born now in wealthy countries will live past 100.
6. The Muppets' Mah Na Mah Na was originally composed by Piero Umiliani for the Italian movie 'Svezia, inferno e paradiso'. Posted on an old schoolmate's Facebook wall.
7. Firefox can be easily tweaked to earch Google from the Address Bar à la Chrome.

I'm running Firefox 3.5.3 and every time I start a new browser session Twitter asks me to log on. Not only that, I am also required to type my username every time, regardless of having checked the 'remember me' option.

I don't think I am doing anything wrong, and I have not enabled the 'Clear history when Firefox closes'. Any ideas?

Memo.m4a (1562 KB)

Since the release of Halo 3: ODST last week Stuart has been playing on
the Xbox every night, and this is what it sounds like.

I know, content duplication, I hate it too but…

I use Twitter because it's pushed through to my phone and I love the @, RT and # syntax.

However, I get many more comments on Facebook (that's where most of my friends are), and some of the comments are very useful when I ask questions or need advice.

After recently swapping usernames (from @bitful to @lucabelletti), I did not think to reset the Facebook Twitter app, which is username-based. I only found out when I noticed that nobody commented on my FB status any longer – because it had not been updated in over a month.

They are now in sync again. World harmony is restored.

1. You can get pregnant while pregnant.
2. A Mac ad an iPhone an create their own wireless network.
3. Naked mole rats never get cancer.
4. Røyksopp means puffball mushroom in Norwegian.
5. Feeds can be translated and read in a different language in Google Reader.
6. Scatman John stuttered.
7. The title of Steinbeck's novella Of Mice and Men is taken from the poem To a Mouse by Robert Burns.

When I was little, this album cover was one of the scariest things in the house.

Someone mentioned Uriah Heep the other day, the name rang a bell, I googled it and there it was.

Shudder.

I love it when they swap advertising but leave old layered posters on in between campaigns.

Or maybe it's a new campaign made to look old. I had just got to the platform, the train was coming in and I did not have time to check, will do tomorrow.

1. Sarah-Jane Woodhall was nicknamed Trinny by family friend Frank Lauder – the director of the St Trinians films – when she was five-years-old. He dubbed her ‘Trinny’ when she was sent home from school for cutting off another girl’s plait.
2. Eurovision Song Contest organisers may ban countries if broadcasters reveal voters' identities, after people in Azerbaijan were questioned by police after voting for neighbouring Armenia. Azerbaijan and Armenia fought over disputed land in the 1990s.
3. Livestock are responsible for nearly a fifth of all greenhouse emissions. We should eat more plants. Meat-free Monday anyone?
4. Sportswear brands Adidas and Puma were founded by feuding brothers.
5. Australian swimmer Ian Thorpe has put on weight.
6. We have enough body fat to sustain about 40 marathons.
7. Media files in Windows 7 taskbar thumbnails have a toolbar that allows you to play/pause and skip to next and forward items in a playlist.

I had a great time, danced for a whole hour in Trafalgar Square, and briefly caught up with the lovely Mike after his stint on the plinth.

Remember the line diet I started at the beginning of the month? It is not going so well. The idea that each day I could eat anything I wanted except if my weight was above a certain digit (in which case I would only eat broccoli) did not work out. I would either eat too much and then too little and I do not enjoy the extremes.

So it's back to eating slightly less and exercising slightly more, because it might be boring and slow but I know it works. I'm allowing myself 2000 calories per day, divided into six equal meals of low glycemic load eaten at three-hour intervals. It sounds clinical, but I have been doing it for a few days and I can assure you that it's yummy. It's based on musclehack.com GLAD diet, but I've reduced the number of calories to turn it from a muscle-building to a fat-busting regime. It is 1000 calories per day less than what I need to maintain my current weight, and it is expected to produce a weight loss of two pounds per week (each pound of fat corresponding to 3500 calories).

My long-term objective is to be a healthy, steady weigh constantlyt, and to help me achieve that I am trying to eat normally, but less. I know I can diet and lose weight fast, but it comes back faster and faster as I grow old. This is why on Sunday I had some fizzy wine at a friend – but turned down cake. Then I had Stuart's mammoth roast dinner – but only half, and ate the other half the following evening, followed by a Wispa Gold limited edition that I had instead of my late night planned meal, so that the daily total would still be under 2000 calories.

Yesterday's dinner wasn't exactly clean eating, but I'm back on track today.

It's got to work.

Sunday dinner. Could only have half, so I finished it last night. Made it last twice as long, for twice the pleasure!

On Sunday morning I tied an electronic chip on my running shoes, pinned my race number on my running top and headed to Regent's Park to take part in the Bupa Great Capital Run.

Runners were divided into England, Australia and Rest of the world teams, and all runners who completed the race in under forty minutes contributed to their team's average time. I'm sure I registered as England but ended up being in the Rest of the World team. Just as well, as we were second and Australia won.

