I have had the Nokia 6500 slide for a while now and it is as I would have expected.
But this has quite annoyed me.
For a start, when I synchronise it with Nokia PC Suite it gives me the option to install Nokia Maps. i would like to, even though the mobile has no GPS functionality it would still be nice to search and look at the maps. Any way that is that really, you cant install them on this.


More annoying is the preinstalled TrafficTV app in the phone. on initial boot it looks like a maps app sort of thing and I played with it for a while, but was worried lest I rack up any data costs. I tried deleting it from the phone in case I started playing with it after a few beers, it wouldn’t let me.
Worse was to come, I called Orange Customer Services yesterday on a separate matter and they told me that I had been signed up for a £4 a month contract to TrafficTv, I had made doubly sure that I had not accepted any terms or conditions to that affect. I am super wary of such things these days.
happily they cancelled this dubious obligation on my part and we parted on good terms. I even took up a free 2 month evenings and weekends data offer so felt quite pleased.
To summarise, watch tgose prebundled applications installed on your new mobile phone. They are throwing a lot of money in development of these devices and need to claw it back by increasing average revenue per user……… Sneaky bunch they are.

This is without doubt the most beautiful piece of equipment I have been fortunate enough to own for many years.
Upon opening the package I was initially extremely impressed at the sleek white exterior of this portable DVD player, I open the Philips DCP850 up and the machine and its remote are apparent. The remote control is removeable and the space it vacates is exactly proportioned to house an Ipod Classic.

The ipod fits into the DVD player perfectly and, once there is a selectable source ( of many ) for the Philips 850 screen and speakers. You can select from MMC ( memory card via slot ), DVD, AV-in or Ipod. This is most lovely as you can synch up your itunes with the best of You tube and suchlike. YOu can also RIP movies to play on an ipod so you have gigabytes of films selectable and layable through your DVD player.

Another beauty of this device is that it plays DivX movies, I have many Divx movies in my collection and many DVD’s with 5-6 films on them ( which I have bought from shops and converted - I would not condone illegal downloads ). Not only is this perfect for holidays : 3 DVD’s will carry almost 20 full length feature films, but as the Philips 850 has an AV out socket you can use it to watch DivX films on your normal household TV.

The MMC slot comes into its own when wishing to view pictures, you can pull your card straight out of your mobile and view the jpegs as slideshow on the bright and clear 8 inch screen.

Another wonderful way in which I managed to tweak the Philips DCP850 8inch Portable DVD Player was by using my Nokia N95’s AV-Out into the portable DVD player’s AV-in, whilst driving ( the unit comes with an in car charger of course ) so that I was able to use the Nokias GPS on a large screen, very nice I can say.

Naturally the unit plays traditional DVD’s with s supreme picture quality, the two headphone out sockets make for convivial and mutual enjoyment of films without disturbing anyone else and the 180 degree swivel on the screen vastly improves its portability.

The unit is available very cheaply from Philips DCP850 which is an online retailer I would heartily recommend, not least because they bribed me with one of these DVD players for this review.

For those of you who understand Turkish, here is a very lucid description and demonstration I found on You Tube.

Cats have never really turned me on to be sure. Like many people I find them to be slightly sinister, lazy, manipulative and condescending. I have never owned a cat nor will. I have never, to my knowledge killed one either but I may one day. You see, an old friend Takis Kontogiannis of Rethymno explained to me his suprise when he was first in England seeing cars evade cats. He said to me :

” ha ha, I could not believe it, in Greece we try to hit them, in England you try to miss them, why?”

So Cats, what is it about these felines which provoke such adoration. I mean I am totally cold about them but many people go weak at the knees at a little purring.

So I will set out to try to find what makes these cat people tick, What is it about them? They are mostly girls of course but even some blokes like cats - why? .

So many questions I need answering. I am going to interview Rob soon, an apparently red blooded, normal male ( hmm I think he may be veggie maybe that is a clue ) who loves cats. He even has a blog all about cats to Cats at Planetmeow. Maybe we can explain the inexplicable if we read his musings.

Ok, I have been filling this blog with words and articles for a couple of years now and it is about time that I did what I always wanted to do and get down to some serious writing. No more of the 300 word posts about ephemeral items, but to write my novel.

I have at last, I believe, succeeded in bringing together many of the raucous themes which inhabit my creative side and I can see most of the novel starting to put itself together - of course I have to put pen to paper first, but it is taking shape.

Once that is done I will have to think about getting the weighty tome published. I have seen a site which specialises in Self Publishing and am quite impressed at their self publishing process: you receive advice whilst maintaining creative control, and that would be important to me.

Those of you who doubt my resolve to write and publish the first masterpeice of the 21st century please be ready to meet the new Kerouac, the new Henry Miller, the new published…… well just wait and see.