Home  >> Stories  >> The Tale Spinner #2012-52

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IN THIS ISSUE

• Pat Moore is home again after a session in hospital
• Carol Shoemaker puts some fun back into flying
• Eve Cassidy writes about recycling electronics
• Scambusters warns about the latest scams
• Zvonko Springer forwards some male blond jokes
• Sites are recommended by Barbara Wear, Bruce Galway, Carol Hansen, Catherine Nesbitt, Tom Telfer, and Tom Williamson

Pat Moore writes:

IT´S SO WONDERFUL TO BE HOME!

My daughter Diane flew home from Ottawa on November 24 when it was discovered that the stress and constant headaches from the car accident in which I was involved had caused a small stroke, and I was rushed to the hospital.

When you are in the hospital, a cat scan and MRIs are done immediately, whereas if a doctor requests them, they could take 10 days or longer, as there is such a long waiting list.

Once in the hospital, I was moved to the stroke and neurological wing, and Diane returned to Ottawa. On December 4 it was determined that I could not go home, and I would not agree to a nursing home, so the hospital suggested a "transitional" house, which is part of the regional hospital but in a separate building, until it could be determined what future treatment I would need and where I would have to go.

I was under the impression that I would be receiving the same care as I had in the hospital from the stroke team and the neurological team, but that was not the case. The transitional house turned out to be an overflow from the hospital, run as a "private for profit" auxiliary hospital, and was a nightmare. It was short staffed, and most of the time my medication arrived one to three hours late, which threw off all the good work the hospital had done on my 24/7 headache.

After discussion with my doctor, Diane brought me home on December 24, as it was decided I could take better care of myself at home. They arranged appointments with a neurologist specialist and a doctor specializing in strokes, and referred me to an acupuncture specialist regarding the continuous headaches I have had since the car accident.

Diane has arranged for a care nurse to come in once a day for a month or so, for meals to be delivered seven days a week, and for a new schedule of rehab therapy at the rehab centre to begin sometime in January or February, whenever I feel up to it.

Diane has changed her plans so she can stay with me until I see all the specialists except for two who are away until January 31. It has been wonderful to have her here and taking charge of things. We were able to have a conference call with all the family in Australia on Christmas day.

It is wonderful to be home and in my own bed with my own things, and I am so thankful.

ED. NOTE: And we are glad you are home again, Pat, and wish you a speedy recovery from all the ills occasioned by the accident.

At this time of year when many people are travelling by air, Carol Shoemaker puts some humour back into flying:

GETTING THERE IS NOT HALF THE FUN

Cessna pilot: "Tower, Cessna 12345, student pilot, I am out of fuel.

Tower: "Roger, Cessna 12345, reduce airspeed to best glide! Do you have the airfield in sight?"

Cessna: "Uh ... tower, I am on the south ramp; I just want to know where the fuel truck is."

A man telephoned an airline office in New York and asked, "How long does it take to fly to Boston?"

The clerk said, "Just a minute."

"Thank you," the man said and hung up.

A man walks up to the counter at the airport. "Can I help you?" asks the agent.

"I want a round trip ticket," says the man.

"Where to?" asks the agent.

"Right back to here."

A passenger piled his cases on the scale at an airline counter in New York and said to the ticket agent, "I´m flying to Los Angeles. I want the square case to go to Denver and the two round ones to go to Seattle."

"I´m sorry, sir, but we can´t do that," said the ticket agent.

"Why not? You did it last time!"

Air traffic controller: "Flight 1234, for noise abatement, turn right 45 degrees...."

Airline pilot: "But Centre, we are at 35,000 feet. How much noise can we make up here?"

Air Traffic controller: "Sir, have you ever heard the noise a 747 makes when it hits a 727?"

One of the airlines recently introduced a special half-fare rate for wives accompanying their husbands on business trips. Anticipating some valuable testimonials, the publicity department of the airline sent out letters to all the wives of businessmen who used the special rates, asking how they enjoyed theirtrip.

Responses are still pouring in from angry wives asking, "What trip?"

In the ARP Webbers´ Newsletter for the autumn of 2012, Eve Cassidy wrote about

RECYCLING ELECTRONICS

I suppose like many of our readers, I am steadily building up a fair amount of older computer-related equipment; indeed, it seems to fall out of all the storage cupboards in the house.

It has been in the back of my mind for quite a few months that I must really try to get rid of all the things that are not longer of any use to me.

This is all leading to the thorny question of how to dispose of all this unwanted equipment, not to mention the drawers full of different types of electronic leads, plugs, etc.

Three years ago I had the problem of selling or passing on a large colour laser printer, which was in working order except it needed a replacement print drum. As I could not justify the extra cost involved, and I no longer needed such a large and powerful machine, I looked around at how to dispose of it.

The thought of having to remove it to a local waste disposal dump seemed totally ridiculous. I phoned Epson and asked if they refurbished these machines; the answer was in the negative. In the end, I managed to sell it to a new company that was setting up their office. They were highly delighted with the purchase and I understand the printer continued to run with no problems once a replacement part was fitted.

Since July 2007 a system has been operating in the UK to take back, reuse, or treat and recycle used electrical and electronic equipment, the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive, or WEEE. This system is intended to reduce the amount of untreated waste electrical and electronic equipment going to landfill, and to ensure that is gets separately collected and dealt with properly.

As far as households are concerned, these are some of the criteria which apply to EEE waste: a householder who has EEE that´s in working order but they no longer want, and they decide to sell it or give it away; a householder who has an item of used EEE that does not work but is not obviously beyond repair, and they decide to donate it to a charity or community sector re-use refurbishment workshop; or a householder who returns EEE to a retailer under a retailer returns policy.