Until last week I was not even too sure I could take part, as carrying two extra stone makes running a pain: it's like wading through treacle, and my joints feel like they are jammed with grit. But I trained moderately, took it easy and only did one full 5k run last week, just to reassure myself that I could still do it.

I had a fantastic time, the atmosphere was great, there was even a group warmup that brought me back to my aerobics and step-filled 90s (audio file attached, no idea where Posterous is going to place it, but you should be able to play it here).

I ended up being at the front for the start (and saw the dozen or so elite athletes start off in front of me). Which of course meant that for most of the race I was constantly overtaken by hundreds of people, but I kept going.

I did a very good personal time of 26:20, better than the first 5k I did when I took up running two years ago, but a little slower than the last 5k I ran in 2008.

There are a few pictures on the run site, but rights are reserved (the photos are for sale), so if you want to check my stats and see me pant you can enter my race number (1223) at http://raceresults.greatrun.org/?race=128.

My next race is going to be a real challenge for me, as it's a longer distance (10 miles). So training starts today for the Bupa Great South Run in Portsmouth on 25 October.

  
Download now or listen on posterous

20090913 093712.m4a (4252 KB)

1. In Google Reader, 'v' is the keyboard shortcut to jump to the website an item comes from (i.e. 'view original').
2. You can extend a disposable razor's life with a pair of jeans.
3. In Firefox, 'Ctrl-F-Enter' highlights all instances of the string you are searching for. In Chrome, 'Ctrl-F' already highlights them all, and then you can toggle from instance to instance using Enter.
4. Many airlines allow the use a GPS-enabled device on their flights.
5. Double tapping with three fingers on the display of an iPhone 3GS turns on zoomed mode. Double tapping with three fingers again zooms back out.
6. In the sixties, the UK briefly considered switching to driving on the right-hand side. It would have cost '£264m – about £3.4bn today. But that would now be seen as a ridiculously conservative estimate.'
7. When you hold and shake a window in Windows 7, all other windows are minimised. Shake again to restore them back. Also, AERO is a backronym for 'Authentic, Energetic, Reflective and Open'.

Alan Turing was a brilliant mathematician and computer pioneer, widely known because of his outstanding contribution on breaking the German Enigma codes during World War 2.

In 1952 he was convicted of 'gross indecency' after admitting a sexual relationship with a man, and chemically castrated. He committed suicide in prison.

Three weeks ago, the first action I performed with my newly acquired rights as a British citizen was to sign the petition asking the UK government to apologise for Turing's prosecution.

As a gay man, IT professional and British citizen I accept Gordon Brown's apology and I remain as ever proud of my country.

I had noticed the little arrows scribbled on the mattress a long time ago but never asked why. After all, I've got my own quirks so who am I to judge.
 
Then Stuart recently told me that there are four arrows, two on each side of the mattress, at opposite corners, one ponting up and one pointing sideways. And that every time I change the sheets I was meant to turn the mattress in the direction of the arrow at the foot of the bed, so that in the long run both sides and both surfaces of the mattress get used evenly.
 
Like I was going to guess that by myself.

Sent from my iPhone

From 7 Reasons to Eat More Saturated Fat, Tim Ferriss' a review of Dr. Eades' forthcoming book, which is directed at people who want to reduce abdominal fat and suggests that eating saturated fat has the following benefits:

1. Improved cardiovascular risk factors
2. Stronger bones
3. Improved liver health
4. Healthy lungs
5. Healthy brain
6. Proper nerve signaling
7. Strong immune system

I am coming round to this argument lately, and now cannot stop finding evidence for it. All those years with a low-fat diet might have been a waste of time after all (and I have got the midriff spread to prove it).

Three mallets. Three surprisingly small holes. Three empty-handed thieves on the run.

1. The distance between your eyes is one tenth the length of your arm, and this can help you estimate distances.
2. My (old) computer keyboard at work has a Scroll Lock key. I had to look it up to find out that 'Today, this particular use of scroll lock is rare'.
3. People on morphine still feel the pain, but are 'less troubled by it than they would be without the drug'. Found out while reading about the possibility of genetically engineered pain-free animals, so that they would not suffer because of factory farming. Er, improve their living conditions instead? But don't get me started on that – it's the only instance where I am happy to pay more for food.
4. Anna Wintour has had her hair in her trademark pageboy bob since the age of 14.
5. About 10,000 children were sent to Australia from British orphanages and institutions from the 1930s to 1967, many without their parents knowing.
6. The British comedy drama 'Jam & Jerusalem' airs in the US as Clatterford (from the name of the fictional West Country location where it takes place).
7. Paddington bear has an evil twin called Euston. You can follow Euston on Twitter. That's how you can find out that he is how he is because of 'growing up with a smug, t-total, non swearing, non-drug taking marmalade freak who has a fetish for wellington boots'.