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Wireframe End Table design by Gus Modern

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3D wireframe models now heads its way to your living room in the form of this Wireframe End Table design by Gus Modern. It’s your living room center table which comes with a walnut-finished, exposed ply top and a bottom surface. The latter bears a black, powder-coated steel grid framework. You can use the opening on the side to use it as a beautiful storage place for your cushions, blankets, books or anything else you desire. A shelf disguised as a rocking center table. Sounds like a two-in-one furniture!

Overview & Specs
Editor's Rating
Walnut Ply
Powder-Coated Steel
H20"/ Diameter 20"
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Ashley Timms
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Tag Archive: Haggis challenge

Address to a Haggis

I was recently contacted by the popular holiday and travel company Sykes Cottages – who specialise in finding you delightful handpicked holiday cottages, and asked to take part in what they dubbed the ‘Haggis Challenge’. Now, let me tell you,…
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The Old Pelt Club

Mitchell Library, Glasgow Collection

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The Old Pelt Club

"The Old Pelt Club", a song preserved in a scrapbook entitled Old Glasgow Street Songs etc, 1850 which is held at the Mitchell Library.

This comic song is about the members of the Old Pelt Club, who met by the Drygate Bridge to present a wig to one of their number. One man, much the worse for drink, fell into the Lady Well but was hauled out by a passing policeman.

Reference: GC 398.5 GLA

Reproduced with the permission of Glasgow City Council, Libraries Information and Learning

bridges, drinking, Drygate Bridge, folk songs, Lady Well, lyrics, millers, Old Glasgow Street Songs etc, 1850, poetry, policemen, street songs, The Old Pelt Club, wells, wigs

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Bluegrass Pride

By Tonya Newstetter

The rainy days of January have continued into February, and as I look out the window onto the misty hills of Oakland, I am more grateful than ever for the bluegrass community. Here in the Bay Area, our days are filled with news of protests, frustration, and hurt at the recent and ongoing political events. I turn to bluegrass, as many of you do, to remind myself of the love and creativity that is humanity at its best.

Those good feelings were out in full force at The Great 48, a 48-hour jam/concert/workshop that takes place every year at a hotel in Bakersfield. Pickers from all over the state descended on a big, 9-floor Marriott, booking up every room and filling the hotel with bright harmonies, thumping bass, and twangy banjo. Every floor held something slightly different, and jammers of all levels found a home in a hallway, someone's hotel room, a stairwell, or the lobby. I was lucky enough to catch a seat and hear The Hossettes and The Central Valley Boys, who both performed late on a Saturday night in a jam-packed meeting room. Everyone in that hotel had a common goal: pick.all.weekend. After a gloomy January, it felt wonderful to come together with my bluegrass brothers and sisters and rejoice in the art and craft of bluegrass music.

"building a strong bluegrass community takes work"

But bluegrass music isn't just picking and singing. Building a strong bluegrass community takes work, which I witnessed at a very special California Bluegrass Association (CBA) Board of Directors Meeting held that weekend at the hotel. In addition to usual business of amending bylaws and reviewing strategy, the board (which includes our very own, very handsome Jessica Furui) heard a proposal from Bay Area CBA Rep Ted Kuster to organize a CBA float for San Francisco Pride Parade.

In a stand of solidarity with the IBMA's stated value of diversity & inclusiveness, the board voted to approve the proposal, and this June, we will proudly open our bluegrass community to the more than one million attendees at the Pride Parade! If you would like to volunteer your time, or (better yet!) make a donation to the CBA in support of these efforts, please contact Tonya Newstetter -

To me, this was a reminder that engaging deeply with your community can bring surprises and joys that you never expected, and in times of distress, this can make all the difference.


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Celtic Necklace - Sterling Silver - Open Knot-Work

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  • Description

Celtic necklace is crafted in sterling silver that is enhanced with an open knot-work design.

This Celtic necklace has been hallmarked sterling silver by the Irish Assay Office at Dublin Castle in Ireland.

This sterling silver Celtic necklace features a filigree knot work design. The Celtic pendant measures 3/8” wide x 1 1/2“ tall, including the jump ring and the chain bail and Includes an 18” long sterling silver chain. The Irish necklace is made by Solvar Jewelry in Dublin, Ireland and it is gift boxed with a Celtic knot history card that is complements of The Irish Gift House.
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Accuracy • Independence • Integrity

April 18, 2019   |   Ithaca, NY

Fidel Castro’s reputation still being disputed

By | Dec 6, 2016

When we contextualize these facts, we get a clear picture: The U.S. has as much to do with Cuba’s troubled history as Castro does.

Video:The History of Cuban Architecture

By | Apr 4, 2013

Belmont Freeman, principal of Belmont Freeman Architects and Adjunct Professor of Architecture at Columbia University visits Ithaca College to talk about Cuban architecture after the revolution.


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Speak Low

Review and pictures by Brian Homer The mac, Birmingham UK 09-11-2016 Strange Fruit is very hard song to do because of getting the tone of it right and because Billie Holiday did such definitive versions of it. So not many… Read More ›

Food plus Percy Pursglove

Review and pictures by John Watson Hexagon Theatre, mac, Birmingham, UK 02-12-2015 The content of Food has shrunk from time to time over the years… but the quality has always been maintained, and even improved. Food, with UK saxophonist Iain Ballamy… Read More ›

Food – This Is Not A Miracle

(ECM) The Anglo-Norwegian duo of saxophonist Iain Ballamy and drummer Thomas Strønen is joined here by Austrian guitarist Christian Fennesz. Food’s style of atmospheric, electronics-drenched music has had some consistency ever since the band was a quartet with trumpeter Arve Henriksen… Read More ›

Amok Amor & Andrew Woodhead

mac Hexagon, Birmingham UK 17-11-2015 This was the second of four events that Cheltenham Jazz Festival and Jazzlines programmes advisor Tony Dudley-Evans is currently presenting off his own bat (as TDE Promotions) along with Fizzle, the fortnightly Lamp Tavern series. It’s a… Read More ›


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NOW STREAMING on The Killer Movie Channel is CARNIVORE which was originally released on 20th Century Fox and has now been re released worldwide by The Killer Movie Channel. The Film is a Campy 80’s style Monster Movie, and made history as one of the longest productions of all time, taking more than 13 years to complete. Carnivore made its debut on the SyFy Channel and was later released on VHS and DVD at all Hollywood Video stores Nationwide.

SYNOPSIS: Kids discover that an old scary house is a lot scarier than they ever could have imagined in this gory horror outing. Four teenagers looking for a good time decide to have a party in an old house, that, according to local legend, is haunted. However, the kids soon discover that there’s something worse than ghosts waiting for them, the basement of the house is actually a secret laboratory set up as part of an undercover government defense project, and their latest project is a mutant creature that can be unleashed against our enemies. When the monster accidentally gets loose, the only hope for the kids is if government intelligence agents trying to keep the project under wraps can find and kill the creature before he finds them and tears them to bits.

Starring: Jill Adcock, Pamela Thompson,
Jeff Swan, Lori Johnson and John Jacob.
Directed by Kenneth Mader

Also, Available to watch
for FREE on ROKU

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Movies and TV

Richard Erdman dies: Colorado-raised actor in “Stalag 17” and “Community” was 93

For many viewers, Erdman was the consummate “that guy” — a difficult-to-identify-but-recognizable supporting player

Actor Richard Erdman attends The Paley Center For Media's PaleyFest 2013 Honoring "Community" at Saban Theatre on March 5, 2013 in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Jason Kempin, Getty Images)
Actor Richard Erdman attends The Paley Center For Media’s PaleyFest 2013 Honoring “Community” at Saban Theatre on March 5, 2013 in Beverly Hills, Calif. (Jason Kempin, Getty Images)

Richard Erdman, a wisecracking character actor who appeared in more than 175 film and television productions, including as a barracks chief in “Stalag 17,” a time-stopping boor in “The Twilight Zone” and an elderly college student on the recent sitcom “Community,” died March 16 at an assisted-living facility in Los Angeles. He was 93.

