July 2010

Oh, The Places You’ll Go!

24 July 2010

I sometimes get asked, as one does, for a list of my favourite books of all time. The one I’m about to share with you may not get into even the top 1000 of the most absorbing, entertaining or stimulating books. However, it’s right up there as a simple encapsulation of life wisdom. Moreover – [...]

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Purebred Friends

24 July 2010

Genetics, especially as applied to the breeding of the swiftest racehorses, is a subject that occupied a great deal of my brain space until wine started taking over (that would be the subject, not the substance, although I wouldn’t deny its daily effect). The moment when chromosomes match up can be something of a lottery, [...]

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A Surprisingly Successful Phishing Exercise

22 July 2010

Over the past week this site has been hacked by scammers operating phishing campaigns. The first one targeted HSBC clients. No sooner had I killed this one than they launched one for Alliance & Leicester. With some additional technical assistance the problem now seems to have been fixed. I can’t say I’m in the least [...]

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Driving on the Right Side of the Brain

21 July 2010

In the light of my previous life as a wine retailer, it is not surprising that I should have found my way to ecommerce. By the end of July I’ll be running four different online stores (only one selling wine, though). Clearly, this sales channel is somewhat different to bricks and mortar retail, but the [...]

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All that Glitters

11 July 2010

Rudyard Kipling’s If is – I believe – one of the world’s great summaries of life wisdom. And, judging by the number of framed renditions I’ve seen on the walls of homes from a certain era, I’m not alone in admiring those masterly lines. The problem is that these adornments have been rendered in copper, [...]

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