The Hairdresser

Had my hair cut yesterday at my favourite saloon. It's walking distance form my house but I didn't know it was unisex as the place is packed with ladies, until I saw a sign offering discounts on haircuts for gents. There's only one guy there who deals with the guys the rest are all ladies and there's even a special room for the guys.

Anyway, noticed the discount for guys is still on (only £6/). The guy who cut my hair is really friendly and talkative. We got talking and I found out that he's been cutting hair on and off for nearly 46 years. He's been cutting hair even before I was born. However, he told me that he had worked in a car factory for sometime. He lost his job when the factory closed. But he was quite philosophical about it saying that it was part of Coventry's evolution. "It has been reinventing itself over the ages". He told me that the place had been famous for it's watches at one time and for silk at another until industrialisation happened and it became the auto capital of the UK.

No! I forgot to ask his name.

Review of Socialspark.com

In case you haven't heard there is a new social marketing network on the web.
SocialSpark is the latest innovation from the same guys who brought you PayPerPost. It is similar to the latter in some respects in that it is an online market place where advertisers and bloggers come together. However, there are several features that makes Socialspark different from PayPerPost, or for that matter, from any other social marketing network on the web. More about that later.

After signing up, you go and add your blogs. In order to do this, I had to add the claim and the itk (IZEA ToolKit) Javascript codes. You can start taking opportunities (sponsored posts) as soon as your blog is verified.



Taking an opportunity was a bit confusing in the beginning but later found out that it was quite easy. After going through the list of opportunities available. A few seconds after you reserved the opportunity, you should receive an email from them informing that you have 12 hours to complete the opp.

I had signed up sometime back but this is my first SocialSpark sponsored post. One of the main reasons I didn't take any oops earlier was that I was scared of being Googlespanked again. For those who are not aware, Googlespank refers to Google (the leader in the web search industry) punishing websites, which they feel have not been complying with their standards, with a big fat PR 0.

Socialspark has done away with this problem by coming out with their own blog ranking system called "real rank", that takes several factors into account including traffic to your site. Furthermore, all posts will have in-post disclosures and all the required links in the sponsored posts will carry the no-follow tag - something that should satisfy Google guidelines and hopefully silence critics of sponsored posts. Other exciting features are the blog analytics and of course the social networking tools.

So if you are a blogger looking for a way to earn some money from your blog, I recommend that you check out SocialSpark.

African daisies and dahlias

Took my mother-in-law and the kids to the Furnace End car boot yesterday morning. My daughter obviously enjoyed herself on the bouncy castle and the merry-go-round.

Saw these African daisies on sale and got three plants for £2/. Hopefully they will later look as good as the pictures of the flowers I look in Cornwall.



My mother-in-law liked these miniature dahlias and bought two of them as well.



Took the pictures yesterday evening. I had wanted to post them up as part of "Green Thumb Sunday" but couldn't as I slept early yesterday.

Trip to Marazion and St Michael's Mount

Marazion is said to be the oldest town in Britain and called Ictis during Roman times. Driving through the narrow roads was interesting. The sloping roads are too narrow to allow two cars to pass and cars have to give way to those coming from opposite directions at designated points. We had wanted to visit St Michael’s Mount. Unfortunately we were too late as the castle and gardens are only open till 5pm. However we were able to take some pictures of the island from the shore.






You can apparently walk to the island during low tide using the causeway.




Marazion


The plaque says:

HIS MAJESTY KING EDWARD
Landed near this spot
April 19 1902

Trip to Land's End Cornwall

Land's End is the Western most point on the British Isles. They have several undercover attractions including a Dr. Who exhibition but we didn't go to any of them. Instead we walked around.

Here are some pics of our trip there.


Penwith House. Artist's Gallery and End to End Club room.


The First and Last House, where the actual Land’s End point is situated.




On board the Confide, a trawler.


A circle of granite stones. You will find granite pillars all around Cornwall, remnants of pagan beliefs.


The cliffs






A panorama from behind the Land’s End Hotel. In the distance you can see the Longships lighthouse.

Water suitable for vegetarians

Was reading the info on the bottle of Tesco's Scottish Mountain mineral water: "V Suitable for vegetarians". Made me wonder - Are there any mineral water brands not suitable for vegetarians? - Just a short "thought of the day" from Hayle, Cronwall.

As today is a Sunday, here are my 'Green thumb Sunday' pictures:





Join

Gardeners, Plant and Nature lovers can join in every Sunday, visit As the Garden Grows for more information.

Took loads of pics today. Will post them up after I get home tomorrow.

Greetings from Cornwall

I am blogging this from Hayle, Cormwall Cornwall (thanks Ummi) right at the South of Britain (well almost). The journey which was supposed to take around five hours took nearly eight hours due to heavy traffic and road repairs. By the time we reached our destination, it was around 9 pm. Thankfully the days are long and there was still light when we reached the site.

BBC weather predicted a sunny day today. However it was overcast almost the whole day.



Today was the first time my son has ever seen the sea. He was really excited and ran towards the water but when the waves rushed in and soaked his feet with cold water, he rushed back towards me and hung on for dear life on legs.

I am able to access the net here, thanks to the 3 mobile broadband service and of course the guys from 3 mobile buzz. I am still testing out the 3 mobile broadband USB modem. Uploading pictures take a while but the surfing speeds are quite satisfactory. Having connection to the net has proven invaluable while checking for tourist attractions nearby.

More updates and pictures tomorrow.