He had dementia and suffered a fall about two weeks ago, said film historian Alan Rode, an executor of his estate.

For many viewers, Erdman was the consummate “that guy” — a difficult-to-identify-but-recognizable supporting player who injected wit and energy into television shows such as “Perry Mason,” “Cheers,” “Murder, She Wrote” and eventually “Community,” which endeared him to a younger generation when the series premiered on NBC in 2009. (It moved to Yahoo’s streaming service for its sixth and final season in 2015.)

Erdman made his film debut in 1944 as a messenger boy in “Mr. Skeffington” (1944), starring Bette Davis, and went on to appear in dozens of crime dramas and military epics, often as the hero’s witty sidekick.

He performed in radio programs with Orson Welles and Jack Benny; was featured in films alongside James Cagney (“The Time of Your Life”), Errol Flynn (“Objective, Burma!”) and Dorothy Lamour (“Wild Harvest”); and played a paraplegic soldier in Marlon Brando’s first movie, “The Men” (1950).

The two actors spent several days at a veterans hospital near Los Angeles to learn how to use a wheelchair, and Brando lived at Erdman’s Hollywood Boulevard apartment for four weeks during the film shoot, passing the time listening to his host’s sprawling collection of Russian opera records.

Erdman drew early acclaim for his performance in “Cry Danger,” a 1951 film noir starring Dick Powell and Rhonda Fleming, in which he played an alcoholic Marine veteran with an artificial leg. In a 2012 interview with Rode, Erdman recalled auditioning in front of the movie’s screenwriter, William Bowers, who told him, “When you read the script, don’t make faces, and stop acting. Just say the words.”

Following that advice, he offered a deadpan response when his character was shot in the wooden leg. Asked what sort of prosthesis he’d like as a replacement, Erdman replied, “I’d like it in knotty pine, to match my den.”

In a review for The Washington Post, Orval Hopkins wrote that Erdman was “an intelligent young man and a bright future is doubtless on the way.” Film historian Jack Shadoian said his performance was worthy of the best supporting actor Oscar.

Erdman never quite found the right part, although he came close with “Stalag 17” (1953), director Billy Wilder’s World War II classic about a German prisoner-of-war camp. Adapted from a Broadway play by Donald Bevan and Edmund Trzcinski, the film featured William Holden as a gruff American prisoner, with Erdman cast against type as the no-nonsense chief of the barracks.

Erdman later appeared on TV programs such as “The Tab Hunter Show” (1960-61), as a wealthy playboy, and “The Twilight Zone,” which featured him in a celebrated 1963 episode, “A Kind of a Stopwatch,” as a bar fly who receives a watch that enables him to pause time.

In “Community,” he played Leonard Rodriguez, a sardonic member of the “Hipsters,” a clique of Greendale Community College students who’ve all had hip replacements, or are old enough to have done so.

The character became known for annoying his younger community-college classmates, especially Jeff Winger (Joel McHale). Erdman was always met with the words, “Shut up, Leonard,” followed by one of a dozen or so insults: “I heard about your prescription socks,” or “Those teenage girls you played ping-pong with are doing it ironically.”

Occasionally, the show would also nod toward Erdman’s storied acting career. “I’m thinking about breaking into the TV game, since it’s apparently sticking around,” he says in one episode. “I don’t want to wake up in 30 years and wonder, ‘What if?’ ”

John Richard Erdman was born in Enid, Oklahoma, on June 1, 1925, and was raised in Colorado Springs. His father abandoned the family when Dick was a boy, according to Rode, and his mother ran a bakery.

Erdman said that as a young man, he was in a car crash that knocked him out for 17 hours and destroyed his sense of smell. He appeared in school plays and worked as a newspaper deliveryman; the mail-room superintendent later recalled that Erdman entertained the other carriers by climbing on a fence, “hanging by one arm, and screaming and scratching, to do an imitation of a baboon.”

According to a 1972 profile in the Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph, Erdman and his mother moved to Los Angeles when he was a junior in high school, after his drama teacher suggested he could act in movies. He soon signed a seven-year contract with Warner Bros.

But he battled with studio executive Jack Warner, who refused to loan him out for producer Samuel Goldwyn’s 1946 war film “The Best Years of Our Lives.” Erdman said he was offered the part of a disabled veteran who had lost both hands, but the role ultimately went to Harold Russell, who received honorary and best supporting actor Oscars.

Erdman’s other movie appearances included “You’re in the Navy Now” (1951), starring Gary Cooper and Jane Greer; “The Blue Gardenia” (1953), a film noir directed by Fritz Lang; and “Tora! Tora! Tora!” (1970), about the attack on Pearl Harbor. He also directed “The Brothers O’Toole” (1973), a Western comedy, and in the 1950s and ’60s was a leader of Stage Society, a Los Angeles theater troupe.

His marriage to Leza Holland ended in divorce. He married Sharon Randall in 1953, and she died in 2016. Their daughter, Erica Erdman, died in 2010. Mr. Erdman left no immediate survivors.

While Erdman was far from a household name, he said he was often approached at parties or met with a look of vague recognition. “It’s the face,” he told The Salt Lake Tribune in 1967, while leading a summer theater program at the University of Utah. “I look like the fellow you should know, but can’t remember his name.”

“In only about two of the pictures did I ever get the girl,” he added. “Usually I play the leading lady’s boyfriend who is left at the altar while the heroine elopes with Cary Grant. That’s why I like to act in Utah. In Utah, I get the girl. In Hollywood and on Broadway, I end up in second place.”


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Yewbarrow from near Nether Beck

Yewbarrow from near Nether Beck

Summary: Very few fells have such a distinctive shape as that of Yewbarrow, from the south-west it is a definite peak  but from either the east or west side it shows it’s one mile long ridge shape. This fell was listed by Waiwnright for inclusion on all of his lists. Whilst the summit ridge above 1800′ is relatively flat and easy going either end of the ridge are steep and rough crags, Bell Rib at the southern end and Stirrup Crag at the northen end. These crags can be a deterrent to the casual walker. The ascent from the south is normally made by following a rough path up between Dropping Crag and Bell Rib which requires an amount of “hand’s on” work in places. At the other end Stirrup Crag is a bit more of a challenge with sections of easy scrambling which may be off putting to those not used to rock work. However, there is an easier option of ascent avoiding both crags, a grassy path can be taken from near the top of Over Beck close to Dore Head which gradually rises up to the summit on the western side of the fell. Normally the fell is ascended from Wasdale, either by parking at Overbeck or Wasdale Head.

Topographical details: The height of 2058′ given by Wainwright was taken from the 1 inch O.S. map of the day. Today the measured height of the summit is 2057′ 627m GR: NY17337 08473. The Wainwright summit is marked by a decent sized rough cairn placed by an angular block of rock (shown below). There is a trigonometrical point on the summit in the form of a ground bolt which is most likely to be under the cairn. There is at least one more cairn further north near the top of Stirrup Crag.

Yewbarrow summit

Yewbarrow summit

Points of Interest: Impressive views of the area of Wasdale Head and the majestic Scafell massif and Great Gable can be seen from the summit, best views can be had by deviating from the main path on the summit to the east. Worth a look is the huge gash on the southern end of the fell known as Great Door. There are in fact two such features and many walkers mistake the lesser gap as the named one as the path now by-passes the more impressive and almost vertical walled Great Door, the lower and more southerly gap. Dore Head down to Mosedale has perhaps one of the most famous scree runs in the district but it has become very eroded and awkward for descent.

Tarns: none

Waterfalls: Over Beck has one or two small falls.

Adjoining fells: Red Pike to the north can be reached via Dore Head.

Nearest Facilities: Car parking at Overbeck (free) or Wasdale Head (free). Camping at Wasdale Head. Pub at Wasdale Head Inn, small shop The Barn Door.

