'Sunday Girl' Phillipa Alexander has a Sunday baby - and a hit song from Mail on Sunday Ad (includes free mp3 download)

  
Download now or listen on posterous

sundaygirl.mp3 (8324 KB)

She was an unknown session artist until she left thousands transfixed
by singing Blondie’s Sunday Girl on television adverts for The Mail on
Sunday’s You magazine last week.

Now Phillipa Alexander is celebrating the success of the song with a
Sunday Girl of her own.

Phillipa recorded the track for the advert just days before giving
birth to her daughter Priya. And, appropriately, the little girl came
into the world on a Sunday.

‘The song is ­obviously nothing to do with mother­hood, but to have
given birth to my own Sunday girl and to have sung it while she was
still inside me feels like a special and very sweet coincidence,’ said
Phillipa.

Her song is used on a series of adverts whose theme is ‘You time’ –
the precious moment of the day when readers retreat with their
magazine.

The Mail on Sunday was inundated with requests to know who the singer
is – and is now making the complete track available as a free
download.

The musical arrangement to Sunday Girl was masterminded by M&C Saatchi
agency composer Alex Ball. Although not a household name, Phillipa,
38, has impersonated ­singers from Nina Simone to Billie Holiday and
provided voiceover performances for clients including Levi’s, Lynx and
L’Oreal.

‘I am a huge fan of Blondie,’ said Phillipa. ‘Heart Of Glass is my
fav­ourite Blondie song.’

Phillipa moved from Shoreham-by-Sea, West Sussex, to America when she
was seven after her father Colin got an engineering job in San Diego.

Her creative ambitions were encouraged by her mother, Wendy, an artist
and illustrator.

Phillipa enjoyed success as a session singer before moving back to
Brighton with her family at 21. There she met her husband, music
producer Sanj Sen, 35, in 1999.

He suggested a career doing voice­overs for advertisements, and seven
years ago she joined Calypso voice­over agency.

As well as her singing and voice­over work, Phillipa runs a successful
songwriting business, Chicks With Hits, with friend Ellie Wyatt. Their
songs have been heard on hit U.S. shows such as Grey’s Anatomy and
Desperate Housewives, and they are currently trying to secure a record
deal for their latest artist, Larissa Eddie, and her band, Eddie.

But Phillipa’s priority now lies with her gorgeous baby girl.

‘Holding her for the first time was the most incredible experience,’
she said. ‘Priya is adorable, although running my own businesses at
the same time is tough. I am constantly juggling. I am hoping she will
teach me to relax more.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1305022/Sunday-Girl-Sunday-baby--hi...

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exclusive: premiere of new kathryn williams video

Kathryn Williams releases ‘Just A Feeling’, the second single from her critically acclaimed seventh album The Quickening, on Monday and One Little Indian have been kind enough to give us ('Wears the Trousers' Magazine) the exclusive premiere of the accompanying video.

In this suitably dreamy promo, live performance footage is overlaid with images of the natural world – migrating birds, palm trees, raindrops, autumn leaves, clouds etc. – and the effect is borderline hypnotic as Kathryn’s lulling voice coos and questions, “What if love is just a feeling?”.

You can view the video here:
http://www.wearsthetrousers.com/2010/05/exclusive-premiere-of-new-kathryn-wil...

The digital single comes backed with exclusive non-album track, ‘Timer’, which you can preview here:
http://www.7digital.com/artists/kathryn-williams-1/just-a-feeling/

Article courtesy of 'Wears the Trousers' Magazine and Alan Pedder:
www.wearsthetrousers.com

Follow Kathryn Williams on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/kathryncaw

Or follow 'Wears the Trousers' on Twitter:
www.twitter.com/trsrstweets

Or me!
www.twitter.com/uselessdesires

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"Twitter For iPhone" Is Only One Tweetie Update Away & FREE to everyone

Twitter For iPhone Is One Tweetie Update Away and Free to everyone 

On April 9th, Twitter made the official announcement that it would acquire the popular Twitter client Tweetie and anoint it the official Twitter application for the iPhone. Using it’s final app update, developer Atebits has included a little Easter Egg of sorts to whet our appetite for the upcoming unveiling of the newly branded app.

If you currently own the Tweetie app, be sure to update it now. When you go to refresh your timeline by pulling down, be sure to bring the menu down just a bit further than you’re accustomed to and you’ll be greeted with a little surprise. Along with this surprise, the latest update now finally brings full Foursquare integration to Tweetie allowing you to view location information from friends that have linked their Foursquare account to Twitter.

