i got a new job!!!

as of Monday, August 7, i will no longer be in the employ of my father's accounting firm, but rather in the employ of PrintProd, Inc, a custom tag maker. i'll be customer service/admin, taking orders from customers and typesetting their information onto tags for print. i'm excited to be moving into a paying position in a field i want to be in. i've been doing typesetting and graphic design for a while now with hubby's company, but as an unpaid intern (and loving every second of it -- i'd much rather do what i want to do all day for nothing than be paid for doing something i hate). a wage increase and the possibility of medical benefits round out the goodness of the new position.

Scientists at the North Pole have completed research confirming the shock news that making up an advent calendar "as you go along" can be tricky.

Their findings suggest that trying to randomly produce some christmassy image for every day of December, without really thinking things through properly in the first place, is likely to end in disaster. "People looking first thing in the morning might just see a big number where the picture should be", said one boffin, "or perhaps a cat in fairy lights".

Father Christmas is said to be looking into the issue further, and has not yet confirmed whether the makers of rubbish advent calendars will be going on the naughty list this year.

As if laughing directly in the face of this thread, and our subsequent campaign to return the Marathon bar to its rightful place, Nestle have announced that they are to inflict yet more cultural confectionary vandalism on the British public, by abandoning the 68 year old design of the Smarties Tube.

In place of the iconic Smarties cylinder, and much loved plastic cap, is to come a tatty six-sided cardboard carton with its own integral cardboard lid. Gone will be the days of the empty tube being used to fire the plastic cap across the room with a well placed karate chop; gone too will be the collectable caps with their letters of the alphabet hidden underneath.

This is just another of many sacrilegious acts by Nestle since their cruel takeover of Rowntrees in 1988, including the axing of Toffo* and the death of Kit Kat's silver foil. More here.

* Well I haven't seen any for a while, anyway...

Scarily prolific pub chain Wetherspoons looks set to put a no-smoking policy in force in all of its 650 gin mills, by May next year. The move goes far beyond the Government's half-hearted attempt to ban smoking, which only applies to pubs serving food, and won't come into force until 2008.

Strangely I used to think that a completely non-smoking pub was a bad idea - but now I'm quite looking forward to it. More here.

As if being the only shop in the world that sell shirts I like wasn’t enough, Marks and Spencer have once again proved themselves to be man’s best friend by inventing the Man Crèche, where weary women can dump their annoying other halves to play playstation and watch telly while they get on and shop.

Bored men, who have traditionally eschewed the many opportunities to look at shoes and fluffy things generally favoured by their female co-shoppers, will surely welcome this move by the high street chain. Wimmin too are likely to enjoy shopping for frocks or whatever it is they buy, safe in the knowledge that their menfolk are off watching the footie, but not so far away that they can’t help carry the bags to the car later.

I look forward to the rapid introduction of the Man Crèche to other destinations, such as supermarkets, libraries, and the homes of distant in-laws.

So you get an email from a Nigerian businessman, offering millions of dollars for a minimum outlay. Being a scam-artist yourself, you can spot a con a mile away. So naturally, you cough up $250,000 of your own savings and wait for the cash to roll in!

But wait, due to the temporary cashflow difficulties of your new Nigerian benefactor, you need another half a million just to tide things over. No problem, just scam your friends! What could go wrong, after all you've seen the big fat cheque that's coming your way- because the Nigerians faxed it to you..

Unfortunately for Carl Fratzke, it seems some people just can't be trusted. What's a hard working con-artist to do?

Meet Bobo the Bear in the Boinng Shop.

Also new in the aisles, a surprisingly cool Baseball Jersey with helpful instructions on Perspex handling, and an attractive Boinng Clock with a reminder of the imminent death of us all.

Yes, it's true, the shift over is starting and this little piece of information is to let you all know that *anything* you post from now until the new site is up will be lost.

I received an email notifying me of the termination of my account yesterday, on a trumped up charge of leaving my connection unattended. Forgive me if I go make a cup of tea in the half hour it takes to connect in the first place, but I'm not sure that counts..

Let me stress this for anyone who isn't entirely sure by now. Tell your friends. Tell everybody.

BT SUCK SATAN'S ASS FROM HELL.

I'll be Freeserve from the 26th then..

Mercy, but BT have finally decided to bring down the pricing of their broadband ADSL service to home users, by reducing their charge to ISPs- from £25 to £14.75 (per month). There are hopes that this will mean ADSL for the masses, at prices similar to Cable- around £25, as opposed to the £40 most are paying now, although the maths behind that prediction escapes me for the moment.