For fucks sake

Well to blog or not to blog, hard decision

Before I start can I just state I am not looking for sympathy in any way, more needing a place to do a big, big mental scream.

So where to start, well I guess an apology to some people around me, friends and nearest and dearest may have picked up on the fact that I am more than a little bit cranky, the last week or so, I never mean to be, cranky or snappy or snide but it seems that is where for me, worry manifests.

Ok start at the beginning two weeks ago, ( right slap bang in the middle of getting some bad news about a family member) routine shower like we all do, not that exciting until you run your hand over yourself and find a lump, instinct is"what the fuck is that", keep checking, keep checking, keep checking, get out the shower and say to hubby..... nothing.

Spend the next two weeks ignoring any worries and keep going back and checking and checking, maybe it has gone away, right? 

All the time feeling sick to the stomach on one hand and carrying on as normal on the other, only you don't, you get cranky you snap, you feel tired, stressed 

So you make a decision ask hubby if he can feel anything, he is gonna tell you nah your imagining it, right? wrong, he felt it and insisted that you go to a doctor straight away.

Ok, ok calm down, I will go to the doctor and she will say "ahh yes a normal part of the breast nothing to worry about my dear..."

Went to the doctor yesterday and she has a feel which in itself is no fun, only to be told yes there is a lump, we need to get you scanned and a biopsy as soon as possible, is there any family history etc etc, well yes there is my mom died of cancer at exactly this time last year.

Oh right I see, to which she said I can't tell you anything which will make you feel better, only that we must get it checked and work from there.

Cue me going home, bursting into tears at the realness of it, dog barking, kids wondering what on earth is going on, to which I obviously lied and made up some story about Mummy having a headache or something equally lame.

Now I know, that there can be many, many reasons for a lump in the breast, a cyst a fatty deposit, etc etc and breast cancer.

 I am shit scared

Commenting issues

So you may have noticed we have reverted back to a template, something similiar to what we used to have here on Forninepounds.

Let me explain why.

Over the past few months comments have been a serious problem on the blog with people commenting and as soon as they hit the submit button their comment disappears into thin air never to be seen again. This is a very serious issue and one which hopefully by reverting some things back will fix please bear with me over the next day or so until I resolve the issue!

Twitter and Me!

God I remember this place, but my time has over the past while been taken up with decking and organising a tweetup, but on Tuesday night I was invited out by @niallharbison to EnoWines and La Cuvee for a fantastic meal and wine tasting and drinking of course, but with a good few people around the table, many of whom I had never met, twitter came up in conversation, and it was then I saw just how in love with it I am.

Twitter and I have had our ups and downs, when Twitter treats me bad I feel angry but when Twitter works I adore it.

I used to talk about blogging like everyone in the worlds lives depended on it, well Twitter was devised to be a way of, as the creators, Biz Stone and Ev put it, a way to have a miniblog.

Well now Twitter has become my blog. People know much more about me from the past 2 years then they have learnt over the past 5 years on my blog. Are blogs dead, are they a thing of the past? I dunno but I am starting to ask the question in a big way now!

Another amazing thing about Twitter is the amount of people I have met through it, I would not have been invited by Niall last Tuesday were it not for Twitter, I would not have ended up with 19 other photographers been treated by royalty at Mondellopark for a huge Event they held were it not for Twitter, I would not be heading along with maybe 60 other strangers to London on the 14th of November for a tweetup were it not for Twitter and most importantly this blog would not be alive now were it not for Twitter.

My phone now has double the amount of phone numbers in it now due to Twitter, I have Advertising agencies wanting to listen to me talk about Twitter, I have made a little bit of money using Twitter are you catching my drift, Twitter is a huge thing.

But all good things obviously have bad sides too, there are a lot of evil sorts out there spamming their filth to one and all on Twitter, one person in particular I revealed to a lot of people last week is conning her way through Hawaii, and in my opinion praying on some people on Twitter. What will she gain I dunno but it is horrible to see. Then of course Twitter is glitchy, servers slow down, DM's go missing and mental stability of its users get frayed.

One of the latest trends I have noticed on Twitter are the peddlers of misinformation, the people who signed up 6 months ago to twitter and claim to know the secrets behind Twitter, I consider this to be total and utter bullshit, as Twitter themselves dont know where its going, twitter is constantly evolving. An example of these sorts spouting shit was told to me by 3 clients of mine, all from different companies but with advertising as a background.

2 weeks ago I had one of these clients come in to me in work and start telling me what an eejit I was going on since 2007 about Twitter, its a load of shite. You should cop on Shanachie blah blah.

This caught me by suprise since I knew this client in particular had never used Twitter, so what the hell would he know!!!

Well it transpires, he knew all about Twitter because himself and about 30 others went a twitter conference for business and these gurus were there telling them all about twitter. Every single person who paid for that conference left saying they would never ever touch Twitter or ask their clients to use twitter!!! I had to know who else was there!

I know of the gurus that held the talk and I am appauled, the organiser of the conference should have coped on at an early stage that these were not the people for the job, thing is one of these speakers will talk again tomorrow to a huge crowd hopefully the crowd will have the common sense to walk out! Fortunately I did find out who the other 2 clients were and all 3 have now, after a speech of 1 hour from me, for FREE might I add, signed up to Twitter and have seen the positives from it.

So to all you Gurus out there please fuck off, Twitter believe it or not, actually worked better when you guys had never heard about it, go sell your goods somewhere else.

Quick update and apology to those who attempted to comment on this in the past few days and have had their comments deleted I am testing some things and apologise for it.

Les Feuilles Mortes (Autumn leaves )

My favourite time of the year is about to come to the U.K.  I love the Autumn (or fall as they say in the USA)

The colours are spectacular, I love the sound of children's feet kicking up leaves, I love the bite in the air while going for a walk.

But mostly I love the cool dark nights after a day of watery sun, I sleep like someone who has not slept for months.... which is what I am