Lord of Leisure

This week, after surfing the internet and doing random things the you simply do when you have lots on your plate to do, the housework, learning for exams, not writing the podcast, going to gym etc and you really don’t want to do them, I stumbled onto this news story :

Nintendo fires Worker for Blogging

It was a rather interesting tale of how someone who worked for a major corporation contracting as a recruiter lost her job after the bosses at Nintendo found her personal blog, which she described that a bonus of working with someone there gave her a great excuse to drink heavily.

It appears that blogging was not banned but it was not encouraged. The writing of the woman in question was not work appropriate. And this story got me thinking.

I have been writing this blog over a year now and in that time I have been writing while in the employ of two big I.T. outsourcing players. The type of things written on this portal to the inner Hughes have been one of where relationships have gone wrong, where I have cried foul at people and situations. Where I meander in and out through the thread of my existence on the planet Earth and basically write here as a method of expression and in all honesty now, a way of extending my writing skills so in perhaps in future I maybe able to pursue this.

After all, who would pass up the chance to write about this life we all find ourselves in, about the little things which we all take for granted. Though I suppose if you are paid by the word you are going to have to be pretty damned talented to stretch out a story about picking your nose.

For instance you would have to be able to describe the whole contents of the said nose, for all of us there are unknown dangers and hair. The danger is that the green menace will rear it’s ugly juicy head whenever you sneeze and it so happens to be in front of your friends and they never let you forget it either. Or it could be the really bad ones that get stuck on your hairs and then at some point you just have to go in there, like on the beaches of Normandy and rid yourself of the snotty Reich. Just without the help of Tom Hanks.

But I am getting off the point again! Wow, I never do that do I? Oooh, some cheese……

(5 minutes later)

The whole point of this post is to wonder what would happen if the bigwigs at the firm where I work now were to come on here, take a look at what I had been writing all this time and decided it would bring the company into disrepute.

Would I lose the job I worked hard on over things which occurred outside the work premises? It would then mean that I anything that I say or do would be subject to the work’s practises. I know of course, if I were to get arrested then my employment would look in bad shape, of course it would. But things which are said in the public realm outside of work surely would come under free speech.

Remember what I said about Norwich Union a little while ago, and I had the response from one of the “Blog Change Agents” to try and sort it all out. If they were really wanting to destroy the bad publicity, they could have sued for slander, granted the facts of what has happened so far would have saved me because of the length of time it has taken for the whole car business to be settled, but not without costing me a fortune and therefore more than likely succeeding in taking down this web site.

If companies like Norwich Union have people employed as “Blog Change Agents” you makes you wonder as to the power of such sites. Are we getting to the point where people blogs have the ability to bring down companies? Well being honest no.

The definition of a blog is for lack of a better description, an online diary, kept by all sorts of people in all walks just talking about whatever they want. But not everyone is famous from writing a blog, over taking the various “jor-narly-lists” and “bigwigs” we have these days. Have you ever bumped into someone who wrote a blog and therefore could walk into a very expensive restaurant and have a table ready for him/her in seconds because of that?

If you have you are a effing lier! so NUH!

And back to the blog issue, here we would have to determine the line where the freedom of speech stops and company policy starts. This would not only be on this blog but on most written material out there.

And because I am one of the little people and not seen as powerful and able to wield that power on the public to sway them against anyone, they can quite easily put a stop to anything if they want to. What the woman did in this case was bad-mouth her co-workers but the problem I have is that people do that all the time, but they do it sneakily behind others and I would think that blogs are an extension of the “WaterCooler” moments we all have these days.

If I were working in America, frankly I don’t think I would be able to write this. I would only write about fluffy kittens and balls of yarn (oh what fun they are 🙂 ) and therefore wouldn’t annoy anyone.

But I don’t. I live in the UK, a place where it seems for the moment, I am allowed to write what I like and therefore can really get things off my chest. Because if I didn’t have this, you would wonder how else the annoyance would manifest itself?

I wouldn’t be so motivated to write half as much and this little thing has brought out the creative troll that lives under my bridge, he nicked the keyboard, first tried to play solitaire just using his elbows and then started making words appear on this big screen thing I’m sat in front of.

Of course the other side of the fence is:

Is it acceptable? Remember just because things are written in cyberspace doesn’t mean they won’t effect anyone. It’s like saying in front of your sister, to someone near you “My sister, she likes like a cross between Sloth from the Goonies and some afterbirth.” It’s just not cricket, you see. Granted it can be funny but as always you will find someone that is hurt by your remarks. I know from past experience that it can be the case and I have hurt people on the way while writing these very pages.

