Otto

otto-the-snowfan thinks rain..or big mushy sleety drops that fall like bird droppings...

my DNA forensic property marking kit arrived yesterday. i am in love with it.

looking like snow...and overnight snow rather than rain. 1.3degrees at heathrow at this very moment.... otto-the-snowfan

It might look fairly harmless - rainy and sleety for a while during the day - getting in does not look like a problem but when and if the temp drops sometime between 12noon and 3pm it might bucket snow down heavily just in time for your journey home....

impossible that it will be like monday as it will not snow for as long of a period and it is starting out with rain...mondays snow began sunday eve... but it still could make getting home from work difficult...

The met office just issued a 60% severe weather warning for london. rain to sleet, then to heavy snow. of course, it might just stay sleet or rain. hence the 60% chance. the BBC gets its info from the met office...the met office provides a bit more detail and gives odds on it happening.

Hi - re: tomorrow -- The day will start rainy as per usual according to the met office, but, turn to heavy snow sometime between 12noon and 3pm...keep yourself updated on the morning weather at the met office site where you can enter your postcode, or, have a work from home day lest you get stuck with no train... otto the friendly snow-fan

Ah...save the lovely french salt... My campaign is drawing to a close... It is going to Rain Rain Rain tomorrow to appease the anti-shovelers...

Eileen is right. Let's go back to the good old days...

Three cheers to Bellenden Jo!!! Twas fun, wasn't it? Like the good old days...

hurrah! hurrah! our whole side of the street is now almost clear. shoveling is a catchy sport...or, this side of the street is home reading the EDF....

My fantastic senior neighbor has caught the wave and is out there right now...shovel in hand... shovel shovel shovel...lovely sound. a bit of something gritty (perhaps the interesting cat litter suggestion?) on top will make it just perfect...

As an aside though I do not want to drift off topic, it is exactly the opposite in America. One can be sued for not clearing a pavement if someone is injured. But, most people clear the pavement after a snow because it is the sensible thing to do, rather than out of fear of litigation. It is done as good neighborliness. But all that aside, let's go, shovel in hand, out there...and conquer it!

Let's go for common sense, civic enthusiasm and goodwill. Never mind the council, never mind the courts, let's get out there and make a difference! Scrape, scrape, scrape...let's hear those shovels!

People Power - Just do it! We can...we can...just do it all by ourselves! I just poured a 57p. big thing of table salt outside this morning and the pleasures of the snap crackle pop noises were well worth the 57p... C'mon - Group Effort!!! Help yourselves, help your neighbors, help the elderly! Go Go GO...Snap Crackle Pop....

With the weather set to stay fairly cold, how about if people salt/grit or clear the pavements in front of their houses/flats? I hope to shovel a bunch out of the way this evening as the sun is shining, the temp is rising, and it will be a good time to break up the ice...with all the old and young and less steady walking down my road it might be helpful... c,mon group effort...let's go! otto

by the way, i am dead serious. xo, otto

Perhaps there should be a place on the survey to write how bizarre it is that there is an advertisement for a funeral director on the appointment card I was handed today.... !, otto

Hi - Yet again (3rd time) my credit card has been "compromised" as phrased by the bank. Keep an eye out... The new card was NOT used at that grocery on ll It was placed in the HSBC cash machine... xo, otto

