10 DEC 09

Thursday

I confided to a friend about fears of my blagging inadequacies over a (fully paid for) coffee this afternoon. She cheered me up no end by reminding me of travelling blags we’d shared together over the years. The most successful being an evening at the Singapore Hard Rock Café. We’d only popped in to look at the guitars, but several hours later and the four of us had consumed the equivalent of over a hundred pounds worth of free drinks, and I’d sung my favourite U2 song on stage with the band that happened to be playing. The drinks came about after the bar staff discovered we could speak Bahasa Malaysia with them. The singing came about after the discovery that we weren’t paying for our drinks. Sadly, speaking Malay probably won’t help my blagging this week.

The postman delivered two small parcels whilst I was out. The first was a pretty dull, free, book entitled ‘Britain without the European Union’. The second was a waterproof book courtesy of another online offer, and is far more entertaining than the first. The author’s descriptive powers kept me amused for the rest of the afternoon. A quick example:
“I turned into a buxom nurse from a Benny Hill sketch. My breasts became two tethered zeppelins. My belly, a giant jellyfish”, Kathy Lette, ‘All Steamed Up’.
Priceless.

09 DEC 09

Wednesday

I didn’t feel like blagging today. My confidence remained shot from yesterday’s failures. I did, however, seriously need a coffee after my nine o’clock lecture and whilst locating my reward card realised that I’d previously consumed enough caffeine to claim a free hot drink. Further clarification with the coffee-man revealed that despite having always purchased the least costly option on the menu, I could in fact have any drink as my reward. I walked away with a super-mega-large hot chocolate with marshmallows, a mountain of whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles. They wouldn’t let me drink it in the library.

08 DEC 09

Tuesday
I got up unnecessarily early for lectures this morning and logged onto Studentbeans.com. Orders for free (albeit somewhat useless) objects were in place and the day’s blagging pressure was significantly reduced.
I thought it might be worth asking the lady in the post office to reduce the cost of my stamps for a parcel to Germany, but it wasn’t. I did manage to acquire a free Cadbury’s Flake from someone dressed as a chocolate bar in the St. David’s Centre though.

The time had come to test the part of the blagging definition that mentions deception. This was not something I felt completely comfortable with, but figured that if push came to shove then any guilt could be slyly passed from my conscience to gair rhydd. Unfortunately I was sadly lacking in inspiration, and walking up and down Queen Street too often just makes you more susceptible to being pounced on to donate £2 a month to well-meaning charities, which would be somewhat counter-productive today. I then spotted a man, whom everyone seemed to be deliberately avoiding, holding a collection of books. I composed my blagging motives and adopted nerves of steel. I approached. I talked with him about the Hare Krishna movement and managed not to buy a book. I listened to his pleas to help the homeless. I still managed not to buy a book. I started looking for an escape route, but none was forthcoming. I gave him my small change to help out his community projects and sloped off home to come to terms with my first Anti-blag. Exchanging an e-voucher for a free loaf of bread at Co-op did little to improve my mood.

06 DEC 09

It's been over a month since I last posted, and for that I can only apologise and offer excuses of too much work at the end of term, etc!

I thought this feature written for gair rhydd would be of a little interest - my week of blagging. It's in this week's issue, so if you're around Cardiff University, don't forget to pick up your copy!

Installment 1:
The Art of Blagging

To blag: “A means of obtaining something by trick or deception, to obtain something for free” (Wiktionary.org).

Monday
I have one week to test the blagging limits of this fine city. As I stepped out of the Union into the rain I felt strangely confident in my mission, and quietly smug at the prospect of a week of getting something for nothing. Well, not that quietly, I was whistling. I bumped into a fellow student on Cathays Terrace, explained my objective, and came away with a safety pin. Sometimes you have to start small.

03 NOV 09

Cancer Research Centre is Launched in Cardiff


A new Cancer Research UK Centre has been launched in Cardiff. The centre will focus on understanding the biology of leukaemia, urological cancers, breast cancer and bowel cancer to improve prevention, treatment and early detection of cancers.

The partnership between Cardiff University, Cancer Research UK, Velindre NHS Trust and Cardiff and Vale University Health Board hopes to better understand the variations in cancers found in patients and develop suitable treatments for individual cases. The centre will also work with the University to expand existing PhD programmes for training clinical and non-clinical postgraduates.

Local research in cancer biology is already supported by Cancer Research UK, the leading funder of cancer research in the UK, and the establishment of this centre brings an extra £2 million to the work in Cardiff over the next three years. The centres of excellence are part of a prioritised initiative by Cancer Research UK to provide a better understanding of the diseases.

The launch of the centre was announced in the same week as researchers in Cardiff University’s Department of Primary Health Care and Public Health are to be involved in a new five year programme to improve cancer diagnosis. The DISCOVERY programme, which will begin in January 2010, stems from a £1.94 million grant from the National Institute for Health Research. The grant will fund six projects, the findings of which have the potential to directly affect clinical practice and health policy. The projects range from issues at patient and GP level, such as reporting symptoms and referral practices, to a wider economic and societal review of the diagnostic system.

The expertise of researchers at Cardiff University will be drawn on as one of four universities working on the project led by Bristol University, alongside Durham, Cambridge and Oxford, as well as NHS Bristol.

01 NOV 09

I've just been flicking through my housemate's newspaper and found a piece about a study of divorces in the UK.

Apparently, marriages are significantly less likely to end in divorce when the man is at least five years older than the woman and the woman is more intelligent than the man.

So the message here seems to be for men to go for intelligent young women and women to look for stupid old men. Marvellous.

20 Oct 09

A piece I wrote for gair rhydd, the student newspaper, whichwas unfortunately returned as they'd already printed one a few weeks ago. That'll teach me to not read our student publications!!!

Maldives Under Water! (Well, the Government Anyway...)

The Maldives government have held the first underwater cabinet meeting in order to raise awareness about global warming. With the majority of its land being only 3 ft above sea level the Maldives is the lowest lying country in the world, making it one of the most susceptible to the effects of imminent rising sea levels.

The meeting took place to the north of the capital city, Male, with all members submerged at a depth of 20 ft. Extensive training was undertaken during the two months preceding the event, and each cabinet minister was accompanied by a diving instructor and a military minder to ensure health and safety measures were met. Of the fourteen cabinet members only two were not granted permission due to health issues. Communication problems were overcome with the use of hand signals and white-boards and a document was signed calling all nations to dramatically reduce their carbon emissions.

A United Nations conference to address the challenges of climate change is scheduled to take place in Copenhagen this December, with hopes of updating the 1997 Kyoto carbon emissions agreement which is due to expire in 2012. Scientific models have predicted that the country could become uninhabitable in less than a hundred years. At a follow-up press conference, also held in the water, President Mohamed Nasheed said that if no action is taken “we are going to die”.

Autographed wetsuits by each minister are to be auctioned online at www.protectthemaldives.com to raise money for coral reef protection programmes.