Hey, we’re getting new coin designs!

This is only of interest because I tried to pay with a new 1p in a petrol station recently and the woman took one look at it and said, “I don’t know what this is” and gave it back to me. This struck me as funny because who cares, it’s only a penny.

Evidently, however, I do because I took the trouble to look this up and then blog about it. I can now get that sense of moral high ground. I was right! Mwa ha ha ha! She rejected a penny for nothing. Fools. Fooooools!

I don’t know why, maybe I am sick, but I find this edited trailer for Mary Poppins, recut to look like a horror movie, really funny. It might be because I don’t like Disney (some of the films are OK, especially the older ones — I just hate the sickly sweetness, the name, and the corporate greed). It’s certainly not because I don’t like the films, either. Maybe it’s the cleverness and the cynicism.

Anyway, it’s on youtube…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2T5_0AGdFic

I read a few blogs now and again, by different people of different nationality and gender. But when I read, the voice in my head that’s reading the words sounds the same, no matter what sex the person is.

I find this quite weird, because obviously when I’m speaking to someone I can hear their voice and it doesn’t sound like my reading voice.

It got me thinking because I’ve noticed that even my own text, when I read it aloud, sounds totally different from how it “should” sound according to what it sounds like in my head. Even if I got the blog authors to read their posts aloud, they wouldn’t sound like how the authors heard them.

(This got me to thinking about how, without telepathy, we’re all really alone, but not really because I wanted to put that in as a joke.)

I find it interesting how we all relate to each other, even though we can’t hear each others thoughts or see through each others’ eyes and think with each others’ brains. Our relationships rely on us all being a little bit the same, which is totally weird because we’re all so different.

One of the most important lessons you can learn while making progress is learning to recognise the progress you’ve already made. Without realising that you’ve made progress, you’ll get discouraged and stop before you reach your goal.

You won’t make progress in the way that you think you will. Progress comes in from the side, and you suddenly realise that you have taken a step forward without knowing it.

It’s very uplifting to realise that you’re better at something than you thought you were. It’s like seeing the first shoots of a new plant — it’s been growing all along, it’s just been under the surface of the soil.

On 29th June 2008 I got baptised. I was baptised when I was about 13, but why not do it again properly?

So anyway, here’s a photo :)

O2 just agreed to change my mobile phone tariff — I’ve cut my bills in half!

I was on about £30 a month, but was after something different. My mobile is knackered, and I wanted 300 minutes and 300 texts — they’ve given me 400 minutes (anytime, any network) and 1000 texts — for £15 a month and a new phone into the bargain.

I’m really pleased. Read Martin Lewis’s article about haggling with your phone company — there wasn’t a lot of haggling though, just phoned up and asked for something better and they gave it to me.

It’s amazing what money you can save with just a bit of attention and hard work. It’s like claiming back overdraft charges. My friends tell me they’ve been charged, like, £9000 in charges and they’re not fussed about trying to get it back. What’s the worst that can happen — the bank will say no.

Anyway, Martin’s website is a good read for stuff about money — especially the overdraft reclaim article.