another answer to my complaint... Thank you for your email. I appreciate your point about receiving phone calls during working hours. We are trying to arrange for telephone consultations before and after work, as well as Saturdays. We are restricted to an extent by the PCT 'Local Enhanced Service' agreement which stipulates that before 8am and after 630pm we cannot offer telephone consultations. We have explained to the PCT that this is too restrictive to some patients. I hope that we will shortly be able to expand the timing as a result of this. Regarding your description of the service before telephone consultations, I am afraid that your experiences were not shared by the vast majority of patients; waiting times to see doctors and nurses were between one and two weeks (emergencies, were, of course, seen on the same day regardless). We had considerable discontentment amoungst patients about this situation. Southwark PCT had long since been trying to persuade us to embrace telephone consulting to improve the speed and convenience of the service. We were sceptical until we received a letter from the Department of Health (sent to all UK practices) advocating the use of telephone consultations and illustrating case studies of its positive effect on patients. We followed this advice and - whilst it is not perfect - we have found it to be far better than the previous model of care. We have found that only 50% of patients who contact the surgery actually need a face to face appointment (many need simply to pick up a prescription, for example), and as a result, waiting times to be seen have improved hugely. The previous model allowed any patient to book an appointment directly with a doctor, however inappropriate, which caused a considerable backlog in waiting times. Patients who need to be seen on the same day are always seen, and through the new system waiting times have decreased from 1-2 weeks to 48 hours. Most patients have found this to be a big improvement. However, I recognise your concern and I will do my utmost to expand the times of telephone consulting. I you have any further concerns please do let me know Best wishes Adam

Well - I did not say anything about competency - my complaint was about the procedure for securing an appointment which is a pretty difficult process for anyone and particularly if you are a working parent with two kids in school...best, susan

Hi - I wrote to one of the links above and just received this answer....it looks like a standard response, but, if they have to keep sending the same standard response perhaps we'll get somewhere re: this... melbourne grove used to be great and it is a pity they have changed the way appointments are handled. see below...xo. otto Thank you for your email. I am sorry to hear of the problems you are experiencing with Melbourne Grove Surgery. Under the NHS Complaints Procedure, Southwark Primary Care Trust has no remit to directly investigate complaints against family practitioners. All practices have an in-house complaints procedure to enable patients to raise concerns about their provision of services. With your agreement, therefore, I would be happy to forward a copy of your complaint to Adam Hurd, the practice's designated Complaints Administrator and request that he investigates the issues you have raised and replies to you directly. Once we have passed your complaint to the practice, we will continue to monitor the progress of your case. You can also contact us at any time for advice or if you are unhappy with the outcome of the practice's investigation. If you prefer, I could ask him to contact you by telephone or email to discuss your concerns informally. You could also contact the Patient Advice and Liason Service (PALS) who can taken up your concerns with the practice on your behalf. Their number is 0800 58 77 170. A link to the service is attached: http://www.southwarkpct.nhs.uk/patient_information/patient_advice/ I look forward to hearing from you with confirmation of how you would like to proceed. Daniel Marshall Complaints Manager Southwark PCT and Adult Social Care Ground Floor Woodmill Building Neckinger London SE16 3QN

Little coffee van...are you not under similar rules as an ice cream van? in which case, parking on bowen road at the end near dcps school in the morning would likely be very very popular and profitable... otto

from the bbc...old article.... ...article cut - here is the technology lowdown....xo, otto "But yes there are still problems that still exist though it is getting safer." These, Mr Tabeling told the BBC, tend to centre around a retailer not doing a good enough job securing its network. "If the proper encryption is configured on the wireless access point, then an attacker will not be able to get any information. I would have to bet in this case that didn't happen." At stake for victims of fraud is more than just money The authorities said the details of the 40 million credit and debit card holders was obtained by the hackers "wardriving" past stores to find wireless networks they could hack into. This entailed driving around using a hand-held device to detect a wireless signal much in the same way a radio scanner hunts for a signal. The US justice department said the hackers then loaded "sniffer" software onto the retailers' networks which captured numbers as well as passwords and account information as it moved through the retailers credit and debit processing networks. That information was then sent to servers that the group controlled in Eastern Europe and the United States. The justice department said the stolen numbers were "cashed out" by encoding card numbers on the magnetic strips of blank cards and then used to withdraw tens of thousands of dollars from ATMs.

thanks loz - yes - i always cover my pin - to the point i mistype it sometimes...my first card was cloned and used without a pin in the states and the second card....unsure - but - i think mine was not harvested visually as i always always keep a cover on it... best, otto