For those of you that don’t currently own Tweetie, it’s probably best to hold off until the update arrives. As indicated in Twitter’s acquisition announcement, the new official Twitter for iPhone app will be free to use

For more random ramblings, follow Ryan on Twitter ~@uselessdesires. 

He's a tech-geek, net-geek, design-geek, author-geek, photography-geek and of course, a glee-geek. A Gleek. A true, geeky geek.
 And on facebook too ~www.facebook.com/ryanjaprice

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Glee: The Music, Volume 3 "Showstoppers" Due May 18th ~ Exclusive Track-listing & Artwork

Freshly leaked from Sony to day (source withheld), here’s the tracklist for Glee: The Music, Volume 3 – Showstoppers (and Deluxe Edition). Since the Madonna songs were all released on the separate The Power Of Madonna EP, none of them will be featured on this volume. Due for release on May 18th 2010 worldwide. 

1. Hello Goodbye
2. Gives You Hell
3. Hello (featuring Jonathan Groff)
4. A House Is Not A Home
5. One Less Bell To Answer / A House Is Not A Home (featuring Kristin Chenoweth)
6. Beautiful
7. Home (featuring Kristin Chenoweth)
8. Physical (featuring Olivia Newton-John)
9. Total Eclipse Of The Heart (featuring Jonathan Groff)
10. Lady Is A Tramp
11. One
12. Rose’s Turn
13. Dream On (featuring Neil Patrick Harris)
14. Safety Dance
15. I Dreamed A Dream (featuring Idina Menzel)
16. Loser
17. Give Up The Funk
18. Beth
19. Poker Face (featuring Idina Menzel)
20. Bad Romance

(Deluxe Edition tracks are listed in bold.)

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Glee#Track_listing
for full info on Music from Glee, including listings and release dates

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WRONG ROOMS: Critique by Andrew Hodges: An 'Intelligent' Review of the Wrong Rooms Microfiction (screengrabs)

First, a Facebook app notification (which he deleted):

Then a text message from Facebook:

Then an email from Facebook!

Finally, a brief exchange of text messages between Andrew & I:

There's a lot more I could post...

* * *

PS. In *less than* 24 hours, around 900 people *chose* to read my first short story, and with around 100 new readers every day, I'm eternally grateful to them all. It might not be that good, but a lot of people are enjoying it.

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Glee ~ Vogue ~ Full Music Video in HD!

Visit www.e4.com/glee or www.fox.com/glee for more great Glee Exclusives...

Glee returns to UK TV on April 19th 2010

Trademark & Copyright Notice:™ and © FOX and its related entities. This video remains the property of the Fox Broadcasting Company. www.fox.com

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Glee ~ Vogue ~ Full Music Video in HD!

Click here to download:

Glee_-_Vogue_(Full_Music_Video_HD).mp4 (50703 KB)

Visit www.e4.com/glee or www.fox.com/glee for more great Glee Exclusives...

Glee returns to UK TV on April 19th 2010

Trademark & Copyright Notice:™ and © FOX and its related entities. This video remains the property of the Fox Broadcasting Company. www.fox.com

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Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks ~ Available June 1st 2010

Legacy Recordings is proud to announce the release of Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks, the career-spanning collection of chart- topping hits, classic tracks and personal favorites selected by America's top-selling female group, available everywhere Tuesday, June 1.

The latest installment in Legacy's acclaimed Playlist Series of artist- assembled "Very Best Of" career-overviews, Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks includes key tracks and essential selections from all four of the Dixie Chicks chart-topping studio albums, remastered for this CD release for a state-of-the-art listening experience.

Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks provides access to an exclusive Dixie Chicks pdf including an essay, photos and other bonus features once the CD is inserted in a computer drive.

Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks- tracklisting:

Wide Open Spaces (#1 Country Single from Wide Open Spaces)
You Were Mine (#1 Country Single from Wide Open Spaces)
Sin Wagon (from Fly)
Cowboy Take Me Away (#1 Country Single from Fly)
Let Him Fly (from Fly)
Long Time Gone (#2 Country Single, #7 Pop Single from Home)
Landslide (#2 Country Single, #7 Pop Single from Home)
Truth No. 2 (from Home)
The Long Way Around (from Taking The Long Way)
Easy Silence (from Taking The Long Way)
Not Ready To Make Nice (#4 Pop Single from Taking The Long Way)
Lubbock Or Leave It (from Taking The Long Way)

With more than 32 million albums sold, and $100 million in concert tickets sold, the Dixie Chicks are one of the most popular live attractions in the world. The group will perform songs from Playlist: The Very Best of Dixie Chicks during their stadium tour with the Eagles running from April 16 through June 24.

