We seem to complain about our friendly sun when we don’t see it and when we do, and it was a problem that I had been having in our breakfast room in the mornings when we sat down to have our breakfast. This is more apparent at the weekends because we have our bacon and egg treat a little later than during the week. The room is east facing and as you can guess, in the winter in particular when the sun is a little lower in the sky it does cause a bit of a problem.

Now I’m never one for complaining about seeing the sun, I don’t see enough of it but I felt that I could not squint at my breakfast any longer and would have to do something about it. Whilst searching around the internet I came across accompany called Tuiss Blinds and frankly I was agreeable surprised at the fantastic range of window blinds that they offer. These included white roller blinds, silver blinds, venetian blinds, in fact a full range of window blinds that can be bought online. In the end we settled on a white roller blind, although we could have picked from a truly stunning range of colours, from whites and naturals through to modern funky green and red. The blinds are made to measure and the online buying process was simplicity itself. So now I can enjoy my weekend breakfast treat and see what I am eating!

We were at a friend’s house recently and they have just had a swish new bathroom installed, which set me, or should I say my partner thinking about the one that we have at home. I must admit that it is looking a little bit tired and I wondered how I could improve the looks of it without going to the expense of a complete new bathroom suite.

You could be forgiven for thinking that there are no choices of colour available for bathrooms as it seems to be that you can have any colour you want, as long as it’s white! Mine happens to be white, but there is so much that you can do with a white bathroom suite, a coloured one does restrict your choice for the remaining decor. Of course it is very easy to add colour via bathroom decoration rather than through the components themselves. Our bathroom is not huge and this means that it needs to be decorated in light colours to make the room feel as light and airy as possible. However as we have decided to have new ceramic tiles on the walls, we can add some stronger colours with these.

The one area which we have decided to spend some money on is the shower. I have decided on a new shower cubicle which I hope will turn the corner of my bathroom into an elegant shower area. With a new thermostatic mixer valve and easy clean glass protection to the panels and doors, I am quite looking forward to my first shower and of course the smile on my partner’s face when the bathroom is completed!

If you tried to look something up on Wikipedia on Wednesday (18th Jan) you would have been unlucky as the site had closed its English language version for 24 hours. Instead of a database of more than 3.8 million articles, visitors were greeted with an open letter encouraging them to contact Congress in protest. So what was it all about?

Well it would seem that there are two bills being considered by the US legislature, the House of Representatives is considering the Stop Online Piracy Act (Sopa) and the Protect Intellectual Property Act (Pipa) is the parallel bill being considered by the Senate. The proposed legislation is designed to tackle online piracy, with particular emphasis on illegal copies of films and other forms of media hosted on foreign servers. The bills propose that anyone found guilty of streaming copyrighted content without permission 10 or more times within six months should face up to five years in jail.

Everyone will have their own opinions about this of course, but do you really need Wikipedia which has tons of information and I do use it but, I do not understand how this protest will achieve anything. It has just proved to me how little I need Wikipedia and how much info is available on other sites. It is always necessary to check what it says against other sites, anyway, because it is free and anyone can say anything on it so there is no guaranteed accuracy.

Supporters of the bills include television networks, music publishers, movie industry bodies, book publishers and manufacturers. Critics include Google, Facebook, Twitter, Wikipedia, Yahoo, eBay, LinkedIn, AOL and Zynga.

As many of you may remember, I mentioned in one of my posts here in November, that it was time that I got myself a new car, well not new in the sense that it has never been owned before, but new to me. I did get an online valuation and decided that I would look at some of the many cars for sale at Carcraft so I went onto the Carcraft site which is very easy website to use.

You simply enter your postcode which then directs you to the nearest Carcraft showroom to you. I had decided that I really fancied an Audi A3 this time and put my preference into the search boxes to find an Audi A3 for sale and I was not disappointed as they came up with 80 from which I could choose.  Naturally I spent some time looking through those, as well as the many other makes of cars for sale at Carcraft, but in the end I have decided on a 2008 Audi A3 diesel which I can drive away for just £217.23 per month. I was offered  a 1 Year Carcraft Guarantee, a 1 Year Free Servicing, 1 Year RAC Roadside Assistance in case of breakdown, 120 Point Check, a 7 Day Exchange Policy, with a Free MOT. It really does not get much better than that does it!

It is one of those names that when you think of photography the name of Kodak has to crop up in the conversation. I remember not that many years ago when I went to photographic classes the debate about which film was the best one to use and if you did your own developing and printing, which papers did you prefer. In those days there was always a lively debate about whether Kodak was better than Agfa or Ilford; it became even hotter if you favoured transparencies against printed pictures. Then along came digital photography and using film simply faded away. No longer then did we experience the excitement, or disappointment, when you opened up the packet of pictures at the chemist or photographic shop. Why did I take a picture of just Sally’s feet!

Although Kodak did manufacture cameras and other photographic products it made all its money from selling film, then the digital camera came along and now no-one’s buying film. I have managed to find some interesting facts about Kodak and I’m sure that everyone has at least one Kodak product in their home, even if it’s an old black and white print.

Kodak founder George Eastman produced the first camera film in rolls in 1883. The firm Kodak is set up in 1888 and launches the first consumer camera in 1888 with the slogan: “You press the button, we do the rest”. In 1900 Kodak introduces a consumer camera for $1 called the Brownie, which goes on to become a best-seller in America and I had one of those, so did most people I imagine. This I found very interesting, in 1969 a Kodak camera is used by astronauts Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong to record the first Moon landing. Farewell Kodak!

