It is Tuesday, Alex,ChrisD and I returned from Holland. Nothing bad happened, lots of good times.
I’m a little tired right now so, bye for now; more details in post over the next month or so.

The taxi has arrived, 20 minutes early, my bags are all expertly packed by Ira, I am finally on my way to Amsterdam and Britain….
Please excuse a short delay before normal posting resumes.

OK, this is one of the last posts I will make whilst in Kazakhstan, so I intend to use it to catch up with a few articles, videos and sites I have been meaning to post about in the last few weeks. Otherwise I will return in a little under a month, and forget all [...]

Its not quite a Jaguar… OK, enough of Madness’ lyrics wedged into this post for now.
As you may have guessed this entry will be on cars. More precisely, what you can do to protect your investment, should the worst ever happen and your pride and joy be stolen.
GPS tracking systems allow you, and the relevant [...]

The previous post took around 30 minutes to write, mainly because I was also doing a few other things at the same time. Having written the post, I hit the Publish button, and moved onto to clear down the work required on a few dozen other FireFox tabs, intending to return to the WordPress tab [...]

(USA Relevant)
One of the attractions for visitors to Amsterdam is the opportunity to see many diamonds on display. Sadly not everyone can make it to the Netherlands. Although I will be there shortly, I am not sure if Alex, ChrisD and myself will be able to make it to any of the shops there. With [...]

Other than possibly the worst PR photo§ I have ever seen, a recent BBC article caught my attention.
Although Britain has reasonably good ADSL coverage, it took a long time, and BT (British Telecom) dragged their feet in some areas, a lot. As they previously had a virtual monopoly on the residential telecommunications industry (barring oddities [...]

So, dear blog readers, now it is your turn to write something… What sort of break is your perfect idea of a way to get away from it all?
If you check my Facebook entry, you can see where I have been in the past, and from recent posts you will know I enjoy Amsterdam’s attractions.
But [...]

I have already agreed with MattG and Miriam about meeting up with them, and have some dates in mind for when I visiting each town of my mini-Britain tour.
As you may have read recently (joke, the Amsterdam flood of posts should dry up in a month or two ) I am visiting Britain, via [...]

OK, 49 hours 35 minutes to be a little more precise, but that does not quite have the same ring to it…
The plane tickets are e-tickets, which means that I don’t get anything properly official looking until I get to Astana airport, and hand over my printed out e-mail. I’m just hoping that nothing goes [...]

I’ll not post her name until I know whether she minds, but one of Irina’s friends at work recently took part in the BG (the newer name of British Gas) Energy Challenge 2007, here in Kazakhstan. Last night Khabar had a short piece on the event in their news bulletin, so I have uploaded it [...]

For anyone out there that is having difficulty finding an ideal present for a loved one, have you considered looking at which personalized gifts are currently available? Vision Bedding have a pretty unique service, where you send them a photo, and they will transform it into a blanket, duvet cover, pillows or even a dog [...]

I have just completed a quick check of how this blog is faring when it comes to search engine results, using Google.
www.ChrisMerriman.com is 3rd for the phrase Kazakhstan Blog, an improvement most probably helped by a recent campaign I ran over at PayPerPost. Unfortunately if you search for Astana Blog , this blog is now [...]

If you need support for software testing services, why not try using an outsourcing expert that is well-versed in finding qualified, cost-efficient staff? Hundsun Global Services, an American subsidiary of China’s leading provider of IT solutions, has the knowledge, experience & resources to effectively manage your work overflow.
When you send your software outsourcing to China, [...]

Please?
Does any know what causes (Windows) programs to maximise their windows off centre. That is to say instead of a newly-maximised window taking up all available desktop space, apart from the taskbar at the bottom, it leaves some space (at the top and left in my case), and the bottom of this window is actually [...]