On May 4, Columbia Records will release the debut album from Court Yard Hounds, a country duo featuring Martie Maguire and Emily Robison. Court Yard Hounds will appear on this year's Lilith Fair dates.

Visit www.dixiechicks.com for more information.

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Kathryn Williams News Update ~ @kathryncaw

Kathryn has had a very busy month with the release of the stunning first single, '50 White Lines'  from her critically acclaimed album The Quickening, released in February this year. 

She finished her headline nationwide tour supported by label-mate Astrid Williamson early this March, which included a date at London's Southbank Centre on March 6th. She also appeared as special guest of Robyn Hitchcock at The Barbican's 'Songs In The Key Of London', playing alongside Graham Coxon and KT Tunstall on 9th March. 

And most importantly, we are delighted to announce the birth of a bouncing baby boy for Kathryn and are wishing Kathryn, baby Ted, Louis, Neil and all her family all the best!

Available to purchase from iTunes, Play.com & Amazon

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RSC gives Romeo and Juliet the Twitter treatment

RSC gives Romeo and Juliet the Twitter treatment

Royal Shakespeare Company retelling Bard's Romeo and Juliet with cast of six over five weeks and 4,000 tweets

But soft! What tweet through yonder iPhone breaks? It is the east, and @julietcap16 is the sun.

Actually, Juliet Capulet is probably offline at the moment: being only 16, she has to go to school even on her birthday, where to her indignation Twitter is banned. She'll be back. And there's a big party planned tonight that could change all their lives: does any of this sound at all familiar?

The Royal Shakespeare Company today joined with the cross-platform production firm Mudlark and Channel 4's digital investment fund, 4iP, to launch Such Tweet Sorrow, a drama in real time and 4,000 tweets, very roughly based on Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet.

The Bard of Avon's 1597 tragedy of flirty, street-fighting teenagers disastrously caught up in the double trauma of real love and their parents' murderous small-town rivalries is already one of the most adapted of his works. It has been continuously reinvented as an opera, a ballet, a musical, a lesbian love story, a geriatric love story and even an ice show.

This time, Juliet is the daughter of a successful property developer. Her mother died in a car driven by the artist Montague; her father will no longer tolerate any of his works in the house, much less his son. Her brother Tybalt is well on his way to being expelled from his latest boarding school, and their older sister Jess, nicknamed Nurse, keeps well out of the way of their new stepmother.

Juliet ‑ "Totally haven't introduced myself yet! My name is Juliet. I'm 15 and SO proud to be a Capulet!" was how the actor Charlotte Wakefield announced herself yesterday ‑ spends quite a lot of her time in her room, and has helpfully posted a video of it on YouTube, lingering on a photograph of her late mother.

Such Tweet Sorrow is being improvised by a cast of six RSC actors from a story grid, taking in audience responses and real events, with author Tim Wright helping out Shakespeare. At this morning's launch he said he would have to find a way of working the election into the narrative.

The show will run for the next five weeks. The director, Roxana Silbert, described the production as "not very reverential". Or as Tybalt put it: "Couldn't give a crap!"

• William Shakespeare
• Royal Shakespeare Company
• Twitter
• Theatre

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Dream Alliance: from a Gwent slag heap allotment to Grand National hopeful

A horse reared on an allotment above an old slag heap and owned by a group of amateurs, including an Asda cleaner, a pub landlord and a retired noodle maker, is in the running to win Britain's biggest horse race.

It is the unlikeliest of Grand National stories.

But when the tape rises on Dream Alliance and the 39 other starters at Aintree on Saturday, thousands of punters will be hoping that the nine- year-old gelding will rip up the form book once again to provide the fairtale ending the script requires.

The horse, which won the Welsh National at Chepstow in December after recovering from a career-threatening leg injury, has already attracted the attention of a Los Angeles production company, and at 33-1, the bookies clearly see him as having a reasonable chance.

Dream Alliance will be cheered on in Liverpool by a syndicate of twenty-three friends who have spent £10 a week each to bring him to the point where he can compete with racehorses owned by some of the sport's richest patrons.

The syndicate is led by Brian Vokes and his wife Jan, who clearly has the Midas touch when it comes to breeding animals.

A regular winner of 'best in show' with her whippets, she moved on to pigeons – a sport, she admits, she went for because she liked their cooing - breeding a winner of the prestigious Welsh South Road national at her first attempt.

But she had never thought about racehorses until she overheard a conversation in a working men's club in the small town of Blackwood, Gwent.

