Dear Dr. Laura,

Any wilting flowers with bad backs? It could be down to your posture as you slump over your keyboard and read this.

That’s it - straighten up!

The Alexander technique teaches patients how to sit, stand and walk in a way that relieves pain by focusing on their coordination and posture.

Until now there had been little evidence of the therapy’s long term effectiveness with latest findings published in the British Medical Journal.  About half the UK population suffers from back pain during a year with up to 15% going on to have chronic problems. The experiment, run by researchers at the universities of Southampton and Bristol, found that patients who were taught Alexander technique and combined it with exercise were significantly better by the end of a year.

GO! Put your back into it - any other tips or back issues welcomed here!

As a treat for the last day of my holiday, Mandy and I went to Dunge Valley hidden gardens at the weekend.

It was very interesting, despite being slightly out of season, with some lovely walks thru a steep ‘gorge’ which at times was very steep / sheer drops. Luckily, I made it round.

What innocent outing have you started that turned into a ‘fright’?

p.s here’s a link to their website… http://www.dungevalley.co.uk/

I love to watch TV when I get a chance. It doesn’t happen very often though. I end up recording the shows I like and watching them later. That way I can fast forward through commercials. One of my all time favorite shows is Mindfreak. It stars the illusionist Criss Angel. I was disappointed at the beginning of his new season because his ‘demonstrations’ weren’t really mindfreaky like they usually are. (He is in the middle of working on his own Cirque du Soleil show, so I’m thinking he’s thinking more about that then his show.)

I have to say though that this demonstration he did in this video freaked my mind. (Viewer discretion might be advised…)  I think I almost passed out watching it. I haven’t felt that way before! There are skeptics that say that the guy that worked with Criss was an actor and an amputee…blah blah blah. But, I think the way to watch it is to relax and believe.

What should you believe but just can’t?

Last week in our 30th free flowers contest we invited all visitors to GO! Smell the flowers to post a caption for this image AND if they they wanted to include something about themselves, their blog or their website in their answer.

With over 30 entries including a close second place by flowers founder Aussie Cynic the winner on this occasion was erotic fiction writer E.D Beale with:

“Gertrude, I swear to you, just one of these will make Burt think you’re a model.”

Fact about E.D Beale: An aspiring romance/erotica writer.

Well done E.D Beale - the $60 of free flowers will be sent wherever you choose! Just accept your prize here in comments and we’ll contact you with the details on how to claim your prize.

Thanks to our partners Flora2000, the international flower delivery experts. You could always send flowers to someone right now, anywhere in the world . Simply use code GSTF99 if you send someone flowers and you’ll be entitled to a bit of flower smelling discount!

More free flower contests next month folks and in the meantime keep smelling the flowers.

Hey Howdy Hey!

Yes my week in the sun (that was wednesday between the hours of sunrise and about 8.15am) with the children at my Mum and Dad’s in sleepy Gt Chishill is over and I am now officially back at work.

Trouble is, yesterday I was so tired (we had a evening workout and sauna at the gym) after eating dinner, i just crashed out on the sofa (grand schemes of blogging and web updates just went by the by) and this morning i don’t feel much livelier.

Are holidays really that draining? Do we feel a need to squeeze as much activity etc into our week off as possible that it takes us 2 ‘normal’ weeks to recover?

Have you ever been on a holiday and when you were back - you felt like you’d never had one?

Don’t get me wrong, it was lovely having my kids to myself and we did do lots despite the rain - a nature reserve where we collected leaves and feathers and made collages afterwards at ‘home’. A trip to the local market town (treat in toy shop) and a visit to the Imperial War Museum at Duxford where we walked thru Concorde, saw the B52 strato fortress and a spitfire (amongst others).

All over far to quick.

P.S aren’t Team GB doing well?

Well folks you may or may not have notice my lack of visits and lack of comments…

Sorry all not my fault…

This is set to continue for probably another week or so.. Christ I hope not much more than that..

My Puppy with ear or lack of is the cause… on the weekend he scratch himself again on the chest but his little nails were so sharp he slices his chest open… yep.. I am swearing now.. so we dressed it and back to the vets… on the way he got his sock off and also sliced under his front leg (arm pit) he now has about 30+ stitches between these latest acquisitions…

Today he burst 2 stitches so has a lovely mess happening under his arm.. I cant get him to the vets until Wednesday at the earliest… so for the next week he is to eat, drink and wee, then get wrapped up like a baby and kept still…

You really should try keeping a 3-4month puppy still for a week.. with two other dogs wanting to play and a 9 year old with the standard needs …

Just thought I would fill you all in… not a-wall, although its a thought…lol…

catch you all as soon as we resume our normal programing….

Anyone else in awe of the U.S. Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps?

As his gold medal hunt in Beijing ends he leaves the Water Cube eight golds heavier, breaking Mark Spitz’s record of seven gold medals in one Olympics.

He’ll be netting a $1 million bonus from Speedo for his performance now that he’s one-upped Spitz’s record count, cementing his place as one of the best athletes of all time.

Superman. Magical. The King. The Dolphin. The Fish. The Phenomenon has a unique diet.  Let’s just say he eats well with his typical breakfast being:

‘three fried egg sandwiches, with cheese, tomatoes, lettuce, fried onions and mayonnaise, followed by three chocolate-chip pancakes; a five-egg omelette; three sugar-coated slices of French toast and a bowl of grits (a maize-based porridge), washed down with two cups of coffee.’

On it goes as he consumes 12,000 calories during a typical day! With no mention of John West tuna? Another endorsement on the way, perhaps? Whatever next, endorsing credit cards to pay for his food bill? 

Comments welcomed on this superhuman achievement, his calorie intake and other suitable swimming related sponsorship ideas, flipper.

My son left a CD in my truck stereo Friday Night, and yesterday I listened to it while driving to work.  This isn’t some blatant promotion for the band, Blue October, but it is a blatant promotion of a certain song that made me think about how we tend to hide ourselves.

I am in the process of meeting new people, creating a new corporate network, and starting out at the bottom of the barrel in a new job culture.  I don’t want any of my co-workers and team mates to see “my ugly side”.  Quite frankly, I don’t want anyone to see the side of me that is deeply opinionated on several levels.  Most because at this time in my life, I don’t have the energy or the time to engage in licking the flavour (a line I stole from another Blue October song) of something until it’s tasteless. 

And isn’t that what happens?  You get a few people together who have cemented their belief in a philosophy or a tradition on completely opposing sides of the table; compromise isn’t going to happen.

Why? 

Diplomacy insists that we behave according to moral structure in a civilized setting, and yet we continue to battle it out on the war-field.  Lives are lost, countries are left in ruin … because when we show our “ugly side” we are really ugly.

It happens in Divorce, the end of friendships or relations (which is just a different kind of divorce) and history begs us to remember how we hide until guns are loaded, lines are drawn and then we are free to behave as horribly as we want or can.

Why?

What is at the basis of your “ugly side” and what do you NOT want people to see the most about you, your character or your philosophy? 

I go first, in the comments.

Did anyone catch the fastest 100m sprint of all time as 6 foot 5 Jamaican Usain Bolt won the Beijing Olympics 100 meters gold medal in a world record 9.69 seconds, gesturing to the crowd and slapping his chest before crossing the line.

Word is 9.5 seconds for the 100m is well within his reach as he approaches his 22nd birthday. He only started running the 100m to help him train for his preferred event, the 200m!

How much faster can man GO!? Do tell…..