If it hadn't for the efficiency of the doctors at Orange Hospital I would have been heading out Bathurst Road in one of John McDonell's vehicles.

The point of this story is the intensive care medical team of six or more was lead by three female doctors and backed up by nurses.

Dr Julie Phan doing her rounds in the surgical ward found me distressed with organs shutting down and with help carried me downstairs to the intensive care ward where more staff was waiting.

They worked vigorously on me for more than an hour and won the battle.

It was all due to the expertise of the female staff the hospital has like Dr Julie Phan, Dr Jill Lee, Dr Mel Berry, Dr Moshmi Salvi and Dr Shekar.

Orange is lucky isn't it?

And so was I.

If you had to choose between your car and your smartphone, which one would you keep? In past years that might have been easy for car owners but a survey suggests that car ownership is becoming tougher.

Of 1100 people surveyed 30 per cent said if forced to decide between the two they'd ditch their car in favour of their phone.

But although everyone you see has a mobile jammed to their ear, there's no chance of Orange people giving up their cars.

Orange has 49,700 vehicles registered here and it would be interesting to know how many smartphones are out there. Probably nearly as many.

And talking about phones a Microsoft survey found 80 per cent of people said they'd use their phone while eating a meal with others and 48 per cent would do so while trying to sleep.

The survey also examined how people use mobile phones in their personal lives, with those living in Melbourne more likely to go through their partner's text messages and call list than those living in Sydney.

Married women were also more likely to check their partner's phones than married men, while 30 per cent of people admitted to using their mobiles to flirt with someone other than their spouse or partner.

A quarter of Australians would use a GPS to track their partner's whereabouts, while 13 per cent said they would use their phones during "extremely intimate moments".

It was also revealed more than double the amount of men (24 per cent) to women (11 per cent) believed it was acceptable to propose to their partner using their mobile phone. Other than showing some of the more unconventional uses of phones, these results show how entrenched in all aspects of our lives mobile phones have become.

Did you hear about the two blondes who fell down a well. One says: "It's dark in here isn't it?" The other replies: "I don't know. I can't see."

We've told dozens of blonde jokes like this for years but political correctness aside, all that light-hearted fun must now be consigned to the rubbish bin because apparently we've all been doing blondes a terrible disservice. Researchers have found the dumb blonde stereotype is not only inaccurate but the opposite is true with blondes having a higher IQ than people with brown, red or black hair.

The researchers said the evidence clearly showed we shouldn't discriminate against them and although blondes are not necessarily smarter than others, they're definitely not any dumber. So there you go, all you Orange blondes out there. We ought to promote a national blondes' day to right all the wrongs of the past. And you won't read another blonde joke in this column.

Well... maybe not. Did you hear about the blonde who...

The Bush has for years pushed for what we called decentralisation, encouraging Sydney companies and people to leave the 'Big Smoke' behind.

Orange was particularly successful in the 70s attracting numerous new companies and families but there's little government incentives now.

And a bank quality of life index claimed Sydney people should forget a tree change because it said the best life is in the suburbs, particularly those in the Ku-ring-gai, Hunters Hill and Mosman local government areas that topped the list.

The aspirations to leave behind the stress of modern living in the suburbs for a better life in the country was a myth, the bank claimed.

In contrast, the Blue Mountains came in at number 75, Snowy River at 134, Lake Macquarie at 335, the Bega Valley at 356, Byron at 421 and Coffs Harbour at 493.

The bank said residents in Sydney's suburbs often have the best of all worlds, with access to good schools, modern hospitals and reliable jobs, fast internet connections and low crime rates.

But hang on, we've got all that but didn't rate. Newer ABS information says capital cities had their largest net loss of people on record in the March quarter with Sydney losing 8200. Most went to other areas in the same state, obviously the Bush, real estate agents say.

So we're doing OK but we could do with more action from the government and council to boost migration and new industry here.

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