Local tax adviser Howard Davies was reminiscing about the horse he had owned 20 years previously and Mrs Vokes thought she 'wouldn't mind a bit of that'.

"'Brian,' I said, 'go and buy me a thoroughbred mare. We're going to breed a racehorse."
He replied: "Don't be fecking stupid."

But the journey had begun.

Through word of mouth, Mr Vokes found a young man in Llanelli willing to sell a mare called Rewbell for £1000.
Mr Vokes knocked him down to £300 before Mrs Vokes, feeling sorry for him, gave the the seller an extra £50 in 'luck money.'

With Mr Davies recruited as 'racing manager', and a copy of a turf directory, the trio narrowed the selection of stallions down to three within budget, wrote their names on the back of a beer mat and turned up their mats in order of preference.

Bien Bien, untried in his first season at stud, was selected as first choice.

The foal that resulted was named Dream Alliance.

Born at a local vet's, the horse spent his first formative winters on a tenth of an acre mud patch with his mother and chickens and ducks for neighbours.

The view from his 'stable' was the rear of a terrace of old, grey council houses and keeping him in were various types of chain link fence, an occasional rail and six-foot high steel mesh more commonly used to keep people out of building sites.
His summer turn-out was an acre of grass next to some playing fields.

They knew they needed a trainer. They had a short-list of three and after visiting the stables of Philip Hobbs, near Minehead, they plumped for him.

"When we went down there Brian had his leg in plaster and was weighing about 20 stone," recalls Mrs Vokes.
"The place was lovely. Philip took Dream Alliance as a three-year-old during the yard's quiet time in May and said he thought he had promise."

Despite the win in the Welsh Grand National, Mrs Vokes is nervous about Aintree.
"Dream Alliance can run a fantastic race one day and then the next time he doesn't want to know," she said. "I don't know what goes on in his mind.

"He's capable of winning but is he going to win? So many things can go wrong, he could get brought down at the first. I'm excited, it's hard to explain, I want to be there but at the same time I don't."

A patriotic Welshman, Mr Davies is more relaxed. "Aintree is easier to contemplate now that he's already won the Welsh National.

"That was the big one in our eyes because 17 of us are Welsh. Whatever happens at Aintree he's done far more than we ever expected."

Outside the Square Café in Blackwood, the meeting place for syndicate members which includes café owner Rob Rossi, Mr and Mrs Vokes were posing for photographs on Thursday.

A passing car slowed down, the occupant leaned out of the window and asked Brian, distinctive in that visible tattoos outnumber his teeth, if he was 'Dream Alliance'.
"Yes" he replied.
"Oh good," said the woman shaking his hand and wishing him luck. "I've never met anyone famous before."

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Update and Q&A: Wrong Rooms ~ A Twitter Microfiction

Ryan Price (@uselessdesires) 08/04/2010 11:37 ~ I'll be releasing a few more snippets to @wrongrooms later today. Things are about to get serious. More at www.twitter.com/wrongrooms The latest installment ~ Wrong Rooms (@wrongrooms) 06/04/2010 20:54 I leap from his side, snatching the receiver from it's cradle. Hysterical & quite the drama-queen, I yell "WHAT?" into the green plastic. ~ catch the ongoing drama only at www.twitter.com/wrongrooms (new installments published most days)  ~ also updated weekly on Sundays at www.uselessdesires.co.uk/wrong-rooms ~ ask the author about the musical, literary and personal influences behind the theme; ryan@uselessdesires.co.uk or post a comment below...

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The 10 best female comedians

Victoria Wood

The grande dame of British women stand-ups, Wood has featured character comedy, jokes, sketches and songs and draws heavily on her Lancashire roots and keen observations of ordinary women's experiences. Though she is best known for her television work and has won Baftas for writing and straight acting, Wood also won the best live stand-up category at the British Comedy Awards in 1991 and 2001. Her best-loved song is "The Ballad of Barry and Freda", a hymn to middle-aged sexual frustration that features the unforgettable line: "Beat me on the bottom with a Woman's Weekly."

Sarah Silverman

Silverman, 39, has forged a career out of upending political correctness and challenging complacent Eeast coast liberalism. "I don't care if you think I'm racist," she once said, in response to a high-profile complaint about her comedy. "It's more important that you think I'm thin." Silverman's satire is scalpel-sharp, often drawing on her Jewish heritage in her stage persona to ridicule bigotry. In 2008, she won an Emmy for her song "I'm Fucking Matt Damon", performed as a duet with Damon as a spoof confession to her then-boyfriend Jimmy Kimmel on his show Jimmy Kimmel Live! Her autobiography The Bedwetter (Faber) is out now.