Star rating: 3.7 out of 5 stars (3.7 / 5) Yewbarrow is a fell worthy of a visit on its own or even better as part of the Mosedale round. It lacks in points of historic interest but the crags at either end present an entertaining challenge. The views of the Wasdale giants are impressive.

Check walks on this fell:

2/7/06 Mosedale round including Yewbarrow

9/9/09 Yewbarrow to Pillar via Shamrock Traverse

16/2/14 Yewbarrow via Over Beck

Back to The Lakeland 365 area map.

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2mtr LINQ Tetha Bloq

2mtr LINQ Tetha Bloq
2mtr LINQ Tetha Bloq
Tether back v1
Tether back v1

2mtr LINQ Tetha Bloq. IRW200KTKT – 2mtr Retractable Fall Arrestor with Triple Action Karabiners

  • Rated to 140kg in all directions
  • Centrifugal braking to minimise impact forces
  • High impact ultra-strength polymer casing to prevent breakage
  • minimises fall arrest forces to less than 6kN
  • Triple action karabiners both top and bottom
  • Complies to AS1891-3 as covered by EN360:2002

The Lifting Company (TLC) is a Western Australian owned and operated company, which was formed in 2001 to provide specialised Lifting, Rigging, Height Safety, Material Handling products and services to Perth’s construction, mining, industrial, and engineering sectors.

TLC is committed to achieving the highest standards of excellence in its products, services and personnel. It strives to be the most reputable and reliable product and service provider in the lifting, rigging and height safety industry.

The Lifting Company is proud to have a dedicated core team of specialists with capability to design, engineer, manufacture, test and certify quality lifting, rigging and height safety equipment.

From the very beginning, our objective has been to provide excellent service at competitive prices to all of our customers. TLC will never compromise its integrity or your safety.

We are committed to bringing you the best advice, service, and products. As part of an ever changing and evolving industry, we are always looking at ways to make your work environment safer and easier.

AU Standard 179x300 2mtr LINQ Tetha Bloq


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Monthly Archives: August 2014

I went to Ashwood and …..

….added to my scented shrub collection!

I was seeking out a scented shrub in flower now, as I was aware of a flowering gap in my scented shrub border. I was thinking of possibly a Caryopteris, which blooms at this time, but it prefers a sunny position, and our border is predominantly shady. I was open to options.

The nursery had a wide selection of Caryopteris available, and I succumbed, choosing Caryopteris x Clandonensis “Dark Knight”. This variety has the usual silvery-blue foliage, that is strongly aromatic, and the flowers are a lovely deep blue. The bees just love them! It was even obvious in the nursery – they were all over them!

I know! I said the Scented Shrub border was in shade! I’ve decided, that to increase my repertoire and accommodate more sun lovers, it’s time to extend, and the only other sunny area available is the front garden. So that is going to become “Phase 2”.

There’s still the gap in the display in the border in the back garden to solve. On the way out, there was a display of miniature Daphnes, several of which were either flowering or about to. I saw one – Daphne x Napolitana “Meon”. That would fit the bill! A small, scented shrub, reaching only 10″ x 18″, that had only 3 tiny rose pink flowers on it, but was still pumping out a very tempting scent even on this small scale. An impulse buy, well justified!

And a small pressy for my mum! She has been on the lookout for a prostrate Rosemary, so when I saw one I had to treat her.

And then back to the garden to enjoy the remnants of summer sun. As I sip my wine, I’m watching the bees flocking to the “Dark Knight”. Bliss! 🙂

Let Me Introduce You!

I thought it was about time I showed you round our garden, so I’ve created a new page to my blog. It’s got a plan and everything! After all, I’m supposed to be able to design gardens, so I should be able to come up with a plan of my own!

If you fancy a look round, take a peek! You’ll find it at And now the plan! 🙂

I Can Sing A Rainbow

I think now, at this time of year, is a good time to show you some of my grass collection, and some of the ways I use them in the garden. These photos are not current – they were taken earlier in the year, when I was tending to my pots, and this idea came to me then.

Scent is not my only love in the garden. I love the graceful movement that grasses give to a garden, with their wonderful light and airy texture, and their tactile qualities. So I have lots, and use them in many different ways.

I came up with the idea for my Rainbow pots, while admiring all the colour variations, you can get with grasses. Knowing there were many brightly coloured glazed pots available on the market, I thought, “Why not have a collection of cojloured grasses with complementary pots? They should look good lining the path against the wall, in the hot coloured Grass garden.” So here they are all in a row!

They don’t all actually sit in a row on our bench! They’re arranged in two groups either side.

This group are the hotter coloured pots….

GREEN – Miscanthus sinensis “Gold Bar”
YELLOW – Carex oshimensis “Evergold”
TERRACOTTA – Anemanthele lessoniana
RED – Imperata cylindrica rubra
BROWN – Uncinia rubra

….and the cooler pots.

PALE BLUE – Carex comans “Frosted Curls”
MID BLUE – Panicum virgatum “Heavy Metal”
DARK BLUE – Festuca glauca
BLACK – Ophiopogon planiscapus “Nigrescens” – which isn’t, in actual fact a grass, although it is frequently referred to as the black grass. It is a member of the lily family, also known as Lilyturf. But it has the same effect.

And so a collection of colourful grasses!

Having shown you Anemanthele in one of my pots, see what a difference some shade makes!

The Anemanthele on the left is so much more lush and green, growing in a pot in another, shadier part of the garden.

Another experiment I tried, which I think has worked extremely well for me, is using Hakonechloa macra to line a gravel path.

Here, it lines the gravel path adjacent to the garden wall, interspersed with boulders. Although it is a shade lover, it’s doing really well in this sunny position. I love the effect it creates here, en masse!

And to round up on a fun note –
– what better way to plant up an old, chimney pot?….

….or to skirt the base of an old, rusty water pump?….

….than our old faithful, Carex buchananii!

The Summer Garden’s Second Phase

The Cottage border has now done its thing, and is looking a bit flat and tired out. Even the brave attempts by the Leucanthemum daisies, are now looking a bit half hearted. But all is not over yet.

Travel through the archway, and you’ll find our Grass garden, a border of grasses and hot coloured prairie style planting, that happens to flower later in the summer, providing a well received injection of colour. You’ve had glimpses of it in the past, but now is the time to show you in detail.

Hot Grass border

Hot Grass border

This was the border, as we saw it from the archway, way back in June, when it was just filling out. It’s looking nice and “tidy” (a word I hate when applied to the garden!) at this time, and you can make out the basic layout.

It’s a border about 30ft long by 6ft wide, bounded by two paths – the long central grass path, and a concrete/slab path, that originally ran the length of the garden by the garden wall. The slabs had been removed from the top half of the garden, right at the start, to create our cottage border, but the solid concrete path remained, and has now been incorporated into the gardens designs, as an alternative route round the garden. A gravel path links the concrete path to the Cottage Garden beyond the trellis fence, and has been continued to cut through the Grass border. As the border is so long, with paths either side, I thought it would be nice to link the two paths, creating a path through the planting, to “get up close and personal” with the plants, in particular the oh so tactile grasses. In actual fact, at this time of the summer, it is probably a bit too “close and personal”! More like cutting through the undergrowth – not an easy route!

You can also make out our homemade bench. Two metal gabions, filled with empty wine bottles, and a scaffolding plank across the top. We had fun making that! It’s a lovely, hot sunny spot to sit in, in good weather (with a glass of wine, of course!) Several rusty artefacts have also found their way there, their colouring blending in well with the colour scheme here.

The border is, in actual fact, a combination of three colour-themed borders, merged together.

Firstly, the Chocolate-orange border is the one furthest away in the photo.

