I have to save the first spot for what started this who 1541 debarkle off.. the sandwich eating dwarves. Fast food chains have long been accused of using actors with small hands to make their burgers look bigger. That 12″ sub looks to be about two-feet long.

 Next we are in China, where Police officers have come up with an unusual measure to deter speeding drivers – by dressing stone monkey statues in fluorescent jackets.
Clearly not content with the outcomes of speed cameras and sleeping policemen, traffic enforcers have turned to the novel idea of playing dress-up with animal statues.

 Last but certainly not least, and for those who read my blog regularly will know these stories will know and understand my love for cute furry animal stories, and this one will certainly not dissapoint. A cat and a baby deer have become best of friends at the Odessa Zoo, Ukraine.

The moment stopped visitors in their tracks as they passed by the enclosure. As the baby deer rested in the shade during a warm summers day the domestic zoo cat approached. After a quick hello both decided a bit of sleep was in order and the ginger moggy nestled peacefully into the side of the deer.

They say that dogs are a man’s best friends, and who can argue when this clever hound has learned to open her owner’s fridge and pick up a beverage on command. She also fetches creature comforts such as slippers and blankets and can even empty the washing machine.

‘If I come in from work after a hard day and Kalula fetches me a beer, it makes everything seem so much better,’ said owner Nicole Jennings. ‘I attached a tea towel to the handle of the fridge, which Kalula tugs at to open the door.

‘She always closes it behind her, though.’

So take note grotty teenagers of Britain, if your too lazy to help around the house invest in a pooch like Kalula – I cant guarantee they can do your homework though..

Read more: http://www.metro.co.uk/weird/869259-kalula-the-booze-hound-probably-the-best-dog-in-the-world-#ixzz1S4HacQir

Not once in my life have I EVER won anything! Actually, I lie, I won £5 at a horse racing night at my local football club when I was 12.. i was also the bookie - go figure!

So when I saw a tweet from @Transun this morning saying I had won an all inclusive 4 night trip to the Arctic I thought I was dreaming, or someone was pulling my finger!

Well.. they weren’t, I have actually won!  It’s call an “Igloo Interlude” (cue the ooooohs) – From a snowmobile Safari, to a Snowshow expedition and a night in an Igloo, I will finally have a chance to see the northern lights in all its glory.

This does mean I need to reconsider my January wardrobe, maybe its finally time to invest on one of these Lippi Selk’Bag’s!

And it goes without saying that I will be blogging, tweeting and snapping away on my travels to come back in January to see what I get up to!

Unless you have been living in a cave for the last few years, you will all know what social media is and how big a role it is playing not only in our social lives but our business ones too and this is exactly what I am talking about when I say social media – the media to end all things social. Anti-social media we should call it.

As social media continues to grow, details are starting to surface about people’s behaviors and consumption of information in the social space.  Who is really benefiting? Is it improving our social lives or is it just improving the ways in which brands and the media can shove messages down our throats with no escape. Want some facts? Thought you might.

In a recent independent study by Retrevo Gadgetology it was found that over 19% of under 25’s wake up during the night to check their social networks and a further 32% check their social networks as soon as they wake up in the morning. Now that is some serious addiction, and the rest of the stats further demonstrate how addicted to social media our generation really are! (56%: Social media users check Facebook at least once a day for example). If you are reading this on your iPhone in the bathroom you can safely assume you are one of the addictives!

Unfortunately, we now belong to a generation that has embraced quantity over quality. It’s all about how many followers, friends, likes, members and shares we have but how many of those people can you actually call your friend? In a world where we spend the majority of our time tweeting, messaging, emailing, blogging and BBMing, there is little left over to actually say when confronted with a real-time encounter with a friend – they have already read, watched or seen where you have been, who you been talking to and what you have been up to.

Wall-e Fat People

So what am I really getting at? The scene above from a recent Pixar film, Wall-E, is what I am getting at. The death of the old-fashioned world as we know it, those interactive acts that are in danger of becoming almost obsolete: the face-to-face, one-on-one relationship.  As children we were warned against the dangers of talking to strangers and yet in the new world of micro blogging and social profiles we now openly have conversations and give away our personal lives willy nilly for no other reason than the fact we think we are being more social.

The sad fact is that we are not. There is a fine line between using social media to help improve our real social lives and social media taking over our real lives, where on the line do you sit?

I am by no means saying social media is bad, that would be silly thing to say and after all it is my job! All I am saying is have a think about how you are using your social networks in your personal life. Is it replacing your face-to-face relationships is it helping to build them?

Feel free to let me know your thoughts

yellow-green ibycus rachelae

]]> http://www.joesblogg.com/2010/04/ninja-slug-fires-love-darts-at-mates/feed/ 0 http://www.joesblogg.com/2010/03/dianebirch-valentino/ http://www.joesblogg.com/2010/03/dianebirch-valentino/#comments Thu, 18 Mar 2010 09:28:15 +0000 admin http://www.joesblogg.com/?p=248 Music has always been a love of mine, even though I never seem to talk about it you can always find me on iTunes and other music website looking for new talent to listen to. My recent “daydream to work” play-lists have consisted of Ingrid Michaelson, Tristan Prettyman, Brooke Fraser & Amy Macdonald to name but a few. So I was delighted to find a tweet on Twitter this morning by Katy Beale linking to an article listing 10 New women in music worth checking out in which a found the delightful voice of Diane Burch. I am yet to listen to the rest of the album but this happy-go-lucky song called Valentino has got me hooked. Hope you enjoy it as much as I did

//EDIT – And here is another recommendation (thanks again @katybeale) check out the wonderful Alela Diane