Joan Rivers

Whatever you think of Joan Rivers' comedy, you have to admire the durability of her career. Born in 1933, from the mid-1950s she spent a decade braving Greenwich Village clubs in an entertainment world dominated by men, before her first television break on The Johnny Carson Show in 1965. "I was insanely persistent," she says. Rivers rightly regards herself as a pioneer, her brassy persona creating a brand of self-deprecating humour that opened the way for women after her to talk on stage about subjects once regarded as unsuitable for women or comedy.

Shappi Khorsandi

Iranian-born Khorsandi moved to London with her family when her father, satirist Hadi Khorsandi, was deemed an "enemy of the revolution" for his writing. Much of her early comedy drew on her childhood experiences of the culture clash and of the death threats against her father, but she also focuses on more everyday observations of life and relationships, giving audiences the impression that they're chatting with an old friend who can be charming and waspish in the same breath. Khorsandi has lent her support to various free-expression campaigns and has twice appeared on Question Time.

Lucy Porter

Diminutive Porter has been a regular on the stand-up circuit for almost a decade and her Edinburgh shows have delighted audiences for almost as long. Her breezy delivery and fondness for interacting with the audience (she usually gives away sweets during her shows) is often a means of slipping more serious ideas under the radar; previous shows have seen her attempting to grapple with economics, morality and love. She also writes for a variety of television comedy shows and appears regularly on panel shows such as Mock the Week and Have I Got News for You.

Josie Long

Long, 27, represents a new, lo-fi kind of female performer. Diffident, proudly nerdy and offbeat, with her often childlike air of wonderment, she has won over a fanbase tired of cynical, wilfully offensive comedy. Long began stand-up at the age of 14 and won the BBC new comedy award at 17. After graduating from Oxford, she performed at experimental comedy clubs and toured with Stewart Lee as his warm-up act in 2005 before winning the if.comedy (formerly the Perrier) newcomer award in 2006 with her first Edinburgh show. She is also hugely popular in Australia, where she is a regular at the Melbourne Comedy Festival.

Laura Solon

Solon made headlines in 2005 when she became only the second woman to win the Perrier comedy award, at the age of 26. She'd begun performing with the Oxford Revue while an undergraduate, where she had decided that character comedy suited her better than straight stand-up. Her shows feature an array of surreal characters and have been praised for their originality. After the Perrier win, Solon was quickly signed up by the BBC to develop comedy projects and has written and performed three series of her Radio 4 show, Laura Solon: Talking and Not Talking, as well as appearing with Harry Enfield and Paul Whitehouse in their television shows.

Gina Yashere

Yashere turned to comedy after working as a lift engineer, completed her first tour in 2000 and has toured successfully ever since. In 2002, she was voted best female act at the Black Comedy awards and nominated best female stand-up at the Chortle awards. Her big break came in 2007 when she became one of the 10 finalists in the NBC reality show, Last Comic Standing, which brought her to a US audience and in 2008 she was the first British comic to appear on the influential black comedy show, Def Comedy Jam. She has since branched out into acting and has recently recorded a comedy special for US channel Showtime.

Sarah Millican

Newcastle-born Millican started performing comedy at the age of 29 and her early sets were largely based around the experience of her recent divorce. Her combination of a warm delivery with eye-wateringly explicit material about sex and relationships proved hugely appealing, and she accumulated many award nominations as she worked the club circuit before taking her solo show to the Edinburgh fringe in 2008, where she won the if.comedy best newcomer award. Her first Radio 4 series, Sarah Millican's Support Group, aired earlier this year and she has appeared on numerous television panel shows.

Miranda Hart

Most recently seen in her own BBC2 sitcom, Miranda, and taking part in the million-pound bike ride for Sport Relief, Hart is an accomplished actress and comic whose one-woman shows have been a highlight of the Edinburgh fringe for the past 10 years. She first took what she describes as "a terrible show" to Edinburgh in 1994 and decided that if it got one OK review and one night with more than 20 people, she would try comedy for a living. When one audience reached 21, she was committed. Her material is largely character- and sketch-based and often draws on her physical attributes – she is 6ft 1inch tall. 

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NHS Leicester City Stop-Smoking Campaign Online

Stop-smoking campaign online

Leicester Mercury

Health workers are going online to encourage people to quit smoking.

Viewers to YouTube will be able to see an introduction from members of NHS Leicester City's Stop! team.

They have helped to create a series of videos aimed at getting people aged from 16 to 24 talking about the issues.

