Gene detectives on BBC

Gene Detectives is a new series on BBC 1 (Channel 101 on Sky) at 9:15 am. In the show, genealogy expert, Anthony Adolph helps people track down long lost relatives.

We are shown three possible candidates, one of which is the missing relative. I am pretty sure the producers of the show knew who the real relative is but they keep the secret hidden till the last moment. Of course they can tell us straight away who the real relative is but then it won't be that interesting and they won't have a show either.

It's quite emotional and nice to see fathers reunited with daughters and sisters with their long lost brothers.

Anyway, I was recently contacted by someone who had the same family name as mine. The guy has traced back his branch of the family back to 1760. He had traced back the family name back to a little place called Brandon in Suffolk, England, where they had lived from 1800 onwards until about 1965.

It's really surprising because that means that we have two families with the same surname on almost opposite sides of the planet - one is obviously British and another Asian (my family).

Tags: BBC Genealogy Gene detectives

Best RockStartup episode

I am a regular visitor to RockStartup.com, hoping to to catch the latest update. In case you haven't heard, this online reality show provides glimpses of how a Web 2 company (Payperpost) works - life in the office, events, interacting with customers and of course the people who work there.

So far there has been 11 episodes but my favourite has to be the 10th. Of course, everyday life in the office clips are interesting too but what I really want to see are the staff working under pressure in a crisis.



in this video, we see the programmers working under pressure trying to deliver updates to PayPerPost.com in time for Ted's board meeting. Ted (the CEO) is clearly not happy when Peter (Director of coding stuff) tells him that the site is down.

In the end everything goes well. I was surprised to learn that Ted doesn't have a room of his own and it seems like he is in one of the cubicles along with the rest of the guys in the company. I really respect that.

I would love to have one of those Big A** monitors like they have in the clip.



Tags: Payperpost Rockstartup

I am not a spammer

However, several Malaysian blogs running on Word Press seem to think so.

Trying to leave a comment on these blogs gives me the following warning:

Sorry, but your comment has been flagged by the spam filter running on this blog: this might be an error, in which case all apologies. Your comment will be presented to the blog admin who will be able to restore it immediately.
You may want to contact the blog admin via e-mail to notify him.

Not sure what spam filter these people are using but I am definitely not a spammer.

It really turns me off and I do notify the blog owners about this problem. However, if they don't seem to pay attention, I just don't leave comments and become another blurker.

Tags: Wordpress Spam filter

Post classifieds and build a blog

Itsmymarket.com is a new UK focused classifieds ad site and is the trading name for Community Ads Online Ltd. Though basically an ads site, it offers much more than free classified listings. The company positions itself as a community based service offering Community Websites, News, Events, Weather forecasts and much more. You can even build a blog too.

They run some photographic competitions from time to time, though none were up last time I checked. Check out the nice photograph submissions of past competitions.

The ads range from houses for sale to jobs. On checking some of the ads, found out that most of them are from people/ companies in the Norfolk, Cornwall and Cambridgeshire areas. Hopefully, there will be more ads from people in other parts of UK as the website becomes more popular.

Sponsored.

Gold at the end of the rainbow

Have you heard the old saying "pot of gold at the end of the rainbow"? Do you think that we can take this literally? Most of you will say no.

However, according to my mother there is some truth in this saying.

When my mum was just a little girl, she was quite close with her grandmother. The grounds of their house was quite big with big trees and a pond.

Every time it rained, there would be a small rainbow and when viewed from the house, it seemed like one end of the rainbow fell somewhere near the pond.

One day my great grandmother decided to follow a hunch. She took my mother along and dug up the place near where they usually saw the rainbow. She was an avid gardener an quite strong. After a few hours and a few feet near the pond and at the bottom of a huge tree, they hit something. It was a metal lined wooden box and it was full of coins. They were from different era, some as old as a hundred years old and some as recent as the 1940s.

The hoard included silver and gold coins. My great grandmother promptly converted them to jewelery by melting them. She didn't know but they would probably would have cost more if sold in their original form to coin collectors.

My mother, as her partner got half of the treasure and she still has a bag full of it left - but sadly no silver or gold ones.

I suddenly recalled my mom's story when I came across a coin and currency auction catalog.

Maybe there is some truth in the saying.

Tags: Coins Rainbow Treasure

Unsigned artist site

There are a lot of talented artists including singers out there who never got the chance to show off their great work. Without the financial support of a record label, many had to resort to their own means trying to sell their music and other related products. These are the "unsigned artists" - a term is used in the music industry to refer to a singer, songwriter, musician, or band that has no affiliation with a record label.

I just realised how many great undiscovered talent are out there when I was browsing through Unsigned.com. This great site has got to be the one of the best collections of a range of genres ranging from unsigned rock, hip hop, grunge, metal, jazz, country, Ska Artists and much more, on the net.

Don't just believe me, go over there and see/ hear for yourself.



Tags: Music Unsigned artists

Creative crafter

Ita is one talented and creative lady. Have known her for some years now. She was my wife's school mate and is one of her best friends since then.

I worked with her for about 2 months before I quit the job after falling out with the lady boss.

She has been blogging since March 2005 in her blog: Lil' Honey collection. She mostly blogs about needlecraft and other crafting stuff. This has been her hobby but now she shares it with like minded people as well as admirers (including my wife) all around the World.

View all the amazing art she has created. You can see that she really has the patience and passion for it. One amazing thing about her is that she is ambidextrous. It means that when she writes, she uses her right hand but uses her left hand when needle crafting. Learned this from a very reliable source - my wife.

Just received a parcel containing these two beautiful gifts by post from Malaysia. Thanks Ita. We love it (Any more?).

Tags: needlecraft