As you all may know I love to go on a cruise, I find it relaxing and a pretty luxurious holiday which is fantastic value for money. Along with many others I was shocked to hear that the Costa Concordia ran aground and capsized soon after leaving the Italian port of Civitavecchia at the start of her Mediterranean cruise. It has puzzled shipping experts as to why such a modern and well-equipped vessel should have run aground in well-charted waters. The Costa Concordia, which cost around £300m and entered service just 6 years ago, is very familiar with the voyage which it makes weekly. There are a large number of possibilities ranging from human error, to technical failure, to a combination of the two. How it came to deviate from its course by 3-4 nautical miles, and why it capsized so quickly, will be central for investigators trying to establish the cause of the accident.

What is certain is that it will not put me off cruising, just in the same way as when a motoring accident is reported I do not stop driving my car. The investigation is beginning and the ships “black box” has been taken off which will no doubt focus on why a modern ship, with the latest safety equipment, travelling on the same route it travels 52 times every year, seemingly veered off course and hit what the cruise company has described as “a big rock”.

I don’t know if you have had a text message telling you that “following your recent accident you could be due” this is then followed by a four figure sum you could clam from an insurer. Well let me say that I have had a couple of these and I cannot remember when I last had a car accident as it is so long ago! Hearing the BBC news this morning that an MP is demanding action to stop insurers paying out on these claims was music to my ears. As these claims, many of which are bogus, add substantially to all our car insurance premiums, the sooner it is stopped the better. I am not suggesting that someone who has been injured in a car accident should not receive financial recompense, but it is widely understood that some people are professionals at claiming.

Good news to hear was that the Transport Select Committee says claimants should provide much more proof that they have suffered a whiplash injury. Also MPs want insurers to be banned from selling any customer information. The government intends to ban them from receiving referral fees for this data, but only for personal injury claims. It seems incredible that practices that push up premiums such as passing drivers’ personal data to other parties or taking secretive referral fees from solicitors, garages and car hire firms, is allowed.

There has been a 70% rise in motor insurance injury claims in the past six years, despite a 23% drop in the number of casualties actually caused by road accidents, whiplash apparently accounted for 70% of all these injury claims, amounting to roughly 554,000 whiplash claims in 2010-11. Bring on some legislation I say.

The iconic brand is one that I’ve used for years when travelling by car to a business meeting, or going away to catch the cross channel ferry when going over to France. It’s true to say that Little Chef has been a sign of good food for over 50 years, with restaurants right across the UK. I was therefore, very sad to read that they intend to close 67 of its 161 outlets and make between 500 and 600 job cuts.

Sadly this is not the first time that the company has been in trouble, in fact the group went into administration in 2007 after which the majority of its assets were bought by private investment business RCapital. Little Chef has always been a favourite with business people on the move. Whether it is the place to refuel, meet colleagues or catch up on calls. At almost every Little Chef you can now connect to the internet completely free of charge, which in my opinion should be normal at most places now. Whilst reading about the latest problems by the company I was reminded that the first Little Chef opened in Reading in 1958, the same year Britain got its very first motorway.

I for one and I know my colleagues think this way as well, that this is the last we hear of the Little Chef brand being in trouble and hope it soon recovers to keep us motoring between stops at them for a bite to eat or a refreshing cuppa!

As most of you know I do like to have a little flutter at the online casino and play the tables as well as a hand or two of poker, but I occasionally like to have a bet on the horses or fancy my chances at who will be the first scorer at a premier league match. When talking to a mate over a pint the other night he said “are you playing with the bookies money”? No I don’t win that often I laughed and it was then that I got his meaning, free bets not just winning and betting again with that money.

How does that work I wondered, so I did some simple research and found it was very similar to some of the other gaming sites that I use for online bingo, or online poker for example. Although some of the offers for online betting varied, there were some great offers to be seen. With a couple of clicks with the mouse and I soon found the latest free betting offers from the UK’s leading online bookmakers. There are potentially thousands of pound worth of free bets and bonuses just waiting to be claimed. I can now find the very latest free bet offer from the top bookies, as well as full reviews, to help me make the right choice. Fancy joining me in a little free bet on the Carling Cup?

More shops will collapse into administration or announce store closures in the next couple of weeks, after suffering from profits which can only be described as being squeezed to extinction. Add to this a general fall in sales over Christmas, all of which can only add to the problems which are facing our High Street retailers.

Last week saw some more famous names go to the wall including Barratts Priceless, the shoe chain, Hawkin’s Bazaar, the toy shop and D2 Jeans. I have been reading comments made by Stephen Robertson, the director general of the British Retail Consortium, who has said that they expect another clutch of names to go to the wall in the coming weeks and months. According to Robertson, he has said conditions were worse than at the end of 2008, a period acknowledged to be the worst in a generation for the high street and which saw the collapse of Woolworths, Zavvi and MFI.

So I have to ask where the High Street is going, because without it our towns and cities will not be the same. The internet revolution has of course had an effect on the way that we shop, but top retailers have learned not just to live with it but to embrace it. Tesco have a very good home delivery service and on the London underground it is possible to visit a “virtual supermarket” as you commute back to home. John Lewis is yet another example of a top class store that has an excellent online facility but they offer so much more as well.  However the biggest complaint that retailers, particularly smaller ones have is the business rate which increases year on year, they are going up by another record 5.6% next year. As far as I can see the rates in England are the highest in the world.