Louise Ross, manager of the service, said: "We feel the personal touch and support we give our quitters is key to their success and we want to try to engage with them on an even deeper level."

The videos can be seen at:

www.youtube.com/users/commonunityarts

Posted with Reeder for iPhone 

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Reeder 2 - A Phenomenal first-in-class Google Reader App for the iPhone hits the AppStore as a FREE update!

Google Reader, Pocket-Sized... (for iPhone & iPod Touch)

Reeder 2.0 (a free update from Reeder 1+) from developer Silvio Rizzi has hit the AppStore! The best RSS reader on the block for Google Reader is now even faster than before, with extra features like optional image caching, state saving, and increased contrast. There are also more services available (Open in Safari is back!), and holding on a link will now open up the services menu, so you don’t have to load up a page before being able to tweet the link.

Finally, the gestures have been much improved, so it’s easier than ever to swipe to star or mark as read. I also think a new gesture set was added, since I can now pull up after reading an article to switch to the next one — very slick.

Reeder 2.0 is still available for £1.79/$2.99 if you haven’t bought it yet.

Here are some screenshots of this fabulous app:

For more information, and the full feature-set, check out www.reederapp.com

Or download now direct from the AppStore:

http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/reeder/id325502379?mt=8

Follow @reederapp & @uselessdesires on Twitter for more

~ Ryan

See and download the full gallery on posterous

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The New ‘Glee’ Promo Is Like A Prayer

By now it’s no secret that the cast of Glee will be taking a bow to the Madonna back catalog in the April 20th episode of the series. But what was that trilling over a the airwaves with such conviction during an American Idol commercial break last night? Why, it was almost like a religious experience. In fact, it was a religious experience—it was Lea Michele singing Madge’s 1989 hit “Like A Prayer” in a brand new Glee promo! (Sadly, there was nary a sight of her making out with a saint in the clip.) Watch below, Gleeks!

Ah, it’s like school is back in session and we’re convening with all our friends during lunch to talk about what we did over break—you know, at the unpopular table, of course.

Now, a Glee cast mini album called The Power Of Madonna—which features eight Material Girl covers, including a “Borderline/Open Your Heart” mashup—is out April 20, and we already know that Sue Sylvester (Jane Lynch) is singing “Vogue.”

But, forgive us, Father—for we are praying that either Kurt (Chris Colfer) or Finn (Cory Monteith) landed “Like A Virgin.” Or at the very least, give William McKinley High’s star kicker “What It Feels Like For A Girl.” (Oh, hush—you know that would be good television.)

Sigh. Four more weeks. Time goes by so slowly, indeed, Madonna

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Cigarettes & Cancer - 5 Top Questions Answered #wequit #smokefree

1. What are the effects of cigarette smoking on cancer rates?

Cigarette smoking causes 87 percent of lung cancer deaths . Lung cancer is the leading cause of cancer death in both men and women . Smoking is also responsible for most cancers of the larynx, oral cavity and pharynx, esophagus, and bladder. In addition, it is a cause of kidney, pancreatic, cervical, and stomach cancers, as well as acute myeloid leukemia.

Are there any health risks for nonsmokers?

The health risks caused by cigarette smoking are not limited to smokers. Exposure to secondhand smoke, or environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), significantly increases the risk of lung cancer and heart disease in nonsmokers, as well as several respiratory illnesses in young children. (Secondhand smoke is a combination of the smoke that is released from the end of a burning cigarette and the smoke exhaled from the lungs of smokers.) The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the National Institute of Environmental Health Science’s National Toxicology Program, and the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) have all classified secondhand smoke as a known human carcinogen—a category reserved for agents for which there is sufficient scientific evidence that they cause cancer. The U.S. EPA has estimated that exposure to secondhand smoke causes about 3,000 lung cancer deaths among nonsmokers and is responsible for up to 300,000 cases of lower respiratory tract infections in children up to 18 months of age in the United States each year.

What harmful chemicals are found in cigarette smoke?

Cigarette smoke contains about 4,000 chemical agents, including over 60 carcinogens. In addition, many of these substances, such as carbon monoxide, tar, arsenic, and lead, are poisonous and toxic to the human body. Nicotine is a drug that is naturally present in the tobacco plant and is primarily responsible for a person’s addiction to tobacco products, including cigarettes. During smoking, nicotine is absorbed quickly into the bloodstream and travels to the brain in a matter of seconds. Nicotine causes addiction to cigarettes and other tobacco products that is similar to the addiction produced by using heroin and cocaine.