Chocolate-orange Border

Chocolate-orange Border

The border is backed by the shrub, Cotinus “Grace”, with its gorgeous, chocolatey leaves. It needs to be hard pruned every spring to maintain its size, as it can grow quite large, but this way it produces improved leaves. Akebia quinata, the chocolate vine, clambers over the archway. The orange flowers here are Helenium “Moorheim Beauty”, and the remnants of flowers and seed heads of Crocosmia “Lucifer”. The spires you see, are the dead flower spikes of Digitalis parvifola. Geums and Kniphofia continue providing more orange elements. The grasses here are Stipa gigantea, the bronze Carex buchananii and Miscanthus “Ferner Osten”, with its wonderful chocolate/wine plumes.

Miscanthus "Ferner Osten" with Cotinus "Grace"

Miscanthus “Ferner Osten” with Cotinus “Grace”

The central section is the Wine border.

Wine Border

Wine Border

Here, the colour scheme is of deep winey reds, with Persicaria amplexicaulis “Firetail”, Sedum, Knautia macedonia, Sanguisorba menziesii and the annual self-seeder, Atriplex hortensis rubra all set off with the silver Artemisia ludoviciana, and pink Echinacea purpurea. The grasses here are the upright Calamagrostis “Overdam”, the ethereal Molinia “Transparent” and the silvery fountain that is Miscanthus “Morning Light”.

The Grass Border finishes (or starts, depending on how you look at it!) with the Gold border, in shades of golden yellow contrasting with blues and purples.

Gold Border

Gold Border

The gold is provided mainly by the flowers of Fennel and of an unknown perennial Helianthus. At the back of the border, the steely blue orbs of globe thistle, Echinops ritro, tower over 6 ft tall. Thalictrum delavayi, with its lilac froth of flowers blends well with the fennel, creating a very hazy scene, punctuated by spots of purple provided by Phlox “Nicky”. Aster x frikartii “Monch”, is yet to add its lilac flowers to the froth. Elsewhere, there are the blue spires of Perovskia, Veronica, and, earlier, Salvia, with added gold shades from an orange Hemerocallis. Another Calamagrostis, the green “Karl Foerster”, repeats the punctuation provided by the previous silver edged “Overdam” and, sadly, a Melica Atropurpurea, with its beautiful purple plumes, struggles to break through.

You may also have noticed popping up, the purple flower heads of Verbena bonariensis, allowed to self seed throughout the whole border, its repetition linking the three borders together.

And when this border has finished its flowering, it’s still not over. Flowers have been chosen, that have interesting seed heads and shapes, to remain with the dead grasses, giving texture and interest into autumn, and hopefully winter, when frost creates yet another beautiful picture.

There you have it! A riot of colour! Hope you like it!


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Your download of fairy-tail.deskthemepack will start in 5 seconds …

If your download does not start click here to start the download fairy-tail.deskthemepack

How to install theme

  • Save the theme in a preferred folder on your computer
  • Double-click on the deskthemepack file and it would be installed on your Windows PC
  • After installation open personalization control panel for additional theme settings
  • Enjoy your favorite theme
  • fairy-tail.deskthemepack can be used in Windows 10 / Windows 8 (8.1)
  • Fairy Tail Theme contains 24 HD walpappers

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The Wedding Toast

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[FCNYC] OFFER: Wedding Toast; Brooklyn, 11218

April 2, 2013  5:27 AM.                                                                                Mark

Offering a Wedding Toast in very good condition. Barely used. Just once and it was no one you know.

It is spring. The wedding season is upon us. Love is in the air and your best friend has thoughtlessly asked you to provide the toast. Fear not! I am offering this ever so slightly used toast. Please feel free to edit, change names etc., as needs be. If you are really backed up I can give the toast personally in exchange for yummy hors d’oeuvres.

Good evening everyone, I’d like to say a few words about the happy couple but, sorry to say, I am not a man of few words.

I hope you are all….uh  drunk. If not, now may be a good time to reconsider your sobriety and to help you along let’s start with a toast. Yes, I know what your thinking. You’re thinking that a toast hardly ever starts with a toast but I say damn the rule makers and their beady little eyes with the whites all……….white. So let us start with a toast… pretty flowers.

You know it’s not every day that I get asked to stand up and make an ass of myself. I mean, ordinarily I do it without any prompting at all. I just volunteer for the position.

Now, when I think of Jean and Clem, I think the same things that everyone else thinks. My but they’re tall……. And pretty…… And smell nice. But that’s not the half of it. They are also good and decent people. And that is a rare enough quality to deserve……. another toast!

While this is not a World Wrestling Federation sanctioned event, at least not yet, it seems to me that Love is like wrestling. In fact, when love is really good it actually is wrestling.

So let’s have a look at the contestants. In this corner, weighing in at a feathery, oh, I don’t know, 11 pounds we have “The Cat Woman” Lean Jean Shin.

Let’s take a look at her. A person could look at Jean for a long time and it would be time well spent. Fiercely loyal, obsessively organized and ridiculously responsible she is not a contestant to be toyed with.

Blessed with a voice like blue fog and a mind like a train whistle she can easily overwhelm the unprepared opponent. In the ring she has a sure sense of where she is, if not necessarily how she got there.

Of course like any woman Jean exudes a quiet reserve that promises swift punishment for any infraction of the ever changing rulebook.

But hey, that is a good quality in a wife and a great quality in a mother.

In the other corner weighing in at a respectable oh, I don’t know, 19 pounds, we have that crazy cocktail himself “The Mighty Mixer”, Duke Clement.

Fiercely loyal, somewhat organized and occasionally responsible he is clearly a challenger to be toyed with. When I think of Clem a lot of things come to mind but wrestling isn’t one of them.

Blessed with a mind like cotton candy and a voice like Barry White on helium, Clem charms his opponents, leaving them hopelessly confused but strangely cheerful. In the ring Clem has no idea where he is but hey, it looks like a good place to throw a party.

Like most men, Clem doesn’t know where the hell the rule book is or even how to read it.

But hey, that is a good quality in a husband and a great quality in a father.

So these are the contestants. This match, this union, of brains and beauty, love and companionship promises us the most important thing that life has to offer:

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Duct Tape

A man, A mouse, A dog, A house

About a week ago I saw a mouse in the kitchen. Actually, the dog and I both saw it. The mouse ran out from under the stove, zipped across the floor and under the dish washer. The dog looked up from her food dish and tracked the intruder with her eyes. Then she looked up at me to confirm that we had seen something. Satisfied with whatever she saw in my face she put her head back down in her bowl.

I got out a bunch of glue traps and figured I’d have it all wrapped up by morning. Morning came; nothing. And the next and the next. Ok, so these critters come in from the garden now and then; it’s been another unusually warm winter so maybe it slipped back under the door and returned to the wilds of Brooklyn. Having mentally set the mouse outside for the moment, I am left to wonder: How long do we call something unusual that seems to happen every year?

Days pass and last night my little guy and I are in the living room, sitting on the couch, working on his math homework. He takes a break to get a snack which is something he does about every twenty minutes, pretty much ’round the clock. He returns from the kitchen and says:

“Dad, there’s a lizard in the kitchen.”

My little guy is kind of known for attaching the wrong word to things but I suppose it is in the realm of possibility that someone’s lizard has wandered in. Still, it seems like an unlikely coincidence. I ask him where he saw it, just to confirm what I already know.

“It’s right under the thing with the numbers.”

There is only one thing with numbers in the kitchen and it’s the stove clock. Uh oh! That doesn’t confirm what I know. I’m still thinking floor. I can feel the paradigm shifting; it’s making me a little bit queasy. The laissez-faire approach isn’t going to work. I’m going to have to kill something.

“There’s a lizard in the kitchen? Is it possible he saw a lizard?”

Oop, it’s The Wife. Her paradigm is shifting all over the place.

