Given that 2005 is now all but wrapped up, I thought it would be good to go back and look at why it is that 2005 has been the most amazing year yet for sjhoward.co.uk. 

In 2004, the site generated 238,122 hits.  That’s quite a lot for a little site like mine.  In 2005, I’ve been blown away by 1,200,000 hits – the exact figures aren’t yet in at the time of writing, but that’s very nearly one million more hits than last year.  That is truly incredible.  Since January, the average daily number of hits has more than tripled. 

Of course, this popularity boom comes with inherent difficulties.  In the early part of the year, the site was plagued by Internal Server Errors as my host struggled to keep up with the sudden explosion in site traffic.  Over the course of the year, however, B-One have become used to the traffic level, and so Internal Server Errors have almost become a thing of the past.

This year has also been an incredibly prolific one, with 640 posts filed, and special sections set up for coverage of the devastating tsunami of 2004, and the political excitement of this year’s General Election, not to mention being asked to write for Channel 4 News.  The amount written, though, only reflects the amount that’s happened this year – it’s been incredibly busy, with news events covering the broadest possible spectrum of emotion.

On another subject entirely, I’ve conducted several experiments with advertising on the site this year, one of which is still ongoing.  I’m happy to report that, for the first time, the site has generated enough money to cover costs during 2005, and that’s something about which we can all be glad, as it will continue to allow me to innovate and introduce new features to the site.

On the subject of new features… at the beginning of 2005, there was only one way to access the site – visiting it at sjhoward.co.uk using a standard web browser.  Now, there are many more ways of getting your fix:  You can get us on your mobile, on your mp3 player, and in your email inbox to name just three, in addition to the traditional browsing method.

On the technical side, I started the year with Blogger and finished it with WordPress, following the ‘big move’ in January.  And some exciting news:  As of today, the site is running on the all-new WordPress 2.0. This should make the site faster and more reliable, and certainly does give me more to play with, in a more intuitive way, backstage.

Finally, I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all of my visitors, readers, advertisers, and others, for your support during 2005.  With you, it’s been a great year for the site, but without you, the site is nothing.  Thank you so much for your continuing support.

From the MEN:

A NURSE who began preparing a “dead” patient for the undertakers when she was sitting up in bed alive and well has been thrown out of the profession.

A colleague pointed out she had got the wrong person, and Lelis said: “Oh yes. I got mixed up.”

The committee found that the “mistake” did not amount to misconduct, but they ruled that she should be struck off for making a series of other errors which did.

Those included carrying out a test for the killer bug MRSA – by swabbing the wrong part of a woman’s body.

She also put another patient on an oxygen because his nostrils were flared, although there was nothing wrong with his breathing.

The committee also heard how Lelis forgot to give a patient his medication – but then wrote up that she had the day after. She was caught out when she said she had given him a 150mg tablet, although they were only in 50mg doses.

Lelis was cleared of trying to offer a woman Paracetamol two hours after taking Co-Proxamol pills, which would have left the patient at risk of having a Paracetamol overdose.

That’s bad enough, but just read the comments from other nurses:

Staff in the NHS are rushed so much to meet targets etc and by patients to be seen to, there is bound to be mistakes!

Mistakes? A patient who is ‘sitting up alive and well’ being prepared for the undertakers is not a mistake many people would make however rushed they are to meet targets.

What a shame that aperson honest enough to own up to her mistakes has been judged so harshly by her own so called compassionate profession.

Honest enough to write up tablets she hadn’t given?

Everyone makes mistakes. Just because the mistakes of those in healthcare professions tend to have bigger consequences should not necessarily mean they are judged more harshly. We should forgive honest errors; but there is a line between mistakes and downright incompetence and dishonesty. If this press report is as it first appears (which may very well not be the case), then it seems that this nurse crossed that line.

If this doesn’t scare you, nothing will…

Skirt-chasing playboy Daniel Anceneaux spent weeks talking with a sensual woman on the Internet before arranging a romantic rendezvous at a remote beach — and discovering that his on-line sweetie of six months was his own mother!

“I walked out on that dark beach thinking I was going to hook up with the girl of my dreams,” the rattled bachelor later admitted. “And there she was, wearing white shorts and a pink tank top, just like she’d said she would.

“But when I got close, she turned around — and we both got the shock of our lives. I mean, I didn’t know what to say. All I could think was, ‘Oh my God! it’s Mama!’ “

And it gets worse…

…a patrolman passed by and cited them for visiting a restricted beach after dark…

Read the whole thing. And be afraid. Be very afraid.

I wish all my readers a wonderful and very merry Christmas today.

To celebrate this wonderful Christmas season, here’s Chudleigh the dog. Have you ever seen anything more pointless?

The number puzzles Sudoku, first brought to Britain by The Times earlier this year, spawned something of a craze. A craze I covered in some detail. So it feels right to do some kind of six-months-on follow-up.