How does exposure to tobacco smoke affect the cigarette smoker?

Smoking harms nearly every major organ of the body. The risk of developing smoking-related diseases, such as lung and other cancers, heart disease, stroke, and respiratory illnesses, increases with total lifetime exposure to cigarette smoke. This includes the number of cigarettes a person smokes each day, the intensity of smoking (i.e., the size and frequency of puffs), the age at which smoking began, the number of years a person has smoked, and a smoker’s secondhand smoke exposure.

How would quitting smoking affect the risk of developing cancer and other diseases?

Smoking cessation has major and immediate health benefits for men and women of all ages. Quitting smoking decreases the risk of lung and other cancers, heart attack, stroke, and chronic lung disease. The earlier a person quits, the greater the health benefit. For example, research has shown that people who quit before age 50 reduce their risk of dying in the next 15 years by half compared with those who continue to smoke. Smoking low-yield cigarettes, as compared to cigarettes with higher tar and nicotine, provides no clear benefit to health.

For additional information on quitting smoking, why not check out the We Quit Website? Or for great support or information, and to get a free Quit-Kit, visit the NHS Smoke-Free website: http://smokefree.nhs.uk/

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British Airways - The Truth about the Forth-Coming Strike?

British Airways - the truth Unite cabin crew members at British Airways are now days away from strike action. Much of the media has portrayed the crew as overpaid, underworked and prepared to bring BA down to its knees. Nothing can be further from the truth.  The last thing BA crew want to do is to go on strike. In fact, the crew are preparing to take industrial action as a last resort because they care so much about BA and want the airline to have a future as a premier carrier.  In November 2009, BA imposed changes that cut over 1,000 crew members from flights, cuts that cabin crew believe have been a disaster for the on-board service quality. BA’s European flights have seen 25 per cent reductions in crew numbers and on long-haul flights crew compliments have seen reductions of between 1 and 3.   Unite crew members realise that BA is operating in tough financial conditions. That’s why they offered the airline £62m in savings – the same amount BA has saved by removing cabin crew from flights. Crew were prepared to compromise on crew numbers, take a pay cut, and take cuts in their terms and conditions. But no matter how much the union offered, BA simply refused to accept. Unite believes that all along BA was merely playing lip-service to the negotiating process. We believe that BA has another agenda entirely – smashing the collective voice of cabin crew.  BA’s management is becoming increasingly macho. Under Willie Walsh’s leadership the company has undertaken a range of union busting tactics. Most of the crew’s local union leaders are either suspended or awaiting disciplinaries. A further 30 union members have been suspended on spurious grounds. Staff are living in fear of who could be next. BA has also spent months encouraging other BA staff to help break the strike by training up as cabin crew.  BA has threatened to remove the travel concessions from any crew member who goes on strike – this is a particularly vindictive move when around one third of crew use it to commute to work.  The way forward Unite and its members did not want this strike.  But we have been left with no option because management will not listen.  We are, however, ready to resume talks at any time. Crew are prepared to offer compromise and flexibility.  This dispute can only be avoided if BA is prepared to make a serious attempt to finding a negotiated settlement. It could start by putting the offer the airline made last week back on the table so that Unite could give members the right to accept or reject BA's proposal. Unite is prepared to halt the strike while members are consulted and will stand by crew's decision. The ball is clearly in BA's court.  You can help As usual in industrial disputes, some media and politicians are taking the side of the employer ignoring the genuine concerns of workers. You can help get BA crew’s message to a wider audience by forwarding this email to a friend.  Check on Unite’s website to find out the real truth. www.unitetheunion.org/ba   Joint General Secretaries  Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley  BA’s cabin crew save lives BA frequent flyer Karen Ward believes she owes her life to the skills and professionalism of British Airways cabin crew. Here she tells her story about how she survived a life threatening illness thanks to the intervention of highly experienced cabin crew. Click here.  http://www.youtube.com/user/UniteTheUnion#p/u/0/JCXD57CZCFE Click here to read Assistant General Secretary Len McCluskey's article in the Guardian newspaper

Unite, 35 King Street, Covent Garden, London WC2E 8JG Unite, Transport House, 128 Theobald's Road, Holborn, London, WC1X 8TN ©2010 Unite. All rights reserved. All trade marks acknowledged.

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Site News

Just a few lines to tell you of a few developments:

- If you found this site via www.fotoflickr.co.uk, my photography & design site, that's because it's now closed. If you are interested in buying the domain name from me, let me know.

