Unpleasant night

Feeling a bit punked (more later) I decide to continue my quest to clean my PVR down and watch a film I recorded not long ago. Started up in the middle of my regional news, "huh" I thought and fast forwarded. A couple of minutes in (record time) and I'm thinking "huh" again; at this point I notice the time bar is almost three quarters over. Yep my wonderful box had started to record in the middle of the news and stopped when it received the PDC-type signal at the start of the film I wanted to record. Joy!

Ah well I'll try another, a shorter film this time. Half-an-hour in and I think "How can they wrap this up in the remaining half-hour?" I bookmarked my position and fast-forwarded to the end. Yep good old Five had stuck a news section in the middle and this had obviously split the film into two sections on the EPG and I hadn't noticed.

I'll try an Horizon instead. Now I kind of like Horizon, it's the best science programme on non-satellite TV. Not really that great a recommendation as it's the only science programme on TV, but it holds a small place of honour for me as it has a tendency to think the same way I do. Often the programme makes an assertion, I perk up and say "Yes, but", and then the programme does exactly the same thing - I respect that :-). The only let-down is that despite the question being asked it then does little to try to answer it.

The example from the show I watched sums it up. Examining the claims made by 'organic' food the levels of pesticide were measured in a range of foodstuffs (which the programme failed to specify as to how they're grown) and found only 3% had levels of pesticide above the government limit. "Yeah but how do we know those limits are really safe?" I asked and got echoed.

Well it hasn't been proven that the levels are dangerous, i.e. nobody's knowingly been harmed at the current levels. The organic farmer made the correct point that we've no idea what a combination of pesticides do, and this was mildly backed up by old B&W footage of volunteer test subjects being fed a dilute dose of one pesticide. Sadly Horizon didn't follow up on this and stamped 'organic' foods claims as "unproven".

Still feeling off I had an early night. Woke up at 2:30, thought "urgghh" wondered what woke me up and tried to get back to sleep with no success. Too hot and too thirsty, and probably why I woke up in the first place, I go and get some water. Swill it around, spit it out, sip some of it; repeat and back to bed. Still no sleep and I think "No this isn't right... ah I know what this is". So I get up again and adopt the worshipful position at the loo and make several offerings to the Great Porcelain God Hruggh. One sore throat and a very mild nosebleed later I down some more water and finally get back to sleep feeling a lot better and a lot lighter.

Not got a clue what caused it, but other then a sore throat and the feeling my nasal passages have been scoured I'm feeling fine now.