As well as the old Sudoku, though, a whole new raft of puzzle variations have arrived. The Daily Mail’s innovations are Sudoku X, which also includes diagonals, and Super Sudoku X, which includes a whole other set of boxes. The Mail’s efforts sadly seem to make the puzzle somewhat easier, but more protracted in actually solving it. That is, the puzzle is no more challenging, it just takes longer. The Times has experimented with several formats, including Alphadoku (exactly the same as Sudoku but with letters), Samurai Sudoku (which has five interlocking grids), Dodeka Sudoku (which is the usual but on a 12×12 grid), Superior Sudoku (which I don’t really understand why is different), and – most recently and prolifically – Killer Sudoku. This involves a normal Sudoku grid, but with the addition of small korals of letters bordered by a dotted line, with the total given for that group of letters. In this way, no numbers (or very few) are given initially, and the player has to find them all. Personally, whilst I find Killer Sudokus quite enjoyable, the challenge is essentially the same for the most part, and you simply have to factor in a single additional variable. Still, they’re worth a try.

More enjoyable in my opinion, though, is the completely different puzzle of Kakuro, which first appeared when the Guardian relaunched. In this puzzle, the player is presented with a the total for a given run of numbers, and must slot them into a grid. It has some similarities to Sudoku, and is even more similar to Killer Sudoku, but moves away from the basic Sudoku logic, to give a completely different puzzle. It’s clearly, therefore, more satisfying to attempt the paper’s Sudoku and its Kakuro, because it doesn’t feel like you’re doing the same thing twice. Kakuro is also now published in the Daily Mail, but once again, to me, The Guardian’s seem superior, with a definite process, whereas the Mail’s just seem random.

Neither The Mail nor The Guardian have seen fit to publish Kakuro on their website, but there are plenty of Kakuro websites about, including this, this, and this.

With the introduction and marketing of other Sudoku products (witness the DVD, electronic and board games, not to mention the ever-increasing plethora of books – links to the best of which appear on the right), the Sudoku craze shows no sign of slowing down. Susie Dent has even made Sudoku the Word of the Year. Which might be taking things a bit far.

Either way, I just hope that everyone stays addicted to the country’s leading number puzzles. Because if they don’t, then the papers might stop printing them… and whatever will I do then? 😉

John Spencer, the man who brought The West Wing’s Leo McGarry to life, died of a heart attack yesterday, aged 58. He would have been 59 on Tuesday.

For me, Spencer was Leo, the loyal Chief of Staff and Democratic VP nomination. The Associated Press notes that, in a sad parallel to life, McGarry also suffered a heart attack that forced him to give up his White House job as chief of staff. Like McGarry, Spencer was also a recovering alcoholic and – as he himself admitted – workaholic.

To Richard Schiff, who played Toby Ziegler, he was “one of those rare combinations of divinely gifted and incredibly generous. There are very few personal treasures that you put in your knapsack to carry with you for the rest of your life, and he’s one of those.”

Aaron Sorkin, who created the series, and Tommy Schlammem, one of the original executive producers, commented in a joint statement: “John was an uncommonly good man, an exceptional role model and a brilliant actor. We feel privileged to have known him and worked with him. He’ll be missed and remembered every day by his many, many friends.”

Actress Allison Janney, C.J. Cregg on the series, described Spencer as a consummate professional actor. “Everyone adored him,” she said.

“We have all lost a dear, dear brother,” said Bradley Whitford, who plays Josh Lyman.

MSNBC have a fairly lengthy tribute to their colleague, though it seems somewhat tasteless that they have already begun to speculate as to how this will affect The West Wing as a TV series. I’m certain that more full obituaries of Spencer’s life will be written by the British media as the news filters through tomorrow, as Spencer was such a well-loved, Emmy-award winning actor.

For such a talented actor and all-round good person to died at such a relatively young age is tragic, and my thoughts are with his friends, family, and colleagues. He will be very sadly missed.

Requiescat in pace

When it’s a Mandle Candle, apparently.

This is one of the most hilariously awful products I’ve seen in ages. Not only is it truly hideous, the advert and website are terrible. Witness the sheer pleasure on the woman’s face at the beginning of the TV ad (on the site, or – amazingly – national TV), and note that it can “delight and entertain you for hours” (you’d have to be pretty damn bored) or “set the tone of an evening” (if you’re going for the cheap look).

Notice too that the headline 0n the site announces it’s “perfect for conversations”…
“I really think we need to talk”
“Okay, let’s light the Mandle Candle”

I haven’t seen anything so laugh-out-loud funny in a very long time.

This is something I considered blogging about a couple of months ago, but I wanted to see where it went and whether it took off before leaping in there.

There is a new scheme known as the Pipeline Card, which is free to sign up for, and promises to reduce the cost of petrol. The idea is that if enough people sign up and agree to buy their petrol at one chain, it will be possible to negotiate a discount with that chain for Pipeline members.

I first found out about this scheme when it was mentioned on Times Online, and it actually seems to be taking off, with the organisers saying that they should be ready to launch the scheme officially in Spring 2006. It’s completely free to register for updates and for your card, which will obviously be issued once the scheme is running, and over 50,000 people have done so thus far. Since you’re not committing yourself to anything, nor providing payment information and the like, even if the scheme doesn’t take off, you’ve not lost anything. And if it does, you’ll be getting discounted petrol next year. You really have nothing to lose!

I’ve signed up – why don’t you?

This site allows you to see pictures of models before and after they’ve been retouched – click on an image, and roll your mouse over to see the before picture. Some of them have changed beyond all recognition – shocking!

The ITV News Channel is to be axed. It’ll disappear from screens in January. But with its viewing figures, the question really is: Will anybody notice? Probably not, but it hardly says much for ITV’s commitment to news.