- The email addresses & mailboxes associated with fotoflickr.co.uk have now closed also.
These include:
ryan@fotoflickr.co.uk,
sales@fotoflickr.co.uk,
info@fotoflickr.co.uk and
andrew@fotoflickr.co.uk

- if you have tried emaling any of those addresses, please resend your email to ryan(at)uselessdesires.co.uk. Just substitute the (at) for the @ symbol. Spam is a problem! You can also email me on ryanjaprice (a)gmail.com.

- I have just secured, after two or three years of waiting, the domain name flomo.co.uk - I hope to launch a new site offering photography & design services under the new name of flomo* in the near future. For now, www.flomo.co.uk redirects to my main blog at www.uselessdesires.co.uk .

That's it for now. Nothing exciting. Just thought I'd share what I've been doing while giving smoking! See you on Twitter? I'm @uselessdesires on there.

Bye for now...

Ryan

*flomo = flo & molly, my two cats!

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Stopping Smoking Tips

Stopping smoking is not easy. Below are some tips which may help you to quit smoking. At the end of the leaflet there are details of some further resources that may help.

Write a list of the reasons why you want to stop, and keep them with you. Refer to them when tempted to light up. You may wish to read a separate leaflet in this series called 'Smoking - The Facts'. This gives the reasons why smoking is so harmful and lists the benefits of stopping.

Set a date for stopping, and stop completely. (Some people prefer the idea of cutting down gradually. However, research has shown that if you smoke less cigarettes than usual, you are likely to smoke more of each cigarette, and nicotine levels remain nearly the same. Therefore, it is usually best to stop once and for all from a set date.)

Tell everyone that you are giving up smoking. Friends and family often give support and may help you. Smoking by others in the household makes giving up harder. If appropriate, try to get other household members who smoke, or friends who smoke, to stop smoking at the same time. A 'team' effort may be easier than going it alone.

Get rid of ashtrays, lighters, and all cigarettes.

Be prepared for some withdrawal symptoms. When you stop smoking, you are likely to get symptoms which may include: nausea (feeling sick), headaches, anxiety, irritability, craving, and just feeling awful. These symptoms are caused by the lack of nicotine that your body has been used to. They tend to peak after 12-24 hours, and then gradually ease over 2-4 weeks.

Anticipate a cough. It is normal for a 'smokers cough' to get worse when you stop smoking (as the airways 'come back to life'). Many people say that this makes them feel worse for a while after stopping smoking and makes them tempted to restart smoking. Resist this temptation! The cough usually gradually eases.

Be aware of situations in which you are most likely to want to smoke. In particular, drinking alcohol is often associated with failing in an attempt to stop smoking. You should consider not drinking much alcohol in the first few weeks after stopping smoking. Try changing your routine for the first few weeks. For example, don't go to the pub for a while if that is a tempting place to smoke and drink alcohol. Also, if drinking tea and coffee are difficult times, try drinking mainly fruit juice and plenty of water instead.

Take one day at a time. Mark off each successful day on a calendar. Look at it when you feel tempted to smoke, and tell yourself that you don't want to start all over again.

Be positive. You can tell people that you don't smoke. You will smell better. After a few weeks you should feel better, taste your food more, and cough less. You will have more money. Perhaps put away the money you would have spent on cigarettes for treats.

Food. Some people worry about gaining weight when they give up smoking as the appetite may improve. Anticipate an increase in appetite, and try not to increase fatty or sugary foods as snacks. Try sugar-free gum and fruit instead.

Don't despair if you fail. Examine the reasons why you felt it was more difficult at that particular time. It will make you stronger next time. On average, people who eventually stop smoking have made 3 or 4 previous attempts.

Stop Smoking Clinics are available on the NHS. They have a good success in helping people to stop smoking. Your doctor may refer you to one if you are keen to stop smoking but are finding it difficult to do so.

Various medicines can increase your chance of quitting. These include Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) which comes as gums, sprays, patches, tablets, lozenges, and inhalers. You can buy NRT without a prescription. Also, medicines called bupropion (trade name 'Zyban') and varenicline (trade name 'Champix) can help. These are available on prescription. See separate leaflets called 'Smoking - Nicotine Replacement Therapy', 'Smoking - Helping to Stop with Bupropion' and 'Smoking - Helping to Stop with Varenicline'.

Further help and information

Quit - a charity that helps people to stop smoking.
Quitline: 0800 00 22 00 Web: www.quit.org.uk

Smokefree - information from the NHS
Free smoking helpline 0800 022 4 332 Web: www.smokefree.nhs.uk
For help and advice on stopping smoking, and for details of your local NHS Stop Smoking Service.

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