Dumpling in a Hanky

Apparently, that's some of the scent "notes" to be detected in the distinctive smell of "old books". For me, old books are those manky things that it's almost guaranteed I'll need to copy/carry a big pile of, almost always when I'm wearing a white top. Orange/brown smudges from when they lean against you is maybe not the most professional of looks... There's even a test been developed to help determine damage to older books, based on their distinctive smell. From that article, I've now learned that books made between 1850 and 1990 are more likely to deteriorate quickly due to the level of acidity in the paper. However, I've also learned from experience that law books, whenever they were made, in the hands of eager solicitors may deteriorate faster than you would have believed possible too. Hello detached-chucks-of-books! Of course, if you object to the old book smell, the Hive Mind of the Internet has a few tips for getting rid of ...

So, there's a new website to "Find a fitty" , the irresistible person you may have spotted working at a desk, or strolling through the shelving in your university library? That's pretty...innovative. Ahhhhh, s'all different from my day *gazes off into middle distance* Back then, in the olden days of the 1990s, nobody had a laptop, we had pens, paper and temperamental photocopiers. It's hard to look attractive while furtively swearing at a machine that's copied a sheet of pure inky black for the 5th time, despite all the settings being fine, a trick usually reserved for when you only having enough credit for 5 copies on your copier card and need to be in a lecture in 5 minutes. And of course you didn't want to attract the wrath of the librarians, so all frustrations had to be expressed in a whisper. Or a note on the back of the miscopied page, filled with swear words. All of this may lead to a red face, dishevelment and generally high levels of irritati...

So, the imminent death of Bebo has been announced. I say death, as it seems unlikely anyone will want to buy an ailing social networking website in an English-speaking market dominated by Facebook . I was on Bebo. For a while. Then I remembered that I hate people who talk in txt spk (vowels are there to be used, in my world), and witter mindlessly about drinking, and clubbing, and shopping. I grew out of that long ago, but it seems to be the main reason for Bebo's continued existence. Being on it feels like a teenage contest of who was more drunk / spent more money / plastered more makeup on / fell over more. Hence me deleting my account some time ago (along with my MySpace one). And I'm retreating from Facebook more too: the effort to hide the endless updates from games that people are playing is annoying; I don't need it to suggest friends for me, or patronisingly tell me to help other people find friends; I don't want to play games endlessly - I work; I don't ne...

Dear HTC, I love my Hero phonemibob, I do. I took a giant leap forward into the world of technology when I got it. A phone, that could go on the interweb? Amazing. But a few weeks ago I noticed something: the end of the charger that plugs into the phone has wires showing, as you can see in the pic. I tend to think that tools that need electricity to flow into them will work best when that electricity doesn't go elsewhere en route, like into me, via those exposed wires. And with time, those wires are only going to get more exposed. So, I did something crazy. I emailed your customer support, asking about replacing this obviously defective cable. I did it here . This is definitely an email contact form, right? I did everything the form asked, attached the photo, took apart my phone and filled in the product S/N. And then I waited. I waited for an acknowledgement of my email. Nothing. So I waited for a response to my email, someone to say how you were going to go about getting the cab...