This needs to be handled gingerly. She hates rodents of any kind. She also hates lizards. And amphibians. She’s not altogether too fond of birds either. Or fish. Insects, of course. Come to think of it, she’s shown a diminishing interest in children and the vast majority of adults too. She likes me and the dog. The dog and I are about on an even footing; we are locked in a battle for her affection. If I’m the bearer of bad news the wife is gonna freak and the dog is gonna rule, at least for a minute. Thankfully I can pretty much count on the dog to soil the rug at regular intervals but let’s face it, this is also a test of my manliness. And while ordinarily I am an excellent test taker, manliness may not be my strongest subject. Forced to choose sides along the hunter-gatherer divide, I would much rather gather. You don’t even need to force me; I like it better there. It’s like treasure hunting for snacks. Sure I could hunt for my meat if I had to but the fact is, I prefer to do my hunting with a fork. At Peter Luger’s or Spark’s; Smith & Wollensky or The Capital Grille; Five Guys Burgers & Fries or even a nice, store bought pemmican. The only thing I’m really able to kill with any efficiency is time. But that’s not gonna put Chateaubriand on the table or rid me of Stuart Little here.

I’m a product of urban civilization; highly evolved with a specialized skill-set but subject to bouts of the heebie-jeebies. Now it’s time to bring that skill-set to bear on this mouse. My specialty is heavy construction and I’m not sure how cranes, gas powered tools and concrete are going to help me sort this out but I feel certain they will.

“Okay pal, show me where you saw the lizard.”

Off to the kitchen and …… look at that; there’s a mouse on the stove top. We make eye contact and he’s into the heat vent for the oven, directly below the clock. Oh, this is gonna be a snap. Out with the glue traps again, I surround the vents and fire up the oven. In a few minutes the heat will drive the mouse out of the vents onto the traps and voila, mouse on the half shell. Until then I get back to parsing word problems with my young Einstein.

Okay, so let’s see:

Sheena needs to bake 55 cookies for her sleepover. She has already baked 21 cookies.

How long before Sheena realizes that cookies are loaded with refined sugar

and saturated fats and that diabetes is epidemic in her demographic?

It’s the new, New Math. I’m just here for moral support.

I return to the kitchen a little while later to collect my prey and there he is scampering across the counter seeking cover behind the fruit bowl. How is that possible? Really, it isn’t. It’s Inconceivable! He was completely surrounded by space age adhesive. I don’t have time to figure it out. He’s cornered and cowering and therefore at his most dangerous. His lightening speed, his barely discernible claws and somewhat bucked teeth are nothing to mess around with. I know! I saw that first Alien movie. Ferocious things come in small packages that come blasting out of your chest cavity. He’s capable of anything and I need to carefully guard my internal organs and major arteries as well as be ready for a screaming retreat if he turns and attacks.

And that’s the problem. What I want to do is stand up on a chair and shriek like a little girl. Mice give me the willies. I think it’s the hairless tail. But I’m gonna be no ones hero up on that chair. So what I’m gonna do is release the inner predator. Ok, I’ve released the inner predator and he doesn’t want to come out. Mice give him the willies too. I’m gonna have to go in there and drag his sorry predatory ass out and apply a little shame and encouragement. That done, I am now ready for battle. In his corner, a half ounce of mouse. Possibly ferocious. You can never tell, you know? In my corner, 155 pounds of Hebrew National Bologna. Unquestionably loyal. Questionably brave. Ferocious? I guess you never know until you’re cornered but all the evidence points somewhere west of fearsome; closer I think, to squeamish and reckless. You work with what you’ve got.

I rearrange the glue traps at the end of the counter, blocking his way back to the stove. I rustle the fruit bowl and he’s off again and…. I don’t believe it! He has somehow made it tiptoeing at high speed (my goodness they’re fast) across the traps on their plastic rims? Is that what I saw? Unbelievable! Inconceivable!

He crosses the stove to the counter on the far side and squeezes into the alcove that holds the microwave. I remember when microwaves first came out. If I had one of those beauties, before the shielding was more or less perfected, I could have turned the microwave to high and nuked him like one of those little pink potatoes. Just another drawback of man’s mastery over nature I suppose.

The important thing is, he’s cornered. The problem is I can’t get at him. Once again I surround the area with glue traps but I’m losing confidence. I need to flush him out and force him onto a trap. But if I walk away I know he will somehow make good his escape. Time to call in my helpmate. By now she’s upstairs in bed with the dog warming her feet. I call her cell phone from my cell phone so as not to arouse suspicion or curiosity from the kids. I don’t need them to see either possible outcome. The one where I waste the City Mouse of storybook fame or the one where the helpless little creature kicks my ass.

Hi Honey. Are you two cozy up there?

That’s nice.

Could you please bring me

The Duct Tape and Some Bleach

Oh Yeah!

Gonna bring down some Trench Warfare on his furry little ass!

In my one hand, I am armed with Duct Tape; the indispensable tool of homeowners, jerry-riggers and paranoid survivalists (is there any other kind?) the world over.

In my other hand, household bleach. Sodium Hypochlorite (NaClO) 5.25%, the A-list antimicrobial pesticide and corrosive. Gas Attack! Cruel but effective.

I tape the sides of the microwave to the wall, I tape the bottom to the counter, I cover the top. There is a single opening, with a large glue trap in front of it. Pop the top on the bleach, a half cup down behind the microwave and there he is dancing across the glue trap on his extended little claws. He’s on the counter, clear of the trap. He sees me and jets right back the way he came, picking ninja style, like he’s walking on water. Worse yet, like he’s walking on pavement. It’s Inconceivable. If I so much as look at one of those traps it sticks to my elbow.

On reflection, these many days later, it occurs to me that this little creature, with its awesome will to survive and its Fred Astaire like dance moves, might have made a fine little pet. But that is today. Last week my course was set. I was determined to follow it through to its hopefully bloodless conclusion.

For House & Family!

To paraphrase an old saying, if you can’t bring the mouse to the trap, you must bring the trap to the mouse. I seal the entire microwave to the surrounding wall and counter after dumping more bleach. It’s unconditional warfare now. People used to do this to each other so there’s a lot of historical evidence as to its efficaciousness.

Ok so that’s a wrap. I wash up and go to bed figuring to dispose of the mortal remains before I go to work and before anyone gets up tomorrow morning.

Rise and shine and let’s go see the carnage. Pull the tape, slowly pull the microwave out of its niche; it’s creepy, you know. Dead things are creepy. And mice give me the willies. I am facing down a case of the creeping willies here.

What is this? No mouse? Just an empty bag of Gummi-bears? You know, I was wondering where those got off to. So this is where the kids hide the evidence. Only the evidence isn’t so empty. Theres a live tail sticking out. It’s Inconceivable!

Thats it! I’ve had enough! I cover the bag with a bleach soaked dish cloth and an oven mitt to prevent escape and I start punching. This is maddening! It’s an outrage! I’m all juiced up with disgust and regret but the inner predator is out and he’s pissed.

I want it to be over but nothing is going to be easy about this one. No tidy package to slip into a bag and forget about. This will be a killing. In cold blood. Blunt force trauma. I’m shooting for the stars. Infinity and beyond.

I’d like to tell you it ended there but it didn’t. I went for the broom stick. Like an overhand pool cue I jab at the offending mass with the handle. One mouse in the corner pocket.

I read somewhere that mice have no bones. The whole thing is built on cartilage. But nowhere have I read that they have no internal organs. I pull back the dish cloth and I’m detecting life. It’s Inconceivable! I’m beginning to think that word does not mean what I think it means.

With my bare hands, I wrap the whole thing up in the bleach soaked dishcloth and pick up where I started off. Duct tape. I wrap the whole thing up like a homemade baseball and I am done. That was brutal. I kicked a rat to death at work not long ago but this was more hand to hand. More intimate.

Later, from work, I texted my wife:

The Mousey has left the Housey

 She wrote back:

Somehow “Thanks” does not seem like thanks enough. I think I have Post Traumatic Mouse Disorder. I’m still a little amped up.

I text her back:

It was a mighty battle

Her return text:

My Hero!

Ah, sweet victory!

Move over Rover.