Though I must point out on the record that for one person I did it for a cheap laugh and it worked, so no regrets there! 🙂 Just as in real life you should say things in an appropriate time and place, so too the same rules apply out here, because at the other side of the screen is another human (or gorilla) reading what you have written and passing judgement on that. You never know, someone in the workplace may just want to have a word with you. Beware good people, your words are seen by more than you know.

Cool ain’t it?

The problem with everything is everything has a problem with it in the first place.

Quite a profound sentence there isn’t it? This could lead onto some discovery about the shape of things to come for human society and the ultimate truth of no matter what people do to create working products, they will flawed due to the flawed nature of all living beings.

We could also remark on the futility of existence in the fact that we will follow the same program, we are born, we mate with the others, have kids, we die and decompose into nothing, they go on having kids etc and that is the whole point of life. Life is designed so that everything was created for the purpose of impressing the opposite sex into bed therefore keeping the cycle going.

But the blog isn’t that type of thing! 🙂

LOL!! I’m sorry but I couldn’t help myself. It was just something you expect from educated (or those who read something off the internet) people over dinner parties where it gets to the point of the evening where a bit too much wine has had and this kind of drivel is spilled out all over the place just like the gravy served with the rice pudding. Everyone agrees and goes home and think what a load of b******ks.

This place is meant to be light hearted, a refuge from the harsh world we live in, where we forget the things which matter and read about all the rubbish of what I do, and people can come away safe in the knowledge that their life is better. Well I am paid by the government to do this, it’s part of feeling that Britain isn’t that bad.

And on that bombshell It’s time to start the lesson!

I achieved something which most people can only dream of today. It was the peak of human achievement and my legacy shall be passed on through the ages. I went to the gym.

Stop laughing.

You see I had joined the great number of people who have a gym membership but the last time they used it was 1987 at the time there was no real internet. This was always a thing to say to people, that you went to the gym, and say look I have a membership card and everything.

Though it always looks like the person saying it is one pork pie away from needing help from Noel Edmunds at Christmas to be airlifted to Hospital. But after a disturbing view of my stomach, aided by watching Run, Fatboy, Run! I decided to actually use it. And it only confirmed what I already knew. I have the heart of a 90-year old and it’s been given the last rights.

And I know it will only get worse, because as we all know when we get older, our body gives up and says you’re fat, deal with it. And actually that does mean this gives rise to the entire fighting fat empire where we are promised the earth and a body which could even win over Jessica Biel or some attractive man (maybe even me! that’s for the ladies out there!) and we have plenty of self help books by Paul Mckenna to aid you lose weight, gain confidence and now he can even make you rich!

WOW! What sane person would actually buy this only be disappointed at the lack of results?

That’ll be me then!

We have weight supplements, guides, dieticians, books, magazines, CDs, DVDs, herbs, sports shops, experts, celebrities, food councils, slogans, promises, all relating to the ideal person you are meant to be. But surely it all comes down to will power, the fact that the end of the day it comes down to the type of person you are and whether or not you have the will to do something about it.

You can try all sorts, but in the end it is all about what you do. Now having said this award winning piece of advice of which surely I could win a luxury weekend in a spa from the Take-a-break magazine, when it comes down to it I generally am very lazy and would be more than happy sitting in front of the computer watching TV and playing games.

That would be my lot in life if I were left to my own devices and there was nothing else. But the problem is, there is something else. I want to be able to move about without issue into my late life. I want to actually think that some women out there could find me worthy of allowing into their inner sanctum. All this relates to my health and the sad fact is if I don’t do things about the general state of my health, it only gets worse for me.

There are things which would motivate me yet my nature of being the Lord of Leisure is at odds with this notion. Add to the fact that too much exercise for the frame of body different people have, can cause the very problems later in life you would face without exercising. Rock. Hard place.

Well hell, I will try and do something about it again. But with the track record so far of 5 days in the week that I start out doing the right thing then it all goes wrong and I end up eating lots of s**t feeling better for 30 seconds.

Now you could get into the whole arena of eating because I am depressed and therefore the whole comfort eating thing comes into play. I guess that’s true and it has become a habit. Maybe the best thing for me to do is to locked away in a health farm for 4 weeks and then I really have no choice. Mind you the best choice for me is just to be locked up. mmm, padded walls are my friend.

And not only that, after the Gym today, Dave came around from North Wales wanting to see my PC (no, for those at the back that is not a euphemism) he is getting a uber beast of a machine for all the good stuff like the gaming things that we geeks get addicted to. I introduced the thrill of the show Californication to him and he loved it, by the way, that show is coming to Channel 5 next month. Please please look out for it.

It was a refreshing change and being honest it’s good to have friends around the place. One day I hope to have a proper place where people can actually come around whenever and it wouldn’t be a problem. Then again I hope to own the Playboy Palace one day and well life makes a fool of us all!

That is all. Go forth good campers and enjoy the fruits of other people’s labour. BYE!!!!