angieh's Minti Blog

Goodbye - My Final Words

angieh — Thu, 15 May 2008 23:41:27 -0700

As you all know, today is my last day on Minti - much to most of your relief, I'm sure! I bet you'll all have a bit of a party when I leave. Be nice to Izzy!

I woke up this morning realising that it was my final day at Minti - which was both exciting but sad at the same time. I also think it'll be strange not coming back onto Minti every morning for work... it's kind of like my routine.. like eating breakfast in the morning, but now you just skip it!

Thank you everyone for having me and listening to me (sometimes ). Thank you to Clay and Matthew for hiring me (and to them plus Rachel, and our Tech Developers for putting up with me!).

To all my Minti friends, thanks for making my work life fun and very interesting. You know who you are; and I'm glad to get to know you better.

I wish everyone the best in all they do in the future.

Lots of love and all the best,

Angie

MySpace cyber-bully mum indicted

angieh — Thu, 15 May 2008 19:48:48 -0700

I'm not sure if any of you recall that incident where a mum cyber-bullied her daughter's ex-friend on MySpace? (Seriously, how can you stoop that low. That's taking loving parenting way too far )

Good news - the American Federal Court has now indicted the mum. You can read more at BBC News (possibly my last parenting news update ever!)

Pre-eclampsia may be genetic

angieh — Sun, 11 May 2008 20:48:15 -0700

Harvard Medical School Researchers have found a gene that may be linked to pre-eclampsia, which they hope to research further to create diagnostic tests and early treatment on humans. Apparently rats which were deficient in an enzyme called COMT were found to have developed pre-eclampsia.

Happy Mother's Day!

angieh — Sun, 11 May 2008 18:59:55 -0700

I wish everyone on Minti a happy belated Mother's Day!

Thank you to everyone who sent me Happy Mother's Day wishes.

Fun Dancing on Britain's Got Talent - WatchMeWednesday

angieh — Wed, 07 May 2008 19:47:10 -0700

This video is for all the people who love to watch people dance, do Michael Jackson moves... and are Indian!

Treatment slashes baby HIV risk

angieh — Wed, 07 May 2008 19:30:47 -0700

Great news for those who are HIV+ and are pregnant. According to a study by the University College of London, "infant infection rate of just 1.2% where preventative steps were taken."

"The researchers said it was the first time such low rates of infection had been observed at a population level." Isn't that fantastic?

Trees help to cut-down asthma rates

angieh — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 20:30:15 -0700

I know there's a green movement at the moment where we are becoming more consciously aware in trying to save our planet. A good way is to plant trees. But trees can be annoying when they are planted where cars could actually park.

However, did you know that a study in New York just found that having more tree-line streets cut down asthma rates?

According to the news article, "Columbia University researchers found that asthma rates among children aged four and five fell by 25% for every extra 343 trees per square kilometre."

Something we should all be thinking about...

Congratulations to Izzy, the new Admin

angieh — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 19:13:48 -0700

I would like to congratulate Izzy on her new position as the Minti Community Administrator (also sometimes known as the Minti Community Evangelist or Techy Titan - not sure which title Izzy would prefer )

I read that some people think that Izzy has been promoted in regards to the natural progression of the shields - like when you get Admin status when you get a silver badge with 2 stripes. She has been elevated to true Admin status, and will be an employee of Minti - just like me! I hope that clears up some confusion there.

Once again, congratulations to Izzy for accepting this position on Minti. I wish you all the best in this job.

Watch Me Wednesday - Amazing Human and Dog Freestyling

angieh — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 07:58:42 -0700

From the show Britain's Got Talent, here's a human and her dog freestyle dancing. Cool innit?

FotoFriday - totally overdue

angieh — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 07:31:56 -0700

I know today it Watch Me Wednesday, but I'll put that up after this since my FotoFriday is totally overdue! This is mainly for Marg, since I asked her for some cooking ideas. The next round of cooking should be this week... I think. I'm still not sure whether to go for traditional or more experimental type stuff. We'll see.

As some people know, I had some friends over on ANZAC Day and cooked up a meal after weeks of postponements. I ended up changing the menu a few times, and the final menu consisted of pumpkin cappuccino, scallops, and wafuu pasuta (Japanese-style pasta). My friend bought a cake, for those who are wondering what happened to dessert.

I didn't take the photos of them as I was cooking.... but basically the pumpkin cappuccino was an experiment. It's basically pumpkin soup with milk froth over the top. My friend brought over her coffee machine solely for this purpose of experimentation. It wasn't too bad actually.

This pic is the first experiment - just a layer of milk froth at the top.

I challenged her to make.... soup art (like coffee art, but on a soup) but she said she didn't know how to do it. So this is her version - the big blob:

This is my go:

I then somehow made a picture of Australia with the milk froth - I know, how Australian of me for ANZAC day eh?

The scallops were probably the hardest ones to do. I think next time I'll put it under the grill instead of the fry pan as the sesame wasn't sticking to the scallop very well. I put it with an Asian um, vinaigrette type thing.