The man of the house is coming home.

Sexy Shorts

It has been suggested to me that my oeuvre does not contain enough sex. I thought oeuvre was French for egg. I became concerned because I didn’t know how to fold that into an erotic situation. I suddenly became worried that everybody knew something about sex that had just completely got below my radar. Then I learned that oeuvre is French for work and it started to make a little more sense.

Prurient thoughts are not foreign to me. Or anyone else for that matter. Be that as it may, I wish the suggestion for sexier content had not come from my 77 year old mother. It’s a little awkward. Everyones parents are sexual creatures but who wants to dwell on that? Still, a person always wants to please their mom.

My maternal grandparents were married for more than fifty years. They met on the telephone. My grandfather was a telephone switchboard operator at City Hall in Philadelphia. This was way back when there were switchboards and operators. My grandmother was calling City Hall on some forgotten mission. This was way back when you could call City Hall. She liked the sound of his voice. They met, had premarital sex and married shortly before the birth of my uncle Gibby.

My grandmother once announced, half complaining, half teasing and entirely without discretion, that my grandfather couldn’t really do “it” anymore. She could be tactless. After his third or fourth heart attack I guess he just couldn’t manage the necessary blood pressure but he was an even tempered man, if you discount the life long gambling binges. His response was “I’ve been fucking for more than 50 years. You’ll see. When you get to be my age, it’s not that big a deal.”

Thirty years after the birth of my uncle, my father caught site of my mother wearing white short shorts, no bra and a tight t-shirt. They were married, after an unusually affectionate courtship, not long before my sister was born. Not long at all.

I can remember waking to the sounds of them talking and laughing. My room was down the hall from theirs. I couldn’t make out the conversation, muffled as it was by doors and blankets on both ends but laughter is laughter. It had all the sounds of happiness and intimacy. Needless to say the divorce, though many years later, came as a surprise but their laughter is still at my core. They lost it for a time but I will always carry it. I have long considered it my most important memory.

My wife is a beautiful, mixed-race black woman. As the kids like to say, “Dad, you’re the only white person in our family.” We kissed at a Halloween party when she was twelve. I had just turned fourteen. It didn’t go anywhere. Where was it going to go at that age? We met again when she was nineteen. It was immediate and overpowering but we were young. We struggled with commitment until marriage and have never turned back since that day. She has a lovely caboose that has grown a bit over the last few years. As love would have it my tastes have changed along with her contours.

We are in our middle years and one day is very much like the next.

It’s the end of the day. The boys are warm and quiet in their beds. A load of laundry is tumbling in the tropical heat of the dryer. Plates and cups are being soaked in the scalding waters of the dishwasher. I shower and get under the covers to read and warm the bed for her, propped up a little by soft pillows. She bathes long. A displaced marine mammal from somewhere near the equator, she is in repose, submerged in the placid, steaming lagoon of our bathtub; grateful for a reprieve from the thin air. She comes to bed, her skin still warm and damp. She lays on her side, her head resting on my chest, one leg entwined with mine. We sleep together and we depart for sleep together. The lights are out and our breathing falls into harmony. I rest my hand on her hip. We exchange a few words of love talk and my hand slips down and around to her lower back. I stroke her soft backside. It’s very quiet. Then the whisper, “I want to snuggle.” It’s not our code. It’s not a secret invitation. It’s our little guy. We didn’t hear his soft approach. He’s ready for love.


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4 x 500ml Organic Juices Daily
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Daily Skin & Hair Care
Daily Supplements
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Toddington - Shared Bathroom

Gretton - Shared Bathroom

Isbourne - Wet Room

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Includes accommodation, full DNE protocol and all workshops, excludes additional treatments.

4 Day Special Broadway & Sudeley
Toddington & Gretton
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If you own a dog, there is a friendly kennels half a mile down the road from our detox centre.
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What Is Blogging? How to Start a Money Making Blog Successfully?

What Is Blogging? How to Start a Money Making Blog Successfully?

How to Start Money Making Blog

Imagine, if you could vacation on an exotic island, and still make money? Imagine if you could spend time with your children, and still make money? Imagine, if you could be sleeping, and still be making money?

Sounds impossible? It actually isn’t. This is possible by starting a simple, but effective blogs.

Take another one. Imagine you had a great team in sales, which could also work as your marketing team, and your PR team – all of this, round the clock. 24 x 7. Irrespective of whether you are paying attention, or not. Sounds impossible? It actually isn’t.

By now, you might be completely puzzled, as to how any of these are even distant possibilities. As a matter of fact, they are. The one word answer is – blogging. Business blogging or blogging for business can be your gateway to passive income, your personalized marketing channel, your very own sales funnel and your own PR tool, all at the same time. Blogging is one of the most loosely used terms, with a huge number of ‘experts’ telling you how to do it. It still remains to be one of the most overheard but underused tools for businesses.

Before heading towards how to start a money making blog, we need to know why do we need a bog? So here are 5 reasons why you need to start blogging?

1. It helps you build your brand

Be it social media or a search engine. People are looking for trustworthy businesses providing solutions to their problems. By blogging extensively about the solutions you are providing to the specific problems of your consumers, you are building your brand.

When finely crafted and well research blog posts are found by readers, they are shared on social media and that is how you earn the brownie points of word of mouth.

Recommended Read: Micro-Influencers Powerful Resources To Boost Your Brand

Not only this, blogging helps you establish your expertise in your field. Once people start seeing the solutions to your problems, even if they do not buy your product/service, they will remember you as a genuine problem solver, an expert.

2. It helps you generate new business

Once your brand has been built, that is, the consumer relates your name to a certain set of positive qualities; your blogs are ready to serve as the fundamentals to generating new business.

You can extensively blog about your products, and how they solve real-world problems. Using the required number of keywords and good enough promotion, your content will reach out to people who are looking for the solutions.

That is it. The solution meets a problem, and you generate new business.

3. It brings traffic to your website

You may argue, not all your blog readers tend to get converted into business prospects. Accepted, but can you guarantee, none of them will ever convert to future business? Future is uncertain.

traffic to website

A trustworthy blog post helps you being remembered as a coveted expert in the field, to whose opinion, people can turn to in case of facing a problem. So, all the traffic your blogs generate might not bring leads.

That said it gets you the correct number of people reading your blog, listening to your story. And that, ultimately, increases your chances of being able to generate business in the future.

4. It gives you a greater control as a marketer

You might choose PPC or paid Social Media ads, or influencers. Any popular marketing medium you pick up is a channel owned by someone else.

greater control as a marketer

Someone, whom you pay to put your message through, the best part about blogging, is along with the creation of content and carrying your marketing message, it helps you build your own marketing channel on which you have absolute control.

Recommended Read: Google Analytics Reports All Marketers Need to Know

5. It helps you understand your consumers

Once you become a seasoned blogger, you will start tracking the performance of your blogs and also work upon greater research for topics to write about. This will help you understand, which blogs are helping your consumers and what are your consumers exactly looking for.

understand your consumers

Ultimately, all of this will generate data for you to understand the persona of your readers, who might ultimately turn into your consumers.

Business blogging can widely translate into two meanings:

  1. You have a blog for your business – You run a business, where blogging is not your primary business. In this case, blogging serves as a platform to support the agenda of your business.
  2. You want a business out of your blog – You are willing to monetize your blog into becoming a source of income, a business itself.

In any of the cases, you will be able to enjoy the above-stated benefits and many others. The best scenario can be, when you start with the part a, and ultimately reach to part b.

So, this was simple restating of the underlying benefits of blogging. The real challenge is, how do start a blog worth reading? Most of the places on the internet will suggest you – just start writing, quality content finds its readers, with time your blog will grow, blah blahblah. This is not just misleading; it’s malicious and forms nothing but a useless dent in your resources (time and money).

