Inspired by the turn off your lights campaign last night I decided to calculate my personal carbon footprint

Apparently I am living as if I had 2.73 Planets to support us, which is below the UK average, but I could improve. My carbon footprint is 9.93 tonnes per year.

Owning a car is not good, and the flights I make for business and pleasure all add to my impact, plus consumerism. At least I take the train to work, which is a big plusD

if you want to check yours it is under http://footprint.wwf.org.uk

maybe I will try this again in 3 months time, see if I can whittle it down a bit

Yesterday evening when i tried to send emails, I was getting the following error message

An error occurred while sending mail. The mail server responded: Mail from your IP address is currently blocked based on RBL listing. Please check the message recipients and try again.

beyond me! But has anyone any experience of this, and how do we go about cleaning up the router and getting a new IP address for it? Hubby is going to try reinstalling the router.
I think the original problem was caused by him, he was trying to download something from a dodgy site. That will teach him

We do have major firewalls for the PC, and the router is password protected , but just goes to show, nothing is totally safe.

So, It is Saturday morning, and actually nearly 9am here. The Sun is shining, the cats are sleeping, my husband is sleeping, my 16 year old is sleeping, the 12 year old is overnighting elsewhere, it is sooooooooo peaceful.

I have spent the last hour catching up on posts from friends on here, and drinking a cup of tea - and ok, I started a chocolate rabbit, but it is dark chocolate, so hard going.

Last night we had the English Conversation group here at our place. Easy for us

There were about 11 came, and with us, that filled our lounge ( it is small). We drank red wine, and chatted in English, up to 10pm, when everyone switches back to Swiss German!

Yesterday at work we had a leaving do for the boss, who left the company after 22 years with us. So we had a big event. As we work for a Toy company, we each had to think of a product and make up a story to go with it as to how it related to us and the boss. Very challenging for an Accountant! I managed it in the end though, and he liked everything we presented. We had a great buffet lunch, and no one did any work all afternoon

Even better there was stuff left over from the buffet, so I could provide more things for the English group last night. I did have to confess in the end where most of the food came from however, as it was suspicious that I didn't know what was in most of it.

So everyone left by midnight, and I fell asleep as soon as I hit the pillow ( very rare for me). Unfortunately one cat woke me at 5, she got put out, then youngests' alarm went off at 7, so I had to get up to switch that off, and then the other cat came into our room about 7.30!
No rest for some

So today, i have an easy day, as I cleaned last night. Might go to the office to make up for not doing much yesterday, but then again, I might not
have a good day everyone

i was full of good intentions this morning. I wanted to get to the 9 o'clock service at Church, but unfortunately woke at 8.55 with a sore throat and feeling very tired. I could have made it to the 10.30 service instead, but when I looked out of the window and saw all that snow, I thought better of it.
So I crawled back into bed, and asked my hubby to make me a herbal tea for colds. 2 cups of it, and no discernable effect later, I discovered he had made me relaxing tea instead - no wonder I felt so relaxed!

And now the day is over, I have still got a sore throat, and have won and lost at scrabble, baked and eaten cakes, blogged a bit, devoured one chocolate bunny (and no not the 1 kilo one) and now Top Gear is on.
So i think I will watch that for a while, have another herbal tea, maybe a schnapps ( kills all known germs ) and then time for an early (ish) night.
Have a good night folks

at work today we had a traditional Eiertutsch. This is a Swiss tradition a bit like conkers, only with hard boiled eggs.
To win was a 1 kilo Lindt chocolate rabbit. I was motivated, very motivated. Every other year I have always hit the egg too hard and broken my own, this year I tried different tactics. I chose my egg with care, small and tough. I warmed it up, I held it with care and whispered encouragement to it.
The competition started. 11 playing for 1 rabbit.
I wonD
I am now a very happy bunny. I will share it with the kids though, otherwise I will be a very fat bunny

Why is it that most emails from blog uk make it into my inbox, but every now and then some end up in the spam filter. Today there were 4 notifications of comments in the inbox, and 4 in the spam box, all from info at blog uk!!
maybe my spam filter is reflecting on the quality of the commentsD

I think the running for the chair lift on Friday may not have been such a good idea. My legs ache today. Hope I haven't put something out of alignment!

I have just seen an advert on ITV for some store where you can buy TV's or a new sofa etc, with " No scary credit checks" and an APR of 29.9%. I couldn't believe it. I am amazed this sort of advertising is allowed, never mind the granting of the loans. People who fear credit checks probably have good reason to, like a load of debt already, and then nearly 30% interest on top just so they can have today, what they can't really afford. No wonder Britain has such a high rate of personal debt.

Another scary advert that followed was that if you didn't pay your Vehicle tax, your vehicle could be crushed! That's going a bit far isn't it? Why not auction it off to pay off the tax, and the fines for having no tax in the first place. There might be enough left over to pay cash for that new TV instead.

la_spice reminded me of the upcoming blogmeet in London in May. I would love to attend one, but May 10 is a bank holiday weekend here, and I have the feeling my family might be less than impressed if I fly off to London for it, and I certainly am not bringing them all with me. So looks like I will have to wait for the next one.