I am sure that I would have found this most helpful when I was trying to dispose of my laser printer. I had vaguely heard of this directive at the time, but when asking around nobody could give me any useful information.

I have now researched this a little further as I have many items to dispose of, and have found that there are quite a few companies that have set up during the intervening years. Many of these operate nationwide and some provide free collection services, complying with the WEEE directives as to the stringent rules for wiping clean any data, and the processing of any resulting hazardous waste.

Most of the businesses are described as charities, community groups, non-profit companies, or social enterprises. They declare their aims to be to supply refurbished IT and office equipment to educational, charitable, and non-profit-making organizations, either as donations or very cheaply. Some also state that the equipment will be sent to Sub-Saharan Africa, the Caribbean, or Europe, along with support and training.

So if like me you find yourself in a similar position, I would recommend that you take a look at this comprehensive list of companies at http://www.itforcharities.co.uk/pcs. It will furnish you with details of where the companies are, their status and aims.

ED. NOTE: Since most of my readers are in Canada and the US, here are the relevant sites to check:

http://arunaurl.com/4l7c

http://www.computerrecyclingusa.com/

Scambusters (http://www.scambusters.org/) sends these alerts about

THE LATEST SPAM TRICKS

The latest tricks used by spammers trying to fool victims into clicking links include:

* Using well-known names in the subject line. Most recently, we´ve seen messages using the names of Groupon (the online special offers discount service) and Norton (the Symantec security firm).

They usually advertise products in the same way the genuine providers do - only they never get delivered - and the financial information you provide could be used for identity theft.

* Disguising emails to look like they´re from social networks such as Facebook and LinkedIn, saying you have new messages.

But if you click on the link (don´t!) you´re delivered to a phony products website.

* Using automated software to post "comments" on individuals´ blogs and websites, often with no relevance to the page contents but with links to the spammers´ websites.

ED. NOTE: With reference to the last paragraph, I have had a spate of comments posted on my blog site. They are often very funny, with their bad grammar and unrelated remarks, but I have never been tempted to click on the links to their websites. I don´t suppose anyone ever reads the blogs which I posted some time ago, but if they should, they will probably be surprised at the comments.

Zvonko Springer forwards the following jokes, which are a welcome change from the usual blonde jokes:

BLOND MEN JOKES

A friend told a blond man, "Christmas is on a Friday this year."

The blond man replied, "Let´s hope it´s not the 13th."

Two blond men find three grenades, and they decide to take them to a police station. One asked: "What if one explodes before we get there?"

The other says: "We´ll lie and say we only found two."

A blond man is in the bathroom and his wife shouts: "Did you find the shampoo?"

He answers, "Yes, but I´m not sure what to do. It´s for dry hair, and I´ve just wet mine."

A blond man goes to the vet with his goldfish.

"I think it´s got epilepsy," he tells the vet.

The vet takes a look and says, "It seems calm enough to me."

The blond man says, "Wait, I haven´t taken it out of the bowl yet."

A blond man spies a letter lying on his doormat. It says on the envelope, "DO NOT BEND."

He spends the next two hours trying to figure out how to pick it up.

A blond man shouts frantically into the phone, "My wife is pregnant and her contractions are only two minutes apart!"

"Is this her first child?" asks the doctor.

"No," he shouts, "this is her husband!"

A blond man was driving home, drunk as a skunk. Suddenly he has to swerve to avoid a tree, then another, then another.

A cop car pulls him over, so he tells the cop about all the trees in the road. The cop says, "That´s your air freshener swinging about!"

A blond man´s dog goes missing and he is frantic. His wife says, "Why don´t you put an ad in the paper?"

He does, but two weeks later the dog is still missing.

"What did you put in the paper?" his wife asks.

"Here, boy!" he replies.

A blond man is in jail. A guard looks in his cell and sees him hanging by his feet.

"Just what are you doing?" he asks.

"Hanging myself," the blond replies.

"It should be around your neck," says the guard.

"I tried that," he replies, "but then I couldn´t breathe."

(This one actually makes sense.)

An Italian tourist asks a blond man: "Why do scuba divers always fall backwards off their boats?"

To which the blond man replies: "If they fell forward, they´d still be in the boat."

SUGGESTED SITES

Barbara Wear sends this link to capsule of the history of the United States, from the 13 colonies up to the present day. Do not click on GO at the bottom, but rather, click on PLAY at the top:

Bruce Galway forwards the URL for a wild ride through San Francisco. It cost $1 million to get the rights to film this and to do all the planning. They did the spin-out on the Bay Bridge by slowing traffic for one run.

Carol Hansen sends this link to a video that will put a smile on your face:

Catherine Nesbitt sends this link to a video of a female Lab interacting with a child with Down syndrome:

Tom Telfer suggests this link to a video of Bill Clinton singing with 40 Israeli and 40 Arab kids. See how easy it is to get along:

Tom also sends this URL for a video of the Dubai fountains:

Tom Williamson sends this link to a 360-degree view of London from the top of the Shard London Bridge. Move the cursor or left/right/up down arrows to see an all-round view of London; use the thumbwheel to zoom in and out:

Tom also shares this link which will take you to the space station, and a personal tour by Sunita Williams. She shows how big this place really is, and explains how all aspects of human needs are handled. It´s a little long, but quite fascinating.

Legendary skeptic James Randi takes a fatal dose of homeopathic sleeping pills onstage, kicking off a searing 18-minute indictment of irrational beliefs. He throws out a challenge to the world´s psychics: Prove what you do is real, and I´ll give you a million dollars. (No takers yet.)

To check out the features of the "freedictionary", which changes daily, go to