Recommended Read: Four Things I Learned in Four Years of Blogging

There are as many as blogs on the internet, as you can think of. Wordpress adds 50,000 websites daily; Tumblr has more than 375 million blogging accounts on its network. Now, if you think simply writing would get you noticed amongst this humongous crowd of blogs, you are simply being naïve!

1. Choose a blogging platform

There are so many blogging platforms available, that you may spend hours and hours just researching on each one of them, and yet end up being confused. Here is everything you require, to save yourself from the trouble:

WordPress runs in two dimensions – and offers a free blogging platform. That said, don’t get lured by it. If you sign up for this:

  1. You will not be able to monetize your blog since you cannot run ads.
  2. You will have a tacky and unmarketable address, something along the lines of Not only is it too long, it does not put your brand in the limelight.
  3. You cannot expect a reliable customer service. Since it is a free service, there will not be an effective resolution to all your queries. In fact, many bloggers have woke up and found that their entire “free blog” is missing and there is no one to answer!

It is ideal, only if you want to practice some writing; but, even for that, you have better options available.

On the other hand, you have, the real deal! definitely powers a majority of the blogs across the internet. Why you should be using it:

  1. It has tons of functionalities and plug-ins available.
  2. The user interface is very lucid. If you know what you want, you can have your website running in minutes.
  3. It has a very lively community worldwide. This helps you get new ideas and updates very easily. You can always go out a research on what are the ongoing trends for your business vertical amongst other similar users.

Medium is one of the largest blogging platforms. It is simply a collective of writers and content creators, who get to work on the same UI/UX and can produce their content for a worldwide audience.

Here is how it works:

  1. After signing up for Medium, you get to write on any topic you wish to write upon. That said, there are no blog designs available. You only get to choose from some fonts and typefaces.
  2. You can opt to choose this only if you are starting your blogging/writer’s journey and want to get noticed. Medium has a large base of subscribers and writers, and hence it can help you promote your individual name as a writer very effectively.

3. Blogger and Tumblr:

They are not same but are very similar. Both of them have an archaic age-old look and feel. They will be of use only if:

  1. You are looking for a free hobbyist microblog.
  2. If you are not willing to turn your blog into a business project, you can go ahead with any of these.
  3. It has very limited features. Though that might be a limitation for many, it actually makes the set up fairly easy.

There are other options available as well:

Ghost: It is a blogging set up software with built-in tech for SEO and Social Media. In short, it is a simpler version of an already simple

Squarespace: It is a website building tool that helps you launch blogs, business websites, and even ecommerce sites. It has a subscription-based model and also offers a handful of great plugins. That said, it can get expensive if you keep on adding functionalities to your monthly subscription.

Wix: If you do not want a ton of features and are looking for a simple, decent looking blog, you can go ahead with Wix. Wix is a rather simplified version of Squarespace. It offers more than 500 designs to choose from, but has limited features available, since it is focused on building websites and not specifically blogs.

Hence, the conclusion being – use a account for your blogging. You may opt for any of the other paid blogging services providers, but definitely stands out to be the most preferred one, because:

  1. Numerous themes to choose from.
  2. It gives you absolute control of your content, brand, and blog.
  3. It is fairly easy to use and has great customer support (along with an extensive forum).
  4. It is highly reliable, as 28% of websites on the internet are powered by Wordpress.

2. Choose a hosting platform

In the beginning, you can do with a free hosting service provided by many blogging websites. That said, once you grow your blog you will require additional space for photos, content, themes, plugins and most important images on your blog. For this, it is highly advised, that you have you use a hosting platform which can host your blog for you.

Pretty much like website and blog building platforms, there are many hosting platforms available as well. Before you go on hunting for the best web hosting services, answer the following questions:

  1. Why are you setting up the website/blog?
  2. Do you want to scale it up on a larger basis?
  3. How much are you willing to spend months in running the website?
  4. How much traffic are you targeting?
  5. Will your website need any special software/plugins?

Answering these questions will help you know the exact requirements you have. Once you know your exact requirements, you can choose your ideal web hosting service.

For the initial phase, especially if this is your first website, it is highly recommended that you go for a shared hosting plan. A shared hosting plan will do just the thing you need for now: give you the storage space from a professional service and that too at minimal costs. Once you know that you want to scale your website, you can always have a dedicated hosting service for yourself.

There are many hosting services to choose from - BlueHost, GoDaddy, and much more.  You should look for the following particulars, before choosing a hosting service provider:

  1. What do they offer in their basic plan?
  2. What is the uptime they guarantee?
  3. What is the upgrading cost?
  4. What are the maximum limits of your plan?

You can easily find a plan under $10 if you do not choose a complex plan with customs requirements such as the ones for e-commerce websites or the ones used for running websites on the same server.

3. Choosing a domain name

This is the point, where you start building your brand. A domain name is how your blog will be remembered. Your domain name has to check in multiple checkboxes, in order to be good enough for turning into a brand:

  1. Do not use generic words: might have been a great domain name in 2004 when Facebook was yet to take over the internet. That said, if you want to turn your domain name into a brand, try using a more creative domain name that defines what your products and services standby. You can use tools like to find a suitable domain name.
  2. Do some market research: As creative as it should be, your domain name has to be in parity with the keywords your prospective consumers are typing to find a solution to their problems. Coming as close as you can to this solution or finding a term that defines your product/service/offering. This will be in line with and affect Search Engine results, and hence should be done carefully.

Names With Domains

For instance,, an Indian real estate portal, has very well used its unique offering into a domain name and ultimately is building a brand over it. The website ensures that the users can have a look at real estate properties without going through the hassle of a broker, and that is exactly the promise provided by the domain name.

  1. Ensure there are no numbers, punctuation marks and spelling errors: The entire motive is to make your domain name easily remembered. For this, keeping it simple plays the trick. And hence, ensure that you are not making it too complex to type, or too difficult to remember.
  2. Look into any copyright infringements: Many domain names are already taken or registered under copyright laws of other users. Hence, before strategizing around your domain name, look into a website like GoDaddy, where you can search for domain name availability. Also, search through Social Media in order to see the similarities with your domain name, and about to be a brand name. To start with, you can buy the domain names that include misspellings and similar names, as done by many brands. For instance, and, both will lead you to the same page run by Google.
  3. Take care of the extension: There are many fancy extensions available today such as .biz, .me, .co, .ooo and so on. That said, the old world charm of .com remains as it is. The reasons being, first and foremost, it is the easiest to remember and type; the second being, it is more reliable for both the website owner and the visitor.

4. Selecting a theme for your blog

Technically, this step should come after you have chosen your topic of blogging. This is because; your theme has to be in parity with your content.

theme for your blog

The dilemma you might face (again!) is paid vs. free themes. While using Wordpress, you will definitely find many tempting themes. That said, similar to using over, you need to understand the gimmicks of free themes and choose the paid ones, looking at your needs.

You might face one of the below problems, after choosing a free theme:

  1. Many of them are simply abandoned, without intimating the users.
  2. Customer support is next to none; since, best you may know is, you might be using a theme created by a bored hobbyist, who doesn’t care what happens to your business.
  3. There is hardly any updating done.

Hence, usually, it is recommended to use one of the paid themes. While buying a theme, ensure that you see the following basics:

  1. The theme is in parity with your content: You cannot have a theme of luxurious leather closets if all you are talking about is web development!
  2. The theme is rated very well on the platform: It simply increases the reliability of the theme.
  3. It is responsive on different user platforms: Whether it is mobile, desktop or tablet, the theme should be responsive to any possible device. These things are usually provided in the description.
  4. It is SEO friendly: For starters, it might be difficult for you as a beginner to understand the robustness of a themes HTML code. That said, reliable developers providing Premium Wordpress themes would state in the description whether their theme is SEO friendly. Go for such themes.
  5. Ensuring the theme developer provides enough customer support.
  6. Plug in and browser compatibility: A theme should be able to provide compatibility to maximum popular plugins. Plugins are various tools that you download and install on your Wordpress theme, in order to add features. Adding to this, the theme should be easily viewable (and look the same) in all browsers such as Chrome, Explorer or Safari.

