Random round-up…

Because Diary of an Internet Nobody has always been themeless, formless and essentially devoid of any specific expertise, I often post stuff on the spur of the moment, as and when it occurs to me.
Admittedly this was pretty much my mission statement from the start, so it shouldn’t really be a surprise to anyone that you can find a post on photography  and one on politics, flanked by cookery and a short story, but this scattershot method of (not) scheduling posts sometimes means I forget to follow up on some of the more random topics I cover in my effort to transcribe the random chattering in my head.

Often these posts are a result of something that pisses me off on Facebook, a news story I find interesting, or simply a flash of inspiration I have to write down in order to stop it going round and round in my brain for the rest of the day.
And sometimes they are just an excuse to crowbar in a link to something I’m particularly enthusiastic about.

Here, then, are some brief updates and musings on a few things I’ve talked about recently, simply to tie up loose ends (and to clear the junk out of my head)…

1.
Last week I told you about the atrocious customer service I received when I tried to return Rhonda’s dead Samsung phone for repair.
Well, it just so happens that my phone contract was due for renewal, the very next day.
As I mentioned in that post, I have always had Samsung phones before and I’ve not had a problem with any of them, but my recent experience made me disinclined to give them any more of my custom, even if it was via a free handset from my network provider.

I was aware that I may have to pay a fair bit more for my new contract, as 3, my provider, have changed their pricing policy for “all-you-can-eat” data deals, (which is an essential requirement for me, given my lack of a computer and reliance on my phone for all my online activities) so I went into the shop, already with a feeling of financial trepidation, to check out possible alternatives.

The friendly young chap with the hipster beard and self-consciously trendy clothes began by asking how much data I regularly used because they now tried to tailor an affordable plan to each customer’s individual needs and, when I assured him that I would definitely be needing the unlimited data plan, said; “Oh, you’ll be surprised, you might not be using as much as you think.”
He told me that he “streams stuff all the time and that only uses about two or three GB of data a month”.

He then proceeded to ring up and get my data usage figures for the previous six months, his immaculately groomed eyebrows rising further up the spotless expanse of his forehead until they almost vanished into his expensively coiffed hairline.
He eventually hung up and looked at me with an expression that was a mixture of disbelief and grudging respect.
“Well, it seems as if you were right, your monthly usage averages out at 16.4GB.”

“Which means..?”

“Yes, you’re going to need the all-you-can-eat plan.”

Well, whadaya know?

Having established that upgrading my Galaxy S4 to an S5 or S6 on the same tariff was going to cost me nearly fifteen quid a month more than I was already paying, I enquired what other comparable handsets were available.
Straight away, my well dressed host became animated and started to evangelize about his new Huawei “Honor-7” phone, which was apparently released to compete with the S6 and iphone 6.

And the price?
Only £2 extra on the cost of my current contract.

I believe that’s known as a “no brainer”.

So, how is my first, non-Samsung phone?
Bloody marvellous, thanks.
– OS: Android 5.0.2 (Lollipop) soon to be updated to 6.0 (Marshmallow)
– Quad core processor.
– 20 megapixel (with 1080p HD video) camera.
– Fingerprint ID security.
– Excellent battery life.
– Gorilla glass toughened screen
– 16GB internal storage (expandable up to 128GB)

A new toy, this afternoon.

The touchscreen operation is extremely slick, with no lag and a good clean display, making switching between open apps very simple. Plus, there are lots of customising options, allowing the switching round of navigation keys and menus to suit your personal preference.
I have yet to find any glitches or niggling faults and even the case that I bought for £6 (a generic one; I’m told the official case will be rolled out next month) is a clever design, with a spring loaded cradle that grips the handset and slides up to allow use of the camera.

All in all I’m delighted with the Honor-7, if you’re thinking of buying a new Android phone I’d highly recommend it, (non-contract purchase price is a very reasonable £250) and I doubt there’s a better value handset on the market right now.

2.
It must be, oh, two weeks or more since I last reminded you that you can now purchase your very own copy of Stories In Green Ink, the anthology which contains my first three published short stories.
(To avoid confusion I should remind you that I submitted my work under the slightly less peculiar name of Guy Thair.)

Here are the Amazon links (please leave a review if you would be so kind):

For U.K. readers –
Buy the Kindle edition here.

Go here if you’d prefer the paperback.

U.S. and international readers –
Both formats available here.

Also, I’m reliably informed that the second collection featuring more of my work will be out in the next couple of months, so stay tuned…

3.
This is an odd one.
I had a bit of a rant a few weeks ago about gullibility on the internet and how so many people blindly post stuff on Facebook, which can easily be found to be nonsense with the very minimum of research.
It’s not like I expected anything to change, there will always be people who will post anything if it conforms to their own personal world view, irrespective of whether it’s likely to be genuine or not.

I’m not huge fan of Jane Fonda, although I’ll admit to a certain fondness for Barbarella and Klute and I’m aware that she’s said some pretty dumb things in her time, particularly concerning the Vietnam war, but the post I saw on Facebook yesterday seemed too outrageous to be true.

It was posted by a friend of an American friend of mine and was therefore inevitably captioned with a furious, all capitals rant about how Fonda was “a traitor” and how it was unforgivable that President Obama was going to honour her in some way (he isn’t) because of her involvement in betraying captive American soldiers during her much publicised trip to a Vietnamese POW camp in 1972.

You may well have seen the circulated “facts”, which claim Fonda passed messages, slipped to her by American prisoners, to their Vietnamese captors, thereby contributing to the torture or deaths of specific soldiers, some of whom are actually identified by name in the piece.

This seemed so utterly unbelievable, especially since it would have been an enormous news story at the time, that I had to check it out on the ever-reliable Snopes.

Well, guess what?
It’s complete bollocks.

The only part of the original hoax (which has apparently been circulating for ten years) that is even remotely true, is the fact that Fonda posed for photos in the seat a Vietnamese anti-aircraft gun, a stunt she later apologised for anyway.

Why anyone would harbour enough malice against an actress to go to all the trouble of spreading such unpleasant rumours is beyond me, but she clearly rubs a certain type of keyboard warrior up the wrong way.

Anyway, to close this burst of rambling, here are some nice pictures I took with the fab new camera on my phone.

Enjoy.