Wafuu pasuta - normal spaghetti noodles, sauce with roe, and I also marinated small chicken pieces with soy sauce. Oh and there's seaweed too.

Minti Featured Member #25 - arna

angieh — Wed, 23 Apr 2008 20:15:53 -0700

I have chosen Arna to be our next Minti Featured Member! Congratulations!!

I have chosen Arna to be the next featured member due to her positivity and thoughtfulness on Minti, as well as the ability to start and contribute to healthy debates.

Please visit Arna's page to congratulate her.

People who have already been a featured member:

Peaceful Affirmations for Parenting - Watch Me Wednesday

angieh — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 21:29:07 -0700

Bug issues resolved

angieh — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 21:30:33 -0700

Just to confirm that these issues have been resolved:

* People were receiving blank daemon mail issues - now fixed

* we can now upload new images onto Minti, yay! As you can see I have a new display pic now, so i can confirm it's fixed ;-)

Reincarted Deleted Members

angieh — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 21:22:59 -0700

Hi all, thanks for reporting and deleting the member (originally kansf) otherwise known as the mega link spammer for the week. Or the month... possibly even the year. :S Seriously, s/he should get the hint!

In other news, I have now deleted a member. I deleted this member after some investigation into her account. This 'new' member was voted out of Minti last year for her misbehaviour, and when she attempted to create one or more accounts, those accounts were deleted. She also had a 3rd strike, hacking into another members account.

So for those who are wondering where their new found friend has gone, this is the reason why - she has reached her 3 strikes and is now out.

1st video - Watch Me Wednesday!

angieh — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 21:18:55 -0700

I know, I know, I'm late for Watch Me Wednesday and I was the person who set it up. I was lucky enough to go to the Celine Dion concert on Tuesday night and it was absolutely fantastic! I like Celine's famous songs but the funny thing is that I don't own a single one of her albums. I would definitely go back and watch her perform, but for a longer set. One day when I'm rich enough (haha) maybe I'll hire her out so she can sing all the songs that I love by her that she didn't sing in the concert.

It was a little weird cos in the middle she started singing Queen songs because she loves Queen and thinks Freddie Mercury rocks. Hear hear!

Anyway, I found footage of her Sydney concert on YouTube... I have no idea how this person got the footage, especially since cameras were banned and you had to cloak it. Maybe the Gate Staff in Sydney were just lazy. Tsk tsk tsk!

Deleted & Suspended Members

angieh — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 18:44:16 -0700

This blog entry is split up into two sections - deletions and suspensions:

DELETED MEMBERS

To the person who keeps coming back - don't. Just stop it right now. lol Not that she/he is going to probably going to read my blog, but I notice this person has signed up 9 accounts since the 2nd of April. This person btw was reported and voted off of Minti twice, the other 7 times I've had to manually delete it. I think this person gets paid to splog (spam blog), and I wonder why they still do it when their accounts always get deleted. It's not like they're going to get paid for it.

Anyway, if you do see something similar to the member ksanf (who is the returning member that some of you may remember from last week vote off), please report this member so we can quickly get rid of him/her.

Also, I am now going to resolve the report on nancylady1 as I have seen the email and it is definitely one of those spam mails about them being nice lady looking for love, are you looking for a friendship and can you please send a photo.

SUSPENDED MEMBER

Clay has suspended a member for a few days which you can read in the Report It Or Not group. We are not kidding when we say that we will lock you out of Minti if you continue to misbehave.

Introducing Watch Me Wednesday (WMW)

angieh — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:08:18 -0700

Watch Me Wednesday is where we can upload videos using the new YouTube feature and share our vlog's (video blogs), youtube clips that you want to share with the other members, and so on. So basically, it's like Foto Friday except using video!

If you are uploading your video to YouTube, don't forget to add "Minti" as a tag! On Minti, please add the tag "watchmewednesday".

Please add the video to your Minti blog. I'm not sure whether the YouTube Favourites Administrator would mind you putting your video in there as part of WMW, but hopefully they'll allow it.

The long term risk of premature births

angieh — Wed, 26 Mar 2008 18:10:52 -0700

"An analysis of nearly 1.2m births in Norway revealed those born early were more likely to die as children and less likely to reproduce as adults.

They also had a poorer educational record, the Journal of the American Medical Association study found."

To read more, visit here

Hyper girls 'struggle as adults'

angieh — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 20:27:32 -0700

"Hyperactive young girls are more likely to have "serious" problems in adulthood, research suggests.

A study of more than 800 girls up to the age of 21 found hyperactivity was linked to poor job prospects, abusive relationships and teenage pregnancy.

Previous research on the lasting impact of childhood hyperactivity has focused on boys, who are more likely to be diagnosed and treated."

Taken from BBC News (more details in the article here).

ps-I should really call this Tuesday News Day.

Wheeze 'link' to baby milk powder

angieh — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 20:19:35 -0700

"Prolonged exposure to baby milk powder increases the risk of breathing problems, including wheezing and breathlessness, a study has found."

You can read more from this BBC News link about this article

I would say the sample size is too small to be conclusive though.