It might be a tiresome experience to browse through themes while starting your blog. You can simply have a look at these compilations, and choose a theme that suits your purpose - 22 Best Free WordPress Business Themes, 61 Best Business WordPress Themes 2017 and 29 Best Corporate WordPress Themes for Your Business (2017).

Finally, once you have set up these things, you need to look into the most important aspect of your blog – the Content. You may tick all the boxes the above-given points talk about, but if your content is not promising enough, or solving real-world problems, it will all go in vain. At the same time, if you have great content in place, but don’t look into the above-given matters, your content will not be able to perform at its optimal levels. Hence, it is of paramount importance, to ensure that your content is reliable, relevant and connecting enough for your readers and about to be consumers.

Here’s how to do it:

1. Define the purpose of your blog:

Before even starting, you need to be crystal clear about the exact purpose of your blog. Your blog might be able to do multiple things at a time, but which one is the most important for you? Once you have known, you will have a direction for your content.

2. Understand who you are writing for:

You have to know, who you are talking to. This will help you decide the tone of your content and ultimately the kind of content your users want. Hubspot has very well worked on the Buyer Persona philosophy that helps you understand your prospective buyers are and what they might be looking for. Once you have understood this, all you need to do is, provide solutions to your Buyer Persona’s problems.

3. What kind of posts are you about to create:

There are various types of content posts. The most famous one (the ones which go ‘viral’) usually are – how to posts, curated content posts, list posts, newsjacking posts and Slideshare presentation posts. Since you have understood, who your ideal readers might be, you will know what kind of content will work for them.

4. Competition and Keywords:

Now that you know, what your users are looking for, try looking into the fact – who all are providing solutions to these problems. What kind of content and following is controlled by your competition? No one is asking you to simply replicate it; but, this will decrease the learning curve and make you more efficient.

Recommended Read: Tips for Finding Profitable Keywords for Your Business

Also, look into the kind of language used by your Buyer Personas. Try understanding their slangs, and most importantly their keywords. Keywords will prove to be the broad themes as well as specific points of your blogs and will help your content be more discoverable and relevant.

5. Define your performance metrics:

You have to understand, what kind of content is working. And in order to understand that, you will have to understand what is the exact meaning of ‘working’. Quality is always better than quantity, and hence you will have to know which blog posts are giving you conversions, against the mere number of posts you are publishing.

Always look for conversions, instead of looking for traffic. Conversions will give you direct business, whereas traffic will simply hype the value of your blog.

6. Formulate a Content Calendar:

A content calendar is a document where you strategize the frequency and date of producing the posts. This will help you stay in line with your initial motive and also help you stay disciplined with the routine of posting. You will have to determine, based on your researched Buyer Personas, what frequency of content will work for your prospective customers.

7. A promotion strategy has to be in place:

Initially, you might not look into this. But with time, you will have to outgrow your personal contact list and ensure that your content is reaching out to your relevant audience because they will be the ones bringing your business. You may use Social Media, Influencers, Email Marketing, Paid Ads and many of the other mediums to promote your content.

If you feel skeptical about the overall idea of promoting content, just remember, there are tons of blogs with decent content; the ones which really are able to bring business, are the ones that are able to reach out to the correct audience.

Blogging is not a secondary strategy, but a powerful tool that can assist the entire business. Like all good things, it takes its own time to bring results. That said, every blog piece, whether working according to your performance metric or not, will give you data about your prospective consumers; data, which will help you, understand your customers and your business better.

Happy Blogging!

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  1. Gareth Griffiths

    November 16, 2017at5:18 am

    Great article, Sawaram. 🙂

    However, you’ve gotten confused and mixed up WordPress and is the hosting service. is where you go to download WordPress.

  2. Jack

    December 30, 2017at12:14 pm

    Ԝhenever you elect to fгeelance, additionally, you will be in command of your own schedule. Instеad of being bound tο the 9-to-five work day of most lаw workplaces, both your each day schedule and ｙour cаlendаг as a whole can be largely up to you. Whether or not it is advisablｅ take time without work, ⲟr whether you wish tо takе on a heavier ᴡorkload, freеlancing will meet your needs.

    • Sam Makad

      December 30, 2017at1:05 pm

      Thank you Jack!

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Tag Archives: cabbage rolls

Our Family’s Secret Cabbage Roll Recipe

Every family, especially here in Winnipeg – a diverse multicultural city, seems to have a different way of creating their family’s favourite cabbage roll recipe, especially for the holidays. The secret of ours is the Sour Cabbage. OK, well it’s not really ‘so’ secret.

I grew up in Regina, and just outside the city is the beautiful Lumsden Valley full of great market gardens. Kissel’s Cabbage is based there, and they are known for their sour cabbage product. They supply the majority of that bagged greeny-grey cabbage (and sauerkraut) that you see in the produce section of grocery stores across Western Canada. I see that they even ship to Minnesota.

So for my niece’s who always wanted to know how to make Grandma’s Cabbage Rolls, here’s the recipe… it’s super easy and fast. You don’t have to wait until Christmas to make them, as they are great on any cold, winter day!

Cabbage Roll Collage

This is really a very simple recipe, and it’s a million times better if you make them fresh and eat the whole batch. I’m not a fan of freezing these, but my Mom used to always make an extra big pot full of them and place the pot and everything into the freezer. She’d pull them out when my Dad’s friend Vic came to town unexpectedly, as these were his favourite.

The Not-So-Secret Coleshaw Cabbage Rolls

1 lb. Ground Pork

1 lb. Ground Beef

1 cup Long Grain Rice, uncooked

1 can Diced Tomatoes (796mL)

1 tsp. Sea Salt

1 tsp. Black Pepper, ground

1 head Sour Cabbage

1. Mix all the ingredients together, except the cabbage.

2. Core the sour cabbage, and carefully remove the individual leaves.

Remember the outside leaves make the bigger cabbage rolls – those are my favourite.

3. Place a heaping tablespoon of filling on the cabbage leaf in the middle
but closer to the end of the leaf with the thick vein.

There is a tricky balance between creating a nice, full cabbage roll and overfilling the leaf, so be generous with caution.

4. Fold the edge with the thick vein over the filling and roll once.

5. Fold in each of the side of the cabbage leaf and continue to roll the filling up tightly.

Sometimes you may need to poke the corners of the roll into the filling.

6. Place the finished roll in the bottom of a large soup pot with the open edge
facing down, this will help to ‘seal’ the seam.

7. Continue to fill your pot with rolls, laying them tightly side-by-side, and then
layering them to the top edge of the pot.

8. Once your pot is filled to capacity, top the rolls with tap water until
they are all covered with liquid.

9. Place the pot on your stove, and bring the water to a boil on High.

10. Reduce the heat after the water comes to a boil, and continue to cook
for an hour or more on a Medium-Low setting.

11. Remove rolls carefully with a slotted spoon and serve.

This is how I "roll", I don't really eat the cabbage leaves, but I like the flavour that they impart.

This is how I “roll”, I don’t really eat the cabbage leaves, but I like the flavour that they impart.

My mama never said that I “had to” eat the cabbage. Usually I’ll eat a leaf or two, but I really just like the filling with a nice, soft white dinner bun.

TIP: The smaller clumps of leftover cabbage leaves that are hard to roll can be shredded for sauerkraut and used on Reuben Sandwiches or over Bratwurst.

Can you make this in the oven – Yes!
Can you make it in a crock pot – Sure!
My Mom actually used to make these in a Pressure Cooker.

But if you make it this way on the stove-top, you will have homemade cabbage rolls in about 90 minutes. If you make them in the morning, you can have them for lunch, and probably dinner too! The other cooking methods are fine, they just take longer, and I’m impatient.

How do you make your cabbage rolls?
Do you only make them at Christmas too?
What’s your secret ingredient?
Please share in the Comments section below.