To me it does not really matter where it is, as flying is involved regardless. It is more interesting who is attending, and it would have been nice to have met some of those who have signed up so far for this years.
So have a good time you guys, even without me along

despite the cloud cover, we had a great works day out.

in the morning we all met as planned, some rather later than others, but that is only to be expected. The majority donned their skigear and headed for a coffee ! while I and Yvonne went to the Wellness Hotel. it turned out that anything requiring heat, like sauna or steam bath, did not open before 1, and all the massages were booked out, but we had the pool and the fitness centre to ourselves, so we were happy.
Then we went up to Mannlichen, and met the others for lunch. The sun was shining, the views were breathtaking as they ever are up there. Unfortunately I had left my camera in the car at the bottom though.
Lunch was great, everyone was really happy from the mornings skiing, and then we announced the helicopter surprise. Unfortunately the cloud was heavy just where we were, so the heli first wouldn't come, then came, but couldn't land, and then finally we could do it. I was in the first one up, and it was fantastic. To see all the mountains and the glacier from the air, to be up against the North wall of the Eiger, absolutely breathtaking. Way too short a ride though, and a wee bit thrilling on the updraughts.
The fog was only on Mannlichen, so everywhere else was brilliant sunshine, could even see my town in the distance

Then at 3.30 the others departed down on skis, and Yvonne and I set off for Kleine Scheidegg. Im winter you have to take a different route, more up and down, and across ski runs etc, with a chair lift up at the end. Trouble is we forgot the chair lift might close at 5, and once we realised, we did not know how far it was. Also trekking through snow takes a lot longer than trekking on grass.
Then a piste patrol guy came towards us on his scooter and told us we needed to hurry if we wanted to make it, so we started hurrying, but it was still a long way. Fortunately he came back after about 10 minutes, and I asked him for a lift, and he took us nearly the whole way, which was great fun on the back of the scooter. So we made it by 4.45 to the chair, I don't think we would have made it in time without the lift, it was quite a distance. And they had closed the lift as we were in the train coming down again at 5.03. Yvonne reckons we had a guardian angel with us
If we had missed the chair lift, it meant a 200 metre hike back up hill in the snow, or possibly a hike back down to Grindelwald instead, but as the train takes 30 minutes to descend, i think that was never an option

so all in all, it was a great day out, and certainly beats work. The helicopter ride, and the scooter ride were great, and so I now feel pretty elated.D

well, it is finally happening. Our firm outing is taking place tomorrow. We had to postpone it twice cos of the weather, so this is our last chance. Tomorrow promises to be "brightening up" which I think is the best we can hope for, Unfortunately only half the firm can make it as well, but it is impossible finding a date that suits all. So 9 of us will make it to Grindelwald tomorrow, 7 will go skiing, and 2 of us are doing wellness in the morning. I opted for the wellness, but only so the other lady will not be alone
Then we will all meet for lunch on Mannlichen, and afterwards, if the weather is okay, we have planned a 15 minute helicopter flight. But don't tell the others, as it is a surprise
And then some will sledge, some will ski, and some of us will walk to Kleine Scheidegg
It should be fun, This week has been mega stressy at work, so I need a bit of wellness. I may need to work half the weekend to make up for it, but so is it. It is worth it.
Then on Sunday I am off up to Germany for 2 days, to meet my new team!
But i will be back to blogland next week.

jsut read my post from last week which I ended with a choice between the gym and spring cleaning. Surprisingly enough, I did neither, and am now faced with a similar choice for tomorrow afternoon.
I think it will not be spring cleaning, although there is a lot that could be tackled, but it is getting going that is the challenge.
Today is my brothers birthday, the big 40, so happy birthday Philip.
And of course it is International Womens day as I blogged in the Good news blog. I was hoping for flowers, but t'was not to be
But the sun is shining, and it is a beautiful day here. There is fresh snow on the mountains, but it feels like Spring.
And now I have to go and clear out old toys and clothes from my youngest, cos next week we have a sale of such things at Church, but I get to keep 80% of what I make.
Have a good one

This morning I was in Church, and the themes for the day were to do with sensing God around, and the fact that in the UK it is Mothering Sunday today. The vicar suggested we should all thank God for the gift of our Mothers, but I must admit this was not easy for me, as I struggle to see how particularly she was a gift to me.
As a Mother we of course do make sacrifices for our children, and my Mother always made sure I was aware of hers! But it is also our choice generally to have children, they bring us joy, or they should anyway. So I cannot believe I was the only person in the congregation who had not had the best mothering around, and I was not the only person not to comment it on the way out of the service afterwards.

But I do see gifts from God in my life. More and more these days. Right now there is a good chance that a job will open up for my assistant in Canada, which is where he wants to be. All doors were closing, but now one has opened, and it looks hopeful. The fact I prayed for him may have something to do with it.
I do believe that the people who enter our lives are often sent for a reason, even if we don't see the reason at the time.

Other news was that someone has accepted the post of Vicar here, and starts in June. He and his wife are coming from Scotland. His surname did conjure up visions of young wizards with glasses, which was not the most appropriate image for Church, but at least we won't forget his name

And this afternoon I should decide between starting the spring cleaning or going to the Gym. Amazing what excuses I will find to avoid the gym