The Blog of Ross C Brown

A long, long time ago in a blog post not so far from here, I once posted an entry discussing the merits of stockpiling anti-viral drugs on an individual basis.  Back then, the would was shook by the H5N1 Avian Influenza.  This time, it’s H1N1, or swine flu to you and me, seemingly originating from Mexico.  People are afraid, rightly so looking a some headlines particularly in the tabloids, and are turning to the internet (and worrying, to my blog) for advice on what to do now.

With the news that the World Health Organisation has increased the pandemic alert level to level four.  To put that into language which the man on the Clapham omnibus might be comfortable, a level four severity indicates “sustained human to human infection” -  a level down from levels five and six concerned with “widespread human to human infection”.

With the world sitting on the border between epidemic and pandemic the volume of visitors to my posts the subject have increased dramatically and as a result the volume of email I’ve been receiving has increased too.  Let’s tackle few of the most frequent questions I’m receiving here [...]

No, I’ve not met Ariane Sherine (blog).  But I do dream about meeting her.  And with your help, I’m gonna!  Rather simple really, she owes me a cake/tea/hot beverage and in these tough economic times the calling in of any notes of credit is necessitated.

On a serious note however, Ariane is just a lovely and admirable person.  She’s written for The Guardian’s Comment is Free portal, The Independent and countless popular television shows including My Family, Two Pints and, erm, The Story of Tracy Beaker.  She’s seems bubbly but I really want to know if there is another side to her.  I secretly think that all those pushing (dealing, if you will) comedy are cranky and/or very depressed – just look at Charlie Brooker. [...]

Signing the Official Secrets Act is a joke.  No, really!  I was thinking over the documents I signed when I started work with my current employer and one stands out as being nothing more than complete bureaucratic nonsense: the declaration of confidentiality – often referred to in popular culture as ‘signing the Official Secrets Act’. [...]

Sometimes iChat can be too honest:

Ross:
Am I just a pretentious prat?

Carol:
You are but its okay.
Your readers already know that and love you for it.

For a while now I’ve been subscribing to the online digital editions of The Guardian Newspaper and to be perfectly frank, the user experience was in needs of some extra development. Countless times have there been delays in publishing and my emails to customer services have went unanswered.

While editions were eventually posted, it was common to be still waiting well into the afternoon for the day’s paper. Sadly, if the service was ever going to work for me, the editions would have to be online before 9am otherwise I’d end up buying a physical paper copy for my daily lefty news fix. [...]