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?